 Thanks everybody. Now, yeah, I play only an ornamental role this morning. So which is my usually my wife laughs uproariously when I say that Welcome everybody glad to have you here This is a part of the military strategy forum And I want to say sincere thanks to our friends at rules Royce that are able they make it possible for us to bring this to the policy community From my recollection. I think this is the first time that we've had the the chief of the guard bureau And I'm glad for that now part of it. I think it's quite opportune from a timing standpoint because As everybody knows there is a giant war being fought every day. It's inside the Pentagon and it's over money This happens It happened a lot when I was over there It's quite intense now because we're in this Well, we don't have a national debate Frustrated by that there should be a national debate over what we're doing. I mean, we are just having a lopsided discussion where Where we don't really have the substance Brought to the table about the meaning of cutting these budgets and it's it's I think we have to be honest to say There's great damage that's being done to the Defense Department these days I had breakfast this morning with a very senior guy with the intelligence community I'm alarmed at what's happening in the intelligence community, but it isn't a broad debate that we're having And that's part of what we're doing today is to try to stimulate that debate, but we're also taking a special focus on the role of the reserve components the guard and the reserves and This as everyone knows is a Long-standing source of both strength but tension in in the department I Grew up in a little town every day walked past the guard armory to go to school. I grew up having the guard It was a presence in my life when I was a kid It's we had to close the guard unit now everybody has to drive 30 miles, you know to get to their guard unit We lost ours, but but we had our own guard unit and it was part of the cultural fabric of my hometown and I remember back when When we went to war in Iraq back in 1991 You know the president sent The Defense Department to war in August But America didn't go to war until January and that was when all of the guard units around the country were being mobilized We'd go down to the courthouse Families were tied a little yellow ribbons You know around trees because their unit their their guardsmen went okay, that was when America went to war And it's one of the things that honestly the active Military doesn't appreciate They don't understand how profoundly The guard and the reserves connect America to the military we become a small military relatively You know it's the communities that routinely see people in uniform are not quite few We don't routinely see this in America you see it in Washington, but you just you know you go back to Sioux Falls, South Dakota. You don't see guys walking around in uniform You go most places you don't see them walking in uniform if you do their guardsmen Now the significance of that is this is a way that America stays connected With its military now. It's a source of frustration for our active-duty friends our active-duty components Because they see themselves in a very different way They see themselves as being at work every day defending the country and they look at the guard as being defending the country on weekends It's not it's not true Guardsmen are out every day I think if you one of the histories of these last ten years is the remarkable the remarkable capacity of reserve components to step up to this fight Four or five times when I had got to Iraq you couldn't tell you Couldn't tell who was active and who was reserved So it was remarkable thing that's accomplished now I'd also have to say to my good friends in the reserve components. You couldn't exist without the active-duty The active-duty is a foundation for you It's essential that this be a constructive partnership and If we continue to have what's a divisive and brutal battle over the edges of the problem, we're going to undermine what's essential to the whole So the purpose of this and the purpose to have you general grass was to bring this Perspective because I know your spirit and you're a member of the Joint Chiefs now and you are sitting there side-by-side working with your counterparts on all of the issues not just guard issues and This is I think part of what's going to heal us together when we go through these wrenching debates Which we're having right now on how we're going to resource the reserve components in the hole as we design a strategy for all of us So I'm grateful to have you here. General. Would you please join me and would you please with your applause welcome general Frank? Dr. Henry, thank you so much Your your comments were right on track With with what we're dealing with today and I do appreciate the opportunity to be here with such a distinguished audience Ladies and gentlemen, you know, it's not that often you get a chance to talk to folks from all different different disciplines That may not necessarily know who the guard is today Or you may have a lot of involvement with the guard of the reserve But I see it as a great opportunity to talk with you and then hopefully you'll take away from this Discussion as well as the panel session Some great great think pieces for the future. I think there's something that we need input from a lot of different Segments of our think tanks definitely as well as you know, what we deal in every day in the Pentagon us in uniform We have to think out of the box these days of where we're going for the future. I Wanted to start out though as I look through the Distinguished audience and the backgrounds and where you all come from and I thought it might be worthwhile for me to start by talking about Who the National Guard is? Where do we come from and a little bit about what was happening pre 9-11 with the guard because we were going in the 80s and 90s Going through a transformation a bit That was quite accelerated after 9-11 and some of the missions that we do today But then we're going to need to change for the future and that's really where I look forward to your comments Your help for the future of of how should we change? How should the active in the guard the reserve mix come out of this in the end and Take away from our last 12 years of experience and cost savings and say, okay What's the right mix of your active component versus your reserve component going to the future? I? Thought I would start out just just some real basic numbers National Guard was stood up 376 years ago Massachusetts Bay colonies the militia to defend their homelands to be able to you know to fight and Small small companies were stood up at that time So we tie back our grounding to that Organization up on the northeast and we spread eventually to all 54 states territories in the District of Columbia The numbers today We were at 358,000 army guardsmen that number is going to go down to 350,000 200 as a part of the drawdown 350,000 right around there is where we were pre 9-11, so we're going back to about where we were if you look at the historical trends The guards said at about 350 for probably the last two to three decades right around there It bumped up and down a little bit here and there, but for the most part around 350 maybe a little above that on The air guard side They were at 105,700 as a part of the 13 budget discussions and some of you heard the debate that's going on and there's a Senate Commission going on right now That number will go down to a hundred and five thousand four hundred The interesting thing as dr. Hammer said though is we are still in close to three thousand communities across the nation So when you mobilize the guard You're touching the communities Everyone knows someone from their hometown and I had the opportunity in the last few weeks to go out and I went out to more, Oklahoma and Walked the the devastated area of the the tornado went through and where the children were killed in the school and talked to residents and Governor Fallon she was with me all afternoon in the adjunct in general But everywhere we went People were thanking the guard for for coming in and supporting the first responders, of course We made it very clear that the lead the lead Organization there was the fire chief and the police chief and the ambulance and the hospitals But our folks were there and everyone knew someone they knew specialist Smith from down the street that Immediately put on his uniform and showed up at his armory ready to go, you know, they knew specialist Jones and sergeant Aurora and all those names They came in right away Left their jobs. They knew there was a devastation that would require the guard to be used and governor Fallon Basically, it announced right off the bat To the adjunct general miles during move in get ready to go But coordinated closely with the state emergency managers as well as with the locals so when you touch The community like that That's the foundation as dr. Hammer said people knew those armories knew where those people were from I went up to Boston and Met with governor Patrick and we talked through how you respond to something like a Boston event a bombing and The city of Boston very proud first responders great police force But how do you how do you bring in the guard to support that and then how do you do it without pushing too far? And it starts with advice advice from the governor advice from the adjunct general and we had 450 National guardsmen supporting the marathon We had some that were actually marching the marathon with their rucksacks and they immediately switched gears from either a security force or a Participant marching in the third marathon to a responder and they stepped right out, but it was their hometown It was the people they grew up with that they were responding to so that brings in that close tie That there's no way you can ever replace that If you lose it so I think you know the 3,000 communities that we touch are extremely important Wanted to talk briefly about our pre 9-11 posture and our How we in probably the 80s? We began to transition a bit In the 80s we started to see some of our first equipment modernization in the guard We also began to see our regional training Institute stand-up 80s and 90s we saw overseas deployment opportunities example 1985 National Guard Task Force Minuteman into Panama 1986 Task Force Big Bear going into Honduras To do infrastructure to do medical support to the to the population to work with either those Militaries are those defense forces or the Ministry of Education or health of those organizations We did the logistics of that to build the base camp so in the mid 80s We started to transition from a strategic reserve to being more operational and Having the opportunity to pack up everything from a hometown and figure out a way how to get it You know three four thousand miles away by ship by air by land Clearing customs moving into an area and establishing a base camp in a foreign nation working with that nation to produce a Humanitarian product in the end to leave it there. So I look back at that and On 9-11 shortly after 9-11 when we first started mobilizing I remembered making calls to some units that had not deployed They usually did their drills or their annual training in a close by training area and I would call those that had deployed Number of times in the Central and South America a couple cases even into Africa