Reserve Forces: Actions Needed to Better Prepare the National	 
Guard for Future Overseas and Domestic Missions (10-NOV-04,	 
GAO-05-21).							 
                                                                 
The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the global war on  
terrorism have triggered the largest activation of National Guard
forces since World War II. As of June 2004, over one-half of the 
National Guard's 457,000 personnel had been activated for	 
overseas warfighting or domestic homeland security missions in	 
federal and state active duty roles. In addition to increased	 
usage, the Guard has also experienced long deployments and high  
demand for personnel with specific skills, such as military	 
police. The high pace of operations and the Guard's expanded role
since September 11 have raised concerns about whether the Guard  
is capable of successfully performing its multiple missions	 
within existing and expected resource levels, especially given	 
the challenges it faces in meeting future requirements. GAO was  
asked to assess the extent to which the Guard is: (1) adapting to
meet warfighting requirements in the post-September 11 security  
environment and (2) supporting immediate and emerging homeland	 
security needs. 						 
-------------------------Indexing Terms------------------------- 
REPORTNUM:   GAO-05-21						        
    ACCNO:   A13432						        
  TITLE:     Reserve Forces: Actions Needed to Better Prepare the     
National Guard for Future Overseas and Domestic Missions	 
     DATE:   11/10/2004 
  SUBJECT:   Agency missions					 
	     Combat readiness					 
	     Counterterrorism					 
	     Defense contingency planning			 
	     Emergency preparedness				 
	     National defense operations			 
	     National Guard					 
	     National preparedness				 
	     Performance measures				 
	     Strategic planning 				 
	     Terrorism						 
	     Warfare						 
	     Homeland security					 

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GAO-05-21

United States Government Accountability Office

GAO	Report to the Chairman, Committee on Government Reform, and Chairman,

Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations,
                            House of Representatives

November 2004

RESERVE FORCES

  Actions Needed to Better Prepare the National Guard for Future Overseas and
                               Domestic Missions

                                       a

GAO-05-21

[IMG]

November 2004

RESERVE FORCES

Actions Needed to Better Prepare the National Guard for Future Overseas and
Domestic Missions

  What GAO Found

The Army and the Air National Guard have begun adapting their forces to
meet new warfighting requirements since the September 11 attacks, but some
measures taken to meet short-term requirements have degraded the readiness
of nondeployed units, particularly in the Army National Guard. To deploy
ready units for overseas missions, the Army National Guard has had to
transfer equipment and personnel from nondeploying units. Between
September 11, 2001, and July 2004, the Army National Guard had performed
over 74,000 personnel transfers. Similarly, as of May 2004, the Army
National Guard had transferred over 35,000 equipment items to prepare
deploying units, leaving nondeployed Army National Guard units short
one-third of the critical equipment they need for war. The Army has
developed plans, such as the Army Campaign Plan, to restructure its forces
to better prepare them for future missions. However, it has not finalized
detailed plans identifying equipment needs and costs for restructuring
Guard units. Moreover, the Army is still structured and funded according
to a resourcing plan that does not provide Guard units all the personnel
and equipment they need to deploy in wartime, so the Army National Guard
will be challenged to continue to provide ready units for operations
expected in the next 3 to 5 years. The Air National Guard is also adapting
to meet new warfighting requirements, but it has not been as negatively
affected as the Army National Guard because it has not been required to
sustain the same high level of operations. In addition, the Air National
Guard generally maintains fully manned and equipped units.

While the Army and the Air National Guard have, thus far, also supported
the nation's homeland security needs, the Guard's preparedness to perform
homeland security missions that may be needed in the future is unknown
because requirements and readiness standards and measures have not been
defined. Without this information, policy makers are not in the best
position to manage the risks to the nation's homeland security by
targeting investments to the highest priority needs and ensuring that the
investments are having the desired effect. Since September 11, the Guard
has been performing several unanticipated homeland missions, such as
flying patrols over U.S. cities and guarding critical infrastructure.
However, states have concerns about the preparedness and availability of
Guard forces for domestic needs and natural disasters while overseas
deployments continue at a high pace. The Department of Defense (DOD) plans
to publish a comprehensive strategy for homeland security missions that
DOD will lead. However, DOD has not reached agreement with multiple
federal and state authorities on the Guard's role in such missions. Also,
the National Guard Bureau has proposed initiatives to strengthen the
Guard's homeland security capabilities. However, many of these initiatives
are at an early stage and will require coordination and approval from
other stakeholders, such as DOD and the states. In the absence of clear
homeland security requirements, the Guard's preparedness to perform
missions at home cannot be measured to determine whether it needs
additional assets or training.

United States Government Accountability Office

Contents

  Letter

Results in Brief
Background
National Guard Has Been Adapting to Meet Current Warfighting

Requirements, but Readiness Challenges Remain for Future Operations
National Guard Has Supported Homeland Security Needs, but Its

Readiness for Future Homeland Missions Is Not Measured Conclusions
Recommendations for Executive Action Agency Comments and Our Evaluation

                                       1

                                      3 6

10

20 28 30 31

Appendix I Scope and Methodology

Appendix II Comments from the Department of Defense

Appendix III GAO Contacts and Staff Acknowledgments

  Figures

Figure 1: Post-September 11 National Guard Federal Activity

under Title 10 8 Figure 2: Percent of Army National Guard Soldiers
Alerted, Mobilized, or Deployed for Federal Missions as of June 2, 2004 22
Figure 3: Percent of Air National Guard Soldiers Mobilized or

Deployed for Federal Missions as of May 31, 2004 23

Abbreviations

DOD Department of Defense
SINCGARS Single Channel Ground Air Radio System

This is a work of the U.S. government and is not subject to copyright
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separately.

United States Government Accountability Office Washington, DC 20548

November 10, 2004

The Honorable Tom Davis

Chairman

The Honorable Christopher Shays

Chairman

Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International
Relations House of Representatives

The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and subsequent launch of the
global war on terrorism have resulted in the largest activation of
National Guard forces-both Army and Air-since World War II. Within 1 month
of the September 11 attacks, the number of Army National Guard members
activated for federal missions more than quadrupled, from about 5,500 to
about 23,000. By June 2004, over 50 percent of the National Guard's nearly
350,000 Army and 107,000 Air National Guard members had been activated for
overseas warfighting operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, peacekeeping
operations in Bosnia and Kosovo, or homeland missions, such as guarding
active Air Force bases. These operations have resulted in a high demand
for Guard members overall and especially for those trained with certain
skills, such as security personnel and tanker pilots. As a result,
National Guard personnel have experienced lengthy and repeated deployments
since the September 11 terrorist attacks.

The National Guard holds a unique dual status in that it performs federal
missions under the command of the President and state missions under the
command of the state's governor. After September 11, the Guard's duties
were expanded to include supporting new homeland missions,1 such as flying
combat air patrols over U.S. cities, securing borders, providing radar
coverage for the continental United States, and protecting civilian
airports, Air Force bases, and other critical infrastructure. Governors
also activated the Guard to perform additional missions, such

1 According to the National Strategy for Homeland Security (Office of
Homeland Security, Washington, D.C.: July 2002), homeland security is a
broad term that encompasses efforts to reduce America's vulnerability to
terrorism and prevent terrorist attacks as well as respond to an attack
that might occur. The Department of Defense refers to its contributions to
the overall homeland security effort as "homeland defense," and support to
civil authorities.

as guarding bridges and nuclear power plants. Guard involvement in state
missions almost tripled in the year after the attacks, and it has remained
well above pre-September 11 levels. The Guard spent about 236,000 days
performing state missions in fiscal year 2001, and that number increased
to
about 645,000 days in fiscal year 2002. State mission involvement
subsequently declined to almost 433,000 days in fiscal year 2003, more
than twice the level before September 11.2 This high pace of operations
has raised concerns about the National Guard's ability to perform
warfighting and homeland missions successfully within its existing
resources and the challenges it faces in meeting these requirements in the
future.

The objectives of this report are to assess the extent to which the
National Guard is (1) adapting to meet current and future overseas
warfighting requirements in the post-September 11 security
environment and (2) supporting immediate and emerging homeland
security needs.3 We testified before the Committee on Government Reform
on April 29, 2004, and provided observations on high Guard usage and the
challenges the Guard faces in adapting to the demands of the new security
environment.4 This report updates information contained in our testimony
and concludes our work in response to your request.

