The Pentagon on Wednesday announced a new “deploy or be removed” policy that could affect up to nearly 300,000 service members who have been non-deployable for the past 12 months.

“This new policy is a 12-month deploy or be removed policy,” Robert Wilkie, the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, told the Senate Armed Services subcommittee on personnel and readiness on Wednesday.

The move comes after Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’ memo last year stressing the need to ensure that “everyone who comes into the service and everyone who stays in the service is world-wide deployable.”

The plan was first revealed by The Military Times.

According to various estimates, between 11 to 14 percent -- or well over 200,000 service members -- of the 2.1 million personnel serving on active duty, in the reserves or National Guard are currently non-deployable on any given day, hindering military readiness.

The new policy will have exceptions such as pregnancy while medical boards will continue to be able to grant exceptions for wounded personnel.

“The situation we face today is really unlike anything we have faced, certainly in the post-World War II era,” Wilkie told the Senate panel. “On any given day, about 13 to 14 percent of the force is medically unable to deploy. That comes out to be about 286,000 [service members].”

The official asked the panel to imagine Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, walking into his company on Christmas week and finding out that 14 percent of his workforce is unable to work. “He would no longer be the largest company in the world,” Wilkie said.

Command Sgt. Maj. John Troxell told the Times earlier this month that nearly 100,000 are non-deployable because of administrative reasons like not having all their immunizations or their medical exams.

Another 20,000 are not deployable due to pregnancy while the remaining service members are non-deployable because of short or long-term injuries. But Troxell said that very few of those injuries “are related to combat injuries. Or battle injuries. It’s related to everyday, doing their job, or during physical training that they were injured.”

“If you are going to serve and continue to want to serve, and if you want to make this a career, you’re going to have to learn that path of recovery and get back to being healthy. Because we need healthy, fit warriors to defend this nation,” Troxell added.

Wilkie admitted the military shares responsibility for reaching such high numbers of non-deployable personnel, as unit leaders often did not ensure those under their command received all required medical examinations and care.

“The other thing we’ve seen is that in the down years of recruiting for the military, we offered too many medical waivers,” the official said. “The medical conditions ... have followed them into the service as they progressed through their careers. We have to address that.”


http://www.foxnews.com/politic...y-or-be-removed.html

Why has it taken so long to start this policy???

quote:

Originally posted by Sigmund:
Why has it taken so long to start this policy???

Having a military hating commander in chief for 8 years didn't help. I think we'll be seeing a lot of positive changes in the next 7 years.

Jim

Great. Now Trump's gonna make all the military Deployables...

It's about time.

Get rid of the dead weight. They should have done this back in 2013 (or was it 2014?) during the "Air Force Hunger Games" 'force shaping.' Almost everybody had to justify why they should be allowed to stay in, with some exceptions. I can't help but think how many good people could have been retained if they had filtered everybody through this 'deployable' standard first.

quote:

Originally posted by sigmonkey:
Great. Now Trump's gonna make all the military Deployables...

Nice one Monkey!

Well, not every MoS is deployable. But that's not to say they can't deploy under temp duty in another role but aren't there limitations to that?

I wonder what this edict takes that 11-14% number down to?

Seems like another application of simple common sense. And the pregnancy thing noted in the story is a bit troubling too, but I'm unsure just how one who address that issue.

Because they likely need the bodies, even if they're not deployable. How many military jobs are done behind a desk? Yes, if the balloon goes up, they need to be able to pound the ground. But at the moment they don't. So if they kick these people out they cause themselves an operational shortage. And the economy is picking up, so replacing them may be not so easy, and the new crop may be no better.

http://www.newsweek.com/americ...ldiers-danger-778840

quote:

Originally posted by Sigmund:
Why has it taken so long to start this policy???

quote:

Originally posted by bigdeal:
Seems like another application of simple common sense. And the pregnancy thing noted in the story is a bit troubling too, but I'm unsure just how one who address that issue.

Woman gets pregnant and is removed from a deployable status (to protect the unborn child). She is also removed from area with hazardous material and noise.

About 3 - 6 months after birth (allows for her body to heal and for the mother/child bonding), she is placed back onto a deployable status.

It's when a single mother gets pregnant and claims to not have (or truly does not have) family who can care for the child while she deploys. Some commands evaluate the value added to the service if the mother is allowed to remain on duty in a non-deployable status. Some commands do not care and either summarily discharges the mother or does the appropriate paperwork to let her stay in.

