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DoD to expand military jobs for noncitizens

By William H. McMichael - Staff writer
Posted : Friday Dec 5, 2008 17:03:01 EST

Holders of temporary work visas who have lived in the U.S. for two years can, for the first time in modern history, enlist in the military if they are a health care professional or have cultural and language skills in specialties or areas deemed critical, the Pentagon announced Friday.

Those accepted into the pilot program, initially limited to 1,000 people and authorized through December 2009, would be eligible for accelerated U.S. citizenship, a privilege already granted to permanent resident aliens, known as green card holders.

Noncitizens are eligible for expedited citizenship under a July 2002 Executive Order. Since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the U.S., nearly 43,000 service members have used this route to gain U.S. citizenship, according to the Pentagon.

“Why now?” Bill Carr, deputy undersecretary for military personnel policy, said of the pilot program launch. “Because we can, and now we judge we must.”

The Pentagon has significant shortfalls in language translators and health care professionals, Carr said. The military has about 24,000 medical professionals — 11,000 doctors, 3,000 dentists and 10,000 nurses — but is still about 1,000 short of requirements, evenly divided between nurses and doctors, Carr said.

The services are meeting nearly all general quotas for recruiting and retention. But despite a favorable recruiting and retention climate — with rising unemployment a contributing factor — Carr said the servicesa are not attracting sufficient numbers of doctors, nurses, and language/cultural experts.

The military’s greatest medical needs are for neurosurgeons and dermatologists, who are especially critical to treatment of those wounded in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which have produced a tragic abundance of brain injuries and burns resulting from roadside bomb blasts.

At the same time, Adm. Eric Olson, chief of U.S. Special Operations Command, has pressed hard for more cultural and language specialists during meetings with Defense Secretary Robert Gates and the service secretaries.

The upshot: One-third of the slots will be reserved for medical billets, and two-thirds for cultural/language skills.

Gates limited the initial overall number of people in the pilot program, despite the military’s needs in both areas, in order to reduce concerns some may have about opening the military’s doors too widely to nonpermanent residents.

“We said 1,000 so that nobody’s too anxious about the scope of the program,” Carr said.

Applicants will be closely vetted. “The intelligence community can and shall screen them aggressively,” Carr said.

The cultural/language personnel will be divided equally between those with basic and advanced skills in reading, listening and speaking, Carr said. Someone considered advanced would have such skills roughly equivalent to a college freshman.

The temporary work visa applicants will be welcome to enlist in any service and for any specialty, include Special Forces, and would qualify for any cash bonuses normally awarded, Carr said.

But the cultural/language specialists will largely be regarded as a sort of bullpen, scattered across the services in any number of different jobs, from which Special Forces could draw for specific and unanticipated needs — for a service member with cultural and language skills applicable to, say, Nigeria.

To be accepted, Carr said, “they must meet every standard — aptitude, medical, physical — and compete their way in.”

Also, medical professionals, most of whom would be officers, would have to serve three years on active duty or six in the Selected Reserves, while cultural/language specialists would have to serve a minimum of four years, Carr said.

All who are accepted into the program and successfully complete training can, like permanent resident aliens, apply immediately for accelerated citizenship. Those deemed not to have served honorably, however, could have their citizenship revoked under the authority of current immigration law, Carr said.

Download the fact sheet for more information on eligibility, specific requirements and the language specialties sought.