Army Times - Independent News For Soldiers | Army Times

Hodges: First Rotational Armored Brigade to Reach Europe in January

migration — Fri, 07 Oct 2016 01:32:57 +0000

WASHINGTON — The US Army’s first heel-to-toe rotational heavy armored brigade combat team (ABCT) is set to reach Europe in January as part of a US military buildup in the region to reassure allies and deter against an aggressive Russia, the service’s commander in Europe said.

The 3rd Brigade of the 4th Division out of Fort Carson, Colorado, will start loading ships in the coming weeks and is scheduled to arrive in the port of Bremerhaven, Germany, in the middle of January, Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges said in an interview with Defense News at annual Association of the United States Army conference.

Once in port, the brigade will undergo a readiness test to see how fast it can unload the ships and get to western Poland. Hodges predicted unloading the ship would not be the challenging part, but rather working to move equipment by rail and highway from a single port.

The ABCT that will rotate in to replace the first one in September 2017 will likely sail into several ports to test its ability to unload and come together in another designated point, Hodges noted.

Based on several factors — from exercising a mission it hasn’t had to do in a very long time to moving equipment via rail and highway to dealing with winter weather in Northern Europe — Hodges predicts the ABCT will reach Polish assembly areas near Drawsko Pomorskie Training Area in roughly three weeks.

“I’m going to make all kinds of mistakes on this,” Hodges said, even though the Army has been rehearsing and drilling. “We haven’t done it in a long time.”

This exercise to move from the German port to Poland was tasked by Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, the supreme allied commander in Europe, in order to demonstrate speed of assembly, Hodges noted.

Once the ABCT has assembled and prepared its equipment, such as loading ammunition, testing communications and camouflaging, in order to set up its posture “like a crisis response rehearsal,” Hodges said, the brigade will disperse to areas of responsibility aligned with the Atlantic Resolve mission.

Atlantic Resolve is the framework for the US mission to assure allies in Europe and deter Russia through exercises and operations.

One battalion will head to the Baltic region — Atlantic Resolve North — while another battalion will deploy to Romania and Bulgaria — Atlantic Resolve South — according to Hodges.

The bulk of the combat team will remain in Poland, staying in Polish barracks at training areas where some of the best ranges and maintenance facilities are situated, such as Drawsko Pomorskie, he said.

Over the course of the rotation, the ABCT will mass “a couple of times,” Hodges added.

While Poland’s national exercise Anakonda is held every other year and therefore will not be held in 2017, Hodge’s command has helped to coordinate opportunities for the ABCT to heavily participate in Saber Guardian, which will take place in July in Bulgaria and Romania. The exercise will consist of more than 30,000 soldiers with 20-plus nations, making it similar in size to Anakonda. The 82nd Airborne, the US Army’s global response force, will jump in like it did in Anakonda. Saber Guardian will also be linked to Sea Breeze — a maritime exercise in the Black Sea — and Noble Partner in Georgia.

The 2nd Brigade of the 1st Division out of Fort Riley, Kansas, will replace the first ABCT in September, Hodges said.

The commander said even though the Army is having to operate under a continuing resolutionfor the next three months, which means money is only available at 2016 funding levels, there would be enough money to move forward with the deployment of the first ABCT.

Army Secretary Eric Fanning told Defense News in an interview before AUSA that he was concerned over the impact the continuing resolution might have on the Pentagon’s special funding for assurance and deterrence in Europe, called the European Reassurance Initiative.

“ERI is oxygen for us,” Hodges said. “Without the ERI money, there is no rotation of forces, there’s no buildup of Army pre-positioned stock. In other words, there is no real capable deterrent force above and beyond what we have on the ground now … it’s essential to what we are doing.”

2016 Foreign Military Sales Totals Down

migration — Tue, 04 Oct 2016 20:36:59 +0000

WASHINGTON — US foreign military sales dropped by around $10 billion in 2016, but the Pentagon’s top weapon sales official isn’t concerned that interest is waning globally.

Vice Adm. Joseph Rixey, director of the Defense Security Cooperation Agency, said during the AUSA conference that the unofficial tally of FMS deals is at “about the mid-30s” in terms of billions of dollars. Those totals are not finalized for the year but are unlikely to shift much.

