The Army National Guard faces a $2 billion shortfall in its personnel and training accounts that, if uncorrected, would hurt deployment preparations and put the breaks on its wildly successfully recruiting.
The Pentagon's fiscal 2008 budget request falls $1.2 billion short of what the Army Guard needs for premobilization training, a deficit that will hinder units readying missions in Iraq and Afghanistan next year, officials said last month.
It also shorts recruiting and retention by $822 million, which could force the Army Guard to lay off recruiters and stop awarding enlistment and re-enlistment bonuses by January.
This would be a "significant setback" to the Army Guard after a reinvigorated recruiting and retention campaign has led to historic growth of the force, said Col. Mike Jones, the Army Guard's director of recruiting and retention.
With added recruiters and larger bonuses, the Army Guard increased its force from 333,000 to 352,000 soldiers in just two years. But litde of the growth can be attributed to Pentagon budgetary assistance, Jones said.
"Literally, every year we have had to beg off of the supplemental to make up for the shortfalls," he said.
The Guard last month was hoping to receive $850 million to make up for shortfalls in its fiscal 2007 accounts.
But Lt. Gen. Clyde Vaughn, Army Guard director, warned a congressional hearing that he could no longer cover recruiting and retention dollars in anticipation of a sizeable reprogramming late in fiscal 2008.
"We've got to straighten this out, because next year we will quit recruiting about February," Vaughn said.
© 2007 National Guard Association of the United States Provided by ProQuest LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Source: National Guard
