Army Recruiters Say They Feel Pressure to Bend Rules
By DAMIEN CAVE
Published: May 3, 2005
It was late September when the 21-year-old man, fresh from a three-week commitment in a psychiatric ward, showed up at an Army recruiting station in southern Ohio. The two recruiters there wasted no time signing him up, and even after the man's parents told them he had bipolar disorder - a diagnosis that would disqualify him - he was all set to be shipped to boot camp, and perhaps Iraq after that, before senior officers found out and canceled the enlistment.
Despite an Army investigation, the recruiters were not punished and were still working in the area late last month.
Two hundred miles away, in northern Ohio, another recruiter said the incident hardly surprised him. He has been bending or breaking enlistment rules for months, he said, hiding police records and medical histories of potential recruits. His commanders have encouraged such deception, he said, because they know there is no other way to meet the Army's stiff recruitment quotas.
"The problem is that no one wants to join," the recruiter said. "We have to play fast and loose with the rules just to get by."
These two cases in a single state - one centered on a recruit, the other on a recruiter - may lie at the outer limits of the fudging and finagling that are occurring in enlistment offices as the Army tries to maintain its all-volunteer force in a time of war. But that cheating, evidenced by Army statistics that show an increase in cases against recruiters, is disturbing many of the men and women charged with the uphill task of refilling the ranks.
Interviews with more than two dozen recruiters in 10 states hint at the extent of their concern, if not the exact scope of the transgressions. Several spoke of concealing mental-health histories and police records. They described falsified documents, wallet-size cheat sheets slipped to applicants before the military's aptitude test and commanding officers who look the other way. And they voiced doubts about the quality of some troops destined for the front lines.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/03/national/03recruit.html?
By DAMIEN CAVE
Published: May 3, 2005
It was late September when the 21-year-old man, fresh from a three-week commitment in a psychiatric ward, showed up at an Army recruiting station in southern Ohio. The two recruiters there wasted no time signing him up, and even after the man's parents told them he had bipolar disorder - a diagnosis that would disqualify him - he was all set to be shipped to boot camp, and perhaps Iraq after that, before senior officers found out and canceled the enlistment.
Despite an Army investigation, the recruiters were not punished and were still working in the area late last month.
Two hundred miles away, in northern Ohio, another recruiter said the incident hardly surprised him. He has been bending or breaking enlistment rules for months, he said, hiding police records and medical histories of potential recruits. His commanders have encouraged such deception, he said, because they know there is no other way to meet the Army's stiff recruitment quotas.
"The problem is that no one wants to join," the recruiter said. "We have to play fast and loose with the rules just to get by."
These two cases in a single state - one centered on a recruit, the other on a recruiter - may lie at the outer limits of the fudging and finagling that are occurring in enlistment offices as the Army tries to maintain its all-volunteer force in a time of war. But that cheating, evidenced by Army statistics that show an increase in cases against recruiters, is disturbing many of the men and women charged with the uphill task of refilling the ranks.
Interviews with more than two dozen recruiters in 10 states hint at the extent of their concern, if not the exact scope of the transgressions. Several spoke of concealing mental-health histories and police records. They described falsified documents, wallet-size cheat sheets slipped to applicants before the military's aptitude test and commanding officers who look the other way. And they voiced doubts about the quality of some troops destined for the front lines.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/03/national/03recruit.html?
posted by Kangaroo Brisbane Australia at 4:26 AM
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