House panel probes quality of Army recruits

Members of the House Armed Services Personnel Subcommittee complained Tuesday that the Bush administration's reliance on supplemental funding for the military made the challenging task of recruiting quality personnel more difficult. But the Pentagon's top personnel official argued that supplemental funding would be less of an issue if Congress had provided the full amount requested.

They expressed concern about what Armed Services Personnel Subcommittee Chairwoman Susan Davis, D-Calif., called "sacrifices in recruit quality." That is reflected mainly in the Army's failure to meet the Pentagon standard of 90 percent high school graduates and its need to take more recruits who score in the lowest acceptable category on the military qualification test and to issue more waivers for physical and "moral" problems.

Armed Services Personnel Subcommittee ranking member John McHugh, R-N.Y., said he shared "the concern of many about the new recruits who do not meet the time-tested DoD quality standards." He asked the service personnel officials to explain the implications of failing to meet those standards.

David Chu, undersecretary of Defense for personnel and readiness, noted that although only 82 percent of Army recruits so far this year had high school diplomas, the three other services were exceeding the standard. But Chu insisted that all the military recruits were "high school graduates" because they had passed the General Education Development exam.

Chu also suggested that the recent drop in recruit quality had to be considered in "historic context," pointing out how much better educated today's recruits are than in the past. In the years immediately after the Vietnam War, none of the services recruited 90 percent high school graduates, the Army and Marine Corps struggled to get above 50 percent, and more than half of all recruits fell in "category four," in the recruiting test scores.

But Rep. Carol Shea-Porter, D-N.H., rejected that argument, claiming that military service is much more complex now.

Questioned about the increased numbers of moral waivers, Chu said that reflected a society in which more young people have experimented with drugs. And he noted that recruits needed waivers because they admitted drug use or misdemeanor violations. Waivers are granted only after several layers of review.

Chu cited an Army study that showed recruits granted moral waivers "performed as well or even better" than other soldiers while in service.

All of the services met their recruiting goals last year and expressed confidence they would do so again this year, with the help of bonuses and increasing benefits.

Davis suggested that the recruiting problems were linked to "the increasing reliance of recruiting and retention programs on emergency supplemental funding," which prevented the planning and timely execution needed to sign enough recruits.

Other members complained about the continued use of supplemental requests, more than six years after the war in Afghanistan began.

Chu and the service personnel officials agreed they all would prefer getting their recruiting funds in the normal budget. Lt. Gen. Michael Rochelle said the Army was committed to funding recruiting and retention in its fiscal 2010 budget.

But Chu made the point several times that the administration had requested the fiscal 2008 supplemental quite early and that Congress provided less than half, leaving $102.5 billion still awaiting action.

"What would be most useful now would be the second increment of the supplemental," he said.