NAMPA, Idaho — At 43, Doug Prickett had long left his military career behind, settling in the southwestern Idaho farming and manufacturing town where he was born and establishing a small horseshoeing business.
He also had a job with the city of Nampa’s water department in the sagebrush-ridden high desert. And yet, watching an Army National Guard recruiter sit across the kitchen table from his youngest son five years ago, Prickett had to ask.
How old was too old?
“Within six months I was in Kirkuk, Iraq,” said Prickett, whose son, Tony, soon joined him.
The husband and father of two celebrated his 45th birthday in a war zone.
And now, pushing 50, Prickett is among the 67 members of the Idaho Army National Guard’s 2nd Squadron of the 116th Cavalry Brigade Combat Team who made up the single largest re-enlistment in the history of the squadron last month.
Prickett, now a Canyon County deputy sheriff stationed at the local jail, re-enlisted along with four other guardsmen he served with during his first tour in Iraq.
Citizen soldiers, in record numbers, are choosing to continue military service by re-enlisting, extending their stay in Iraq or transferring to active-duty status.
As the nation’s economic woes drag on, several states reported the recession has been a boon to Guard recruitment. The Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps met goals for active duty and reserve recruiting during the budget year that ended Sept. 30 — the first time that’s happened since the all-volunteer force was established, according to Defense Department head of personnel Bill Carr.
This was partly because of department spending on finding recruits, even as fewer civilian jobs were available due to the nation’s economic problems, Carr told a Pentagon press conference in October.
The Army Guard finished the budget year with 358,391 citizen soldiers, recruiting 56,071 and retaining 36,672 — about 2,000 more than the agency’s goal of 34,593. Last year, the agency reached just 93 percent of a 31,889 re-enlistment goal.
“More people are coming in, but more people are also staying,” said Lt. Col. Robert Ditchey, a spokesman for the National Guard Bureau.
The recession is playing a role, said Idaho Army Guard spokesman Lt. Col. Tim Marsano, but it’s not the predominant factor.
“We talk about the economy driving people into the National Guard, I’m not buying it,” said Marsano, pointing out that a sergeant first class guardsman earns $477 a month and $119 per day while serving their two weeks a year.
“If you make $5,000 a year as a part-time national guardsmen and you’re trying to feed a family, that’s ramen noodles,” Marsano said. “They’re not making enough to live on, they have to have full-time jobs besides that.”
The Defense Department in September alerted more than 3,500 Army National Guard soldiers in Idaho, Montana and Oregon. About 2,200 members are from Idaho.
If mobilized, department officials say the soldiers would likely be added to the rotation of troops supporting ongoing operations in Iraq and replace soldiers now deployed there sometime late next year.
“I don’t want to be the guy that’s not there when my unit is deployed,” said Sgt. Eric Mendez, a full-time guardsman from Emmett, Idaho, who was among the record number to re-enlist in November.
Spc. Samir Smriko, a 24-year-old Jerome County sheriff’s deputy in south-central Idaho and a guardsman who was deployed in 2007 and based in Al Anbar province, said he has no qualms with going back to Iraq.
“My friends, all the guys I volunteer with, I’ve decided wherever they go, I go,” he said.
And in rural southwestern Idaho, Doug Prickett and his wife prepare for his likely departure in a home filled with holiday decorations. Their son, who extended his service for another year, could also be deployed, said Margie Prickett, a 54-year-old care provider for handicapped adults.
“I have to think about it everyday,” she said. “There’s a lot of paperwork and wills, that kind of stuff, everything has to be in order.”
And her husband contemplates marking another milestone birthday overseas.
“At this point, I would say a normal person’s thinking about retirement and progressing at work,” Prickett said. “I don’t pay attention to my age, I guess at some point I’ll break a hip … but that isn’t where I’m at right now.”
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