WARTIME TAGs

Matthews, William

Advocate, logistician, family counselor; adjutant general roles, responsibilities increase with Guard operations tempo

With his wife, Judy, along as an impromptu supply officer, Maj. Gen. Douglas Burnett heads for the checkout line at a Florida Wal-Mart, his mission nearly complete.

He's got two shopping carts loaded with stuff-Mini Mag-Lite flashlights, AA batteries, larger flashlights, rechargeable high-powered Q Beam spotlights, candy and magazines. These are essential supplies for Florida National Guardsmen headed to Iraq. The soldiers will duct-tape the Mag-Lites to the barrels of their rifles. The rugged little flashlights are a serviceable substitute for the Surefire weapon lights the Army issues troops to conduct house-to-house searches in places like Fallujah and Sadr City.

In wartime, soldiers must be able to improvise-even adjutants general like General Burnett.

About 55,000 of the U.S. troops in Iraq are Guardsmen. Approximately 50,000 are deployed elsewhere. They compnse a current mobilization rate that has been nearly constant since 9/11. So adjutants general are busy preparing units to deploy, comforting families, visiting the wounded in hospitals, and when necessary, performing procurement operations at local discount stores. It's all a sustained level of increased responsibilities, in addition to state duties, not seen since World War II.

"The tempo with which we are operating is absolutely phenomenal," says Maj. Gen. Thomas W. Eres, California adjutant general. "It has taken a great deal of agility to support these mobilizations. Everyone, civilians on up to general officers, is being pushed very hard. We have a seven-day-a-week operation."

One of the first responsibilities for wartime adjutants general is to make sure that mobilized units are fully manned and ready to go.

"In wartime we have to make some hard decisions," says Maj. Gen. Gus L. Hargett, Tennessee adjutant general and NGAUS immediate past chairman. When mobilization orders arrive, one of the first steps, he says, is to begin "cross-leveling people and moving equipment around the state" to fill personnel gaps and equipment shortages in units heading to war.

It's no way to win a popularity contest. Units often balk at giving up people and hardware, says the general. "They see themselves as the next to go," and they worry that troops will be less prepared to deploy.

"I have to assure them that they will get the same treatment" when it's their time to face combat, he says.

"The first thing I do is ask for volunteers," General Hargett says. "I had a shortage of combat medics in 278th Armored Cavalry Regiment. But a call for volunteers prompted more than 20 combat medics to sign on for duty in Iraq."

Some "kids," he says, even went to Iraq and then volunteered to return. But it isn't just young soldiers who are willing to serve.

When the 278th received its alert in February 2004, 60-year-old Sgt. Maj. Jim Pippin contacted General Hargett. "You fix it so I can go," he told the adjutant general. Since 60 is the Guard's mandatory retirement age, Sergeant Pippin would need a waiver from the secretary of the Army to go to war.

General Hargett asked, the secretary approved and Sargeant Pippin left his job as an engineering professor at the University of Tennessee for a tour in Iraq.

In California, General Eres also struggles with cross-leveling.

"You have to make sure units are fully staffed," he says. "You have to find [military occupational specialty] qualified individuals to fill in. The challenge, then, is to make them into a team."

The first stop for most deploying troops is a U.S. training base. At Camp Roberts near San Luis Obispo, Calif, Army Guardsmen undergo refresher training in the basics, such as using a protective mask. Then comes theater-specific training, such as how to operate a checkpoint, or identify Iraq's infamous improvised explosive devices (IEDs).

The intense post-mobilization training can last 60 to 90 days, sometimes longer. In January, 2,127 soldiers from Pennsylvania's 2nd Brigade Combat Team packed up for three or four months of training at Camp Shelby, Miss., followed by a stint at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif.

Only then, in mid 2005, will the brigade head to Iraq for a yearlong "boots on the ground" tour, says Maj. Gen. Jessica L. Wright, Pennsylvania adjutant general.

