Army Misses Monthly Recruitment Goal, Predicts It Will Meet Annual Goal
Army misses first monthly recruitment goal in two years but numbers up overall.
June 11, 2007— -- For the first time in nearly two years, the Army has missed a monthly recruiting goal, but Army officials are still confident that the annual goal of 80,000 new recruits will be met by Oct. 1, which marks the end of the Army's recruiting year.
The monthly recruiting drop is the Army's first since 2005, when it fell 7,000 recruits short of its annual effort to enlist 80,000 new soldiers.
Since then, the Army has met its monthly recruiting goals for 23 consecutive months, despite the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
For the month of May, Army recruiting came in at 93 percent of the monthly goal -- 5,101 new recruits joined the Army instead of the goal of 5,500 recruits.
Army officials are confident that despite this setback they will still achieve their annual recruiting goal.
"We are ahead of our year-to-date goal and we are going to make our yearly goal," says Army personnel spokesman Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty. "We are very confident. This is an anomaly. Babe Ruth didn't get a home run every at-bat."
Part of that confidence is due to the fact that Army recruiting is already 2,000 recruits ahead of where it was at this same time last year, equal to 105 percent of the year-to-date goal.
That's a reflection of how well recruiting has gone this year in previous months, as monthly goals have surpassed 100 percent.
"It tells a lot about the youth of America, who are enlisting in an all volunteer force in a protracted war. They get it," says Hilferty.
Another reason the Army's confident, the summer months have traditionally been the Army's best recruiting period.
According to Hilferty, "The summer is clearly our best recruiting season, but the summer goals are higher. I can't predict we will make every summer month goal, but we will make our year-long goal."
Another new incentive available to recruiters: offering more money to potential recruits.
The Army just recently boosted the amount given to new recruits as a signing bonus. New recruits will now get as much as $25,000 if they enlist for three years. The previous top amount had been $10,000.
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