Army National Guard outlines $24 billion equipment wish list

The Army National Guard has sent a $24 billion budgetary wish list to Capitol Hill, detailing thousands of vehicles, radios and other gear it needs over the next six years to fully outfit its units with updated equipment.

The "equipment modernization shortfall list" details 25 types of equipment ranging from helicopters to night-vision devices that did not make the cut for the Pentagon's six-year budget projections.

National Guard leaders, who have said repeatedly their stateside equipment stocks have been substantially reduced due to operations overseas, said they would need to buy nearly 50,000 new Humvees and trucks, upgrade 159 CH-47 Chinook helicopters and purchase communications and other gear to re-equip their force.

To simply get all of its units to C-1 baseline readiness standards -- meaning they have 90 percent of their needed equipment on hand to respond to homeland missions and overseas contingencies -- the Army Guard still would need $13.1 billion by fiscal 2013, according to another National Guard Bureau document.

The document acknowledged that the White House's fiscal 2008 budget request "meets the nation's needs." However, it also states that "strategic risk would be further reduced" if the Guard received additional funding.

The shortfalls have drawn the ire of House Armed Services ranking member Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., who said Wednesday during a hearing on the Army budget that delaying purchases of National Guard equipment is "kind of disturbing."

Hunter, who spoke late Tuesday with National Guard Bureau Chief Lt. Gen. Steven Blum, stressed that the Army is fighting with its "total force," indicating that he believes Guard equipment must become a larger priority.

An advocate of increased defense spending across the board, Hunter said Congress might use the war supplemental spending bills or the fiscal 2008 base budget to make up at least some of the shortfalls. Hunter also pressured Army officials to examine whether they have vehicles, such as non-armored Humvees, and other equipment in theater that they no longer need.

"Let's contemplate a transfer" to U.S.-based Guard units, he said.

The Army already has set aside $21 billion through 2011 to modernize the Army Guard. But a recent Government Accountability Office report has questioned whether Guard units in the United States will have to forfeit that gear to deploying units.

Army Chief of Staff Peter Schoomaker acknowledged the $24 billion shortfall during Wednesday's hearing, saying it falls beyond the Defense Department's six-year budget projections. The Army Reserve and active-duty force will also need another $28 billion after fiscal 2013 to repair and replace its current fleet of equipment, Schoomaker added.