STUDY OF DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE POLICIES RELATING TO DEPLOYMENT OF MILITARY SERVICEMEMBERS WITH DEPENDENTS OR SERVICEMEMBERS FROM FAMILIES WITH MORE THAN ONE SERVICEMEMBER

SEC. 315. STUDY OF DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE POLICIES RELATING TO DEPLOYMENT OF MILITARY SERVICEMEMBERS WITH DEPENDENTS OR SERVICEMEMBERS FROM FAMILIES WITH MORE THAN ONE SERVICEMEMBER (a) Study.— The Secretary of Defense shall carry out a study of the policies of the Department of Defense relating— (1) to activation of units and members of reserve components for active duty (other than for training); and (2) to deployments overseas of members of the Armed Forces (whether from active or reserve components), as those policies affect the family responsibilities and interests of members of the Armed Forces who have minor children or who are from families with more than one member in the Armed Forces. (b) Matters To Be Considered.— The study under subsection (a) shall examine the family policies of the military departments for consistency among the Armed Forces and shall consider whether these policies adequately address the needs of reserve component personnel. The study shall also assess the responsiveness of current policies to the needs of the all-volunteer Force as it is presently constituted, as reflected by its demographic profile. (c) Report.— Not later than March 31, 1992, the Secretary of Defense shall submit to the Committees on Armed Services of the Senate and House of Representatives a report containing the results of the study under subsection (a). The report shall include an 105 STAT. 87analysis of the effect of deployments made as part of military operations during the Persian Gulf conflict on members of the Armed Forces referred to in that subsection, including the following (which shall be shown separately by service and for active-component and reserve-component personnel): (1) The number of single parent military personnel who were deployed and the number of children of those parents. (2) The number of members of the Armed Forces married to another member of the Armed Forces who were both deployed and the number of children of those members. (3) The number of members of the Armed Forces deployed (or given orders to deploy) who requested exceptions to existing policies respecting family members, categorized by the reasons given for the requests and the dispositions of the requests. (4) A description of any differences in any of the military departments in policies applicable to active component members and reserve component members and any problems that arose from those differences. (5) A statement of the incidence of use of military family assistance programs by persons other than parents who provided care for dependent children while parents in the Armed Forces were deployed. (6) A discussion of the effectiveness of military family assistance programs during the Persian Gulf conflict. (7) A discussion of the applicability of existing policies with respect to members of the Armed Forces who have dependents other than minor children, including dependent parents and dependent disabled adult children. (8) A discussion of proposed and actual changes by the Department of Defense in family assistance programs and assignment policies.