Preserving dwell time a priority for Army - Army News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Army Times

Preserving dwell time a priority for Army

The Army will work to preserve soldiers’ dwell time of at least 12 months between deployments despite the upcoming surge in Afghanistan and the end of stop-loss, officials say.

Rotational units got at least 12 months of dwell time between 12-month deployments as of late December, according to Army operations officials. The service’s long-term plan is to increase dwell time to 24 months as forces are withdrawn from Iraq and Afghanistan.

But, for now, the challenge will be to keep dwell time stable during the Afghanistan buildup ordered by President Obama in early December.

During that same period, the Army will phase out the stop-loss policies that have prevented soldiers from separating or retiring during deployment.

“We have a couple of programs in effect that should mitigate problems in that area,” said Maj. Gen. Sean Byrne, commander of Human Resources Command.

“One very important consideration is the deployment extension bonuses available to soldiers who in the past would have been in a stop-loss situation, but who now have an opportunity to voluntarily complete a deployment with their unit,” he said.

Depending on when they extend, these soldiers can receive $350 or $500 for each month of the extension.

HRC assignment branches are taking a close look at units that deploy in 2010 and will replace soldiers whose terms of service will expire during the deployment, Byrne said.

“There is a price to pay with that, in that it will increase the number of people we put in units by 1 or 2 percent, but it will get us off stop-loss,” he said.

Byrne also said that within the next couple of months, the Army will start seeing the first increment of soldiers to be brought into service under the 22,000-soldier growth plan approved in 2009 by the Defense Department and Congress.

Initially this will involve about 5,000 soldiers who were recruited in the fall, and who will start coming out of the training base this winter.

While the president has ordered an additional 30,000 soldiers and Marines for Afghanistan duty in 2010, the Army’s huge force in Iraq, about 100,000 soldiers, will begin to decline after the Iraq elections in March, Byrne said.

Operating tempo will still run high, and HRC assignment managers remain committed to insuring assignment equity, according to Byrne.

“Right now, 379,000 soldiers, or 69 percent of the active force, have served at least one deployment,” Byrne said.

“That’s an increase of 10 percent in the past two years and does not include 250,000 soldiers who deployed and left service, and another 50,000 who deployed on active duty and then transferred to the reserve components,” he said.

Col. Jon Finke, chief of HRC’s enlisted personnel management directorate, said deployment equity plays a major role in the decisions of his career managers.

“When we review soldiers for reassignment to deploying units, we do look at a soldier’s deployment history so that we can balance the burden of deployments across the force.”

While the Army is temporarily growing by 22,000 soldiers, Congress recently authorized the service to add 30,000 over three years, which would bring the size of the force to 577,000 soldiers.

Byrne said additional troops will not be used to build new units, but to fill out existing ones.

“This means these soldiers will be privates, lieutenants and maybe some retirees who are recalled to active duty,” Byrne said.

As the Army adds soldiers, “there will be some midcourse assessments and corrections, either up or down, as needed,” he said.

The Army’s five-year plan to increase the number of brigade combat teams from 33 to 45 will be completed this year as the final units are manned and readied for operations. Byrne said that with the completion of that force expansion, personnel managers “will be able to tell with some precision what the manning requirements for brigades will be during reset.

“However, I expect that some of the same issues we have today, such as the shortage of captains and majors, will persist.”