Guard/Reserve MPA days

[lloyd christmas]

Does anyone know what the deal is with the Guard/Reserve man days? I read an article today about the tanker units in the northeast having to cancel their support of the tanker bridge over the Atlantic because they do not have man days. Our unit (AETC) has been told there are absolutely no MPA days available in the foreseeable future. This affects our part time guys who are wanting to bum with us or go fly with our active duty counterparts here in the C-130 FTU at Little Rock. It seems to be an issue across the board.

Edited October 20, 2010 by lloyd christmas

[SUX]

The numbers I've seen aren't good, as bad as FY11 might be, FY12 will be worse. Conversely, I don't see how the MAF will be able to maintain the current ops tempo without guard/reserve assets and participation.

[brickhistory]

Does anyone know what the deal is with the Guard/Reserve man days?

MPA = $$

A unit is allocated so many per fiscal year. During GWOT/OCO/etc, etc, etc, the spigot has been wide open. Times are getting tight and units aren't getting a blank check anymore. Guard/Reserve HQs usually also have a pot of MPA that they can shift around to those in hurt status, but that too has been tapped out.

A unit has to use that available MPA to keep their crews current/perform their basic mission(s). Additional support requires additional MPA that Uncle DoD has to come up with.

One unintended consequence of this open spigot is the thousands of guys/gals who had gone Reserve/Guard well shy of ringing the magic 20 year retirement, i.e., getting retirement immediately upon retirement instead of having to wait until age 60 (yes, I'm aware of the provisions for earlier retirement based upon time activated, yada, yada, yada, but just go with it for now) but due to long-term activation or extended MPA orders now have the time in to qualify.

Not an insignificant amount of money involved.

Lesson learned (again): Don't go to war expecting it to be cheap...

[Toro]

Ditto Brick.

We rely heavily on Guard/Reserve augmentation and are in a manning crush right now because the mandays we expected never came through. We're told that what few mandays we can expect for FY11 (which still haven't dropped) will be even less in the following years.

[Guest]

Here's an idea...

Let's shut off all that money we flush down the shitter to have guys sitting "alert" gets shut off so we can and get some of these ARC units off the tit so we can spend that money on something worthwhile.

I swear, someone should go to jail for all money we've wasted paying guys to triple dip on so called "alert" or be on AGR orders for Noble Eagle or whatever the fuck it is called now. All that money and absolutely ZERO contribution to the war effort.

[Buddy Spike]

Here's an idea...

Let's shut off all that money we flush down the shitter to have guys sitting "alert" gets shut off so we can and get some of these ARC units off the tit so we can spend that money on something worthwhile.

I swear, someone should go to jail for all money we've wasted paying guys to triple dip on so called "alert" or be on AGR orders for Noble Eagle or whatever the fuck it is called now. All that money and absolutely ZERO contribution to the war effort.

The three for one good deal is done, thanks to Fresno. The times, they are a changing. Last I heard was at best a two for one, but it went down to a one for one. It may still be a one for one.

[Karl Hungus]

Here's an idea...

Let's shut off all that money we flush down the shitter to have guys sitting "alert" gets shut off so we can and get some of these ARC units off the tit so we can spend that money on something worthwhile.

I swear, someone should go to jail for all money we've wasted paying guys to triple dip on so called "alert" or be on AGR orders for Noble Eagle or whatever the ###### it is called now. All that money and absolutely ZERO contribution to the war effort.

Plenty of desert lines to be filled by reservists bitching about the well running dry. How bad do they want to get paid...

[SUX]

Plenty of desert lines to be filled by reservists bitching about the well running dry. How bad do they want to get paid...

That is no longer an option as of Nov 1.

[SUX]

I saw an email from another unit that mentioned it. Friends in the AOR have heard the same thing also.

[Clayton Bigsby]

Explain this triple dip?

[Guest]

Explain this triple dip?

3 x 8 hr "days" = one 24 hr alert period

The three for one good deal is done, thanks to Fresno. The times, they are a changing. Last I heard was at best a two for one, but it went down to a one for one. It may still be a one for one.

Whatever.

Even at 1:1 it is a total waste, especially considering all the AGR position the units sitting alert have been allocated.

This sitting alert to shoot down a fucking airliner is a joke and a complete waste of money. It is everything that makes the ARC look bad, classic ANG sugar tit.

[Clayton Bigsby]

This sitting alert to shoot down a fucking airliner is a joke and a complete waste of money. It is everything that makes the ARC look bad, classic ANG sugar tit.

