European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - July 25, 1993, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Cover All Volunteer Force from the cover the military anymore. The other services have yet to feel the Pinch but the army coming off the Best recruiting year in its history in fiscal 1992, sees worrisome signs of Poten tial problems. The army is still meeting its Overall goals but it is having to let recruit Quality slip a bit to do so. The percentage of High school graduates never less than 95 percent since fiscal 1990, Sank to 89 percent in the first half of the current fiscal year. The number of recruits in the upper mental categories on the armed forces entry tests has also dipped several percentage Points. Even More importantly from the army s perspective the percentage of Young people who claim a Strong inclination to join up has declined for three years in a Row. The world has changed said maj. Gen. Albin Wheeler chief of army recruiting. The disappear acc of the challenges we faced internationally As perceived by the Market we Are after has raised the question in their minds of whether their skills and talents arc needed in  if you want Young people to join you have to present a Clear Case for Why they would be needed said Doug Dan Dow an analyst with the Cato Institute who served As a special assistant to president Reagan on military manpower issues in the Early 1980s. It s not that there is an unwillingness to join but it s certainly a lot harder to convince kids that Amer Ica really needs them to police a mindless guerrilla War in Somalia or an even More Lunatic conflict in the Balkans Dan Dow said. At the same time the steady drumbeat of news stories about base closings Force Structure downsize Ings and personnel layoffs has served to reinforce a perception that the military in today s Environ. Mint is not a growth Industry Wheeler said. No one is pushing the panic buttons yet. And the subject of a return to a draft which flared briefly during the persian Gulf War is not even a Blip on anyone s radar screen. Even so As the Volunteer concept turns 20, Mili tary officials admit to being concerned. Every time i go up to Capitol Hill i remind those folks that recruiting in a Volunteer environment is a very fragile business said it. Gen. Thomas Carney the army s personnel chief. In the beginning the Volunteer Force concept began a a Campaign Promise by president Nixon to an electorate that had grown angry and resentful of the turmoil aus cd by the Vietnam Era draft. But within just a few years it became Lear that the military was going about it completely wrong. Charles Moskos one of the nation s pre eminent military sociologists said the defense department blundered from the Start by pitching military service As just another Job rather than a unique institution. By the late 70s. Half of the entrants were High school dropouts and 60 percent were in the lower mental categories he said. Crime and drugs were rampant. By Selling itself As a Job like any other Job the military virtually guaranteed that it would get the least qualified  by 1979, the Apex of the hollow army syndrome was at hand. Recruiting and retention rates were so abysmal that we came close to scrapping the whole Volunteer concept Moskos said. Moskos and other military personnel experts say that May Well have happened if not for the efforts of one Man retired Gen. Maxwell Thurman. As a two Star Thurman known during his Active duty Days As mad Max for his hard charging style was assigned As chief of army recruiting in novem Ber 1979, shortly after the service closed out its worst recruiting year Ever. Thurman said there were plenty of reasons for the Volunteer concept s near failure in the 1970s. A significant part of the problem was the lingering Mal aise from the doomed Vietnam War Effort. S43  in urls Roach just graduated from Berlin american High school joins the army this past week with the help of sgt. 1st class James Terrell at the army recruiting station in Frankfurt Germany. The military was desperately searching for a Way to get Back into the heartbeat of America he said. Frankly we were to longer a institution that was highly  Thurman said the army also made a huge and costly mistake by assuming that its standards would have to be compromised or it would be unable to maintain a sufficient flow of recruits. It was a fishing expedition fuelled largely by fear Thurman said. The thinking was that maybe our lifestyle was too harsh. But there was no Short age of Young High Quality males who were willing to serve. We were just inept about recruiting  another critical event that contributed to the Early problems of the All Volunteer Force was the 1976 decision to kill the i Bill which had educated Mil Lions of soldiers since world War ii. Thurman said the misguided rationale for that decision held that the i Bill essentially was meant to compensate draftees who had been taken off the col lege track against their will. The i Bill was not thought to be a necessity in a Volunteer setting. Low pay also Hurt the military. As a result of the draft we did not have a Market wage for the Young soldiers and cos Thurman said. By 1979 we were 12 percent below the entry wage of an 18-year-old High school graduate in the civilian labor  recruiting process itself was also flawed. To meet their quotas into an no corps that had been decimated by Vietnam. We were 16,000 to 17,000 cos Short in 1979," Thurman said. As a result we were sending them to Europe on Back to Back assignments for two or three years sending them Back to the United states for a year and then shipping them Back to  because the military and Congress were not budgeting enough Money for pay and allowances cos were leaving in droves. Their families could t stand it and they were letting us know it by getting out Thurman said. Other experts support Thurman s assertion that Low pay was a critical Factor in the retention collapse of the late 70s. You had officers counselling Servic members on How to apply for welfare and food Stamps Bandow said. We were asking these people to defend their country but also telling them that we did t value them enough to keep them off of food  that was the situation Thurman inherited in 1979, which was the recruiting Nadir not Only for the army but for All the services. All four services failed to meet their  he said. It was unheard of for the air Force not to meet its quota but it did. And the army was Low Man on the totem pole. We had missed our recruit army recruiters faked High school diplomas let applicants cheat on entry tests and worked with local judges to let Young hooligans Exchange jail time for military service. There were All kinds of shenanigans going on because we just did t know How to recruit in an All Volunteer environment Thurman said. The recruiting process kept looking for ways to expand the Market. But the bigger the Market gets the More unqualified people you have coming into the mar  while the recruiting problems were serious enough the roots of the hollow army prob Lem went much deeper All Volunteer numbers army enlisted recruiting trends fy90 fy91 fy92 fy93 total object it .87.000 78.241. 75.000. .36435 total recruit 89,617 78.241 77.583. .3869 % of objective 100.5% 103% 103.4% ,.ios.6% throw a my m Amy go Toi fy93 �p�cl1 to re null m tfx mtg 71.000. Percentage of army recruits with fy90 fy9i fy92 fy93 High school diplomas 95%.98% 100% .89% scores in the top three mental categories on the armed forces enlistment tests .98% .99% 99% 96% through italic it f m i of fy93 Doo youth attitude tracking Survey fy91 fy92 fy93 percentage of 16-to-21-year-old males who say they will definitely or probably join the military .32% 29%.�.27% s4s Page 4 sunday july 25,1993