While thousands of people came to the nation’s capital to celebrate the U.S. Army’s 250th birthday, the big news was that the Army has met its active duty recruiting goal for 2025, marking the earliest the service has reached its annual enlistment target in more than a decade.
The Army surpassed 61,000 future soldier contracts, four months before the end of the fiscal year, marking the second consecutive year that the service has reached its target for new enlistment after it had failed to meet its goals in 2022 and 2023.
U.S. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll credited the service’s 10,000 or so recruiters for their “colossal efforts” to improve the service’s recruiting wing in recent years and sign up some 10% more young Americans to join the Army so far this year than last year when it achieved its 55,000-recruit target just before the fiscal year’s end…
The Army secretary said Tuesday that hitting the goal so early showed the service’s recruiting challenges were “behind us.”
APB News was invited by the America 250th Commission to spend time with the Army leadership and witness the parade.
The Army, and most of the other military services, have struggled in recent years to meet their recruiting goals, at least in part because of a shrinking pool of eligible candidates.
The Pentagon in recent years has estimated only some 23% of young Americans between the ages of 17 and 24 meet the basic education, fitness and moral criteria to serve. Among those qualified, only about 9% have shown interest in the military in recent years, according to Pentagon data.
Amid its struggles in recent years, the Army has launched new programs to bolster its recruiting apparatus and raised its recruiting commander from a two-star general to a three-star. It also opened a new pathway to enlistment for Army hopefuls who initially fall short of meeting the service’s enlistment standards.
Before the parade activities started, more than a dozen Army teams competed in a CrossFit-style competition, showcasing their strength, speed and stamina.
The core message from the competition was to demonstrate to the public the level of teamwork that is required of its service members, as these exact fitness exercises are conducted regularly to teach soldiers how to keep mission-focused under pressure.
Army Secretary Dan Driscoll congratulated the 3rd Infantry Division soldiers after they won the Army’s fitness contest all as part of the service’s 250th birthday festival on the National Mall in Washington.