The National Guard in Iraq, makes US States vulnerable, partIII

Today we follow up on our National Guard week of posts. Saturday I posed some questions about readiness of New York at times when members of our NY State National Guard are fighting in Iraq. Then came a somber supplemental piece, tornadoes destroying communities in Kansas and causing massive devistation and left several dead;

Kansas

The governor said the state's response was limited by the shifting of emergency equipment, such as tents, trucks and semitrailers, to the war in Iraq. [via reuters]

and these from our recent past;

Louisiana

The moment Katrina hit Louisiana, thirty-five percent of that state's National Guard troops were deployed in Iraq. In Mississippi, ground zero for the storm, nearly 40 percent of the National Guard troops were in the Middle East. Indisputably it had an effect on the readiness of the disaster-afflicted region to quickly respond with the home team. Even Army National Guard cheerleader Lt. General H. Steven Blum, Chief of the Army's National Guard Bureau, (Above) couldn't dance around that question. When asked if the deployments of these National Guard units had a negative impact on the initial response, Blum admitted, "Had those brigades been at home and not in Iraq, their expertise and capabilities could have been brought to bear". [via military.com]

Military officials here acknowledged that the Louisiana Guard members faced the prospect of returning from draining, dangerous duty in Iraq and launching quickly into a hurricane relief effort that is expected to last months. [via Washington Post]

Montana

Recognizing the potential danger, Montana 's Governor Brian Schweitzer sounded the alarm in his sparsely populated state. Forty-four percent of Montana 's NG troops are already deployed to Iraq. If Montana has to cope with an emergency such as the huge wild fires the drought-stricken region is prone to, Schweitzer recently admitted "the state of Montana does not have that many assets outside the National Guard". [via military.com]

Support America, bring our National Guard home.