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NATIONAL GUARD ON-THE-RECORD TELEPHONIC MEDIA ROUNDTABLE

September 1, 2021

TOPIC SUBJECT MATTER EXPERTS

National Guard Hurricane Ida and Western 

States Wildfire Response

 Army Gen. Daniel R. Hokanson, Chief, National 

Guard Bureau.

 Army Maj. Gen. David S. Baldwin, Adjutant 

General, California National Guard.

 Army Maj. Gen. Lee W Hopkins, Assistant Adjutant 

General, Louisiana National Guard.

 COL Greg G. St Romain, 225th Engineer Brigade 

Commander, Louisiana ARNG 

 Air Force Lt. Col. Chuck Steffens, MAFFS Pilot 

and Instructor, Nevada National Guard.

 Air Force Lt. Col. Jon Holland, 187th Airlift 

Squadron Command, Wyoming ANG

Introduction:

Good afternoon. Thank you for joining us for today's media roundtable, focusing on the National 

Guard response efforts in the aftermath of Hurricane Ida and the battle against wildfires in the 

western United States. Before we begin, I want to remind everyone that this event is on the 

record. This roundtable will last forty five minutes and begin with opening remarks from General 

Daniel Hokanson, Chief of the National Guard Bureau. He will be followed by remarks from 

Major General Lee Hopkins', the Assistant Adjutant General from the Louisiana National Guard, 

and Major General David Baldwin, the Adjutant General for the California National Guard. Also 

joining us today are Army Colonel Greg St Romain of the Louisiana Guard, Air Force 

Lieutenant Colonel Jon Holland of the Wyoming National Guard and Air Force Lieutenant 

Colonel Chuck Steffen's of the Nevada National Guard. With that, General Hokanson over to 

you, Sir.
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Opening Statement:

Army Gen. Daniel R. Hokanson, Chief, National Guard Bureau:

Thank you. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for the opportunity to provide 

an update on National Guard operations around the world. First, in light of the events of this 

week, I would like to take a minute to acknowledge the National Guard soldiers and airmen who 

served and sacrificed over the past 20 years in Afghanistan. As a combat reserve with the Army, 

the Air Force, our presence in this war with significant. Our service includes efforts over the past 

several weeks in Kabul, where National Guard men and women served alongside their active 

duty reserve and State Department colleagues. Over the past two decades the National Guard has 

deployed more than two hundred and sixty five thousand times to Operation Enduring

Freedom and Operation Freedom Sentinel. And two hundred and twenty six Guard members 

gave their lives in Afghanistan. We remain forever grateful to those who serve so selflessly, their 

families, and especially our Gold Star families. Our hearts go out to the families of those killed 

and wounded in the past week and the people of Afghanistan. Here at home, the National Guard 

continues to live up to our promise of always ready, always there. Of the over fifty six thousand 

nine hundred guard men and women on duty today, more than sixty five hundred from eleven 

states are helping their communities respond to the aftermath of Hurricane Ida. In Louisiana 

alone, more than 5400 Guard members are working across thirty one parishes to save lives and 

expedite recovery efforts. We're expecting that number to increase over eight thousand by 

tomorrow. Equipped with more than one hundred and seventy five high water vehicles and 40 

helicopters, they're conducting search and rescue sweeps, providing security and support of local 

law enforcement, establishing distribution locations for people to get food and water, and are 

clearing roads to allow crews to restore power to over one million residents. I've asked

Major General Lee Hopkins', Louisiana's assistant adjutant general, and Colonel Greg St

Romain, the Louisiana National Guard's two hundred and twenty fifth engineer brigade 

commander, to join us remotely. And in a few minutes, they will cover some of the conditions 

that they're facing there. Hurricane Ida is not the National Guard's only major effort. However, 

out west, where nearly five million acres have burned so far this year. Nearly twelve hundred 

and fifty citizen soldiers and airmen are battling wildfires. This includes three of our C-130 

firefighting aircraft, 16 Black Hawk and Lakotah helicopters and three aerial systems that are 

mapping fire locations. I've asked Major General Dave Baldwin, adjutant general of California, 

and pilots, Lieutenant Colonel Chuck Steffen's from the Nevada National Guard, Lieutenant 

Colonel John Holland from the Wyoming National Guard. Both who fly our C-130 is equipped 

with a modular airborne firefighting system or MAFFS to join us. With respect to COVID 

operations, over twelve thousand seven hundred guard men and women continue to support their 
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local hospitals and communities across the nation. In support of Operation Allies Welcome, 

we're working closely with the State Department, Department of Homeland Security, US 

Northern Command and US Transportation Command. Nearly eight hundred National Guard 

members are assisting with the relocation of Afghan nationals to six sites throughout the country. 

That's in addition to the air crews and support teams directly involved in the airlift operations. 

