An analysis of the effect of the global war on terror on the retention of United States Military Academy graduates

• Main Author: Genc, Serdar
• Other Authors: Shen, Yu-Chu
• Published: Monterey, California. Naval Postgraduate School 2012
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10945/4263

This thesis analyzes whether the frequency and length of military deployments, due to the Global War on Terrorism, had an effect on separation at the end of the initial service obligation for USMA (United States Military Academy) graduates between 1994 and 2001. Two types of cohorts, those who were eligible to make the stay/leave decision before March 2003 and those who were after March 2003, are compared by using difference-in-difference estimation techniques. The General Deployment Model indicated that deployment had an adverse effect on retention. The results indicated that retention was 14.5% points lower for the period after Gulf War II (post-GWOT period). It was also found that as Army officers experience more deployments, their probability of leaving increases as well. An officer who deployed once is 7.3% points more likely to leave while one with two or more deployments is 10.7% points more likely to leave the Army, compared to an officer with no deployment. Models which compare hostile and non-hostile deployments indicate that both types of deployment affect negatively the decision to leave. However, non-hostile deployments had greater effects on the decision to leave than hostile deployments. In the post-GWOT period the effects of non-hostile deployments were even greater compared to officers in pre-GWOT period. Specifically, an officer with more than 15 months experience in a non-hostile area is 23 percentage points more likely to leave relative to his peer in the pre-GWOT period.