THE ARMY'S wartime recruit- ing challenge is aggravated by a sharp drop in black enlistments over the past four years, which internal Army and Pentagon polls trace to the unpopular war in Iraq and concerns among blacks with Bush administration policies.
The Army strains to meet recruiting goals in part because black volunteers have fallen 41 percent--from 23.5 percent of recruits in fiscal 2000 to 13.9 percent in the first four months of fiscal 2005.
"It's alarming," said Maj. Gen. Michael D. Rochelle, commanding general of the Army Recruiting Command in Fort Knox, Ky.
No single factor explains the drop, he added, but the propensity of black youth to enlist is clearly affected by the war and increasingly by the views of parents, teachers, coaches, clergy and other "influencers."
Officer recruiting is hit, too--down 36 percent since 2001 among blacks in the Army Reserve Officers' Training Corps.
The Marine Corps also reports a drop in black recruits, but its racial data is suspect due to a government policy that allows recruits and all new federal workers to decline to identify their race.
Rep. Charles B. Rangel, a Democrat whose New York City district includes Harlem, wasn't surprised by the Army data.
"I have not found a black person in support of this war in my district," he said. "The fact that every member of the Congressional Black Caucus--emotionally, politically and vigorously--opposes this war is an indication of what black folks think throughout this country."
The Pentagon's own Youth and Influencer Polls, conducted last May, affirm that administration policies and the Iraq war have prompted fewer black youths to enlist, particularly in the Army and Marines--the ground forces taking most of the casualties.
While the war reduced the likelihood of youth in general to join the military, states the Youth Poll, "Black youth reported being more negatively affected. Black youth were less supportive of U.S. troops' presence in Iraq, less likely to feel the war was justified, more disapproving of the Bush administration's handling of foreign affairs and more disapproving of its use of U.S. military forces than were whites or Hispanics."
Black youth unemployment remains above 10 percent, higher than for Hispanics and double that of whites. Blacks also tend to view military pay as more attractive than do other racial groups.
In years past, such factors enticed a disproportionate number of black youths to see opportunity in the Army. In some years since the draft ended in 1973, the percentage of blacks among Army volunteers approached 30 percent.
In fiscal 2000, blacks still represented almost a quarter of Army recruits. That percentage fell to 22.7 in '01, 19.9 in '02, 16.4 in '03, 15.9 in '04, and now to 13.9 percent through four months of fiscal 2005. No such decline has been seen among Hispanics or white recruits. Indeed, their percentages among Army recruits grew during the first Bush administration.
Because blacks are 14 percent of all recruit-age youth, their recruiting numbers remain "acceptable," proportional to blacks in society, Rochelle said. But the steep drop in black recruits overall does hurt plans "to grow the Army," he conceded. Congress has ordered a 30,000-person increase in the number of active-duty soldiers by October 2009.
While money for college remains a major motivator to enlist, the Iraq war leaves youths, particularly blacks, conflicted.
"More African-Americans identify having to fight for a cause they don't support as a barrier to military service," states the U.S. Military Image Study, an Army poll based on interviews with 3,236 youth ages 16 to 24. "Recruiting an all-volunteer Army in times of war is increasingly difficult."
Fear of being killed or injured was the top reason to avoid service for 26 percent of youth in 2004, almost double the 14 percent reported in 2000, the poll states.
And more black parents, particularly mothers, worry that their children could be killed or injured in the war, the study found.
Many African-Americans believe that black soldiers suffer higher casualty rates than other racial groups. The numbers, Rochelle said, "do not bear that out, neither from Vietnam nor subsequent conflicts.
"We would never, ever deny that in the short term there is danger associated with being in the Army," he said. But Rochelle worries that black youth now "are depriving themselves of pretty substantial opportunities.
"If we were able to tell the Army story in a very balanced way to more young African-Americans, as well as to their influencers, then clearly the numbers would grow," he said. "I'm convinced of that."
TOM PHILPOTT is a syndicated columnist. Send questions or comments to Military Update, Box 231111, Centreville, Va. 20120-1111; e-mail milupdate@aol.com; or visit militaryupdate.com on the Web.