[ OUR OPINION ]
Increase active-duty Army
instead of calling up GuardFATIGUE is becoming a serious enemy of U.S. forces in Iraq, and increasing numbers of Reserve and National Guard units have been mobilized to supplement active-duty troops. Pentagon officials now recognize that foreign nations may not volunteer adequate forces for a third international division. They should ask Congress for funds to beef up the active-duty forces and return Reserve and Guard members to their role as emergency forces.
THE ISSUE
The Defense Department is considering calling up thousands of additional National Guard and Reserve troops for duty in Iraq.Reliance on citizen soldiers to fill in for active-duty troops has reached levels that Rep. Neil Abercrombie describes as "a draft by default," achieved by the calling up of Reserve and Guard units. Abercrombie and other members of the House Armed Services Committee seem prepared to provide funds for more active-duty troops, but Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has insisted in recent weeks that U.S. troop strength is adequate.
The Army was reduced from 750,000 to 535,000 soldiers following the end of the first Gulf War and the Cold War. The strength later fell to 491,000, and a further cut was contemplated before Sept. 11, 2001.
The 130,000 U.S. forces in Iraq, including 20,000 Guard members, are joined by two international divisions with 20,000 troops. On Friday, the Pentagon mobilized two enhanced National Guard brigades from Arkansas and North Carolina for up to a year in Iraq after three months training, replacing the Guard units now in Iraq.
The Pentagon's current plan -- reduced last week to a hope -- calls for a third international division to replace the Army's 101st Airborne Division when it rotates from Iraq in February or March. If that fails to materialize, Gen. John M. Keane, the Army's vice chief of staff, told Abercrombie in a committee hearing last week, "then we will have to go back and draw on U.S. military forces, both active and reserve, to accommodate that."
The Hawaii National Guard's 2,100-member 29th Infantry Brigade is among 15 enhanced brigades -- those that have modern equipment and regularly train with active-duty forces -- that could be considered for deployment. Brig. Gen. Vern Miyagi, the Hawaii Guard's commander, has called the 29th "one of the top enhanced brigades in the Army."
The total number of Guard and Reserve troops on active duty at home and overseas now totals 170,465, down from a high of 223,000 during major combat operations in Iraq. National Guard units are planned to replace troops in Kosovo, Bosnia and the Sinai Peninsula at the completion of those troops' six-month rotations.
Pentagon officials consider relief provided by the Guard and Reserve troops in Iraq as important to reduce the stress created by back-to-back deployments of active-duty troops. They should be equally concerned about an exodus of soldiers from Guard and Reserve units that have been deployed too often for periods longer than a year.
