Considering a Cadre Augmented Army - RAND Corporation

-148- An Operational Analysis of Cadre
Figure 1.1—Cadre Wartime Stages
In this paper, we address all of these stages separately except deployment.
Deployments for cadre units would be 12 months, the same length as AC deployments.
Deliberation is an important concern because delays in activating cadre units can
significantly reduce the attractiveness of a cadre augmented force. Activation of cadre units
would require Congressional approval to increase end-strength. We explore the idea of prewar
cadre legislation allowing the DoD to increase end-strength for cadre without
Congressional approval. However, we find that it is very unlikely that Congress would ever
pass such a law because it would reduce its powers.
The most important concern regarding cadre units is the ability to fill units with junior
personnel in wartime. We find that increased recruiting alone is unlikely to fill out a cadre
augmented force at the rate assumed in the first paper. Therefore, we consider additional
ways to procure junior personnel in wartime such as IRR activation and offering bonuses to
RC personnel to join a cadre unit. Both of these alternatives create additional concerns.
Filling units with junior personnel is the Achilles heal of a cadre force and needs to be
carefully considered. However, for small cadre forces such as the +6 Cadre force, if we
reduced the rate of cadre mobilization to one to two BCTs per year, a cadre augmented
force would still reduces annual costs by billions of dollars and could likely be filled out
solely by increasing recruiting.