We do all of this and continue to meet every overseas deployment requirement with more than 

seventeen thousand seven hundred National Guardsmen and women providing assistance on the 

ground and in the air to our combatant commanders. As the combat reserve with the

Army, the Air Force, we are trained and equipped to fight our nation's wars, but in times of 

emergency, those same people, training and equipment provide us the ability to respond to our 

communities when they need us most. At this time, I'd like to welcome Major General

Lee Hopkins to give us an update on the recovery efforts in Louisiana. And he'll be followed by 

Major General Dave Baldwin to give us an update on the water situation in California. Lee, over 

to you.

MAJ GEN Lee Hopkins, Assistant Adjutant General, Louisiana National Guard:

Thank you very much, General Hokanson. And I thank you for the close cooperation and 

coordination with the NGB, with our staffs in Louisiana is very helpful. As we look back to 

2020, we watched Hurricane Laura impact the state of Louisiana with the hurricane winds up to 

one hundred fifty miles per hour. And that was a record that had not been broken back to 

eighteen fifty six. And here we are today, almost to the day, one year later. And we're responding 

to Hurricane Ida, which match that same one hundred fifty mile per hour winds. So this is 

definitely one of those situations where the going gets tough, the tough have to get going.

So several days prior to our hurricane landfall, our governor, Governor Edwards, and our 

adjutant general, Major General Keith Waddell, made the decision to really go all hands on deck. 

And we mobilized all of our available soldiers and airmen for the response. So and for the pre 

storm response, we kind of followed our playbook. We prepositioned our search and rescue 

assets forward. We pushed our engineer around clearance assets to those affected parishes. And 

then we looked at how our communications assets were flowed across those parishes that were in 

the projected storm path. And as soon as landfall happened and the winds allowed, all those high 

water vehicles and helicopters you talked about, we launched them and we were out in thirty one

parishes conducting search and rescue and looking for the people who were stranded in 

Louisiana. So far, we've rescued three hundred ninety three citizens and sixty pets and we 

continue making those search and rescue sweeps in the areas where the waters still remain. 

Those flood waters in support of four parishes at this point. We currently have over four hundred 

soldiers and airmen who are conducting security operations in six parishes, and as we kind of 

begin to taper down on our search and rescue missions, we anticipate that our security missions
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will grow, especially as parishes welcome their citizens back to their home so they can pick up 

the pieces after the storm. Our engineers and I know COL St. Romain is on the line to talk, but 

our engineers began assessing and clearing roads to support those first responders and 

emergency vehicles so they would have access throughout the areas. Today, they have cleared 

excuse me, they have assessed more than two hundred twenty miles and they've cleared four 

hundred and three miles of road to get debris out of the way to allow that access. Once those 

roads are cleared, our engineers will transition to working with the parishes to clear 

governmental buildings and municipal buildings to allow access so they can stand up their 

government and get back in working order. Engineers have done a lot, but we still have a lot left 

to do. We just began moving into one of our most manpower intensive missions, which is 

commodity distribution. During pre-storm, we relocated and moved hundreds of thousands of 

meals and hundreds of thousands of bottled water to our region staging area. We took the pre 

storm time to get all of our trucks loaded. We got our convoys lined up and we were fully 

prepared prior to the storm coming in and we hunkered down. Once the storm passed, we 

immediately pushed those convoys out to establish points of distribution or as we call them, 

pods. As of today, we're operating 17 pods in support of nine parishes. But we know in the 

coming days that's going to grow to over 40 pods. And we anticipate during this response we'll 

hand out millions of bottles of water and millions of meals to support the affected citizens of 

Louisiana. With that increase in manpower it's very important that we give a thank you to the 

EMAC partners that are coming to help. So on behalf of our governor and our adjutant general, I 

would like to thank the governors and the adjutant general in those states who are sending 

EMAC forces to help the citizens of Louisiana. So far, we have currently 15 states that have 

committed to help and they're on their way and we have many others that have offered support. 

So we thank them. These forces did begin arriving yesterday and are coming in today and the 

next day. And I can tell you they're coming just in time as our missions are increasing. Our 

soldiers and airmen have been doing remarkably hard work in support of this response.

But we have a lot left to do to recover. And our EMAC partners will be a key role in that 

recovery. And I would like to take a quick moment, General Hokanson talked about the deployed 

soldiers and airmen. Louisiana currently has twenty four hundred soldiers and airmen who are 

deployed and one of the major units and the majority that units, the two five, six Infantry 

Brigade, which is the largest unit in state Louisiana. We are so extremely proud of all of our 

soldiers and airmen who deployed, who are supporting this nation and the great job that they're 

doing in that mission. And as a personal note, 16 years ago, I was deployed with the two, five, 

six overseas and we watch Hurricane Katrina, hit Louisiana. So I want to let the soldiers and 

airmen who deploy know that while they're taking care of their Federal mission and serving our 

nation, we're at home, we've got their backs, we're going to take care of the home front and we 

look forward to their safe return soon. And General Hokanson, thank you so much for inviting us 

in and allowing us to share our story.
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MAJ GEN David Baldwin, Adjutant General, California National Guard:

Good morning, everyone, from California. Good afternoon, if you're in the East Coast, thanks for 

taking the time to cover the great work that our National Guard and partners are doing across the 

nation, and in particular here in California, as we battle some pretty horrendous wildfires.

