'I hear there are rumours on the internets that we're going to have a
draft. We're not going to have a draft, period,'
Wonder if this line will end up in the history books beside 'Read my
lips. No new taxes' ?
It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the courts with so
many now refusing to die for Haliburton.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/16/national/16reserves.html?oref=login&hp
Former G.I.'s, Ordered to War, Fight Not to Go
By MONICA DAVEY
The Army has encountered resistance from more than 2,000 former soldiers
it has ordered back to military work, complicating its efforts to fill
gaps in the regular troops.
Many of these former soldiers - some of whom say they have not trained,
held a gun, worn a uniform or even gone for a jog in years - object to
being sent to Iraq and Afghanistan now, after they thought they were
through with life on active duty.
They are seeking exemptions, filing court cases or simply failing to
report for duty, moves that will be watched closely by approximately
110,000 other members of the Individual Ready Reserve, a corps of
soldiers who are no longer on active duty but still are eligible for
call-up.
In the last few months, the Army has sent notices to more than 4,000
former soldiers informing them that they must return to active duty, but
more than 1,800 of them have already requested exemptions or delays,
many of which are still being considered.
And, of about 2,500 who were due to arrive on military bases for
refresher training by Nov. 7, 733 had not shown up.
Army officials say the call-up is proceeding at rates they anticipated,
and they are trying to fill needed jobs with former soldiers as they did
in the Persian Gulf war of 1991.
Still, the resistance puts further strain on a military that has
summoned reserve troops in numbers not seen since World War II and
forced thousands of soldiers in Iraq to postpone their departures when
their enlistment obligations ended.
Tensions are flaring between the Army and some of its veterans, who say
they are surprised and confused about their obligations and unsure where
to turn.
"I consider myself a civilian," said Rick Howell, a major from
Tuscaloosa, Ala., who said he thought he had left the Army behind in
1997 after more than a decade flying helicopters. "I've done my time.
I've got a brand new baby and a wife, and I haven't touched the controls
of an aircraft in seven years. I'm 47 years old. How could they be
calling me? How could they even want me?"
Some former soldiers acknowledge that the Army has every right to call
them back, but argue that their personal circumstances - illness, single
parenthood, financial woes - make going overseas impossible now.
Others say they do not believe they are eligible to be returned to
active duty because, they contend, they already finished the obligations
they signed up for when they joined the military. A handful of such
former soldiers, scattered across the country, have filed lawsuits
making that claim in federal courts.
These former soldiers are not among the part-time soldiers - reservists
and National Guard members - who receive paychecks and train on
weekends, and who have been called up in large numbers over the last
three years.
Instead, these are members of the Individual Ready Reserve, a pool of
former soldiers seldom ordered back to work. Ordinarily, these former
soldiers do not get military pay, nor do they train. They receive points
toward a military retirement and an address form to update once a year.
When soldiers enlist, they typically agree to an eight-year commitment
to the Army but often are allowed to end active duty sooner. Some of
them join the Reserves or National Guard to complete their commitment;
others finish their time in the Individual Ready Reserve.
For officers, the commitment does not expire unless they formally resign
their commissions in writing, a detail some insist they did not know and
were not told when they signed their contracts, although Army officials
strongly dispute that.
Lt. Col. Pamela Hart, a spokeswoman for the Army, said people in the
service are well aware of the provision. "We all know about it," Colonel
Hart said.
She said problems with the call-ups of former soldiers have involved a
relatively small number of people, are being worked out, and are hardly
unique to this conflict. In the first gulf war, she said, more than
20,000 former soldiers were called up. With medical problems and
no-shows, only about 14,400 were actually deployed, she said.
Most of the deployments in the first gulf war lasted 120 days, the Army
said. The current call-ups are more likely to last a year.
Of those seeking exemptions now, the Army is studying each person's case
individually, Colonel Hart said, and has no set rule on what allows a
person to avoid deployment. Army officials are still weighing more than
half of the requests. So far, only 3 percent of requests for exemptions
have been turned down, while 45 percent have been approved.
As for the former soldiers who failed to appear at bases by their
assigned dates, the Army is trying to reach them, one by one, to discuss
their circumstances, Colonel Hart said. In late September, some Army
officials suggested that they would pursue harsher punishments -
declaring people AWOL and possibly pursuing military charges - but the
Army has since taken a quieter, more conciliatory approach.
"These are challenging times in their lives," Colonel Hart said, adding
that some former soldiers who failed to report might have moved and not
received the Army's notice. "We're contacting them as best as possible."
For the rest, though, some questions linger over who really qualifies
for the callback.
Colette Parrish said she burst into tears the evening that her husband,
Todd, walked into their house in Cary, N.C., with a letter from the Army
calling him back to service. "We had no idea this could happen," she
said. "We hadn't been preparing for any of it because we thought it
wasn't possible."
At first, Mr. Parrish, 31, said he was convinced that the letter was
just an administrative error because he believed that his time in the
Individual Ready Reserve had ended.