At least year’s AUSA conference, Rixey announced 2015 had brought in a record $46.6 billion, but predicted that the 2016 total would drop due to lower oil prices and cuts to global defense budgets. While the drop happened as predicted, Rixey said he learned an important lesson about assuming a root cause.

“I have spent the entire year trying to correlate something to pricing, and in fact we have found you can’t really correlate that. My answer to you is we don’t have an economic indicator out there,” Rixey told reporters after his speech. “It could also be currency difference. There are so many factors that it’s not what I thought it was. I thought we could directly correlate it.”

“Now, I’m sure oil price is having an impact on that particular number, but I didn’t find the correlation I was looking for,” he added.

The drop in dollar value is also partly misleading, Rixey noted, because a number of high-end sales – most notably a trio of fighter jet sales to Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain – have been delayed. The package reportedly includes 72 Boeing F-15E Strike Eagles for Qatar and up to 40 Boeing F/A-18 E/F Super Hornets for Kuwait. Bahrain’s package includes Lockheed Martin F-16 fighters.

“What would have happened if they had gone this year? We would have had record sales again,” Rixey said. “So we’ve decided maybe we should look at this like a rolling three-year number” in order to have a truer sense of trends.

But Rixey also downplayed the overall figure, noting that the US does not set a sales target each year.

“We don’t look at sales like a benchmark we’re trying to capture. It’s not a number we’re trying to go for. Sales is really a fundamental result of foreign policy. We just have to understand what kind of workforce we’re going to need to prosecute those sales,” Rixey said. “It’s nothing more than a tool for us to anticipate what we’re going to anticipate and work with.”

The admiral also continued his defense of the speed of the FMS system, following up on comments made last month at a conference and an editorial featured in Defense News.

As to the jet sales, Rixey would not comment on the full status, but acknowledged media reports that the sales are “moving forward.”

Bob Work: Army Challenges Reminiscent of 1970s

migration — Tue, 04 Oct 2016 18:48:17 +0000

WASHINGTON — The challenges facing the Army in 2016 are giving Deputy Defense Secretary Bob Work déjà vu.

Speaking at the AUSA conference here Tuesday, Work said the Army finds itself in a scenario that is very reminiscent of the 1970s, when the service was forced to innovate with both its tactics and technology.

As Work sees it, the three main challenges facing the Army are nuclear parity with a potential adversary (which undermines the conventional deterrence ability of the Army), new operational doctrines across the globe, and low resources — the same trio that the Army faced in the 1970s.

For full AUSA 2016 coverage: www.defensenews.com/ausa

“The response bears remembering — we concluded that a smaller ground force, backed by technology and honed by training, could still form the foundation of a credible conventional deterrent,” Work told the audience.

Part of that response was the Army trying to “own the night,” emphasizing night-vision capabilities. As Work explained it, however, it’s not just about the technology.

“Anybody could have bought night vision goggles in 1978. It was the training, techniques and procedures… that allowed [the Army] to own the night,” Work said.

Like other top Pentagon officials, Work emphasized that the US is not looking to start a war with Russia. But he acknowledged the reality – that the actions of Moscow over the last two-and-a-half years have put Russia and the US on very different paths.

“We’re not planning on fighting a war with Russia, but it would be foolish to not pay attention to their operations, because they are, quite frankly, a pacing competitor who tells us where we need to go” to maintain a military advantage, he said.

And despite the capabilities of Russia, China or other potential adversaries, Work said he was confident that the joint force would find a way to defeat any foe if conflict breaks out.

“Adversaries think they can keep us out. I’m here to tell you they are absolutely wrong,” Work said. “We will, quite frankly, pound the snot out of them from range and in the close fight.”

Fanning: US Army ‘Stretched Very Thin,’ Needs Steady Funding

migration — Mon, 03 Oct 2016 13:59:32 +0000

The Army continues to be “stretched very thin” as it continues to draw down to a total force of 980,000, the service’s top civilian leader said.

“I do worry about that,” Army Secretary Eric Fanning said. “We are running it hard.”

