Army Considers Longer Combat Tours Again

[sabbat hunter]

Source: Associated press.

The Army is considering whether it will have to extend the combat tours of troops in Iraq if President Bush opts to maintain the recent buildup of forces through spring 2008.



Acting Army Secretary Pete Geren testified Tuesday that the service is reviewing other options, including relying more heavily on Army reservists or Navy and Air Force personnel, so as not to put more pressure on a stretched active-duty force.





Gen. David Petraeus, Iraq war commander, suggested Sunday that conditions on the ground might not be stable enough by September to justify a drop in force levels, and he predicted that stabilizing Iraq could take a decade

Read more: http://www.myfoxmemphis.com/myfox/pages/News/Detail?contentId=3536941&version=1&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=TSTY&pageId=3.3.1

---

here we go again. longer tours of duty, Petraeus already realizing that things arent going to be any different in sept.

why the f are we still there at all?

[babylonsister]

1. There will come a point where there will be no one left to extend, OR,

the military just might revolt. It could happen... and I'll bet they're at the brink.

[JAYJDF]

2. I agree, but it will take a real leader

for them to follow.
Problem is, it's not like they can just take the next plane home

[hobbit709]

4. 1917-The Russian army had enough and just started walking home.

[sabbat hunter]

6. well in russia

the army wasnt getting their pay, the country was in open violent revolution.

also our armed forces stationed overseas cannot exactly walk home.

[conspirator]

10. And there is the danger that they could be followed :) nt

[sanskritwarrior]

7. The military isn't on the brink of revolt

there is definitely grumbling within the ranks but good order and discipline are holding. I posted back in May it would take til 2010 with the current optempo for us to break.........

[babylonsister]

21. I feel so bad for all the soldiers and their families; this is so unfair. nt

[sanskritwarrior]

24. It is,

I however have 6 more years until retirement and I will stick it out no matter how long they make the tours.

[babylonsister]

26. Yes, I recognized your name and knew you were active, leaving

fairly soon. I don't blame you for wanting to get that pension. I just pray you stay safe.

[sanskritwarrior]

30. LOL

I pray I stay safe as well......thanks for your kind words.

[alfredo]

3. I wonder how the soldiers are going to react to this?

[sanskritwarrior]

8. Most of us will piss and moan

and do our duty........If it keeps up for 2 more years, then yeah you could see a revolt. My guys and I talk alot about our upcoming 15 months, most of us have reenlisted to get to this point so most of us don't like it, but we do our duty.

[alfredo]

12. Yeah, I remember the feeling. We called it the green weenie.

[sanskritwarrior]

14. LOL

yeah.......

We want to be here, we renlisted to be here, so I guess we like the green weenie............. :)

Only 6 more years, that's what I keep telling myself.......

[alfredo]

17. Hopefully we will have new leadership soon. That always helps.

[superconnected]

27. You got someone who's running that is NOT going to continue this?

do tell, do tell!

I'll vote for them.

[alfredo]

38. Sooner or later

the generals will step in to protect the military. Us putting pressure on the administration will do nothing. We don't matter to them. We will have to set our sites on congress. Eventually they will have to act on our demands. I believe the withdrawal will begin before the election.

[aquart]

5. I'd be real nervous of leaving guns in the hands of those soldiers.

No wonder our officials have to be guarded by mercenaries.

[sanskritwarrior]

9. Soldiers are not responsible for officials security

Alcabides mystery had an excellent post on this, but in my 13 years in the Army I have never once pulled security for a Flag officer, it has been civilians since I can remember.

[tabasco]

13. I was security officer for a 2-star in the Middle East.

I was a Captain. This was 93-94. We had no civilian security.

He was the overall commander of US forces in the region, not some rooty-poot.

That was 13 years ago. I guess things have changed.

[sanskritwarrior]

15. LOL I joined 13 years ago

and anyone above the rank of Full bird has private security..........The four star in Korea had a 10 man team of Americans and Koreans and that was back in 1994.......My two tours in Iraq, I have never seen any general with military security........

[tabasco]

16. This doesn't surprise me a bit.

By the time I got out, it was becoming the "corporate Army" with Blackwater, MPRI, etc.

"Freeing up soldiers to do soldier work" or some such horseshit. I always considered it soldiers' work to guard their generals.

Replacing the cooks is another friggin' mistake. I thought Army chow was pretty damn good when I got a chance to eat in the mess hall. Not exactly Navy quality but still pretty good.

