Fight Ahead, The

The ink was hardly dry on the Defense Department's Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) recommendations May 13 when confusion and concern started pouring into our headquarters.

First came the e-mails; then the phone calls. All were from members of Air National Guard flying units slated for grounding under BRAC. All posed the same fundamental question: What is NGAUS going to do to save us?

The answer is just as basic: We're going to do what we've done every time unilateral action threatens our constitutionally mandated role in national defense. We're going to fight to ensure we have input into the decisions that affect our future.

Our opponents, of course, are already charging that our primary motivation is fear of change. We're not fighting change. The world is changing, and we know we must keep pace. We're fighting to keep from being left behind by change.

But even more is at stake in this battle. These decisions greatly affect the defense of a nation at war. Is, as many in Washington charge, the timing wrong? How flexible is the course of action set by BRAC? What if the presumptions turn out to be wrong?

We've been down similar roads, and that experience provides some valuable lessons. The last time was during the 1990s. Army leaders twice slashed Army Guard force structure without involving the adjutants general.

The first occasion was in the wake of the Persian Gulf War. Four of the eight Army Guard combat divisions were on the chopping block. Then came the 1997 Quadrennial Defense Review that included an Army recommendation to cut 38,000 Army Guardsmen.

Arguments both times were the same: The Army Guard troops, units and equipment were simply no longer needed in a world with fewer threats. The active component could handle things largely on its own.

Unfortunately, the world defies such predictions. Fortunately for a nation that now needs every soldier it has, NGAUS and the adjutants general were able to enlist elected officials and beat back both proposals.

Such battles with the Army leadership are now a memory. Today we try to work as one. The threats to our nation simply demand it. An example is the participation ol the adjutants general in the Army's BRAC process.

Sadly, that was not the case in the Air Force. Officials merely used BRAC to implement a Future Total Force (FTF) plan that seems to view the Air Guard as more of a bill payer than a participant in future flying operations.

The most obvious problem here is the Pentagon can't raise much money by retiring Air Guard aircraft or facilities. The total savings for closing Otis Air National Guard Base, Mass., for example, won't pay for a single F/A-22 Raptor.

But more troublesome is the incalculable cost of resources potentially lost to the nation. Air Force officials acknowledge that their most experienced aircrews are in the Air Guard. Yet FTF/BRAC will no doubt compel hundreds, maybe thousands, to leave the military.

It's no wonder there's so much confusion and concern in the field. To answer the questions we received more specifically, we mobilized to fight the BRAC recommendations immediately after they were made public.

Retired Brig. Gen. Stephen M. Koper, NGAUS president, and other Washington staff members have been in daily contact with congressional personnel, the adjutants general and the press about BRAC since May 13.

General Koper included this column's main points in testimony before a Senate committee May 17. The association also helped organize a May 26 Capitol Hill press conference in which a dozen lawmakers called for delaying the BRAC process.

In the weeks to come we'll use every means available to make our views known to the BRAC Commission, which will review the Pentagon recommendations and report their findings to President Bush in September.

This will be a tough fight. But as we learned in the 1990s, it's one we can't afford to lose.

Robert V. Taylor, Chairman of the Board, NGAUS

Copyright National Guard Association of the United States Jun 2005
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