When the Army began drawing down to 980,000 soldiers – with goals of 450,000 in the active Army, 335,000 in the Army National Guard, and 195,000 in the Army Reserve by the end of 2018 – the demand for soldiers was not as high as it is today, Fanning said.

For full AUSA 2016 coverage: www.defensenews.com/ausa

“We did not see Russia being as aggressive as it is. We did not have ISIL to contend with like we do now,” he said. “There are a lot of requirements on an Army that is being asked to do a lot of things globally. Just in the last four years or so, we have increased our uniformed [and] civilian presence in the Pacific theater by 50 percent while we are drawing down.”

But Fanning also cautioned against increasing the Army’s size without proper funding.

“The worst thing for the Army would be that we are required to keep a larger force structure but the budget does not change,” he said. “We have already taken a lot of risk in our modernization accounts … and in our operations and maintenance accounts. The force structure that we are headed towards, while there are a lot of requirements levied against it, it is, we think, a balanced force structure for the budget that we have.”

As soldiers continue to deploy around the world, whether to Iraq and Afghanistan or to support exercises and engagements in Europe, the Pacific and Africa, Army leaders are focused on keeping the force trained and ready, Fanning said.

“That is one of the concerns,” he said. “There are some stressors out there, and certain parts of the Army, like the Patriot batteries, we do not have the optempo down to the ratio that we want it to be.”

Fanning, who recently returned from a troop visit to Iraq and Afghanistan, praised soldiers for their desire to serve.

“Soldiers want to deploy. They want to get outside of the gate,” he said. “It is an incredibly strong and resilient force that is doing great things over there. I think the biggest stressor for the Army and for the force is just the unpredictability of what the future holds for them and for the Army just based on the political and budgetary instability that we have been facing now for many years.”

As he looks to the future, Fanning said the Army “is really drawn into focusing on and resourcing today’s fight at the expense of the future.”

As Army secretary, Fanning said he remains concerned about the budget, even as the Army faces another continuing resolution.

“The instability makes it very hard to plan,” he said. “Continuing resolutions are disruptive. Not being able to budget even for a full year because of the continuing resolution is disruptive. This all impacts how you build a program to maintain flexibility so you can respond quickly. It is not nearly as effective as having a long-term program that you can plan on.”

FORSCOM Commander: ‘We Are Not In An Inter-War Period’

migration — Mon, 03 Oct 2016 13:43:57 +0000

All three Army components must continue to build soldier and unit readiness in the face of a volatile, complex and ambiguous world, the commander of U.S. Army Forces Command said Monday.

“Some may ask, why all the emphasis on readiness? And why all the emphasis to decrease post-mobilization time for the Army National Guard and United States Army Reserve?” Gen. Robert Abrams said. “Because contrary to some people’s opinion, we are not in an inter-war period.”

The Army currently rotates three armored brigade combat teams to Europe, Korea and Southwest Asia for nine months at a time. It is committed in Iraq, Afghanistan, Africa, and throughout the Pacific.

And it also must be surge-ready, said Abrams, who spoke Monday at the Guard and Reserve breakfast during the Association of the United States Army annual meeting.

For full AUSA 2016 coverage: www.defensenews.com/ausa

“We need to be ready to surge to support commander war plan requirements to defeat one of our near-peer competitors, like Russia or China or North Korea or Iran,” he said. “We have to defeat that one while denying the objective of another near-peer threat, while protecting the homeland, and continuing our counter-terrorism missions around the world.”

In order to meet all those requirements, the active Army “cannot do it alone,” Abrams said.

“It takes all 980,000 of us,” he said. “Now, possibly more than ever, the readiness of the Guard and Reserve is crucial.”

While there’s still work to be done, especially as the Army continues to rebuild its core warfighting skills after 15 years of counter-insurgency operations, there already are signs of progress, Abrams said.

Last year, there were zero Army National Guard division headquarters deployed, he said.

Today, the 36th Infantry Division headquarters from the Texas Army National Guard is four months into its deployment to Afghanistan, becoming the first Guard division headquarters to assume authority for a regional command headquarters there since the start of the war, Abrams said.