To assess the objectives, we analyzed data on National Guard utilization
and readiness prior to and after September 11, 2001. We interviewed
officials in the Departments of Defense (DOD), Army, and Air Force and
the National Guard Bureau and supplemented this information with visits
to Army and Air Force commands and Army mobilization stations. We
also developed case studies of recent federal and state National Guard
operations in four states-Georgia, New Jersey, Oregon, and Texas. We
selected these states because they represent a mix of geographic areas,
Army and Air National Guard units with different specialties, and units
that had been or were expected to be activated for federal and/or state

2 A National Guard official who maintains data on the extent of support to
civil authorities explained to us that because some state data may not be
reported, this figure might underestimate the days spent supporting state
missions.

3 We are conducting a separate effort examining the roles and readiness of
the Army Reserve.

4 GAO, Reserve Forces: Observations on Recent National Guard Use in
Overseas and Homeland Missions and Future Challenges, GAO-04-670T
(Washington, D.C.: Apr. 29, 2004).

  Results in Brief

missions. In each of these states, we visited the Adjutant General and
National Guard headquarters, as well as Army and Air National Guard units
that had been or will be involved in overseas or domestic missions. We
also reviewed documents on planned changes to the Army Guard's force
structure, such as the Army Campaign Plan and the Army Transformation
Roadmap. We conducted our review in accordance with generally accepted
government auditing standards between April 2003 and September 2004 and
determined that the data used were sufficiently reliable for our
objectives. The scope and methodology used in our review are described in
further detail in appendix I.

The Army and the Air National Guard have been adapting their forces to
meet new warfighting requirements since the September 11 terrorist
attacks, but some measures taken to meet immediate needs have made
providing forces for future operations more challenging for the Army
National Guard. Unlike the Air National Guard, the Army National Guard is
still organized according to a post-cold war military planning strategy
that provides it only a portion of the resources needed to perform
warfighting missions, with the assumption that its units will have
sufficient time to obtain the additional personnel and equipment before
deploying. However, recent operations have required that Army National
Guard units be fully manned and equipped to deploy, sometimes within short
time frames. To meet warfighting needs, DOD has retrained some Army
National Guard soldiers and units to perform key functions and changed the
missions of some units, issuing them new equipment for their new
activities.5 For example, to respond to a continuing demand for military
police, the Army has changed some field artillery units to security forces
and retrained over 7,000 soldiers to perform new duties. In addition,
because the Army National Guard units do not have all of the resources
they need for warfighting missions, the Army National Guard has had to
transfer personnel and equipment from nondeploying units to prepare
deploying units. As of July 2004, the Army National Guard had performed
over 74,000 personnel transfers, shifting soldiers from one unit to
another, to meet warfighting needs. Similarly, as of May 2004, it had
transferred over 35,000 pieces of equipment to deploying units. While the
Army National Guard has provided ready units thus far, the cumulative
effect of these personnel and equipment transfers is that the readiness of
nondeployed

5 We previously reported that forces' skills are not well matched with the
needs of domestic military missions. See GAO-04-670T.

forces has declined, challenging the Army to continue to provide ready
Guard forces for future missions. The Army has taken steps to begin to
restructure its active, Guard, and Reserve forces into more versatile
units to improve its ability to respond to the dynamic security
environment, but it is still in the process of developing plans for
restructuring Army National Guard forces. Under preliminary plans, Guard
restructuring would not be completed until 2010. In addition, current
plans do not address how the Guard's equipment will be modernized to make
it compatible with active Army equipment or provide detailed time frames
and costs for converting all Guard equipment. Until plans on how the Guard
will fit into overall Army reorganization plans are finalized and shared
with Congress, it is uncertain how they will transform the Guard for a new
operational role. Further, the Army has not reevaluated its resourcing
policy for the Army National Guard to mitigate the effects of increased
usage on its nondeployed forces, and current Army funding plans call for
continuing to maintain nondeployed Army National Guard forces with only a
portion of the personnel and equipment required for warfighting
operations. Like the Army National Guard, the Air National Guard has also
had to adjust to the demands of recent operations and has provided forces
to support current military operations by extending tours of duty.
Although its readiness has declined as a result of the high use of
personnel and equipment, the Air National Guard has not been as negatively
affected as the Army National Guard because it has not been required to
sustain the same high level of activations and is funded to maintain more
fully manned and equipped units.

While the Army and the Air National Guard have supported the nation's
homeland security needs by providing personnel and equipment for
unanticipated missions, the Guard's preparedness to perform the homeland
defense and civil support missions that may be needed in the future is
unknown because (1) its role in these missions is not defined and
requirements have not been established and (2) preparedness standards and
measures have not been developed. Since September 11, the Army National
Guard has provided security for borders, airports, and other key assets,
while the Air National Guard has taken on missions such as flying air
patrols over U.S. cities. The Army and the Air National Guard have
conducted these missions largely using existing forces and equipment that
were provided for warfighting missions. However, state officials have
expressed concern about the Guard's preparedness to undertake state
missions, including supporting homeland security missions, given the
increase in overseas deployments and the shortages of personnel and
equipment among the remaining Guard units. Moreover, some homeland
security missions could require training and equipment, such as

decontamination training and equipment, that differ from that provided to
support warfighting missions. Because DOD, specifically the U.S. Northern
Command and the Office of Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland
Defense,6 has not clearly defined what the Guard's role will be or
analyzed what personnel, training, and equipment may be required to
support homeland missions in conjunction with the Department of Homeland
Security, it is difficult to measure the Guard's preparedness for
potential missions. DOD and Congress have taken some actions to strengthen
the Guard's homeland capabilities, such as establishing Weapons of Mass
Destruction Civil Support Teams,7 to support civil authorities in
identifying whether chemical and biological events have occurred and the
type of agent used. Moreover, the National Guard Bureau is implementing
pilot programs to strengthen other capabilities to respond to weapons of
mass destruction events and improve critical infrastructure protection.
However, these pilot programs are in the early stages of implementation
and were developed by the Guard to respond to pressing needs. They are not
based on a comprehensive analysis of the full spectrum of the Guard's role
and requirements for homeland security missions. Without such a
comprehensive analysis, DOD and congressional policy makers may not be in
the best position to assess whether additional investments are needed, and
Guard personnel may lack the type of training and equipment that would
facilitate an effective and timely response to future homeland security
threats.

We are recommending that the Secretary of Defense develop and submit a
strategy to Congress for improving the Army National Guard's structure and
readiness and clearly define the Guard's role in homeland defense and
providing support to civilian authorities. DOD generally agreed with our
recommendations and cited several actions it is taking to develop a
strategy that addresses the Army National Guard's future roles and
requirements.

6 The U.S. Northern Command is responsible for executing homeland defense
activities and supporting civilian authorities when requested. The Office
of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense assists the
Secretary of Defense in providing policy and guidance to combatant
commanders regarding air, ground, and maritime defense of U.S. territories
and supporting civilian authorities.

7 The Guard's Weapons of Mass Destruction Civil Support Teams are each
comprised of 22 full-time personnel and maintained at the highest
preparedness levels so as to respond rapidly to support civil authorities
in an event involving a weapon of mass destruction. Their role is to
assist local officials in determining the nature of the attack, provide
medical and technical advice, and assist with requests for additional
support.

Background

The National Guard of the United States, which performs both federal and
state missions, represents about 52 percent of the armed services'
selected reserve8 and consists of approximately 457,000 members: about
350,000 in the Army National Guard and about 107,000 in the Air National
Guard. Overall, the Army National Guard makes up more than one-half of the
Army's ground combat forces and one-third of its support forces (e.g.,
military police or transportation units) and has units in more than 3,000
armories and bases in all 50 states and 4 U.S. territories. Air National
Guard personnel make up 20 percent of the total Air Force, with 88 flying
units and 579 mission support units at more than 170 installations
throughout the United States. The majority of Guard members are employed
on a part-time basis, typically training 1 weekend per month and 2 weeks
per year. The Guard also employs some full-time personnel who assist unit
commanders in administrative, training, and maintenance tasks. The
National Guard Bureau is the federal entity responsible for the
administration of the National Guard.

National Guard personnel may be ordered to perform duty under three
different authorities: Title 10 or Title 32 of the United State Code or
pursuant to state law in a state active duty status. Personnel in a Title
10 status are federally funded and under federal command and control.
Personnel may enter Title 10 status by being ordered to active duty in
their status as federal Reserves, either voluntarily or under appropriate
circumstances involuntarily (i.e., mobilization). Personnel in Title 32
status are federally funded but under state control. Title 32 is the
status in which National Guard personnel typically perform training for
their federal mission. Personnel performing state active duty are
state-funded and under state command and control. Under state law, the
governor may order National Guard soldiers to perform state active duty to
respond to emergencies, disasters, civil disturbances, and for other
reasons authorized by state law.

