Let's dispose of the strawman that it is necessary to have vast experience in the military in order to comment on military matters.

Any person of reasonable intelligence, after a tour of one year, will have a good understanding of the way the military works. I understood it well enough myself six months in to refuse an illegal order from a superior officer given to me in the presence of witnesses -- and to make it stick. Cost him is commission. Me, just my stripes (hey, no good deed ever goes unpunished, and TANJ.)

Some people will never learn, of course, even if they serve their 20.

Here's how they'd handle it (my specialty in the Army was personnel, BTW). When assembling a unit for overseas duty, they'd simply add the requirement for off-time to all the other requirements they already consider, and simply run it through the computer programs they already use. Here's a hint for those unfamiliar with the military method: they do it using first-come first-served, a well-known, robust, and utterly simple methodology, which would have no problem with the additional constraint.

It would make assembling units a bit harder on those sending people over, and a little bit less hard on the people being sent, which is the point, right?

The Bush administration's approach to the military has been like their approach to almost everything else: use it at a faster rate than it can be replenished, and leave it for somebody else to try and repair (while they will no doubt be sniping on the sidelines to try and make sure they and their friends do not have to pay their fair share.)

The time has come for people outside the blogosphere to emphasize what chickenhawks these guys (and gals) are and to organize in a way so as to pressure WaPo et al., to publish other voices (petitions, ads, etc.), particularly voices of people who've been right about Iraq. -- Raj

Or at least to publish their Sara-Lee-fed wanker photos alongside their articles.

Kitt

Your example is irrelevant, because the same is true of even combat units in the Army and Marines; when your EAS is up, you leave. But that is different from wholesale switching around of people within a unit, especially while in combat.

We're not talking about the odd guy leaving here and there. In Vietnam you'd sometimes have a 40% turnover in a unit in as little as six months. That's no way to build a cohesive fighting force.

Also, I don't remember too many Navy destroyers being in heavy combat in Vietnam, although those sailors certainly served honorably.

-- Hornet Driver

Well, you have paragraph after paragraph proving that you just make shit up. My brother was on a Destroyer...in combat...in Vietnam...he wasn't the "odd guy". He was part of a unit/crew...but his time was up. As I'm sure happened frequently to his crew members over the period of his three tours to Vietnam on the same Destroyer that he was on during his four years of service.

"By the way, one reason we have today's brutal deployment schedule is that everyone, but primarily Democrats, cut the US military almost by 50% with the fall of the Soviet Union."

Unbelievable.

So enlighten me. How many days as a FAC were you engaged in exposing yourself to IEDs, bullets and street fighting? I can accept being wrong if you have experienced anything like what the Army and Marine Corps are subjected to in Iraq.

Democrats, cut the US military almost by 50% with the fall of the Soviet Union. Everyone was braying about the so-called "peace dividend" and how we could save all this money. Turns out they were seriously wrong, and we have today's undermanned military that has to rely on reserves and National Guard units to fulfill its mission.

It should have been cut more, and we should have a "peace dividend". This war we're in in Iraq and probably Syria & Iran next is stupid and worse than useless. If we were in a serious war against a foe that the American people thought was really a threat, there'd be plenty of folks down at the recruiting office to sign up. Who knows, maybe even one of these folks who always advocate wars might even think about signing up if they really thought there was some big existential threat, instead of a bullsh*t piece of crap war that they made up for their own selfish reasons.

If the U.S. started acting like a self-respecting citizen of the world instead of being a big cry-baby bully, it wouldn't need its huge military.

You're supposed to back your own troops against a river so they have no escape and will redouble their efforts to fight.

Yes, they forgot the gag about "There has never been a protracted war from which a country has benefited" -- but with the Art of History Buff Warfare it's always best to pick and choose.

So, the Bush Sr / Clinton force reductions account for the current stress on military personnel?

Wow, let's say that somehow, we had not only maintained every one of our crumbling, outdated bases, but somehow had increased our military personnel by 300% over pre-Soviet collapse levels, you know, just for the heck of it, just cause Bush Sr. thought it would be cool, maybe, but then if more of his idiot successors were to invade 10 nations which required 1,500% of the personnel, we'd still be down. Damn those anti-military skin-flints!!

Somehow, even though it sounds crazy, a lot of people, including military people, think the particular stresses of the failed Iraq occupation have something to do with current stresses on military personnel.

Perhaps then on the off-chance that we're led by more aggressive and foolish dumb*sses, maybe we should increase our military personnel numbers to, say, 75% of our total workforce, you know, just in case, and then after our idiot in chief attempts to invade and occupy every single nation on the planet, then the brave Republicans and war-mongering twits could once again blame those wimpy, traitorous, hate-the-military stabbed in the back Democrats again for our strained military personnel.