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Guest opinion: Time for Guard to join JCS

Should the chief of the National Guard Bureau have a full seat on the Joint Chiefs of Staff?

Many with whom I have spoken on this subject over the years have heard me say I am against it. Well, that was then. Call me a flip-flopper, but I have decided that I must change my position.

On one level, my Marine Corps heritage might predispose me toward this view. When the post-World War II Joint Chiefs system originated, the commandant of the Marine Corps was not included. When his membership was proposed, all manner of objections were raised.

Eventually, he was allowed to attend meetings and even to participate on “matters of importance to the Marine Corps.” But he was not a member.

Gen. Louis H. Wilson, the 26th Commandant and a recipient of the Medal of Honor, changed that based largely on his personal credibility. Today, I would wager that no one seriously doubts the propriety of full Marine Corps representation.

But those, perhaps, are emotional arguments. The fact is the Marine Corps is a service in its own right. Is the National Guard a service? Aren’t the Army National Guard and Air National Guard part of their “parent” services? That logic has always persuaded me until now.

But as I think more deeply about this question, I realize the answer is “not always.” Putting aside for a moment the fact that neither the Marine Corps nor the Air Force are mentioned in the Constitution, the framers of that remarkable document took note of three armed “services.”

In Article I, Section 8, they enumerated the power “to raise and support Armies; to provide and maintain a Navy; and to provide for … the Militia.” Three branches, identified with capital letters. But it is the Militia that is unrepresented on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, much to the detriment of a cohesive and coordinated national security effort.

When the Army National Guard is called to service as a part of the Army, it can certainly be argued that its equities will be well represented by the Army chief of staff. The same can undoubtedly be said for the Air National Guard and the Air Force.

But who speaks for the Militia? The effectiveness and availability of the Army and Air Guard to augment and reinforce under Title 10 is substantially related to the way they recruit, organize and train in a Militia status.

As the 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review and every subsequent force structure review has pointed out, in the 21st century the “total force” (which certainly includes the Militia) will be required to maintain America’s security and place in the world. Accordingly, the strength and well-being of the Militia will play a key role.

I have never heard an Army or Air Force chief of staff claim to be an expert on, or a spokesman for, the Militia. This is not false modesty on the part of those dedicated and exceptional officers. It is simply an honest recognition that the Militia experience is not an area within their training or expertise.

Successive four-star officers drawn from the regular military establishment and sent to lead U.S. Northern Command have quickly learned how little they knew prior to their assignment about the Militia.

In my own experience in the Pentagon, I saw firsthand the lack of understanding of basic Militia issues when the secretary of defense was presented with the necessity of making decisions about the assignment of Militia forces during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Regular flag officers, preeminently skilled in military operations, simply did not have some of the fundamental knowledge and experience the secretary of defense needed.

As expected, when the Joint Chiefs appeared before Congress recently to discuss this issue, they all say that the chief of the National Guard Bureau is a valued colleague who is almost always invited into “the Tank” for JCS meetings, and that they value his opinion. This sounds very reminiscent of the role prescribed for the commandant of the Marine Corps before Gen. Louis H. Wilson took his stand that led to the inclusion of the commandant as a full-fledged member of the Joint Chiefs.

The Militia is a constitutionally rooted force of vital national importance, especially in a time of grave threats at home as well as abroad. When military options are being prepared for the president and secretary of defense, the Militia’s viewpoint should be spoken by a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Dennis McCarthy is a retired Marine Corps major general and former assistant secretary of defense for reserve affairs.