and It was pretty interesting to see those that had deployed the first question you got. Okay. What's my timeline? Where's my budget? You know, what's my lift gonna be? Those that hadn't left and have been at Camp Swampy, you know in state training area for the last 20 years It was the first words were usually. Oh What do we got ourselves into? But it was that that mindset that we created by having those operational deployment opportunities In addition in the 80s and 90s especially in the 90s We had the opportunity to deploy to combat training centers Combat training centers being the National Training Center and the Joint Readiness Training Center and Send brigades and our enhanced brigades had an opportunity to plan and execute a deployment and Do an operational mission in a training status That gave them value and grew leaders like we never had before at the brigade level So I see that as some of the Change from a strategic reserve pointing us in the direction of An operational force in the Guard a Couple of unique programs that we started in the 80s and 90s the state partnership program Some of you may be aware of it where we partner a nation with a state this really came out of the fall of the Soviet Union and up in the Throughout Europe a lot of countries wanted to partner with somebody the first three were Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia And we aligned them with states. Some had similar backgrounds Poland wanted a partner. We aligned them with Illinois using the cultural diversity and background that comes with that Today we have 65 state partners some states have to and Many of them have deployed together, but that program started really in in about 90 to 93 time frames So some of them have been on with us now for 20 years very unique But it provided an opportunity for a country to align with the state and Then eventually get into NATO many of these countries and then today some of them are deployed and give you an example Maryland is partnered with Estonia and Bosnia I was just up at the state house with governor O'Malley and the adjutant general a minister of defense of Bosnia was there a minister of defense of Estonia was there Estonia was celebrating their 20th year of their partnership Bosnia their 10th Right now Bosnia has an MP platoon embedded in the MP company of the Maryland National Guard in Afghanistan I can give you hundreds of Deployments like that that we've done with many countries now where we're actually taking countries that were consumers of security 20 years ago now 10 years ago that are now producers of security and they want to continue to progress and it's that partnership that hometown relationship and I'll give you one example on the state partnership that Pays us huge benefits and oh by the way the whole thing for 65 state partners cost about 14 million dollars a year and it is the one program that continues to do well in the budget discussions But to give you an example I had an adjutant general come to me one day and He had had a long-standing partnership with the chief of defense and the minister of defense And they had just assigned a new combatant commander To that combatant command and the first call the minister made was to the adjutant general who he had known Probably since he was a lieutenant colonel now a two-star in the state And he says what can you tell me about this guy? What do I need to know about this combatant commander? You know how will he work for us? When do I need to go see him? What should I focus on for our country to be a part of this combatant command? So it tells you the long ties they've created the current adjutant general of Maryland General Jim Adkins. He was a lieutenant colonel one of the first US officers to go into Estonia After the wall fell and now he's the adjutant general So creates deep ties that you can only get with a foundation that stays with you for that long and because of a guard being a community-based Organization that we're able to do that Couple other programs that began and then maybe even further back But the counter-drug program where each state supports local law enforcement's Agencies they support the Southwest border each state Provides aviation support to state police whatever the state may need we have a counter-drug program That is funded to support first responders as well as we also have a training program to train county local municipality police On counter-drug and those programs we provide the facility and the trainers actually come in from DEA from narks from some of the bigger communities within the regions and The counter-drug program has been very successful for us It's been successful for hometown America where you have very limited resources in some areas and that program is constantly under under threat Because of the budget issues and one other program that I will mention that really came out of the 80s and 90s was the youth challenge program Youth challenge is where we take at-risk youth We work with the school state school system the states have to pay 25 percent of the cost We get 75 percent to run a logistic setup, so we may take an installation I was recently visiting the DC Guard here They use their armory as a base and they bring these students in We provide almost like a drill sergeant for five months and these are at-risk youth They can't have any felonies, but they're at-risk youth and we run them through we provide the discipline And then the school system comes in and gets them through a GED most of them are 16 17 18 year olds that probably would end up in the In the the court system at some point if we didn't do something for these young folks So that program that started in the probably more ramped up in the 90s is still in existence today Not all states have it. They don't have the funds in some cases But it's a great opportunity for the guard again through hometown America to help out those communities And there's some tremendous success stories and some of you may have been to the gala here that we host every year in February But there's some tremendous success stories about an individual who would tell you they were on path You know to end up in jail and today they're productive members of society very well educated So it's a part of a mission that fits well in our community-based organization on federal missions in pre 9-11 We were doing as I mentioned earlier desert the some of the missions in Balkans as well as the missions that we supported Under the no fly zone And but it was very small two to three thousand a year being mobilized for those missions We did deploy to desert storm Desert shield desert storm. We had troops. We had an MP platoon and just cause but most of it were very small units And not for very long time frames So a very small portion of our population actually had the opportunity to mobilize and I gave you the numbers up fun if you think about today 460,000 army and air guardsmen and that time a couple two or three thousand a year getting a chance to deploy was a very small number In addition to that though our air National Guard Dating back into the 70s actually before that probably even as late as the late 50s under the NORAD agreement Doing air control alert over the United States Today, there's 40 fighters seven tankers and a couple of AWACS 95% of that capability setting alert today comes out of the Air National Guard and We've been doing that mission for a long time and again through the 80s and 90s We continued to hone that and our folks do that very well working with Under the direction under the command and control of North American Aerospace Defense Command In the 80s and 90s our state active duty missions had little interaction with the federal side for the most part There wasn't no North comm there wasn't a J 34 in the Pentagon. There wasn't an ASD HD Assistant Secretary for Homeland Defense So we were pretty much internal we knew we had to get beyond being able to respond just to a state disaster We had to ramp that up So we established I say we the states established a thing called emergency management assistance compacts So that they could bring in civilian assets from one state to another an agreement between two governors and two attorney generals But then we included in that the National Guard So if you're in New Jersey and you get hit by a hurricane and there's a capability it doesn't reside in your state Let's say you don't have the engineer capability you need or the medical you can reach out to the surrounding states Or you can reach out halfway across the country if you want you can reach to any state as long as the governor's willing to release those Forces and move in to assist so that's really the the foundation of the emergency management compacts, which today we use quite frequently But again, there was very little interaction on the federal and state I think Hurricane Andrew was the largest interaction, but it wasn't It wasn't synchronized as unity of effort and unity of command at that point. I'll come back to that later Post 9-11 I Was I was the ops chief for the Army National Guard over here in Arlington again. You've seen kind of what we were doing pre 9-11 I Didn't realize what had happened as the buildings started to fall. I just knew that something was changing General Roger Schultz was my boss he came in and said This is going to change who we are for the future and I tried to think and grasp that and Somebody said yep get ready to mobilize Get ready to deploy and oh by the way By next week you give out I have 6,000 guardsmen in the airports 6,000 right off the bat What status will they be in who's going to pay the bill? What do they need to be equipped with? What are the rules of engagement? Those are all the kind of things that we went through early on 150 active installations across the US needed to be closed because we were a very open military and many of you Could drive right through the gates and go to Fort Myers and drive right on through nobody stops You can go up to the general's house if you want nobody'll stop you So all those installations those depots Those storage sites for ammunition all of that had to be closed That took upwards of 10,000 troops at the peak When we actually added in Europe at the time too because many of the installations that Europe did not have the manpower to Close those installations So we mobilized for that in title 10 federal duty The state in the airports we mobilized those forces, but the adjutant generals did it and They received the money from the federal government, but the forces stayed under their command and control of the governor Very unique later on we had this thing called winter freeze operation winter freeze and We needed to support 12 states 12 border states Commerce was backing up on the borders Three weeks of auto supplies that crossed between Canada and the US up in the Great Lakes We're beginning to back up employers were beginning to have to lay off the auto industry was ready to lay off people because they couldn't get parts So the mission we got was to support coast customs and border protection With close to 2,000 guardsmen Again, what status in this case? We had to come up with a new criteria, which was a federally paid farm mission So they are on federal active duty working under their active duty counterparts, which we were going to mobilize our forces and Then we had to detail them to customs and border protection for guardsmen. It's pretty easy That's what we do