Is it true that if you go into the IRR in the Army Reserve you're more likely to be deployed again?

Question

Air Force Reserve, here I come...

Answer 1

When you enlist, you sign up for a 8 year obligation.

You might serve 2,4 or 6 years on active duty and then when you are discharged, you are assigned into the IRR.

The IRR is a non drilling, non pay reserve.

IRR members from each branch have been called back to active duty since 9/11.

You do not have a choice of what IRR you go into, you go into the IRR for the branch you served in.

Answer 2

When they call people back they call them back for the job they needs. Some of those jobs have been senior enlisted people for combat related fields. Some of them have also been things like intelligence. It isn't a lottery, you probably won't get called back if you aren't senior and you aren't in a very small career field. I keep my uniforms out of paranoia of getting called back and having to pay for them again. but the odds of that happening are so astronomical, that I would literally have to be paranoid to think it was worth the space to keep that stuff around. Unfortunately for me, I am.

Don't make your decisions to join based on what might happen in IRR when it is such a tiny chance, join to get the job you want.