Pentagon abandons active-duty time limit

[Jcrowley]

Pentagon abandons active-duty time limit
ROBERT BURNS
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The Pentagon has abandoned its limit on the time a citizen-soldier can be required to serve on active duty, officials said Thursday, a major change that reflects an Army stretched thin by longer-than-expected combat in Iraq.

The day after President Bush announced his plan for a deeper U.S. military commitment in Iraq, Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters the change in reserve policy would have been made anyway because active-duty troops already were getting too little time between their combat tours.

The Pentagon also announced it is proposing to Congress that the size of the Army be increased by 65,000, to 547,000 and that the Marine Corps, the smallest of the services, grow by 27,000, to 202,000, over the next five years. No cost estimate was provided, but officials said it would be at least several billion dollars.

Until now, the Pentagon's policy on the Guard or Reserve was that members' cumulative time on active duty for the Iraq or Afghan wars could not exceed 24 months. That cumulative limit is now lifted; the remaining limit is on the length of any single mobilization, which may not exceed 24 consecutive months, Pace said.

http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/16436371.htm

[DURHAM D]

1. Oh God !!

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

2. Yesiree. Step right up. Uncle Sam needs you for life...or death.

Whichever comes first.

[Earth_First]

3. No cost estimate was provided, (...I have one right here:)

92,000 additional troops 'could' cost $15 billion annually...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=3098105&mesg_id=3098105

[SteveM]

4. An ADMIRAL now oversees all operations in mid-East.

Few in the media noticed (one military commentator on PBS did) that putting an admiral in charge of what are essentially ground operations means one thing: projection of power. That, along with another carrier group dispatched to the region and a U.S. attack today on the Iranian consulate in the Kurdish region, means that Bush plans on more war and more morals. He knows he is unchecked, not so much by Constitutional constraint but by a Democratic Party that has cowed down too long and too quickly whenever the GOPer hustles its nuts. Too often the Dems, when questioned on the Sunday talk shows about what they would do about Bush, answer that he is defying the American people and even members of the GOP. That is not an answer. That is a bad habit learned well; a stultifying inability to lead. In fact, it seems that the Dems in their frustration seem to be implying that Americans should be outraged enough to take to the streets. This, after three decades of purging anyone from Party organizing who was to the left of Carter! My, my, who they call on when the going gets tough: old hippies and old-line libs the Democratic "Leadership" have done their best to ignore. Bush won't break. He won't even bend. That is his chief moral, the moral he came in power with and the one he will dance with. He'll play a chicky run with the Dems because he knows them better than they know themselves. He wants a fight HERE as much as he wants one abroad. To paraphrase Howard Dean, will anyone take him on?

[Rosemary2205]

5. Iran will have to pretty much be an air war.

Aircraft carriers will be the prime instrument so it follows that they'll need Naval leadership at the top.