In Jordan, the 29th Infantry Division headquarters, from Virginia and Maryland, assumed command of the military’s joint operations center there to support Operation Inherent Resolve, Abrams said. In December, the division also will assume responsibility for a “brand-new requirement” for a division headquarters to be fully employed in Kuwait to support U.S. Army Central and Operation Spartan Shield, he said.

“Both the 36th and 29th Infantry Divisions are filling critical roles in support of our combatant commanders,” Abrams said.

They also are providing key leadership and development opportunities for soldiers, he said.

Another effort is the Associated Units pilot program, which pairs active Army units with those in the Guard and Reserve.

The partnerships will mean “more training days, exchange of key personnel and oversight of training by the gaining headquarters,” Abrams said.

“All of that translates into increased readiness,” he said. “It’ll also increase cross-component integration.”

The Army must continue to build on its total force, Abrams said.

“We need to find innovative ways to train and to master the fundamentals and best utilize our most precious resource, and that’s time,” he said. “We need to capitalize on our unique strengths and continue to integrate the outstanding units of the National Guard and Army Reserve with the Regular Army.”

SECARM Sets Goals, Timeline for Rapid Capabilities Office: AUSA Exclusive

migration — Mon, 03 Oct 2016 12:08:27 +0000

The Army is aggressively pursuing overhauls this year to its troubled procurement system – concurrent with Congress’ own efforts to reform the Defense Department’s acquisition process at-large.

The Army is actually pushing for more acquisition reforms than outlined in the 2016 defense policy. Chief among these initiatives is the Rapid Capabilities Office, launched this fall under the leadership of new Army Secretary Eric Fanning.

The RCO is designed to zero in on the Army’s biggest requirements, with the intent to deliver capabilities within a one- to five-year horizon.

For full AUSA 2016 coverage: www.defensenews.com/ausa

Fanning vowed in his confirmation hearing in May that he would set up such an office and on Sept. 26, the RCO held its first board of directors meeting. This was within the 30-day time frame Fanning set for himself.

“We’re kind of building it as we fly,” Fanning told Defense News in a Sept. 27 interview at the Pentagon.

The first board meeting covered how the charter would be finalized, but also how the office would decide to tackle some of its major priorities going forward. Among those priorities are electronic warfare, survivability, precision, navigation and timing (PNT) capability and countering unmanned aircraft systems.

“First of all, the physics have to be possible,” Fanning said, and the projects have to be doable in a one- to five-year time frame. And the RCO team is looking at operational needs statements from the combatant commanders “up against what we already have that we could be able to accelerate,” he added.

Maj. Gen. Walter Piatt, the RCO’s director of operations, and Douglas Wiltsie, the RCO director, said the first board meeting with Army leadership is a reflection of the fast pace of the office.

In the next 30 days, the RCO will come back to its second board meeting, around the beginning of November, with a complete charter to be finalized along with recommended projects and programs within the electronic warfare, PNT and cyber capability areas. Along with suggestions on ways forward in those three areas, the RCO has to weigh its recommendations against time, funding, and risk, Piatt told Defense News on Sept. 28.

In addition to the RCO being part of a bigger acquisition reform effort, it’s also an acknowledgement of the pace of technology and enemy capability, that not everything can move at the pace of a normal acquisition program. Some acquisition needs to synch with the pace of, for instance, quadcopters flying off the shelf at a local electronics store.

“The Army didn’t just wake up and say, ‘We need to make acquisition go faster,'” Piatt said, but due to such factors born from adversaries, the need to rapidly evolve technology, turn it into new systems or change existing systems to make it better, will keep enemies from closing the gap on US military advantage.

Wiltsie and Piatt said they are involving leaders within the Army from scientists to requirements writers to maintainers to help move programs through the RCO. And wherever possible, the office will be examining capabilities in exercises, assessments, and even real operations for insight on how capabilities can be accelerated.

The next Army Warfighting Assessment to be held this month at Fort Bliss, Texas, will demonstrate two of the three top priorities for the RCO. “We are going to run a vignette for electronic warfare, an EW denied environment to see how not only do we do detection but how do we get the information back into the tactical operations center of the brigade and do they generate an effect,” Wiltsie said.

