These days, reservists are just soldiers who get laid off between deployments

By Maj. Gen. Michael Symanski
(US Army, ret.)

Best Defense department of
reserve affairs

The
Army will add more time to the National Guard and Reserve training year, so
let's be candid about what the "operational" reserve military forces really
are: A method to avoid the cost of a full-time military of adequate size.  The reserve force, which was our
strategic capital banked for a once-in-a-career national military emergency,
has been cashed in because our expensive regular force has been too small to
wage a protracted war.  We
no longer have citizen soldiers; we have professional soldiers who are laid off
between deployments overseas.

It is
no longer economically or politically feasible to expand our military with a
draft, and a modern, effective standing force is very expensive to hire and
sustain. Citizens and their employers accepted and supported the concept
of voluntarily giving and allowing the time necessary to economically sustain a
reserve with which to expand the army for the common defense for a short,
unwanted war. Our laws regulating the mobilization of reservists (the term
includes the National Guard) and their post-war re-employment are still based
on that concept of finite and rare service.

America
met the sudden demand for soldiers for the War on Terrorism by calling up our
reserves involuntarily for a year, and by offering short-term employment to
volunteers who are available to serve. The war goes on, but Congress will not
fund a regular force of adequate size and, instead, allows the cheaper
reservists to be involuntarily called up every five years or to voluntarily
extend their active duty. Unemployed reservists welcome the opportunity
for active duty and under-employed reservists can do an important job for
better pay commensurate with their actual abilities. Employers are obligated to
re-employ a returning reservist, even if the soldier has, in truth, volunteered
for active duty.  Since the
reservist cannot refuse the government's periodic call-ups, the government is
his or her primary employer who regularly lays him off. A civilian employer needs
the revenue generated by each employee, and sharing him or her is a very
expensive expression of patriotism. Consequently, the reservist finds it very
difficult to find career civilian employment.

The
Chief of Staff of the Army has announced that reservists will spend more time
training in the future, and be on a schedule of periodic active duty (Army
Force Generation). The availability of each individual reservist for training
or duty varies according to his or her current circumstances, and it would be
good management for the military to use all that available time. All soldiers'
contracts with the government, however, are subject to the unpredictable needs
of the nation and have been difficult to always honor despite all good
faith. The old one weekend a month two weeks a year for training model was
always a burden for the civilian employers, and will get worse as long as the
government remains the soldier's primary employer with increased demands for
time.  We cannot sustain an
exceptional national military policy, forever.

Maj. Gen. (Ret.) Michael Symanski served on the U.S. Army
Staff (G-3/5/7) as the Assistant Deputy Chief of Staff for Mobilization and
Reserve Affairs, 2005-2007, and represented the Army Staff on the Army Reserve
Policy Committee and the joint Reserve Forces Policy Board. He commanded Army
Reserve and National Guard units at all levels through two-star.