Considering that the USA economy is at almost full employment, is now a good time for the new Deploy or Discharge Policy?

SP5 Donald Wood — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 07:46:12 -0500

Response by SSG Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 17 at 2018 7:59 AM

SSG Private RallyPoint Member — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 07:59:17 -0500

In my opinion the military even though having an effect on the economy is a separate entity. If you are not capable of fulfilling your duties with into he regulation of your branch of service then you should not be in the service. Just like any other job if you can't perform with in guidelines then you don't have a job. I do believe in a set period of time based on the reason for non deployability for the SM to correct the deficiency.

Response by SFC Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 17 at 2018 8:05 AM

SFC Private RallyPoint Member — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 08:05:51 -0500

The two are completely separate from each other. The job of the military is not to provide welfare to those who are not capable of serving. One day, I will no longer be able to serve at the capacity required by the military. When that day comes, I will have to leave and make my way knowing that i left it better than I found it.

Response by SSG Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 17 at 2018 8:14 AM

SSG Private RallyPoint Member — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 08:14:03 -0500

It is not about the economy or jobs it is about readiness.

Response by SSG Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 17 at 2018 10:02 AM

SSG Private RallyPoint Member — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 10:02:26 -0500

I am very harsh on my Soldiers we have one purpose and that is all, if we can no longer defend Our Country with in all regulations then like SFC Boyd said it is not welfare.

Response by SGT Eric Davis made Feb 17 at 2018 10:53 AM

SGT Eric Davis — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 10:53:31 -0500

I’ve been out the military for 7 years and about to enlist and since I been out I keep the same standard I had when I was in the military; so why people currently in the service; mainly referring to the soldiers who are young soldiers or have less than 10 years in Service keep up the standards? I am in the process in Re-enlisting back in the service and hope to maintain that standard. The main purpose of the military is to deploy and stop the criminal From coming here. I’m a police officer and if you want to sit in the states and stop crime then get into law enforcement.

The policy has nothing to do with civilian employment but the state of the army and its readiness!

Response by Lt Col Jim Coe made Feb 17 at 2018 11:30 AM

Lt Col Jim Coe — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 11:30:13 -0500

Economy aside, if your military duty requires you meet certain standards, physical and otherwise, then you should meet them. If you are unable to do so, then you should leave the military either voluntarily or involuntarily. The Services should make allowances for temporary disabilities and combat injuries, which I believe they do. It's not being unnecessarily harsh, it's being ready to defend the US "against all enemies foreign and domestic."

Response by Sgt Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 17 at 2018 3:08 PM

Sgt Private RallyPoint Member — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 15:08:34 -0500

SP5 Donald Wood Yes. Our military needs to maintain a high state of readiness at all times. A strong military requires military members that can share the load when it comes to deployments.

Response by SPC Erich Guenther made Feb 17 at 2018 3:35 PM

SPC Erich Guenther — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 15:35:07 -0500

No, boot them out and I am actually shocked that was not in place during the Cold War because it seemed the 101st had a policy similar to that but my memory is getting hazy. I do remember for absolute certain that if you missed a EDRE in the 101st and were FTR then they Chaptered you and would not accept any excuses. Not exactly sure about the profiles. I know on one deployment they had a rear detachment of profiles but I don't remember the same people being on profile for each rear detachment in the 1980's........so that part is hazy in my memory.

Response by LTC Jason Mackay made Feb 17 at 2018 3:37 PM

LTC Jason Mackay — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 15:37:10 -0500

At the peak of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the only people that were separated, were for egregious misconduct and PT/WT, the Army was paying $11B in unemployment compensation, yep that's a B for Billion. So really doesn't matter whether we keep people in or push people out. This is the cost that is tracked.

This policy is not really different than what was happening in 2016 when I was retired. If people were on permanent, not rectifiable profiles, they were sent to a medical board and considered for separation. Some needed surgery and refused it. Some received surgery and the recovery did not yield the results. Some were just malingering. I knew many, including me, that late in our careers had permanent profiles. To a man, we were deployable and had done so multiple times.