[sanskritwarrior]

19. The KBR chow isn't terrible........

and they still have Army cooks, just not at the battalion level anymore........

The KBR chow halls in Iraq still have Army cooks making a lot of the food, however all the servers are TCN's (Third country nationals)

[tabasco]

35. Myself and an E-6 from the 82nd were security OIC/NCOIC

We would have an Inf or MP squad or platoon for escort depending on where we were going. I carried either a Car-15 or a shotgun. We were better than any fucking civilians. The only thing that scared me was snipers. To this day I still scan rooftops.

What's your MOS?

[sanskritwarrior]

40. See post 36

[benld74]

11. shit just make it life, or end of it whichever comes first

this keeps up the draft bill everyone was talking about back when Bush first got into office will surface again you watch

[paparush]

18. No fucking way! MAKE THESE SONS OF BITCHES INSTITUTE THE DRAFT!!

The Bushbot Neocons are being kept off the hook by ........shocking..... AVOIDING THE DRAFT!!

The DRAFT is the one thing that would galvanize this country (kinda like a new Pearl Harbor) against this war to the point of demanding change; and the neocons know it.

They have thus far avoided The Draft by:

A. Recycling our troops (the only thing Bush recycles is our troops)

B. Spending Billions of our dollars on private, mercenary armies (Blackwater, et al)

[sanskritwarrior]

20. Don't need a draft, most of us active duty

don't want draftees fighting with us.. We are being abused, but we want to fight with people that want to be there, not sullen draftees...........

[Pharaoh]

22. So what exactly are you

fighting for over there? I'm kinda confused, cause I thought it was about WMD's and then getting sadamn, and then about spreading freedom ect, what's the story these days?

[sanskritwarrior]

23. Who knows what the clusterfuck administration says, but

I fight for my men.......And for my country and the hope that it returns to form in another year and a half......Now even more than ever the military needs good men and women liberals in its ranks.......

[paparush]

33. Keep your head down and your chin up

and thank you for your service.

[tabasco]

34. What's your MOS?

I got out in 2000. 11B.

[sanskritwarrior]

36. LOL

I reclassed a few years back to 11B (huge bonuses) but they keep filling me in to slots in my former MOS 96B Intel analyst. I have never had a platoon of my own as I am always popped back into a Brigade or Battalion S-2 shop. Right now I'm in a brigade S-2 shop as once they see my MOS identifer on my records they pluck me out of an infantry unit and assign me to a staff job.........Sucks........

[tabasco]

41. Hopefully something with some "skills."

I found that the civilian sector doesn't have a great need for "planning a raid, etc." So I started my own business.

One of the best platoon sergeants I ever knew was out of line units for a loooooong time before he came to my company. Did a super job.

Stay safe and fight to get a platoon!

[AndyTiedye]

42. Once They Get The Draft They Can Keep the War Going Forever

because they will have all the cannon fodder they want.

What good will a draft do us?
You think it will cause people to protest.
We're protesting now. The MSM doesn't report it.
Some people would resist the draft, but most wouldn't.

[Rageneau]

25. HOO-AH! How about that all-volunteer army now?

Thgese poor soldiers can't even bitch. Because -- as the Freepers remind -- they all "knew" that when they volunteered for the Army, the Army might call their bet and go all-in.

[sanskritwarrior]

31. Well we can bitch all we want

but the freeps are right about one thing, we all did volunteer to be here, of course we had hoped for better leadership...........

[mariema]

43. Volunteering doesn't mean you signed up for abuse

Sanskritwarrior said

“but the freeps are right about one thing, we all did volunteer to be here, of course we had hoped for better leadership...........”

But you didn’t volunteer to be used and abused. And neither did your families.

My husband was in 'Nam and Gulf War One and I cannot imagine the hard times you and your families are going thru. It has gone from shameful to unbelievable to--I don't know--insane? absurd? crazy? ludicrous?

Stay safe and sane.

[superconnected]

28. That's supporting the troops bush style.

Did they ever get armor?

[MikeNearMcChord]

29. These Generals are not on the frontlines.

I would not want to be a company commander or a platoon leader in Iraq for all the whiskey in Ireland. Might get an grenade omlete for breakfast.

[sanskritwarrior]

32. I have bene in a leadership position in a platoon before

when the previous Platoon Sergeant was wounded.......morale ain't great, but is far from beng abysmal....The two incidents of fragging in this war involved

A. A muslim who was disaffected he did it on the day the war started in 2003

B. A New York National guardsman that fragged two officers that were about to charge him with stealing govt. property.

I'm not saying a fragging couldn't happen, but Discipline is still incredibly good in the Army.......It would take at least 2 more years of the surge type deployment schedule for me to think we would might start seeing fraggings......

