Some Afghan Tours to be Three Years - Families can Accompany Spouse

In a little-known but significant change to deployment policies the military has revealed there will be three-year tours to Afghanistan starting in mid-2014. The number of personnel required to perform the long deployments will likely be small as the level of troops in Afghanistan is slowly going down. By February 2014 troop levels should be at 32,000 but in October 2014 it is estimated that there will be only 10,000 troops. Assignments will not be begin until after the Bilateral Security Agreement is signed and the NATO SOFA is formalized. Defense spokesmen state that only selected personnel in unique positions will be on the extended tours. The personnel likely to perform the three-year tours include ministry-level advisers, members of the Afghan Hands program, Air Force advisers to the Afghan Air Force, defense attache personnel, and Foreign Area Officers (FAOs). The impact to family life will be minimal as the military members will have the option of an accompanied tour. Read more in "Afghanistan Assignments Now Three-Year Accompanied Tours", Shadow Spear, January 2014.