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IRS May Help DOD Find Reservists |
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The unusual measure,
which the Pentagon said has been examined by lawyers, would allow the IRS to
pass on addresses for tens of thousands of former military members who still
face recall into the active duty. The proposal has largely
escaped attention amid all the other crises of government, and it is likely
to face opposition from privacy rights activists who see information held by
the IRS as inviolate. For it to become
practice, Congress and President Bush would have to approve the proposal,
which would involve amending the tax code. Ari Schwartz, an
associate director of the Center for Democracy and Technology in Just a few years ago,
Congress strengthened the privacy provisions of the tax code, he said. "There are other
ways to solve the problem they have, without putting the tax information at
risk," Schwartz said. "We would hope that those
members who worked only four or five years ago on strengthening
tax-privacy laws would stand up and say this is a bad idea." Lt. Col. Bob Stone, a
spokesman for the assistant defense secretary for reserve affairs, said the
proposal was developed several years ago and is unconnected to the Army's
current shortage of troops. Part or all of nine of
the Army's 10 active-duty divisions are deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, and
167,000 members of the reserves or National Guard are on active duty, with
thousands more on alert for mobilization. Unknown to most
Americans, though, is the existence of the Individual Ready Reserve, which
has more than 280,000 members. The IRR is a distinctly
different animal than the drilling reserves or National Guard. Those in the IRR are
people who have completed their active-duty tours but are subject to
involuntary recall for a certain number of years. For example, a soldier who
serves four years on active duty remains in the IRR for another four years. During that time,
however, they receive no pay, do not drill with a unit and are otherwise
completely civilian. The problem for the
Pentagon is that the whereabouts of 50,200 of those veterans are unknown to
the Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force. The largest number
- 40,700 - are former Army GIs. Because "While the
military today is comprised of an all-volunteer force, every individual who
volunteers for service in the armed forces voluntarily accepts an eight-year
military service obligation," Stone said. The troops are required
to keep the services' updated on their residences, but many do not.
Thirty-four percent of former Army soldiers cannot be tracked. The unknowns in
the other services are in the single digit percentages. "One of the
difficulties that the military services confront is keeping addresses
current," Stone said. The Defense Department
has called on members of the IRR before. About 7,000 people have been
recalled since 9-11, Stone said. Approximately 30,000 were recalled for
service during the buildup for the Persian Gulf War in 1990 and 1991, he
said. |
