Jim Webb: “But I would like to mention some points out of this outline. It is a very good survey of the types of things our…”

“But I would like to mention some points out of this outline. It is a very good survey of the types of things our soldiers have to do. So put yourself in the mind of a soldier who has just finished a 15-month deployment in Iraq. When they come home for a year, which is all they get now after a 15-month deployment, they do not sit around and get to know their family and have rest time. There is a little bit of that, but month by month during these 12 months of dwell time before they have to redeploy, these are the types of things they do: In the first month, they have 1 to 2 weeks of redeployment from the theater back home. That is a part of that first month. They have what is called reintegration training for a couple weeks. In the second month, there is 'block leave,' but then they activate the headquarters. They begin recovery of equipment that was shipped. In the third through the fifth months, they have recovery operations of their equipment. They have the requirement of bringing in newly assigned people, the typical adjustment at the top and at the bottom which requires a great deal of command supervision in terms of bringing these people and assimilating them into the units. In the sixth month, they have individual training, crew training, team training, squad-level training, and begin platoon training. A small core of their personnel at the top actually have to deploy back to Iraq or Afghanistan for 10-day reconnaissance.”