Spiralling personnel costs in the military are unlikely to come down any time soon, despite attempts to reduce manpower levels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said yesterday.
While there are fewer servicemen to pay, the military's attempts to develop volunteer armed forces has, and will, cost more money, said Major General Hsia Chih-hsin (
"The MND's goal for the future is to replace conscripts with volunteer soldiers as the backbone of the three services. It is much more expensive to keep a force comprised mainly of volunteers," Hsia said. "To reach the goal, the military certainly must spend a considerable amount of money in the years to come. Under the circumstances, it would be hard for the personnel costs of the military to drop in the meantime," he said.
"It is hard to predict now whether the personnel costs will continue to increase, he said. "We are only sure that the costs will not go down."
Hsia said personnel costs had risen over the past eight years mainly because of investments the military made in downsizing the armed forces.
"Since 1994, personnel costs have risen by nearly NT$70 billion. During the same period of time, a total of 88,000 military personnel were taken from the active list," Hsia said.
"The reduced personnel contributed to a saving of NT$35 billion in personnel expenditures. This did not help the MND much, though," he said.
Hsia said some of the expense of the personnel streamlining project included incentive rewards given to encourage personnel to retire early or stay longer.
He did not specify exactly how much money had been given out as incentives.
The incentive rewards given to military officials who volunteered to retire early ranged from NT$1 million to NT$1.5 million for ranks between major and colonel. Thousands of officials of these ranks have retired early in recent years to qualify for the benefits.
There are also rewards for those who the military wants to stay.
Starting last year, the military has started giving bonuses to combat pilots ranked between captain and major who are willing to stay longer in the air force after their legally-required service terms expire, Hsia said.
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