You should have read the fine print

"Stop-loss" is originally a term referring to a kind of instruction to a broker regarding an investment. If the value of a stock fell to a certain point below the purchase price, the broker was to sell it off, thus preventing further loss to the investor.

But right now, it's best-known meaning is a military one.

Washington (AP, June 2) - The Army will prevent soldiers in units set to deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan from leaving the service at the end of their terms, a top general said Wednesday.

The announcement, an expansion of an Army program called "stop-loss," means that thousands of soldiers who had expected to retire or otherwise leave the military will have to stay on for the duration of their deployment to those combat zones.

The expansion affects units that are 90 days away or less from deploying, said Lt. Gen. Frank L. "Buster" Hagenbeck, the Army's deputy chief of staff for personnel.

Since such deployments can be for as long as a year, that means some soldiers will be kept in uniform for as long as 15 months after their supposed end of service.

The argument that it's intended to "keep units together as they deploy" is fooling no one; the real reason is that between Iraq and Afghanistan, the military has a total of about 150,000 combat troops in the field and the Pentagon is finding it hard to keep up the numbers. Allowing for rotations of units in and out of theater has stretched forces enough that 3,600 US troops are being redeployed from South Korea to Iraq - that's about 1/3 of the US force in Korea.

Some voices are calling the program contrary to the idea of an all-volunteer army and a "backdoor draft." For example,

[i]n an opinion piece in Wednesday's New York Times, Andrew Exum, a former Army captain who served under Hagenbeck in the 10th Mountain Division in Afghanistan, called the treatment of soldiers under stop-loss programs "shameful." ...

"[L]ike draftees, they have been conscripted to meet the additional needs in Iraq."

(Does that mean if they were draftees this would be okay?)

There's no reason to be surprised at this development, actually, and little basis to complain. "Military necessity" is used to trump all other considerations, just like it always has. Besides, our only president has made direct links between World War II ("the good war") and the "war on terrorism." Well, in WW2, soldiers were regarded as being "in for the duration," that is, until the war was over or they were disabled or killed. So what's the beef here? Don't you know there's a war on?

There's only one solution here, and it's not a stop-loss program and it's not a renewed draft.

It's set the damn date and get the hell out.