Assessing Stop-Loss Policy Options through Personnel Flow Modeling
Abstract
The practice of stop-loss retains soldiers who are scheduled to end their voluntary terms of active service during an impending or ongoing deployment. These involuntary extensions are legal and have been employed by the U.S. Army over the past two decades. They provide a highly efficient means for meeting the high-priority needs of deployed units. Because stop-loss keeps soldiers in their units, it generally fills deployment needs in the least amount of time possible and minimizes the budgetary impact of added recruitment, training, and personnel reassignment. Besides bolstering head counts with the soldiers who are generally best matched to their deployed jobs, the practice promotes unit personnel stability by helping to keep intact the units that have trained together for missions. It also keeps in check the extended recruitment and reassignment activities needed to maintain a deployed force during periods of extraordinary demand. This documented briefing examines a set of alternatives to stop-loss when the Army faces a demanding deployment schedule, as it did during operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Detailed manpower flow simulations were used to assess specific stop-loss policy proposals proffered in 2008 by the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD), focusing on their quantitative effects on deployed-unit fill, personnel stability, and individual deployment tempo for the active enlisted force. To enrich the discussion of the effects of a new stop-loss policy, the briefing also examines brigade combat team cycle lengths and the number of units being rotated into theaters. In the summer and fall of 2008, early results were shared with OSD on a nearly continuous basis while the Secretary of Defense and the President reexamined the stop-loss policy. Their eventual decision to suspend stop-loss for the active Army by January 1, 2010, was consistent with findings presented then and reported here.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2014
- Accession Number
- ADA599238
Entities
People
- Stephen D. Brady
Organizations
- RAND Corporation