Editorial: Allow paternal leave - Military Community, military installations, discussions, blogs, photos, videos - Military Times

Editorial: Allow paternal leave

The Senate Armed Services Committee has proposed giving new dads in uniform a benefit already widely available in the private sector: a little time off to bond with baby and care for mom.

A provision of the committee’s version of the 2009 defense authorization bill would allow up to 21 days of postnatal leave for military fathers, on top other accrued military leave.

Today, the Marine Corps is the only service branch with such a policy; the Corps gives Marines up to 10 days off following the birth of a child.

Of course, the mission would still have to come first, and the decision on whether to approve such leave, and for how long, still would be up to commanders.

In a force that’s overwhelmingly young, healthy and male — and produced 85,785 babies last year — this could become a morale issue, especially in a deployment-heavy wartime environment.

In many cases, time off for one person means everyone else has to make up the difference. And if you give every male service member three weeks off, that’s the equivalent of cutting the force by more than 4,000 people.

Yet if you put any stock in the adage that the military enlists the individual but re-enlists the family, such a policy still has merit. It could create stronger bonds, reduce family stress and perhaps give a boost to retention — no small thing in this era of continuous deployments.

But if three full weeks off is too much to accommodate given the current operating tempo, let’s not throw the idea out in its entirety.

Giving new military fathers at least a week or 10 days off for such a life-altering event is the right thing to do. And if the Marines can figure out how to do it, the other services can, too.

SPEAK OUT: Is it the right thing to do?