[badgervan]

37. Thanks For Your Service...

Just curious - what do you think of Navy and Air Force enlisted on patrol with Army and Marines? Are they sufficiently trained, especially in weapons? If bush invades Iran, I don't see where the troops come from except via a draft - that would worry me if I were in Iraq: sheer difference in numbers between the good guys and the potential new bad guys.

[sanskritwarrior]

39. You know I see those stories all the time

and I know they are in Iraq, but I have never seen one of those guys or girls myself.......

The only Navy I have ever seen in Iraq are Navy Corpsmen attached to every Marine Platoon, Navy Seabees building the base infrstructure with KBR and Navy River Patrol guys....I have never seen a Navy sailor on Patrol with an Army unit. Ditto the Air Force....Outside of Combat controllers, Meterological people at every Brigade and the occasional Parajumper, I never see the air force on Patrol with the Army. Now I know the Air Force runs three FOB's in Iraq, they run FOB Warrior in Kirkuk which is home to an Army Brigade and an Air Force SP force, LSA Anaconda in Balad which is where the Fighter Jets are, and FOB Talil in south Iraq.........I'm sure they are on Patrol but on both tours I never saw one........

[ringtailtooter]

44. And Iraqi Forces are no help

Our soldiers are not getting much help form those "trained Iraqi troops" as General Dempsey promised. Here is a clipping form Iraq's paper Azzaman on June 12th.

"General Dempsey repeated the strategic error of saying that the Prime Minister is determined to improve the performance of Iraqi forces. This is a foolish statement and shows that Dempsey doesn't know what he's talking about. But perhaps he's just reading his lines from the American script he inherited from his predecessor.

General Dempsey was astonished to find that there are no banks in which Iraqi soldiers can deposit their salaries at the end of the month, and they are forced to hide their earnings in their homes. Of course, this doesn't occur in the United States or Europe, where salaries can be securely and automatically deposited in banks and then withdrawn when needed.

This is not just a casual observation as it may appear at first glance. This is a core issue for the reconstruction of Iraq's military, and is the clearest illustration of how the occupation forces have been unable to secure banking institutions and wrest them from the control of the militias. General Dempsey mentioned none of this when he appeared before the U.S. Senate or House of Representatives - not only because it's a scandal of scandals, but because it shows that the militias are much more influential than it looks on paper, in the statistics published by the government."

http://www.watchingamerica.com/azzaman000139.shtml

[maddezmom]

45. Army again considers longer combat tours

Source: AP

WASHINGTON - The Army is considering whether it will have to extend the combat tours of troops in Iraq if President Bush opts to maintain the recent buildup of forces through spring 2008.

Acting Army Secretary Pete Geren testified Tuesday that the service is reviewing other options, including relying more heavily on Army reservists or Navy and Air Force personnel, so as not to put more pressure on a stretched active-duty force.

Most soldiers spend 15 months in combat with a guaranteed 12 months home, a rotation plan that has infuriated Democrats because it exceeds the service's goal of giving troops equal time home as in combat. In coming weeks, the Senate will vote on a proposal by Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., that would restrict deployments.

"It's too early to look into the next year, but for the Army we have to begin to plan," Geren told the Senate Armed Services Committee. "We have to look into our options."



Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070620/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_iraq

[AndyTiedye]

46. Soon, The Only Way They'll Let Our Soldiers Come Home Is…

[Debau2005]

47. Hopefully

My S.O. will be able to get out in August when his current time is up. He has 16 years in, and is willing to sacrifice the last four and the benefits, so that he does not have to go back.

His unit lost 3 soldiers when he was in Iraq. He doesn't talk about it. And he doesn't know that I know that he has a Bronze Star. We did not meet until after he returned.

He has PTSD, but the resources are not there to help the soldiers when they return.

This country has a rude awakening coming when all of these soldiers finally make it home. The VA resources are already strained, I don't see them being able to handle what will happen later.

[Javaman]

48. So the surge is failing, the dems choose to wait till sept to make a

decision and now they are going to extend the tours again. Hmmmm, smells like we are in for another wave of the bush's* bullshit bingo!

morons* coming statement in september, "see the surge failed because we didn't allow the soldiers, our men and women in the armed forces, to DO their, um, jobs for the time it takes for the surge to succeed, you follow me, wait! let me finish...okay, I'm done".

My brain hurts.