Totally serious question - is the capability to do intercepts and enforce airspace/shoot stuff down worth keeping at all? Does it serve much of a legitimate purpose?

Another question - could 9/11 have happened as it did in the days of Air Defense Command? Did getting rid of the intercept capability we had enable it to transpire?

I recognize that the horse has already left the barn, but do we still need the barn door at all?

Edited October 23, 2010 by Clayton Bigsby

[brickhistory]

Back in the good ol' Cold War days, you had a very robust air defense capability in the active duty strangely enough called Air Defense Command (before that it was the Continental Air Defense Command) complete with SAMs (Nike, Nike-Hercules/Nike-Ajax, even some US-based AAA) and interceptors - F-101, F-102, F-106s, Canadian (as part of NORAD before space became a player) with their CF-100s and CF-101s and a hellishly expensive but really amazing for the time radar lines in Canada and the US, off the coasts in picket ships, early AWACS based on the Constellation, and even oil-rig like sea platforms (see Texas Tower 4 for an odd way for USAF dudes to die, RIP).

As the threat from Soviet bombers declined, costs from Vietnam and LBJ's "Great Society" escalated, DoD was used, again, to pay for everything else and the budget was cut. One result of that was the air defense mission going completely Guard by the early 1980s. 1st Air Force became the keeper of the airspace and more and more alert positions were eliminated until by 9/11 there were only a handful with birds still on alert. And that mission was for the "threat" coming from outside the ADIZ, not an internal one.

So, yes, 9/11 could've happened back in the old days. We weren't watching, nor trained and equipped for an internal air attack as occured that September day. I also think that any self-respecting nation should have a means of protecting its sovereignty, to include airspace defense.

Post-9/11, the kneejerk reaction, besides TSA and the like, was a substantial beefing up of the air defense mission with ONE. Lots of $$ spent on tieing in the FAA radars in CONUS to the sector operations centers, lots of $$ spent on upgrading alert facilities and TTPs, etc, etc. And not to mention the money spent on those actually pulling alert. Which, by the way, is a political decision, not really a military one. Congress and the President mandated the CONUS-based operation.

Without going into some of the current measures in use today, I still have yet to see how splashing a B767 over Georgetown is better than one hitting the intended target; the bad guys still achieve their aim (no pun intended). But it's a feel good capability. But point the finger at the politicians, not the units involved. If not for that mission, even more fighters would be gone from the inventory.

AGRs/extended MPAs/and the like are at the behest of the political leadership. Don't blame the guys who choose to fulfill those missions. Blame the ones who decided they are worthwhile.

brick - AGR (ret). DoD air defense liaison to FAA's Air Traffic Control System Command Center, 2002-2008.

Edited October 23, 2010 by brickhistory

[noodles]

complete with SAMs (Nike, Nike-Hercules/Nike-Ajax, even some US-based AAA)

Brick- I knew about the CONUS SAMs...but where did we have CONUS AAA?

[brickhistory]

CONUS AAA

In 1949 there was only one operational AA battalion. ARAACOM worked to prepare some 66 AA battalions to defend 23 priority locations. The units were to be armed with 90mm and 120mm AA weapons (later 75mm ìskysweeperî guns were also used) while the Nike missile program was being brought on line. Beginning in 1952, the first of the Nike defenses became operational. The Nike batteries represented the next phase in the evolution of American coastal defenses, defending America from attack through the air and was developed during the years 1945-1951. The batteries consisted of a launch area and a radar control area. Where feasible, existing Army and Air Force facilities were used. Thus, the old harbor defense reservations at San Francisco and Los Angeles were used for Nike missile launch sites and command posts. As these sites were prepared ARAACOM ìconvertedî units from gun AA units to missile Air Defense units. Nike defenses were located at the following areas on the continental Pacific Coast: Los Angeles, San Francisco, near Hamilton AFB, Seattle, the Hanford Nuclear Research facility and Fairchild AFB near Spokane. The first operational missile system was known as Nike-Ajax, which had a range of about 25 miles. In 1957 ARAACOM became the Army Air Defense Command (ARADCOM) as all of the Armyís air defense units were now missile battalions. During the years 1962-1968, Nike Ajax was replaced by the larger, more powerful and nuclear warhead capable Nike Hercules, which had a range of over 80 miles. As these were more powerful weapons, less launch sites were required for these missiles and only about 1 out of 4 of the existing Nike-Ajax sites were converted for use with the Nike-Hercules. Nike-Hercules defenses were also located at Anchorage, Alaska, Fairbanks, Alaska, and on Oahu Island, Hawaii, however these units were not under the command of ARADCOM.The Nike program was discontinued in the mid-1970s, superseded by further advances in weapons development. There was no further need for Army defense installations near the coast and almost all of those reservations were also declared surplus.

