Leahy’s National
Guard Empowerment Reforms Clear Congress,
Giving Guard A
Voice In Key Decisions
On Equipment,
Missions And Manpower
Leahy Also Wins
Repeal Of Year-Old Law That Made It Easier
For President To
Take Over Guard And Declare Martial Law
WASHINGTON (Friday, Dec. 14) – The
U.S. Senate Friday passed and sent to the President’s desk a
defense policy bill that includes key victories for the National
Guard, including giving the Guard more bureaucratic muscle at
the Pentagon in decision making about the Guard’s missions,
equipment and staffing. The President is expected to sign the
bill, which also cleared the House earlier in the week.
The bill also will
repeal the so-called “Insurrection Act Rider,” attached to last
year’s defense policy bill, which has made it easier for
Presidents to take control of the National Guard from governors
and to use the U.S. military for domestic law enforcement.
Earlier this year, key national military and law enforcement
officials testified against last year’s changes in a Senate
Judiciary Committee hearing organized by Leahy. Both the “Guard
Empowerment” provisions and the legislation to repeal the
changes to the Insurrection Act are drawn from two bills
introduced by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Sen. Kit Bond
(R-Mo.), the co-chairs of the Senate National Guard Caucus.
The defense policy
bill includes a variety of organizational reforms from the
Leahy-Bond bill, including elevating the Chief of the National
Guard from the rank of Lt. General to the rank of General;
making the Chief the prime military advisory to the Defense
Secretary and to the Joint Chiefs; raising the status of the
National Guard Bureau; forging a stronger relationship between
the Guard and the Northern Command; and directing the Pentagon
to work with the Guard in planning on homeland defense.
“The National Guard
is a 21st Century military
organization, coping with a 19th Century Pentagon
organization chart,” said Leahy. “These reforms will clear away
organizational cobwebs to give the Guard a bigger say about the
Guard’s future. Right now the Guard has to beg and
scrape and rely
on the tender mercies of others for every piece of equipment
they need to do the jobs they are asked to do. These reforms
will begin changing that.”
# # # # #
Statement Of U.S. Senator
Patrick Leahy
Fiscal Year 2008 Defense
Authorization Bill Conference Report
National Guard
Empowerment
December 14, 2007
Mr. President, the Conference
Report on the Fiscal Year 2008 Department of Defense
Authorization Bill now before the Senate includes some
significant mileposts of progress for the National Guard. Those
sections of the bill come directly from the National Guard
Empowerment Act of 2007, a bill that I sponsored along with
Senator Kit Bond of Missouri, my fellow co-chair of the U.S
Senate National Guard Caucus. Well over half of the Senate -- a
significant portion of the National Guard Caucus -- cosponsored
the Empowerment Bill. Working with the Nation’s Governors, key
National Guard-affiliated organizations, and the Adjutants
General of the United States, we make notable headway in this
bill on several issues that go to the core of the Guard’s
missions, preparedness and our national defense.
This legislation clears away
organizational cobwebs in the Department of Defense and changes
the Pentagon’s structure to better reflect the vital role and
responsibilities of the Guard. More importantly, we direct the
Department of Defense to begin the urgently needed process of
tapping into the National Guard’s extensive experience in
homeland defense issues – expertise the Defense Department has
previously ignored.
To give the Guard more
bureaucratic muscle, especially in decisions affecting the
Guard, the legislation elevates the Chief of the National Guard
from the rank of Lieutenant General to the rank of General,
making the Chief the prime military advisor to the Secretary of
Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The
National Guard Bureau becomes what is called a Joint Activity,
still closely affiliated with the Department of the Army and the
Air Force, but now more like other joint agencies like Combatant
Commands and the Defense Intelligence Agency, capable of
communication across the Department.
To focus the Defense Department
more on homeland defense, the bill requires that the Deputy
Commander of the U.S. Northern Command come from the ranks of
the National Guard, and it requires the Department of Defense to
develop a plan in conjunction with the Guard to deal with
homeland defense situations.
These reforms are tangible
progress for the Guard, and there is a pressing need for them.
The National Guard is a keystone to our nation’s defense, ready
to carry out missions at home and abroad. The Guard is ready to
serve as the primary reserve to both the Army and the Air Force,
while taking the lead in providing military support during
emergencies situations at home. It would take a long time even
only to list the missions accomplished by the National Guard
since September 11th in carrying out their
assignments in Iraq and Afghanistan or to respond to natural
disasters like Hurricane Katrina.
