ClearedHot Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 Completely, 100%, unsubstantiated rumor, but still interesting... Dudes, I felt compelled to pass on some distressing news that I recently received from a friend of mine in the XXX ANG. He is a viper pilot that took an AGR spot at XXX as the MX squadron commander, but still gets to fly. I merely emailed him to XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX and asked him how the guard was going. I got back some troubling news. Here are a few quotes from his email: "I literally just got the brief that the Sec of the Air Force and Penetta both want to get rid of the Air Guard all together. Best case is all the aircraft will be sent to Active Duty and all the fighters sent to the boneyard! Right now they are talking 100% cut of the Air National Guard!!! Please get the word out" "I am really bummed out right now knowing that I will see the end of fighters. BTW the Sec. also said that if he had his way, he would cut EVERY fighter!!!! He does not see a need for us!" In order to try and separate emotion from reality I asked if he had received an official brief, or if there was a quote posted somewhere of the SECAF remarks and this was his response: "It was straight from his mouth in a room of maintainers. It is amazing what is said about "us" (pilots) when we are not around. I where ABUs when I am not flying and I hear things when they forget about my wings on my chest. Sorry no cell phones allowed. Don't worry, all the intel I get I will send out to ALL THE BROS ASAP! Option 1 is to get rid of the Guard. Option 2 is combine Guard and Reserve and transfer all fighter (minus block 30, which will be in the boneyard) to the AD. Plan on all new commands and structuring (just like 1992 and the restructure of MAC, SAC, TAC). All to begin in 2013!"
herkbier Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 Chicken little much? If anything, wouldn't it make more sense to decrease the size of the AD force and increase the ANG force (my assumption is that AD is more costly than AGR?)
Vertigo Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 Wouldn't they have to get the permission of each states governor first?
ForgotPassword Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 Wouldn't they have to get the permission of each states governor first? I think they could just pull the federal dollars and all the cards would come down.
Napoleon_Tanerite Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 That doesn't pass a reality check for a couple reasons. 1. You can't just "transfer" iron out of the guard to active duty. It's a bit of a one way street there. Those airplanes were released by the federal government and are off their books. They are officially property of their respective states. They can be federalized during a mobilization, and fall under federal CONTROL; however, the iron remains property of the state. Are there ways around it? Sure, but see point 2. 2. In many/most cases the active force doesn't WANT that iron back. A big reason that the guard has a mission in the first place is money. Since the assets are guard, the state foots the bill for upkeep and non-federalized operation. I seriously doubt that there's room in the DoD budget to absorb even a PORTION of the cost that the Guard pays for with regard to upkeep and maintaining their assets. 3. The guard is one big jobs program. Elected reps tend to be VERY protective of their guard jobs in their states too. If you delete a guard unit, you have just deleted hundreds, if not thousands of jobs in that state. That tends to make elected reps uneasy, and is something they will fight on capitol hill. It's not something the SECDEF or even POTUS can simply mandate. I think you titled the thread properly. The sky isn't falling here. If anything I wouldn't be surprised to see a bigger push to move assets to the guard to get them off the DoD's books, but the states might not want them on the basis that they can't afford them either. Who knows, but rest assured the Guard isn't going anywhere.... at least I don't think so.
SocialD Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 All to begin in 2013!" Crap, you had me worried for a few seconds. But then I realized it's not a big deal, since the world is ending in 2012 anyway... 1
CJ-6A Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 If I had to throw an uneducated guess in the pot, it'd be that most fighter units will probably move to UAV/Recce and surviving fighter units will just be AD associate units for the homeland missions. State politics will probably keep a compromise going somehow.