There is also going to be a defensive cyber operations vignette at the AWA, he noted.

The Army’s RCO is looking at PNT but is anticipating examining the capability at a different venue such as White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico, but that is not yet tied to an exercise, according to Wiltsie.

While the plan is flexible, the RCO will spend much of 2017 analyzing the capabilities it has prioritized and working on prototypes which would then be followed by a limited production in the 2018 timeframe, Wiltsie said. But it all depends on the number initiatives the RCO is working and how they evolve, he added.

The Army’s Capability Integration Center director Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster told a group of reporters Sept. 27 that his outfit was looking to nominate capabilities that could be delivered quickly through the RCO. “I’m not ready to mention what those are now but I think there are three of them in particular that I think are really going to help the Army by getting capabilities out faster,” he said.

Fanning noted that the first round of projects will largely be things that the Army is already doing, probably parts of programs of record that it could accelerate.

Army Sending More Troops, Resources to Africa

migration — Sun, 02 Oct 2016 11:09:32 +0000

With 54 countries, more than 2,100 languages and upwards of 800 tribes in its area of operations, U.S. Army Africa must continue to grow its partnerships and exercises across the vast continent, the command’s top officer said.

“It’s the land of tremendous opportunity, but the land of where, if the perfect storm brews, a lot of negative things could happen,” said Maj. Gen. Joseph Harrington, commanding general of U.S. Army Africa.

More than 1.2 billion people — 41 percent of them under the age of 15 — live in Africa, Harrington said.

Economically, Africa is the fastest growing continent, and it continues to battle growing threats from Islamic extremist group Boko Haram, Al-Shabaab, a Somali-based military group with ties to al-QaIda, and the Islamic State, he said.

“What Africa do we want in the future?” Harrington said. “Do we want the one that is contributing to the world order, where Africa’s potential is realized both economically and human-dimension-wise, or is it going to be one where we worry about people migrating in large numbers to flee terrorism? Africa will become more and more important to the United States in the decades to come.”

For its part, U.S. Army Africa, with help from regionally-aligned forces that include a brigade combat team from the 101st Airborne Division, is looking to continue partnering with its African counterparts.

On any given day, about 2,000 U.S. soldiers are deployed to Africa to conduct theater security cooperation activities, train with African partners and participate in exercises, Harrington said.

This year, soldiers from 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, rotated in and out of the continent for exercises large and small, ranging from Central Accord, U.S. Army Africa’s largest exercise to date on the continent, to small, military-to-military engagements.

Beginning in October, soldiers from 1st BCT, 101st Airborne Division, will take over for the 3rd Infantry Division soldiers.

U.S. Army soldiers assigned to 1st Battalion, 30th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division and the Senegalese Army’s 1st Paratrooper Battalion rehearse mortar crew drills July 12, in Thies, Senegal as part of Africa Readiness Training 2016.

Photo Credit: Spc. Craig Philbrick/Army

Also dedicated to Africa are the headquarters for several brigade-level units that bring with them a variety of enabler capabilities. They include elements from the 101st Sustainment Brigade, the 30th Medical Brigade, the 20th Engineer Brigade, the 414th Contracting Support Brigade, the 207th Military Intelligence Brigade, the 13th Expeditionary Support Command, and the 35th Signal Brigade.

“That gives me the forces and the intellectual problem-solvers to look at Africa and come up with long-term solutions,” Harrington said.

Africa is “just a splendid place” to give soldiers valuable leadership experience, he said.

“When you go to a country in Africa, the officer or senior [noncommissioned officer] in many cases is the senior U.S. Army representative in the country,” Harrington said. “These guys are impacting national-level events for those countries.”

Soldiers also get the chance to deploy to austere environments and build relationships with African soldiers.

“The opportunity to leave home station, figure out how to employ your tactical unit, it’s a wonderful opportunity for these guys,” Harrington said. “These engagements, these partnerships, these set the conditions for success. Some lieutenant that’s in 2nd Brigade or the 101st Brigade is going to sit in my seat someday.”

As soldiers deploy to Africa to support U.S. Army Africa’s mission, Harrington said his job is to maintain accountability of these troops and ensure their security.

“That’s something I take very seriously here,” he said.