every day. We support someone in the community in this case We're supporting someone on the border and so another unique mission. They came to us after 9-11 Somewhere in the early 2000s and actually a little before 9-11 another very unique mission The guard picked up Which we're doing today is the missile defense ground-based interceptors 100% operational arm Runs through national guardsmen that are sitting right now Fort Greeley, Alaska Shrever Air Force Base in Colorado and Vandenberg Operational centers of those are both in Shrever and Greeley and those are guardsmen that have been trained up mostly air defense Skill sets and they are the operational arm of our ground-based interceptor Even though General Jacoby is the in the individual who would you know would employ them and the secretary and the president But the people that set their everyday air guardsmen and women as we moved on and we moved into Afghanistan The air guard right off the bat had a huge part to play 22,000 air guardsmen mostly mobilized and both strat lift Tactical lift moved them in as well as fighters 22,000 and then that number actually came down after the initial surge into Afghanistan in 2001 2002 time frame then in 2003 as We prepared to go across the border into Iraq from Kuwait again the air guard Went up to 24,000 most of that mobilized fighter capability red harsh units to build up the fobs security forces going in Transportation we started using the air guard for something completely different than in some cases of what their support personnel Work were designed to do and they stepped up to the challenge and filled those requirements So About 2003 the army guard we had we had been mobilizing a few up to that point Homeland missions overseas missions We had taken over the Kosovo mission for the army. They'd asked us and we took over the Sinai mission at that point but about 2003 19 January I remember the specific date Secretary Rumsfeldt said prepare the reserve component to augment the active Which for the National Guard at that point it meant on the 19th of January we alerted 21,000 troops And we gave them anywhere from three days to seven days to pack up and Move to their mobilization station in some cases hundreds of miles away And I would tell you that some of the conversations I had with Agis and its general were pretty amazing But they really took it as a huge challenge First thing they had to do is make sure everything was in place all the records were in place The medical piece was done anyone that wasn't medically deployable. They got them out of the unit They pushed in another person caused some disruption as far as cross-leveling additional tasks that they had to accomplish When they got to the mob station was the train up whatever tasks they were not prepared to do Against the mission they were deploying to they had to do that So a lot of our units within 30 to 45 days of arriving at the mob station the smaller units Especially the company and some of the battalions had to be certified Have their equipment loaded on the ship and moving on a plane overseas to a staging area within 30 to 45 days Charlie after that we had a request from forces command to start looking at mobilizing brigades So what we did was we looked at our combat training center rotations We looked at who had been deployed recently to a combat training center rotation Who was next up and we picked six brigades and said those are the brigades ready to go and Now if you think about that going from 39 days a year training and now you're going to deploy And you could be expected to do full-spectrum operations. You need a bit more time Probably at that time the average post mobilization training time was about a hundred and ten to a hundred and twenty days I think if you figure on the far end those units that weren't resourced at the higher end was probably closer to a hundred and fifty but for the most part three to three to five months to Certify the brigade and all those units have to be certified by the army Before they can deploy that they've got the right equipment personnel and they've can't accomplished all the training So I throw all that out as how this transitioned The guard from a strategic reserve in the 60s and 70s progressing through some initial changes in the 80s and 90s and then deployment and full up now 12 years of Participation in overseas operations as well as the homeland and I thought I would just give you a few of the numbers The army guard has mobilized 510,000 You know, that's not you know, we got 358,000 You know some have had two deployments some have had three some have had four some have had you know We've had to turn over where some haven't had any and when I see those kids They usually ask those young soldiers will say when when's my deployment I want to go the air guard I think the number I saw the other day To date was just right at 290,000 air guardsman and normally their deployments are going to be shorter periods four to six months part of a F rotation But some air guard have gone a year or longer So, you know well over 700 800,000 guardsmen have been used in this war if you look at today and This would have been unheard of 20 years ago. I pulled the numbers off of our report this morning On federal duty today. We have 29,372 guardsmen 22,000 of those are deployed overseas. The others are either getting ready or just got back and they're going through their demobilization In state active duty today and state status. We have 3,290 guardsman supporting the wildfires fight in Colorado supporting the air control alert in title 32 status Supporting the counter drug program in the Southwest border So we are very active today in many of these missions that we've been doing for years State missions and the change that has occurred in the state and I talked to that earlier about Hurricane Andrew the biggest problem we had after Hurricane Andrew and then the problem we had Later on with Hurricane Katrina was unity of effort and unity of command. We did not have the systems in place to do that about three to four years ago General McKinley and Everett Winnefeld who was the commander of North Common at the time came together and said we need to work on this They worked with the assistant secretary of homeland defense and they came up with a structure called dual status commands And a dual status command is usually a one star that will come from the state We will run them through Training with FEMA so they understand the national incident management system They will understand defense support to civil authorities They will go through a JTF commander's course hosted by Northern command and then they will go through They're designated by the by the agent general they will go through a course of study and Actually office visits with the senior leadership of both DHS as well as the military And that dual status commander of course then allows general Jacobi and I to certify them that they can command and control active and guard and reserve troops Today we have at least one in every state Most states have two some have three of these dual status commanders last year We use these folks for unity of effort and unity of command. We use them probably six times We used them for the NATO summit up in Chicago. We used them for the Republican and Democratic national conventions We used them for the fires last year in Colorado We use them for floods whenever a governor says I might need some capability from the federal government I'm going to stand up a dual status command It takes one phone call or one email and the secretary will approve it because the president has delegated that authority to put This individual in both title 10 and title 32 On the state side title 32 that dual status commander answers to his or her governor and Agent general on the title 10 side. They report to general Jacobi and the president secretary defense and president So we have been using this now the first one was actually done in 2005, but we didn't use it much in contingency operations till Admiral Winnefeld and general McKinley met and said we need to do something here for contingency operations So today it's the usual and customary way of doing suit C2 in the homeland. The most recent one was over the weekend when the dual or actually last week when the dual status commander stood up for the Firefights there in the Black Forest of Colorado Springs Where general Jacobi had brought in some forces from Fort Carson the Colorado Guard brought in Helicopters and security and engineers and they teamed them up all under one commander So I think I'm gonna stop there Wanted to just give you a flavor of how we've progressed, but let me pose a few questions to you So realizing we have invested best equipped best trained best led guard today We have the schools we go to the same schools our active counterparts do But giving given the budget constraints we have today and the fact that in the sequestration 50 50 billion dollars You picked the number it was 37 billion had to come out of 494 about 500 billion this year next year will actually even be deeper cut What can the nation afford in its military? What can they put in the reserve component in the National Guard that can be ready at some timeframe? You know smaller units can be ready a lot quicker brigades might take a bit longer to be depends on what you can accomplish in 39 days a year What can you afford when you you pick the number of what the cost difference is? You know some studies say cost, you know You can buy one active unit for three reserve component units You can buy one or four depends on how you look at that But that's somewhere in that range one and three or one and four So what do you need on the ramp today to respond to a very uncertain world? By the way, if you look at the map of all the places that could flash at any time But what can you put in your reserve component and keep it operational at some level? Which it which is a cost, but when you look at the total budget again one and three one and four Also at a time when our budget if you look at the manpower cost the compensation Dave and I were just talking about this a Minute ago There's a report out there that says if even if we weren't under the budget control act by 2021 80 percent of the defense budget would be going to compensation If we didn't do something to change that and again going back to the reserve component being a small part So my question to you is what can the nation afford? What should the nation afford? And I try not to say one or the other, you know, I think there's a balance in there somewhere as a nation we have to find and You know if if we can't find that balance and we start giving up reserve component units And we get into a major operation Where those folks going to come from we're going to go back to a draft. We don't want to you ask anybody in uniform We don't want to do that. We've got the great greatest military in the world and it's because it's an all-volunteer force So I pose the question be looking forward to any kind of comments you might have and Looking forward to hearing for the future or anything you might have as you leave here and get a chance to spend some time with the Director of the Air Guard director the Army Guard and my vice Thank you General grass. Thank you. I'm David Burto CSIS General grass has agreed to take a couple of questions We've already got a whole host of them coming in so if you do have questions on your cards