The fire situation here in California remains pretty dire. We have 16 major fires burning 

throughout the state. Now, that may not seem a lot, 20 or 30 years ago, we'd have many more 

fires burning. But the significant difference is these fires are huge. As a matter of fact, the fires 

are making runs of twenty and thirty thousand acres per day. And 20 or 30 years ago, a big fire 

was a 20 thousand acre fire that burned for several weeks. But now we're seeing in a single day 

that kind of massive growth in the big fires that we've got going. The other thing that's happening 

is the first time I've ever seen it in my career dealing with forest fires is fires will start on the 

west side of the Sierra and burn up and over the top and into the east side of the Sierra. That's 

never happened before. The fuel conditions remain pretty bad and our weather is not conducive 

for putting these fires out quickly. We currently have over twenty five hundred soldiers, airmen

and sailors from the Cal Guard that are conducting emergency response operations and law 

enforcement operations throughout the state. Of those, one thousand three hundred and fifty 

eight are dedicated to fire support and fire suppression operations. Like Louisiana, we're getting 

a lot of help from outside states. We have 10 states that have contributed forces, mainly aviation 

units, to participate and assist us with putting out these fires. We're also getting help from the

United States Air Force Reserve. And just last night, we got a battalion from the active army out 

of Fort Lewis that's coming in to provide additional type two hand crews for firefighting on the 

ground. This is particularly critical for us in California because like

Louisiana, having their brigade combat team deployed, our aviation brigade is from

California, is currently deployed to the Middle East. So we really appreciate the help from the 

other states. And I especially am appreciative of Louisiana, who has sent this aviation support. 

And it's going to continue to send us aviation support here in California to deal with our fire as 

well. Concurrently, they're dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Ida. So

General Hopkins passed on to General Waddell my deep appreciation for that, that's really 

awesome. In California, we're providing a broad spectrum of military capability to support fire 

suppression and consequence management operations. This is goes from space based systems 

that we're leveraging to boots on the ground, putting out the fires. We have twenty three aircraft 

engaged. That includes water bucket equipped helicopters, medical evacuation helicopters, the 

modular airborne firefighting systems that General Hokanson mentioned and that Lieutenant 

Colonel Steffens and Holland will talk about later. And incident awareness aircraft that include 

both manned and unmanned surveillance platforms that are assisting with fire mapping and 

disaster assistance. A note on the medevac yesterday. Our medevac crews out of the 129th rescue 
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wing saved a firefighter that was severely burned on the Caldor fire. And it happened to be the 

very first mission of our newest para rescue men, Senior Airman Keith Hughes, on his first 

mission, helped save the life of that firefighter and transport him to a burn unit in Sacramento. In 

addition to the air breathing aircraft that we have operating on this mission, we're also using 

satellite systems that we leverage for mapping and disaster assistance. On the ground we have

twenty five Cal Guard hand crews from the National Guard and our State Guard, including nine 

very elite type one hand crews that we have trained up and are operating year round now for both 

fuel reduction and fire suppression activity. We have soldiers that are manning traffic control 

points in two counties working both the Dixie fire and the Caldor fire, and they are helping assist 

in evacuations and then securing areas that have been evacuated to prevent looters. We're also 

providing logistic support to Cal Fire in the form of fuel trucks and warehouse personnel that are 

helping them move the massive amount of commodities that are required to sustain all the 

firefighters and support personnel working these issues. We anticipate more missions here in 

California because the fuel conditions remain explosive. The weather is still hot and very, very 

dry, and it's going to be a problem for some time to come. But we're in this for the long haul and 

we're postured. And again, we appreciate all the help that we're getting from our outside partner 

states. Thank you.

COL Greg St. Romain, 225th Engineer Brigade Commander, Louisiana Army National 

Guard:

Thank you so much for this opportunity. I'm Colonel Greg St Romain, the 225th Engineer

Brigade commander within the Louisiana Army National Guard. So in regards specifically to 

Hurricane Ida response, we're in support of search and rescue operations, engineer support and 

distribution of commodities. We continue to be versatile and adaptable to this emerging 

response. And again, thank you so much.

Lt Col Jon Holland, 187th Airlift Squadron Commander, Wyoming Air National Guard:

Good morning or afternoon, depending on where you are in the country. I'm Lieutenant Colonel

John Holland from the Wyoming Air National Guard. I've been out here for the last week and a 

half flying on a crew with one of our MAFFS aircraft. I'm going to rotate out here shortly and 

then I'm sure I'll be back out in another week or so. But we can hear outside right now. Things 

are starting to spool up and air traffic start to go to work. But I'm happy to be out here and 

helping with the effort.