He had gone to college on an R.O.T.C. scholarship, then served four
years as a field artillery officer. He said he resigned his commission
after that, became an engineer, and still owed the Army four years in
the Individual Ready Reserve to complete his total obligation.
To Mr. Parrish, who has filed a lawsuit against the Army in federal
court in North Carolina, that obligation ended on Dec. 19, 2003. But the
Army apparently does not agree, and says that it never accepted Mr.
Parrish's resignation as an officer.
As the court fight has continued, Mr. Parrish's date to report to Fort
Sill, Okla., has been pushed back, again and again, one month at a time.
Instead of thinking about long-term plans, for his wife and their future
family, he is living in 30-day increments.
He said he always looked back on his service years fondly, and with a
deep sense of patriotism.
"I guess I feel disillusioned now," he said. "This isn't about being for
or against the war. It's not about Democrats or Republicans. It's just a
contract, and I don't think this is right. If they need more people,
shouldn't they get them the right way? How many more like me are there?"
Mark Waple, Mr. Parrish's lawyer, said he had received calls from 30
other former soldiers in recent months, all of whom had heard of Mr.
Parrish's case and had similar stories.
At least two other former soldiers have filed suit over the question.
In Hawaii, David Miyasato, a former enlisted soldier who served in the
first gulf war, said he would never go AWOL; he would have gone to Iraq,
he said, if need be.
But Mr. Miyasato also said that his eight-year commitment ended nearly a
decade ago. After he received his letter calling him back to service, he
said, he called the Army repeatedly to argue that he was not eligible.
Finally, he said, with his date to report to a base in South Carolina
just days away, he contacted a lawyer and filed suit on Nov. 5.
"This was actually my last resort," said Mr. Miyasato, a former truck
driver and fuel hauler who said that, at 34, he led an entirely
different life, with an 8-month-old daughter and a window-tinting
company to run. "I had been calling around everywhere for help."
On Nov. 10, Mr. Miyasato said, he learned that the Army had rescinded
his orders.
In New York, Jay Ferriola, a former captain in the Army, filed a suit
saying he had resigned his officer's commission in June and no longer
qualified for call-up in the Individual Ready Reserve. On Nov. 5, the
Army rescinded his orders and honorably discharged him.
"This shows that the system works," Colonel Hart said. "If the soldiers
bring their situations to our attention, we're going to do what's right."
Barry Slotnick, Mr. Ferriola's lawyer, said he wondered how many other
soldiers might be in similar positions, but without the money, the
contacts or the certainty to sue. Mr. Slotnick said he had received
numerous calls from others since he filed Mr. Ferriola's case in late
October.
"We might as well add another phone bank," Mr. Slotnick said. "What I
can see is that there are many, many cases of people being called up
that shouldn't have been. This is a backdoor draft. I also have to
wonder how many are already in Iraq who shouldn't be there, who just
didn't think to question it."
The Army's current plan is to fill 4,400 jobs through March from among
5,600 former soldiers ordered to duty. But an Army official said last
month that more former soldiers, perhaps in similar numbers, might be
called on later next year, as well.
For now, those being sent to Iraq and Afghanistan are being asked to
handle a variety of support positions, including truck drivers and fuel
and food suppliers.
Months ago, the Army said some of the former soldiers would be needed to
play the French horn, the clarinet, the euphonium, the saxophone and the
electric bass as part of the military's bands, but the notion drew
criticism from members of Congress who questioned the need to order
people to give up their civilian lives to play instruments. Colonel Hart
said the Army has since filled the musician jobs with volunteers.
Before going to Iraq, former soldiers are receiving as many days of
training as they need, an Army spokesman said. Some of the soldiers said
they were worried, though, about the prospect and safety of trying to
get up to speed in a few months.
"These guys like me are basically untrained civilians now," said Mr.
Howell, the former helicopter test pilot. Mr. Howell said he left the
Army years ago with an injured back, knee and elbow, leaving him
wondering about his own physical condition.
"I don't even have a uniform anymore," he said. "But they don't have any
more reserves left, so we're it. All they want is some bodies to go to
Iraq, just someone to be there, to sit on the ground."
When he left the military in 1997 as part of a reduction in forces, Mr.
Howell said, he saw a note in the "little print" in his annuity
agreement about a future commitment. But he said he was told that his
obligation to the Individual Ready Reserve would be brief and meant
little anyway. "They said it was just a way of having me on the books,"
he said.
After that, Mr. Howell said, he jumped into the civilian world. He got
married. He and his new wife began building a house. They struggled to
have children.
In September, his first child, Clayton, was born. Just before that, his
orders arrived.
"It does rip my heart out that these young men and women are over there,
and there is part of me that wants to be with them," he said recently.
"But I have responsibilities here now."
Mr. Howell said he had applied to the Army for an exemption but was
recently turned down. If he loses his appeal, he will be given a new
reporting date. His best hope, he said, is that his appeal is buried
somewhere at the very bottom of a big stack of them.
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