Hold them up the staff will come by and pick them up and we're going to save the easy ones for the panel So I'm just going to give you a couple that that the panel itself is probably not in as good a position One is of course your role now as a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Can you talk a little bit about the challenges and opportunities that that are afforded to the National Guard because of that new role? Sure. Thanks. Thanks, Dave Well first, let me say that It's quite an opportunity to serve as a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff But that brings certain requirements that you better be ready to step up and when chairman Dempsey and General Engel my vice when we're setting in the tank sessions We don't get asked just about Issues that deal with the guard we get asked to vote on every issue, you know, we voted on Moving forces from one co-com to another We had input to that we had input to Women in service today We have nine guard brigades that are transitioning more skill sets to women in service To have an opportunity for them to serve in a number of our combat skills We voted on same-sex marriage Any issue that comes up inside of the tank we have a vote on So the challenge there though is the National Guard Bureau staff hasn't had in some cases the opportunities to work at that level So we're working very closely with the Army and Air Force to say we've got great people But there's some positions we need opportunities to fill We need to ensure that everyone on the NGB staff the National Guard Bureau staff is Focused at the strategic level and we're doing a strategic realignment right now Which we're actually briefing later this week to the Agents General to say, okay Sid Clark and and Bill Ingram Air and Army Guard Directorates They do the operational the tactical the relationship with the state We work very closely with the Agents General, but let's keep our focus at the strategic level So that when questions do come up We've got the background and the real value that I see that we have to provide For the chairman for the president for the Joint Chiefs is how does how does all this come together in the state when you? when you have to employ You know a hundred thousand troops someday To a new Madrid earthquake. How does that happen? How do we do that? That's just one example of some of the tough issues that lie ahead for us. I think also the As we look to the future and the Joint Chiefs. I found that During Hurricane Sandy. I didn't know exactly what I was getting into up front Although I did what I always do is Immediately communicate with the Agents General Not just in the affected states but surrounding states to have a better understanding of the status of their forces the capability The readiness how long would it take them to move in if a governor asks for under emergency management assistance compact? How long would it take them to get there? So I had that information Flowing to me. I was talking to General Jacoby three four five times a day looking at the title ten Capabilities that were out there and what was what was available? So I found there was real value at it setting with Secretary Panetta and being able to provide that that level of detail Looking forward though now. We're getting into a thing called National Guard strategic planning system Which actually later today we're going to brief to Secretary Carter to say how do you identify? those more complex catastrophe events and Something that is nested underneath General Jacoby's Ability has his XR under the defense support to civil authorities But how do I determine what the states need working with the states to respond to disasters? You can pretty well pick across the country where those worst-case scenarios are but then I need to better understand the state requirements So I can come to the Pentagon come to the Joint Chiefs and vote wisely on future structure and resources for the Guard again Staying at the very strategic level. Thank you. That's a very you know It's kind of interesting that both you and Admiral Winnefeld Come from North com you end up on the Joint Chiefs at the same time at just at a time that we need it the most second question and and then I'll Will let you get back to your duties and we'll bring the panel up In your posture statement for the year you mentioned that we shouldn't rely too much on cost as the big driver of size and readiness of National Guard but that other factors should come into play you've hinted at a couple of those factors in your talk this morning But I wonder if you could elaborate a little on the additional factors that ought to be brought to bear to determine the size and the Readiness of the Guard sure sure two things. Let me start by saying that when we talk about cost I think the Army Guard today is about 9% of the Army's total obligation authority I think the air is about 6% of the total obligation authority for a significant percentage of the force But that doesn't tell the full story as my good friend said Clark will tell you and told me the other day You you cannot separate us from our Federal Reserve Opera or a federal relationship with the Army and Air Force Because the research and development we don't pay for The equipment comes to us from the service through the acquisition programs the training base for basic training We don't run basic training. We do run some RTI facilities some regional training institutes where we train active Garden Reserve But we we really look to our service partners to give us that so we are so tied on our federal mission To those services that sometimes the numbers can get lost a bit So you have to take that into the equation when you start thinking about the split of the budget for the future And the second question I think one of the things we will deal with in the future as we As we get beyond the budget the Guard brings tremendous value and there's going to be new mission sets And I told someone the other day. I was reading this thing in popular science about 30 years from now where you have you won't your platoon will be Robots, I mean that may be far far fletched, but the the technology is there today You think about what's just happened in 12 years with you unmanned aerial systems. I Think there's a lot of opportunities for the Guard both to continue to support our federal mission partners in the Air Force and Army And also to have that capability that training and that command and control that we we grow Inside our leaders That we get that from our federal mission that we do every day and can provide support to the state Cyber cyber is an area that I think we're going to have huge capability for the future I was Saturday visiting unit here in Virginia that was in annual training division headquarters A two-star command they had this huge drash tent. They call it sets up on about three acres The networking in that facility was just phenomenal And I went around and I talked to all the staff. They have the new CPOP communications Same thing they were using in Iraq and Afghanistan But I was talking to the members of that unit that are in that division on there in their annual training two-week period They're halfway through and the current ops chief Colonel Works for ITT He owns five patents on the night vision goggle system in his civilian capacity The network administrator inside the division a captain Works for a large IT firm. In fact, he told me he says you've really got some good stuff here in the military So we have junk on my side of it but What I found over and over is that skill set that our guardsmen and women bring is a real treasure That you can kind of find about any discipline you want In addition to their military status and they want to serve they want to be challenged So I see as we go forward and in today's warfare I mean, I remember listening to a fourth infantry division brigade commander when he returned from Afghanistan and one point he made was One third of his mission was security Two-thirds of his mission were infrastructure development re-establishing Security forces and police forces water, you know electric you name it So I think that's where the guard has a great niche for the future because of our many skill sets And I think these are the types of things we're going to deal with as we head down to the end of the future Sorry it has been an honor and a privilege for us to have you here with us this morning We're very grateful to you when we're delighted to be able to continue the conversation with the panel But I ask you all to please join me in a round of applause. Thank you very much We're now gonna bring our panel up on the stage if you want this opportunity to replenish your coffee Not that we aren't gonna keep you awake with our comments This is a good time to do that. So generals, would you please join me up here on the stage? Thanks Ladies and gentlemen, if you'd please take your seats, we'll resume the program We can We can we can run pass Hi guys got everything you need All right, we'll we'll resume the program now It's always a testament to the audience when the key speaker departs and the audience still remains I think that though in large part is due to the panel that we have following up here This morning and I will introduce them They'll each have an opportunity to make some remarks and then we'll turn to the questions I have a few questions left over from from general grasses commentary, but I know others are still pouring in So if you don't have a card Raise your hand and we'll get you a card if you have a card and you've put a question on it already Raise your hand with the card and the staff will pick it up and bring it up here to our able senior fellows Stephanie Sannick and Nate Fryer who will assemble and integrate them and make them harder for us I'm David Berto. I'm the senior vice president here at the Center for Strategic International Studies I'm the director of the international security program. It's my real Pleasure this morning to have with me this morning the three Generals who have to carry into action all those wonderful things that general grass talked about this morning I'm a native of South Louisiana And so I grew up with the guard and I saw the guard primarily as the people who showed up when we had hurricanes coming And we had them a through R. I guess Sandy actually was here and that was my s That was my first s hurricane, but starting, you know, Audrey Betsy Camille Dominique there was actually a hurricane named David It took me a while to live that one down all the way up through through Rita and in Louisiana We actually activated the National Guard when the hurricane warnings went up We didn't really wait until it hit because in fact it was part of preparation and part of advancement So for me the guard was a part of my life growing up and it was a very important part of my life That's why I'm so pleased to be here today with the distinguished gentleman that we have up here on the stage I'm going to introduce the three of them then they'll each take some remarks and then we'll open it up for questions To my immediate left is Lieutenant General Joseph Langell. He is the vice chief of the National Guard Bureau He came to this from a really easy job as a defense attache in Egypt Where nothing was going on at the time and so it made it easy here commissioned in 1981 through the Reserve Officer Training Corps out of North Texas State University in Denton Next to to his