Lt Col Chuck Steffens, MAFFS Pilot and Instructor, Nevada National Guard
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Yes, I'm Lt Col Chuck Steffens, MAFFS pilot. I'm the mission planner that's going to be 

launching these airplanes off to go out and support our communities.

Dialogue:

[Name] [QUESTION/RESPONSE]

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:17:17]

Thank you, gentlemen. And with that, I would like to take this brief 

opportunity to remind folks to joined us late that this is an on the 

record event. We are on the record and being respectful of time. I'd 

like to ask the media to please stick to one question and we will 

allow for additional questions. If time permits, if we're unable to

address your question, I'll take note of it and we will try to get you 

an answer as soon as we can. We are also putting member bios in a 

fact sheet into the chat window of the Zoom for media to be able to 

ensure that they have proper spellings of all the participants’ names.

With that, I'd like to open the floor to questions, starting with Travis 

Loller from Associated Press. Are you with us? Do you have a 

question?

Travis Loller, The Associated Press

[00:17:57]

I'm here. Just a quick clarification. Major General Hopkins. Did you 

say that the entire Louisiana National Guard was activated prior to 

the hurricane? Everyone.

MAJ GEN Lee Hopkins, 

Assistant Adjutant General, LANG

[00:18:17]

Yes, we took the opportunity to to mobilize all available. Of course, 

we have some who are not available some of those who also first 

responders or are supporting other missions, such as the personnel 

who are supporting overseas operations.
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Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:18:35] Thank you. We'll move on next to NBC, Courtney Kube or Mosheh 

Gains, are one of you on the line? Nothing heard moving on next to 

Stars and Stripes Rose Thayer. Are you with us?

Rose Thayer, Stars and Stripes

[00:18:52]

Yes, I am. Thank you for putting this together. I had a question, I 

guess, both in California and in Louisiana. Can you describe some 

of the conditions that service members are facing as they're 

conducting their work? I mean, I'm guessing in California it's hot 

and smoky and that in Louisiana. Whoever wants to go first just to 

paint a picture for people on what it's like to be doing this?

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:19:30]

I think I'd like to offer this up to Colonel St Romain to start and then 

we will shift to California.

COL Greg St. Romain, 225th Engineer Brigade Commander, LA ARNG

[00:19:39]

OK, thank you very much. Well, as I continue to move around, 

impacted areas throughout the portions of the south and southeast of 

Louisiana that were impacted, there's no doubt there's quite a bit of 

infrastructure damage, a lot of homes that have been damaged

,roadways that were closed off from traffic. But again, I know we'll 

likely maybe discuss that in further, but that's where a lot of our 

route clearance operations have taken place. And the engineers, 

including interagency partners, we're doing we're working together 

to clear the route. So we're allowing vehicles, emergency vehicles 

to continue to move in some of those impacted areas. Specifically, 

you're talking about power companies. A lot of power lines are 

down. So it's a lot of limited traffic ability throughout those areas. 

But it's been amazing to see the work. Everybody's everyone's 

working together to clear those routes and as efficient and effective 
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as possible. Thank you.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:20:47]

Thank you, sir. I'd like to go to California now. General Baldwin or 

your pilots have some things that can offer up the operating 

conditions of California.

MAJ GEN David Baldwin, Adjutant General, CANG

[00:20:58]

So I'll defer to the pilots first to let them talk about it, what it's like 

flying in these very treacherous aviation conditions.

Lt Col Chuck Steffens, MAFFS Pilot and Instructor, Nevada National Guard

[00:21:08]

I think you saw it, so you hit the nail on the head. It's pretty hot. It's 

pretty smoky. Occasionally the smoke will clear out because the 

wind will pick up. But when the wind picks up, the fire tends to get 

up and run and spread quickly, as General Baldwin mentioned 

earlier. So getting in and out of the different air tanker bases to load 

the retardant to make sure that we've got enough fuel on board to get 

back to the fire, get on scene, and then work quickly enough to stay 

out in front of the movement of the fire so that some of those ground 

crews can really get to work and try and stand this thing up when 

they can. Is pretty key, especially with the Dixie fire, the Caldor fire 

being two of the big ones right now as they start to move into places 

where they threaten structures. There's a lot of air assets that are 

flying on those incidents. And so making sure that we are well 

coordinated and orchestrated with everybody that's in the airspace 

to get that effectively dealt with and try to mitigate as best as 

possible is kind of the picture for us.

Rose Thayer, Stars and Stripes

[00:22:28]

Thank you. I appreciate that.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA
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[00:22:32]

Anyone else have anything to add onto that question?

