Life may never be the same for the weekend warriors in the reserves and the National Guard. One out of every five soldiers serving in Iraq signed up as a reservist or for the National Guard. They had every reason to believe that they were going to be cleaning up after hurricanes and floods rather than dodging rocket-propelled grenades on the highways outside Baghdad.
Now, the strength of Iraqi insurgency has caught the Pentagon by surprise, and that means extended deployments for 4,500 of them. What’s more, the number of those in the National Guard and reservists in Iraq will double in the next rotation of soldiers. It is, in many ways, transforming the overall make up of the U.S. military.
Guests:
Richard Kohn, professor of history at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and co-editor of “Soldiers and Civilians: The Civil-Military Gap and American National Security,” and former chief historian of the Air Force
Captain Winfield Danielson, press officer for the Massachusetts National Guard
Brigadier General Mark Hertling, of the 1st armored division in Iraq
Paul Vogel, father of Army Reservist Aaron Vogel of the 652nd Engineer Company;Chris Munson, husband of Felice Munson, Staff Sargeant E-6, 737th Transportation, Army reserves