The Systemic Shortcomings of the All-Volunteer Force Model That Adversely Affect America’s National Security

By Colonel Dianna L. Carson and Gary A. Roulier

Abstract:

Typically, when the All-Volunteer Force Model is examined, writers and senior leaders discuss it  chiefly as a recruiting or manpower issue. The model, as was noted at the time of its inception, had  implications beyond manpower—the overall defense posture cost picture, reliability of an  appropriate size force to meet the operational and strategic needs of the country, whether costs  would allow for a high quality of life, trade-offs that would have to be made due to burgeoning  costs, etc. This paper will make the case that the All-Volunteer Force model must be looked at,  again, more holistically because leaders cannot fully appreciate its viability or nature if each of  these factors is dealt with independently. Recruiting and retention have increasing costs that  influence other national security leader choices in equipping, force structure size, weapons  systems, ships, aircraft, housing, quality of life, etc. Systemic shortcomings of the model appear to  go unexamined, and the paper will address them. 

Introduction:

Today’s mitary manning crisis highlights problems with the All-Volunteer Force as  implemented and represents a clear and present danger to America’s national security. Except for Space Force, all the Services have been struggling to fill their ranks, and the Army, Navy, and Air  Force failed to attain their recruiting goals in 2023 (1,2,3). The Army National Guard and Army Reserve  have frequently missed their goals since FY17, and the Navy Reserve has similarly missed their  recruiting goals since FY18. The Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve have had missed  recruiting goals since FY22 (4). The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2023 (NDAA  FY23) authorized the smallest Army (452,000 Soldiers) since World War II (5). FY24’s Defense budget perpetuates this. It allows the Army to maintain its 452,000 end strength, (6) the Navy authorized  strength to drop by 17,000, the Air Force by 5,344, and the Marine Corps by 5,000 (7). Defense  officials freely admit these are the levels they can recruit to, not their desired staffing levels for a  formidable national defense (8, 9, 10) 

When the All-Volunteer Force began, the Gates Commission and the Selective Service  System made assumptions about factors that would determine how large the recruited military could be:  

• Recruiting for clear national security reasons, like a “Pearl Harbor type” event, would result  in higher recruiting numbers than would materialize for a limited operation overseas.

• The quality of life in the military and terms of service would influence recruiting and  retention. 

• Casualties would influence a willingness to serve.

• Compensation could motivate one to serve. 

• How the public viewed military service would be a factor in deciding about service for potential recruits (11, 12). 

Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird was convinced that, with the advent of the AVF, the Reserve  Components would come to be more heavily relied upon. This was because he saw a need to reduce  the DoD budget and the size of the Active force. He came to refer to this augmentation as a “total  force concept.” In 1973, his successor James Schlesinger articulated this concept in terms of  augmenting Active Component personnel and integrating “use of all forces that are available Active, Reserve, civilian, and allied.”(13) 

University of Chicago Libertarian economists persuaded the Gates Commission that  overall costs savings from “hidden taxes” would offset some cost increases of a recruited force,  but the military Services were rightly skeptical (14). Over time, the recruiting costs were typically seen  in the context of manpower (15), and these costs were most frequently reduced by downsizing (16) of  military manpower (17). Force structure cuts can, though, reach a point at which the national security  risks can be too high. There is little evidence that leaders considered the implications of  downsizing on operational tempo (OPTEMPO), family dynamics, oversight, and the potential  psychological and physical impacts. 

Initially, the Gates Commission and Department of Defense (DoD) officials considered  mitigating military personnel costs by proposing some support billets be reclassified to civilian  positions (18). This notion that cost savings can be realized by conversion of military to civilian  positions persists (19). Over time, however, it became clear to some, like Secretary of Defense Donald  Rumsfeld during the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars, that contractor support was more efficient and  flexible than civilianizing positions (20). This has meant that, when pursued, many of the cost-savings  anticipated with civilianized positions were not realized with contractors. When combined with downsizing of military forces, this has meant a growth in the contractor-to-Service-member ratio of  1.5 to 1.0 and an increase in costs (21).  

