The U.S. armed forces missed their annual recruitment goals by 41,000 people last year. The impact is already being felt as Navy vessels go unmanned and Army officials reduce their troop configurations.
Meanwhile, our adversaries — from Iranian-backed terrorists in the Middle East to communist China in the Indo-Pacific — are growing bolder by the day. It’s a combination ripe for catastrophe.
What can we do to correct course? On one level, the answer is simple. We need to restore Americans’ confidence in the value of a military career. As Adm. Mike Mullen reports, recruitment is falling because “moms, dads, uncles, coaches, and pastors don’t see [the armed forces] as a good choice anymore.”
But to restore people’s confidence, we need to understand why they lost it. This requires facing three difficult truths about our country’s recent history.
The first truth is that mission creep in the Middle East did major damage to American morale.
More than 250,000 people enlisted in the wake of 9/11. They joined to defend the United States from terrorism and exact justice for a day that was one of our darkest. They ended up serving in long-term counterinsurgency and nation-building efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Our troops disrupted terrorist networks that threatened countless lives. The value of those gains cannot be overstated. But our broader efforts were less successful. Afghanistan is again in the hands of the Taliban, while service members in Iraq are unappreciated and increasingly threatened by Iranian-backed attacks.
Predictably, the result has been discouragement among many veterans — and the broader public. All of this translates into less enthusiasm for military recruitment.
The second truth we need to face is that, for years, our government has provided service members with an unsuitable quality of life.
During the 2000s, troops deployed overseas at a 1 to 1 dwell time, far beyond the recommendations of the post-Vietnam War Gates Commission. It was grueling work, yet what did they receive in return? Moldy bases and pay that dipped below the poverty line, not to mention toxic exposure.
When they got home, they had to do battle again — this time against the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, which denied healthcare to hundreds of thousands of men and women injured in the line of duty. It was not much of an advertisement for service.
The third truth we must understand is how politics is turning young people away from the military.
For close to a decade, the far Left has proclaimed that the United States is an evil country, steeped in racism and financing oppression across the globe. The consequence is a generation of people who feel alienated from their own nation — and far less willing to serve.
This isn’t speculation. Just look at this quote from a recent high school graduate: “Is it really worth joining and putting our life on the line for ideologies that we don’t agree with and that we don’t want to necessarily protect?”
It’s an understandable sentiment. But for a nation with an all-volunteer military, it’s a serious problem.
What can we do to chart a new trajectory?
For one, we must increase the quality of life of the armed forces and their veterans. This means addressing lackluster housing, child care, and salaries. It also means faithfully executing laws such as my VA Accountability and Whistleblower Protection Act and the bipartisan Honoring our PACT Act. If the Biden administration continues to slow-walk these reforms, Congress must force its hand.
In addition, we must eliminate polarizing politics from the military. Through the 2024 annual defense bill, Congress froze hires and capped salaries for the Pentagon’s diversity, equity, and inclusion program. We need more such measures to mitigate the impact of the left-right divide on our national defense.
Finally, we must remind people of our military’s value to the national interest. This doesn’t mean whitewashing the legacy of Afghanistan and Iraq. Rather, it means more clearly communicating the stakes of the current moment.
Today, American ships are under attack from the same Iranian-backed militias threatening to drag Israel into a regional war in the Middle East. Terrorist cells are poised to strike at our heartland. Russia has launched the largest European land conflict since 1945. Above all, there is the threat of communist China, which seeks to establish global hegemony and thereby make Americans dependent on its totalitarian regime for everything from cancer treatments to the components of ballistic missiles.
We must deter aggression and maintain our independence and freedom from these grave threats. But we can only do so if we have the strongest military in the world.
Policymakers have a duty to convey a sense of urgency to young people and convince them that lessons have been learned. Without new recruits, the chance that the 21st century will be another American century is very slim indeed.
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Marco Rubio is the senior U.S. senator for Florida.
