this is really very simple and straightforward. People's lives are not being disrupted, and the order is not an order to active duty.

The Reserves can be split into two groups--the "Selected Reserves" and everyone else. The "Selected Reserves" are the people in Reserve units that do the "one weekend a month, two weeks per year" training that we are all familiar with from Recruitment advertizing.

When you sign up in the Military, you do so for eight years---but in most cases, you have to serve in the "active duty component" (e.g. the Regular Army) for only three or four years. The rest of that time, you are supposed to become part of a Reserve Unit (e.g. Selected Reserves).

But there are only so many authorized Selected Reserve positions, and far more people who are required to serve in these positions. These "excess personnel" get designated as Individual Ready Reserves" and are not required to train as such.

Now that the Selected Reserve Units are being mobilized for Iraq duty, the Selected Reserves themselves have tens of thousands of available positions. So, the Army is filling those positions with the people who are REQUIRED to fulfill those positions in the first place--the Individual Ready Reservists who were designated as "excess personnel."

But all that is being required of them is that they show up one weekend a month, and two weeks per year, for reserve training. They are NOT being mobilized for active duty, and their lives are NOT being disrupted to any great extent.

Unfortunately, you're not privy to the entire memo being sent around. Kevin Drum and others have not posted its full text. On a subsequent page, the order says that IRR soldiers selected for involuntary transfer are to be put into units scheduled to be deployed for OEF/OIF (Afghanistan/Iraq). Once transferred into units on a deployment list, these soldiers then become stop-lossed. So, you're right that this is not an immediate mobilization order. However, it is a delayed mob order, and it effectively extends these people's military commitment for some time because of the future deployment which has been locked in.

Second note: most IRR soldiers are not required to serve in the select reserve, both by virture of their contracts and by virture of statute. (See AR 135-91). So it's not true that these people are being required to serve in a way that they agreed to. They're being forced to serve more than they agreed to.

Third note: you're incorrect about the enlistment terms of soldiers. It is true that soldiers sign up for an 8 year enlistment regardless of the actual terms in their contract -- this 8 year period is known as the 'statutory military service obligation'. However, if a soldier serves 4 years on active duty, he/she is *not* obligated to spend the rest of the 8 years in the select reserve (i.e. in active reserve units). In fact, the opposite is true. After completing the active-duty service obligation, soldiers are automatically discharged into the U.S. Army Reserve Control Group (Reinforcement), aka the "individual ready reserve", and it is their choice whether they want to join the select reserve or not. Many do, for the benefits involved. But there is no obligation to do so. You may want to download a DD-4 (enlistment contract) to see this for yourself, or check out the applicable Army regs at http://www.usapa.army.mil.

Hope this helps.

well, once those 37k Reserve/NG are mobilized, it leaves a 37K gap between the number of people authorized to be in TPUs/Selected Reserve Units, and the number who are in TPUs/Selected Reserve Units. So they are calling up IRRs to fill the Selected Reserve positions.