Activated Guard, Reserve Troop Numbers Dip

The ranks of National Guard and Reserve troops on active duty for Iraq and the global fight against terror has fallen to just under 118,000, the lowest level since before the U.S. invasion of Iraq three years ago. The reduction is a welcome trend for America's citizen-soldiers, who have been called to combat duty in numbers not seen in decades and who were further strained by last year's hurricane relief efforts on the Gulf Coast.

The driving reason for the drop, Pentagon officials say, is that more active-duty combat units like the Army's 4th Infantry Division are returning to Iraq after extensive reorganizations. Guard and Reserve units, the bulk of whom are in Iraq and Afghanistan, were filling more combat positions while the active-duty force was being reconfigured for the kinds of conflicts the Pentagon expects in the years ahead.

The Pentagon says the decline in Guard and Reserve call-ups also reflects that some troops whose specialties make them among the most frequently deployed have served their required time. Lt. Col. Ellen Krenke, a Pentagon spokeswoman, said some "high demand" units such as military police, military intelligence and special operations forces have completed their 24 months of mobilization time. This means they are no longer available unless they volunteer.

The military says it does not expect the two-year mobilization limit to create a major problem unless the United States becomes involved in another major conflict.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060315/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_iraq_reserves

gee I wonder where that would be :eyes:

WP, pg1: Army Guard Refilling Its Ranks Updated at 4:28 PM

Army Guard Refilling Its Ranks
Members Get Bonus For New Recruits
By Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, March 12, 2006; Page A01


The Army National Guard, which has suffered a severe three-year recruiting slump, has begun to reel in soldiers in record numbers, aided in part by a new initiative that pays Guard members $2,000 for each person they enlist.

The Army Guard said Friday that it signed up more than 26,000 soldiers in the first five months of fiscal 2006, exceeding its target by 7 percent in its best performance in 13 years. At this pace, Guard leaders say they are confident they will reach their goal of boosting manpower from the current 336,000 to the congressionally authorized level of 350,000 by the end of the year.

"Will we make 350,000? The answer is: Absolutely," said Lt. Gen. H Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau.

The rebound is striking because since 2003, the Army Guard has performed worse in annual recruiting than any other branch of the U.S. military. The Guard was shrinking while it was being asked to shoulder a big part of the burden in Iraq. Together with the Army Reserve, it supplied as many as 40 percent of the troops in Iraq while also dispatching tens of thousands of members to domestic disasters.

Today, the Guard is surpassing its goals and growing in strength -- a welcome boost for an all-volunteer Army stretched thin by unprecedented deployments. In recent months, the Guard enlisted nearly as many troops as the active-duty Army, even though it is a much smaller force. Indeed, the Army Guard, present in about 3,500 U.S. communities, will launch pilot programs this year to recruit for the entire Army....


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/20...