Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, April 2, 1990 TAG: 9004020034
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ROBERT BURNS ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
"I got out. I decided not to wait around for the cuts to hit," he says.
Thorlakson and untold numbers of other men and women in the American armed forces are trying to make their peace with peace.
Some are leaving. Many more are considering it. Most apparently are hoping to hold on, unsure they'll avoid the ax but unwilling just now to give up the uniform and make the leap back to civilian life.
These private struggles are being played out across the nation and at U.S. bases abroad as the Bush administration and Congress scale down defenses in light of a suddenly receding Soviet military threat. Big force reductions are coming - some estimate 300,000 people over four years - although the crunch is not likely to hit many military families until next year.
Thorlakson, 45, didn't know when he retired last December if he would have been forced out by the cutbacks. He held the rank of lieutenant colonel and was nearly eligible for promotion. But the Army's future - and thus his own - looked so murky he took his chances on a civilian job.
Like many others who had never held a job outside the military, Thorlakson stumbled at first. He took a job selling family financial services but soon found it didn't suit him. He quit. Now he is looking for work in personnel management.
Thorlakson, of suburban Washington, is confident he will find a good job. But for many others facing similar decisions, the prospect of change can be intimidating - even though it's too early to know how many one-time soldiers will be competing for civilian jobs.
"They are apprehensive. They don't know what's going on," says Jack Merritt, a retired Army general who keeps in close contact with servicemen. He is executive vice president of the Association of the United States Army, a champion of Army causes.
The fear is felt even among those just entering the service.
Merritt spoke recently to ROTC cadets at Norwich University, a military school in Northfield, Vt.
"That was foremost on their minds: `Is there a future for me now?'
"My answer is, of course there's a future, but it will be a future for fewer people," he says.
Pentagon planners are worried, too. They have never had to shrink an all-volunteer force, which has 2.1 million active-duty personnel. Many careers will be slowed, many ended. And some will be changed even before they begin. A recent Pentagon report to Congress said many ROTC students, some of whom signed up as long as five years ago, will not be allowed to enter active duty. They will have to serve their required time in the reserves.
Soon, probably starting next year, the pink slip will start coming. The Pentagon is concerned that this might hurt morale and discourage America's youth from taking a chance on the military in the future.
In force reductions following World War II and the Korean and Vietnam wars, thousands of draftees were itching to turn in their weapons and get back into civvies.
"That's not true today," Christopher Jehn, the assistant defense secretary for force management and personnel, said in an interview. "Everybody in the military wants to be there, including many who believe they made a career commitment to the military."
Most Army cuts will hit the enlisted ranks, but officers also will be dropped. The Pentagon recently asked Congress for greater authority to fire officers in grades below lieutenant colonel.
Attrition alone won't do the trick in 1991, though, or for the next several years.
Because the services have not yet resorted to dismissals, the fear of firing is only beginning to set in.
Stanley D. Hyman, president of Identify Research Institute, which advises military people on making the transition to civilian life, says most soldiers are at least vaguely aware of the painful adjustments they face but are trying to ignore them.
by CNB