Yeah, but We Don't Need Troops That Badly...

Gee, I can't imagine why we're seeing headlines like this one:

Deployments Stretching Army, Study Finds

WASHINGTON - Stretched by frequent troop rotations to Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army has become a "thin green line" that could snap unless relief comes soon, according to a study for the Pentagon.

Andrew Krepinevich, a retired Army officer who wrote the report under a Pentagon contract, concluded that the Army cannot sustain the pace of troop deployments to Iraq long enough to break the back of the insurgency. He also suggested that the Pentagon's decision, announced in December, to begin reducing the force in Iraq this year was driven in part by a realization that the Army was overextended.

As evidence, Krepinevich points to the Army's 2005 recruiting slump — missing its recruiting goal for the first time since 1999 — and its decision to offer much bigger enlistment bonuses and other incentives.

Of course, the contempt for soldier safety, a war based on lies, a dismissive White House, and the horror of war itself would have nothing to do with that.

"You really begin to wonder just how much stress and strain there is on the Army, how much longer it can continue," he said in an interview. He added that the Army is still a highly effective fighting force and is implementing a plan that will expand the number of combat brigades available for rotations to Iraq and Afghanistan.

The 136-page report represents a more sobering picture of the Army's condition than military officials offer in public. While not released publicly, a copy of the report was provided in response to an Associated Press inquiry.

Illustrating his level of concern about strain on the Army, Krepinevich titled one of his report's chapters, "The Thin Green Line."

He wrote that the Army is "in a race against time" to adjust to the demands of war "or risk `breaking' the force in the form of a catastrophic decline" in recruitment and re-enlistment.

Wow. This is really, really bad news.

Col. Lewis Boone, spokesman for Army Forces Command, which is responsible for providing troops to war commanders, said it would be "a very extreme characterization" to call the Army broken. He said his organization has been able to fulfill every request for troops that it has received from field commanders.

Okay, fine. While I think the word "broken" is kind of a ridiculous word to use, I'm sure that those responsible for providing troops would be doing everything possible to get new recruits, and keep the ones they have, right? Wait a second... what's that story right below this one?

Officers Discharged Under Gay Policy

Ah.

WASHINGTON - Hundreds of officers and health care professionals have been discharged in the past 10 years under the Pentagon's policy on gays, a loss that while relatively small in numbers involves troops who are expensive for the military to educate and train.

The 350 or so affected are a tiny fraction of the 1.4 million members of the uniformed services and about 3.5 percent of the more than 10,000 people discharged under the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy since its inception in 1994.

But many were military school graduates or service members who went to medical school at the taxpayers' expense — troops not as easily replaced by a nation at war that is struggling to fill its enlistment quotas.

So once again, we're willing to weaken the military and compromise the safety of Americans and American troops... because we're scared someone might see our willie in the shower.

"You don't just go out on the street tomorrow and pluck someone from the general population who has an Air Force education, someone trained as a physician, someone who bleeds Air Force blue, who is willing to serve, and that you can put in Iraq tomorrow," said Beth Schissel, who graduated from the Air Force Academy in 1989 and went on to medical school.

Schissel was forced out of the military after she acknowledged that she was gay.

Key phrase there: Willing to serve. It just amazes me that, in this day and age, in this colossal blunder of a war, the Military is still willing to reject an incredibly qualified soldier... one that wants to serve, remember... a freakin' physician, fer chrissakes, because she's a lesbian.

These discharges comprise a very small percentage of the total and should be viewed in that context," said Lt. Col. Ellen Krenke, a Pentagon spokeswoman. She added that troops discharged under the law can continue to serve their country by becoming a private military contractor or working for other federal agencies.

You know what, Krenke? Blow me sideways. I'm sure you noticed, being in the Pentagon and everything, that we are at war. We can't meet our recruitment efforts, no one wants to fight, and you're rejecting qualified soldiers because of a ridiculous policy. People that are highly qualified, with skills that are desperately needed, and that are (fortunately for you), willing to jump in and get their hands dirty. And possibly get blown in half. I don't care how small the percentage is; that's immaterial. Do you honestly think that if you approached military commanders and offered them a few hundred highly qualified, eager soldiers, that they would reject them because they were a small percentage?

Bullshit. Wake up. Pull your heads out of the sand. Haven't you learned your lesson from your mistake with Arabic translators? And as for whining about "the taxpayer's expense:"

Early last year the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, estimated it cost the Pentagon nearly $200 million to recruit and train replacements for the nearly 9,500 troops that had to leave the military because of the policy. The losses included hundreds of highly skilled troops, including translators, between 1994 through 2003.

Two Hundred Million dollars.

Look, we can't afford this crap. Get over your bigotry, stop knuckling under to the religious right, and get rid of this policy. It's ridiculous, it's archaic, and it's compromising the safety of Americans and our stretched-to-the-breaking-point Military.

When you've got Santorum telling America that putting one of his goddamed bumper stickers on your car is comparable to serving in the military... when he's actually telling people not to serve, you'd better take whatever you can get.

Especially when they're physicians and Arabic translators.

(I've got a cross-post in the Pacific... and everything about it is terriffic...)