You got it wrong (276 words)

In order to meet its recruitment target, the British army has worked out some new strategies. However, are they the solutions to its problem?

The cover story in the latest NEWSTATESMAN says that the army is throwing open its door to people it would not have considered five years ago. It raises the maximum recruitment age from 26 to 33, and according to the magazine, one in every ten soldiers is a foreign national.

Furthermore, the army’s new recruitment target is the schoolchildren - from seven-year-old boys. Its Camouflage youth scheme aims to hold and develop the interest of those who made contact with the army but are too young to join. The members can get the magazine Camouflage launched every quarter, books and some military games on the website. The recruiter receives their contact details and follows them up.

The British army seems to make every effort to meet manpower requirement. However, it does not know why people are unwilling to join and stay in the army. It ignores people’s fear. If a married man joins the army, what might happen to his family? Can the government promise that he can return his country safely? It is not the case of money is everything.

Moreover, the 16-year-old Cara, a girl mentioned in the story, whose reasons of becoming a soldier are to keep fit and get higher pay than her cousins. Are those motivations sustainable over her military career? If not, the number of new recruits would never catch up with those personnel left the service.

The British army needs to figure out why skilled and experienced soldiers quitted, not only throwing money at recruitment.
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References
1 - NEWSTATESMAN - 5 February 2007