Operation Blue to Green Website- US ARMY
"Allowing You To Continue to Serve Your Country"
The U.S. Army, caught in a recruitment shortfall because of the continuing nightmare that is Iraq War II, had an idea... get people the Pentagon is losing to retirement from the Air Force and the Navy to transfer into the Army... rather than return to civilian life.
These patriotic folks have already signed their names on the dotted line. They have served their country proudly, and surely the old warhorses in the Pentagon could imagine that these are folks who will send a message to the rest of the country by 'voting with their feet'.
During this time of 'right sizing' the air force and navy, the army recognizes the need for our armed forces to retain highly qualified men and women in our ranks.
Unfortunately, the Army included lines that lend themselves to unintended gallows humor like:
Operation Blue to Green offers you an alternative to civilian life.
But... you get to keep your rank, your pay is going to be increased with benefits and other bonuses.
We cut the training down by weeks.
No push-ups?
Hey, where are you going?
Stars and Stripes Sailors and Airmen say 'No Thanks' to Army
WASHINGTON -- Only 375 airmen or sailors have so far transferred to the Army under the Blue to Green program, more than 3,000 soldiers short of what Army officials had hoped for.
Since the program was launched last July, another 750 recently retired airmen and sailors also were enticed to enlist because of the program, which shortens training time, according to Lt. Col Roy Steed, branch chief of the Army's recruiting policy and plans.
But even with those prior-service recruits, the program's enrollment is still well short of the 3,400 transfers Army officials had projected they could place in open slots this year.
Steed said the 3,400 figure was never a set goal for the Army, only that Blue to Green was set up to handle that many transfers.
Now, I don't necessarily see this as a sort of absolute referendum on what some of the people who have already been in uniform think of the war... it's just one indicator, and there are lots of other reasons why somebody who has done his or her time might just want to walk away with their head held high and return to their families and other careers... but rather, I see it as another big warning sign on the road to a trainwreck.
What if they threw a war... and nobody came in the middle?
Next year, the US military plans on adding an additional 80,000 men and women to the armed forces. Now that means a hell of a lot of chickenhawks and members of the 101rst Fighting Keyboardists better start getting off of their asses and off to the recruitment center. Stat!
Because this bullshit:
http://www.andrewsullivan.com/index.php
DON'T 'SON' ME: Hitch delivers a spot-on retort to those who claim or seem to claim that those of us who are not actually in uniform or who do not have sons to send into battle are somehow illegitimate as commentators or supporters or critics of the effort. The whole ploy is ludicrous. We have a volunteer army, that is directed, as it should be, by civilians. The military is answerable to people who have no military experience, because it is answerable - and should be accountable - to a civilian democracy. This isn't Burma or Cuba. The rest is cheap shots.
referring to this bullshit:
Christopher Hitchens
But when it comes to the confrontation in Iraq, the whole notion of grown-ups volunteering is dismissed or lampooned. Instead, it's people's children getting "sent." Recall Michael Moore asking congressmen whether they would "send" one of their offspring, as if they had the power to do so, or the right? (John Ashcroft's son was in the Gulf, but I doubt that his father dispatched him there, and in any case it would take a lot more than this to reconcile me to Ashcroft, as Moore implies that it should.) Nobody has to join the armed forces, and those who do are old enough to vote, get married, and do almost everything legal except buy themselves a drink. Why infantilize young people who are entitled to every presumption of adulthood?
--is all a total smokescreen issue (help... I might be oppressed 'Bill O'Reilly style' for helping to start a war because somebody told me to shut up) to cover the real issue:
The military on the ground in Iraq is nearer to a very real breaking point on the horizon that to a point of actually winning this wretched war I opposed. Why? Well, since so many in the pro-war movement dismiss my idea that this war was a mistake of lies and choice... we'll speak in your terms. Because there are more basement war boosters than fighters... and somebody willing to turn themselves into a human bomb will trump a t-shirt with a slogan kind of guy who will only 'type and send' for freedom..
Its time for the great boosters of this war, reformed yet hopeful or I heart Gitmo branch, to put their deeds where their mouths have been and choose: go help fight this war that is so desperately in need of an influx of actual bodies by actually carrying a rifle, or go help recruit for it by calling on the thousands of 'able but unwilling to serve' pro-war peers of yours to get the lead out. Each and every day we are in Iraq and Afghanistan from now on. Pronto.
