Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, seemed to give a thumbs down to bipartisan legislation that would greatly expand educational benefits for members of the military returning from Iraq and Afghanistan under the GI Bill.
McCain indicated he would offer some sort of alternative to the legislation to address concerns that expanding the GI Bill could lead more members of the military to get out of the service.
Fair enough. But the Army, the service that has struggled most with retention, is already on top of things
In an effort to encourage more mid-grade officers to remain in service, the Army is again offering a "menu of incentives" for active-component captains that includes options for a cash bonus, attendance at graduate school or the Defense Language Institute.
So while improved GI benefits may hurt retention, it's important to remember that they do wonders to boost recruitment. I pinged an Army buddy for his reaction to the whole benefits/retention issue, and his response was classic soldier: "If the Army wants to boost retention, they can start by unf**king themselves!"
Taking the above story into account, I'd say that the Army has done just that.
As for Senator McCain, there's nothing stopping Congress from having their cake and eating it too. They can do the right thing by knocking veterans' benefits up to a level commensurate with the 21st century, while also kicking the services a little extra cash for retention benefits. It's the least we can do after tasking our military members with 7 long years of fighting.
Of course neither story addresses the most critical issue in the quest to improve retention: proper force size. When we have enough troops to end the year-on, year-off deployment cycle, retention issues will slowly fade away.