left is Lieutenant General Bill Ingram the director of the Army National Guard his commission 1972 as a distinguished graduate from Officer Candidate School in what was then called the North Carolina Military Academy at Fort Bragg I don't know if it's still in existence by that name, but we're still turning out an awful lot of fine soldiers there He has been the adjutant general of North Carolina and of course now as director of the Army National Guard He's responsible for guiding the formulation and development implementation of the programs and policies for the 350,000 National Guardsmen that General Gras described and To the his left is Lieutenant General Sid Clark director of the Air National Guard he's got responsibility for only a little over a hundred thousand Air Guardsmen and across some 213 locations around the country and around the world Commissioned in 1981 again as a distinguished graduate of the Reserve Officer Training Candidate Program at the University of Georgia He had a much easier assignment as defense attache. I think that was in Turkey So, you know, nobody gets the the the easy ones here like Actually, I don't know where there are any easy ones anymore now that I think about it So without further ado, I'll turn first to General Ling Yell and then we'll proceed down the table. Thank you Good morning. Thank you everyone It's an honor to be here and just the fact that the National Guard is here at this August institution to talk about Our future and our potential capabilities to the Department of Defense as something about where the National Guard has come from over the past 15 or 20 years or so General Gras gave you a great rundown on I think The major events and the transformation really the National Guard over the last 10 or 15 years or so and where we are And I don't think anybody doubts the contribution that we're making to the National Defense today I thought I'd tell you just a couple things on what General Gras has me focused on in the building with my with my Colleagues up here and and that is how do we maintain this operational force that we have become? You know all the senior leaders throughout the last Couple of chairmen's have said that we've made a great investment in the National Guard in in terms of People equipment training. It's been engaged operationally throughout the world and remains so today unlike ever before and And we feel like that investment is something that we want to maintain and we want to want to reap the benefit Benefits from it going forward. So for four main parts that General Gras has me working on is maintaining this operational force How do we get our fiscal house in order? How do we maintain? The best bang for the buck that the National Guard is a very lean institution anyway, but how do we go forward become even even more lean? How do we? invest in our National Guard community of interest so that we can continue continue to develop and Transform to an even in better more able organization that looks at three things that the members themselves How do we become developed to a point where we can serve in various roles with our active component counterparts? Across the department in the inter agency to get the positions up here where we actually can support a four-star position as a member of the joint chiefs of staff And finally to to look ahead to the future What is it that the National Guard needs to become divest transform? What new missions do we need to take on? We're the best fits that we feel for the National Guard in the future as we go forward. I Think you know I come here today, and I'm an optimist that when you when you look across the street at the Pentagon from here You see you tend to see this big black cloud sitting over it as we talk about the woes of having to find two Two two billion dollars a week every week for the next ten years If full sequestration were to hit that means we have to do things differently But I'll tell you that because of this investment that we've made in the National Guard I'm an optimist in that we have a tremendous Tool to use in the reserve component going forward Never have we been more ready never have we been more capable? And as the financial burden comes across I think it's entirely possible that that we may have to Find ways to leverage the combat capability and the contributions both in a federal and state sense To use the reserve components going forward I think it comes down to four four major questions as to how much we can leverage that tool General grass touched on on pretty much all of them. It always comes down to essentially Ken the National Guard or the reserve component gets there fast enough the cost question which Anytime someone can throw a number out there and tell you a certain certain cost Someone can trump you and show you another number that shows you a different cost So getting agreement on on what the cost is one of one of my favorite statements that I'll steal from dr. Patrick And the back was was a never trust any number that you have not manipulated yourself And and and I think we do that to each other routinely In the Pentagon and sometimes not to the best interest of the total enterprise next is access When can we use the guard? I think One thing that has fundamentally changed about the National Guard is is not only the use and the access to it But the expectation that they will be used 39 days is is no longer Anybody's expectation in the garden in fact Rather than as I watched some of the old old TV shows and you talk about the National Guard as a pay as a place to serve as a Refuge from combat as a refuge from being in fray Now it's anything but people get in the guard because they want to go break things They get in the guard because they want to travel they get in the guard because they want to be members of full spectrum decisive action combat units And we're proud of that and that's something that I think that should we make this This transition at this point and decide not to do that It's gonna have immense adverse impacts on the National Guard and our ability to recruit So as you said clean it up after hurricanes, that's not what the National Guard is anymore Not what they want to be now with the resource to be and certainly We not what they could be leveraged to be in the future going forward although they are still damn good at it They are still damn good at it and every time you look out there and you see these soldiers on TV Whether it's bombs blowing up in Boston or hurricanes in the Gulf or or tornadoes in more, Oklahoma The National Guard is there and we're there resource trained and equipped by our Services the Army and the Air Force and and that is a unique Piece that the American people can leverage in the 3,000 communities where the National Guard is out there So finally the final question I think that that sometimes is harder to assess is is the National Guard Force actually the same quality force is It's the same readiness force and I think The service of the National Guard and engagements I think back to 2005 and of 15 bcts in Iraq at the time eight of them were National Guard And so I think that clearly they've been They have been engaged at the highest level across the spectrum of conflict I don't think the National Guard is tired. I don't think the National Guard is looking for an opportunity to take a knee I think the National Guard is is engaged and ready to stay engaged in the future at an even greater rate So with that being said, I am an optimist I think right now that the National Guard is poised to make a great contribution to the National Defense and Remain so in the future and with that I'll turn it over to my colleague Thank you Well, thank you very much for the opportunity to be here It's an honor really to join you today. I'm proud to represent the 358,000 soldiers in the Army National Guard of the United States Today's Army National Guard is Honestly, the best man best trained best equipped best led organization that we've ever had in our 376 year history Right now 25,000 of our soldiers are mobilized across the world including 10,000 that are in OEF today since 9-11 there have been more than 520,000 mobilizations of National Guard soldiers At the same time the Guard soldiers continue to fulfill obligations to our communities Last year the Army Guard served over 447,000 man days duty days conducting state missions and Actually, that was a historically slow year for us One message I'd like to leave with you today is that citizen soldiers will continue to play a pivotal role Defending our states the territories as well as the nation To this end we work every day to strengthen the Army National Guard's 21st century capabilities The evolutionary path that we've taken over the past 12 years really underscores that fact The value of the National Guard was recently reinforced in a letter Written on the 5th of June to Congress on behalf of the state governors that encourage Congress To fully utilize the National Guard's cost-effectiveness and high-skill level To maintain critical capabilities for the federal government and the states while reducing the overall size and cost of our nation's military As the governors point out utilizing today's guard is an essential element in our nation's defense Our strengths are based on four key elements First the Army National Guard is cost-effective a range of department of defense and independent studies That have already been mentioned Confirmed that an Army National Guard soldier delivers operational impact and strategic debt at about a third of the cost of his active component counterpart in Terms a sheer scale the Army National Guard contributes 39% of the Army's operating forces for 12% of its budget complimenting the active army and the Army Reserve and providing vital capability to the total force With these forces the Army National Guard serves as military's first responder for domestic emergencies While also providing a balanced force for employment overseas, and I can't underscore that enough The reason that the guard is good at doing the domestic mission is because we're man-trained equipped and organized by federal forces as federal forces and we provide The Army National Guard provides a combat reserve of the Army the Army Reserve does other things, but The preponderance of the combat forces in the reserve components of the Army are in the Army National Guard Second the Army National Guard responds rapidly past dozen years of war have demonstrated that even the largest guard formations can be Trained to standard validated and deployed well within the timelines required by combatant commanders The experience of deploying Repeatedly over the past decade has honed this training regimen and significantly Reduced post-mobilization training time The Army National Guard the Army Force generation cycle provides a rotating pool of about 55 to 60,000 Army guardsmen in their ready cycle available for employment each year Most companies and company-sized units complete their post-mobilization training in approximately 30 days Brigade combat teams take a little longer Averaging 50 to 80 days of post-mobile training and again It all depends the active army takes about that long as well Depending on what level you go into that training regimen if you go in a platoon. It takes a little longer If you go in a company level train It doesn't take quite as long and while predictability of scheduled deployments is preferable for soldiers Families