Army National Guard: Pillars of Army Strength

The Army National Guard (ARNG) has a strong foundation based on two long-standing pillars of strength: personnel readiness and equipment versatility. Personnel readiness means having the right force structure as well as recruiting, training and retaining the best people. Personnel readiness also means providing the best benefits-especially family, health and education benefits. Equipment versatility involves having modern equipment comparable to that of the active Army. This means that our deploying soldiers get the same equipment as the active Army soldiers and take the equipment they need to the war.

Since September 11,2001, ARNG soldiers have been fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan alongside the active Army. At the same time, our units have undergone extensive reorganization to a modular force while adjusting to the intense deployment demands as an operational force.

The U.S. Army is moving from a threat-based Army to a capabilities-based Army, which requires a rebalancing of the force with the objectives and challenges of addressing high demand for federal and state forces, despite unit shortages in both personnel and equipment. The Army National Guard history of first-responder capabilities emphasizes the need for prepositioned personnel and equipment, especially during peak natural disaster seasons.

The Army National Guard has an end strength of 358,438 soldiers as of April 2008-28,000 more soldiers than in July 2005. The next Army Guard end-strength goal is to have 360,000 soldiers. Personnel readiness, as we know, is not about numerical goals; personnel readiness is about people. Soldiers and units all have stories to tellsome from around the campfire and some from behind a podium-examples of courage and commitment coming from all over the globe.

Training has become so realistic and high-tech in recent years that some of our veterans and retired soldiers might not immediately distinguish a training scenario from a live operation. On a typical training day outside of Kabul, a squad of Afghan soldiers mounts a simulated attack with all the elements of an actual event except for live fire. Three soldiers lie flat on their stomachs, providing simulated cover for four comrades who rush forward, Kalashnikovs in hand. An advisory team from the New York National Guard observes and critiques the drill while continuing to coach and train the Afghan National Army (ANA) at the rehabilitated Kabul Military Training Center (KMTC); about a third of the ANA trained at the KMTC. In the past six years, more than 70,000 recruits have spent 10 grueling weeks or more learning the basics of being a soldier.

As the Guard increases end strength, demand for ARNG service increases proportionately. When April showers turned into storms and flooding this spring, the Missouri National Guard was ready-the 70th Troop Command in the Marble Hill and Piedmont communities moved families and sandbags to counterbalance the flooding. Unfortunately, five people died due to the storm, but the 70th and other first responders quickly and efficiently contained more than a foot of rainfall. Relieved communities were able to return to the ordinary activities of early spring.

On a mission in Afghanistan with the 240th Engineering Group of the Maine Army National Guard, a three-vehicle convoy was struck by a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device. After the blast, two soldiers from the convoy were medically evacuated by helicopter. Immediately after the evacuation, a motorcycle with two passengers armed with AK-47s approached the convoy. Sgt. Annette Marcotte, the gunner in the lead vehicle, followed her rules of engagement. After the motorcycle failed to comply, Sgt. Marcotte fired a warning shot in the vicinity of the motorcycle, which then turned around and vacated the scene. Sgt. Marcotte received a Combat Action Badge for her quick and decisive actions. She is one of the first women to earn this prestigious badge. Spc. Kathryn Bouffard, also of the 240th, was awarded a Combat Action Badge for her professional actions during a mortar attack while on a medical support mission.

In addition, the 240th Engineer Group, Maine National Guard, coordinated the movement of Bailey bridge parts from Italy to Afghanistan. The 240th moved the bridge parts to a construction site at the Pech and Waygal rivers and assembled three bridges across the rivers to support movement and resupply of friendly forces. The 230-foot-long Pech River Bridge is reportedly the longest Bailey bridge built under combat conditions since World War II. The 240th also improved irrigation projects (dams, canals, retaining walls, storage tanks) in eight villages, assisted with three mosque refurbishments, and helped with four medical clinic refurbishments and 50 medical missions, treating approximately 15,000 local nationals and providing communities with more than $100,000 worth of medical supplies. In addition, the 240th cleared more than 2 million square meters of unexploded ordnance, mines and other explosive hazards on Bagram Air Field.

The soldiers of the 829th Engineer Battalion, Wisconsin National Guard, have also been very busy. They traveled to Trinidad to help build clinics and schools as part of Beyond the Horizon, a Joint and international humanitarian mission sponsored by U.S. Southern Command and planned and supervised by U.S. Army South. The soldiers used the Canadian-developed Royal Building System, which has modular sections that can withstand hurricane-force winds. Working with Trinidad engineers, the Wisconsin soldiers built friendships as well as buildings.

On the other side of the world, National Guard soldiers from Iowa and Minnesota continue to participate in NATO's Kosovo Force. If Kosovo destabilizes, it will threaten an entire region, which will affect future obligations and national security for the United States. This important mission of maintaining the peace between the Albanians and the Serbians is helping to fortify this new nation.

In January 2007, the Secretary of Defense directed that ARNG units be scheduled for mobilizations of no more than 12 months. To maximize the availability of National Guard troops to combatant commanders, the ARNG is moving toward completing certification of soldiers and units at home-state or regional premobilization training. The Army Chief of Staff has directed that each adjutant general have certification authority. This local certification process will reduce training time away from the home state, territory or region and increase boots-on-the-ground time.

