‘Full-time leveling’ directive would ‘jeopardize’ Alaska Air Guard’s rescue, homeland defense missions, officials say
Alaska’s Air National Guard has been exempted from a congressional directive out of concern it would jeopardize search and rescue and national defense missions.
Federal Air National Guard acting commander Maj. Gen. Duke Pirak informed Alaska’s Air Guard this week that it’ll be exempted from the so-called “full-time leveling” program that’s intended to evenly distribute personnel assigned to all 54 state and territorial Guard units.
Alan Brown is a spokesperson for the Alaska National Guard and state Department of Military and Veterans affairs. He says the state needs all Air Guard personnel to remain on the job.
“The Alaskan Air National Guard is without a doubt the most operational Guard unit in the country,” he said.
Brown says the federal initiative would’ve affected 18 Air Guard members at Eielson Air Force Base, five at Clear Space Force Station and 57 at Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson.
“Air National Guard personnel in Alaska conduct air defense and combat search and rescue missions here out of JBER,” he said. “And they also conduct the early missile warning mission at Clear Space Force, and aerial refueling alert mission at Eielson.”
The full-time leveling would’ve cut the pay and benefits for some positions, and required converting others now filled by Active Guard and Reserve personnel into civilian jobs. Critics of the plan say that would’ve reduced readiness to scramble quickly for search and rescue missions, often in bad weather, and to help support long-distance operations like intercepting Russian and Chinese aircraft flying near Alaska’s airspace.
“We conduct multiple 24/7 missions that directly support homeland defense that a lot of other states or most other states don't,” Brown said. “These real-world missions have unique personnel requirements, and those go above and beyond what the Air Guard’s proposed full-time leveling plan included.”
Members of the state’s congressional delegation made the same argument to federal Air Guard officials. A statement issued by the delegation said they “strongly pressed Guard leaders to exempt Alaska from the planned cuts, highlighting the many unique missions of the Alaska Air Guard that are critically important to U.S. homeland defense, including missile warning, aerial refueling, and combat rescue.”
Sen. Dan Sullivan placed a hold on Pirak’s promotion to lieutenant general to pressure him and other high-ranking Guard officials to exempt Alaska from the full-time leveling mandate. A Sullivan spokesperson said the senator lifted that hold that Friday, three days after he decided to to grant the exemption because of the Alaska Air Guard’s mission requires those Active Guard and Reserve personnel.
“Fulltime Leveling did not fully consider these requirements,” Pirak said in an Aug. 20 letter to Sullivan informing the senator of his decision.
Brown says state officials and Guard members also spoke out against the proposal.
“Alaska Air National Guard was pretty adamant back in January when this proposal came out, that if we were going to lose those 80 active Guard-Reserve positions, that was going to jeopardize our ability to conduct these critical missions.”
He says one of the arguments raised about the staffing reductions was that they would require JBER’s three Air Guard squadrons under the 176th Wing -- the 210th, 211th and 212th Rescue Squadrons -- to cut back on civilian search and rescue missions.
“Those squadrons conduct on average more than a hundred civilian search and rescue missions every year, as requested by the Alaska Rescue Coordination Center here at JBER.”
Brown says the cuts also could’ve limited search and rescue response around the Interior by an Eielson-based UH-60 Pavehawk helicopter.
“If we were going to have to absorb the losses that the full-time leveling was prescribing, we would definitely have to reduce the number of civilian search and rescue missions.”
Brown said in an interview Wednesday that Guard personnel appreciate the efforts of the congressional delegation and Governor Mike Dunleavy in helping convince the federal Air National Guard to leave Alaska’s Air Guard’s staffing at present levels.