8 The reserve components of the U.S. Armed Forces are the Army National
Guard of the United States, the Army Reserve, the Naval Reserve, the
Marine Corps Reserve, the Air National Guard of the United States, the Air
Force Reserve, and the Coast Guard Reserve. The selected reserve consists
of military members assigned to organized reserve units and reservists who
participate in at least 48 scheduled drills or training periods each year
and serve on active duty for training of not less than 14 days during each
year.

    National Guard Federal Missions

The Guard is organized, trained, and equipped for its federal missions,
which take priority over state missions. As we reported in our April 2004
testimony, the National Guard's involvement in federal operations has
increased substantially since the September 11 terrorist attacks. Three
days after the attacks, the President, under Title 10, authorized
reservists to be activated for up to 2 years.9 This authority was
subsequently used to activate reservists for overseas warfighting and
stabilization missions in Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom in
Afghanistan as well as for domestic missions, such as flying patrols and
supporting federal civilian agencies in guarding the nation's borders. As
figure 1 illustrates, as of May 2004, about 102,800 Army and Air National
Guard members-the vast majority of whom were Army National Guard
members-were on active duty. Although both Army and Air National Guard
activations increased in the aftermath of September 11, the Air National
Guard activations had declined to pre-September 11 levels by October 2003,
while Army National Guard activations continued to rise.

9 10 U.S.C. S: 12302.

Figure 1: Post-September 11 National Guard Federal Activity under Title 10

Number of activateda guardsmen

100,000 96,657

90,000

80,000

70,000

60,000

50,000

40,000

30,000

20,000

10,000

0 Sept. Nov. Jan. Mar. May July Sept. Nov. Jan.b Mar. May July Sept. Nov.
Jan. Mar. May

                       2001 2002 2003 2004 Month and year

Army

Air Force

Source: GAO analysis of Army and Air National Guard data.

aArmy National Guard data represent the number of soldiers mobilized. Air
National Guard data represent the number of Air National Guard personnel
who are mobilized, including those who volunteered for duty.

bBecause Army National Guard data for January 2003 were not available,
chart data point was estimated based on trend.

When activated under Title 10, the National Guard is subject to the Posse
Comitatus Act,10 which prohibits the military from law enforcement
activities unless expressly authorized by the Constitution or law.

The Army and the Air Force have different strategies for structuring and
providing resources for their Guard components that reflect each service's
planned use and available resources. While the Army National Guard's
structure requires 375,000 personnel to be fully manned, in fiscal year
2004, the Army National Guard was authorized 350,000 soldiers resulting in
many units being manned below wartime requirements. Using DOD

10 18 U.S.C. S: 1385.

planning guidance, Army National Guard units are provided varying levels
of resources according to the priority assigned to their warfighting
missions. Because much of the Army National Guard was expected to be used
as a follow-on force in the event of an extended conflict, many of its
units were structured with fewer personnel and lesser amounts of equipment
than they would need to deploy, with the assumption that there would be
time to supply additional personnel, equipment, and training before these
units would be needed. For example, Army National Guard divisions, which
include over 117,000 soldiers and provide the majority of the combat
capability in the Army National Guard, are supplied with 65 to 74 percent
of their required personnel and 65 to 79 percent of their required
equipment, and are less ready for their missions. This approach to
managing limited resources is referred to as "tiered readiness." In
contrast, the Air National Guard was integrated into the Air Force's
operational force and maintained at readiness levels comparable to its
active component counterparts. This approach enables the Air National
Guard to be ready to deploy on short notice.

    National Guard State Missions

Since September 11, Guard members have also been activated for missions
under the authority of state governors in both Title 32 and state active
duty statuses. Title 32 status is generally used to train National Guard
units and personnel to perform their federal mission. National Guard
personnel also may perform operational (nontraining) missions in Title 32
status when authorized by federal statute. 11 According to DOD, after
September 11, the Guard performed other operational (nontraining) duties
such as providing airport security in Title 32 status in response to
presidential direction. National Guard personnel in Title 32 status have
also provided support for events such as the G-8 Summit and the Democratic
and Republican National Conventions. Also, National Guard personnel have
served in a state active duty status in response to natural disasters.

Additionally, the National Guard performs state missions under the command
and control of the governor, with costs for these missions borne by the
state. Guard missions typically performed in this status include providing
assistance in response to natural disasters such as fires and storms that
have not been declared federal disasters.

11 Examples include counterdrug support (32 U.S.C. S: 112) and Weapons of
Mass Destruction Civil Support Teams (10 U.S.C. S: 12310(c)).

  National Guard Has Been Adapting to Meet Current Warfighting Requirements, but
  Readiness Challenges Remain for Future Operations

Since September 11, governors have increasingly used this authority to
activate Guard members to protect key assets in the states.

Both at home and overseas, the Army and the Air National Guard have been
adapting in several ways to meet the demands of current warfighting
requirements, but some of the measures taken may challenge the Army
National Guard's efforts to provide ready forces for future operations.
While the Army National Guard has met new warfighting requirements by
retraining some units to acquire in-demand skills, tailoring others to
provide particular capabilities, changing unit missions in some cases, and
transferring personnel and equipment to meet combatant commander needs,
these adaptations have reduced the readiness12 of its nondeployed units,
in turn challenging the Army National Guard to prepare for future
operations. The Army recognizes the need to restructure its active,
Reserve, and Guard forces to respond more effectively to the new global
security environment and is in the process of developing plans to make its
forces more modular. However, its plans for restructuring Army National
Guard forces are not finalized and do not provide detailed information on
time frames for restructuring all the Guard's units, whether the Guard's
equipment will be compatible with that of active units, or the costs of
implementing these plans. The Air National Guard has also adapted to meet
new warfighting requirements, but its readiness has not been as negatively
affected because it has not experienced continued high usage as the Army
National Guard has and because its units are more fully equipped and
manned for war.

    Army National Guard Adaptation to Warfighting Requirements Reduced Readiness
    of Nondeployed Units

The Army National Guard has been adapting to the demands of current
warfighting requirements but faces future challenges in providing ready
forces for future operations. The recent increased and expanded use of the
National Guard illustrates the shift from the post-cold war military
planning strategy, in which much of the Guard represented a force to
follow the active military in the event of extended conflict, to an
operational force similar to the Air National Guard. Using this strategy,
the Army has generally maintained most Army National Guard units at lower

12 Readiness is generally defined as a measure of DOD's ability to provide
the capabilities needed to execute the mission specified in the National
Military Strategy. At the unit level, readiness refers to the ability of
units, such as Army divisions and Air Force wings, to provide capabilities
required by the combatant commands. Details of DOD readiness data are
classified.

Army Has Retrained Some Guard Units and Made Other Adjustments

readiness levels under the assumption that additional personnel and
equipment would be provided prior to deployment. While the Army National
Guard's adaptations since September 11 were intended to make deploying
units more useful for current operations, these adaptations have caused
the overall readiness of nondeployed Guard units to decline, which may
hamper the Guard's ability to meet the requirements of future warfighting
operations overseas, particularly in Iraq.

To meet the high demand for Army National Guard personnel for recent
operations, the Army has alerted or mobilized over one-half of the Army
National Guard's personnel since September 11. In June 2004, Army National
Guard activations peaked with almost 81,000 Army National Guard
members-more than one-quarter of the Army National Guard's force-activated
for overseas military operations such as in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Personnel with certain skills have been in particularly high demand. For
example, as of June 2004, 95 percent of military police units had
deployed, with 23 percent having deployed more than once, and at least 50
percent of units with specialties such as transportation, aviation,
medical, and special operations had been activated.

To alleviate the stress on these forces, the Army has retrained personnel
in units with less needed skills, such as field artillery, to provide
skills in higher demand. For example, the Army recently changed the
mission of 27 artillery units and retrained over 7,000 personnel to meet
the need for additional military police and security forces. Some of these
soldiers have already deployed to Iraq to perform missions such as convoy
security.

The Army has also adapted Guard units to meet the specific requirements of
current overseas missions by tailoring units for particular purposes. In
some cases, the Army took personnel with key capabilities from existing
units and created new, smaller units whose personnel had skills
specifically tailored to provide the capabilities required by the
combatant commander. For example, the Army extracted 55 soldiers with
military police skills from an armored battalion of about 600 soldiers to
perform a security mission at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. More than 35,000 Army
National Guard soldiers-almost one-fifth of all soldiers utilized-deployed
in these newly created, tailored units to support recent military
operations. Over one-half of these tailored units (about 57 percent) were
small, containing 10 or fewer soldiers. In addition to extracting key
capabilities, tailored units have also been used to address personnel
shortages in deploying units.