More CONUS AAA

There were many more assets to be defended than there were forces to defend them. Even after the initial listing of 60 areas to defend was scrubbed to 23, the Army of 1950 had only 15 usable AAA battalions on active duty. The Army would expand that number to 45 battalions by the end of 1951, due in large part to the addition of National Guard battalions federalized for the Korean War. Although these antiaircraft battalions were available, the vast majority were not deployed around the assets they were to defend. Some units had to travel hundreds of miles to the assets they were to protect. Not until land could be acquired, facilities built and troops deployed would these critical assets be protected from a surprise attack.

Several sites enjoyed this type of permanent protection in 1951, notably the Hanford Atomic Energy plant in Washington and the Sault Sainte Marie locks in Michigan. In 1952, dozens of 90mm and 120mm gun batteries, and several automatic weapons (AW) batteries, deployed in protection of Washington, Baltimore, Norfolk, Chicago, Detroit, New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Boston, Niagara Falls, San Francisco, Limestone Air Force Base in Maine, and Fairchild, Travis, Castle and March Air Force Bases in California. In the rush to deploy these units in 1952, soldiers moved into some areas with few or no facilities. Some units spent that winter in tents.

Gun units typically occupied sites with the only advance planning being a reconnaissance. Then a massive self-help effort was required to overcome the lack of essentials. For example, Battery D of the 18th AAA Battalion occupied a field only 10 miles from the center of Detroit. The field lacked drainage, so after a good rain, the vehicles of this 90mm gun battery sank to their axles. There was no road from the site to the highway. Soldiers slogged around in the mud. Field latrines were set in, along with many tents for sleeping, eating and unit administration. Showers were only available at the local YMCA or school gymnasiums. One hundred soldiers lived permanently in the field just outside Detroit, working in a quagmire. This was a typical site deployment in the early 1950s.

Edited October 23, 2010 by brickhistory

[JarheadBoom]

Does anyone know what the deal is with the Guard/Reserve man days? I read an article today about the tanker units in the northeast having to cancel their support of the tanker bridge over the Atlantic because they do not have man days.

That's not the only mission we're no longer performing.

[broncoflyer05]

Since they are talking about turning the air bridge money back on, any talks of letting the Guard/Reserve deploy with the active duty again?

[Bergman]

I hadn't heard this.

Source?

I have the email. It was the 155 ARW/CC who sent it out to many interested parties (WG and OG/CC types). He was apparently in on the discussion/working group at AMC HQ,

and the direction of "no more ANG/AFRC help to AD" comes from 18 AF/CC.

[JarheadBoom]

Since they are talking about turning the air bridge money back on, any talks of letting the Guard/Reserve deploy with the active duty again?

Not gonna happen here.

[lloyd christmas]

Bottom line is that UTAs are used for our drill weekends and FTPs are for currency and local flight training. If big daddy AF wants the Guard and Reserves help he is going to have to pay for it with man days. The AF apparently thinks they can do it all on their own for now. What sucks is my section alone basically laid off 6 or 7 bums. These guys had actually been working and not scamming the system. They are instructors who were training students in an active duty FTU squadron as well as our squadron.

[Guest dudemize]

As far as I can tell, the only units that still have long term MPA for everyone are the Guard/Reserve UAV units.

My old C-5 unit has been cut off for the most part. It will be a drastic change for the AD if they have to start manning all the trips.

I hope the MPA comes back at least on a limited basis so guys can rotate on and off 45 day orders to keep the full time health coverage.

I'm curious to see how this works out.

[thecloser2144]

New to the discussion, but saw the part on back-filling active duty at the AOR....not gonna happen. Just talked with the "bureau" and apparently too many man days being spent on guard bums for doing active duty work....so, they want the active duty to start flying their lines in the desert, MPA days need to be saved for other things, (the important things like manning the all too important fuel conservation office). We will have to see how long that will last.

My 2 cents...it will last about 6 months, then the guard will be able to back-fill active duty again once they (active duty) starts complaining about being on the road 300 days a year.

Also, expect the long term MPA to get turned off around 1 April, too many man days being spent.