Paper: Elite Nuclear Forces Opened

Thursday, January 11th 2001, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

NEW YORK (AP) â€” The Pentagon has decided to once again allow members of the National Guard and reserves to serve on teams of elite strategic nuclear forces, The New York Times reported.

The decision, to be announced Thursday, would allow thousands of citizen soldiers to join the highly screened forces that guard and control the nation's nuclear weapons.

It would also enable the Air Force and Navy to consider new ways to use reserve troops and guardsmen for jobs that are becoming increasingly difficult to fill due to declining military enrollment.

``What we're ensuring is that the men and women of the Guard and reserves who have the expertise and willingness to serve are going to be part of the talent pool commanders can call on,'' Charles L. Cragin, the principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for reserve affairs, told the newspaper.

Reservists and guardsmen would still have to pass rigorous physical and psychological tests and submit to increased scrutiny of their personal lives.

During the Cold War, members of the National Guard and reservists routinely served in positions transporting nuclear weapons and operating launch sites, but began to be excluded from those jobs as the military developed into a more professional, strategic force.

That exclusion was codified into law in 1993.

Despite the decision, resistance to the idea remains, particularly among some commanders who believe that reservists and guardsmen don't have the necessary training to serve in such posts.

The decision further heightens the Pentagon's reliance on the roughly 870,000 members of the Guard and reserves.

With the active-duty military having shrunk by a third since the Cold War, such units have been used in nearly every recent operation overseas, from humanitarian relief to peacekeeping operations to the air war over Kosovo.

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On the Net:

Pentagon: http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/pentagon

National Guard: http://www.ngb.dtic.mil