Imminent danger pay will be halted for troops in Bosnia, Croatia

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Imminent danger pay will be halted for troops in Bosnia, Croatia


By Jeff Schogol, Stars and Stripes
Online edition, Friday, March 30, 2007



ARLINGTON, Va. — U.S. troops in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia will no longer receive $225 per month in imminent danger pay as of Nov. 1, the Defense Department announced late Friday.
The move will affect about 232 U.S. troops now deployed to Bosnia-Herzegovina, according to the Defense Department. The number of U.S. troops in Croatia was not immediately available on Friday.
The news came one week after the Defense Department announced that about 1,500 U.S. troops stationed in Kosovo would continue to get imminent danger pay.
The Defense Department pays certain troops imminent danger pay if they are deployed to a region where they face “the threat of physical harm or imminent danger on the basis of civil insurrection, civil war, terrorism or wartime conditions.”
The U.S. military has had a presence in Bosnia-Herzegovina for more than a decade. About 20,000 U.S. troops, mostly based in Germany, were sent to the region in late 1995 to enforce the Dayton peace accords, which ended that country’s civil war.
The decision to stop giving the pay to U.S. troops in Bosnia-Herzegovina comes as a result of a periodic review of who should get the special pay, the news release says.
The review also determined the following troops also would no longer receive imminent danger pay:

• 43 troops deployed to Macedonia.
• Seven troops deployed to Georgia.
• Five troops deployed to Angola.
• One servicemember deployed to Sierra Leone.

However, those troops will get more in hardship pay, which is meant to compensate troops deployed to areas where the quality of life is “substantially below” what most servicemembers in the U.S. experience, the news release says.
“Factors considered include physical environment, living conditions and personal security,” the news release says.
Under the changes, U.S. troops in Angola, Georgia and Sierra Leone will get $150 per month in hardship pay, up from $100 per month, the news release says. In another change, troops in Macedonia will now collect hardship pay at a rate of $100 per month.


Stars & Stripes: Imminent danger pay will be halted for troops in Bosnia, Croatia