I wont comment on the intangibles. What I will say is that article identifies pay & education as two main draws. For the Army pay and education are simply unwo

I wont comment on the intangibles. What I will say is that article identifies pay & education as two main draws. For the Army pay and education are simply unworkable. The Army stopped paying colleges because their own website was broken at release. Who got stuck with the bill? Soldiers. The only response was the SMA saying "We wont stand for this..." Years ago he said that, now he's retired and education is still f'd. Pay is even worse. The Dod just instituted a bonus pay for the Soldiers whose annual pay was under the poverty line. It's a joke. Housing pay is meant to not cover the monthly cost of housing. Food pay (for those who get it) is meant to not cover the monthly cost of food. If you don't get food pay it's even worse- Fort Cavazos will not man their cafeterias, so they just shut them down. A Soldier by regulation has to eat at a cafeteria. Army gimps pay to specifically dock the cost of food. And then shuts down the cafeteria. It's a joke. That's for the poor bastards without civilian skills. If you have skill in, say cyber, guess what? Same thing but the Department of the Army has job listings for civilians to do the same exact job for twice the pay and no extraneous duties, because that's what the private sector demands. If you bring that up then you are immediately shunned for being a greedy-as-fuck mercenary with no love of nation. Same goes for if you bring up the congressional mandated incentive pay. The Army doesn't want the people in the country today, they want the people available 50 years ago.