A drastically weakened military
The table below reflects the data as provided by MANPOWER Office of the SED DEF from 1954 to March of 2018. (Full data shown in Appendix 5.)
Min, Max and Average Personnel for the Services Year of Occurrence for Min and Max
Army Navy Marines AF Totals Army Navy Marines AF Totals
Min 464,458 318,818 170,621 311,357 1,289,668 2018 2012 1960 2015 2018
Max 1,570,343 775,869 309,771 959,946 3,547,902 1968 1969 1969 1955 1968
Ave 762,392 514,744 196,735 572,213 2,046,069
SD 275,577 135,690 28,430 211,134 623,686
Several Items need to be noted in the above data.
a. 2018 appears as the minimum twice; Once for the Total strength and once for the US Arm strength. This indicates President Trump has the worst record for troop strength. Technically this is correct. However, his minimums are a total of 11,640 for two years. Obama (the previous record holder) has t total loss of 124,274 (9%) of troop strength in his last 6 years.A rate of 20,600 per year. This after raising it 29,473 in his first two years. It remains to be seen if President Trump will be able to raise the manpower levels to pre-Obama levels.
b. If one counts the Coast Guard in the figures, Obama returns to the “winner in the cutting contest. I have omitted these figures since they are not available using the same collection strategy except for 2017 and 2018.
c. The peak numbers (1968 and 1969) reflect the high point for troop involvement in the Viet Nam war. The 1954 peak is for the ending and wind down of the Korean war and start of the troop draw down.