Discussions about the military manning crisis too often devolve into a simplistic discussion  of how to enhance recruiting efforts. Questions arise about paying for more recruiters, paying  recruiters more, redesigning the recruiting structure, access to schools, screening criteria,  enlistment bonuses, etc. The tradeoffs and mitigation strategies employed to keep the AVF in place  are rarely discussed in terms of inter-related factors. The All-Volunteer Force Model must be  looked at more holistically because leaders cannot fully appreciate the model’s viability or nature if  each factor is dealt with independently of the ecosystem affected. Recruiting and retention have  increasing costs that influence other national security leader choices in equipping, force structure  size, weapons systems, ships, aircraft, housing, quality of life, etc. Systemic shortcomings of the  model appear to go unexamined, and the paper will address them.  

Quality of Life Factors:

Opinion polls continue to show time and time again that the American public con siders its military volunteers to be among the country’s most skilled, dedicated, and  courageous professionals. To ensure this perception remains accurate, military  volunteers must be provided a quality of life that encourages the skilled and disciplined  to stay and attracts promising young people to join. Voluntary service is inexorably  linked to quality of life. – 1995 Defense Science Board Task Force on Quality of Life (22) 

Operational Tempo:

OPTEMPO is a term for the rate at which Service members engage in all their military duties,  and it includes day-to-day work, travel to and from these duties, training, and deployments (23). A  reasonable outcome of a shrinking force is that the necessary duties not transferred to civilian  workers and contractors fall on the shoulders of those Service members who remain. This can  create stress on them and their families. When operational requirements are ambiguous, the Services may further compound the burden by having to train for multiple scenarios. For example, OPTEMPO in March 2023 led to 120,000 Soldiers being deployed overseas that month. In 2008, DoD  had 187,900 troops deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan, but they also had about 70,000 more Soldiers  in the Army that year than were in the Army in 2023. Preparing for the Combat Training Center (CTC)  ahead of these deployments, training at the CTC, and then deploying has meant long days and time  

away from home to ensure troops are prepared for the worst case scenarios (24). Since 9/11, the high  operational tempo has meant increased use of the Reserve Components, so much so that they  have come to be referred to as an Operational Reserve. This has placed a huge amount of stress on  them and their families, often with varied levels of benefits for the Service members and their  families (25, 26). This has not abated. The U.S. continues to rely on the Reserve Components to fulfill  global missions. This OPTEMPO comes at cost to quality of life. It affects Service members’ and their family members’ psychological well-being, personal interactions, work-life conflicts, physical  health, and may lead to substance abuse (27-31). 

Suicide in some military branches is at the highest rate since before World War II (32). Since  9/11, suicide rates among active-duty military members continue to increase (33, 34). For example, in  2021, 30,177 active component post-9/11 Service members and veterans died by suicide (35), while  only 7,057 were killed in combat (36). A recent study that looked at 2.5 million service member medical records found the veteran suicide rate rose more than tenfold from 2006 to 2020, even  though the rate for the US adult population remained relatively flat (37). 

Healthcare:

A compounding factor for Service members and their families is that DoD — to address  their own personnel shortfalls and reduce costs — restructured and outsourced healthcare, which  has reduced access to timely behavioral health and medical care (38). In Fiscal Years 2020, 2021, and  2022, DoD also reduced budgetary requests for the Defense Health Program in conjunction with  the restructuring and personnel reductions (39). Under authorization in the FY17 NDAA, the Defense Health Agency (DHA) planned to cut 12,800 military billets to “close or realign” 50 treatment sites  (38 of which provided care to military personnel only). To add insult to injury, DHA sought to have  non-active-duty family members pay more of their health care costs as part of the plan (40). 

