Who Would Have Believed?

It's been a year and a half since the Katrina and Rita disasters of 2005. In both instances, relief efforts were hampered greatly by reduced National Guard forces in the affected states.

So here we are, Spring of 2007, and guess what? We still have a large chunk of forces in Iraq and worse, we have equipment that is being destroyed on a daily basis there that really ought to be in barns and armories here:

OVERLAND PARK, Kansas (Reuters) - Critics of the Iraq war said on Tuesday the Bush administration's failure to replenish vital National Guard equipment sent to Iraq caused Kansas to fall short in responding to last week's tornado disaster, and other states were equally vulnerable.

The White House and the Pentagon rebuffed the criticism, saying Kansas and other states had adequate resources that they could share in event of disasters like the Kansas tornado that leveled one small town on Friday and killed 10 in the area.

The debate was ignited by Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, a Democrat, who said on Monday the federal government had failed to replace state National Guard equipment deployed to Iraq and the lack of equipment was hindering rescue and recovery efforts after a weekend of violent weather in the Midwestern state.

"Adequate resources" sounds like a misnomer, and also suggests that Gov. Sebelius has been deliberately underutilizing the resources at hand to make a political point. Currently, Kansas has available about forty percent of the hardware its National Guard needs to be effective domestically.

Estimates for National Guard material resources being used in Iraq that will need to be replaced hover just under $50 billion dollars, with an estimated four-year time frame to replace all that equipment. Sure, it's possible that the next four years will be free of any major disasters that would require, say, bulldozers, front loaders, backhoes and trucks.

Just like it's also possible that monkeys might fly out of my butt.

Kansas is a curious political duck. While it tends to vote "red" and is in fact, the reddest of red states based on election results, it does have a Democratic governor and has shown a tendency for "bluer" results creeping from the Missouri River valley inward, possibly as a result of the proximity of Kansas City, MO, right across the river and an influx of immigrants.

That Sebelius has been successfully able to make this complaint and that this complaint seems to be sticking, does not bode well for Kansas' continued support for the invasion of Iraq, or Senators Sam Brownback, Presidential hopeful, and Pat Roberts, both of whom have given full-throated support to the invasion.

Naked America

One of the underreported side effects of a war in Iraq fought on the cheap is suddenly becoming a grave issue:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Pentagon is not adequately equipping the National Guard and has not adapted to the increasingly important security role it plays in the post-September 11 environment, an independent commission said in a report to Congress on Thursday.

The report said the global war on terrorism had placed increased demands for the National Guard to provide forces for both overseas and domestic missions, but added that the Defense Department, or DOD, had been slow to adapt to the change.

"DOD's failure to appropriately consider National Guard needs and funding requirements has produced a National Guard that is not fully ready to meet current and emerging missions," the commission concluded.

Among its findings, the 13-member panel said the Defense Department was not adequately equipping the Guard for its domestic missions.

Pretty scary stuff, but it gets worse:

Nearly 90 percent of Guard units in the United States are rated "not ready," partly because of equipment shortages, according to Guard data and the findings of the Commission on the National Guard and Reserves, The Washington Post reported.

National Guard units deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan have been required to leave large quantities of gear behind when they return home, the newspaper said.

So we're trashing them there so they can trash us here...

The National Guard's function used to be pretty simple: help out in an emergency that overwhelmed local authorities. You know, a tornado hits, you call in the Red Cross and National Guard. Or maybe a big blizzard.

Certainly during and after a terror attack.And while the Guard can be used to protect our land by fighting overseas, that really ought to be a last resort and ought to be in support of regular army and other military branch forces. You should be sending in the first team. Rumsfeld, Cheney, Bush et al, did not, and there's a price to pay for that.

See, there's a concept in American constitutional law, posse comitatus, which was created in Colonial times, as the British army used to barrack their soldiers in private residences, creating a de facto network of military police. Although the Constitution itself does not create the concept of "posse comitatus", it does contain the Third Amendment, prohibiting the quartering of soldiers in peacetime without the owner's consent. The Posse Comitatus Act of 1875 goes one step further in barring the use of the military in nearly any domestic situation, under Federal authority.

The National Guard is an outgrowth of Article 1 of the Constitution, and so is explicitly designated for domestic use along with the Coast Guard, should it become necessary.

You know, like, in a blizzard. Or tornado. Or terror attack. The governor of the afflicted state (remember, it cannot be the President) can ask for his state's Guard to assist.

We've been fairly lucky in that, since the Iraq invasion began, aside from Katrina, we haven't had a major disaster that required all hands on deck.

And one begins to wonder how much better Katrina would have turned out had the Louisiana and Mississippi National Guards been at full complement. As it was, over 58,000 Guard troops from all over the country were called in, and you have to figure that the 30,000 that were serving in Iraq including thousands from Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama could have been there, as the Civil War general used to say, "furstest", saving hours and saving lives.

But no. And it's costing us: lives, money, property. All to fight a war overseas that means nothing at a cheaper cost to the economic royalty.

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