COUNTERING MILITARY RECRUITMENT
Articles: Military Recruiting: Personnel Crunch
What it takes to sign up
Susan Palmer, The Register-Guard
August 14, 2007
Twenty thousand dollars is a nice chunk of change, but it's not the main reason Curtis Boechler said he has joined the Army.
The 18-year-old Thurston High School graduate said he has had his eye on the military since he was a freshman.
So when the Army came calling this summer, he jumped at the chance to enlist, he said.
He is one of thousands of young people nationwide who will receive the
extra financial incentive if they show up for basic training before
Sept. 30, and fulfill their service.
The Army began offering the $20,000 bonuses in late July after falling
short of nationwide recruiting goals in May and June. It hopes to
enlist 80,000 new soldiers by the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30.
The incentive, which was announced July 25, may already have helped the
Army surpass its nationwide July recruiting goal of 9,750 soldiers by
222 recruits. If recruiting continues at this level, and the recruits
all qualify for the bonus, it could cost the Army hundreds of millions
of additional dollars.
It's a challenging time for recruiters, Army recruiting spokesman Douglas Smith said.
It's the first time that the military has had to fight a multiyear war with an all-volunteer force.
At the same time, more high school graduates are going on to
universities and there are plenty of jobs available in the nation's
robust economy, Smith said.
"Our recruiters are spending a lot more time with applicants and their families," he said.
Despite the war in Iraq, the Army was not a hard sell for Boechler. He
first started thinking about enlisting as a high school freshman, but
back then it was just rebellious-teen talk, he said.
"I didn't want to do what my parents wanted me to do, which was stay in town," Boechler said.
By his sophomore year, the Army began to seem like a contender for his
future. At a job fair, he looked into possible careers in police work
and firefighting, but he also checked out the Army. And there was
something about the infantry that appealed to him, he said.
As a physically fit young man, he felt like he could commit to putting his life at risk in the service of his country, he said.
"The Bible says, there's something in there about the stronger forces should take care of the weaker ones," he said.
After graduating this spring, Boechler got a job at a local wood
products mill. He first contacted the Navy because that branch of the
military seemed a little less dangerous to his mother. But then Army
recruiters called him and mentioned the early training bonus.
It's one of several financial incentives the military offers. There are
bonuses for signing up for four years of service, money for college and
a loan repayment program for those who are in debt. Soldiers can get
close to $73,000 for higher education or help with student loans up to
$65,000.
They also can combine enlistment bonuses and receive as much as $40,000.
If Boechler successfully completes his initial training, he will get
$10,000. The rest will come in annual installments over the course of
his three-year, 17-week service, he said.
He heads to Portland on Wednesday. On Thursday, he flies to Fort
Benning, Ga., for basic training, which will be followed by infantry
training.
"I'm not going for the money," he said. "But if they're willing to give it to me, then, hell, I'll take it."
Recruiting in Oregon mirrors the national trend, with recruiters
falling short of their goals in two of the past three months, said
Charles Glenn, spokesman at the Portland recruiting office.
But Oregon's record is better than many other areas of the country, Glenn said.
The nation is broken into 41 recruiting battalions, and Oregon's
battalion, which includes southern Washington, northern California and
Hawaii, ranked 12th in the nation from May through July, signing up 470
recruits in that time, Glenn said.
"It had a lot to do with motivated recruiters who get out there and
sell the Army, who talk to kids about the programs that the Army has to
offer," he said.
Peace groups that oppose military recruitment worry that the bonuses
put a dollar value on the life of new recruits and that recruits may
not always understand exactly what they're getting into when they join
the military.
"My first question would be, does the young person understand what's
involved? Does he understand that he will most probably be deployed to
Iraq?" said Nina Laboy, Associate Regional Director in Seattle of the
American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker organization. "We have
more young people calling us after signing on the dotted line and now
they want to get out."
But Boechler said he understands the risks and the likelihood that he
will be sent to the Middle East. He says he is more concerned about
taking a life than losing his own.
"It's the grief or the blame on my shoulders of killing someone," he said.
Boechler said his mother was not enthusiastic about him joining, but
that she, his stepfather and his biological father are all supportive,
now that he's made up his mind.
"The military is for certain people, and those people kind of know by heart whether they're made for that," he said.
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