In a just-called Pentagon press conference, Defense Secretary Gates just announced that tours of duty for all Army soldiers in Iraq are being extended from 12 to 15 months. Speaking as someone who has an immediate family member deployed, I would just like to take this brief opportunity to thank the Secretary of Defense for having the compassion and decency to allow CNN and Fox to break the news to me gently, as I strolled past a friggin television in the campus center. I'm sure that a television announcement to the American people is a much more compassionate method of breaking the news than telling the families first would have been, you miserable little jackass.
Actually, it was on the Today Show at 7am eastern time that this was a likely thing to happen. Leaks being what they are, of course...
And a friend of mine was just called for a physical preparatory to being called back after having done 6 years of active duty and getting out 6 months ago, getting a job, and buying a house for his wife and two kids. His wife is now starting to freak out.
We're not over-extended. No, not much.
In other news, military recruiters hang around our campus building, trying to put on a stalwart expression in spite of the fact that at the end of the day, they still have the same number of "US Marines" carabiners in the giveaway basket as they had in the morning.
It must be tough to be a recruiter these days. Not that I feel sorry for them.
Nor should you, their targets get moved around all the time to make it seem like they're "surpassing their goals".