The Army National Guard has restructured into a more independent and interchangeable modular force. Army National Guard brigade combat teams (BCTs) are being structured and manned identically to those in the active Army and can work together with other BCTs or elements of the Joint force, improving integration, interoperability and compatibility. This transformation also includes combat aviation brigades, theater aviation brigades, sustainment brigades, maneuver enhancement brigades and fires brigades. The modular organization provides a more flexible, capable and rapidly deployable force with the BCT as the centerpiece. The modular force also factors into the Army Force Generation model, which provides more predictable deployment rotations.

Thousands of Guard soldiers have been engaged in stability-and-support operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Horn of Africa (the region of Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia), peacekeeping in the Sinai and Balkans, and security operations in Guantanamo Bay, as well as homeland defense and support to civil authorities within the United States.

The Army National Guard fulfills a vital role in the nation's defense at home and abroad by providing combat, combat support and combat service support units to the combatant commanders, the Army, Joint and combined forces, and the states and territories. These ready forces are capable of performing full spectrum operations in support of our civil and military leadership. The Army National Guard continues to be a relevant and ready element of the nation's emergency preparedness network with missions at home and abroad.

At the end of fiscal year (FY) 2007, the governors of our states and territories had about 61 percent of authorized equipment on hand. The Guard equipping levels for domestic missions fell from 70 percent in 2001 to as low as 40 percent in 2006. Several factors have contributed to the decline of the Army National Guard equipping levels since 2001, including different requirements, equipment destroyed during operations and equipment left in theater for other units. Even at 2001 equipping levels, much of the Guard equipment was not interoperable with active Army equipment. Conversion of Army National Guard units to modular configuration in an era of persistent conflict has significantly increased the requirements for equipment and modernization and has contributed to a decrease in equipment readiness.

Any decrease in equipment availability puts the nation at great risk, which is exacerbated by outdated and nondeployable equipment. Thanks to a commitment from senior leaders in the Office of the secretary of Defense and the U.S. Army, and continued assistance from Congress, the Army National Guard equipment-and-modernization levels have risen sharply in recent years and will continue to rise as deliveries are made.

Our soldiers have been fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan while undergoing a transformation to a modular force and adjusting to an active role as an operational force. These combined activities have caused increased demands for our equipment and have created additional equipment requirements. As ARNG units convert to modular formations, their requirements increase significantly: They have to be equipped with multiple new and highly capable (but expensive) systems. By the end of 2009, with the help of an additional $800 million for the National Guard and Reserve equipment appropriation, equipping levels will be closer to 70 percent. This is a good illustration of the strong support and commitment that Congress, the U.S. Army and the DoD have for equipment readiness.

The Army National Guard is challenged with providing adequate equipment to units that are training for mobilization, equipping the mobilization stations and ensuring that units have the right equipment to deploy to theater. The National Guard Bureau (NGB) has leveraged Army procurement or cross-leveled the equipment required by units to conduct relevant and timely premobilization training before deployment. Army National Guard equipment was repositioned to augment the Army's postmobilization training equipment at mobilization stations. Although ARNG units used this equipment, it was not available for conducting domestic missions. At both home stations and mobilization stations, the units are conducting collective training with the equipment necessary for completion of their wartime missions. Extensive redistribution of equipment is required to ensure that deploying units have the systems needed to fight and win wherever engaged.

Much of this needed equipment was left behind in theater for reuse by incoming units. A portion of the effort to improve readiness involves the replacement of equipment left behind in theater, damaged beyond repair or no longer serviceable. With the aid of congressional funding and a new memorandum of understanding with the Army concerning equipment left in theater, the Army National Guard has made considerable headway in rebalancing, resetting and reequipping our force for the future.

The Army has adopted a new strategy to fully equip the reserve components to active component standards, a major paradigm shift from the Cold War practice of tiered resourcing. The Army allocated $27 billion of its procurement funding for Army National Guard equipment for FY 2008 through FY 2013. Despite this strong commitment of resources from Army leadership, the Guard will continue to have a shortage of items such as trucks, trailers, communications equipment, night-vision devices, water purification systems and nuclear, biological and chemical equipment.

Congress has been very responsive to our equipping requirements. The Army National Guard via the National Guard and Reserve Equipment Appropriation has received $735 million in FY 2006, $1.1 billion in FY 2007 and $650 million in FY 2008. This much-needed funding has been used to procure critical dual-use items to support our "Essential 10" capabilities: command and control, communications, aviation, force protection (including civil-support teams), engineering, logistics, maintenance, medical care, security and transportation.

From coast to coast and around the world, the Army National Guard is a major asset for the President of the United States, the secretary of Defense, the secretary of the Army and the governors of the states and territories. Individual and unit achievements are remarkable, but in an amazing organization such as the Army National Guard, these achievements are routine for countless soldiers who have answered the call to duty. For almost four centuries, the Army National Guard has been a keystone in the strong foundation of our nation.

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