Guest Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 Wouldn't they have to get the permission of each states governor first? [broken record] Fuck no. Big Blue owns the iron. [/broken record]
Guest Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 You can't just "transfer" iron out of the guard to active duty...the iron remains property of the state. Wrong. Since the assets are guard, the state foots the bill Wrong. The guard is one big jobs program. Elected reps tend to be VERY protective of their guard jobs in their states too. If you delete a guard unit, you have just deleted hundreds, if not thousands of jobs in that state. That tends to make elected reps uneasy, and is something they will fight on capitol hill. It's not something the SECDEF or even POTUS can simply mandate. Right except for the last sentence, which is totally fucking insanely ignorantly wrong. Who knows, but rest assured the Guard isn't going anywhere.... at least I don't think so. That is a dangerous statement. ANG history is littered with the blackened bones of many a Guard unit and Guardsman who have uttered that same sentiment with complete confidence. That said, I certainly hope the Guard will remain because it serves an excellent purpose. However, the iron in it's current form will absolutely change just like it always has...often for reasons that are far more political than logical or strategic.
LoneStar Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 Correct me if I am wrong - but wasn't the purpose of all the guard units to be the militia which are what would protect the state from a federal government that had to much control, or at least that was the basic principle? It was the check in the check and balance system. The ANG is an extension of that arm that started with the original militia units that had failed during the Spanish American War and strengthened through the, yes this is legit, the Dick Act.
Buddy Spike Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 Completely, 100%, unsubstantiated rumor, but still interesting... Dudes, I felt compelled to pass on some distressing news that I recently received from a friend of mine in the XXX ANG. He is a viper pilot that took an AGR spot at XXX as the MX squadron commander, but still gets to fly. I merely emailed him to XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX and asked him how the guard was going. I got back some troubling news. Here are a few quotes from his email: "I literally just got the brief that the Sec of the Air Force and Penetta both want to get rid of the Air Guard all together. Best case is all the aircraft will be sent to Active Duty and all the fighters sent to the boneyard! Right now they are talking 100% cut of the Air National Guard!!! Please get the word out" "I am really bummed out right now knowing that I will see the end of fighters. BTW the Sec. also said that if he had his way, he would cut EVERY fighter!!!! He does not see a need for us!" In order to try and separate emotion from reality I asked if he had received an official brief, or if there was a quote posted somewhere of the SECAF remarks and this was his response: "It was straight from his mouth in a room of maintainers. It is amazing what is said about "us" (pilots) when we are not around. I where ABUs when I am not flying and I hear things when they forget about my wings on my chest. Sorry no cell phones allowed. Don't worry, all the intel I get I will send out to ALL THE BROS ASAP! Option 1 is to get rid of the Guard. Option 2 is combine Guard and Reserve and transfer all fighter (minus block 30, which will be in the boneyard) to the AD. Plan on all new commands and structuring (just like 1992 and the restructure of MAC, SAC, TAC). All to begin in 2013!" 1
jcollins Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 I don't understand. What is the different between a pilot and a maintainer in this context? If they pull the aircraft, both loose their jobs. I call BS. Rainman is correct, the USAF owns the iron. But we (the Guard) have a lot of political pull, something I would not discount. Plus the fact that we are substantially cheaper than AD.
SocialD Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 I should caveat my last post with the following... If you're a Guard guy and not keeping your resume up-to-date/pinging your contacts from time to time, you're probably fu#king up!
JarheadBoom Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 (edited) 1. You can't just "transfer" iron out of the guard to active duty. It's a bit of a one way street there. Those airplanes were released by the federal government and are off their books. They are officially property of their respective states. They can be federalized during a mobilization, and fall under federal CONTROL; however, the iron remains property of the state. Uhhh... no. Ask former PA governor "Fast Eddie" Rendell about exactly who owns the iron assigned to the ANG - he learned that lesson the hard way. edit: Gotta finish reading the whole thread before I hit Reply.... Edited August 6, 2011 by JarheadBoom
ForgotPassword Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 32 U.S.C. 7 § 710 (a) All military property issued by the United States to the National Guard remains the property of the United States.