Looking ahead, Harrington said his command continues to grow Central Accord and the Accord series of exercises. It also plans to continue conducting its medical readiness exercises, which give Army medical personnel the opportunity to work alongside local doctors.

“Their doctors get to understand and work with our doctors, and that’s extra capacity for them, and our doctors get to work in these austere conditions and build friendships and partnership,” Harrington said. “The [events] are worth their weight in gold in our medical community.”

Maj. Gen. Joseph Harrington, commander of U.S. Army Africa, listens as Gen. Griffin Spoon Phiri (right), commanding general of Malawi Defense Forces, speaks to military representatives from Southern African countries during a regional leader symposium August 11, 2016, in Salima, Malawi as part of Southern Accord 2016. SA16 is a U.S. Army Africa-led annual, combined military exercise that brings together U.S. military personnel with African partner nations to improve readiness, promote interoperability, build capacity and strengthen partner relationships.

Photo Credit: Staff Sgt. Candace Mundt/Army

U.S. Army Africa also plans to continue conducting readiness training exercises. The very first such event took place this summer, where a battalion-sized unit from the 3rd Infantry Division conducted platoon- and company-level live-fire training with the Senegalese army, Harrington said.

Plans call for at least one of these events every year, and discussions are already underway for the 2017 event. Early discussions could put the next readiness training event in Uganda, but nothing has been finalized, Harrington said.

Army Africa also is planning another large Accord exercise in 2017, possibly in South Africa, but that also could change pending a final decision, he said.

At the same time, Harrington and his staff are working with their African counterparts to determine what training or capabilities they want.

“They want to control their own borders, they want to protect and secure their own population,” Harrington said. “We can leverage our partnerships to help these other armies improve their own capability and capacity to address those issues.”

The armies across Africa are already making progress, Harrington said.

“There are 16 [United Nations] peacekeeping operations in the world right now, and nine of them are resident in Africa,” he said. “Ten years ago, Africans accounted for 20 percent of the peacekeepers on their own continent. Now, they make up more than 50 percent. A lot of these countries are building up their own capabilities and capacities.”

The relationships the Army continues to grow with its partners in Africa are critical, Harrington said.

“You can’t surge relationships,” he said. “Building these relationships now will be critically important. Maybe not three years from now, maybe 15 years from now.”

Army National Guard’s Brigade Combat Teams Face Tougher Training

migration — Sun, 02 Oct 2016 11:05:32 +0000

The Army National Guard’s armored and Stryker brigade combat teams (BCT) will soon receive more high-level, complex training as the component works to better prepare those high-demand units to respond to contingencies.

The effort is being called the Army National Guard enhanced readiness posture, and it could reduce by at least 30 percent the amount of time one of these units spends at a mobilization site after it’s called up for duty, said Lt. Gen. Timothy Kadavy, the director of the Army Guard.

“We have a very limited number of armored and Stryker brigade combat teams in the Army,” he said. “We need to ensure that they are at higher levels of readiness today, tomorrow and further into the future.”

This includes “increased gunnery and increased maneuver training and increased training center rotations,” Kadavy said. “What this will do is it will increase the readiness to the point that we can reduce post-mobilization time, initially, up to 30 percent for those formations as they run through our new model.”

On average, Guard BCTs spend about 100 days at the post-mobilization site, Kadavy said.

After the initial 30 percent reduction in time, Kadavy hopes to further improve on that number.

“The more sets and repetitions you do, the better you get,” he said. “The more reps we have, the better the units will be, and the fewer lessons they will be learning. They will be improving, and we will be able to build on those training center rotations.”

The effort, which the Guard is developing with Army Forces Command, comes as the Army’s armored BCTs are in high demand, with rotational deployment missions in Kuwait, South Korea and, soon, Europe.

The move also will mean more training days for the armored and Stryker BCTs, he said.

“I think the maximum in any given year would be 60 days, but we have to work with the soldiers, families and employers,” he said. “We owe it to them to explain why this is important to the Army and to the nation’s defense, which it is.”

This includes keeping soldiers, families and employers informed and building in predictability, Kadavy said.

