No cuts coming for National Guard, Army chief tells convention

RENO – The Army chief of staff told National Guard conventioneers Monday that they should not worry about federal funding because he knows of no pending cuts.

Gen. Raymond T. Odierno also told the crowd of 4,000 that he does not know whether the number of National Guard members will be reduced under President Barack Obama’s proposal to leave Afghanistan in 2014.

About half of the nation’s 675,000 National Guard members have served in war zones.

"It is up to me to ensure you have resources," Odierno told the crowd. "The long term is problematic. But we won’t send anybody in harm’s way without proper equipment, training and leadership."

Guard members gathered in Reno for their three-day National Guard Association’s national convention.

Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney will address the crowd this morning.

Obama will visit Las Vegas on Wednesday but has not scheduled an appearance at the convention.

The future of the National Guard as the war in Afghanistan winds down was on the minds of convention attendees and speakers Monday.

Odierno said that under the national Budget Control Act, defense spending will be reduced by $500 billion over the next 10 years, including $55 billion in January, unless Congress changes the law.

Romney has called the law a major mistake, while Paul Ryan, his vice presidential running mate, spent Sunday on TV talk shows defending his vote for the act.

Ryan said that he wanted to cut other parts of the federal budget, not defense.

Proposed defense spending for the 2013 fiscal year is $614 billion, down $32 billion from this year, but more than twice the figure from 2001.

The Nevada National Guard has 200 personnel in Afghanistan, with 120 more headed there this fall.

Besides their duty in war zones, National Guard members recently helped fight wildfires in the West, worked to help people displaced by Hurricane Isaac and served as security for the Democratic and Republican national conventions.

Even with the war slowing down, Maj. Gen. Frank Vavala, chairman of the National Guard Association, said future National Guard members can plan on spending one year out of every five on active duty.

The costs of preparing National Guard members is one-third of the regular active-duty military, he said.

"We provide that best bang for our bucks our taxpayers could hope for," Vavala said.

Contact reporter Ed Vogel at evogel@reviewjournal.com or 775-687-3901.