There were always a ton of people on temporary profile. Twisted ankles, torn ACLs, pregnancy, etc. with the exception of pregnancy, all were usually byproducts of deployment, training, or PT. In a Whose buried in Grant's Tomb moment, it was determined that soldiers got lots of sports injuries from doing and overdoing PT. The answer was more PT. There was a small subset of these that moved from a temporary to,permanent profile. The cut line was if it was going to take a year or more (which sounds like thempolicy they just rolled out).

All that being said, what does full employment have to do with who is chaptered for medical issues? This is a readiness issue. In times when recruiting got tough, we forged ahead. In times when recruiting was easy, we forged ahead. 13-14 percent of the force I served non-deployable. This is all sources, medical, legal, etc. if you are flagged for a SHARP investigation, you can't deploy. Somebody has to waive it, and no one will touch that packet, not even with tongs. Your flagged pending the outcome of civilian trial, no matter how long that drags out, withnthe investigation and trial movingly at a quarter of the speed of smell.

Being deployable is different from deploying. Able to deploy, because the US military does not play home games. Service members need to be deployable and do their job. We need to be able to move to an environment essentially devoid of medical care. This even true for domestic operations, particularly for disaster relief when medical care is scarce. The usual figure is 6 months, as it is applied to Dental Category I and II. You are not projected to have a dental issue requiring treatment for 6 months. III and IV are applied if you have issues requiring treatment. Yes you can be CAT III for a cleaning, because that cleaning and fluoride treatment will protect your teeth. CAT IV is usually the lack of a panorex image of your teeth. Remedied by SRP update and a fifteen minute x ray.

Response by CAPT Kevin B. made Feb 17 at 2018 9:17 PM

CAPT Kevin B. — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 21:17:56 -0500

When your office is anywhere in the world, you're expected to show up for work at the office, period. It's an easy business decision to offload people who can't/won't show up at the office. Makes room for people who will. People forget the military is a business, not a welfare society. If you look at many of the retention, toss, or shaping decisions, they all are business decisions. DoD doesn't get the luxury of hanging onto unusable rounds. Another business decision that's prevalent is to shift the problem to the VA. Different budget, someone else's money. Let them deal with it. All this sounds heartless, but in reality, whatever "heart" there is in it all is from individual people collectively and is not a policy thing, unless it's cheaper and less effort to do so.

Response by SGT Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 18 at 2018 10:44 AM

SGT Private RallyPoint Member — Sun, 18 Feb 2018 10:44:44 -0500

Full employment definition: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/f/fullemployment.asp
So, when you say that an economy is at "full employment" (which is an arbitrary thing, since there is no magical way to no exactly when all unemployment is simply frictional), you are saying that the only people who aren't employed at the moment doing something like changing jobs, or aren't in the labor force at all (non-participants). It DOES NOT mean that there is not room for hiring additional personnel in industry. (Actually, it's quite the opposite - when you have full employment, employers have to offer better compensation to attract the few remaining candidates not currently employed or to attract candidates from existing jobs to fill jobs at their own firm.)

Full Employment

Full employment is a situation in which all available labor resources are being used in the most economically efficient way.

Response by SGM Bill Frazer made Feb 20 at 2018 9:52 AM

SGM Bill Frazer — Tue, 20 Feb 2018 09:52:32 -0500

As a grunt- I like it. Our folks are being toasted- my kids have had over 7 deployments in the past 12 yrs. If you can't deploy and aren't filling a non-deployable position then what good are you doing us?

Response by Cpl Justin Goolsby made Feb 20 at 2018 6:02 PM

Cpl Justin Goolsby — Tue, 20 Feb 2018 18:02:50 -0500

Honestly I'm not sure about the Deploy or Discharge Policy. Granted I don't know full specifics because I'm only just hearing about it, but it does raise some questions.

Mission Readiness aside, what if you were assigned to a training squadron that doesn't deploy? What if you were assigned to a logistical squadron that only deploys like once every 4 years? What if you got injured prior to a deployment (unintentionally) and then got sidelined?

Each of us plays a role in the military and supports the mission at hand in our own way. I can agree with getting rid of the dead weight. But I know a lot of good Marines who haven't deployed through no fault of their own.