The discussion over at Nomad’s site over the latest taxi cab related incident has diverted to if soldiers in today’s army are of lower quality than in the past. From what I have personally seen from leading these soldiers, today’s soldiers are getting smarter not dumber compared to in the past. The technical and especially computer skills of soldiers are far superior when compared to soldiers from just 10 years ago. The biggest difference I have seen is in weight. There is definitely been heavier soldiers allowed to enlist because they no longer have to meet the weight standards in basic training anymore. They are allowed to go to their units where they then have to meet weight standards or be chaptered out of the army.

Additionally from what I see soldiers are less physically active and play on their computers more than participating in sports compared to 10 years ago. This probably directly relates back to what I believe is the increased weight of soldiers. I could not find in specific studies, but I’m willing to bet that soldiers today weigh more on average than soldiers 10 years ago. However, just because soldiers are overweight doesn’t mean they are stupid, in fact I have found many of the overweight soldiers to be very capable and many of them could pass the Army Physical Fitness Test, but not the tape test, which put them on the overweight program.

One of the commenters at Nomad’s site left a link to this Slate article that accuses the Army of being dumbed down to meet recruiting goals. The article focuses on the 2005 recruiting challenges in the military and accuses the military of recruiting dumber recruits in order to meet recruiting goals that are not being met because of the war in Iraq. The article unfortunately makes no mention that the recruiting troubles in 2005 were because of the 30,000 soldier increase in the force, not because of the war in Iraq. Since the expansion was completed over a year ago the military has met all their recruiting goals because it is easier for the recruiters to sustain the force than to grow it.

The Slate article also uses statistics from a Rand Report to support their hypothesis that soldiers today are dumber than in year past. The study provides statistics that soldiers who score low on the military’s AFSQ aptitude test perform their duties more poorly compared to soldiers with higher scores.

However, what Slate won’t tell you is that the statistics from the report are from the 70s and 80s and that the Rand report writers freely admit problems with drawing conclusions from this data because of its age and the increased technical skills of today’s soldiers:

Next, the studies reviewed here largely examined the military of the 1980s. Since then, the scale and scope of operations have grown; many functions, including combat arms and logistics, have experienced technological advances; and the career content of personnel has risen. For each of these reasons, our knowledge of the relative effectiveness of members by tenure and grade is dated.

Additionally looking at the raw statistics I see some problems in how they were compiled. Take tank gunnery scores for example. The statistics say that the lower a soldier’s aptitude test the more poorly a tank gunner scores during a simulated gunnery exercise. I have to question this method because a tank gunnery is a crew exercise. You could have an extremely intelligent gunner but if his team chief and driver are incompetent than his scores will be more poor. Instead of measuring strictly the gunners score they should have measured the entire crews aptitude tests in regards to gunnery scores.

Also the statistics includes how many PATRIOT missiles need to be fired to destroy a target by different soldiers organized by their AFQT score. It found that more missiles are expended by soldiers with lower scores compared to soldiers with higher scores. The cost savings from having smarter soldier fire PATRIOT missiles is evident because each PATRIOT missile costs $2 million dollars. Like I said before this is really old data and the determination to fire PATRIOT missiles has long been decided by a college educated lieutenant and only recently after Operation Iraqi Freedom, the decision to fire a PATRIOT was given to more experienced warrant officers. However, the decision to change from a lieutenant to a warrant officer was not about cost savings, but because of the two fratricide incidents that happened during the war involving PATRIOT.

So obviously trying to use these old statistics to prove soldiers today are dumber is totally false and the writer of the report even admits to this weakness in her report. Of course Slate isn’t going to tell you that.

Also what Slate isn’t going to tell you is that the report found that someone can jump one category per year of training, which means just because they enlisted with a low test score doesn’t mean they stay dumb:

In an effort to quantify the effect of AFQT on performance in their model, the authors note that the effect of a one-level change in AFQT category appeared to equal or surpass the effect of an additional year of operator experience

There are five categories recruits are classified in according to their test scores and the report shows that a soldier is able to increase one category due to training and experience per year minimum. So even if you enlist someone from Category Four doesn’t mean they stay a category four their whole career. Additionally I find the title of the Slate article, Why Dumb Recruits Cost the Army, Big Time, offensive. I don’t agree with classifying someone as a dumb just because they initially scored as a Category Four on the test. I have had soldiers that may not be rocket scientists, but in their given specialty they are highly competent. This is most evident I have seen with cooks and mechanics. These guys may not score well overall on this test, but they generally are very good in the specialized career field they chose.