Personnel Transfers into Deploying Units Have Degraded Personnel Readiness
for Future Operations

The Army has also changed the mission, organization, and tactics of some
deploying units, issuing them new or different equipment and adding
personnel to meet combatant commander requirements. For example, the 30th
Infantry (Mechanized), an enhanced separate brigade13 that deployed to
Iraq in the spring of 2004, was directed to deploy as a motorized brigade
combat team with humvees instead of with all of its assigned heavytracked
equipment such as Bradley fighting vehicles and tanks. To accomplish this
change, the unit required an infusion of personnel because "light" units
require more personnel than "heavy" units. In addition, the unit underwent
additional training on operating and maintaining the newly issued
equipment. This unit was operating in Iraq in its new, lighter
configuration at the time of this report.

To ready deploying units, the Army National Guard had to transfer
personnel from nondeploying units, but in doing so, it has degraded their
readiness. This, in turn, challenges the Guard's efforts to provide ready
forces for future operations. To be ready to deploy, units need to have a
sufficient number of soldiers who are qualified to deploy. According to
the tiered-readiness policy, many National Guard units do not have all the
qualified soldiers they need to be ready for their missions. However, in
recent operations, the Army's deployment goal for Guard combat units has
been to be fully manned and for unit personnel to be fully qualified for
their positions. To meet the requirements for units fully manned with
qualified personnel, the Guard transferred qualified soldiers from
nondeployed units. By July 2004, the National Guard had initiated over
74,000 personnel transfers to meet the combatant commander's needs.

There are a number of reasons that Army National Guard units may not have
all of the personnel they need to deploy for their warfighting missions.
First, the Army National Guard is not funded to fully man all its units to
deployment standards. Second, some soldiers assigned to a unit may not
have completed required training.14 As of May 2004, over

13 Enhanced separate brigades have between 3,000 and 5,000 soldiers and
are the Army National Guard's highest priority combat units. These 15
brigades receive specialized training and higher priority than other
National Guard units for personnel and resources during peacetime. Once
called to active duty, they are expected to be ready to deploy overseas
within 90 days.

14 GAO, Military Personnel: DOD Actions Needed to Improve the Efficiency
of Mobilizations for Reserve Forces, GAO-03-921 (Washington, D.C.: Aug.
21, 2003) and Military Personnel: DOD Needs To Address Long-Term Reserve
Force Availability and Related Mobilization and Demobilization Issues,
GAO-04-1031 (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 15, 2004).

71,000 Army National Guard soldiers were not fully trained for their
positions. Finally, soldiers may be unable to deploy overseas for personal
reasons, such as medical or dental problems, family issues, or legal
difficulties. As of June 2004, there were over 9,000 soldiers in the Army
National Guard who were identified as nondeployable. When two of the Army
National Guard's enhanced separate brigades, some of its most ready units,
were activated for rotation to Iraq in 2003, only 74 percent of their
required personnel were qualified for their assigned positions and
deployable, leaving a shortfall of over 2,100 soldiers that had to be
filled from other units.

To minimize transfers of qualified soldiers from other units, the Army
Guard ordered 700 untrained soldiers between April and June 2004 to report
for training so they could become fully qualified in their positions
before their units were activated for overseas operations. However, the
Guard has not been able to address all of its shortfalls in this manner.
For example, the Army National Guard is preparing a combat division
headquarters and a number of its support units for deployment to Iraq in
2005. When the 42nd Infantry Division was alerted,15 it lacked 783
qualified personnel-about 18 percent of the total personnel required-to
meet deployment requirements. As of June 2004, the National Guard was only
able to fill 415 of these positions through transfers of personnel from
other units, leaving 368 positions unfilled. Army National Guard officials
expect that the active Army will have to find personnel to address these
shortfalls. According to National Guard officials, additional soldiers
with medical, dental, legal, or family issues may be identified as
nondeployable after they are mobilized, so the number of personnel needed
may rise.

As overseas operations continue, it is becoming increasingly challenging
for the Army National Guard to ready units because the number of soldiers
who have not been deployed and are available for future deployments has
decreased and the practice of transferring qualified personnel to
deploying units has degraded readiness of nondeployed units. Our analysis
of the decline in Army National Guard readiness between September 2001 and
April 2004 showed that the most frequently cited reasons for the decline
in personnel readiness of nondeployed units were that personnel were
already deployed or not available for deployment. Of the almost 162,000
soldiers who are available for future deployments, almost 36,000

15 DOD has established in policy a goal to provide reservists a minimum of
30 days written notification, referred to as "alert," before they are
mobilized for active duty.

Equipment Transfers to Deploying Units Have Degraded Equipment Readiness
for Future Operations

are in nondeployable units that provide maintenance, medical, and legal
support to the Army National Guard. Approximately 9,000 additional
soldiers have medical or other conditions that prevent deployment, and
about 28,000 soldiers will need required training before they will be
available for deployment. This leaves approximately 89,000 soldiers who
are currently available to deploy for overseas operations. Because DOD
expects the high pace of operations to continue for the next 3 to 5 years
and estimates that operations will require 100,000 to 150,000 National
Guard and reserve personnel each year, the Army National Guard will likely
have to alert and mobilize personnel who have been previously deployed.

Because the combatant commander has required Army National Guard units to
have modern, capable, and compatible equipment for recent operations, the
Army National Guard adapted its units and transferred equipment to
deploying units from nondeploying units. However, this adaptation has made
equipping units for future operations more challenging. The Army equips
units according to when it expects them to be needed in combat; thus, the
"first to fight" units are given the priority for modern equipment. Based
on post-cold war plans, it was assumed that most Army National Guard units
would follow active units and that there would be sufficient time to
provide them with the equipment they need for their missions before they
deployed. However, when National Guard units were alerted for recent
operations, they generally did not have sufficient amounts of equipment or
equipment that was modern enough to be compatible with active units and to
meet combatant commander requirements.

For recent operations, the Army National Guard has had to fill the
shortages of equipment among deploying units by transferring equipment
from nondeploying units. National Guard data showed that in order to ready
units deploying to support operations in Iraq between September 2002 and
May 2004, the National Guard transferred over 18,000 night vision goggles,
1,700 chemical monitors, 900 wheeled vehicles, 700 radios, and 500 machine
guns, among other items, from nondeploying units. As a result, by June
2004, the Army National Guard had transferred more than 35,000 pieces of
equipment and had critical shortages16of about 480 different types of
items, including machine guns and heavy trucks. In total,

16 A critical shortage is defined as having five or less of an item in the
total Army National Guard inventory.

the Army National Guard's nondeployed force lacks 33 percent of its
essential items17 and, as of June 2004, its stocks had been depleted to
the point where it had to request that the Army provide about 13,000
pieces of equipment for its deploying units.

Equipment shortages were worsened when the combatant commander and the
National Guard Bureau barred Army National Guard units from deploying with
items that were incompatible with active Army equipment or that could not
be supported with spare parts in the area of operations. For example, Army
National Guard units equipped with 20 to 30-year-old radios were barred
from taking them to the Iraqi area of operations because they cannot
communicate with the Single Channel Ground Air Radio System (SINCGARS)
used by other Army units. Likewise, some of the older rifles the Guard
uses for training have been barred because they use different ammunition
than those of the active Army units. Moreover, Guard units alerted for the
earlier deployments were not equipped with the most modern body armor and
night vision goggles that the combatant commander subsequently required
for deploying units. After units were identified for mobilization and
deployment, the Army took some steps to augment existing Guard equipment
using supplemental wartime funding.

Our analysis of DOD data showed that the equipment readiness of
nondeployed units has continued to decline and, as overseas operations
continue, it has become increasingly challenging for the National Guard to
ready deploying units to meet warfighting requirements. As reported by the
National Guard,18 87 percent of the 1,527 reporting units in fiscal year
2001 met their peacetime equipment readiness goals, which are often lower
than wartime requirements. By fiscal year 2002, only 71 percent of the
nondeployed reporting units met their peacetime equipment goals. The
report attributed this decrease in readiness posture to equipment
shortages and transfers among nondeployed units to fill shortages in other
units.

17 Essential items are defined as a unit's principal weapon/mission
systems and equipment that are critical to accomplishment of primary
mission tasks and critical mission support items.

