Pentagon Weighs Bigger Army as Service Sees Early Recruiting Success

The Army is on the cusp of hitting its annual recruiting target months ahead of schedule, a development that's prompting Pentagon planners to consider a rare move: increasing the active-duty force without Congress.
As of Monday, the Army had brought in 59,875 new active-duty enlisted soldiers with a total goal of 61,000 for fiscal 2025, which ends Sept. 30, according to data reviewed by Military.com. That tally includes about 14,000 recruits who signed up last year but delayed shipping to basic training due to school obligations or training capacity issues. Such recruits are counted in the year they begin service.
With the Army expected to hit its target in the next week or two, the Pentagon is weighing whether to invoke a little-used and relatively obscure authority that allows the defense secretary to increase a service's end strength by up to 3% without congressional action, four defense officials told Military.com. That would boost the Army's size from 450,000 soldiers to 463,500. The other option, a 4% increase, would require approval from Capitol Hill. The Army secretary also has authority to make some marginal increases.
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"We probably wouldn't want to turn off the recruiting spigot," one Pentagon official with direct knowledge of the situation told Military.com on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the press. "We're winning and want to keep playing."
Some Army recruiting officials noted that shutting down or scaling back recruiting would be dead on arrival, given the service's recruiting arm has finally gotten into a groove since the disruption from the COVID-19 pandemic. However, some plans of scaling back next year to compensate for this year's surge of new recruits are being mulled, particularly as the Army is downsizing units.
While Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and President Donald Trump have linked recruiting momentum with their leadership, there's no evidence recruiting is affected by the personalities of any given administration.
The recruiting rebound follows several years of shortfalls across the military services, with the Army missing its targets in both 2022 and 2023. The current momentum is the result of reforms launched during the previous administration, most notably the Future Soldier Preparatory Courses and streamlining the enlistment process at Military Entrance Processing Stations, or MEPS, where applicants were getting held up in bureaucratic gridlocks, mostly over routine medical waivers.
One in four Army recruits last year came through the Future Soldier Preparatory Courses, a basic training before basic training that's become the backbone of the service's recruiting recovery. The Pentagon estimates only a quarter of young Americans are eligible for military service.
The programs, split into academic and fitness tracks, are designed for applicants who flunk the SAT-style entrance exam or don't meet weight standards. Once they get up to snuff, they ship off to basic training like any other recruit. The prep courses graduated enough recruits to counter the entire recruiting shortfall.
The service plans to expand the program even further next year.
"The success we're seeing now is built on initiatives that began more than two years ago," one senior Army recruiting official said. "It's the result of hard work, not politics."
Also, a consistent factor in military recruiting gains is a weakening economy. The U.S. economy contracted by 0.3% in the first quarter of 2025, the worst performance in three years after Trump's chaotic trade war spurred uncertainty in global markets.
Meanwhile, the Army's recruiting ranks are quickly getting more diverse.
Service data shows a sharp drop in white enlistments, with just 37.5% of new soldiers identifying as white so far this year, down from more than 52% in 2021. Meanwhile, Hispanic and Black Americans are filling the gap: Hispanic recruits now make up nearly 27% of recruits so far this year, up from less than 20% four years ago, while Black recruits climbed to 28.3%, a nearly seven-point jump from 2021.
Women make up nearly 20% of new enlistments so far this year, up from 16% at the start of the decade, a modest but meaningful increase.
The increase in female recruits comes even as Hegseth has a history of questioning the role of women in the military, calling them "life-givers" in a book he wrote, adding that "we need moms, but not in the military." Hegseth and Trump have also fired women serving in top military roles, including Adm. Lisa Franchetti, the Navy's first female chief, without explanation.
While overall recruiting has been rocky, women have signed up at relatively steady rates, even as the number of men willing, or eligible, to serve has declined sharply. Since 2013, male enlistments have dropped by about 22%, from 58,000 to just 45,000 last year.
Women applicants often enter the process with a built-in edge: They're far less likely to have criminal records and are increasingly outperforming their male peers in education, part of a broader problem with boys and young men falling behind in the larger economy and education. It's a key factor, given that academic disqualifications remain one of the top barriers to service.
Related: 'Last Stop USA': How the Army Is Trying to Fill in for a Broken Education System

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