Army tank units faced overwork & higher suicides, investigation finds

It won't get better at all!
1) It won't get better because even with some recent balancing in dwell times, nothing is going to change the physical differences.
and, more importantly,
2) We have too many people in leadership positions who have never been in an Armored unit who are determined to say "Everybody does that, stop whining and suck it up" because they are incapable of comprehending the differences even when those differences are quantified, recorded, and explained.

It is indeed . . .

CSM Chuck Stafford I guess what MSG Thomas Currie is saying, using his example of working through the night, is that the Officer and NCO leadership, specifically the senior leadership, exhibit poor planning and extremely poor time management skills while in a garrison environment. Count me as glad to have not been a tanker if that's how it's done there.

For the record MSG Thomas Currie, as a MP commander, I had M1117's integral to my unit. So there's that. Not to mention the other rolling stock on the property books.

I also spent 18 years as an infantryman. 4 months of that was spent on staff, the other 17 plus was at the company level and below as XO, PL, PSG, SL, TL and Rifleman.

If that qualifies me as a REMF, then I'll gladly assume the title.

LTC Trent Klug - Didn't want to disparage my Cav brethren as they were all superb leaders less one who constantly bragged that he was blessed to be tough because he liked to work harder rather than smarter. I'll put my REMF bonifides against anyone elses and we would have a long night of story telling and drinking.

CSM Chuck Stafford I wasn't trying to either. I spent many late nights and weekends doing things that could have been done without impacting time off or working 24 hour plus days. I tried to avoid doing that to my troops. I wasn't always successful, but I mitigated as best I could.

LTC Trent Klug - I feel like we are both talking but not quite understanding each other because we have a completely different frame of reference. About as close as we get is that you had a few of those cute little M1117 Armored Security Vehicles in your command, so obviously your 15-ton wheeled trucks have the same demands as 70-ton tracked armored fighting vehicles (yes, I'm being sarcastic and I realize you know better -- but knowing better doesn't change how you think about the issues).

But staying with your ASVs for a moment, were they a pacing item with daily availability rates reported and highlighted up the entire chain of command? Did you ever have one deadlined waiting for parts? If those parts arrived late in the afternoon would anyone have cared if your people put those parts on the next day? When you took those ASVs to the field, did they ever even get off the pavement?

This is why I told Lt Col Charlie Brown that the problem will never be fixed, it isn't even possible to discuss the problem with anyone who isn't part of the problem, but everyone thinks they understand things they have never done or even seen. The discussion always ends with someone who can barely recognize a tank telling us "EVERYBODY works hard and EVERYBODY has problems, Shut Up and Do Your Job"

Even within the heavy combat arms community, where people do understand the nature of the problem (if not quite the extent) by the time you reach the levels where any real change could be possible the people who could make some difference their priorities are on the numbers that get attention above them -- this study might be the best chance we have for change IF people take the numbers seriously and are willing to keep looking because this time we have solid numbers showing that there is a "statistically significant difference" in suicide rates for ABCTs compared to the rest of the Army. SOMETHING about being in an ABCT is driving soldiers to suicide (or at least failing to prevent it)