US Army and end of deployment procedure

[Jimmy_Chitwood]

A woman I just met told me a story about her husband’s military service that has me scratching my head. I don’t know anything at all about the military, so I’m sure I’ll get some of the details wrong and there’s no chance at all I’ll use the right terminology, but I’m hoping the more experienced Army folk can straighten me out here.

My understanding of her husband’s situation is this: he was deployed (again) to front-line type duty last year. This deployment was set to end at some point toward the end of this year. He’s already back from Afghanistan but is currently on a base somewhere in the US. He filed some paperwork to have his accrued leave time count toward moving his end of deployment forward, but “they lost his paperwork.” Here’s where it gets weird from my perspective: he isn’t allowed to sleep in the barracks so he’s currently sleeping on people’s couches (?). He doesn’t actually have work to do or any kind of duties, so after his morning PT he just kind of hangs around all the time but he’s obligated to be there. This is, apparently, going to be the case all the time until his appointed date rolls around.

He and his wife are obviously annoyed about this state of affairs, but I feel like I must be missing something or didn’t get the whole story. Is this normal procedure? Why is it to the Army’s benefit to just have a soldier hanging around on base all the time, and either way, why on earth doesn’t he have a place to freaking live? Do they want him around in case they want to ship him out again, and if yes, is that even something they can do given that his deployment is officially over in a couple of months anyway? Is it just the fact that it’s administratively difficult to fiddle with terms of deployment that’s keeping him around? If that’s the case, why’s the dude back in the US already?

Again, I really don’t have any experience with this kind of stuff so this might be extremely common knowledge. For all I know every single soldier goes through this. But she and her husband seem to think it isn’t normal and are upset about it, and if things are the way I’m understanding them, I think it’s pretty fucked up myself.

Thanks to anybody who can point me toward some regulations, or the appropriate parlance, or anything.

[DrCube]

First off, I never was a “front-line type duty” soldier; I fixed missile systems and computers. But most of what I fixed in the Army was used by the Infantry, so I talked to plenty of grunts. And not having any work to do was pretty common for them, especially right before and after deployments (when there wasn’t any equipment to maintain and no training to do).

But there is no way the Army will just let you take the day off without pass or leave paperwork signed by the company commander. And if he is anything like my company commanders, nobody is going on leave until the entire deployment is over, meaning every soldier in the unit is back and all the vehicles are unloaded off the train, washed and lined up pretty in the motor pool, weapons cleaned, inventories completed, et cetera. I knew good squad leaders who would give half their guys the morning off when there was nothing to do and the other half the afternoon, but somebody always had to be there and if the CO came by to check, squad leader better have an excuse for half his squad being gone.

As far as the sleeping arrangement, I can see it happening although the Army won’t technically let soldiers go without someplace to stay. It might be that he is in a Reserve or Guard unit, but demobilizing at an active duty station (like Ft. Hood perhaps?). When reservists came to deploy from Ft. Riley when I was there, they all had to set up on cots in the gym, probably very uncomfortable and close quarters. Plus the reservists aren’t as used to that as the active duty guys. So maybe he decided to forgo his crappy gym cot and sleep on a buddy’s couch? I was offered a broken bed in a mold-covered room with a smelly room mate in the barracks once in Redstone Arsenal. I decided to get a hotel off-post with my wife instead, but that was highly improper. I got my ass chewed by the CO once she found out, but it isn’t like she checked bunks or anything, so I kept on doing it.

Also, besides the normal course of a deployment, paperwork bullshit can keep people idle for long periods of time. I was called back into the Army (after being a civilian for 2.5 years :mad: ) and before joining my unit, was supposed to take a “refresher” course for my MOS at the aforementioned Redstone Arsenal. However, they didn’t expect us there, so we had about a day and a half of basic electronics refresher (which was bullshit for me since I was most of the way through an electrical engineering degree at that time), and then we waited for our orders to move on to Ft. Hood and train with our unit. We waited, idle, in Redstone Arsenal for an entire month. By the time we got to Ft. Hood, our unit had deployed without us. So we had to train by ourselves, but they didn’t know what training to put us through. After the brass argued about it and forgot about us for 2 months (!) we finally got to deploy to Iraq and meet our unit, without having completed any extra training at all. 3 months in the Army I didn’t do anything but hang out in the internet cafe and collect a paycheck while I waited for orders to go to Iraq.

Anyway, long story short, I could believe everything that is going on with your friend’s husband. On the other hand, his story is probably unique, just like mine, so you have to ask him for the details. It isn’t the way things are supposed to go, but a lot of shit happens in war time. Catch-22 was the most accurate military story I’ve ever read. Pure bumbling absurdity outweighs any other aspect of the military in my experience.

[Crupiea]

I was in the Navy for 20 years so although it’s not the same it is similar.

When you are singke they give you a barracks room, when you are married you give up your barracks room and they pay you extra to live out in town with your family. They dont pay you extra and give you a barracks room, its one or the other.

I had a similar situation where I was getting a divorce and my wife still lived in my base houseing place so i didnt qualify for a barracks room and had to fend for myself. The Navy did what it was supposed to buy giving me a hime already.

As for him not working, if his main unit is deployed still then he will be temprarily assigned to what they call a transient unit. This is for people just checking in or checking out, that sort of thing. Some days you just muster in the morning and that is it for the day, other days you might clean out a warehouse or sweep up the parking lot or whatever it is they need doing. Other than that no real main job.

You can take what they call terminal leave when you get out so say you have 30 days leave on the books then you can check out 30 days ahead of time, be on leave for 30 days and then be technically checked out.

Now lets say you have 60 days of leave accrued you can take 30 days and sell back 30 days which will give you a bigger check when you get out.

If he processed his paperwork overseas with his unit then its an easy thing for them to not have trafserred it with him when they sent it back. You can imiagine that he had to get a bunch of people to sign off on that paperwork so now who is going to sign it? His enitre chain of commans ius still deployed. His best bet would be to talk tpo his superior and explain the situation, they can get the paperwork sent to his personnel office and it will be straight.