Also Slate makes no mention that the report had nothing to do with determining if the Army has been dumbed down as Slate claims. What the report states is that the military will experience cost savings by retaining more experienced soldiers instead of recruiting new ones:

The shift to a more senior force would also lead to an increase in average experience and force readiness. Depending on the estimated economic value of this readiness, aging the force could be a cost-effective approach to increasing force preparedness and efficiency.

There are many soldiers that reach a certain point of their career where for whatever reason they don’t want to be promoted. They are happy being an E-4 for example and don’t want the added responsibility of being promoted. Currently at the 10 year mark, these E-4s are forced to leave the Army, but more often than not these guys choose to leave the Army well before then, due to the pressure from their chain of command to become NCOs. The report says it is cheaper to give bonuses to and pay these senior soldiers more to retain them due to their high productivity compared to the cost of training a new recruit. Basically the report is recommending bringing back the old SPEC5 rank.

The report also recommends that these senior soldiers should be used in technical career fields where their experience and extra productivity are more beneficial to the Army compared to a branch like infantry where the younger recruits are needed due to their physical conditioning and the lack of needing great technical competence to be a junior enlisted infantrymen.

I would love to see an updated study done comparing soldiers in the 70s and 80s as this report studies to the soldiers in the US military today. I am willing to bet that our force today is more educated and a more competent fighting force. However, this wouldn’t fit into the myth making agendas of those opposed to the US military.

I believe the people should be given the maximum opportunity to serve their country and I don’t appreciate the elitist mind set that dumb people shouldn’t be allowed to join the military. This elitist mind set is very similar to what elitists decades ago used to say about black recruits and once they received increased opportunities in the military they excelled. The ranks in the military are filled with many great black soldiers and leaders. People should be given every opportunity to serve their country even if they are “dumb”, fat, female, a “gangbanger”, a “hick”, black, or have polka dots. If once they are in and cannot meet the standards than there are ways to chapter them from the ranks, while soldiers that could have initially been classified as dumb I have seen go on and excel. However, we don’t know if these people can excel if we don’t give them an opportunity.

Also I find the argument by some commenters that taxi cab related incidents in general is a sign of decreased recruiting standards and a dumbed down force. The overall crime rate and incidents by USFK soldiers has been on a steady decrease and per capita USFK soldiers commit less crime than the general Korean population. The perception however, doesn’t reflect that because every incident is immediately broadcast on the news compared to years ago when it wasn’t. Imagine if every time a Korean civilian had an incident with a taxi cab it was broadcast on the news? It would create the same unfair perception as well.

Just from my own personal historical perspective I saw much more serious crime happen years ago in USFK compared to now. Additionally, the ville is relatively tame compared to what used go on there just eight years ago where the prostitutes, booze, and fighting was out of control. I better knock on wood here, but look at the last time there was a murder of a Korean civilian by a USFK soldier. The last murder was in 2000 when SPC McCarthy murdered a juicy girl in Itaewon. A US soldier was more recently murdered by a Korean than vice versa. Heck I can remember when a soldier stole an M-88 on Camp Hovey years ago and ran it into a club in Toko-ri to get back at some juicy girl. Can you imagine the media coverage if something like that happened today? Back then it wasn’t a big deal, now something like that happening would be.

USFK soldiers are much better behaved than years past and the statistics reflect that, however the publicizing of every incident involving a US soldier, causes a perception that says otherwise. The sensationalizing of every incident is used to create a perception of out of control USFK soldiers which statistics show is not true. This perception game is being played in order to increase anti-USFK sentiment within Korea. It is this same perception game that groups opposed to the US military in America are trying to create by continually running stories that we are dumb, uneducated low lives that are committing war crimes all over Iraq that do not deserve the nation’s respect. But remember they support the troops.

As much as some people want so desperately to believe otherwise, the military is not full of uneducated low lives. If anything we have never had a more educated and professional force than we have now, which is testament to the hard work of the US military recruiters that have been able to keep the force filled in the midst of a force expansion, transformation, an on going war, and a anti-military campaign be launched by both the media and politicians. Yet people are still joining the military. I am proud to serve with the people that I serve with now.

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