thedrifter
11-28-06, 04:22 PM
DoD considers compensation for dwindling ‘dwell time’
By Gordon Lubold
Staff writer
The Defense Department is looking at ways to compensate troops who see less-than-expected time at home between deployments, a signal that the Pentagon may have to lean more heavily on service members as it tries to support two difficult wars.
The current thinking is that troops should be able to expect “dwell time” — time at home — at least as long as their most recent deployment. That is, if a service member deploys for a year, he should count on at least a year at home before being expected to deploy again.
Most troops do get that much dwell time. But with challenges remaining in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan — and the manning for both wars in question — officials have begun to look at ways to acknowledge, with greenbacks, the stresses imposed on some service members and their families.
The initiative is so new that it remains unclear how much money could be involved or even if the Defense Department will implement it. But officials say compensation might be the way to say, in effect: “Sorry for the inconvenience.”
“It would be a recognition sufficient to persuade the member and the family that we attach a value to an expectation, and if we change that expectation, we’ll provide some return value to demonstrate our regret, our respect and our encouragement,” said Bill Carr, acting deputy undersecretary for military personnel policy.
Pentagon officials see the initiative as a tool that could be used sparingly on an as-needed basis to support a short-term increase in deployment and operational tempo.
Carr said several options are on the table:
• Compensation could be paid to troops at a level proportionate to the amount of expected dwell time that is lost. For example, someone who deploys for a year and then expects to enjoy a year of dwell time, but receives orders to redeploy nine months later, could be paid “broken dwell-time pay” for those three lost months.
• Troops could be compensated simply for being away from home. A service member could be paid for “away time,” regardless of where that is, to address the frequency and duration of his time away from home. This option would not distinguish between a Marine going through training in the relative safety of Twentynine Palms, Calif., and a Marine on the streets of downtown Ramadi. But the latter Marine would still get other pays, such as hazardous-duty pay, as compensation for the danger in Iraq.
It is unclear how many service members have had to deploy beyond the 1:1 deployment/dwell-time ratio; Carr said there have been some, but not many.
The issue came to light when Pentagon officials began looking at options for deploying units to Iraq in the coming years. When certain units were plugged into deployment scenarios, flags appeared indicating that some members of those units would be deploying short of their expected dwell time, Carr said.
Officials then began considering how to address the problem. Any change likely would not require congressional authority, since the Pentagon could use special pays, such as hardship-duty pay or incentive pay, to fund the initiative.
Carr stressed that no decision on the issue would be made for at least another couple of months.
Although retention levels have remained strong for the last several years despite multiple deployments to a war zone for some, officials are concerned that broken dwell-time expectations could be the last straw.
The issue is gaining visibility with senior defense officials. Gen. James Conway, the new Marine commandant, is confronting the issue as he tries to give leathernecks more time at home before deployments. In the old days, Marines deployed at a 1:3 ratio — for each deployment, they would get three times as much time at home.
But the war in Iraq has broken that model. Now, after a seven-month deployment, a Marine returns home for about seven months before deploying again. Conway, the I Marine Expeditionary Force commander during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, came into office with the stated intention of getting Marines back to at least a 1:2 deployment-dwell time ratio. Conway may push for a larger force to achieve that.
An October 2006 report by the Congressional Budget Office cited a 2006 study by Rand Corp. that indicated troops who didn’t come home on time were more likely to want to leave the service.
By Gordon Lubold
Staff writer
The Defense Department is looking at ways to compensate troops who see less-than-expected time at home between deployments, a signal that the Pentagon may have to lean more heavily on service members as it tries to support two difficult wars.
The current thinking is that troops should be able to expect “dwell time” — time at home — at least as long as their most recent deployment. That is, if a service member deploys for a year, he should count on at least a year at home before being expected to deploy again.
Most troops do get that much dwell time. But with challenges remaining in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan — and the manning for both wars in question — officials have begun to look at ways to acknowledge, with greenbacks, the stresses imposed on some service members and their families.
The initiative is so new that it remains unclear how much money could be involved or even if the Defense Department will implement it. But officials say compensation might be the way to say, in effect: “Sorry for the inconvenience.”
“It would be a recognition sufficient to persuade the member and the family that we attach a value to an expectation, and if we change that expectation, we’ll provide some return value to demonstrate our regret, our respect and our encouragement,” said Bill Carr, acting deputy undersecretary for military personnel policy.
Pentagon officials see the initiative as a tool that could be used sparingly on an as-needed basis to support a short-term increase in deployment and operational tempo.
Carr said several options are on the table:
• Compensation could be paid to troops at a level proportionate to the amount of expected dwell time that is lost. For example, someone who deploys for a year and then expects to enjoy a year of dwell time, but receives orders to redeploy nine months later, could be paid “broken dwell-time pay” for those three lost months.
• Troops could be compensated simply for being away from home. A service member could be paid for “away time,” regardless of where that is, to address the frequency and duration of his time away from home. This option would not distinguish between a Marine going through training in the relative safety of Twentynine Palms, Calif., and a Marine on the streets of downtown Ramadi. But the latter Marine would still get other pays, such as hazardous-duty pay, as compensation for the danger in Iraq.
It is unclear how many service members have had to deploy beyond the 1:1 deployment/dwell-time ratio; Carr said there have been some, but not many.
The issue came to light when Pentagon officials began looking at options for deploying units to Iraq in the coming years. When certain units were plugged into deployment scenarios, flags appeared indicating that some members of those units would be deploying short of their expected dwell time, Carr said.
Officials then began considering how to address the problem. Any change likely would not require congressional authority, since the Pentagon could use special pays, such as hardship-duty pay or incentive pay, to fund the initiative.
Carr stressed that no decision on the issue would be made for at least another couple of months.
Although retention levels have remained strong for the last several years despite multiple deployments to a war zone for some, officials are concerned that broken dwell-time expectations could be the last straw.
The issue is gaining visibility with senior defense officials. Gen. James Conway, the new Marine commandant, is confronting the issue as he tries to give leathernecks more time at home before deployments. In the old days, Marines deployed at a 1:3 ratio — for each deployment, they would get three times as much time at home.
But the war in Iraq has broken that model. Now, after a seven-month deployment, a Marine returns home for about seven months before deploying again. Conway, the I Marine Expeditionary Force commander during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, came into office with the stated intention of getting Marines back to at least a 1:2 deployment-dwell time ratio. Conway may push for a larger force to achieve that.
An October 2006 report by the Congressional Budget Office cited a 2006 study by Rand Corp. that indicated troops who didn’t come home on time were more likely to want to leave the service.