Despite all the Guard’s
achievements on our behalf, the force often has gotten
second-class treatment in the Department of Defense. The Guard
has to beg and scrape and rely on the tender mercies of others
for every piece of equipment they need to do the jobs they are
asked to do, and they have to fight to be included in the
long-range planning and budget and policy discussions that
directly affect the Guard, its missions, its people, its
equipment and its other needs. The Guard works extremely
closely with state emergency responders, and they have special
authorities and experience in working within the domestic United
States. But despite this special expertise and these special
authorities, does the Pentagon listen to and learn from the
Guard’s ideas and knowledge about domestic defense? Sad but
true, the answer is no.
I wish we could have gone even
further in this legislation. Dropped during floor debate here
in the Senate was a section of the Empowerment bill make the
Guard Bureau Chief a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. That
would improve the quality of advice to the Secretary of Defense
and the President on domestic defense matters. Another
provision, removed in conference with the House, would give the
Guard a separate budget for procuring homeland defense-related
equipment, as well as the ability to work with states to
identify gaps in emergency response capabilities. Another
clearly warranted section of our bill would have ensured that
our Adjutants General, who command units from the both the Army
Guard and the Air Force Guard, receive joint credit for their
experience. That would create a greater pool of candidates for
the senior positions that we have opened up in this bill. The
institutional objections we heard to these provisions ranged
from the weak to the unreasonable. But regrettably, in this
case they carried the day.
We did make clear progress. The
Joint Activity provision, to take a less prominent example, is
highly significant. The phrase “Joint Activity” means exactly
how it is used in the Goldwater-Nichols Act: an organization
that performs joint missions under the auspices of the Office of
the Secretary of Defense, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, or the commander of a Combatant or a Combined Command.
The National Guard Bureau has now basically been given a legal
license to work not only with the two services -- the Army and
Air Force -- but also with a variety of unified commands, the
Joint Staff, and the Office of the Secretary of Defense. The
National Guard Bureau now will have similar organizational
standing as that granted to other joint activities such as,
among many other organizations, the Joint Staff or the Defense
Logistics Agency.
This coalition of National Guard
supporters -- which goes far beyond the sponsors and co-sponsors
to the Governors, the Associations, and many others -- must keep
pushing. If we are to have a national security structure that
is as effective as the American people need and deserve it to
be, we must ensure that the Guard’s voice is heard loud and
clear in key deliberations. We must ensure that the Pentagon
takes the military support mission seriously. We should
consider re-introducing the portions of the Empowerment
legislation that have not yet been enacted. To keep a
laser-like focus on domestic defense, we must take a careful
look at other Defense Department organizations involved in
domestic defense, like U.S. Northern Command.
I know that Senator Bond joins me
in thanking the Nation’s Governors for their stalwart support of
the Empowerment Bill, as well their unstinting energy in working
with us on another successful effort on behalf of the Guard, the
similarly successful effort to repeal the recent changes to the
Insurrection Act, turning back an unjustifiable expansion of a
President’s power to use the military for law enforcement. This
provision of this Defense Authorization Bill was drawn directly
from legislation that I introduced with Senator Bond, which this
year was the subject of a hearing by the Judiciary Committee.
Associations like the Adjutants
General Association of the United States, the National Guard
Association of the United States, and the Enlisted Association
of the National Guard of the United States were there every step
of the way, keeping their members informed and bringing enormous
energy to this effort.
Special thanks go to
Representatives Gene Taylor of Mississippi and Tom Davis of
Virginia who led a vigorous, companion effort on the House side,
as well as Senators Carl Levin of Michigan, John McCain of
Arizona, and John Warner of Virginia for leading the Senate
negotiations.
We owe the deepest thanks to the
almost 500,000 members of the National Guard. Their ability to
balance their full-time jobs with their family responsibilities
and Guard commitments is simply remarkable. They are
indispensable to our national security structure, at home, and
abroad. Their sense of pride, professionalism and duty
represents the very best qualities of our military and our
country. I am simply in awe of what they have done to protect
this Nation, and I know the whole Congress and the country share
this heartfelt gratitude.
Throughout this whole process, we
have been guided by the fact that the Guard is always there for
the people of the United States of America. Our part is easier
than theirs: We cannot afford to let our Guard down. The Guard
Empowerment provisions of this bill will help us honor that
commitment to the men and women of the Guard.
# # # # #
