The Senate on July 13 confirmed Pete Geren to become the next Secretary of the Army. President Bush nominated Geren, who has been serving as acting Army Secretary since Francis Harvey got the boot earlier this year over the wounded warrior problems at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. Geren, a former Congressman from Texas, also served for about three months as acting Air Force Secretary, after which he returned to his former position as special assistant to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld before becoming Undersecretary of the Army.
The Air Force’s recent trend of low promotion rates for enlisted noncommissioned officers continued Aug. 17, as the service announced it had tapped just 9,706 senior airmen out of 45,991 eligible to become staff sergeants—a 21.1 percent promotion rate. That mark is the lowest in nearly a quarter of a…