Posted on 05/17/2006 9:36:56 AM PDT by Abathar
CAPITOL HILL -- Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said using National Guard troops on the U.S. border will sharpen their "real-life" skills and won't weaken readiness.
Rumsfeld said President George W. Bush's plan to back up border patrols with some 6,000 Guard troops would use only about 2 percent of the total Guard force. He tells a Senate panel the Guard personnel mostly will be assigned during their weeks of active duty training. And Rumsfeld denies the deployment will diminish the response to emergencies at home or war-fighting overseas.
Rumsfeld was testifying on the Bush administration's 2007 defense budget and a request for an extra $65 billion this year for Iraq and Afghanistan.
Guard troops are under state control, but the bill for the border assignment will go to the federal government.
I like 18K and only about 6% myself...
Quite a practical amount...
30,000 sounds better
Thank God for Rummy. I suspect if he is given free reign here...we will actually see more results than the President anticipates...
The sad part of that edict will be that 3.000 of the Guards will only stay 1 year (another sneaky slop to the pigs in the U.S. electorate, slipped in the over 600 pages.
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