RAFINO

RAFINO Report
ISSUE 20 - Spring 1998
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Message From The Honorary
Colonel of The Finance Corps Regiment
MG (Ret.) Paul P. Burns


Dear Fellow RAFINO members:

Concerning The Future of the F.C. Corps !

The Fourteenth Finance Board meets 13-15 May at the Finance School and will focus on the future of the Finance Corps!  The board will review the current status of the Corps, develop and analyze options for the Corps' future, and decide on the best course of action.  This assessment is necessary because of today's environment of total force drawdowns, budget constraints, the ongoing Service to the Soldier Study, and the Soldier Support Battalion (SSB) Test of changes in doctrine, force structure and systems, centralization of accounting and disbursing functions to regional Finance Offices and DFAS, and merging pay and personnel change data into the SIDPERS-#3 personnel system. 

After the demise of the Soviet Union and the end of the Persian Gulf War, Army strength was reduced from 725,000 to 491,500 in the mid-1990s. Active Army strength is projected to be 480,000 by late 1999.  This 11,500 drawdown is targeted at combat service support (Finance and Personnel) and combat support operations.  On the budget side, the Army is required to fund peacekeeping missions such as in Bosnia and the current deployment to the Gulf with offsets of existing appropriations.  The Army decided to draw down ammunition stocks and to defer equipment depot maintenance.  This combined with the deployment of units and individual small unit leaders resulted in reduced combat readiness of units tested at the National Training Center and the Joint Readiness Training Center.  In March, the House National Security Committee asked the President to submit a Supplemental to correct this problem.  As of this time, no funds have been approved.  I'll cover results of the Finance Board meeting in my next message.

Soldier Support Battalion Test at Ft. Bragg Update

For clarification, this test is Phase 1 of the Service to the Soldier Study approved by the CG, Forces Command.  The study director is the CG, Soldier Support Institute (SSI).  Phase 1 would test BN headquarters Command and Control (Cē).  Phase 2 would assess merging pay and personnel functions supported by the SIDPERS-3 computer system with PerPay additions, which are not yet implemented.  This assessment would use the Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC) force development process which is a disciplined method of developing and testing doctrine and force structure.  The 82d SSB test only validated Sē TOE additions for a Finance Operations Section, a Personnel Operations Section and an S6--Communications Staff Section.  On 1 Dec 97, the CG, SSI briefed findings to the General Officer Steering Committee (GOSC) and recommended fielding the test SSB structure Army wide simultaneously with: 1) Proceeding with Phase 2 of the Service to the Soldier Study, and 2) Merging Finance Functional Area 44 with Comptroller Area 45.  No decision has been made yet pending time consuming resolution of many issues.

Meanwhile, the CG of FORSCOM has approved a request from the CG, XVIII Airborne to: 1. combine the 18th Finance Group and the 18th Personnel Group; 2. to establish a provisional 18th Soldier Support Group (18th SSG) at Ft. Hood; 3. to form SSBs at Forts Stewart, Drum and Campbell; and, 4. to combine the two remaining Finance Battalions at Ft. Bragg.  The GOSC does not support the XVIII consolidations as proposed.  This decision was made without the benefit of the TRADOC force development process which is Phase 2 of the Service to the Soldier Study mentioned above. 

Notwithstanding the above, it is not a forgone conclusion that SSBs and SSGs will be implemented Army-Wide.  FORSCOM and XVIII Airborne Corps are forging ahead of the Soldier Support Institute study as it is expedient to do so due to the impending draw downs.  More about this in my next message.