Honor promise made to troops

No more delay. Pay National Guard, Reserve and regular army members the respite-leave pay they've earned by serving extended tours in combat. Military leaders must waste no time in making sure these troops are compensated - up to $200 per eligible day, as they were promised - for their hardship and sacrifice.

Officials announced early in 2007 they'd pay Post-Deployment/Mobilization Respite Absence benefits for service members whose combat deployments were extended beyond their usual length of time.

But delays in implementing that program meant many troops were denied some of the benefits they'd earned.

More bureaucratic back-and-forth kept those missed payments from being distributed for years. And even after legislators gave the Department of Defense the authority to make the retroactive payments last fall, many troops still haven't been paid.

About 22,000 Guard members across the country still haven't received the missed payments, including about 750 members of the Iowa National Guard, even though many are soon being redeployed.

That undermines the goal of the payments - to help troops and their families deal with the extra strain those lengthy deployments, mostly to Iraq and Afghanistan, placed on their civilian lives - and it's unacceptable.

Spokesmen for all five U.S. House members - Reps. Bruce Braley, Dave Loebsack, Leonard Boswell, Tom Latham and Steve King - along with Sens. Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin have said they will join dozens of other federal lawmakers in signing a letter telling Defense Secretary Robert Gates of their concerns about the delay.

The letter states their special concern that more than 2,000 affected troops already have been mobilized for deployment back to Iraq and Afghanistan this year. Thousands more may be subsequently redeployed.

“We believe it's unacceptable that these troops - who have been waiting for more than two years now to receive these promised Respite Leave benefits - are being redeployed to combat zones without benefits earned during their previous deployments in hand,” they write.

We agree. As First District U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley's spokeswoman Caitlin Legacki told us Monday, many of the soldiers waiting for these benefits were involved in the longest military deployment since World War II.

They have earned our respect, our gratitude and our support.

Late Monday, the Army issued guidelines for distributing the unpaid benefits. Our congressional delegation must keep pushing until the payments are in the hands of troops. Promises made to those who serve on the battle lines must be kept.

Calls to patriotism ring hollow when we fail to uphold our commitment to those who give up so much to serve.