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For Soldier and Country: Saving the All-Volunteer Army

Progressive Priorities Project
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As a new presidential term and a new Congress begin, the Center for American Progress has launched the Progressive Priorities Project to provide policymakers and the public with a positive vision for progressive policymaking supported by a series of new and bold policy ideas in priority areas identified by American Progress.  For Soldier and Country: Saving the All-Volunteer Army is the fourth of approximately a dozen papers in the series that American Progress will issue over the course of the next two months. In addition to providing broad policy recommendations, each of the papers in the series proposes specific steps that policymakers can take to achieve the broader policy goals. All of the papers in the series will be compiled and published as a book in early 2005.

For Soldier and Country: Saving the All-Volunteer Army

Executive summary

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Over-extension, overuse, and inadequate priority to the men and women of our armed forces threaten the U.S. all-volunteer Army. In order to conduct combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and to meet other U.S. commitments around the globe, the Pentagon has been forced to violate the policies that have been established over the past 30 years to maintain the quality and readiness of the Army. If the administration and Congress do not move quickly to address the problems facing our Army and soldiers, they risk breaking the all-volunteer force at a time when it is most critically needed.

In this chapter of the Progressive Priorities Series, the Center for American Progress proposes several steps the administration and Congress should take to correct the current situation. First, they must add at least 86,000 soldiers to the Army. These additional soldiers will allow the army to add two peacekeeping and stabilization divisions to the force, double the size of the Special Forces, and add more military police, civil affairs personnel, and engineers to the active component. Second, they should amend backdoor draft policies by reducing the military service obligation to four years of active service and modifying stop loss so that no solider is extended more than once. Third, the administration needs to give higher priority in the defense budget to quality of life issues. Fourth, the Congress must repeal the unworkable don’t ask, don’t tell policy, which forces the Army to discharge individuals with critical skills for fighting the war on terror. 

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