Military families are increasingly unhappy with access to care, their selection of providers, co-pays, and medication costs. A Military Officers Association of America survey of 8,500 TRICARE  users in 2018 found that 15 percent of spouses said they had to cancel or postpone care because  of associated expenses, and more than 50 percent were worried about paying for medications (41). In  rural areas, obtaining care as a TRICARE beneficiary has been difficult post-COVID (42). 

In its November 2023 Management Advisory about access to care and staffing shortages,  the DoD Inspector General (DoDIG) indicated that Soldiers in South Korea identified a lack of  access to medical care as contributory to suicide, and a focus group told the DoDIG they faced  barriers to behavioral health access (having to wait as long as six weeks) (43). Concerns in Congress  about the potential relationship between the lack of access to behavioral health care and suicides  led to the passage in 2017 of the Brandon Act (named for Navy Petty Officer Third Class Brandon  Caserta) (44), and the lack of care has been associated with deaths overseas (45) and is especially  difficult in the Indo-Pacific region (46). As a result of the DoDIG’s findings, DoD has started a reversal  of DHA’s decision to send beneficiaries into communities for care instead of receiving care through  DoD facilities (47). 

The DHA redesign was not intended to deliver the best medical care delivery system for  those who serve in the Armed Services, nor can they sell it to prospective recruits as such. Because  of how DoD functions, DHA’s design also would not have been part of a holistic examination of a recruiting and retention strategy. The perceived cost-cutting measures were not, therefore,  developed to ensure high potential for recruiting and retention. Instead, they would have been part of an independent healthcare cost reduction strategy, even though quality, timely care is essential  to Service member and family well-being. 

Housing:

While the Gates Commission efforts were underway, Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird  placed his Assistant Secretary of Defense for Manpower and Reserve Affairs Roger Kelley in charge  of a committee to examine the feasibility of an all-volunteer force. Secretary Kelley’s team  cautioned Secretary Laird that the Gates Commission might have been underestimating the long term costs of the AVF. They said that, beyond competitive and equitable pay being essential to the  feasibility of an all-volunteer force, “Better housing than exists or is now being planned will be  necessary . . . .” (48). 

In 1996, to enhance recruiting, Congress privatized military family housing. Today 99  percent of such housing is privatized, but families have grown frustrated with the management  companies and the conditions in housing (49). As part of its response, the Services established a  tenant’s bill of rights, but they did this before negotiating with the housing companies, which has  impaired appropriate implementation of the bill of rights. Because of the continuing family housing  issues, Congress intervened to address substandard conditions, the tenant’s bill of rights, and  military oversight. DoD’s response to these requirements has been inadequate, as it has not  standardized inspections and has failed to provide sufficient inspector training (50). These housing  conditions are not part of military recruiting or retention strategy development. Housing is simply  seen as a DoD activity unto itself. 

Unlike how DoD handles family housing, the US government owns most permanent party  and training barracks,1 so they control the condition of the barracks (51). Yet, barracks are no better. In 2023, when the Government Accountability Office (GAO) investigated military housing, they found  deplorable living conditions and an assessment system that failed to identify shortcomings. These include barracks that were uninhabitable, had squatters, and had squalid conditions. GAO also  found that family housing was too frequently unavailable or substandard (52) and had housing  management companies that were unresponsive (53, 54, 55). Investigators warned these conditions  could undermine military readiness and morale, and Reuters conducted an investigative series on  the conditions in military family housing, emphasizing Service members’ and their families’  frustrations with military housing (56). The barracks are in this state because the Services funded  sustainment needs at only 80 percent (57). When juggling costs, DoD did not seem to recognize the  connection between the experience of barracks life and recruiting and retention. 

In too many instances, military families find no housing is available on the installation and  must look in the local market for a house. Cost and availability present challenges (58). Former Vice  Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Paul J. Selva said that “nationwide, over 70 percent of  military families live of base due to lack of military housing,” and the basic allowance for housing is  “not keeping pace with inflation.” Further, the situation becomes a matter of national security  because “when military families struggle to find affordable housing, it can have a significant impact  on their overall well-being and readiness to serve (59)”. Matters are made worse when Service  members move frequently, as military families have reported that housing costs and relocation  issues are “increasingly stressful and expensive (60)”. 

