Brownlee: where we stand

Soldiers Magazine, Oct, 2004 by Beth Reece

A RETIRED Army colonel, acting Secretary of the Army R.L. Brownlee knows what it's like to be a Soldier. Since assuming his Pentagon position last June, he has visited Soldiers in Iraq, Kuwait, Afghanistan, Korea, Bosnia and other locations around the world. The American Soldier, he's known to say, is the single most important factor in winning America's war on terror. Here, he addresses issues currently affecting Soldiers and how the Army is coping with, and will continue to cope with, the demands of war.

Q What would you say is the Army's biggest challenge right now?

Brownlee: Our main mission right now is to win the war on terror, and we're doing that. But we also want to ensure that we're taking care of Soldiers and their families. The Soldiers we have today volunteered to wear the uniform of their country. That many of them volunteered during a war is an incredible circumstance, so I feel a huge obligation to be sure we're taking care of them. When I go out and talk to Soldiers the one thing most of them ask me to do is ensure their families are being well cared for.

Q How is the Army responding to the current operations tempo? How will we meet our present and future commitments without stretching ourselves too thin?

Brownlee: Right now we have a very high level of commitment. We have a much larger number of brigades deployed than we thought we would at this time. We're asking a lot of our Soldiers in terms of deployments, how frequently they're deployed and the amount of time they have before going back.

But at the same time, we're laying the groundwork to relieve the stress on them. One of the things that we're doing is increasing the size of the active force. Our plan is to "grow" the Army by 30,000 over the next three years, using supplemental dollars and building the right kinds of units in the right components and in the right numbers with the capabilities we need. Ultimately, it means more cohesive and combat-ready formations, more stability, and a more predictable lifestyle for our Soldiers and their families.

We're also working very hard to restructure the Guard and Reserve so they're used more effectively and efficiently. For example, we've converted a lot of artillery batteries into military police units because they're in high demand right now. We're going to do more and more of that, but it's not going to be easy or happen overnight. The chief of staff of the Army has likened it to repairing an engine while it's still running.

Q Will Reserve and Guard mobilizations continue as they are, or will there be changes?

Brownlee: Right now there are some units and job specialties that are in higher demand than others. Because we have to rely on those Soldiers so much, they get deployed more. We're currently restructuring the Guard to increase the number of units in such specialties as military police and civil affairs. To do that, we're converting units we don't need as much anymore--like air defense and artillery. Again, it's like repairing an engine while the motor is running. It's hard to do. If you're converting an artillery unit to military police, for example, you don't just dub them military police. You've got to send them to school, organize them as a unit and train them as a unit. Our long-term goal is to increase the size of the active component so that Soldiers only have to deploy once for every three times they don't have to deploy. If they go for six months, they would only have to deploy every couple of years. Right now some of them are going one for one.

In the reserve components, we hope to get them to one deployment for six. But for at least the next three years we're going to be under some stress. We will also be able to bring down the commitment level as the Iraqis become more capable of helping themselves.

Q Is the Army meeting its retention goals? What are the challenges and how are we responding to them?

Brownlee: We're meeting our retention goals in the active Army, the Guard and the Reserve. We're also meeting our recruiting goals, except the Guard is a little bit down right now. Part of that, of course, is because more of our Soldiers are staying in the active force, which is one of the pools from which the Guard recruits prior-service members.

Q Why do you think Soldiers are staying in?

Brownlee: It's amazing, and a lot of people don't understand it . Our Soldiers are brave and patriotic Americans who love their country, who understand how this country is threatened. They haven't forgotten 9/ 11. And believe me, these people who attacked us on 9/11--and there are still plenty of them out there--if they could kill 10 times the people they killed on 9/11, they would.

I believe the strategy we have for fighting them is a good one. Not only have our Soldiers provided an opportunity for freedom and democracy for all the people in Afghanistan and Iraq, they are simultaneously protecting the American people. I believe Soldiers understand the gravity of that, maybe more than many other Americans do.