Why Is the US Military Getting Weaker, and What Can Be Done?

Military aircraft including F/A-18 fighter jets are seen parked on the flight deck of the USS Carl Vinson, the U.S. Navy's nuclear-powered Nimitz-class aircraft carrier, anchored off the coast in Danang on March 5, 2018. (Linh Pham/AFP via Getty Images)

Commentary

According to a new report by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that has been in operation for half a century, the U.S. military is headed in the wrong direction. With each passing year, the military appears to be getting weaker. At the same time, Russia and China are behaving more aggressively; the latter, according to the report, possesses “formidable” capabilities.

In short, things don’t look good for the United States.

The Heritage Foundation’s findings echo those of a recent Army Times report outlining the many ways in which recruiters are struggling to find enough young Americans capable of serving their country. Authored by Todd South, the report shows that the service has witnessed a 13 percent drop in aptitude scores. To make matters worse, “70 percent of potential recruits interested in Army service are disqualified in the first 48 hours.” Why?

There are three reasons: poor test scores, obesity, and drug use.

The importance of having an Army of strong, healthy individuals really can’t be emphasized enough. The security and stability of the United States rely on the recruitment of qualified individuals.

In July, Epoch Times writer Mimi Nguyen Ly reported that the U.S. Army is facing a number of “unprecedented challenges,” which include struggling to recruit new members, as well as training and retaining them. Because of these rather significant struggles, the Army “is likely to significantly fall short of its target number of troops,” Ly wrote.

How short? Seven thousand short, to be exact.

In 2023, the Army is projecting a considerably higher shortfall, Ly reported.

To understand why, let’s discuss the aforementioned poor test scores, obesity, and drug use.

If you’re in the market for a sobering read, why not take a look at the United States’ most recent national test results? That should hit the desired spot. Scores for elementary school students in basic reading skills are at their lowest point since the 1980s. Math scores, meanwhile, are at their lowest point in five decades. The United States prides itself on having some of the finest educational establishments in the world—and rightly so.

Nevertheless, it now finds itself being overtaken by a number of its first-world peers. The writing is on the wall; sadly, fewer Americans can actually read it.

Then, there’s the matter of obesity. To join the Army, an individual must be at least 17 years old and in reasonable shape. As you are no doubt aware, millions of American teens are desperately out of shape. Since the early 1990s, “the prevalence of childhood obesity has more than doubled in children and tripled in adolescents,” according to an interesting paper published in Global Pediatric Health.

Researchers at Harvard’s School of Public Health estimate that 40 percent of U.S. adults and 20 percent of adolescents are clinically obese. By the end of the decade, 51 percent of the U.S. population will be obese. Not only are more Americans struggling to read and write; they’re struggling to breathe and engage in basic movements.

Finally, let’s focus on the increase in drug use. The Addiction Center, a site that helps those struggling with addiction, argues rather convincingly that members of Generation Z, otherwise referred to as zoomers, run a higher risk of developing substance abuse issues than members of previous generations. It’s easy to see why. Born between 1997 and 2012, millions of zoomers enjoy nothing more than smoking cannabis.

To be clear, this isn’t the cannabis of the 1960s and ‘70s. As I have written before, today’s weed is incredibly potent. Members of Gen Z are the first generations to choose a powerful “blunt” over an alcoholic beverage.

What, if anything, can be done to put things right?

Some authors believe that the decline in recruits could be remedied by changing both our expectations and our standards. In other words, lower the bar and allow less healthy, less intelligent people to join. Desperate times, some will say, call for desperate measures. Perhaps.

However, there is something wholly unpalatable about the idea of the U.S. Army lowering the bar just because a growing number of Americans are incapable of getting a leg over it, never mind clearing it. The United States deserves to be defended by the brightest and the fittest, not by panting potheads. Lowering the bar isn’t the answer. It’s not a “solution” worth entertaining.

The recruitment crisis isn’t just a matter of quantity, it’s also a matter of quality. Would you prefer to have an Army of 500,000 thoroughly mediocre individuals, or one consisting of 380,000 exceptionally skilled men and women? Hopefully, the latter. Maybe offering better incentives, including improved salaries, to competent recruits is a better option, an actual path worth pursuing.

In truth, it’s probably the only one worth pursuing.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.