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To attract the most sought-after employees, the Defense Department must adopt more flexible working environments, similar to the private sector's recognition that today's employees frequently change jobs during their lives, according to the final report on the future of the National Guard and Reserves.

To compete for a shrinking pool of qualified people, the Reserves should provide citizen-soldiers an expanded menu of choices in pay and benefits, and flexibility in the duration of active-duty service, said David S.C. Chu, Defense undersecretary for personnel and readiness at a Center for Strategic and International Studies conference on Wednesday. Chu discussed the final report of the Commission on the National Guard and Reserves, a panel established by Congress in the 2005 Defense authorization act.

The Army Reserves has outperformed the active Army in recruitment and retention, partly because it offers a "wider set of choices" particularly as it relates to conditions of service, said Chu. "If offering choice is a key element of why we have been successful in sustaining the operational reserve up to today, should we not extend that set of choice in terms of compensation, in terms of other benefits, and other conditions of service?"

Part of the Reserves' appeal is that the service provides people with more than one way to serve the country in uniform. While many citizens cannot make the commitment to active duty because of career or family, they still want to serve. Pay levels are likely less important to citizen-soldiers, who already receive compensation in the private sector, than providing them with greater flexibility and choice in how to use their civilian job skills while serving on active duty.

The commission's report said because of the demands of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Reserves has shifted from a purely strategic force to an operational force with frequent combat deployments. But Defense's personnel policies have not changed to account for new realities. The report includes 95 recommendations for reform that will require a "major restructuring of laws and DoD's budget," it said.

The country needs one Army made up of both active and reserve components, not multiple armies, said Lt. Gen. Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau. And that one Army must be properly funded and equipped. "If we make up half the [Army], we ought to have half the equipment," Blum said. The service also risks losing personnel "because [Defense] is unwilling to buy them a truck or a radio that is modern and works. It's ridiculous... it's all about money, that's what it really comes down to," he said, also speaking at the CSIS conference.

Blum said most of the Guard's funding is in "risky" supplemental funding and not part of the appropriated budget. When the funds to equip and train reserve soldiers come through the supplementals instead of the base budget, "it's almost not realistic," Blum said. "We have not advocated for a separate service; however, if they don't fix this equipping and budget and funding business, you're liable to see that one day. There is more than a moderate desire to establish a separate service," he said.

Blum said the Guard and Reserves are an "operational force," but it's not recognized or properly funded as such. Reserves make up about 40 percent of the Army's total combat power. During the past two years, the Reserves provided more than half of all Army forces deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as 100 percent of the personnel deployed to peacekeeping missions in the Balkans and Sinai, he said. When Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in August 2005, the Guard provided 50,000 soldiers in six days, while at the same time 70,000 reserve soldiers were deployed overseas.

Speaking for the Army staff, Maj. Gen. David Fastabend, director of Army strategy, plans and policy, said when soldiers are deployed to a war zone there is no difference in how active-duty service members and Reserves are equipped. He said policymakers should realize that the reserve and active components of the Army have separate charters, which dictate whether they're controlled at the federal or state levels as well as different homeland security missions.

COMMENTS

• I read and still have an article from an AF magazine that said the Guard and Reserves do 54% of the mission with 11% of the budget. My last tour in Iraq 2007 I sat next to an Army Officer who said he got out of the Guard because it was too hard to make do with nothing. He said I don't know how you guys do it. We bust our behinds to make do! The Active Duty wants us to impart our skills to their children but they choke us with all the rules they make up for the 2% that don't follow the ones we already have. The 2 star said we weren't in a combat zone so I guess those were fireworks incoming, I was not entertained. ps To all my military brothers and sisters, you are like no other. I love you!!! JC Posted April 18, 2008 11:44 AM
• With all due respect to the MG. We may have the same equipment down range but I am typing this on a computer that barely works in a building that is 150 yrs old. In the motorpool I have vehicles that resemble what we have down range in name only. The radios, battlefield tracking systems, weapons systems, logistical systems, as well as administrative systems are all different from what reserve soldiers are trained on. The saving grace are the soldiers that have deployed, some as many as 5 times in the last 10 yrs, and can show the younger troops what is useable training and what is a waste of time. SFC Keith A. Coleman Posted April 3, 2008 12:01 PM
• If they want to retain and recruit good reserves they need to quit releasing them at 729 days active duty when 730 days give them college benefits. Some reserves are there for the money, and college benefits would be important. j.wilson Posted April 3, 2008 10:24 AM