High quality barracks and family housing conditions, as Secretary Kelley foresaw, are  essential to recruiting and retention. The housing and barracks standards must be worthy of the  Service members and family who serve the nation. For FY24, Congress authorized additional  funding to cover the costs of restoring favorable housing conditions, and they mandated DoD set minimum standards for “safety, security, and habitability” for barracks ahead of housing them in those facilities. Congress’s actions are consistent with the American public’s expectation for  Service member housing (61, 62). The cost factors that led DoD to divert 20 percent of housing  sustainment funds elsewhere put recruiting and retention at risk, as well as the health and well being of Service members and families. A volunteer force model cannot be sustained in such an  ecosystem. 

The age-old leader's admonition to avoid “messing with pay, food, and mail” has fallen to the  wayside when it comes to feeding single Service members. Too frequently, military bases are  having a hard time keeping dining facilities open. For example, at Fort Cavazos, Texas, the post was  able to consistently keep only two of its ten dining facilities (DFACs) open during much of the  summer of 2023 – forcing many Soldiers to travel distances of up to an hour round trip for meals (63).  Similarly, food services at Fort Knox in 2023 were disrupted when contractors walked off the job,  complaining they had not been paid. This resulted in Reserve Officer Training Corps cadets eating  expired Meals Ready to Eat (MREs), some of which cadets reported were moldy (64). Officials at Fort  Cavazos explained their dining facilities issues resulted from diverting their DFAC workers to Fort  Knox to provide food service for Cadet Service Training when the walk out occurred. Additionally,  due to OPTEMPO, several were sent to the National Training Center (65). 

Food service costs are the major logistical cost driver on military installations. The  downsizing in the number of troops has compounded the difficulty in covering the costs of running  DFACs, and there is a tendency of Service members to seek out fast food for many of their meals— either because of taste, convenience (66), or the restricted hours DFACs are open, further reducing  usage (67). The Services began contracting out food service in 1990, presuming food services could be  acquired at competitive prices and Service members could be relieved of these duties to focus on  mission tasks (68).

Troops complain about the nutritional options, quality and variety of food, and unhygienic  foods and DFAC conditions. Soldier social media posts about this, which are common, can erode  recruiting messages. To address troops’ concerns and create a more favorable dining experience for  Soldiers, the Army in the last five year has sought to modernize food service options. This has  included considering allowing restaurants to provide foods in DFACs, permitting Soldiers to use  commissaries as a source for food they had to obtain at DFACs before, and food kiosks (69, 70, 71). 

Food is also an issue for military families. More than one quarter of military families were  food insecure in 2018, and, in 2020, more than 14 percent of military families indicated they had  experienced food insecurity in the previous year. Sixty-seven percent of those reporting food  insecurity were in grades E4 to E6, and 21 percent were E1 to E3. Additionally, the rate of those who  were food insecure living on an installation (30 percent) was 7 percent higher than those living of  base/post (72). Research shows families in which both parents contribute to household income are 27 percent less likely to need food supplementation than those with only one income. Military families  too often must resort to rely on a single income because of how frequently they move (73). Additionally, the Basic Allowance for Housing does not immediately change upon relocation or the  addition of a dependent, and not all moving expenses are reimbursed (74). The food, housing, and  healthcare realities are very different from what the Services describe to potential recruits.

Military Spouse Unemployment and Under-Employment:

Military spouses have a 22 percent unemployment rate. The Chamber of Commerce points  out that this is “one of the highest unemployed demographics in the United States. (75)”. Additionally,  they face a 26 percent wage gap when compared to civilians (76). According to research, this – in  addition to moving every two to three years - makes it hard to bring in a competitive salary. It is also  difficult to maximize employer-sponsored retirement benefits (they were frequently unable to fully  vest) (77). Just over one third of military spouses are licensed in the work they do, which can present difficulties when seeking employment at a new duty station, given the need to transfer the license.  One in five of them have had to wait at least 10 months or more for the transfer to occur (78). In a 2021  study, the GAO estimated a 25 percent unemployment rate for spouses in credentialed fields. While  a 2024 law has come to fruition that will require states to recognize professional licenses from  other states when a move occurs due to military orders (except for law licenses), 43 percent of  active-duty families say spousal unemployment is their biggest stressor (79).

