Oy. Somehow I missed this bit of good news from last week: “The Army National Guard estimates that its units left over 64,000 items valued at over $1.2 billion overseas. However, the Army cannot account for over half of these items and does not have a plan to replace them,” the Government Accountability Office, Congress’ investigatory arm, said in a report last week.
The Army talking point for a while now has been that National Guard and Reserve units get treated just as well as regular Joes. And, in many cases, that’s true. But it’s hard to imagine active duty units being allowed to piss away $600 million worth of trucks and radios and NVGs. According to the GAO, guard units had anywhere from 65 to 79 percent of their “required war-time items” before 2001. These days, “nondeployed Guard units now have only about one-third of the equipment they need for their overseas missions, which hampers their ability to prepare for future missions and conduct domestic operations.“
Obviously, the priority has got to be put on the fellas in the field. But, still. The guard obviously has some pretty serious responsibilities at home. And given how often these guys are deploying, they need to be able to train to fight.
(Big ups: Defense News)
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Need more info. Was the stuff left behind for follow-on units to use. Did it get ‘liberated’ by other units? Were they ordered to cough up stuff? Did they just decide that it was easier to go home without the stuff and left it behind? Some combination of the above?
While flag rankers and civilian bureaucrats have often been known to play games of this sort, loss of property accountability can be a career breaker for more junior sorts.
That is unorganized.
How can you lose 600 million dollars worth of gear?
Probably is getting sold for haliburton profits. Or maybe the soldiers have decided its time for them to start earning profits too. Or maybe they wanted their own pair of NVG’s for the house and wife.
Eh well I guess they deserve it, they make minimum wage as it is.
Hopefully some of the stuff goes up on Ebay.
Good Morning Folks,
I think there are two aspects at play here first it budget showdown time and the NG is “phishing for phunds”. The second part I believe what JSAllison said is the case, the equipment has been passed on to the units comming in, in relief.
Some was, also I’m sure combat losses which have a habit of not being recorded for various reasons, the vehicle log book goes up in flames there goes the record of that vehicle, and also I’m sure that some of the unaccounted for equipment has been turned over to the emerging Iraqi forces.
What ever the problems are and I’m sure it’s more then one, the amount of money being asked for is quite modest in compairson to other expenses for the GWOT.
I wouldn’t be surprised that this is just another “Much to do about nothing” in the media’s attempt “To busy getty minds with foreign wars.“
The above quotes are off the top of my head so any ole (or young) English or Literature Teacher please feel free to correct.
ALLONS,
Byron Skinner
“Stewart’s Platoon”
IT’S NOT HARD TO BELEVE THAT THAT MUCH GEAR IS NOT ACCOUNTED FOR. I ALSO AGREE THAT MANY ITEMS WERE PASSED ALONG OR “PROCURED” BY SOMEONE WHO NEEDED IT. THE ONLY THING THAT BOTHERS ME IS I WONDER HOW MUCH OF THE GEAR GOT INTO THE HANDS OF THE OTHER SIDE AND IS BEING USED AGAINST US.
The report did not say that the equipment is missing or lost…
What the report said was that the Army has no plan to return or replace equipment that remains in theater to support other units. They are required by law to produce this plan and have not done so.