Reply #: Former soldiers: Uncle Sam wants you, again

[SCRUBDASHRUB]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10257413/from/RS.2/

Updated: 9:48 p.m. ET Nov. 29, 2005
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WASHINGTON - For former soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines who might be toying with the idea of getting back into uniform, the Army has a new offer: Join us and regain your old rank without repeating basic training.

It’s the latest twist in the Army’s pitch for recruits at a time when wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are making it increasingly difficult to enlist young people and meet the Army’s need for 80,000 new soldiers a year.

“It’s common sense,” says Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty, an Army spokesman. For the cost of mailing a brochure to targeted former service members, the Army can open a door that had been jammed shut before.

The Army previously had welcomed back former service members, but only under conditions that made it an unattractive proposition to most, namely that they would lose their prior rank and were required to take basic training again. Starting this month, the Army sent mailings to 78,000 people who left the Army, Navy, Air Force or Marine Corps less than five years ago, including 7,000 officers, as first reported Monday by the private Army Times newspaper.

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