The U.S. military has found one fighting force it cannot afford to have as an enemy.
Military wives - swift, well-organized and armed with cell phones, e-mail and Facebook accounts - rose up in angerover a decision in February by the Department of Defense to halt a program that was paying educational expenses for more than 136,500 spouses.
Defense Department brass, acknowledging the suspension had been poorly handled, partially reinstated the program last week, pledging to honor the military's promises and earn back spouses' trust.
But it's not clear when, or if, the program will be reopened to new applicants or under what terms, and some spouses remain skeptical.
"It's kind of like when you put your hand in the cookie jar, and it gets smacked," said Carol Farnum, whose husband is a paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg. "The next time, you don't want to put your hand in the cookie jar so fast."
U.S. Sen. Richard Burr, who objected to the suspension of the Military Spouse Career Advancement Accounts program, called MyCAA, applauded its restart and said the Defense Department must reopen it to new applicants. Part of the popularity ofMyCAA was that, unlike other programs, it was open to nearly all spouses of active-duty service members and those of activated National Guard and Reserve members.
"These spouses support our men and women in the Armed Forces, and at a time when we are demanding so much from our military families, the My Career Advancement Accounts program is a small token of our appreciation and support for their sacrifices," Burr said.
Thousands of people in North Carolina, mostly women, were enticed after MyCAA launched last March.
Keeping spouses happy
The program was a response to a 2008 survey of 1.3 million active-duty spouses in which 77 percent said they wanted and needed to work. Recognizing the role spouses play in troop readiness and re-enlistment, the military has sought to make them happier with such things as improved base housing and expanded child care.
On the job front, spouses were thwarted by frequent moves that made it hard to cultivate skills and establish work histories.
MyCAA was supposed to help by paying for them to get degrees, certifications and licenses in high-growth career fields. Applicants were steered into areas such as teaching, health care and information technology, in which they could expect to find work almost anywhere in the world.
Students could attend local community and four-year colleges or take courses online, a popular option that allowed them to stay in school even if they had to move.
Once approved, participants could get grants of up to $6,000, which the Defense Department paid to schools as each round of classes began.
The military never advertised the program, letting the news travel through family readiness groups and other informal means.
"I spread the word to every single person I knew," said Melissa Warren, a Marine wife who teaches high school at Camp Lejeune. She started a master's program last summer and pounced on MyCAA as soon as she heard about it. Until then, she said, she had been taking out personal loans to pay for her continuing education.
Ten thousand people applied to MyCAA each of the first several months, according to Maj. April Cunningham, a Pentagon press officer. Then, in January, 70,000 people applied, followed by 25,000 in the first two weeks of February. The influx threatened to break the program's $166 million budget.
"It's kind of insulting that they didn't expect us to take advantage of such a great opportunity," said Patricia Moore, whose husband is in an Army signal unit at Fort Bragg.
Moore enrolled in MyCAA to finish an associate degree in information technology through the University of Phoenix's online school. She does her coursework in the afternoons and evenings. She has a part-time job, a 3-year-old daughter and $10,000 in outstanding loans for earlier college courses.
On Feb. 16, the military suspended the program. Most participants found out by going online to enter their classes for payment and finding a cryptic note.
Warren, at Camp Lejeune, was stunned. She says she'll need that master's to compete for a teaching job at her husband's next post, likely to be at Quantico, Va. Once she enrolled in MyCAA, she canceled the loan she was going to take out. She had not applied for federal aid because she didn't think she would need it.
Suddenly, she said, she was on the hook for $2,700 to American Military University.
"Let's face it," she said. "On a military educator's budget, that money isn't going to magically appear."
Rally to action
As they learned of the program's suspension, spouses mobilized. They started a Facebook page, "Take Action Against MyCAA Shutdown," which has more than 2,600 members.
They called and wrote letters and sent e-mail to their congressional delegates, including Sens. Burr and Kay Hagan of North Carolina.
They kicked off a media blitz, sharing talking points through the Facebook page and making themselves available to their local newspaper and TV reporters. They were discussing a protest rally when Tommy Thomas, deputy under secretary of defense, announced Thursday that the program would be restarted for those already enrolled.
"When we determined that an operational pause in the program was critically needed, we failed to notify our spouses in a timely and appropriate manner," Thomas said in a statement. "As a result of our failure, we know we will have to work hard to restore their faith in us. We are committed to earning that trust through improved communication and by delivering services."
Now, though, the Defense Department will have to find the money to continue the program. Hagan said she would look into including the money in a supplemental spending bill that could be passed this spring.
"If we have promised this to people, we have got to follow through with it," Hagan said. "We've made the commitment."
Washington correspondent Barbara Barrett contributed to this report.
