The Challenge of Meeting the Needs of Our Active and Reserve Military (PDF; 1.16 MB
Source: Center for Strategic and International Studies
“The Iraq War is a warning that the US needs enough military manpower to fight all of the kinds of wars it may face, and meet all of its strategic commitments. Planning on technology, the ability to predict the nature of future conflicts, and improvements in individual manpower quality is only meaningful if every element is fully implemented. If any element falls short, the only answer is more men and women in uniform, and at least one element — US procurement plans — cannot be implemented in anything like the way that current plans call for. As a result, the greatest single uncertainty in current military manpower plans seems to be the idea that the US can solve its manpower problems with the same or smaller number of men and women in uniform. Increasing active and reserve end strength is not cheap. However, current plans may well rely too heavily on force restructuring to solve these problems without providing a realistic analysis of whether the total military manpower pool is adequate, and of the cost- benefits of increasing the manpower pool in the various active and reserve components. Policy seems to be designed around the thesis that force restructuring and rebalancing will work because they need to work if the US is to keep defense spending within anything approaching its current limits — and pay for the technology that is being given higher priority than manpower quantity and quality.”

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