Can We Foresee a Future Where Are SDFs Able To Utilize Federal Equipment & Vehicles

In this Commanders Briefing clip, Lt. Colonel (MD) Barry Greene, President of the State Guard Association of The United States (SGAUS), outlines a forward-thinking strategy to enhance State Defense Forces capabilities by a method on which they can utilize federal equipment and vehicles into both training exercises and emergency response missions. He emphasizes that leveraging these advanced federal assets can significantly improve operational readiness and effectiveness of those missions. He elaborates that it will also help foster improved collaboration between state and federal agencies via standardized protocols and communication channels. Greene further discusses practical steps for implementation, addressing legal and regulatory challenges, and how to resolve those challenges. If successful it will expand the capabilities of the states ability to respond to statewide emergencies, hurricanes and other natural disasters.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This episode was made possible by Dustin Colgrove, Colonel Ben Perry,
Colonel C McAdams Sr. And other Patreon members. Support us
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Speaker 2 (00:13):
You mentioned that you believe that the use of federal equipment, vehicles,
the prohibition of use of federal equipment and vehicles will
go away, that state defense forces will be able to
utilize these assets. Do you believe there's legislation in the work.

(00:36):
I know that, and this kind of combined sort of
future question I was going to have with you a
couple of years ago, before the twenty twenty two Ukraine crisis,
that SUGAS, a few SUGAS board members or SUGUS in general,
was working with the US Congress to implement some changes

(01:01):
that would be no cost that a federal government, which
would in essence have the state defense forces be able
to use federal equipment and be able to buy access
federal assets. Unfortunately, twenty twenty two happened, a lot of

(01:25):
things got sidelined. Do you believe such legislation is going
to come forward? And that's why you believe this is
going to go away?

Speaker 3 (01:38):
A combination the way you you you've asked a very
very broad question with a lot of stuff covered. I'm
going to answer it as best as I can. Specifically,
first off, access to federal equipment. Let me let me
chomp this down and bite sized pieces. I'm going to

(02:01):
go further than that, and I'm going to say, we're
not talking about access to federal equipment, We're not talking
about access to federal property, We're not talking about access
to federal funds. What we are talking about is can
an adjutant General or a governor who has activated their
National guard and or state defense force in a federal

(02:24):
emergency being paid by federal funds? Which is important an
important differentiation. Okay, Can they, under such activation or in
training for such activations activate not all access not all
federal supplies and equipment, non combat mission specific equipment for

(02:50):
training and or for usage. Okay? And the answer logically
should be yes, should be because ultimately that's up to
the Adjutant General or the governor who's sitting on those assets.
And if you've studied the law, which I have just
to the level of understanding enough about how US Code

(03:12):
Statute applies to that and how these activations work. At
the point that state Defense Force people are on SAD
being backfilled under the Stafford Act by federal funds. They
are doing missions under federal guidance. That's what all this
nim's training and MEMS badge stuff under Saugust is all about,

(03:32):
is being qualified and having the certifications to do the
federal missions the way the federal government needs them done
and accounted for, and that includes the access to federal equipment.
I have a great example for you where a National
Guard commander unilaterally made the decision to launch a rescue
mission of his Blackhawks because the neighboring state had had flooding.

(03:56):
There were people on roofs to be rescued, and he
had people there for drill that could take off in
these black Hawks and go do the right thing. And
so he did, and he deployed them, and they did
a bunch of rescue missions. They also went through a
whole bunch of fuel. Now, the good news is he
did fill out the appropriate paperwork and DHS and FEMA

(04:22):
through the Federal Treasury did in fact reimburse the United
States Army for that fuel. However, there was no mechanism
within the Army's accounting systems to make that fuel go
back to that squadron. So the squadron was actually now
under budget for the rest of the year for its
ability to train and operate its people. Okay, so this

(04:44):
is where I talk about the legalities versus the realities.
Is that you are still talking about government operations and
the way things are funded, and the simple realities that
that fellow, that commander in doing the right thing by
the American people, which is what I would hope that
any military officer in uniform would do, actually shot himself

(05:08):
in the foot figuratively by screwing his entire budget for
his squadron because of the fact that they had no
way to recoup the budget. You're looking at stuff like this,
and when the Adjutant General and his or her j
threes and planners are going through this or going through
this with the governor and with federal advisors on Stafford

(05:30):
Act money and stuff like this. This is all in
this this continuum of how these force packages, how these
individual units are activated, brought across state lines, and ultimately
who is paying the bill. When you when you have
to look at it through that lens, which is really
how you have to look at it, then what the

(05:53):
issue really becomes is have we given the Adjutant General
or the governor in their toolbox the ability to say, yes,
if I activate let's say, Lieutenant Colonel Barry Green in
Maryland's forces to go do a bunch of what they

(06:14):
call knock knock visits and just go into a neighborhood
and check on citizens that are without power and they
may not be able to call out and ask for help.
We just do that and they say, well, the only
vehicles that are cleared to go in there are humvies,
but those are technically a federal asset. And we've run
into this before in numerous states. Okay, that the Adjutant

(06:36):
General has the ability to say no, this is not
a state defense force thing as to whether the state
defense force is able to access federal equipment. What it
is is I have assembled lawfully a task force and
it is mixed between State Defense Force and National Guard people.
Am I able, as the Adjutant General or the governor

(06:57):
to give them unrestricted access to the tools they need
to do the mission I've given? So we would all
love to see this wonderful piece of legislation come out
either at the federal or the state level. That gives
just you know, gosh, any state guard for a person
can walk on any federal military base and just hey,

(07:17):
there's an Abrams tank. I can jump into that and
start it up and take it for a drive. Answer
is no, you may not answer is that. What SAUGUS
is based in is we're kind of based into reality
in the sense that the legislation and the messaging that
we're working on very very hard with our federal and

(07:39):
state partners is a reality based message on just giving
those governors and Adjudants General the tool set that they
need to get done with their state defense force what
they need to get done, and if they don't have
a state defense force or they don't want their state
defense force to do that mission, it's a moot point.

(08:02):
It's it's entirely to just give that tool set to
the governor or the Adjutant General