This headline is grossly inaccurate. The White House has not ordered anybody to active duty. "I hereby authorize the Secretary of Defense . . . to order to [them to] active duty." The only thing that has happened is that SECDEF may authorize it. I am not aware of any services asking to do so at this time. This order does nothing more than to put the authority in place, should it be needed.
Additionally, while not inaccurate, "certain IRR" is putting it lightly. This only applies to IRR members who are both:
(1) "in the Individual Ready Reserve mobilization category," which is 100% voluntary under 10 U.S.C. § 10144(b)(1)(A); AND
(2) "designated as essential."
Lastly, even that number is capped: "not more than 450 may be members of the Individual Ready Reserve."
I hear you, but I merely copy/pasted the title from the White House press release and slightly truncated it to fit the character limit. I get your point that this isn't like, say, stop loss during OIF. But it's still noteworthy, and it's going to be interesting to think about which MOS's are short such that this policy needs to be explored in the first place. That's honestly why I submitted the link in the first place, because there's a well known/reported recruiting problem in the armed forces right now.
And if I recall correctly you still have to be in the IRR if it was part of your MSO, but you can "opt in" as well. Might be wrong, it's been a while.
Are you suggesting the White House’s own headline “Ordering the Selected Reserve and Certain Members of the Individual Ready Reserve of the Armed Forces to Active Duty” is grossly inaccurate too?
Isn’t the SECDEF under direct orders from the president who signed this order?
The official press release and HN’s titles say “Ordering”, not “Authorizing” nor “Issuing Policy”.
I don’t know why you’re reading between the lines of one sentence saying that he is only “authorizing the SECDEF” and ignoring the president himself saying this one sentence prior:
> I hereby determine that it is necessary to augment the active Armed Forces […]
The SECDEF is under orders of the president who commands the military and says it is necessary.
It is not accurate. As a purely factual matter, the White House has done no such thing. And the language you're relying on so heavily is just statutory boilerplate. The "determination" isn't some conspiracy theory veiled directive to SECDEF, it's a checklist item for delegating the authority in the first place. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/10/12304
ok that makes sense, thanks for the link. the “deem it nessecary” phrase is indeed directly lifted boilerplate from that piece of law to make the authorization but it’s not an order in itself.
For SelRes, probably. For IRR MC, almost certainly not.
This 2021 report from the Congressional Research Service indicates that the military "has not made it a priority to fill this mobilization category and currently there are no members assigned to it. Thus, the [12304] authority is effectively limited to members of the Selected Reserve at present."
Activating IRR is such a shit move. I wonder if it’s only for certain critical MOS or something. Can’t imagine getting out of the military and having to go back (happened to friends of mine)
Best guess: specialist systems like EW or missiles that are being stretched by Ukraine support. IRR also got raided before Iraq II for linguists and certain intelligence specialists as well.
Pull back some of the Russian language specialists or ELINT analysts specializing in late-Soviet or post-Soviet systems, etc.
"Guess what killer, you're the only expert on Borisoglebsk-2 who doesn't have a drinking problem. Welcome back."
Could see them doing similar for Chinese system specialists or linguists.
It's almost like something in political water compels USA to be actively fighting all the time. USA had wasted lived and enormous treasure over the past three decades, and keeps losing.
Additionally, while not inaccurate, "certain IRR" is putting it lightly. This only applies to IRR members who are both:
(1) "in the Individual Ready Reserve mobilization category," which is 100% voluntary under 10 U.S.C. § 10144(b)(1)(A); AND
(2) "designated as essential."
Lastly, even that number is capped: "not more than 450 may be members of the Individual Ready Reserve."