If you are not going to be allowed into the service because you are gay and HIV+ and discriminated against by the services like Mr. Sullivan, or because you are too old and too drunk to successfully open the recruitment office door like Mr. Hitchens... start calling on those who can serve in the pro-war movement to go fight! Because this war that you both thought was so fucking wonderful, once upon a time or no, really, honestly, and truly needs new bodies to go fight it, and there is a vast >untapped< supply of blow-hard warboosters who fit the bill.
You don't want a draft? Then choose to go.
You don't want to lose? Then choose to go.
You don't want to go? Then choose to call.
You don't want to call? Then choose to lose.
First, to imply that the idea of 'choice' or 'voluntary service' in going off to the war is being degraded by the act of some people daring to question the terrible disconnect between what the great war party says and their actual deeds, especially in this time of a growing crisis in recruitment, is total nonsense. If how MoveOn.org or Michael Moore says something critical of you offends... ignore them because, really, they disregard what they consider your flop and tripe more often than not.
Second, I fail to see this massive outcry claiming that neoconservatives, left and rightwing warhawks, and the great patriotic media play-warriors of the cocktail parties and DC dinners have "no right" to speak their mind on the war because they are not in uniform, or because their children are not in uniform as some kind of 'end all be all' debate killer. That's utter intellectually dishonest horseflop and both Mr. Sullivan (who gets to wring his hands about torture, but also finds time to enable the idiotic PR architects... who boosted the people... who created the climate... that allowed the torture to occur) and Mr. Hitchens are well aware that the claim is so much horseflop.
The real issue is this: Look in the mirror, and then back at your war of choice... this was, as most wars are, purely propaganda generated:
Osama=Saddam.
Or
Afghanistan and-or Saudi Arabia=Iraq
Or
Treason=I Disagree
You are either with us, or the terrorists.
Bring it on.
Your propaganda, not mine.
You can't blame the media or the antiwar movement because your country needs more than your ability to type a Word file and submit it right now. But we know that you will. Because it's a waiting game and your country needs you to fight or help drum up fighters for the fight by calling out the warlovin' windbags to go 'Full Metal Jacketing'. But then, there are so many self-generated strawmen and red herrings the pro-war movement has got to run down.
If Iraq War II fails because the Army breaks due to lack of recruits, don't think history will blame the anti-war movement, liberals, communists, Amhearst Ma. or Berkeley Ca., the media, George Soros's left shoe, or any of your other traditional buggaboos. Look at your pro-war means pro-rhetoric hero-class, and then look in the fucking mirror because all that hot-air that helped get us off to battle won't do a damned thing when the tab comes due.
Yes,you really do have to do more than just talk.
One branch or so of the military is meeting one month or so's recruitment quota by moving the goalposts closer together.
80K is an awfully big number for moving goalposts.
The soldiers are seemingly voting with their feet by going home (the ones who aren't stop-lossed), a majority of the American public is voting thumbs down, the mothers and fathers of America are going all Nancy Reagan 'just say no' on the recruitment officers... so its all on you, warparty-goers. Firing at MoveOn.org or Howard Dean isn't going to cut it anymore.
You actually have to do something beyond a t-shirt, a blog, or a bumpersticker's slogan this time.
Now, why would an antiwar guy post such a thing? Because this antiwar guy knows that when it comes to getting the masses of the pro-war-if-it's-push-button war movement to actually fight? It will never happen.
"Fighting is for 'other' people."
"They volunteered. I support their volunteering."
"Because I just got into the most elite private business school in the country."
"I would like to get into politics, and you can't do that over there."
So, millions of people just like me, who will have to spend billions of precious tax dollars and years cleaning up the pro-choice-if-it's-war-and-it's-other-people's-choice movement's mess, will be able to get back to the business of living in a 'reality based' universe once more. So, the way I figure it, calling you all out now is a way to get started cleaning up all your expensive disasters a few months or years earlier.
Hey, it's your war, so get your war on, or... to paraphrase an old advertisement:
This 'Nam's for you.