Wow ... effed up

Defense Secretery Gates just announced that active Army units are going to 15 month deployments and guaranteed 12 months at home.

Let me tell you why this is so effed up. The 12 month on/12 month off policy in place until today didn't work. You see, this policy only applies to units. It is technically supposed to apply to individuals also, but in reality, if someone moves to a new station and their new unit is set to deploy, they could very well be called upon to deploy with their unit, regardless of how long they've been back in the States.

How can this happen? A little clause attached to every policy the Army has ever been written: "Based on the needs of the Army." The needs of the Army trumps everything else they tell you.