and civilian employers the last decade has made the guard more ready to respond to no notice Overseas continuancies than we ever were in the past Third the Army National Guard is accessible Lessons were earned in nearly 12 years of mobilizing and deploying soldiers have enabled the Department of Defense to collectively refine Processes and procedures for employing the reserve component Army National Guard has answered the call and accomplished the mission time and again without fail Fourth the Army National Guard is fully capable Whether it's brigade combat teams conducting full-spectrum operations in Iraq or Afghanistan or small units and individuals Executing security cooperation missions and exercises other places in the world The Army National Guard has accomplished every mission that's been assigned perhaps. This was most evident during Katrina 80,000 Guard soldiers were deployed overseas and another 50,000 Soldiers from every state territory in the district converged upon the Gulf Coast to and They were there in time to support rescue as well as recovery operations Governors across the nation have depended on our units to save lives and properties in the face of danger and disaster for decades for years and years and years these inherent Army National Guard strengths are a direct result of decades of deployments and again the cumulative experience that we've That we've gained in the war fight for the last 12 years I really appreciate the opportunity to be with you today, and I'll turn over to to sit Good morning. It's a pleasure to be here. I always feel welcome when you come to a place particularly when it smells like pancakes when you walk in the door, so glad to be here a Lot of numbers were already thrown out to a lot of description of about the Air National Guard what we are who we do what we do and where we're at Again a little over a hundred and five thousand outstanding airmen serving in the Air National Guard a Lot of those are former members of the regular Air Force The largest gift that I think that the regular Air Force gives the Air National Guard are fully trained experienced personnel for one reason or another have elected to leave the regular Air Force and Have come to work in the Air National Guard, and they found a home and they love it and are very happy to be members of the National Guard 89 wings we're in all 54 states territories in the district as John grass had pointed out we have Mission types extend across the entire United States Air Force portfolio every single core function that the Air Force does we're part of it and I think we do it very well, and I'll talk to a little bit why I think we do it very well in just a minute the other thing I wanted to talk about that I think is important is readiness the Air Force years ago made the decision that its reserve components both the Air Force reserve and the Air National Guard would be as ready as their Regular Air Force members when it came time to go to war That was a huge investment big decision and went well beyond just talking about a volunteer force It was about how would they posture their forces to commit to a combat environment because of that We have outstanding cooperation when we go overseas seamlessly. We work side-by-side You'll hear multiple times when people tell you that they can't tell the difference between a member of the Air Force Reserve their National Guard of the Regular Air Force when we're serving together That is the starting point for any discussion as we go forward when we talk about active component reserve component if you want to talk about What can we do? What can we change? One thing that has to be the foundational understanding is The Air National Guard can do any mission It has to do if it has the proper resources and you set the expectations high enough Joe talked to that just a little bit Expectation that's a big part of it. I would tell you that years ago We also were included in everything when it came to professional military education Things like sending our Air National Guard members to the fighter weapons school Things like that made a big impact on the Air National Guard when it came to our readiness levels today We still have very high readiness and the Air Force values that in many ways basically it's a Somewhat of a core value of the Air Force to be as ready as possible when called upon to do whatever mission you Have to do. So we've been very fortunate and be included in that I Also wanted to talk a little bit about the operational force In fact, I think it's key and I mentioned my pillars here in a second of the total force but as members of the total force the the readiness along with The the idea that the expectation you will be an operational force is big Because our members will look forward to the opportunity to serve side-by-side with regular Air Force airmen Or in missions are tasked to do individually including air defense over the nation every day When we talk about future discussions on force structure They are very happy when they're deployed the proudest Conversations you'll see or have with members of the National Guard is when they've been deployed side-by-side with their other total Force brother and doing a mission for the nation They're also very proud when they do their missions at home When guardsmen are helping pull things off of houses and and looking for victims in tornadoes earthquakes the Hurricane Sandy You will see another piece of pride come out of guardsmen when they perform those missions at home So unique structure title 32 title 10 But the pride that comes with being able to serve the federal mission in the States is quite unique and very proud to be the one member of that not just a director of the Air National Guard The big change to me for the operational force came in the 90s We were asked to step up and be a part of the air expeditionary force That is going back to that foundational understanding that if you're going to a mission be as good as anybody else in the Guard to the components that serve in the service We were put on the first string basically when it came to the air expeditionary force That was profound and people stepped up to it They realized that meant rapid more deployments more time away from home But that was the beginning and that folded into the last decade when we served in Iraqi freedom and enduring freedom. I Think in the future. I see no difference. I see guardsmen very proud to serve in that operational force I see them being supported by the families. I see them being supported by their employers There are four pieces four pillars if you will to the total force The first one is standards We all meet the same standards in the Air Force You can't tell the difference between an F-22 pilot in their National Guard and one in the regular Air Force That's because the Air Force set that Template if you will for how we would be construct structured in Meeting the same standards as one part of it the section when the second one is inspections We all meet the same inspections That's important. If you expect to be tier one ready ready to go out the door on day one Whatever mobilization time it takes whether it's two days three days a week Be ready to go. There's no going off to another location to get ready You got to leave your in garrison location and go forward right now The third part is of the pillars is the operational force. I was talking about that's the expectation piece that you will do this Either in rotational demand, whatever that is right now It's a one to three for the regulars one to five for the reserve components That's an expectation that you will meet if that rotational demand is there then you have to step up to that Of course, if there's a bigger conflict and different mobilization authorities required Then you be ready to go and it could significantly change in the life of a guardsman for one to three years It's going to be a big deal if that happens, but we're ready to do that Anybody wears this uniform in the guard has to understand that And the fourth pillar is resourcing that makes the first three happen correctly So when it comes to the recapitalization efforts the modernization efforts The mandates to support the operational force may have to be there Pull all that together. You got a great total force. You got a great team We talked about the efficiencies cost factors and others And I would be happy to answer any questions that you have along with the rest of the panel Thank you for your time Thank you all three of you. That was a very well-rounded survey if you will As the moderator I'm tempted to ask all the questions because I have about 40 of them here But I'm only going to ask one and then I'm going to turn to our Associates here to catch some of the questions that you all have been circulating again If you if you still have questions written on your cards raise them up and the staff will we'll collect them I want to tackle the readiness issue because all of you touched on it And and it seems to me that for active forces Readiness questions are fairly linear. How much money do you have where you're going to cut? Who comes in first the whole question of first tier and below? Is it okay? Can we live with the consequences for the guard? This is a harder dynamic the questions are more complicated It's not only readiness for what but you've got to balance federal responsibilities and state responsibilities you hinted at that in your comments You have to also I think think about how you compensate for a less ready active component Which adds a complexity to your situation. They're probably not looking at In the other direction. So how do you deal with those challenges and really I guess is a question for all three of you Well, I think uh, you know clearly the issue of the day is readiness. I think the discussion As we've had in the Pentagon over the recent weeks in terms of uh, How do we go far forward in all the analysis on where is there money to be saved? Once you have the force built and the equipment bought and the people trained, you know readiness Is incrementally caught. I mean when you when you start to adjust readiness There aren't huge huge dollar savings there that you can get to immediately It's it's it's relatively constant for us in the guard I would I would offer that our readiness problems are no different than the active component Where you take uh, you you look at people training facilities and equipment All of those things impact our readiness and we tend to defer the Thing that we cut things first that don't actually impact our ability to go out and And save people's lives and that's we we let our buildings start to decay We let our equipment become less ready And then over time this begins to snowball as I'm sure Sid and bill will tell you and it becomes harder and harder And more expensive to dig ourselves out of it. So our questions are the same When we look at a drill weekend Those are the periods where we increase our readiness that in our 39 days for the army national guard It costs about 300 million dollars to bring all 350,000 of bill soldiers in 300 million dollars to bring them on and put them on a drill weekend for readiness It's much less than that for for the air national guard much less people. So it's it's um, you know It's it's it's an expensive proposition in order to do it and so however ready ready you want to be that's so much money Money we have so it's it's I think uh, you know the question