The secretary of the Army voiced concern Tuesday that soldiers have little to no time to train for other potential conflicts away from Iraq and Afghanistan. Top Army officials have been sounding alarm in recent days that the Army is seriously strained and must reduce deployments to Iraq as soon as possible.
"The demand to get [soldiers] prepared for what we are asking them to do now understandably limits their ability to prepare for other missions," Secretary Pete Geren told the Senate Armed Services panel during a hearing.  Geren was responding to concerns raised by Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii) about the Army's ability to respond to other crises around the world.
Geren's comments support claims by both Senate and House members who say the military has been so overstretched by the current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan that it would not have the necessary resources, equipment and troops to tackle an unforeseen conflict. Army officials have already acknowledged to lawmakers in past months that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have put such a strain on their forces.
"Our goal is full-spectrum readiness: have our soldiers ready for the full range of threats that are out there," Geren explained. "With the length of time that we have at home today, 12 months between deployments, we do not have time to train for full-spectrum readiness in that period of time."
Gen. George Casey, the Army chief of staff and former top commander in Iraq, said that some conventional warfare training is still taking place on bases in Japan and Korea, for example. "There's a perception that conventional training is not happening in the Army, and it's not happening much [...] but it's not nonexistent," Casey told the panel. Currently, soldiers are deployed to war for 15 months and get 12 months at home. The 12 months at home are enough to refocus the soldiers on the conflicts at hand and repair and reset the war-torn equipment. "We have funding that is allowing us to reset the equipment so that that equipment is ready for when soldiers redeploy," Geren said.
Both Geren and Casey said that the Army is under serious strain and has to reduce the length of combat tours as soon as possible. http://thehill.com/business--lobby/army-secretary-wars-restrict-time-to-train-2008-02-26.html | 
