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 Long before smartphones, National Guard responded to nationwide muster in Operation Minuteman By Capt. William Carraway
                Military historian, Georgia Army National Guard
 ATLANTA - In April, 1955, the National Guard's 400,000-strong force responded within two hours to an unprecedented activation exercise. Operation Minuteman, conceived by Maj. Gen. Edgar Erickson, chief of the National Guard Bureau, successfully mobilized nearly 320,000 National Guard members within two hours in an age long before e-mail, social media and smart phones. "Considering this was the first time that a nationwide alert has been held by a reserve component of the armed forces, the National Guard made a great showing," said Maj. Gen. George Hearn, adjutant general of the Georgia National Guard. "The people of the state and nation became instantly aware of the potent force we mobilized in such a short period of time." The purpose of Operation Minuteman was to test the speed and efficiency with which the National Guard could be mobilized in the event of a national emergency. Additionally, the operation was intended to demonstrate to the public the efficiency and readiness of the National Guard. At 3:30 on the afternoon of April 20, 1955, the alert notification was dispatched from Washington D.C., to the adjutants general of the 48 states and Alaska Territory. In towns across the country, local armories were flooded with National Guardsmen responding to the exercise alert. A California National Guard captain reported 70 percent of his personnel had reported within one hour of the alert. Ninety percent had reported by the second hour and all were present within three hours of the alert notice. After assembling, the Guard members were dispatched on simulated missions. Units of the Atlanta-based 122nd Infantry Regiment established protective cordons around vital infrastructure including power stations, water works and radio stations. The 215th Medical Battalion of the Tennessee National Guard set up four hospital tents near their Memphis Armory and ambulances were dispatched to receive simulated patients. In addition to the myriad of Army unit movements, the Air National Guard also responded in force. Georgia Air National Guardsmen of the 116th Fighter Bomber Wing launched 24 aircraft within the first hour of the alert. While he declined to give official numbers due to operations security concerns, Brig. Gen. Winston P. Wilson, Chief of the Air National Guard, noted that hundreds of aircraft participated in the exercise. Operation Minuteman was said to represent the first time in the history of the National Guard that such a national-level alert had been executed. While the National Guard had previously conducted large-scale mobilization efforts, such as those for Mexican Border service in 1916 and for service in the world wars, those mobilizations were incremental and took place over months. By contrast, the ability of the National Guard to mobilize hundreds of thousands of Guardsmen to meet a possible Cold War threat within hours elegantly communicated a message of strength and readiness to citizens across the nation and helped cement the image of the Citizen-Soldier and -Airmen in the public consciousness.
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