A History of Unit Stabilization

ONE OF THE PERSISTENT themes in the U.S. Army is the belief that stabilizing personnel in units will improve readiness and retention by slowing down the movement of soldiers and holding them together long enough for them to bond and learn to operate as teams. History and sociological studies provide persuasive evidence that soldiers work better together if they remain together for extended periods of time. Too much personnel turbulence in units degrades unit readiness, and high rates of personnel velocity lead to dissatisfaction with service conditions, which causes soldiers to leave the Army. Despite unit stabilization's evident desirability, the Army has not yet been able to sustain it. Unit stabilization, which is different from unit rotation, is a personnel-management action that achieves a low rate of personnel turnover in a unit by restricting assignments outside the unit for a sustained period of time. Unit rotation is an operational action that moves entire units from one location to another to perform missions (often overseas assignments of protracted duration in short-tour areas). Unit stabilization is not required for unit rotation, but it is usually part of the unit rotation scheme. Units may be stabilized without entering into unit rotation. Army Unit Stabilization Programs 1899-1980 Having long appreciated the value of stabilized units, the Army has tried to initiate and institutionalize a stabilized unit replacement program 10 times since 1899. The Army has also recognized the inherently bad features of an individual replacement system, particularly in combat, and tried repeatedly to adopt some form of unit rotation. However, a combination of fiscal and manpower constraints and a general state of unpreparedness thwarted the Army's efforts to create and sustain such programs. From 1899 to 1912, the Army rotated battalions to sustain forces in the Philippines, Cuba, and Puerto Rico where tropical diseases were prevalent. Each deployed regiment was directed to fill one battalion with unfit and ill soldiers and send it back to the United States to serve as a depot. The depot battalion would recruit to full strength, train, and after a year return overseas for a 2-year tour to replace another battalion that would then return to the United States. This system had problems, however, mostly because soldiers' enlistment contracts expired before the battalion was to deploy, causing turbulence and reduced readiness. The Army abandoned the system in 1910 and in 1912 officially adopted the individual replacement system (IRS). (1) During World War I, the Army initially provided replacements by forming one replacement division for every two combat divisions. However, the initial demand for replacements to fill understrength divisions, the need to place all available divisions in France on the front line, and a failure to provide for nondivisional unit replacements undermined this plan. Depot brigades in the continental United States (CONUS) could not provide enough trained replacements, and the Army had made no plans for a workable individual replacement system. The result was a system that thrust poorly trained soldiers into combat units and impaired unit performance. (2) During World War II, the Army tried package unit rotation, but this failed because receiving commanders elected to break the packages down and distribute individual replacements to combat units. Withdrawing divisions from the line long enough to refit them was impossible because the Army fought the war with the minimum number of divisions. All but one division (in Hawaii) was committed to combat during the war. The Army once again used an individual replacement system that worked poorly, in part because it was hastily formed and staffed and partly because estimates of replacements of combat losses were too low. (3) From the end of the Korean War in 1953 to the start of the Vietnam War in 1962, the Army tried five unit replacement programs. …