18 Department of Defense, National Guard and Reserve Equipment Report for
Fiscal Year 2003 (Washington, D.C.: February 2002) and National Guard and
Reserve Equipment Report for Fiscal Year 2004 (Washington, D.C.: February
2003).

Initially, the Guard managed these transfers so that nondeploying units
shared the burden of providing resources to deploying units and could
remain at their planned readiness levels. However, this became
increasingly difficult as the number of activations mounted, and, in
November 2003, the Director of the Army National Guard issued a memorandum
to the states directing them to transfer equipment to deploying units
regardless of the impact on the readiness of remaining units.

    Plans to Restructure Army National Guard Are Not Fully Developed or Funded
    and May Not Address Future Readiness Challenges

The Army and the National Guard have recognized that the post-September 11
security environment requires changes to the Guard's structure and an
improvement in its readiness posture. However, in the near term, the Army
National Guard will have difficulty improving its readiness for projected
operations over the next 3 to 5 years under current plans, which assume
the Guard will be funded at peacetime readiness levels. Over the longer
term, DOD, the Army, and the National Guard have initiated, but not
completed, several restructuring efforts, including moving some positions
with high-demand skills out of the Guard and into the active force,
creating new standardized modular units that are flexible to respond to
combatant commander needs, and establishing predictable deployments for
units. To improve readiness, the Army National Guard seeks to increase the
amount of full-time support and qualified personnel in its units. However,
these measures will require additional funding. At this time, it is not
clear whether these planned actions will fully address the difficulties
the Army National Guard has experienced in supplying the numbers and types
of fully ready forces needed for the global war on terrorism.

The Guard may be challenged in the near term to deploy units and sustain
the high pace of operations required by the global war on terrorism with
its current resources. While the costs of activated Army National Guard
units in wartime are borne by the active Army with funds provided through
supplemental appropriations, for recent operations the Guard has had to
ready its forces for mobilization using its existing resources. The Army
National Guard received $175 million in supplemental funding in fiscal
year 2003, for personnel and operation and maintenance, but it did not
receive additional fiscal year 2004 funding to ready nondeployed units so
they can train and gain proficiency before they are mobilized. In fiscal
year 2004, $111 million was reprogrammed from Army National Guard
personnel to Army National Guard operation and maintenance appropriation
accounts to support requirements for units before they were mobilized.
These funds were available because mobilized Army National

Guard personnel are paid by the active Army military personnel
appropriation. The 2005 President's budget submission and long-term
funding plan are still based on the tiered-readiness approach. Because the
Army is in the process of developing a new budget and long-term funding
plan, it is not clear at this time whether future budget submissions will
include funding to support increased readiness levels.

For the long term, DOD and the Army are changing some units' missions to
increase the availability of certain high-demand Army National Guard
units, such as military police and transportation units. They have also
taken steps to rebalance skills among the active and reserve forces to
decrease the burden of repeated deployments on reserve personnel who have
skills that are in great demand. To make more efficient use of its forces,
DOD is also planning to move military personnel out of positions involving
duties that can be performed by civilians or contractors and into
high-demand specialties, as well as taking advantage of technological
advances to reduce personnel needs. However, these initiatives are in the
early stages of implementation and the extent to which they will alleviate
the strain on Army National Guard forces due to the continuing high pace
of operations is uncertain.

In April 2004, the Army published The Army Campaign Plan that sets out
some specific objectives and assigns responsibilities for actions to be
taken to plan and execute ongoing operations and transform forces for the
future. A key element of the Army's plan to transform its forces,
including National Guard units, is to restructure into "modular" units
that can be tailored to the specific needs of combatant commanders in
future operations. After restructuring, the Army National Guard expects to
have 34 smaller, lighter brigades instead of its current 38 brigades.19
Current plans call for converting Army National Guard units as they return
from overseas operations into brigades that share a common basic
organization with their active counterparts by 2010. Further, the Army has
a goal of restructuring its forces so that units will be authorized the
qualified personnel they require. However, the Army's current plans do not
completely address how the Guard's equipment will be modernized to make it
compatible with active Army equipment or include a detailed schedule and
funding needs for restructuring all Guard units, including support units.

19 This includes the Army National Guard's 15 enhanced separate brigades,
2 separate brigades, and 21 brigades in its 8 divisions.

In addition, one of the Army National Guard's initiatives to improve
readiness by increasing the amount of full-time support personnel within
its units is still based on its tiered-readiness model, which resources
some Guard units well below requirements. With this initiative, the Army
National Guard plans to increase the percentage of full-time personnel
gradually to about 71 percent of the personnel it needs by 2012. Full-time
Guard members enhance unit readiness by performing tasks such as
monitoring soldiers' readiness, recruiting and training personnel, and
maintaining aircraft, supplies, and equipment. However, for fiscal year
2003, the Army National Guard was only funded for 59 percent of the
full-time personnel it needs to be fully manned, as compared to the Air
National Guard, which is staffed at 100 percent of its required full-time
support personnel. Without sufficient full-time personnel, these tasks,
which are critical to unit readiness, suffer.

The Army National Guard also has plans to increase the number of qualified
personnel in each unit by spreading its soldiers over fewer, in some cases
smaller, units. According to Army National Guard officials, using this
strategy could increase the number of qualified personnel to an estimated
85 percent of unit requirements. However, Army deployment goals for combat
units are for 100 percent of deploying soldiers to be qualified in their
positions. Therefore, the Guard will likely still need to transfer
personnel when units are called to deploy.

To avoid overtaxing the force and improve deployment predictability, the
Army has developed a proposal to establish a rotational deployment cycle
for its Army National Guard units that would meet the Secretary of
Defense's goal of no more than one deployment every 6 years. In
conjunction with this proposal, preliminary Army plans propose equipping
Guard units that are 4 to 5 years away from an expected deployment well
below wartime readiness standards. However, this model may be difficult to
achieve while the high pace of operations continues.

    Air National Guard
    Efforts to Adapt to New
    Warfighting Requirements
    Facilitated by Its Structure
    and Funding at
    High-Readiness Levels

The Air National Guard, like the Army National Guard, has also adapted to
meet new warfighting requirements since September 11. It made several
adjustments to accommodate the higher pace of operations, including
extending tours of duty for some Guard personnel, calling up others
earlier than expected, and recently extending its rotational cycle to
lengthen the amount of time personnel are available for deployment.
However, the demands of ongoing operations have not been as detrimental to
the Air National Guard for two reasons. First, along with the Air Force
Reserve, the Air National Guard is funded to maintain readiness levels

similar to that of the active Air Force and is expected to be able to
deploy
within 72 hours. Second, the Air National Guard has not been required to
sustain the same high level of activations as the Army National Guard.
Air National Guard activations declined to pre-September 11 levels of
about 10,000 by October 2003, and have since declined to about 6,000,
while the Army National Guard's activations have continued to rise.
Between 2001 and 2003, the Air National Guard unit readiness declined as
a result of its high utilization of personnel and equipment, but Congress
provided additional funding to stabilize Air National Guard readiness.

To meet increased personnel requirements during the initial phases of
current operations, Air National Guard officials activated and deployed
personnel earlier than planned under their standard rotational deployment
cycle.20 In January 2003, Air Force officials said that over 320
personnel,
including some Air National Guard members, deployed about 45 days
earlier than usual. In addition, the Air Force also disrupted the normal
rotation cycle by extending tour lengths to meet increased requirements.
Air Force officials extended the duty tours of selected Air National Guard
personnel from the usual 90 days up to 179 days. For example, during the
preparation phase for Operation Iraqi Freedom the Air Force extended
the tours of almost 2,400 personnel, including some Air National Guard
personnel. To accommodate ongoing operational requirements, in
June 2004, the Air Force announced that most Air National Guard
personnel scheduled to deploy in future cycles would spend 120 days in
the deployment phase of their cycle. To accommodate the increased tour
lengths, the new rotational cycle will be 20 months in length, and Guard
personnel will train for 16 months and be eligible for deployment for
4 months.

Overall, Air National Guard unit readiness has declined since
September 2001 due to the increased demands for people and usage of
equipment. Our analysis of DOD data showed that commanders attributed
this decline in readiness primarily to personnel and equipment shortages,
damaged or inoperative equipment, and incomplete training. In addition,
Air National Guard officials in states we visited told us that meeting
current operational demands has resulted in fewer aircraft available to be
used for training at home and increased maintenance requirements on

20 The Air Force divides its forces into 10 groups, each containing a mix
of active, Guard, and reserve forces, and until June 2004, operated on a
15-month rotational cycle. The 15-month cycle included a 90-day period
when a unit was eligible for deployment.