MAJ GEN David Baldwin, Adjutant General, CANG

[00:22:33]

It's General Baldwin. And then for our troops on the ground, 

beginning with our hand crews, the type one hand crews are 

operating in extremely treacherous terrain because a lot of these 

fires are burning way up high in the Sierra. So it's mountainous 

terrain. There's a lot of hazards with risk of fallen trees because 

they're working on active fire line. They're often faced with huge

walls of flame. The smoke is choking, because it's extremely thick 

with air quality. Index is as high as four hundred or however high it 

goes there at it. It's very hot during the day. And this time of year it 

gets very cold at night. So temperatures are approaching freezing at

night. Our hand crews work twenty four hour shifts. Which is very, 

very physically demanding. And it's tough on them. Our security 

force soldiers are operating in the same conditions where often 

they're flanked by fire. So they have to be very cognizant of their 

escape routes. And addition to dealing with smoke all during the 

day, they're sleeping outside in tents. So they're exposed to all of 

those hazards. In addition to for both the hand crews and the security 

force people being having to see all the destruction that's wrought

by these fires, because unfortunately, we don't get very many 

damaged buildings. And in fires, all the buildings, almost all the 

buildings are destroyed. And it could be very heart wrenching to see 

entire communities like the town of Greenville that's just gone. And 

that takes a toll also. So what our soldiers and airmen are taking on 

stride and performing their missions magnificently.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:24:14]

Thank you, sir, General Hopkins, I believe you had a clarification 

you'd like to add.

MAJ GEN Lee Hopkins, Assistant Adjutant General, LANG

[00:24:20]
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I sure can. I mean, California has hot and smoky, I can tell you, 

Louisiana has hot and humid. And as Colonel St Romain discussed 

with the power outages, our soldiers and airmen operating in austere 

conditions. But we're doing everything we can to make life is good 

for them as possible as they serve the citizens of Louisiana. But as 

General Baldwin said, our soldiers and airmen take it all in stride. 

Our motto in Louisiana is protect what matters. And they're going 

to do everything they can to do that. And because it's just what we

do in Louisiana and other states, we protect what matters.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:24:57]

Thank you, sir. I've just been made aware, apparently a point of 

clarification, too, that apparently the engineers, if your teams have 

assessed two hundred and two thousand one hundred and twelve 

miles of road in areas in Louisiana. Thank you, sir. So we'll move 

on next to CNN. Ellie Kaufman, are you on the line or do you have 

a question? Nothing heard. ABC News, Matt Seyler, are you on the 

line, you have a question. Nothing heard. We'll move on to Army 

Times, Davis Winkie are you on the line?

Davis Winkie, Army Times

[00:25:39]

Yes, I am. Wayne, thanks for organizing, putting this together. My 

question is for mainly General Hokanson, but the other GO's could

probably chime in as well. It's really sticks out to me and, you know, 

I'm a guard officer myself, that for both the states most affected right 

now, the formations that would be most effective in this kind of state 

mission, that is the spirit of the guard are overseas deployed. And so 

are we at all concerned about the confluence of these op tempos, you

know, the federal op tempo that's been relentless for two decades 

and then this increasing tempo upstate stuff as climate change seems 

to increase the frequency and intensity of stuff like these wildfires 

and like these hurricanes, are we at all worried about the effects of

this cumulative op tempo on the soldiers as these things keep piling 

up? Thanks.

GEN Daniel Hokanson, Commander, NGB
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[00:26:53]

David, thanks for the question. And as regards when you're probably 

aware, as I led off with my statement, is the primary mission of our 

National Guard is to fight and win our nation's wars. And we're 

manned, trained and equipped to do so. And it's those capabilities 

that allow us the ability to really to respond to our communities 

when they need us most. And so when we look at the 40thCombat 

Aviation Brigade out of California and the two fifty six the Infantry 

Brigade Combat Team out of Louisiana being deployed, first and 

foremost, that's their federal mission, which is most important. The 

one thing that we do and we've done previously, particularly with 

our state's most prone to hurricanes, is we have an all hazards 

conference in the summer. And what we do is we take a look at each 

of the states and those units that are deployed, and then we really 

mitigate the risk by identifying units that could fill a lot of the

capabilities that they would normally provide. So in this case, with 

the 256th that all hazards conference, they notify those capabilities 

that will be gone as they are right now. And those states then pony 

up or say, hey, I will provide this capability. And as Lee Hopkins' 

mentioned, those units are enroute. They'll get there today and 

tomorrow and provide that capability just in time. Now, the thing 

that we've learned about forest fires and wildfires is previously we 

kind of looked at a wildfire season. It started usually June, July and 

until October. But under the current conditions and the winds and 

the things that we're facing and the extended drought periods, those 

fire seasons literally go without end. They start early in the year. 

