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Much work awaits new Army secretary

Cynics might say that President Obama nominated Rep. John McHugh as the next Army secretary in order to move a senior Republican out of the House of Representatives and open a New York district to a takeover bid by Democrats.

But McHugh, a House Armed Services Committee member whose district includes Fort Drum, is not just another pol getting a shot at a cushy executive office. McHugh is a centrist, well-versed in military matters, with a particular interest in the Army. His nomination echoes Obama’s bipartisan pragmatism, best exemplified by his decision to retain his predecessor’s defense secretary, Robert Gates.

Confirmation should be almost automatic, a good thing because he’s coming to the job some six months after the president’s inauguration. There’s no time to waste; the Army has numerous pressing needs awaiting the new secretary’s attention:

• Soldier well-being. Signs that the Army has been pushed to its breaking point after nearly eight years of fighting are endemic: One in five combat vets is suffering symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. The more deployments, the higher the rate. Suicides are up for the fourth year in a row. Taking care of troops isn’t about platitudes anymore. It’s about keeping them alive. More needs to be known about what’s driving troops to kill themselves and what can be done to keep them from reaching that breaking point.

• Deployments and dwell time. Turning around the trends in suicides and PTSD cases hinges largely on easing the operations tempo and providing soldiers more time at home. And that doesn’t mean spending all the time between deployments gearing up for the next big push. It means giving them time to heal, to reconnect with families, to rest and emotionally recuperate.

The Army needs to study other deployment models: Would shorter, more frequent deployments — like the Marines’ seven-month war tours — be a healthier option? Army leaders like to say that wouldn’t work for their service. But as their civilian leader, McHugh should be willing to put that claim to the test.

• Deployment fairness. While some troops are getting ready for their fifth tour in the war zone, some 30,000 others have yet to deploy. McHugh must push Army leaders to root out soldiers who haven’t deployed and get them to take their turns.

• End strength. As a congressman, McHugh supported increases in the size of the Army, growth that has been essential to helping the Army meet its commitments in a time of war. Now, as secretary, he must protect those gains while pressing his generals to make more efficient use of the people they have.

Any efforts in Congress to secure a “peace dividend” when troops start coming home from Iraq are premature. One reason the Army got in this bind was that it was allowed to grow too small in the 1990s. That can’t happen again.

• Acquisition. The Army’s recent record is spotty at best. The speed with which new MRAPs were developed and delivered was exceptional. But the next-generation Joint Light Tactical Vehicle is overweight, the once-prized Future Combat Systems program, over-priced and ill-conceived, is defunct, and efforts to field a better rifle and carbine to replace the M16 and M4 have dragged on for years without results. Infighting among commands continues to hold up improvements in body armor and other soldier gear. There is no area where the secretary holds more sway than acquisition, and no area more in need of his attention and resolve to see improvement.