Will State Defense Forces Deploy Overseas Again? SGAUS President Barry Greene Weighs In

In this episode of Commanders Briefing, we continue our discussion with Lt. Colonel (MD) Barry Greene, President of SGAUS, exploring whether State Defense Forces will see more overseas deployments in support of National Guard missions in non-combat roles. Using The Maryland Defense Force’s 2006 deployment to Bosnia for a Maryland Air National Guard medical and humanitarian mission as an example, we ask if similar missions could happen again. Lt. Colonel Greene confidently affirms that such deployments will increase, citing examples by The Florida State Guard and The New York Guard as examples of how State Defense Forces are expanding their capabilities to support National Guard operations abroad.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This episode is made possible by Dustin Colgrove and Ben
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Speaker 2 (00:12):
I kind of want to bounce off something you mentioned earlier.
It's a question I was planning to ask.

Speaker 3 (00:18):
So in two thousand and seven, the.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Maryland Defense Force, and I think this is what you
were alluding to, deployed with the Maryland Air National Guard
to Bosnia as part of a medical and humanitarian mission.
We have been seeing other US military auxiliary forces, like
the Coast Guard Auxiliary now actually deploying on Coast Guard

(00:42):
cutters for full active duty missions. Do you believe we
could see more State Defense Force State Guide missions?

Speaker 3 (00:55):
I know, not believe. I know we're seeing more. We're
going to continue to see more. And by the way,
the Bosnia example is not the only example. In fact,
in the New York Guard, about twenty years ago or so,
we actually sent a lieutenant to aerossault school and he

(01:15):
successfully graduated the US Army's Aerossault School as a State
Defense Force member. My point being, and by the way,
the comedy there is that I would be hard pressed
to come up with any missions where a state Guard
would be reasonably expected to have aerossault skills with a helicopter, although, frankly,

(01:35):
from some of the stuff I've been seeing from the
aforementioned Florida State Guard, that question may be answered in
the short term because they are standing up aviation units
and aviation search and rescue capabilities, so the concept of
dangling people from helicopters in the Florida State Guard may
not be too far in the future. Now that being said,

(02:02):
all this is all gets back to resource management, whether
you are a federal commander, a state commander, whether you
are a federal officer or state governor or territorial governor.
If you're in trouble and there's an emergency and you
need resources, the first thing you're going to look at
is what resources are available. Now. Bosnia is a great example.

(02:26):
The resource that they needed was properly trained medical personnel.
And if your state Guard has them and your National
Guard doesn't have enough of them. The reality is that
even the federal military doesn't run medical school. You don't
hear of people going into the US Army to go
to the US Army's medical school. You hear about people

(02:48):
going into the US Army and people like, for instance,
Congressman Mark Green went to medical school paid for by
the US Army, but he was a West Point grad
and already a US Army officer, so that's not unusual.
Our former Surgeon General Richard Carmona, he went to medical
school on the GI Bill having been Special Forces in

(03:09):
Vietnam as an enlisted. So there are lots of examples
of where the military will develop military people by sending
them to civilian medical school. Well, all the State Defense
Force does is gives the opportunities to smart governors and
tags to turn around going, oh, if I need more
people qualified in this particular skill and in this one

(03:31):
it happens to be medicine, if my National Guard hasn't
recruited enough of them, has my State Guard recruited some?
Or can I incentivize my State Guard or my National
Guard to get me more of them, because I'm going
to need more medical professionals with the following skill sets.
On missions. The Bosnia mission is a great example of that,

(03:53):
just as the North Carolina Mission for Florida State Guard.
Florida sent specialized units that had already been skilled in
fast water and or flood rescue. Okay, again, you say
missions are a problem to be solved, you send the

(04:13):
problem solvers that are the most qualified to solve the
problem and come back home safely. That is what any
reasonable commander and resource manager is going to do. The
Bosnia emission was one of those. There are going to
be lots more. And part of the reason there haven't
been more up until this point is I still joke

(04:34):
around with our title ten compatriots, those working for the
Department of Defense and going, you know, you guys and
gals need to get out more. And I say that
with love and respect, because I'm talking to the warfighter
community who is and should be one hundred percent focused
on winning any war that we're in and bringing every
one of our sergeants snuffies home safely. That needs to

(04:57):
be one hundred percent of their focus. Are close too.
In the meantime during any of those missions, if they're
now bringing more National Guard troops in, if they are
missions that require specialization, then of course, if the State
Guard can produce those specialties or recruit those specialties without
cost to the taxpayers, then that becomes the tremendous value

(05:21):
that the State Guard has to the Department of Defense.
Is that we become specialized recruiting at a level of
department Defense cannot do