Paper TigIRR: The Armys Diminished Strategic Personnel Reserve in an Era of Great Power Competition
Abstract
The Russo-Ukrainian War highlights the intensity of Large Scale Combat Operations (LSCO) and its staggering personnel requirements. This demands an urgent examination of the U.S. Army's strategic depth to fight and prevail in conflicts with significant casualties that disproportionately impact leaders. The Army's Individual Ready Reserve (IRR) is shrinking, and this trend is compounded by a persistent recruiting crisis across all Army components. In a full mobilization scenario, the undersized IRR will be nearly exhausted filling vacancies in authorized force structure, leaving little for casualty replacement, reconstitution, or expansion requirements. The timely activation of the Selective Service System (SSS) cannot be assumed, and the first trained personnel inducted through SSS will not be available for deployment until at least 270 days after the drafts resumption. In the interim valley of death, the depleted IRR and Retired Reserve would constitute the Army's only substantial strategic pool of pretrained individual manpower for approximately nine months. The IRR must be revitalized, and the current mobilization and expansion timelines shortened to account for anticipated LSCO personnel requirements. This can be accomplished through a suite of feasible policy changes: 1) priority expansion of the IRR; 2) restoring SSS initial delivery date for inductees to its pre-1994 standard (M 13); and 3) enhanced management of the Retired Reserves Category I personnel.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 14, 2023
- Accession Number
- AD1215164
Entities
People
- Stephen K. Trynosky
Organizations
- United States Army War College