“When they understand the training requirements, they can plug that in and plan that as part of their lives and their work schedules with their employers,” he said.

The Guard currently has five armored BCTs and in fiscal 2017 will have two Stryker BCTs.

While officials are still working out the details of the enhanced readiness posture, the effort is already in motion. Plans call for units to move through a roughly four-year cycle or strategy, Kadavy said.

“We are going to start this year,” he said. “We will start to align them. We will need to send the right units to training, and in 2018 we could reach full operational capability.”

Capt. Travis Stellfox (right), a First Army observer/coach/trainer, listens to the defensive strategy of a soldier of the Iowa Army National Guard’s 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 34th Infantry Division, during an exportable combat training capability exercise at Fort McCoy, Wis.

Photo Credit: Master Sgt. Gail Braymen/Army

This move ties in with the Army’s plans to double to four the number of combat training center rotations for Guard brigades beginning in 2018.

For now, the enhanced readiness posture is only designed for the armored and Stryker BCTs, based on funding and resources, Kadavy said.

“But we are going to grow this,” he said. “Right now, we are focused, step one, on armored brigade combat teams and Stryker brigade combat teams.”

This effort also helps the Guard support Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley’s top priority of readiness, Kadavy said.

“For us in the Guard, it is about our dual mission,” he said. “We are focused on war-fighting capability … and the capacity and capability to respond when there are domestic incidents, whether it is an earthquake, a hurricane, or a tornado or flooding.”

In addition to building readiness for its armored and Stryker BCTs, the Guard has remained busy at home and overseas. Kadavy outlined some of the Guard’s work to Army Times.

Here’s are some highlights.

Q. Describe this past year.

A. This last year, we have been more engaged and more intertwined, more used in various ways than we ever had before.

We sent two brigades to the National Training Center and the Joint Readiness Center, and that’s always a tremendous effort. We supported a number of overseas deployment training. We sent one of our battalions to Arctic Anvil to support U.S. Army Pacific. We were key contributors to the Total Army force at Operation Anakonda in Poland last year, and we were one of the lead elements supporting Saber Guardian in Romania.

It has been very busy, and we continue to mobilize and deploy about 10,000 to 12,000 soldiers a year in support of the named operations.

Lt. Gen. Timothy Kadavy, director of the Army National Guard, presents coins to soldiers from 2nd Battalion, 116th Cavalry Brigade Combat Team during exercise Saber Guardian 2016 in Cincu, Romania. The Guard play key roles in several major exercises overseas and at home this year.

Photo Credit: Sgt. Tyler Meister/Army

Q. How about your missions at home?

A. We continue to do a lot of missions and nearly 900,000 man-days in support of domestic operations here in the United States.

This was also a very good year for the Army Guard in Army competitions. We won the Best Ranger Competition this year for the first time ever. We won the Sullivan Cup for the best tank crew in the Army for the first time ever. We have won a number of other championships related to marksmanship, culinary, etc.

I think it speaks to the tactical and technical capabilities that the Army has helped us grow within the Army National Guard. I think it shows the warrior mentality and culture that resides in the Army National Guard after 15 years of war-fighting and investment by the United States Army.

Q. Can you talk about how you’re integrating with the Army?

A. We are one Army. We are focused on trying to find things that will increase readiness. This year, General Milley announced the Associated Units pilot program, and we have a number of units that are now associated with active-duty units.

The 48th Brigade out of Georgia is now wearing the 3rd Infantry Division patch. The 3rd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division put on the 36th Infantry Division patch for Texas. We have a battalion that is associated with the 173rd Airborne Brigade out of Italy.

We think it’s a good thing for the Army and a good thing for the Army National Guard.

Q. What are you hearing from soldiers as you travel across the force?

A. They’re optimistic. They said ‘this is exactly why we signed up. We want to do more of this.’

This year, for instance, we deployed 16,000 soldiers in theater security cooperation-type activities. That’s a pretty sizable commitment from the Army National Guard to supporting overseas and deployment training.

We anticipate in the future years, fiscal year 2018 and beyond, we will become more engaged in supporting U.S. Army Pacific with Pacific Pathways. We anticipate still being engaged in some of U.S. Army Europe’s exercises.