  National Guard Has Supported Homeland Security Needs, but Its Readiness for
  Future Homeland Missions Is Not Measured

aircraft being used in current operations. However, Air National Guard
officials told us that equipment readiness rates have remained steady
during fiscal year 2004, and they attributed this stabilization to
supplemental funding of $20 million in fiscal 2003 and $214 million in
fiscal year 2004 for operation and maintenance activities.

While Army and Air National Guard forces have, thus far, supported the
nation's homeland security needs, the Guard's preparedness to perform
homeland defense and civil support missions that may be needed in the
future cannot be measured because its role in these missions is not
defined, requirements have not been identified, and standards have not
been developed against which to measure preparedness. Since September 11,
the Guard has performed a number of missions, including flying patrols
over U.S. cities and guarding critical infrastructure. However, state and
National Guard officials voiced concerns about preparedness and
availability of Guard forces as overseas deployments continue at a high
pace. Even though plans and requirements for the homeland missions the
Guard will support are not fully developed, DOD and the National Guard
Bureau have taken some actions to address potential needs.

    Guard Forces Have Supported Homeland Security Missions, but States Have
    Concerns about Readiness for Future Missions

Since September 11, Army and Air National Guard forces have supported a
range of homeland security missions, primarily with the equipment DOD has
provided for their federal missions. For example, Army National Guard
units helped guard the nation's borders and airports in the aftermath of
September 11, and they continue to guard key assets such as nuclear power
plants. Also, the Army National Guard is currently providing security at
U.S. military installations, including about 5,500 Army National Guard
soldiers guarding Air Force bases in the United States as of June 2004.
Similarly, Air National Guard units continue to fly patrol missions over
the United States.

We performed case studies in four states to examine how the Guard has
supported new homeland security missions. In all four states we visited
(New Jersey, Oregon, Georgia, and Texas), Guard officials reported that
their units supported homeland tasks for both state governors and federal
authorities. The following are examples of how the Army National Guard has
supported homeland missions since September 11:

o  	The New Jersey Army National Guard provided security for bridges,
tunnels, and nuclear power plants for the state governor during 2003 and
continues to provide security at two nuclear power plants.

o  	The Oregon Army National Guard provided security at federal
installations, such as the Umatilla Chemical Depot and Fort Lewis,
Washington, in 2002 and 2003.

o  	The Texas Army National Guard performed border security, assisting
U.S. Customs agents from October 2001 to November 2002, and provided
security at Air Force installations and state nuclear power plants from
October 2001 to October 2002.

o  	The Georgia Army National Guard provided airport security almost
immediately after September 11 and was still guarding Army bases and Air
Force facilities at the time of our visit in December 2003.

The Air National Guard has also been called on to perform new missions,
such as air patrols and providing radar coverage for the continental
United States. Air National Guard units in the states we visited played
key roles in homeland defense missions. For example:

o  	The 177th Fighter Wing in New Jersey, which is strategically located
near major cities such as New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, and
Washington, D.C., took on the additional mission of flying patrols over
these cities. Through early November 2003, the 177th had flown 1,458 air
patrol missions.

o  	The 147th Fighter Wing in Texas flew a total of 284 patrol missions
over New York City and Washington, D.C., between December 2001 and March
2002. Since September 11, the unit has also flown patrols over Houston,
the Gulf Coast, and in support of special events such as the Super Bowl
and the Winter Olympics.

Despite the Guard's response to homeland needs, officials in all of the
states we visited expressed concerns about their Guards' preparedness for
homeland security missions, especially given the high level of National
Guard deployments to operations outside of the United States. As figure 2
illustrates, at the beginning of June 2004, one-half of the 50 states and
4 territories had more than 40 percent of their Army National Guard forces
alerted, mobilized, or deployed for federal missions. Montana and Idaho
both had high numbers of soldiers alerted, mobilized, or deployed with 80
percent and 96 percent, respectively.21

21 Since the data in figure 2 were reported, forces in several other
states, including Hawaii, Nevada, and South Carolina, have been alerted or
mobilized. Deployed forces from other states have also returned home.

    Figure 2: Percent of Army National Guard Soldiers Alerted, Mobilized, or
                Deployed for Federal Missions as of June 2, 2004

               Source: GAO analysis of Army National Guard data.

Figure 3 illustrates the percentage of Air National Guard personnel who
volunteered or were mobilized or deployed as of the end of May 2004. In
contrast to the Army National Guard, only two states, New Hampshire and
Nevada, had more than 20 percent of their Air National Guard mobilized or
deployed, while 43 of the 54 states and territories had less than 10
percent of their Air National Guard activated.

Figure 3: Percent of Air National Guard Soldiers Mobilized or Deployed for
                      Federal Missions as of May 31, 2004

                Source: GAO analysis of Air National Guard data.

Some Guard officials also expressed concerns that their states' Guards had
not received additional federal funding to support homeland security
missions, even as homeland security missions are continuing and as the
homeland security advisory system threat level has risen. While the states
have funded some homeland security activities, such as guarding critical
infrastructure, and purchased some equipment, such as decontamination
equipment, officials said that homeland security requirements must compete
with other needs in limited state budgets. Furthermore, state officials
said that the Guard is not generally eligible for funding from the
Department of Homeland Security because its grants are limited to "first
responders," such as police or firefighters. Officials in all four states
we visited raised concerns about their Guards' readiness for homeland
security and other state missions. For example:

o  	New Jersey Guard units that responded to a terrorist threat alert in
December 2003 reported that they lacked some essential equipment, such as
humvees, night vision equipment, cold weather gear, chemical protective
suits, and nerve agent antidote. The state paid for some essential
equipment for its Guard forces during this time on an emergency basis. At
the time of our visit, New Jersey was preparing to deploy large numbers of
its state Guard personnel overseas and was determining how it would
respond to another terrorist threat with almost 60 percent of its forces
unavailable.

o  	Georgia officials told us that hosting the 2004 International Economic
Summit of Eight Industrialized Nations, known as the G-8 Summit, in June
2004, increased Georgia's security missions such as aerial reconnaissance
and surveillance, at a time when its Army National Guard aviation units
were deployed overseas. National Guard units from 12 other states
participated. The state also received federal funds for the G-8 Summit,
which reimbursed the state for costs of activating Guard personnel. In
addition, recognizing the Guard's unique role in homeland security, active
component forces were commanded by a National Guard general for this
operation-a new arrangement designed to provide unity of command for
homeland missions that defense officials stated might serve as a model for
the future.22

o  	In 2002, the state of Oregon called up more than 1,400 Army National
Guard soldiers to respond to one of the worst forest fire seasons in a

22 The 2004 National Defense Authorization Act authorized National Guard
officers in Title 32 status to retain that status if called to active duty
under Title 10. This arrangement requires agreement between the President
and the governor to be in effect and allows a National Guard officer to
command federal as well as National Guard troops in state status.

century. Oregon officials said that because many of the state's Guard
forces and equipment were deployed and the state had only limited
engineering capability left, it would not be able to provide the same
level of support to civilian authorities if similar circumstances were to
occur.

o  	All of the Texas Guard's aviation assets that would be needed to fight
fires and all of the state's military police were deployed at the time of
our visit. However, Texas officials said that the state had been able to
meet their homeland security needs, even at the height of its Guard's
overseas deployments, because its largest Army National Guard unit had not
been fully deployed and, as a large state, it had ample state emergency
response capability.

States are developing plans and examining resources currently available to
them to address homeland security needs. For example, each state is
developing a plan for protecting its infrastructure sites. Additionally,
most states have entered into mutual assistance agreements that may
provide them access to another state's National Guard forces in times of
need. These agreements, known as Emergency Management Assistance Compacts,
are typically used to facilitate access to additional forces for natural
disaster response. However, it is not clear whether these arrangements
will always meet the states' needs for forces or capabilities for homeland
security because, under Emergency Management Assistance Compacts, states
can withhold their forces if they are needed in their home state. This
situation occurred in one of our case study states. According to state
officials, New Jersey has faced an elevated terrorist threat due to
specific threats against the state as well as its proximity to New York
City. The officials said they requested access to another state's Weapons
of Mass Destruction Civil Support Team on three occasions prior to 2004.
On two occasions, the request was not granted because officials in the
team's home state determined that it was needed at home. When New Jersey
made a third request, in response to a specific and credible terrorist
threat, access was approved.

