The US Air Force today stood up a new squadron which will focus specifically on recruiting for special operations Airmen, News Radio 1200 WOAI reports.
The 330th Recruiting Squadron will be headquartered at Randolph Air Force Base, and will include 96 recruiters who will be stationed around the world.
Master Sergeant Benjamin Hannigan says the new unit indicates how the Air Force mission is changing at a time of terrorism and 'asymmetrical warfare.'
"Growing requirement down range and the need of more individuals to do the job, at the same time as it becomes more difficult to recruit for the Air Force in general," he said.
Recruitment is being hurt by a number of factors, including the strong civilian economy, more and more young people who are ineligible for military service due to drug use, poor physical fitness and obesity, and the fact that fewer and fewer American young people have a family connection to the military.
Hannigan says the new unit will recruit, as he put it, young people who have the grit not to quit.
"These units will be assigned specifically bring air power to the ground, ordnance to the ground that is needed to execute war," he said.
Other recruits will be involved in pararescue, survival, evasion, resistance and escape, and it will even recruit meterologists who will be skilled in predicting the weather in the area of planned military operations.