going forward We're looking at in the national guard perspective. We're looking at our ability to react both on the federal side and the state side Um and determine what kinds of equipment and people do we need to keep ready general General grass touched on the national guard strategic planning system as as we look at various states and various catastrophes that may happen Uh to determine what are the most important things that we keep ready in order to respond to those kinds of things That'll let bill Okay, thanks joe. I Absolutely agree with what you said one thing I think to point out is that Federal readiness for the federal mission and readiness for state missions really don't compete with each other You heard general grass talk today about Visiting the 29th infantry division and their headquarters was set up with the with the c-puff and The drash tents and they were they were ready to do business. It doesn't really matter if they were doing us A state mission doing command and control for a new madrid earthquake or whether they were in iraq or afghanistan Doing a combat mission the skill sets that your user are almost the same and The ability to train. I think when you talk about readiness, you can only be as ready as your resource so as Um as we move into this next era of reduced resources We're gonna have to be very careful about how we pick and choose what what training Exercises that we do and everybody in the force, you know the army with their Arphogen the army force generation model is really a Is a methodology for having cyclic readiness we were training and equipping and Preparing for the next to deploy to either afghanistan or iraq and We focus resources on the next to deploy units In the case of arphogen for the army national guard. It's a An available cycle of one year and every five And we're still looking to do that level of That level of of resourcing So we'll have about a fifth of the force which again is about 60 000 soldiers that are in their available cycle Every year and the type of forces that are in that available year are across section of the army national guard of Combat units combat support combat service support units that's our Be ready for the for the federal mission Which has us ready for the state mission as well The state mission is the fight tonight mission So we have to be careful with dual use equipment so that we keep that equipment Ready as it can be based again on resources For whenever we're called for the For the response to things like hirken sandy or the or the tornadoes or the or the fires Our fires during the season With that i'll turn it over to sit The question david i think you kind of reflected on the regular forces and their their readiness The chief staff of the air force and the secretary of the air force Are committed to whatever size the air force is and however we're composed We'll keep the readiness high So their their commitment is to keep that readiness up there. We've seen times when it's dropped down Now as of recently we had to in the air force had to ground some squadrons Due to sequestration and the oco bills that had to be paid And that hurt readiness no doubt But i think that's a tremendous also complement to the reserve components because we continued to fly in the reserve components Due to different appropriations But i think the confidence that the regular force has in the garden reserve if the nation calls them will step up and Will will respond i would hope that we all maintain the same level readiness in the out years Can i just add one more point This goes to the operational use the reserve component There is a certain readiness that comes from using that force in an operational sense And so when we actually go to Sinai or we go to Bosnia or we go to horn of Africa as an operational force That replaces otherwise in some cases training that someone has to spend extra dollars to do And that's one reason why we find it it's so imperative that the national guards stay operationally involved We stay current we stay networked with the operational forces that we engage with And it helps to maintain us at a higher level of readiness while doing an operational mission Good thank you Let me turn now to the questions from the audience Nate fryer, Stephanie sanik our two senior fellows I assume you all have organized yourselves and and have an order to proceed. So let me turn the mic over to you Thank you very much for being here gentlemen I think this question applies across the board It's it's again kind of a amalgam of a couple of questions that came in from the audience First I'd say what are the current as we reset from Iraq and Afghanistan and look to the future And deal with an era of increasingly tight resources. What are the acquisition priorities? for the guard In particular the two components and then overall sort of as you look Look forward and then at the same time where are there areas that we can take some risk? Where are there areas that that where we're oversubscribed perhaps in capability? And where are there areas that you really want to cover down on risk? sure Well and the last part of your question about where do you take risk, you know, one of the discussions that Obviously, we're going to have is probably about the active component reserve component mix Um, I think one of the foundational questions you have to ask yourself is what threats Do we face now? What should we face in the future? Does the united states face an existential threat? Do we face one in 10 years? Do we face one in 20 years? And that gets back to what General Engel brought up a while ago about how big a force do we have or need? How big how fast that force have to get to the fight? And how long is that force going to stay there and employ? So I think that's one part of the The assumptions and the questions you have to ask you about what you're going to do in the future Your question had to do with again, where do we take risk? But what are our acquisition priorities for the future? We have to be again careful because of our dual mission We need to have the equipment available And in in a readiness level that it's available Uh to do the domestic mission and the way the army national guard is arrayed across the 54 states territories in the district We have a a mix of of capabilities in each state and All disasters and all emergencies are local. So the governor is in charge is is what it really amounts to so The national guard has to have certain capability and and again available capability in each state for the For the domestic mission On the other side a brigade combat team is a brigade combat team is a brigade combat team Uh, the striker brigade and the army national guard are one of the infantry brigade combat teams Again in the the readiness cycles, we're still going to do For the foreseeable future The same things that we've done for the last 10 years 12 years In being ready for the war fight. So resources will be Centered and focused on the on the units that are in the available cycles as a as a training model moves forward Before we get to our question Um, I wanted to note that a lot of the cards that Nate and I have been receiving have the first line of them has has read Thank you for your service. So I think not only is the smell of this room welcoming, but uh Things are emanating towards that towards you guys. That's really there. There's a lot of appreciation for everything that you've done My question is a little bit More about cyber security the guard straddles Between in many cases between the Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security Engagement with FEMA federal coordinating officers and and the like I think cyber security and cyber terrorism is an area Where a lot of people are talking about what is the risk that's acceptable? Can I ask and it was reflected on several of the cards that we received the role of the guard in approaching cyber security and cyber terrorism When you look out in the next 20 years, how will the guard play in that arena? Thank you Well, I'll see if I can hit the wavetops and then turn it over and let the army National guard near national guard talk about their service things. Um, clearly There's a lot a lot a lot of discussion in the Pentagon about cyber enterprise in general One thing to consider about it as as we have and we engage in all these discussions about what Is the current active component reserve component mix and across the air domain the land domain to see domain all the rest of Stuff I'd like to make the point that as we begin to build the cyber domain Really, and we've been engaged in cyber activities for quite some time But we're just really getting serious about putting together a A a force model a cyber mission force for the support of u.s cyber command from all the services We have an opportunity to build it Kind of from the ground up and think through where the best places are to put the cyber piece in the reserve component Um, you know, I think uh one thing that has kind of been touched on across several speakers has been The unique attributes and civilian skill sets that are resident in the reserves And the the capabilities where people with unique cyber skill sets Are able to uh to bring sometimes the the newest leading edge Capabilities in the in the cyber domain To they're they're well trained. They're they're already in it. They understand it The other thing we think and we are concerned from a state and a FEMA and a dhs and a state level is Where do we expect the cyber attacks to hit oftentimes? We think well, will they come after us or will they go after the Uh, the networks of the banks and the systems and the pieces that are going to hurt our economy or our power grids Or all those things that are actually out there in the in the civilian sector So we feel like uh national guardsmen who work in these sectors Uh reservists in general will have sometimes The first look and ability to see those things identify them Fix them and and go in and clean them up. I think uh The challenges that we're going through right now is is that we think it's important that Whatever it is that we build in the reserves and in the national guard is we feel it's important that it mirror The title 10 capability the same Standards and training that general clark and general england. We've talked about before and and so that so that we are integral and replaceable for pieces of the federal title 10 mission domain and um So that a lot of ongoing discussion with how we build that and how the national guard can contribute to it Turn it over to bill and sit Thanks, jode picking up on that Right now we have army national guard soldiers that are working As soldiers at nsa and have been for the last 10 years actually There are a couple of units in the army national guard that are That are deployed and working in the cyber arena But they're very small and they're very selective Obviously the civilian acquired skills is a perfect is a perfect match for the guard um the real question is about authorities and that's being worked at at US cyber com and other places is do soldiers have the authority to uh To get into the networks of civilian corporations for example In the banking industry and and the power grid and others There's a lot of reluctance and and how do we If we attack a If we attack another country by Back you know by backtracking who's attacking or who is uh Is trying to get into our networks is that an act of war is