Guest Hueypilot812 Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 The Guard has a huge mafia on the Hill. As much as DoD or any other Federal entity might want to scrap the Guard, it'll have to get through Congress. Good luck with that. On another note, it makes no sense to scrap the ANG. The ARC can be useful for many missions that the AD could probably transfer over, like the C-130 FTU, for example. I've mentioned this lately and I've had bros say that "the FTU is our place to get a break" but honestly, with all the freakin' AEF deployment band stuff, AETC has become just as bad for deployments as AMC these days. It makes sense to have AFRC or the ANG take over the training mission.
Prosuper Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 The Guard has a huge mafia on the Hill. As much as DoD or any other Federal entity might want to scrap the Guard, it'll have to get through Congress. Good luck with that. On another note, it makes no sense to scrap the ANG. The ARC can be useful for many missions that the AD could probably transfer over, like the C-130 FTU, for example. I've mentioned this lately and I've had bros say that "the FTU is our place to get a break" but honestly, with all the freakin' AEF deployment band stuff, AETC has become just as bad for deployments as AMC these days. It makes sense to have AFRC or the ANG take over the training mission. AZANG at Tuscon has the F-16 school house, F-15's Schoolhouse at Klamath Falls ORANG, and the C-5's at Kelly/Lackland AFRC. AETC is all civilian mx, the Altus 97th AMW kissed ass in the last rodeo. Won't be surprised when the rest of the MDS's will be under ANG/AFRC school houses with civilian mx .
HuggyU2 Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 I know the square root of crap about the Guard/Reserve. And I've got a lot of friends that got there, even though I didn't... I tried though. That said, my dealings with guys that work 2 "pay periods", have their commercial travel paid for,... and that brag to me about making bank and owning 2 houses (C-17 guys) because they are able to work the system WRT rules and AFI's that I don't need to know (since I'm not a G/R guy),... well, I'm not sure the taxpayers are getting all they should. And yes, I know we are keeping some very experienced and quality people in. Got it. But the impression,... right or wrong,... is reality. 2 1
Danny Noonin Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 Totally fukking wrong... in most cases. There are obviously dudes who work the system but it's still cheaper in the end especially when you take into account the cost of benefits
Guest Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 And yes, I know we are keeping some very experienced and quality people in. Got it. But the impression,... right or wrong,... is reality. Guard Babies take note. This is Huggy, not me, saying this. This is a very commonly held opinion in the AD, especially at the leadership levels. There are obviously dudes who work the system but it's still cheaper in the end especially when you take into account the cost of benefits This is a common argument but very few people who say it have actually seen the numbers. There are some things that the ARC does that is cheaper than AD. However, if you use activity based costing models the ARC is actually no less expensive and is often much more expensive than their AD counterpart. The costs for an ARC unit to deploy is often more expensive but ignored because the unit is willing (and able) to absorb the expense. The largest benefit of the ARC is not cost savings but retention of talents and trained people who leave AD and often continue their service far beyond what they would've done had they stayed on AD. And I'm not talking about pilots, but they're included. Just sayin'... ...the Altus 97th AMW kissed ass in the last rodeo. Wait, what?
Prosuper Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 Wait, what? Dammit, kicked ass, stupid typing fingers, stupid brain
Ram Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 AZANG at Tuscon has the F-16 school house, F-15's Schoolhouse at Klamath Falls ORANG, and the C-5's at Kelly/Lackland AFRC. AETC is all civilian mx, the Altus 97th AMW kissed ass in the last rodeo. Won't be surprised when the rest of the MDS's will be under ANG/AFRC school houses with civilian mx . The AZANG in Tuscon doesn't teach USAF F-16 pilots. Foreigners only.
SocialD Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 (edited) The AZANG in Tuscon doesn't teach USAF F-16 pilots. Yes they do. Edited August 6, 2011 by SocialD
Guest Crew Report Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 Dammit, kicked ass, stupid typing fingers, stupid brain Altus Maintainers are awesome and deserved every award they won.
matmacwc Posted August 6, 2011 Posted August 6, 2011 Congressionally mandated end strength. Over it now, they can't add more.
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