Childcare:

According to a 2023 GAO report, accessibility and affordability of childcare remain  challenges for military families. Wait lists for on-base childcare continue to affect military families,  and cost is particularly a major concern for lower-ranking Service members. When on-base/post care is not available, families are forced to use local facilities, resulting in increased costs, even  with fee assistance. A 2021 Military Family Lifestyle Survey revealed that 20 percent of unemployed  active-duty spouse respondents who desired employment found childcare unavailability blocked  them from being able to attain it. The same study found that 34 percent acknowledged that  childcare was too expensive (80). Additionally, Service member parents too often find that childcare  hours are not flexible enough to ensure care during military duty hours (81).

Service Family Members are Discouraging Their Children from Serving:

Not surprisingly, these quality-of-life factors are causing service family members to begin  to discourage their children from serving. According to the 2017 Military Lifestyles Survey, 60  percent of survey participants said they would not encourage their children to go into the military,  primarily because of long separations from their families. Nearly 40 percent of Service members  had been separated from their families for six months in the past 18 months. Fifty-one percent felt they did not belong in their communities, and 67 percent of female Service members could not find  childcare (82). 

Prior to the All-Volunteer Force, 40 percent of enlisted Service members were married.  Today, 49 percent are (83). Two-income households were uncommon among military families, but they  are a necessity now (84). The well-being of military families is essential to readiness and the  psychological health of Service members. The rippling effect of employment, income, financial  security, quality housing, and healthcare must be considered when looking at how best to frame  how DoD will support the ecosystem of her Service members (85). One cannot ensure robust recruiting and retention when military families struggle. 

Leadership Issues:

Leadership is intangible, and, therefore, no weapon ever designed can replace it.  ~Omar N. Bradley 

The military has a longstanding reputation for leader development. Warren Bennis,  renowned leadership expert, created an entire program of learning at the University of Southern  California and wrote about 30 books on the subject (86). Throughout his years as a professor and  advisor to presidents and other executives, he translated the leadership tenets he learned while in  the Army into sage advice to business leaders (87, 88) The types of leaders the military develops today  will profoundly affect recruiting and retention of tomorrow’s force. What is accepted and expected  of military leaders shape the ecosystem in which one serves. This must be considered as part of  what the military manning system should be. 

OPTEMPO presents a considerable obstacle to today’s military leaders when compared  with those of the World War I and II eras. Today’s OPTEMPO makes it harder for leaders to  transform in ways these other leaders developed. Quite simply, OPTEMPO precludes current  leaders from having time to unwind, reflect, read, and study. They are confronted with pending deployments, rotations through the National Training Center, training exercises, and preparations  for multiple threat scenarios, while struggling with quality of life challenges. This absence of  leisure and reflection has the potential to stunt their development as leaders, and it makes military  service less desirable to the younger generations, especially military kids who have experienced  the impact (89). 

The American “up-and-out” system, which was intended to allow for upward movement  within a highly competitive, centralized pyramid promotion system works as intended in that it  downsizes and empties out upper levels of leadership to accommodate advancement through the  pyramid. Today, when the Services complain that obesity restricts who can serve, they ignore that  today’s weight restrictions were designed specifically to force some Service members out.  

This personnel system is not what the Gates Commission envisioned for a viable all volunteer force (90). The current system has put an end to variable military career paths that produced  the likes of John J. Pershing, Leonard Wood, George C. Marshall, Chester W. Nimitz, and Matthew  Ridgeway. Ultimately, the AVF grew to have a centralized promotion system, an end to lateral  transfers from industry, and - especially in the Army - a highly competitive, rather than cooperative  or collaborative promotion system. This changed how officers functioned within their organizations  and how the Services developed them as leaders (91). 

