Doesn't the fact that 50,000 reservists are being called up imply there's a major military operation on the horizon?

According to CNN, the Pentagon said, "These reservists are being called upon to provide port operations, medical support, engineer support, general civil support and homeland defense." But what happened to the guys normally doing those jobs? Where are they going?

-Tom

Well, in some cases, there isn't anyone "normally doing those jobs." Those jobs only get done in times of crisis, and to save money the military relies on reservists for those tasks. In other cases, the people who are doing those jobs are obviously being gathered so we can right-click on somebody on the other side of the map, er, globe.

>Well, in some cases, there isn't anyone "normally doing those jobs."

That's exactly right. I have several friends who were in the National Guard during the Gulf War and they were called up and sent over there. They were all in non-combat situations, like cooking, tracking supplies, things like that.

Nobody is doing them right now. This call-up is to start setting up the logistical tail to support a regular army. The NYT says that much of it is to support the 15-minute alert fighter aircraft (http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/14/international/14MILI.htm).

One thing the armed forces learned from Desert Storm was that it took almost as long to put a reserve unit into fighting trim as it did to create a new combat unit from scratch. However, that is not the case with logistic units; they can jump right into the job. Expect to see reserves mostly handling the support positions, and the pointy end of the spear will be regulars.

I would guess, and I haven't seen the reports, that they'll be providing assistance to the civilians already working these roles.

Active duty personnel stateside, if they aren't in command or support roles, spend most of their time training for deployment. Defense and civil assistance is really the job of the Guard and Reserve units.

Then again, they may be ramping up to get things into place for a major operation, but it doesn't sound like it from that quote.

- Raife

Robert Meyer wrote: "Well, in some cases, there isn't anyone "normally doing those jobs." Those jobs only get done in times of crisis,"

Which of those jobs only get done in times of crisis? What does the military need to do now that it wasn't doing before? I doubt CAP patrols over NY and DC require 50,000 reservists. This sounds to me like a case of having to fill the vaccum for a major movement of troops.

As Supertanker mentioned, this sounds like the logistical tail of a regular army about to be deployed somewhere.

William Harms wrote: "I have several friends who were in the National Guard during the Gulf War and they were called up and sent over there."

Exactly. And the Gulf War was a major movement of troops. Reservists get called up when the regular military is doing stuff like Desert Storm.

Raife wrote: "Then again, they may be ramping up to get things into place for a major operation, but it doesn't sound like it from that quote."

The Pentagon can't very well announce that their plans in advance. Until things firm up, they pretty much have to downplay their plans. I'm just reading between the lines. It seems that calling up reservists (nb. Bush embracing the language of war) is a pretty strong indicator of impending large military action.

-Tom

I wonder if there's a point where they could call up the inactive reserve. It would be very strange to find myself manning a gunnery station on a patrol boat after all these years.

Just a follow up to my own message...

To put into context the announcement that 50,000 reservists are being called up:

During Desert Storm, 250,000 reservists were called up. During the air war over Kosovo, 33,000 reservists were called up.

-Tom

Wow, Tom Chick posting actual facts to support his argument. What next, the apocalypse?

Okay, don't answer that.

"The Pentagon can't very well announce that their plans in advance. Until things firm up, they pretty much have to downplay their plans. I'm just reading between the lines. It seems that calling up reservists (nb. Bush embracing the language of war) is a pretty strong indicator of impending large military action."


It really depends on what the units are, where they're from, and where they deploy. I don't have any of this information (probably be more tomorrow), so any pronouncement is a little premature.

If they are mostly air & air support units, then they could very easily move on to support a strike.

The hammer is coming, that's for sure. Whether this is the handle, I'm not so sure. It doesn't sound like it, to me, based on their described roles. The Pentagon isn't going to say they're for one thing and secretly have them doing another (we're just not that organized). Yeah, 50,000 sounds like a lot, but the military tends to call up liberally when they do. That, and people need the reassurance that we're taking action. We didn't really have to worry about civil defense or disaster aid in either Kosovo or Desert Storm.

Security is tight everywehere. You can't even get into the VA Hospitals now without showing picture ID and signing in.

- Raife

My gut feeling is that the Administration is just trying to shore up national defense at this point.
Now if another 50,000 are called, and then another... That'll be something to make you go "Hmmm"

50000 sounds like quite a bit but really isn't. Since desert storm the military has been down sized quite a bit. The reservists that are called up are for support positions, mainly air guard and reserves. These handle refueling, troop transports, plane maintenece, some intelligence those type positions. Air guard and reserves do handle these type things normally. However they are normally scheduled around the members time on. They are expecting to need more time then the 2-3 days a month right now. To put it in perspective, to actually call up ground troops would involve a mininum of 12000 people per division.

I suspect that the Administration isn't sure what they're going to do right now, other than that we'll probably need ground troops over there.

I hope Bin Laden stays in Afghanistan. If he does, I think we'll get him. If he goes underground and starts fleeing to other countries, I'm not sure what we'll do. It's not like we can roll our tanks into Syria, Iraq, Iran, etc., because we're looking for him.

Get Bin Laden, destroy his camps, arrest as many of his agents as we can find, and maybe depose the Taliban too. I think those should be our goals. That Bin Laden's slippery, though.

Yeah, but he's also pretty arrogant. While he'll undoubtedly hide (more or less) I don't know that he'll leave the country.

But, I'm certainly not an expert in what he's likely to do, and for that, I am glad...I don't WANT to understand psychos like that.

He seems to think he's pretty untouchable, though. I guess, if I thought I was absolutely doing the will of God (which would never involve the slaughter of innocents) I might be inclined to think that He'd protect me indefinitely, too.