    DOD Lacks Plans and Requirements to Measure Preparedness for Homeland
    Missions but Is Taking Some Actions to Prepare

DOD's Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense
and the Northern Command are charged with leading DOD's efforts in
homeland defense, and while they have taken some actions, they have not
completed developing requirements or preparedness standards and measures
for the homeland missions in which the National Guard is expected to
participate. DOD plans to publish a comprehensive strategy for the
homeland defense.23 Until the strategy is finalized, the Northern Command
will not be able to complete its planning to identify the full range of
forces and resources needed for the homeland missions it may lead or civil
support missions in which active or reserve forces should be prepared to
assist federal or state civilian authorities. Without this information,
policy makers are not in the best position to manage risks to the nation's
homeland security by targeting investments to the highest priority needs
and ensuring that the investments are having the desired effect.

While the Guard has traditionally undertaken a wide variety of missions
for states, it is organized, trained, and equipped to perform a
warfighting mission. DOD measures the readiness of its forces for combat
missions by identifying the personnel and equipment required to
successfully undertake the mission and assessing the extent to which units
have the resources they need. Typically, Guard forces are expected to
perform civil support missions with either the resources supplied for
their warfighting missions or the equipment supplied by the state. Guard
officials said that units have supported state missions with capabilities
such as aviation, military police, medical, and others, as needs have
arisen.

However, in the post-September 11 environment, Guard forces may be
expected to perform missions that differ greatly from their warfighting or
traditional state missions and may require different equipment, training,
and specialized capabilities than they currently possess. Homeland
missions, such as providing large-scale critical infrastructure protection
or responding to weapons of mass destruction events in the United States,
could differ substantially from conditions expected on the battlefield or
from more traditional state missions, such as responding to natural
disasters or civil disturbances. For example, New Jersey units that
responded to a terrorist threat alert in December 2003 reported that they

23 We previously reported on the Northern Command's activities in a
classified report. GAO, Homeland Defense: Progress Made in Organizing to
Achieve Northern Command's Mission but Challenges Remain, GAO-04-622C
(Washington, D.C.: Sept. 8, 2004).

lacked some essential equipment such as humvees, night vision equipment,
cold weather gear, chemical protective suits, and nerve agent antidote. In
addition, state officials said that other items, such as pepper spray,
which are not routinely supplied to all types of units for their
warfighting mission, might be useful for potential homeland missions
involving crowd control. New Jersey subsequently paid for some essential
equipment for its forces during this time on an emergency basis. Until the
requirements for personnel and equipment are better defined, DOD cannot
measure how prepared Guard forces are for the missions they may be called
to undertake. To finalize its plans, the Northern Command will have to
coordinate with federal agencies, such as the Department of Homeland
Security, and state emergency management offices to ascertain their needs
for Guard support. Furthermore, it will have to balance the needs for
National Guard forces at home and overseas.

Since 1999, DOD has maintained full-time Guard forces in Weapons of Mass
Destruction Civil Support Teams that are dedicated to homeland security
missions. These teams are comprised of 22 full-time personnel and are
maintained at the highest readiness levels and can respond rapidly to
support civil authorities in an event involving a weapon of mass
destruction. Their role is to assist local officials in determining the
nature of the attack, provide medical and technical advice, and help to
identify follow-on federal and state assets that might be needed. Congress
has authorized at least one team for each state and territory. Currently,
32 teams are fully operational, with the remaining 23 estimated to be
operational by 2007. These teams are federally funded and trained but
perform their mission under the command and control of the state governor.

The National Guard Bureau has proposed some additional initiatives that
are in varied stages of implementation, which are intended to further
prepare states for meeting homeland security needs. For example, the
National Guard Bureau has:

o  	Set up a pilot program in April 2004 in 6 states (California,
Colorado, Georgia, Minnesota, New York, and West Virginia) to jointly
assess with state officials critical infrastructure protection policy,
tactics, procedures, and implementation.

o  	Established a regional task force to provide the capability for 12
states to respond to a weapon of mass destruction event. These Guard
forces are designed to locate and extract victims from a contaminated
environment, perform mass casualty/patient decontamination, and provide
medical triage and treatment in response to one of these events.

The 12 participating states are New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania,
West Virginia, Illinois, Missouri, Florida, Texas, Colorado, California,
Washington, and Hawaii.

o  	Proposed an initiative to distribute Guard personnel with key
capabilities, including aviation, military police, engineering,
transportation, medical, chemical, and ordnance, to each state and
territory. When stationing personnel with these capabilities in a state or
territory is not possible, the National Guard Bureau will try to maintain
all capabilities within the geographical region.

o  	Developed a proposal for rotational deployment of Guard forces that
would enable each state to retain 50 percent of its Guard in the state to
respond to homeland security missions and to support civil authorities,
while 25 percent of the state's forces deploy, and 25 percent prepare for
future deployments.

While these initiatives would provide enhanced capability for homeland
security in the National Guard, they will require coordination with the
Army and the Air Force as well as with the states, and they might face
implementation challenges. For example, the Chief of the National Guard
Bureau has developed a proposal to station a mix of forces with skills
useful for state missions within each state and presented the proposal to
state governors. However, the Army, the Air Force, Congress, and others
are also involved in making such decisions. Similarly, implementing the
National Guard's proposal to retain 50 percent of a state's Guard at home
for homeland security and civil support missions has not been implemented
and could be difficult to achieve during periods of high-military
operations. Officials from the U.S. Army Forces Command, the Army command
that selects Army Guard personnel for federal activation, said that while
they try to minimize the impact of federal mobilizations on the states,
this becomes more and more difficult as the level of federal activations
increases.

Conclusions 	The September 11 terrorist attacks and the global war on
terrorism have placed new demands for ready forces on the National
Guard-especially the Army National Guard-for overseas, homeland security,
and homeland defense operations. At the same time, it is apparent that the
Army National Guard's structure as a follow-on force to the active Army is
not consistent with its current use as an operational force. The current
demands for large numbers of fully manned and equipped forces to support
overseas operations have forced the Guard to transfer personnel and
equipment from nondeploying units to deploying units, degrading the
readiness of the nondeployed units. This continued decline in readiness of
nondeployed

units hinders the Army National Guard's ability to continue to provide the
ready forces in the short term that DOD estimates will be needed to meet
operational needs over the next 3 to 5 years. However, DOD's current
budget continues to fund the Guard at peacetime levels, and it is not
clear whether future budgets will include funding to improve readiness. In
the longer term, while DOD is reevaluating its strategy for the new
security environment, it is important for it to decide what the role of
the National Guard will be in the 21st century. This decision is important
because it will determine the missions for which the Guard will have to
prepare, the number and types of units it will need, and how much
personnel, equipment, and training it should be provided. Furthermore,
until DOD establishes the Guard's role in the post-September 11
environment and develops a strategy to prepare its forces to meet new
demands, it cannot be sure that it is best managing risks by investing its
resources to target the highest priority needs and Congress, in turn, will
not have detailed information on which to base funding and policy
decisions. Continuing to structure and fund the Guard under current policy
will result in continued personnel transfers and readiness declines for
its units that may hamper its ability to sustain much needed Guard
involvement in the global war on terrorism over the long term.

At the same time that the Guard's overseas missions have increased-
reducing the personnel and equipment available for state missions-
homeland security needs have also increased. However, DOD has not fully
defined what role the National Guard will have in the homeland missions
DOD will lead or support and how it will balance this role with its
increased participation in overseas operations. Absent a clearly defined
role for all its homeland missions, the Guard cannot identify requirements
for successfully executing this role and the standards and measures it
will use to assess preparedness for all its homeland missions. Until it
has these standards and measures, DOD does not have the means to determine
whether the Guard is prepared to meet homeland security needs with its
current structure and assets. As such, policy makers are not in the best
position to manage the risks to the nation's homeland security by
targeting investments to the highest priority needs and ensuring that they
are having the desired effect.

  Recommendations for Executive Action

We recommend that the Secretary of Defense direct the Secretary of the
Army to develop and submit to Congress a strategy that addresses the Army
National Guard's needs for the global war on terrorism, including the Army
National Guard's anticipated role, missions, and requirements for
personnel and equipment in both the near and long term. The near-term
portion of the strategy should address the current decline in readiness
for overseas missions and the Army National Guard's plans to provide the
ready forces needed for the global war on terrorism over the next 3 to 5
years. Specifically it should include

o  	an analysis of how support for current operations will affect the
readiness of nondeployed Army National Guard forces for future overseas
and domestic missions and

o  	a plan to manage the risk associated with the declining readiness of
nondeployed Army National Guard forces, including identifying funding for
any personnel and equipment required to mitigate unacceptable levels of
risk.

