With the active Army, Army Reserve, and Army National Guard all likely to miss their recruiting targets for FY 2005, it is a little surprising that so few politicians are calling for a return to conscription.

I suspect that a majority of the Congress, including some of the most enthusiastic voices for invading Iraq in March 2003, is beginning to think current recruiting woes are tied to an unpopular war rather than to some serious flaw with a wartime all-volunteer force.
Pull out of Iraq, common sense tells us, and most of those recruiting problems will melt away.

Military leaders, of course, can’t argue that point publicly and undermine the mission. President George W. Bush, commander in chief, insists that U.S. forces won’t leave Iraq until democracy takes root and a new Iraqi government can defend itself against insurgents and terrorists. We went in, of course, to destroy weapons of mass destruction. Had they been there, we could have destroyed them and exited quickly.

During the Vietnam War, presidents and the Pentagon didn’t have to sweat monthly recruiting goals. Draft boards supplied the Army with all of the youth it needed to sustain the war. Perhaps because the recruiting supply was a machine on automatic, more than 58,000 American servicemembers died in Southeast Asia before we decided the cost was too dear.

It’s so different with an all-volunteer force, and it’s a difference that could prove to be one of the great strengths of such a force. Presidents who rely on armies of volunteers must be more careful in starting a war; they won’t be able to sustain it without the nation’s support. A powerful stream of recruit volunteers can become a trickle.

We don’t know yet if that will happen with the Iraq war, but there are signs of trouble. Through June, or three quarters of FY 2005, the Army had signed 47,121 recruits, which was 14 percent below target — almost 8,000 recruits short. The Army National Guard missed its recruiting target at the nine-month point by 23 percent, or 10,400 recruits. The Army Reserve signed 4,100 fewer recruits than it wanted, a shortfall of 21 percent.

Curtis Gilroy, DoD’s director of recruiting policy, says the Iraq war doesn’t explain the full recruiting challenge today. After all, the economy is improving, creating more jobs for youth. But Iraq is the biggest factor. It’s the reason Congress ordered active Army strength to grow by 30,000 soldiers over the next three years, forcing the service to raise its annual recruiting mission by at least 8,000.

The Iraq war is largely behind a decline in the propensity of parents, teachers, and other “influencers” to recommend that their recruit-age youth enter military service. The war also is responsible for the call-up of hundreds of thousands of Reservists and National Guard members, the grueling pace and length of overseas deployments, and unpopular stop-loss orders.

Congress is increasing enlistment bonuses and weighing new incentives to attract recruits, including help for some with their mortgage payments. Recruiting budgets are increasing too, along with the number of recruiters. Only time will tell whether an all-volunteer force can survive, or even thrive, through a lengthy war with all the early markings of a quagmire.

The prospect of the Army escaping from a recruiting tailspin is dimmed by a shallow delayed-entry pool (DEP), recruits lined up to enlist sometime in the months ahead. Traditionally, by mid-summer, the Army likes to have in its DEP represent a third of all the recruits needed in the new fiscal year. The goal is more modest now.

“We’re shooting for 15 [percent] to 20 percent in the delayed-entry program. We’re not close to there yet,” Army Deputy Chief for Personnel Lt. Gen. Franklin L. Hagenbeck told a House subcommittee in July. “We have about half that, only about 10 percent. Those that we’re recruiting this summer are, by and large, going right into the uniformed service.”

Although meeting its monthly recruiting targets, the Marine Corps, the other U.S. ground force in Iraq, also has seen erosion in its DEP, another sign of trouble.

There’s no reason to question the operational effectiveness of our volunteer military or the bravery and skill of its individual members. There is reason to question whether Iraq is the right war to have them fight.

In time, our volunteers will tell us, and we should listen.

Tom Philpott is a freelance writer and syndicated news columnist. His column, "Military Update," appears in 48 daily newspapers throughout the United States and overseas.