They go late into the year. And so it's more of what we call afire 

year. And so this is the first year that we've really taken the 

opportunity similar to like hurricanes. And we met in March with 

the National Interagency Fire Center to talk about and really take a 

similar approach that we do as hurricanes to identify those 

capabilities. And in most cases, it's not just ground crews, but it's 

primarily air crews as well. We identified the fact that the 40th 

combat aviation brigade out of California would be gone. And so 

states across the country identified air crews trained them in advance 

so that as California needs them, that they can get there in a timely 

manner to make a difference. And so what we've really learned from 

this is we have to do our federal mission. That's the whole reason 
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the guard exists. But we're also well aware of those natural disasters 

or recurring disasters we have to be ready for. So we're doing 

everything we can to look forward planned for these so that the 

states still have the capabilities they need in a timely manner. And 

with that, I'll hand it over to both Lee and Dave to add anything 

more. Thank you.

MAJ GEN Lee Hopkins, Assistant Adjutant General, LANG

[00:29:40]

Gen Hokanson, Lee Hopkins here, I can tell you that's exactly what 

we always play a role in the All Hazards Conference this year, we 

looked at the possibility of having an event while the 256th was

deployed and we planned accordingly to ensure that we had the right 

assets available to be prepared to roll in. We've taken that plan and 

we're executing that plan. And as a result, 15 states have committed 

and they're rolling in to help and more are available if we need it. 

So, again, we plan for this. And it worked out as the plan comes 

through to help Louisiana.

MAJ GEN David Baldwin, Adjutant General, CANG

[00:30:22]

So we have historically gone to other states during fire season for 

rotary wing aircraft support and of course, MAFFS support and 

General Hokinson’s led the way this year and doing using the

hurricane model to prepare even further so we could bring in air 

crews quickly. So the EMAC model works. However, in California, 

we do have a problem in that across the nation there's one National 

Guardsman for every forty seven citizens of the United States. In 

California, that ratio is one to every one hundred and forty seven. 

So our guard is much smaller than per capita than what the average 

is across the United States. And we're in a state that is constantly in 

a state of emergency. So our demand signal is much, much higher. 

And we do see a strain on the formations that we have to go back to 

the well to time and time again to respond. So our military police 

units, our aviation units are MAFFS units and our combat arms units 

are the ones that we constantly are going to deploy. We've had 

military police companies last year doing non-COVID missions that 

were on duty, that had soldiers on duty for as many as one hundred 
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and fifty days out of the year. It's a tremendous strain on the force 

and it's something that we're working with both the Congress and 

the National Guard Bureau to try to address this imbalance in the 

force ratios of where people are allocated. Frankly, California 

National Guard needs to be significantly bigger to meet the demands 

that are required for supporting a population of 40million people.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:31:55]

Thank you, sir. Lisa Kaplan from Fox News, are you on the line and 

you have a question? Nothing heard. Kevin McCarren from CBS, 

are you on the line, you have a question? Nothing heard. CNBC, 

Amanda Macias, are you on the line? Nothing heard Caitlin from 

Defense One, are you on line? Nothing heard. Alan Millhiser from 

Synopsis. Are you online? OK, is a reporter on the line here, Angie 

Simoneaux from KTK News. All right, KRCA News, are you 

online? Alan Mitchell from the Hill. OK, is there anybody else 

online with a question?

Patricia Kime, Military.com

[00:33:10]

Hi, Wayne, it's Patricia Kime with Military.com.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:33:13]

Thank you, Patricia, go ahead, please.

Patricia Kime, Military.com

[00:33:15]

Yes, you know, there was some discussion earlier this year and 

about restructuring the guard or at least more manpower. Could I get 

an update on whether that's going to be a possibility perhaps in the 

next couple of years, given what General Baldwin just said? And 

what are the thoughts on the right size of the National Guard?

GEN Daniel Hokanson, Commander, NGB

[00:33:45]

Patricia, Dan Hokanson here, I'll take the lead on that. So when we 
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look at additional force structure, when the National Guard and this 

really goes back to the fact that all of our force structure is really 

designed to fight our nation's wars. And so we work very closely 

with the service secretaries, in this case, the secretary of the Air 

Force and the secretary of the Army. And we look for opportunities 

when there's growth in force structure to put that potentially in the 

National Guard. And the service secretaries have to look across all 

three components of both the Army and the Air Force and determine 

where the best place is to put that. We think obviously because of 

the ability to respond to our states in a state active duty for title thirty

two status and also for the federal mission under Title 10, that we 

can really address a myriad of issues. And so we always, of course, 

want to put our best foot forward to to have those growth 

opportunities stationed in the National Guard.

Patricia Kime, Military.com

[00:34:44]

And if I may ask a follow up of a both General Hopkins and General 

Baldwin, my first question will be how long do you anticipate that 

the response to Ida may actually take? Can you project this far out 

how long it will take based on what you're seeing on the ground and 

then which are the fires that really are the guard highly concentrated 

at out in California?