The long-term portion of the strategy should detail how the Army plans to
restructure and provide the Guard resources-personnel, equipment, and
training-consistent with its 21st century role, including

o  	how the Army National Guard will be restructured to support future
missions and ensure operational compatibility with active forces and

o  	the time frames for implementing restructuring actions, the resources
needed to achieve compatibility with active forces and the appropriate
level of readiness for their missions.

As DOD completes its homeland defense strategy and the Northern Command
refines its concept and operational plans for homeland defense and support
to civil authorities and defines requirements, we recommend that the
Secretary of Defense direct the Under Secretaries of Defense for Policy
and for Personnel and Readiness, in consultation with the Chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, Commander of the U.S. Northern Command, Commander
of the U.S. Pacific Command, the Chiefs of the Army and the Air Force, the
Chief of the National Guard Bureau, and appropriate officials in the
Department of Homeland Security, to take the following four actions:

o  	Establish the full range of the National Guard's homeland missions,
including those led by DOD and those conducted in support of civilian
authorities.

o  	Identify the National Guard's capabilities to perform these missions
and any shortfalls in personnel, equipment, and training needed to perform
these missions successfully.

o  	Develop a plan that addresses any shortfalls of personnel, equipment,
and training, assigns responsibility for actions, establishes time frames
for implementing the plan, and identifies required funding.

o  Establish readiness standards and measures for the Guard's homeland

  Agency Comments
  and Our Evaluation

security missions so that the readiness for these missions can be
systematically measured and accurately reported.

The Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs provided written
comments on a draft of this report. The department generally agreed with
our recommendations and cited actions it is taking to implement them.
DOD's comments are reprinted in their entirety in appendix II.

DOD partially agreed with our recommendation that DOD develop and submit
to Congress a strategy that addresses the Army National Guard's short-and
long-term needs for the global war on terrorism, including the Army
National Guard's role, missions, and requirements for personnel and
equipment, and its plans to manage the risk associated with the declining
readiness of nondeployed Army National Guard forces. In its comments, DOD
said that the Army has conducted the recommended analysis, developed a
plan as outlined in the Army Campaign Plan, and communicated its plan to
numerous members of Congress. We agree that the Army Campaign Plan is a
significant step in planning to address National Guard readiness problems
because it identifies goals and objectives and assigns responsibilities
for actions to plan for transforming its forces. However, we believe the
Army Campaign Plan does not fully meet the intent of our recommendation
because it lacks specificity about how the Army will address the readiness
of nondeployed Army National Guard forces in the near term, how all Guard
units will be converted to the modular design, or how the Guard's
equipment will be modernized to make it compatible with active Army
equipment. Furthermore, DOD has not identified the funding needed for
restructuring all Guard units, including support units. Therefore, we
believe the Army should develop more detailed plans to fully implement our
recommendation. In its comments, DOD said that the Army agrees that it
should continue its analysis to identify and minimize readiness impacts to
the current force.

DOD concurred with our recommendation to establish the full range of the
National Guard's homeland missions, to identify the capabilities needed to
perform those missions and develop a plan to address any shortfalls, and

to establish readiness standards and measures for the Guard's homeland
security missions. However, in its comments, DOD said it would take a
different approach to accomplishing the tasks than we recommended. Rather
than having the Assistant Secretary for Homeland Defense take the lead in
all four areas as we recommended, DOD said that the Under Secretary of
Defense for Policy and the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and
Readiness, working in close coordination, should take the lead in
implementing the actions we recommended. We believe the approach DOD
proposes meets the intent of our recommendation, and we have modified the
wording of our recommendation to reflect the proposed change in
organizational responsibilities.

As we agreed with your office, unless you publicly announce the contents
of this report earlier, we plan no further distribution of it until 7 days
from
the date of this letter. We will then send copies to the Secretary of
Defense; the Secretaries of the Army and the Air Force; the Chief,
National
Guard Bureau; and the Director, Office of Management and Budget. We
will also make copies available to others upon request. In addition, this
report will be available at no charge on the GAO Website at
http://www.gao.gov.

If you have any questions about this report, please contact me at
(202) 512-4402. Major contributors to this report are listed in appendix
III.

Janet A. St. Laurent
Director, Defense Capabilities and Management

                       Appendix I: Scope and Methodology

We interviewed officials in the Army National Guard, the Air National
Guard, the National Guard Bureau, and the Department of the Army and
Department of the Air Force headquarters. We supplemented this information
with visits to several Department of Defense (DOD) offices, including the
Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs; the
Office of the Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff; and Joint Force
Headquarters, Homeland Security. We also developed case studies of recent
federal and state National Guard operations in four states-Georgia, New
Jersey, Oregon, and Texas. The states were chosen to represent a mix of
geographic areas, Air and Army National Guard units with different
specialties, and units that had been or expected to be activated for state
or federal missions. In each state we visited the Adjutant General and
offices within the Joint National Guard headquarters. We also interviewed
leaders from a field artillery battalion, an armor battalion, two enhanced
brigades, an air control wing, an airlift wing, an air-refueling wing, and
three fighter wings.

To examine the National Guard's warfighting requirements in this
post-September 11, 2001 security environment, we obtained and analyzed
data on state and federal activations of the Army and the Air National
Guard before and after September 11, 2001. We supplemented this with
interviews, briefings, and documentation from officials from the four case
study states and from the National Guard Bureau, the U.S. Army Forces
Command, First Air Force, and the U.S. Air Force Air Combat Command and
Air and Space Expeditionary Force Center. To examine the ways in which the
National Guard has adapted for its new missions, we interviewed officials
in the four case study states and officials at Army mobilization stations
at Fort Hood, Texas, Fort Benning, Georgia, and Fort Dix, New Jersey, and
at the First and Fifth Continental United States Armies. To identify Guard
usage trends and stressed capabilities, we analyzed DOD's personnel tempo
database, Army National Guard and Air National Guard data on the types of
units mobilized, and information from the Army National Guard on the
transformation of field artillery and other support units into military
police and security force units. We obtained information on personnel and
equipment transfers from the National Guard Bureau and information on
equipment shortages from DOD publications and reports. We reviewed
equipment data, interviewed data sources, and obtained information on data
collection methods and internal control measures applied to the data. We
determined the equipment data were sufficiently reliable for our
objectives. We also reviewed documents on planned changes to the Army
Guard's force structure, such as the Army Campaign Plan and the Army
Transformation Roadmap. We also discussed

Appendix I: Scope and Methodology

personnel, training, and equipment issues with unit, state, Guard Bureau,
and mobilization station officials and force providers.

To assess the National Guard's emerging homeland security needs, in each
of the four case study states we interviewed Guard homeland security
officials and leaders from Army and Air National Guard units with recent
homeland security experience. We also met with officials from the National
Guard Bureau (Homeland Defense), the Department of the Army, three Weapons
of Mass Destruction Civil Support Teams, the Air Combat Command and Air
and Space Expeditionary Force Center, the Army Forces Command, the Office
of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs (Military
Assistance to Civilian Authorities) (now part of the Assistant Secretary
of Defense (Homeland Defense)), the Joint Director of Military Support,
and the Joint Task Force, Civil Support. We also obtained information from
the U.S. Joint Forces Command and reviewed unclassified, publicly
available documents from the U.S. Northern Command. In addition, we
reviewed the National Guard's role in rotation plans for future
operations. We identified the challenges facing DOD, the states, and
Congress in organizing and equipping the Guard for both overseas and
homeland security missions based upon our analysis of the Guard's current
status and discussions with National Guard officials.

We conducted our review between April 2003 and September 2004 in
accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards and
determined that the data were sufficiently reliable to answer our
objectives. For example, we interviewed data sources about how they
ensured their own data accuracy and reviewed their data collection
methods, standard operating procedures, and other internal control
measures. We reviewed available data for inconsistencies, and, when
applicable, performed computer testing to assess data validity and
reliability.

Appendix II: Comments from the Department of Defense

Appendix II: Comments from the Department of Defense

Note: Page numbers in the draft report may differ from those in this
report.

Appendix II: Comments from the Department of Defense

Appendix III: GAO Contacts and Staff Acknowledgments

  GAO Contacts Acknowledgments

(350546)

Janet St. Laurent (202) 512-4402 Margaret G. Morgan (202) 512-8975

In addition to the persons named above Suzanne Wren, Barbara Gannon, James
Lewis, Tina Morgan, Jacquelyn Randolph, V. Malvern Saavedra, Alissa Czyz,
Kenneth Patton, Jennifer Popovic, and Jay Smale also made major
contributions to this report.

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