Looking the best among one’s peers can mean overlooking issues that should be addressed  and corrected. Hazing, sexual violence, racism, and sexism, as well as forms of prejudice, persist  when the leader does not establish a command climate that deters it. Dissuading Service members  from reporting these instances, in a competitive, centralized system, makes a leader look good to  their superiors. One key indicator of leadership failure in such units, though, is the under-report that  occurs, even when there is an anonymous means of reporting. For example, the military is not adequately protecting members from sexual harassment,  unwanted sexual contact, sexual assault, and rape. Even though a female freshman in college is at  a 51 percent higher risk of sexual assault than a female Service member aged 17 to 24 (92), the public  is less accepting of the sexual violence rates in the military. The public expects better from its Service members and their leaders. One sees evidence of this in the persistent perception of the  public that the military has done little to address sexual violence. Indeed, sexual violence has  persisted to the point where Congress has taken these cases out of the hands of commanders and  placed them and domestic violence cases in the hands of independent military prosecutors (93). 

DoD reported in 2022 that more than 8 percent of female Service members and 1.5 percent of males experienced unwanted sexual contact in 2021. This compares to the 2018 report of 6.2 percent of females and 0.7 percent of males. Additionally, the reporting rate was estimated at only  20 percent, down significantly from the 80 percent reporting rate in 2018 (94). 

The problem has been further driven by leadership issues which may be leading to a climate  that is more tolerant of sexual abuse, resulting in low rates of confidence and reporting. In 2021, 39 percent of females were confident that their chain of command would “treat them with dignity and  respect” after reporting a sexual assault – down from 66 percent in 2018. The rate for males  dropped from 82 percent in 2018 to 63 percent, as well (95). In 2018, DoD stated that climates in which  females were sexually harassed, those females were three times more likely to experience sexual  assault, and males who experienced sexual harassment had a sexual assault risk 12 times higher than the average (96). 

According to one Army Leadership Survey, 80 percent of Army leaders directly observed a  toxic leader – 20 percent worked for one – and it was as hazardous to psychological well-being as  combat. A toxic leader has been characterized as a “narcissistic megalomaniac, an extremely self centered, domineering, power obsessed leader (97)”. In that corrosive environment, because higher level leaders do not know about or ensure accountability for the leader’s behaviors, Service  members must try to be cohesive and productive (98). This comes at a cost. Research shows toxic leadership is harmful to mental and physical well-being, leads to lower retention rates, heightens  the potential for suicide, and causes a decline in performance – all factors which can adversely affect mission accomplishment and long-term costs due to increased incidence of post-traumatic  stress syndrome (99). The current approach to promotions and leadership development are not  systems separate unto themselves. Reliance upon the willingness of volunteers to serve in the  military and continue to serve necessarily means leader development, promotions, and  accountability are intrinsic to long-term viability of that force.

Conclusion:

The US faces a military manning crisis that is mostly the result of factors outside of DoD’s  control. The Services are struggling to meet military recruiting objectives, are considering the  lowering of entrance standards, and face ever-growing costs associated with attracting recruits and  retaining Service members. However, temporarily meeting the numbers will not address the  systemic shortcomings in the military that may affect future recruitment, retention, and even the  mission readiness of the force. A holistic look at how America mans its forces is imperative, as  there are intricate interactions involving costs, quality of life issues, and how leaders will be  developed and whether they will be held accountable. The longstanding practice of tweaking  recruiting structure, resources, and approaches will not ensure long-term success. All the  interacting factors must be considered in any long-term approach.  

The fellows of the American College of National Security Leaders believe the threats to our  national security are imminent; the combination of these internal shortcomings and lower numbers  of recruits may result in a failure to adequately respond to threats, both domestic and foreign. Action is needed now.

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