When the 2022 fiscal year ended Sept. 30, the U.S. Army announced fell short of its recruitment goal by about 15,000 soldiers, or 25% of its target, the Army Times reported last fall. Other military branches struggled to hit their recruitment numbers during the year, too, but only the Army failed to meet its goal, the article said.
Elaine Donnelly, who leads the Center for Military Readiness, predicts the Army’s recruiting crisis will continue in 2023 so Congress can and should address it.
“Congress has an obligation for oversight,” she tells AFN. “And I believe they will do something about this because we can't go on like this."
According to Donnelly and CMR, Congress should demand the Pentagon drop its “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” program and related Critical Race Theory-based instructions; end its plan to register women with Selective Service; stop allowing women in infantry units to enjoy less-rigorous training standards; and drop COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
That list of grievances is not just the wish list from a right-leaning think tank. A story by The Military Times, published last fall, said it heard from hundreds of military veterans who said they are not and will not recommend military service to young adults, including their children.
Most of them said “wokeness” and the “social experiment” happening in the branches is the reason, the Times story acknowledged.
“Instead of training and preparing for combat,” a former Navy submariner told the Times, “today’s military is too busy worrying about teaching proper pronouns, how to incorporate men who think they’re women and women who think they’re men into the barracks and showers.”
To its credit, the wokeness article never claims military units aren't being subjected to left-wing indoctrination. Instead, it quotes military service members who insist the criticism is not justified.
Only a "tiny fraction" of military training includes diversity, equity, and inclusion education, the Times story insists.
As far as Congress taking action, Donnelly says the power of the purse is the key.
“The House does provide funding,” she points out, “so a number of people are looking at ways to cut the budget.”
The current armed forces is filled with non-essential agencies, task forces, departments, and commissions that are promoting woke policies, Donnelly advises, and all of them deserve to be scrutinized in light of budget priorities.
“I think all of them,” she concludes, “are going to be looked at very closely.”