MAJ GEN Lee Hopkins, Assistant Adjutant General, LANG

[00:35:15]

Because I appreciate the question, Patricia. We anticipate by some 

of the past responses we have, we figure that we're going to be at 

peak operations for about two to three weeks, and that will be 

closely tied into what some of the power is restored to a lot of the 

communities. But at that point, once we have power restored, we 

have running water, we have stores open that will give us the 

opportunity to begin right sizing our forces, that we're doing the 

right missions and begin a ramp. Now, this could go as long with a 

smaller force of another month or two months. But again, we peak 

operation to another two to three weeks before we see those triggers 

met that allow us to right size.
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Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:35:59]

Thank you, Sir. 

General Baldwin.MAJ GEN David Baldwin, Adjutant General, CANG

[00:36:01]

And so in terms of length of the mission, last year, we had soldiers 

and airmen in California fighting fires on Christmas Eve. So we 

have many months ahead of us of this in terms of troop

concentrations. We have if you include the active component, there's 

probably about a little over six hundred soldiers and airmen and 

sailors on the Dixie fire, which is now the largest single fire in 

California history. The largest fire was the August complex from 

last year, which is over a million acres. But that was a complex of 

several fires. The Dixie fire is the largest single fire and it's up over 

eight hundred thousand acres now. So we have about 600 military 

personnel on that fire. There's about three hundred military 

personnel on the Caldor fire. And then which is where most of our 

effort is, we have most of our effort. The exception is with our 

MAFFS flying on pretty much every fire in Northern California as

conditions allow them to drop their launch and hit the Monument 

fire or the Antelope Fire, Dixie Fire or whatever US Forest Service 

or Cal Fire needs.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:37:15]

Thank you, sir. Are there any other reporters with a question?

Patricia Kime, Military.com

[00:37:19]

This is Gina Cavaleiro with Army magazine.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:37:22]

Welcome. Please go ahead.

Gina Cavaleiro, Army Magazine

[00:37:23]
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I chimed in a little bit late, but I'd like to follow up on Patricia Kime's 

question about the shape of the National Guard for General

Hokanson. I think this is the realignment of the 8th Division 

headquarters with the brigade combat brigades to help be ready to 

look like the active duty army. Would that new configuration, as it 

takes shape, also help in these sorts of responses to domestic

emergencies? Thank you.

GEN Daniel Hokanson, Commander, NGB

[00:37:55]

Thank you for that question. And you really hit on one of the 

founding principles behind this. Number one, we want to make sure 

that our divisions are structured exactly like those on the active 

Army. So that we did this we went from 10 divisions in the Army to 

18 full divisions in the Army. When you include the eight from the 

National Guard. And when you look at the fact that previously we 

really were focused at the brigade level of anywhere from three to 

four thousand soldiers, but we align in divisions. We can be up to 

15 and sometimes greater than 15 thousand soldiers in a single 

formation. And so what it provides us the capability when we have 

large scale combat operations, number one, they're trained and ready 

to do that. But if you look at the response in the homeland now, we 

actually have a two star headquarters with a significant number of 

personnel and equipment that could respond really as an

organization to a large scale event. And so that is one of the 

sidelights and benefits of this whole organization.

Gina Cavaleiro, Army Magazine

[00:39:00]

And is that what do you project that that will look the way you want 

it to look? How long will that take?

GEN Daniel Hokanson, Commander, NGB

[00:39:07]

We're just over our first year into this. We've made a lot of great 

strides. And it really depends on the level of training and resourcing 

that we have. But I see probably within the next year or two and 

we'll work very closely with the division headquarters to the point 
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where which they feel they've got the relationships and they're really 

lines of communications established well enough that they could 

operate as a division. And so it's kind of a conditions based. But 

we're hoping to get that with a first couple of units within the next 

year or two.

Gina Cavaleiro, Army Magazine

[00:39:38]

Thank you.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:39:40]

Thank you. Any other reporters with a question?

Davis Winkie, Army Times

[00:39:43]

Yeah, when I've got another line of questions.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:39:45]

OK, Davis, go ahead with your question, please.

Davis Winkie, Army Times

[00:39:49]

OK, this one is about the duty statuses in the respective missions. 

In the California missions at least you've got Guardsmen working

alongside their title 10 counterparts. And in Louisiana, we've got a 

kind of massive EMAC response. Are these guys and gals in a state 

active duty status or is there a way to get them on the title 32 to 

ensure that they'll be able to get VA benefits should they be injured

in these very hazardous conditions and maybe career some other 

benefits as well. Thanks.

GEN Daniel Hokanson, Commander, NGB

[00:40:35]

David, I'll start out Dan Hokanson, and then I hand it off to both 

Dave and Lee But when we look at the response under state active 

duty, they fall under pay and benefits from that specific state under 
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which they are operating. And under an EMAC agreement, if 

somebody is coming from Mississippi to help Louisiana, they will 

be under a state active duty status and paid in benefits by the state 

of Louisiana. And this is unique under the governor's authority 

under which they do that. And you kind of contrast this with the 

Covid mission, where we have folks under title thirty two, but that's 

under a federal FEMA mission assignment under which they have

been tasked. And so the one thing that we do is we work with the 

fifty four states territories in D.C. to try and at least get the benefits 

as close to comparable as possible. Some cases that are a little bit 

less than they would if they were under Title 32 status. In other states 

it's actually a better process or better pay. And I'll hand it off to both 

Dave Baldwin and Lee Hopkins to talk about their specific 

scenarios.

