Army expects to miss recruiting goal; other services on track

[lebkuchen]

Despite high re-enlistment numbers, Army officials expect they will miss their recruiting goals for this fiscal year and will face serious problems next year too.

Lt. Gen. Franklin Hagenbeck, deputy chief of staff for the Army, said the service’s delayed entry pool for 2006 is about half of what officials usually depend on before entering a new year’s recruiting cycle. Instead of supplementing that pool, recruiters are enrolling new soldiers right away to make up for this year’s shortfalls.

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he noted that the Army recruiting problems could last well into next year, even if higher enlistment bonuses and other new recruiting tools are approved.

Those enticements, pending before Congress, likely won’t go into effect until early 2006, three months into the new recruiting cycle.

“We recognize the seriousness of the problem,” he said. “We are below where we want to be.”

http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=30455