I wonder if having "Non-deployable" status affects their pay after a while? If it doesn't, it probably should.

quote:

Originally posted by joel9507:
I wonder if having "Non-deployable" status affects their pay after a while? If it doesn't, it probably should.

Nope and, technically, it is not supposed to be a detrimental factor with regards to advancement. Go figure, right?

I once heard that if I was able to perform certain jobs and garner certain recognition, which could only happen when deployed, were head-to-head for a sole chance at advancement against a non-deployable person, the recognition I received was supposed to be discounted and nulled.

Apparently Secretary Mattis and his staff didn't get the memo that the military's prime purpose is socially normalizing outliers, non-normals, strangeoids and malcontents. Whatever will we do now?

The real question is, why are there military people who are non-deployable? WTF? You join the military, you better damn well be ready to be deployable at a moment's notice.

quote:

Command Sgt. Maj. John Troxell told the Times earlier this month that nearly 100,000 are non-deployable because of administrative reasons like not having all their immunizations or their medical exams.

Anyone else see the problem here? Administrative reasons? Those in charge of such troops need to be replaced with someone who actually understands their freaking jobs!!!!!!

You cannot deploy because your shots are not up to date? Suspect some prompt, effective changes in leadership would solve a lot of that crap!

No damned excuse for this. When I was "in" there was no question about shot records up to date. We were lined up at the dispensary, our shot records checked, and if we were not up to date, we got the shots then and there!

I realize 8 years of obummer has caused substantial damage to the military, but there is a new sheriff in town. Time to make a couple of examples!

Every military member should be "deployable." That's distinctly different than "pending deployment." A literal "deploy or be removed" policy makes no operational sense, starting with the fact that there aren't enough deployed billets to accomodate all active duty personnel. Strategically and tactically, a commander should be able to use assets wherever he/she needs them, and not to fill some rotating quota of clerks in combat billets. Train the way you fight, and fight with what you need; I see bad political decisions coming out of this a la "a deployable body is a deployable body." If forces are trimmed based on "non-deployable" criteria, they need to be replaced.

I bet the ACLU is licking their chops over this one.

My brother was an army doctor and suffered a significant injury while on active duty, in the field, at Fort Irwin. He was non-deployable outside of the continental US. However, the need for doctors was (and I assume still great), so he was retained. I wonder if this policy will cause problems in certain highly specialized fields like his?

quote:

Originally posted by Elk Hunter:

quote:

Command Sgt. Maj. John Troxell told the Times earlier this month that nearly 100,000 are non-deployable because of administrative reasons like not having all their immunizations or their medical exams.

Anyone else see the problem here? Administrative reasons? Those in charge of such troops need to be replaced with someone who actually understands their freaking jobs!!!!!!

You cannot deploy because your shots are not up to date? Suspect some prompt, effective changes in leadership would solve a lot of that crap!

No damned excuse for this. When I was "in" there was no question about shot records up to date. We were lined up at the dispensary, our shot records checked, and if we were not up to date, we got the shots then and there!

I realize 8 years of obummer has caused substantial damage to the military, but there is a new sheriff in town. Time to make a couple of examples!

One year I got my flu shot 4 times. One of the times the corpsman even setup a room in our building and gave everyone the shots not marked on their record. I'd already got my flu shot but I got it again. The next month I got called on the carpet for failing to have my flu shot.

I'm sure this sounds good at face value to most, but there is definitely another side.

First, we don't care for our military well. High ops tempo and lack of funding has literally broken the backs of the people involved. (not the first time in our history) There is some value in keeping some broken people around to train the newbies. "Non-deployables" as mentioned, can be driven from a myriad of minute bullshit. Shot records are one example shown here. Half the time it isn't because the member didn't get the shot, it's because an idiot didn't properly document it. It's always fun getting multiple flu shots in a year...especially after flu season is over. The list of computer based training is mind boggling, and any number of reasons (like doing your job) can trigger a CBT to throw you on a non-deployable list. Ask some AD veterans how long their CBT list is...and how many hours they spend staring at a computer after hours or at home to try and keep the bullshit current.

I'm not sure when the policy ever changed....I've only been out for 5 years now, but when I left it was largely because of a policy like this. Medically, you can't be on a waiver for over 12 months. I wasn't non-deployable, but I was excluded from parts of the fitness test due to injuries sustained in the military. They didn't keep me from doing my job, and they didn't keep me from deploying...but they were going to keep me from re-enlisting one last time to reach retirement. I watched my CSAR unit get gutted by this policy....and all of the experience was gone. Not surprisingly, the unit has been failing miserably since.