The Corporate Takeover of U.S. Intelligence

[Ken White]

There is another issue that I've not seen anything written about... The net effect has been that we see many qualified soldiers retire or leave the service and take essentially the same positions as either a civil servant or as a contractor.

It is incredible to watch someone retire one day and then assume the same job the next day -- ... -- but less control and accountability.

With uniformed military, you buy the service; with civil service, you are leasing; with contractors, you are are renting the service.

Even though we are in a war, we are still having mandatory retirements and some of the up-or-out policies. These type of policies make sense if you are in a "surge" that is short-term, but they don't make sense if we are trying to fight a long war. In the long run, "renting" costs you more money.

The current grade structure is, however, a limiting factor... the law restricts the senior grade population based on overall end strength. With the push towards more interagency coordination, greater civil affairs requirements, and an emphasis on advisors, it may well be time to relook the grade structure in the military.

There's a lot of writing bout it, just not in the main stream media because they're (IMO) way too slow to understand the problem and it is a topic that'll make the average reader's eyes glaze. Government Executive and the Service pubs all talk about the problems you cite and many more.

I don't think those who go into Civil Service are less subject to control or to accountability though obviously the contractors are. That's getting sorted out, we have a very slowly responding system of government by design and that's generally okay -- we do by pass it in a major war. I suspect the contracts will get tighter, be better written and more controls -- probably too many -- will be emplaced in the next few years.

I'm not sure what you mean by leasing with Civil Service. While I'm certainly aware of a number of problems with the system, I do know that, mostly, it works. The basic reasoning behind civilianizing a position is that the average cost per person in uniform is almost $120K while the average civilian cost is less than 75% of that. The down side is that most civilian jobs aren't deployable. Contracting lowers the cost even more (and using host or third nation folks cost even less).

A soldier on KP or a Marine or Sailor on mess duty still costs $120K a year and you're wasting a lot of money on minimum wage work; a Cook will cost you a bit more but it doesn't approach the military cost and taking the kid away from training. Same goes with Security Guards on bases, it's just a lot cheaper and of about the same effectiveness. There are many arguments pro and con on the practices but the cost factor rules -- and will likely continue to do so. Not least because the big contractors have deep pockets and lobby quietly...

Up or out was never, in my view, a very smart policy. Some of us tried to point out when it was instituted that given a war, you were going to have to dump it if the war lasted a while and there was no major force expansion -- and that time is approaching. I understand the rationale for bringing in new blood and I totally agree that's necessary but a better way than up or out is to fire folks based on poor performance. I submit that up or out is essentially supposed to be a version of that but I do not think it is. Mandatory retirements aren't all that bad, age does have penalties for all. While some can be productive after the nominal mandatory date, on balance, most are ready to go or need to -- even if they don't realize it. It's a young persons game...

Remember the guys and gals in the sandboxes are at war, the bulk of the Armed Forces here in CONUS and elsewhere are not. Two sets of rules are difficult to administer so the peacetime set wins. Probably shouldn't be that way but there are a surprising number of senior folks, Officer and Enlisted who quietly feel like Eisenhower's Army Service Force Commander in Europe did on VE Day when he announced he was glad the war was over and the Army could get back to real soldiering. The Bureaucracy must be served, the institution must be protected, rocks must be painted...

I've run across more than several of those in the last three or four years. I think they've lost sight of why they were hired, personally -- and I do know that the kids don't fail to notice...

While I agree with your penultimate paragraph; my suspicion is that many Americans and many in Congress would not -- they do not want a long war, ergo if they do not support a realistic force structure, the long war will go away. Ostriches abound. Yes, renting does cost more but, as in many other things, Congress is willing to pass that cost on to their successors.

Heh. The statutory limits on grades are more often ignored than not by all services. Standby for opinions and a rant; Other than the FlagOs who are high vis -- and there are way too many of them anyway and many are somewhat underemployed -- most limits are routinely ignored. Do the math on any rank, counting TDRL, Hospital, intransit, schools, serving while frocked and so forth on and on. The statutory grade structure was predicated mostly on the circa 1990 Armed forces which had considerably greater end strength than is the case today -- and of course, those limits do not apply to the Reserve Components.

If there's a grade problem, it is overgrading across the board. Most of the over grade problems are due to DOPMA in the officer ranks and due to, in the Army, the Hoffman Building (my standing advice to all Army Officers; when you get to be Chief of Staff, destroy the Hoffman Building) and its resident Human Resources Command or whatever they are this week. The problem with ranks in the Armed forces in my view is rank creep. Upwards. It needs to be stopped. Concomitantly, the pay structure needs radical work so that people can be rewarded for doing a good job without necessarily being promoted in an effort to prove the Peter Principle works; that will eliminate the need for up or out. End opinionated rant.