does the congress need to be involved? there are a lot of really Fundamentally large questions dealing with cyber Getting down into the tactical part leaving that and going to tactical Any units that we have in the army national guard um because of doctrine and training and others need to look like units that are in the active army and Honestly, the army is working very diligently right now We're standing up some units uh at the direction of us cyber com all the services are to fulfill that need From the army's perspective cyber is a combination of signal intelligence and operations and you combine those G2 g3 and g6 Disciplines together to come up with cyber So the army's still working on what their cyber structure is going to look like for the future as they die in size And it takes people It takes training Figure out what the mos is are going to be the military occupational specialties For people that are in the cyber arena is something that's still Still being worked at whatever the the active army Stands up for cyber units the army national guard will will have similar units again spread across the The 54 states territories in the district as an aside to that They will in a In a non title 10 status they may be available to For for state or domestic missions Depending on how they're called and and what authorities are available sometimes Not often in the pentagon. You'll see one slide It brings remarkable clarity to a subject when you ask about the people In the mission I have a slide and if I had it with me I show it to you But it's one of our network warfare squadrons And there's over 30 different company icons and agencies that guardsmen work for In their civilian world That do it not that they just work for these companies, but they actually do it things related to that company and When you think about that For the individual that's tremendous networking that you get when you get together with all of those different companies on a regular basis And it's a great value to the To the nation that we have these people that serve in that capacity And then I put an employer head on and I went Okay, so at least once a month and more often likely You're going to bring all these people together and they're going to share ideas on information technology computer network defense And how to do things that's such strength. What a fabric that makes for security So if I was in fact if I was the employer and had one of those individuals in the squadron I'd probably try to figure out how I get more of my employees in that squadron Not only are you gonna Task organize them and let them serve with pride professionalize them even further But also that networking piece is big big. So cyber has a natural place with the guard gentlemen There's been there are a number of questions on the the transition from strategic Operational reserve or the maintenance of the guards capability as an operational reserve So I think it would be useful to hear Some specifics on your specific goals with how to maintain sort of the edge the guard has achieved over the last decade What your priorities in that regard are and really I'd I really like to readdress and ask if if there is some tension now as as the active component is certain to decline if there is some tension between The title 10 and title 32 mission with respect to this increasing the increasing interest in maintaining the operational reserve focus Everybody loves tension You know I go back to uh to To our what we've kind of all been saying is is our capabilities to do our state mission comes from our ability to do the federal mission And we are we are organized training as equipped as a combat reserve for united states air force the united states army And when you do that well, and we have those capabilities. We are able to then Cross cross walk those capabilities. We call them the essential 10 capabilities I'm not going to name them all for you But think of everything we use in the homeland the medical the transportation the maintenance logistics all of those things that enable us to respond in the homeland sense Come from our ability and and resourcing to do our title 10 mission. That's that's usually important When when we look at what is it specifically that we're looking at readiness? Sure, we're trying to identify as we talk to an army in an air force with reduced resources Specifically, what is it? We need in terms of combatant commander exercise engagements What is it specifically we need in terms of active man years of operational use of the national guard to maintain us? At a readiness level where we feel we can maintain this combat benefit that we've Leveraged over the last 15 years to what we have now We feel like general brass touched on the state partnership program when he was here But the operational engagement that we get by doing some of the engagements with our state partnership and our partners Is is amazing and and leverages our readiness To really a whole another level This i'll talk about the 65th partner. We just did in in vietnam In march i was given a speech in a dining in in san antonio Which was the 40 year celebration of the release of the prisoners of war from coming back from vietnam One of which was my dad who happened to spend six years as a guest of the state of the vietnamese A week later i am talking to The vietnamese who want to talk to us about how we exercise together to do Search and rescue operations and defense support of of civil authorities all things that we are experts at in the national guard So that's how we try to tie these programs together To uh to which is general grass said 13 million dollars to give us engagements out and beyond and across the enterprise That maintain us a higher operational force and still at a reduced cost of the cost benefit business model of the part-time military force Turn it over to bill It's real the tension is all about money Uh when a active guard or one of them a guardsman is on active duty It costs the same amount of money out of a From the army or the air force as it does to have a a regular army or air force soldier or airman on duty so In a time of diminishing resources in a time of downsizing for the uh the united states army the more Army national guardsmen that are on duty every day is Uh diminishes a number of active duty soldiers that you could Pay for with the same amount of money. So there that's where the tension is. There's no question that being operational Enhances the capabilities of the national guard in general and certainly the people that are involved It's leader development. It's the opportunity to to get out of the state and see what goes on in the in the active Or actually in the big world so Operational is good That can be serving in a Building partner capacity somewhere in the world and working for a combatic commander. It's just as valuable To do humanitarian missions in Scythian Central America. We do a lot of that. We've done that since the 80s general grass talked about that It's also anything that you're doing That you're exercising command and control Training missions We have done in the past a lot of annual training missions Oconas specifically in europe where our maintenance units have gone to Gone to some of the depots and that we mean that the united states maintains in europe and Fixed stuff for for a couple weeks The ability to get outside and exercise command and control in a place that you're not used to Helps in operationalizing the guard national training center jrtc other training opportunities again where you train like you fight Are also great opportunities and we want to continue to do that I'll I'll turn it back I think You know, I think your question had to do with tension between title 32 and title 10 with regard to performing the missions or is it Yeah, I you know, I haven't seen it actually in that that world. I mean, it's it's like we said we train for that federal mission and I would tell you There's some tough scenarios that expands the that operational engagement that we've been talking about that we think is important that operational force I think it seasons our leaders it seasons our people So that we face disasters at home. We perform well at those I think it's important that the governors have those forces in air national guard You wouldn't think that we do as much with as the army national guard does in disasters at home But we do quite a bit. It's because we have people that are pulled forward That know how to task organize. They take orders. They follow direction and in the most extreme cases where we have Tough situations and being from south Louisiana. David, you know down there that We had guardsmen waiting through places where It wasn't very pleasant to tell you the truth that caused The need for people to even go seek Some psychological counseling after some of the stuff they had seen not everybody but in some cases that That's pretty desperate. I mean that's some of some of the stuff that you would see overseas in combat. So I think it's important that We continue to train towards that federal mission be as good as we can at that mission because then that enables us to Do that state mission very well, and I just i'm not familiar with the tensions between title 32 mission and title 10 mission We're reaching the the end of our of our time here one of the things of course that the guard is very good at readiness and that is that At getting governors to assign letters at the drop of a hat of any sign of tension Some of you have seen this come to play I recall back on the friday the 13th may of 2005 when secretary rumsfeld released his List of base closures. There were four states That had an f16 air national guard base that i'm pretty sure on may the 12th The governors of those states didn't know they had a base by The evening of may the 13th It was the last thing that stood between the collapse of civilization and the saving of those of those f16 bases So this these things have a way of focusing themselves I I want to have a number of thanks that i'd like to put out. I'd like to thank our panel For staying through and and and giving us their insights and their expansive views if you will I'd like to thank general grass for his attendance and his speech here this morning I particularly want to note one thing that he brought up and that is the national guard youth challenge Which is an exemplary program. It's been around for more than 20 years But this month is the 20th anniversary of the statutory Entitlement or a creation for that program and in two days in this room CSIS will be hosting the national guard youth challenge program in commemoration of that 20th anniversary event I would invite you all to check your calendars and to be back. I think general mckinley The 26th chief of the national guard bureau will be here as our as our lunchtime speaker Or a lunchtime panel director, etc And so it's a really tremendous tremendous success story all across america that could be replicated over and over again And I want to thank all of you for uh for being here with us and sitting here today And finally, I want to reiterate uh, dr. Hamery's thanks at the beginning to our underwriters for this military strategy forum series Rolls-Royce north america. Thank you very much for your continued support so that we can Continue to have these discussions and forums and bring them. Thanks to our viewers on the web Thanks to all of you and thanks to you gentlemen. Thank you very much