Why are troops deployed for 6 months not any other amount of time?

chindit

It all has to do with the cycle that we use, there is at least a years build up to a six moth tour with preperation, then there is the tour itself. When this is complete there is a six month recovery period for the unit which will include leave. That in total is two years. teachnically speaking that unit should now ot deploy for two years, however the reality can be sopmewhat different. We also have to take into consideration the size of the British Army, it iapprox 105,000 strong which is not that big. Sure we could move ot to a year deployment, like the americans but the fact of the matter we have worked on six moths for a good few years now.

EDIT: as lima coy has already pointed out a six monther is draining any time over it saps your will to live! i had the misfortune to do 7 months in Iraq, I was there a onth before my unit arrived. This is fairly common.

Lima Company - Royal Marines

Most of the lads from Lima Company did a 7 month tour

I did 6 and you can tell the lads who did a 7 month stint from the lads with 6.

It just mentally and physically drains you month by month.

- Countless patrols
- Countless operations
- Lack of sleep, I probs only got about 4-5 hours each day or night, some days about 2 hours when we was out of the compound
- Countless contacts which usually last a good few draining hours.
- Lads getting killed and injured obviously puts the moral down a lot.
- Eating the same rat packs for 6 months (sometimes the KC will boil up something more decent) but nothing great.

Much respect for the lads still out there.

MP US Army

The British Air Force does 4 month tours. I don't know about your navy guys.

They also have a generous leave program.

The UK's military is taken much better care of then the US Army.

DOOM

Because that's the policy. I can tell you that I burned out after 8 months, and had 7 left to go.

alexander m

personal experience says 6 months is about the amount of time it takes to start to burn you out.

FR33FALL79

It depends on the country in question. Also the branch and type of unit.

!Marine Wife!

my husbands got extended to 7. I know i know its only a extra month but still different than 6 right?

Buckeye Fever

Because, in reality, 6 months is all you need for a unit to complete with mission before being burned out. There is still enough troops CONUS to swap out. I know the USAF has 4-6 month deployments and we are doing just fine in our Air Missions, just ask a Marine or Army infantry how well our 6 month deployments are taking care of them when they need us.

mangerpatrick

for marines its 6 months but for army its way longer

Beastie

Royal Navy does anything up to nine months, and while there's damn little that dangerous out there on the blue, nine months of watchkeeping will f*ck you completely.

Start of the Gulf War, I was attached to Ark Royal with COMUKTG staff, and because they only had four Comms junior rates we worked, from the moment the Ark left ammunitioning in Scotland, six hours on, six hours off. The only variation came for two weeks after a month where they changed it to seven and five. Then they changed it back again.

Three months of that. Got home on leave and slept most of the time for a week and a half before I felt anything like a normal human again.

I guarantee if you are a pongo in a warzone six months is plenty long enough... then they extend it for another month or two and that just about finishes them off.

Reality has a Liberal Bias

I'm pretty sure that's not true. Most deployments are a year long.

Buck Starr Jr.

Ask Queen Lizzie!

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