I don't know that we so much accede to it. We're either relieved to escape from an infantry or artillery battalion environment for a few years, or we're drug off kicking and screaming. I would have been in the latter category, but my XO experience shifted me to the former.
I think rotating combat arms officers into CSS jobs would be a mistake. I had the (mis)fortune of pulling a collateral duty as team embarkation officer while doing my company XO time on a MEU deployment. My complete lack of knowledge about embarkation, logistics, or even what an M1123 HMMWV is (come to find out, it's the one that I had always been taught to refer to as a "highback") was a major hindrance. A trained logistics officer would have done a much better job (but try telling my battalion XO that - I did, and he didn't care). Ultimately, I am a much smarter MAGTF officer for having suffered through that; but I think if we were to rotate guys between CA and CSS across the board, it would turn out to be a disaster. My saving grace in that job was being surrounded by guys who were trained in that field, and could help me figure it out.If you have an infantryman running a support service, he'll likely do it with gusto and integrity, because it's his buddies up at the front that he's supporting.
Keep in mind, what you are describing is not a B billet, per se. It is a CSS billet in the operating forces. Yes, there are combat arms officers that do a turn in CSS billets in the opfor as a B billet, but they are few and far between. B billets are typically in the Supporting Establishment, like your husband's job at SYSCOM.
I like the point that Ken and some others are making. Defense contracting is here to stay for some time. A similar thing happened in Europe in the Middle Ages - it was easier to hire trained men to do their fighting than to train and maintain their own armies. The way to maintain some quality control is to word the contracts carefully, and enforce the contractual obligations.
That, sir, is premium signature line material.
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