Air Force to fall short of recruiting goal for first time since 1999

Amid a recruiting crisis that’s impacted each of the military services for the last several years, the Air Force has fared better than most. This year though, it will join the Army and Navy in failing to meet its recruiting goal — something that hasn’t happened in more than two decades.
For the fiscal year that ends this month, the active duty Air Force will be about 10% below the recruiting targets it set for the year — it had planned to add 26,500 new airmen to the force in fiscal 2023. Figures for the Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve are even bleaker: Those components will miss their recruiting targets by about 30%.
Another concern: The population of recruits who’ve agreed to join but haven’t yet been formally onboarded into military service — the “delayed entry pool” — is at uncomfortably low levels.
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