WASHINGTON, June 11, 2005 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - The US Army, which provides most of the US ground troops in Iraq, has slipped further behind its recruiting goals, as officials offered privileges and incentives to lure wary potential recruits.

“The challenge is one of historic proportions,” Maj. Gen. Michael D. Rochelle, head of the Army's recruiting command, told The Washington Post on Saturday, June 11.

He was not sure whether the traditional summer surge in army recruits will take place, or how large it might be.

“What I don't know, in all candor, is how the reduced propensity will dampen” the recruiting prospects of summer, Rochelle added.

The new Pentagon recruiting figures during the fiscal 2005 recruiting year, which ends on September 30, showed that the regular Army was 17 percent behind its goal, the Army Reserve was 20 percent behind and the Army National Guard was 24 percent behind its end-of-May plans.

Unlike the army, the Marine Corps, with a smaller share of the Iraq ground troops, exceeded its May recruiting goal and was two percent ahead of its year-to-date target toward an annual goal of 39,150 recruits. The Navy and Air Force also were on target.

According to Pentagon figures, some 1,685 US troops, mostly from the Army, have died since the beginning of the invasion-turned-occupation of Iraq in March 2003.

Family members of a US soldiers serving in occupied Iraq told IslamOnline.net that the US administration was showing complete apathy toward American troops in Iraq.

The Pentagon said that 1,685 US military personnel have been killed in Iraq since March 2003.

Douglas Smith, a spokesman for the Army Recruiting Command, admitted they were having "a really tough fight (to recruit) this year, and we're going to have an even tougher fight next year”.

The army is not further optimistic at goals for the part-time Guard and Reserve.

“I think the Guard is not going to make it,” an army official told Reuters, meaning it would miss its second straight annual goal.

He said he is not also enthusiastic that the Army Reserve will meet its annual goal.

In May, the regular Army lowered its recruiting goal to 6,700 and still missed it by 25 percent, while the Reserve missed its monthly goal by 18 percent and the Guard fell 29 percent short.

The Pentagon said the Navy Reserve, Marine Corps Reserve and Air National Guard all missed their May recruiting goals.

The Pentagon has relied heavily on part-time soldiers from the Army Guard and Reserve to maintain troop levels in Iraq, where America has 139,000 troops, and Afghanistan, where it has 19,000.

Britain’s daily the Guardian reported in May of last year that the US army was hiring mercenaries to replace its soldiers on security duty in Iraq to meet the severe recruitment shortage because of perilous Iraq.

It said that a Pentagon contractor has begun recruiting former Chilean commandos, other soldiers and seamen, paying them up to $4,000 a month to guard oil wells.

Peter Singer, author of “Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry,” has also revealed that mercenaries made the second largest occupation force in Iraq, outnumbering even the biggest US ally, Britain, with up to 15,000 personnel hired by the US from private military firms.

To meet the worsening recruiting crisis, the US army is mulling offering bonuses and incentives to lure back potential recruits.

It hopes to double the maximum cash bonus from $20,000 to $40,000 a year for troops in high-demand jobs such as intelligence, infantry, special operations and civil affairs, as well as linguists, Rochelle told the Post.

The army further considers to begin a pilot program to give up to $50,000 in home-mortgage assistance to people who volunteer for eight years of active-duty service, said Lt. Col. Thomas Collins, an Army spokesman.

It further suggests raising the age limit for army active-duty service from 35 to 40.

The army also moved this month to take a harder look at keeping first-term soldiers in the force who might otherwise have been kicked out for problems such as drug abuse, poor conduct, or for failure to meet fitness or body-fat standards, the Post said.

The new proposals would need congressional approval, and Army Secretary Francis Harvey already has spoken to lawmakers.