DEP = Delayed Entry Program

Issue Date: October 11, 2004

Recruiting goal met, but there’s a catch
DEP raided; officials cite economy

By Sean D. Naylor
Times staff writer

The “rebounding” economy poses a greater challenge to Army recruiting than does the war in Iraq, the head of Army Recruiting Command said Oct. 1.

“We recruit remarkably talented young men and women, nearly one out of four of whom … come to us with some college credit,” Maj. Gen. Michael Rochelle said during a conference call with reporters to mark the 40th anniversary of Army Recruiting Command.

“These are folks who have, certainly in an economy that’s either robust or rebounding, they have options.”

The conference call enabled Rochelle to announce that the service had met its recruiting goals for this fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30.

The Army began fiscal 2004 aiming to recruit 72,500 soldiers. But that goal was raised in the spring to 77,500 soldiers. By the close of the fiscal year on Sept. 30, the Army had recruited 77,587, Rochelle said.

But to meet that goal, the service had to eat into the delayed entry program, through which the Army routinely recruits soldiers in one year but does not bring them into the service until the following year.

The service accomplished this by sending soldiers to basic training in 2004 whom it had originally planned to count against its fiscal 2005 recruiting mission of 80,000 soldiers.

The Army usually likes to begin a year having already recruited 35 percent of soldiers it needs for that year through DEP. For 2005, the DEP share was reduced to 25 percent. But, the Army now is beginning fiscal 2005 with just 18.4 percent of its target for the next 12 months already on the books in DEP.

Rochelle acknowledged that the war in Iraq, which so far has cost the lives of more than 1,000 U.S. troops, was deterring some young people from entering the service. But he said other recruits were signing up precisely because the country is at war.

“These are a different breed of young Americans,” he said, referring to those now entering the Army as “the Millennial Generation.”

“They are as close to a throwback to the World War II generation as anything we’ve seen since then, and the nation is very fortunate to have that young cohort of Americans here at this particular time,” he said.

Rochelle drew a particularly sharp contrast between this generation and the preceding “Generation X,” who he described as “very much the ‘what’s in it for me?’ generation.”

“Millennials are exactly the reverse of that,” he added. “Not only are they interested in how they can make a larger difference, with self being subordinated to higher goals and ideals, but they are also very much in tune with volunteerism.”

Asked why the Army was nevertheless spending more money on recruiting “the Millennial Generation,” Rochelle referred back to the “rebounding” economy.

As for what sort of soldiers the Army was looking for, Rochelle said the service’s greatest need was for combat arms specialties to fill the new brigade combat teams being created. Linguists, military intelligence and medical specialties were also in high demand, he said.

National Guard leaders previously announced they had come up short 5,000 of the 2004 recruiting goal of 56,000 new Guard members.

I have a real hard time buying this "Millennial Generation" vs. "X Generation" B.S. They being the media and even some political analysis types of just started pushing this theme of late.


The Army Propagandi shows they must not believe it either.

When I joined it was "Be All You Can Be"

Now its an "Army of One?"

The military will be fine…

Unless Kerry is elected then recruitment will drop precipitously and retention will be a disaster.  

New Army recruiting slogan, if I was dictator:

We will take your pansy ass and turn you into a bad motherfucker. You'll go home and fuck the prom queen!