Army Abandoned 24,611 Soldiers for Discipline Issues in 2012 and 2013

Blame the Soldiers For What Is Done to Them? 
Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
October 25, 2015

Bad leadership or bad recruits? Your guess must be the same as mine or you wouldn't be reading Wounded Times. My guess is they are doing what they always did. Blame the soldiers for what is done to them instead of admitting what they are not doing for them. Simple as that? Hardly. It is even worse.

Associate Press reporter Lolita Baldor did fabulous work on what was being done to our troops back in 2014.

Misconduct forcing more soldiers out of Army

Yet Congress has not fixed any of this. "Ex-troops with highest suicide risk often don't qualify for mental care" LA Times reporter Alan Zarembo wrote on April 1, 2015 showing that Congress already knew what was going on.

Those with dishonorable discharges are not eligible unless they can prove they were insane at the time of their crimes. Former troops with other types of less-than-honorable discharges must apply for veteran status, but fewer than 10% do.

Of those, fewer than a quarter succeed, according to a 2007 study by a congressional commission.

More than 140,000 troops have left the military since 2000 with less-than-honorable discharges, according to the Pentagon.

Of those suicides, 403 were among ex-service members whose discharges were "not honorable" — for a wide range of misconduct, from repeatedly disrespecting officers to felony convictions. An additional 380 occurred among veterans with "uncharacterized" discharges, the designation used for troops who leave in fewer than 180 days for a variety of nondisciplinary reasons.

And now the latest reports paints an even more frightening situation.

"The Army parted with 24,611 soldiers for discipline issues in 2012 and 2013."

Army cleaning up its ranks: Service backs dismissals based on misconduct, but critics remain
The Gazette
By: Tom Roeder
Updated: October 25, 2015

The Army has cracked down on misconduct in recent years, sending the number of troops dismissed for misdeeds skyward while piling up punishment paperwork at a rate not seen since the 1990s - the last time the Army saw deep cuts in its ranks.

Army insiders say the service is cleaning up its act after years of lax discipline in wartime. Critics say the service has found a convenient tool to deal with Pentagon belt-tightening by using peacetime to cut soldiers who were good enough for war.

Retired Army Capt. Donald Hamilton found himself on both sides of that equation when he was a personnel officer in Fort Carson's 10th Special Forces Group.

He recalled an October 2012 meeting when personnel officers from across the post were told discipline would be the top tool for shedding soldiers.

The Army shed 57,835 soldiers from 2010 to 2014. Over that time, 57,060 soldiers were kicked out for discipline issues. The Army says the similarity of the numbers is a coincidence.
read more here

So when you read about the number of suicides within the Army itself, factor those numbers in because while suicides went up the number of soldier serving went down.

First Quarter of 2015

Today, the Department of Defense released the Quarterly Suicide Report (QSR) for the first quarter of calendar year 2015.

The report summarizes confirmed suicide counts for all services and components during the months of January there were 57 suicides among service members in the active component, 15 suicides among service members in the reserve component and 27 suicides among service members in the National Guard.

A closer review of the data for Q1 2014 and Q1 2015 reveals that while there were decreases in the number of suicides in the Marine Corps, the Navy, and the Air Force, there was an increase in the number of suicides in the Army.

Second Quarter of 2015

Today, the Department of Defense released the Quarterly Suicide Report (QSR) for the second quarter of calendar year 2015.

The report summarizes confirmed suicide counts for all services and components during the months of April through July of 2015, and also includes total suicide counts for 2014, 2013 and 2012.

In the second quarter of 2015, there were 71 suicides among service members in the active component, 20 suicides among service members in the reserve component and 27 suicides among service members in the National Guard.