Beautiful Virgin Islands

Wednesday, Oct 29, 2025

Military leaders worry America’s youth are still too fat or dumb to fight

Military leaders worry America's youth are still too fat or dumb to fight

U.S. military leaders are increasingly worried that young Americans are too overweight or undereducated to join the armed forces
Young Americans are increasingly too overweight or undereducated to join the U.S. military, according to a growing number of both retired and active-duty military leaders.

In a Dec. 17 letter to Acting Secretary of Defense Christoper Miller, Mission: Readiness — a nonpartisan organization of nearly 800 retired admirals and generals — warned that 71 percent of young Americans between the ages of 17 and 24 are ineligible for military service “because they are too poorly educated, too overweight, or have a history of crime or substance abuse.”

While Mission: Readiness has sought to hammer this point home to active-duty military leaders in recent years, this letter to Miller is different. In it, the group urged the acting defense secretary to stand up an advisory committee on military recruitment to “create a long-term strategy to address the biggest disqualifiers for military service.”

The proposed committee, which matches a recommendation to the Pentagon from lawmakers in the fiscal year 2021 National Defense Authorization Act, would work with the departments of Agriculture, Education, Health and Human Services, and Justice to address underlying factors like obesity, lack of education, and criminality and their impact on recruitment.

Those factors “largely fall outside of the Department of Defense’s purview, but have an immense impact on the ability of the military to recruit new service members as well as a significant monetary impact on the Department,” wrote former Air Force Gen. William M. Fraser and former Coast Guard Adm. James M. Loy in Mission: Readiness’s letter to Miller.

“Without coordinated action, these trends pose a significant threat to the future of the all-volunteer force.”

Mission: Readiness isn’t the only group of military leaders seriously concerned with the state of U.S. military recruitment: Maj. Gen. Frank Muth, head of Army Recruiting Command, warned in 2018 that obesity was the largest reason for the service to disqualify future soldiers.

More recently, Military.com reported that both Navy and Marine Corps officials responsible for recruiting have expressed concern over the factors underlined in the group’s letter to Miller.

“It is something that, as a nation, we should continue to work though … to make sure our children are healthier,” Navy Recruiting Command chief Rear Adm. Dennis Velez told Military.com in a recent interview.

Indeed, Marine Corps Recruiting Service chief Maj. Gen. Jason Bohm went as far as to warn that far fewer than 30 percent of eligible young Americans are suited to join the service.

“If you break it down further into those skill sets, intelligence level, and the physical ability level, those that we’re looking toward bringing into the Marine Corps … quickly decreases to about 7 percent,” Bohm told Military.com. “That’s enormously challenging.”
Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
Bill Gates at 70: “I Have a Real Fear of Artificial Intelligence – and Also Regret”
Elon Musk Unveils Grokipedia: An AI-Driven Alternative to Wikipedia
Saudi Arabia Unveils Vision for First-Ever "Sky Stadium" Suspended Over Desert Floor
Amazon Announces 14 000 Corporate Job Cuts as AI Investment Accelerates
UK Shop Prices Fall for First Time Since March, Food Leads the Decline
London Stock Exchange Group ADR (LNSTY) Earns Zacks Rank #1 Upgrade on Rising Earnings Outlook
Soap legend Tony Adams, long-time star of Crossroads, dies at 84
Rachel Reeves Signals Tax Increases Ahead of November Budget Amid £20-50 Billion Fiscal Gap
NatWest Past Gains of 314% Spotlight Opportunity — But Some Key Risks Remain
UK Launches ‘Golden Age’ of Nuclear with £38 Billion Sizewell C Approval
UK Announces £1.08 Billion Budget for Offshore Wind Auction to Boost 2030 Capacity
UK Seeks Steel Alliance with EU and US to Counter China’s Over-Capacity
UK Struggles to Balance China as Both Strategic Threat and Valued Trading Partner
Argentina’s Markets Surge as Milei’s Party Secures Major Win
British Journalist Sami Hamdi Detained by U.S. Authorities After Visa Revocation Amid Israel-Gaza Commentary
King Charles Unveils UK’s First LGBT+ Armed Forces Memorial at National Memorial Arboretum
At ninety-two and re-elected: Paul Biya secures eighth term in Cameroon amid unrest
Racist Incidents Against UK Nurses Surge by 55%
UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves Cites Shared Concerns With Trump Administration as Foundation for Early US-UK Trade Deal
Essentra plc: A Closer Look at a UK ‘Penny Stock’ Opportunity Amid Market Weakness
U.S. and China Near Deal to Avert Rare-Earth Export Controls Ahead of Trump-Xi Summit
Justin time: Justin Herbert Shields Madison Beer with Impressive Reflex at Lakers Game
Russia’s President Putin Declares Burevestnik Nuclear Cruise Missile Ready for Deployment
Giuffre’s Memoir Alleges Maxwell Claimed Sexual Act with Clooney
House Republicans Move to Strip NYC Mayoral Front-Runner Zohran Mamdani of U.S. Citizenship
Record-High Spoiled Ballots Signal Voter Discontent in Ireland’s 2025 Presidential Election
Philippines’ Taal Volcano Erupts Overnight with 2.4 km Ash Plume
Albania’s Virtual AI 'Minister' Diella Set to 'Birth' Eighty-Three Digital Assistants for MPs
Tesla Unveils Vision for Optimus V3 as ‘Biggest Product of All Time’, Including Surgical Capabilities
Francis Ford Coppola Auctions Luxury Watches After Self-Financed Film Flop
Convicted Sex Offender Mistakenly Freed by UK Prison Service Arrested in London
United States and China Begin Constructive Trade Negotiations Ahead of Trump–Xi Summit
U.S. Treasury Sanctions Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro over Drug-Trafficking Allegations
Miss USA Crowns Nebraska’s Audrey Eckert Amid Leadership Overhaul
‘I Am Not Done’: Kamala Harris Signals Possible 2028 White House Run
NBA Faces Integrity Crisis After Mass Arrests in Gambling Scandal
Swift Heist at the Louvre Sees Eight French Crown Jewels Stolen in Under Seven Minutes
U.S. Halts Trade Talks with Canada After Ontario Ad Using Reagan Voice Triggers Diplomatic Fallout
Microsoft AI CEO: ‘We’re making an AI that you can trust your kids to use’ — but can Microsoft rebuild its own trust before fixing the industry’s?
China and Russia Deploy Seductive Espionage Networks to Infiltrate U.S. Tech Sector
Apple’s ‘iPhone Air’ Collapses After One Month — Another Major Misstep for the Tech Giant
Graham Potter Begins New Chapter as Sweden Head Coach on Short-Term Deal
Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa Alleges Poison Plot via Chocolate and Jam
Lakestar to Halt External Fundraising as Investor in Revolut and Spotify
U.S. Innovation Ranking Under Scrutiny as China Leads Output Outputs but Ranks 10th
Three Men Arrested in London on Suspicion of Spying for Russia
Porsche Reverses EV Strategy as New CEO Bets on Petrol and Hybrids
Singapore’s Prime Minister Warns of ‘Messy’ Transition to Post-American Global Order
Andreessen Horowitz Sets Sights on Ten-Billion-Dollar Fund for Tech Surge
US Administration Under President Donald Trump Reportedly Lifts Ban on Ukraine’s Use of Storm Shadow Missiles Against Russia
×