Pentagon says it has no plans for military draft

WASHINGTON – There are no government plans to reinstate a military draft and the Bush administration does not support conscription, the Pentagon’s top official for personnel and readiness told members of Congress at a hearing Wednesday.

Trying to counter recent Internet rumors that the U.S. military and the Selective Service System are girding for a potential draft to support operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, Undersecretary of Defense David Chu said there is no reason to bring back the draft. He fielded questions on the issue at a House Armed Services Committee hearing that focused on the strains on military personnel as officials plan to rotate more troops into the conflicts in coming months.

“The administration does not support resumption of the draft,” Chu said, responding to a question from Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa. “There is no secret plan on this front.”

Members of the committee from both political parties bemoaned the rising stress on the Army and the increasing use of the National Guard and Reserves to fill gaps in the military. Chu and top military officials said that there is definitely a strain, but that the Army can handle its current operations while relying on reserve forces to share “the burden of service” throughout the all-volunteer military.

There are 18 U.S. brigades with more than 140,000 troops in Iraq, and officials said Wednesday that the next rotation will keep about 135,000 troops there in 17 U.S. brigades. U.S troops are expected to have a presence in Iraq for several years, but Pentagon officials Wednesday declined to speak to members of the committee publicly about plans for future rotations, saying only that they will be “different.”

Last week, the Army announced that it is dipping into a pool of veteran soldiers who have left active-duty service, calling up 5,600 people from across the country this week who are in the Individual Ready Reserve. While the IRR has more than 111,000 members, the Army’s Human Resources Command has identified more than 22,000 members whom it could call involuntarily into service if needed. Pentagon officials have said they probably will tap into some of that pool in the future.

That decision came on the heels of a recent “stop-loss” order that kept thousands of soldiers in the military despite their plans to leave active duty, and it followed a Pentagon decision to move thousands of troops from South Korea into western Iraq by early next year. The Army is also sending its elite training forces overseas.

As of the next rotation into Iraq, reserve components are slated to make up 43 percent of the forces there, said Air Force Lt. Gen. Norton Schwartz, director of operations for the Joint Chiefs.

Army Gen. Richard Cody, the Army’s vice chief of staff, said forces are “absolutely” stretched thin. He also said the entire force is doing a job it was not necessarily trained for, arguing that the Army needs to reconfigure from a Cold War stance to a more versatile force for the global war on terrorism. “This is a different war,” Cody said.

Some members of Congress said Wednesday that they fear the military is dangerously close to being broken. Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., the committee’s ranking Democrat, said he believes that the military is wearing its soldiers out. Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla., said he believes that the military is “using people pretty hard right now” and needs to consider getting permanently larger – an idea the Pentagon has been resisting because it would permanently raise the military’s budget.