As the threat in Iraq evolved from snipers and IEDs to car bombs and suicide bombers, new training techniques had to be added, lengthening the regimen, she says.

Training is especially realistic at the Army Guard's Camp Atterbury, Ind. (NATIONAL GUARD, January 2005), where troops encounter a replica of "the exact environment they will live in in Iraq," says Maj. Gen. Greg Wayt, Ohio adjutant general.

His troops spend weeks at the Indiana camp learning essential survival skills such as how to operate a secured base camp and how to run a convoy through a live-fire attack.

Maj. Gen. Don C. Morrow, Arkansas adjutant general, praised Army trainers who set up live-fire lanes for Arkansas Guard transportation crews at Fort Hood, Texas, and later in Kuwait.

"We hadn't done much of that in the past," but it proved to be "very necessary" for troops headed to the wild highways of Iraq.

It's clear the National Guard is going to be called for duty in Iraq for at least the next several years, and several adjutants general say they worry that the troop rotation schedule the Army now follows is too strenuous to sustain. With training before deployment and demobilization afterward, mobilization frequently lasts 18 months.

"A year of boots on the ground will break the National Guard," Flonda's General Burnett warns. A year of mobilization-from call-up to return home-should be the maximum, he says. "Anything beyond six months is a major stress. Certainly anything beyond a year is too long."

He adds that in the early months of the war, and with the subsequent occupation of Iraq, extended deployments were perhaps justified, but after a couple of years he says rotation schedules should meet the "reasonable expectations of our soldiers."

Generals Burnett, Wayt of Ohio and other adjutants general have registered their concern with members of Congress, the Pentagon and the National Guard Bureau.

Much of the pressure to keep deployments to no more than a year comes from employers and soldiers' families, General Wayt says.

"If we could limit time in theater to six months, it would be easier for employers to deal with," Pennsylvania's General Wright adds.

The adjutants general are also concerned that extended deployments are affecting recruiting and retention (page 27).

Lt. Gen. H Steven Blum, Guard Bureau chief, has joined the call for shorter deployments. He says he favors nine-month tours that include pre-deployment training, six months boots-on-the-ground and a short demobilization.

But he says the Army appears unlikely to shorten Guard deployments before 2007.

The Guard has had more success pressing the Pentagon to provide soldiers with better equipment in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"There were a lot of shortages early on," General Burnett says. That prompted his Wal-Mart shopping spree in April 2003, just weeks after the war had started. He also turned for help to Rep. Bill Young, R-Fla., then chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, which controls federal government spending.

Representative Young made sure there was extra money in the next military spending bill for body armor, General Burnett says.

Extra money was also allocated for up-armored Humvees. The body armor shortage has been solved, but the shortage of armored Humvees and other armored vehicles remains.

Tennessee Army Guard Spc. Thomas Wilson helped make that a high-profile issue in December when he asked visiting Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld why Guard troops in Kuwait had to scrounge for scraps of steel and damaged ballistic glass to fashion makeshift armor for their vehicles.

Mr. Rumsfeld's inelegant response was broadcast around the world: "As you know, you go to war with the Army you have. They're not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time."

"It was a good question," General Hargett says. "I suspect the secretary probably wished he had answered it differently. But [Specialist] Wilson's question led to some improvements. The Army is going to spend $4 billion on up-armored vehicles."

Shortly after the encounter the Army ordered increased production at armor manufacturer Armor Holdings Inc. (page 44), General Hargett says.

But other shortages remain.

"The radios we're using are just antiquated." General Burnett says. The radios issued to soldiers in the Florida Guard are so bad that "some of the soldiers over there are using family radio systems on night patrol."

"[Over-the-counter radios] work better than Army radios, but they're not secure, they're not scrambled," he says.

"I heard a few stories about people buying their own radios," General Morrow says, and adds that during the early months of the war, Arkansas Guardsmen-or their families-reportedly bought body armor.

