ARLINGTON, Va. — Sailors and other servicemembers who join the Navy Reserve can defer being mobilized for up to two years, the Navy has announced.

All sailors are eligible for the deferments, regardless of their last duty station or previous deployment schedules, according to a Tuesday NAVADMIN (Navy Administrative Message). The policy is effective as of Oct. 2, 2006.

The purpose of this change is to “permit a reasonable transition period and avoid back-to-back mobilizations to the maximum extent possible,” according to NAVADMIN 007/07.

Toward that end, sailors and other servicemembers who join the Navy Reserve up to 183 days after leaving active duty are eligible to defer being mobilized for up to two years from the date they joined the Reserve, the NAVADMIN says.

Servicemembers who join the Reserve between seven and 12 months after leaving active duty qualify for a one-year deferment, the NAVADMIN says.

Sailors may volunteer to be called up at any time during the deferment period, the NAVADMIN says.

Reservists typically have made up the majority of individual augmentees, sailors who are sent to a theater of operations to fill billets for other branches of the service, such as the Army and Marine Corps. Augmentees deploy as individuals, not units.

About 60 percent of the 8,500 of individual augmentees now in the U.S. Central Command theater of operations are reservists, Navy officials said.

For more information, go to: www.npc.navy.mil E-mail Jeff Schogol at: schogolj@stripes.osd.mil