MAJ GEN David Baldwin, 

Adjutant General , CANG

[00:41:43]

Thanks Sir, Steve Baldwin again. As you know, Davis the duty 

status is a tremendously complicated. So we do have Title 10 people 

that you mentioned. We have our type one hand crews that are on

duty year round or on title thirty two. We're actually paying them 

out of a mission assignment from FEBA for covid response. The 

other troops that we have in the main are on state active duty. And 

then even then there's a delineation between those who are actively 

engaged in fire suppression get fire pay, which is the regular pay 

plus a bump forfor hazardous duty, whereas the security force 

people are just drawing their regular state active duty pay, which in 

California comports exactly to what you're paying allowances

would be if you were in Title 32 on Title 10 status in terms of risk 

and benefits, benefits or coverage if you're injured in California, we 

have a state compensation insurance fund that covers injuries and 

cost of injuries incurred if a soldier or airman gets hurt out fighting 

a fire and then provides for long term care, it is by no means as 

comprehensive a coverage as what you would get through the VA. 

So if you're on title thirty two and you get injured and you become 

a hundred percent disabled, those benefits are far greater than what 
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the state provides. So it is an issue, but it's one of the things, as you 

know, we have to deal with with operating in a state status versus a 

federal status.

MAJ GEN Lee Hopkins, Assistant Adjutant General, LANG

[00:43:19]

Yes, in Louisiana, we're very similar to California, how we operate 

our pay and benefits mirror that of an active duty person. But the 

key point is some of the benefits aren't the same as with California. 

Louisiana has a worker's compensation insurance that would cover 

any injury or illness that happens. But, you know, there is a benefits 

difference with the VA and with health insurance that would come 

with Title 32. Being that it's a short duration event normally for us. 

Those are things that we deal with, but it's what we have to work 

with right now.

GEN Daniel Hokanson, Commander, NGB

[00:43:58]

And, David, if I could add one last thing is also there's been a lot of 

significant work over the past couple of years on duty status reform, 

because when you look at the number of various statuses that service

members could be in, and there was well over 20 of those, and 

there's been a significant effort within the Department of Defense to 

reduce that down to eight duty statuses that didn't make it through 

the legislative cycle this year. But I think it'll be a priority next year.

And this is not specific to state active duty, but it really addresses a 

lot of those disparities that we've seen between folks in a different 

duty status in terms of title 32 or Title 10 that are working side by 

side. And the intent there is to make sure that they have equal 

benefits when we're asking them to do equal duties.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:44:47]

Sir, thank you very much and thank you the members of the media 

for joining us. We are up on our time. I'd like to turn things back 

over to General Hokanson for closing comments.

GEN Daniel Hokanson, Commander, NGB
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[00:45:01]

Great, thank you Wayne, and folks, for all those that were able to 

join us today. Thank you very much for doing this. And what we 

tried to highlight is just really the diversity of missions that our 

National Guard faces every day. And both Lee and Dave there, folks 

are doing incredible work. And when you look at John, Chuck and 

Greg, they're really representative of leaders performing a lot of

these duties or supervising it. And they're doing a lot of great works 

out there. But all of this everything they're able to do is, is because 

our nation has it invested in the manning training and equipping of 

those units to fight when our nation's wars. And that gives us the

capability to do this. And a lot of times we have to remind folks that 

the National Guard does exist for their federal war fight mission and 

that our ability to help the communities is just a great, great thing 

that we can do because we have that capability. But please, if you

have questions beyond today, I know this is a short amount of time, 

but our public affairs team can reach out to anyone and get you in 

touch with folks. Actually, at this case, at the point of that hurricane 

response or at the point of wildfire response to get you any

information or answer any questions that you would like. But once 

again, thanks for your time today. It was a pleasure speaking with 

all of you. And I know some folks are going to be able to stay a little 

bit longer, so we'll hand it back over to them.

Wayne Hall, NGB PA

[00:46:21]

Thank you, sir. Yeah, some of our folks are going to be able to stay 

on a little bit longer if we have additional questions from media, but 

I do know that most of them do have to get back out to the missions. 

So if there's any last minute questions for our folks remaining, I 

believe we have the California maybe staying on line. All right, sir, 

I don't know that we have any additional questions at this time. I 

appreciate you joining us. And for the rest of the media, if you have 

follow up questions after this, please feel free to reach out to us by 

phone or by email, and we'll do our best to try to get them answered. 

Thank you for joining us.

GEN Daniel Hokanson, Commander, NGB
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[00:47:00]

Thank you.

[End of Audio]

Duration: 47 minutes

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