"Yeah, a lot of people are buying small, two-way radios," says Brig. Gen. Randal E. Thomas, Illinois adjutant general.

They're also buying hand-held global positioning system receivers, compasses and other gear they think will be useful in Iraq or Afghanistan, he says.

But he notes that purchasing personal equipment isn't new; it's something he saw while on active duty in Vietnam.

Some soldiers who have access to high-tech equipment in their civilian jobs bring it with them when mobilized.

"We have some people from law enforcement who have a pretty good idea of what they think they will need, and they have the ability to acquire it, and they do," California's General Eres says.

It's not a practice he encourages, however. He tells soldiers, "We are a team. We train as a team, we fight as a team, so lets equip as a team."

But shortages mean that some Army equipment, like night vision goggles and modern machine guns are not issued until troops arrive in Kuwait or even Iraq.

"That creates some angst among the soldiers training here," General Eres says. "They feel like if they're going to be deployed, they want all the varsity equipment."

It may be a while before they get it all. General Blum said in December it would take $20 billion to meet the Guard's equipment needs.

While the Guard has long coped with equipment shortages, some adjutants general worry about personnel shortages.

Nationwide, the Army Guard has had some tough recent months in recruiting. During fiscal year 2004, which ended Sept. 30, the Army Guard fell about 9 percent short of its goal of recruiting 56,000 new soldiers.

During the early months of fiscal 2005, recruiters missed their goal by about 30 percent.

General Blum and the adjutants general say the main cause of the recruiting decline is a sharp drop in the number of prior service personnel joining the National Guard.

Part of that they blame on stop-loss orders that keep some troops on active duty and thus unavailable to the Guard. But others who leave active duty opt not to join because of the increased likelihood that if they join the Guard they will be mobilized and sent to Iraq or Afghanistan.

"When you join the Guard, the clock starts over again and you can be sent back to Iraq immediately," General Burnett says. "It has happened."

Maj. Gen. Thomas G. Cutler, Michigan adjutant general, says an increase in positive news coverage following the Iraqi elections Jan. 30 gave him hope that recruiting would improve.

He says he also sensed rising optimism during a recent visit to some of the 2,300 Michigan Guard troops deployed in Iraq.

"I was sitting in Iraq having dinner one evening," General Cutler says, "and the soldiers I was with said they really believe progress is being made." They were so sure, "they were buying Iraqi dinars-the exchange rate is something like 1,400 dinars to the dollar-but they think the dinar will get stronger. Some day it might even turn some of them into millionaires."

For many of the adjutants general, retention promises to be easier than recruiting.

"There's not as much of a drop [in retention] as I expected," Illinois' General Thomas says. "Initially a lot of soldiers say they're getting out, but after they have been back home for a few months," they change their minds.

In Ohio, retention dipped from about 80 percent to 75 percent in 2004, General Wayt says. But in Tennessee and California at the end of last year, retention increased.

"Our retention rate was higher than we've ever had before," General Eres says. "We need to have about 70 percent retention, but we were close to 75 percent, and we're pushing to get it above 80 percent."

In Tennessee, "Usually we have about an 18 percent attrition rate. It's at about 16 percent now," General Hargett says.

The adjutants general say they have paid particular attention to family support programs.

The hard part in Florida, General Burnett says, is reaching families in areas with no military bases, such as Orlando.

The solution: "We found faith-based organizations that have stepped up to meet family needs," from fixing broken household appliances and autos, to providing baby sitters and elder care, to solving financial problems.

Pennsylvania has set up nine family service centers where, among other aid, families can conduct video teleconferences with troops deployed overseas, General Wright says.

Ohio is tapping Guardsmen who are lawyers and clergy members to tend to family needs.

In Tennessee, General Hargett conducts town hall meetings at night in locations around the state to keep families informed and to learn about their personal concerns.

California takes a similar approach, General Eres says. "We contact families to see how things are going and to try to identify potential problems. I think we've come a long way in really making that system far more responsive."

