Hospitalized troops being charged for food, getting their pay slashed, getting the runaround regarding when they’ll be rotated out, now this!
Yeah, a free flight to the US, but only as far as Baltimore-Washington International. What, you’re from California? Sorry, unless you can find your own way home, you’re stuck in Baltimore/Washington.
Excuse me? “Looking at ways to expand the program”? Shouldn’t that expansion have been in place before the program started?
Well, bully for them! The airlines are offering lower fares to get the troops home for R&R, something that the Pentagon should be helping with in the first place!
I wonder if there is somewhere I can donate some cash to get these guys plane tickets. Sure, they can buy their own, but that certainly doesn’t show the level of appreciation we should be showing them.
I wonder if there is somewhere I can donate some cash to get these guys plane tickets. Sure, they can buy their own, but that certainly doesn’t show the level of appreciation we should be showing them.
last minute tickets are very expensive (one of the news stories I saw on this said something about $2000 per).
I’d say this had some lack of forethought, some lack of recognition of how it would play in Peoria, well, actually pretty much like SOP for current program.
When I was in Tech School, I had to pay my own way home if I wanted to go. People going off to their first base had to pay for their tickets, too. It’s not like this is a big deal. It’s business as usual.
You seem to be under the impression that being in the military is a free ride. It’s not. We are government employees with guns. We have to jump through some hoops, and as a result we get stuff like education benefits and the like, but other than the potential to get shot at, we’re just like your average GS workers.
Now, it stings the Reservists a bit, but that’s another issue involving equal pay and other things we don’t need to get into here, but it’s the way things have always been done. Pay, or get Space A if you can. shrug
Oh, and one other thing: the Air Force is very fond of sending planes to pick people up. I’m pretty sure something will be worked out in that respect if nothing else.
I wouldn’t expect it to be. This is just the latest example of what I see as our troops getting shoddy treatment from Pentagon brass. They’re dealing with the largest group of troops coming home for R&R since Vietnam and, like wring said, it seems they didn’t think it through. Two grand would be a lot of money for the lower non-coms to be spending on a plane ticket.
FWIW, Jeff, I agree with you. A lot of reservists and Guardsmen have had to take a pay cut because their military pay is lower than what their civilian job pays. Families are taking it in the shorts all over America. Forcing servicemembers to buy last-minute plane tickets to visit their loved ones is cruel, especially after asking these people to short their families like that.
This doesn’t seem odd to me. When it was time for my R&R, (during my all expenses paid S.E. Asian vacation), the good tax payers of the USofA provided us troops airfare from Saigon to any of the following: Hawaii, Hong Kong, Japan, Manila, Bangkok, Singapore, or, Australia. If I wanted to get all the way to the States, I had to pay for the ticket from Hawaii to where I wanted to go.
I think that’s a bit different from the current situation. Seems to me that the Pentagon brass was feeling the heat of public opinion regarding our troops in Iraq so they hurridly set up this 15-day R&R, publicizing it as an opportunity to finally see their families. Except they’re currently SOL unless their families live around BWI.
also, what’s the breakdown of troops there : reservists, reg army, national guard? For reg army, you can make the case that you knew what to expect. For reservists and guard, I dunno that any of them expected to be called away to serve for months and months. (not claiming to know, here, hence the phrase “I dunno”)
Things to keep in mind: ATA (and possibly also Southwest?) don’t require any advance purchase. Comes in very handy for things like funerals as well, for which one generally does not have the opportunity to plan in advance. There do have to be seats available, though, and they don’t fly everywhere.
The entire time I was on Active Duty, one’s BAS was diminished for the meals consumed while in a military medical facility.
One had to obtain one’s own transportation for all leave travel, to include permissive temporary duty & EML (Enviromental & Morale Leave/aka R&R) absences.
Depending on one’s leave status (Regular Leave, EML, etc.) & component, one could qualify for a particular priority of space available transportation on military passenger flights.
Heck, Emergency Leave is from overseas point of embarkation to CONUS point of debarkation. Travel within the CONUS is up to the Servicemember.
In short: this is a tempest in a teapot & just bunk.
Wasn’t there a news article the other day about how some air carriers would let US soldiers on R&R from Iraq get discounted, fully refundable tickets from Baltimore to whatever city they wanted to, no reservations required?
I’m pretty sure something will be worked out in that respect if nothing else.