SubscribeAP Crows: US Desertion Highest Since 1980
Who says the success in Iraq have knocked the news about the war off the front page?
The Associated Press has found something to crow about:
Army desertion rate highest since 1980
By LOLITA C. BALDOR, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - Soldiers strained by six years at war are deserting their posts at the highest rate since 1980, with the number of Army deserters this year showing an 80 percent increase since the United States invaded Iraq in 2003.
While the totals are still far lower than they were during the Vietnam war, when the draft was in effect, they show a steady increase over the past four years and a 42 percent jump since last year.
According to the Army, about nine in every 1,000 soldiers deserted in fiscal year 2007, which ended Sept. 30, compared to nearly seven per 1,000 a year earlier. Overall, 4,698 soldiers deserted this year, compared to 3,301 last year.
The increase comes as the Army continues to bear the brunt of the war demands with many soldiers serving repeated, lengthy tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. Military leaders — including Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey — have acknowledged that the Army has been stretched nearly to the breaking point by the combat. And efforts are under way to increase the size of the Army and Marine Corps to lessen the burden and give troops more time off between deployments.
Despite the continued increase in desertions, however, an Associated Press examination of Pentagon figures earlier this year showed that the military does little to find those who bolt, and rarely prosecutes the ones they get. Some are allowed to simply return to their units, while most are given less-than-honorable discharges.
Of course these numbers reflect the state of things before the surge began to take hold.
And, as the article notes, they also reflect the stress of numerous tours.
Again as the article points out, the current desertion rate is less than during the Vietnam War. In fact, about a third less.
Needless to say, the “anti-war protests” at home have nothing to do with any of this. How could they?
Our soldiers aren’t human beings.
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9 Responses to “AP Crows: US Desertion Highest Since 1980”
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November 16th, 2007 at 3:18 pm
Since the news from Iraq is turning for the good, they have to change tactics to keep making it look bad. Desertions, mental health issues, how much gas the military uses….
November 16th, 2007 at 5:02 pm
Also - don’t know if you’ve been noticing but there is a rise in the electricity isn’t running but 6 to 7 hours a day in Baghdad (sob, sob) stories of late in the msm - what our so ‘investigative’ msm forgets to mention is that under Saddam - Baghdad (and his palaces) got electricity only most of the day (I think 18 to 20 hours) and the rest of Iraq barely got any, at all. Now that it is being spread out throughout the country - Baghdad is suffering like everyone else - not as bad as everyone else use to though.
My m-i-l (bless her heart) was upset about the death rate and suicide rate (she only has the alphabet tv, no cable) - in the military. Was shocked when we told her that the Army averages 1000 deaths a year (without a war) due to accidents and such.
Great msm we have, a crappy headline to make their biased point and not a real bit of truth in the article to let America really understand and put into perspective the whole story.
November 16th, 2007 at 5:54 pm
“Also - don’t know if you’ve been noticing but there is a rise in the electricity isn’t running but 6 to 7 hours a day in Baghdad (sob, sob) stories of late in the msm - what our so ‘investigative’ msm forgets to mention is that under Saddam - Baghdad (and his palaces) got electricity only most of the day (I think 18 to 20 hours) and the rest of Iraq barely got any, at all.”
Good point, WM.
And on a similar subject, when was the last time we heard about the millions of babies who were dying under Saddam?
Remember? That was why we were supposed to end the sanctions against him, even after the “oil for food” program went into effect.
But since we have go into Iraq we have never heard another word about it.
(And where are all the graves of those babies who died of malnutrition?)
November 16th, 2007 at 7:23 pm
The military will not look for you if you go AWOL, nor will they look for you if it turns into desertion. They won’t spend the time and resources because it does not matter - someday you will come into contact with the government or the law, and then you will get picked up. It has been like that for decades. When a bunch of us reported to Ft. Campbell from Germany, one of my friends went AWOL and reported a few weeks late. They arrested him and punished him. The “an Associated Press examination of Pentagon figures earlier this year showed that the military does little to find those who bolt, and rarely prosecutes the ones they get” is a pretty crappy investigation. They could have just talked to me.
That being said, we will have more discipline problems as they lower the standards bit by bit to retain the force structure. If we had to go to the draft, the media would go crazy. Some commanders (if not most) would rather have a slightly smaller force and keep the standards. However, they do pretty good screening to give these people a chance to prove themselves. One of my friends just emailed me saying he crossed into Afghanistan from one of the northern “Stans”. He just got back from Iraq recently (admittedly he does not do super long tours due to his sensitive job, usually six months). The strain is there, but our service members are coping quite well, thank you AP. And when they say “highest since 1980″ they are setting you up for failure. By selecting 1980 when Reagan professionalized the service (the draft was gone by then but the standards went way up) you are setting the start point from a historic low, thus making any increase seem “newsworthy”. Would it kill them to write something positive? Perhaps they should hire an ex-military person or two and not some leftist journalism school graduates.
Every organization has losers. The service has the least. And that is why people respect the military the most, and journalism comes in below used car salesmen.
November 17th, 2007 at 1:15 am
They have to find something to fault folks, it’s the nature of today’s media, bad news sells.
November 17th, 2007 at 9:29 am
Has anyone else noticed that they’re talking about a desertion rate of .9%? It’s an interesting statistic if you’re a math geek as I am, but how on Earth does that constitute a major news story?
November 17th, 2007 at 9:40 am
You know what one of the biggest ‘got ya’ is for the fake soldiers and deserters? It is when they die and the survivors put in for military honors at burial - shocked to find out dear ole dad or uncle jim is a big liar. And the military gets to write off another deserter or loser liar.
November 17th, 2007 at 11:34 am
rak You also have to take in the fact that todays Army is doing much more with less. Back in the 80s the USA was somewhere in the neighborhood of 1 and half million Soldiers. Today we have an Active Strength mandated at 540,000. Not counting Activated Reserves and National Guard formations. If you take the numbers at face value with what is being accomplished by these Soldiers; you’ll see that they are busy as heck deployment wise but compared with the numbers of deserters it is actually lower than say formations that were deployed during peacetime of the 80s. Deployments do effect desertions numbers. But for the article to imply that it is rampant then they are truly wrong.
November 17th, 2007 at 11:52 am
“Has anyone else noticed that they’re talking about a desertion rate of .9%?”
And the rate during Vietnam was close to 4%.