General Wayt is even more proactive. "I'm concerned about [Post Traumatic Stress Disorder]," he says. The Ohio Guard has partnered with state health agencies to brief families on its symptoms and on where to get help if signs appear.

Arkansas is taking a similar approach. "The first thought is that the soldier is home and things are going to be great," he says. "But we know from the past that that's not always the case."

As a result, Guardsmen and their families are provided training sessions that emphasize "care for the soldier after they return and care for the family," General Morrow says.

In addition, the Arkansas Guard has established a relief fund that has provided more than $85,000 in loans and grants to help 120 families through economic hardships while Guardsmen are deployed, he says.

The hardest part about being an adjutant general at war is attending funerals and comforting families of the dead, the generals agreed.

"I was appointed AG in March, and in the first four months I had one funeral per month," General Eres says. "It's the toughest part of this job. At the end of the honors, to take that folded flag and hand it to the loved ones, and say, 'On behalf of the president and a grateful nation,' it is the hardest thing to do."

He also says he is notified of all Purple Heart awards and writes personal letters to the recipients. We're up in the 60s in terms of the number of Purple Hearts."

In Michigan's 42nd Transportation Unit alone, 25 of the 166 soldiers have been wounded badly enough to earn the Purple Heart, General Cutler says.

"They're right in the thick of it" driving heavy equipment trucks north of Baghdad through the Sunni Triangle. Many of the injuries have been caused by IEDs, and as a result, some of the soldiers come home very badly injured.

General Cutler, who has visited wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., several times says almost all of the wounded have said they would return to Iraq in a minute if they could.

"I'm a blue suit AG, and from a personal standpoint I have gained tremendous respect for the Army National Guard," he says. As of Jan. 31, three Michigan Guard members had been killed.

Four Florida Guard members had been killed in combat as of early January.

"As adjutant general, I speak at the funerals and represent the governor," General Burnett said. Brig. Gen. Mike Fleming, the assistant adjutant general, presents the flag to surviving relatives.

"It's a very emotional thing. It's very difficult to pick up the phone and call the mother and father or the spouse" of a fallen soldier, General Burnett says.

"These are young people in the prime of life, 18, 19, 20. These are the salt-of-the-earth young people. They excelled at something, usually at helping others. It's very difficult."

"I go to every funeral," General Wayt says. "And I personally go to the family's home and visit with them one-on-one prior to the funeral. It's very difficult to do. Every parent has been so proud of their soldier. They want to talk to you about how proud they are."

Tennessee had one soldier killed in action, one non-hostile death and one fatal heart attack as of early January, General Hargett says.

He also visits the wounded. "Some of these young men and women make you so proud to be an American," General Hargett says. "All they want to talk about is how they can get back to their unit,"

General Wright says she worries about the safety of her Pennsylvania Guard troops daily.

"When you shake their hand and you put them on the bus to go overseas, it's like sending your own kids off. And when one of them dies, it's a tragic, tragic loss. Clearly nothing is worse."

She has been to five funerals, three for Guardsmen killed in combat and two for heart attack victims.

The burden has been especially heavy for General Morrow. The Arkansas adjutant general says he has attended funerals for all but two of the 15 Arkansas Guard members killed in Iraq. He missed the two only because he was attending other funerals at the same time.

"In most cases I have spoken. I present the awards to the families and I present the flag. It's extremely difficult, but it's something that has to be done to honor the soldier and to honor the families," he says.

General Morrow also womes about his deployed soldiers daily. "I hate to hear the phone ring," he says, "because so many times it's bearing bad news.

"It's [also] difficult to see soldiers leave their families," he says. "If small children are involved, it's just heart-wrenching. But what stands out in my mind is the return. To see a happy reunion is really uplifting."

William Matthews is a Springfield, Va.-based freelance writer who specializes in defense issues.

Copyright National Guard Association of the United States Mar 2005
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