Service Beyond State Lines: How Overseas Deployments Could Change Perceptions of State Defense Forces

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This episode was made possible by Dustin co Grove, Colonel
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C McAdams, Sr. Colonel Phillip Smith, and other Patreon members.
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Support us at patreon dot com. Forward slash State Defense Force.
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The people who the soldiers who serve in State Guards
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don't necessarily have to meet those levels of requirement, would you?
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What are your thoughts about if you were to sign up,
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as if this were to be possible, and you were
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a State Guard soldier, should that State Guard soldier have
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to meet the physical requirements of a National Guard soldier
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in order to be deployed.
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I think so for those cases, because those are few
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and far between cases where you're not going to have
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a lot of those kind of missions, right, They're going
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to be few and far between. They're not going to
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be like every week saying that. But if the National
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Guard said, hey, we're deploying the Tennessee Army National Guard
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to our partner country. I don't know which their partner
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country is, but let's say it's I don't know South Africa, right,
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So I'm just shooting off the bat here. I don't
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know if that's their partner country and they need help
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with supply food distribution, you know for our soldiers, they
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also need warehouse assistance, right. I do feel at that point,
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you know, the Tennessee you know, National Guard can go
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to the Tennessee State Guard and say, hey, we need
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guys that fit that can pass the a F A
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f p T, the Army Physical Fitness Test. Right.
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And I'm sure if.
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I was in the Tennessee State Guard and that was
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an opportunity, I.
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Guarantee I'm a little over weight right now.
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But I see if that would if that was a
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possibility and they say, hey, this is gonna be purely volunteer.
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You have to sign a waiver, no life insurance, no
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workers comp no problem here, take my signature. Right, I
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would be like Rocky running through the streets punishing that bag,
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you know, and then deploying over there. And I can
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tell you, I mean, whether it be working at the
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warehouse or working you know, doing serving chowwall food, or
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you know, working on a hum vy to make it
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working again, you know, whatever, it may be right in
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his support aspect, right, because nine out of ten jobs
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in the Army are support. So that could be medical,
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that could be logistics, that could be administration, that could
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be even it right, nine of those ten jobs are
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those support To put one soldier on the field, that's infantry,
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you need nine people to support them. Right, State Defense
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Forces could be one of those nine. And for me
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to go there for a month or two, you know,
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and I can tell you I'm a very cheap person,
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very cheap person. I would do that, and I would,
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you know, take time, I would go out, I would
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do my duty. And you know, I know that when
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I'm old and gray, hopefully I get old and gray,
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I can say, hey, look, you know I didn't do much,
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but I did.
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This and I did that, and for me that's enough.
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Right, I can know that I did something that supported
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my country.
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So for me that that that would mean a lot.
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And I would definitely get in shape for something.
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Well, as you said, it's not an opportunity for everybody,
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but it is an opportunity for some body. And I
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hope that this gets back in front of the right
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people at some point in the near future.
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And I do think this would drastically increase increase State
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Guard recruiting retention, because if it's if it's volunteer, it's
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State Guard a Texas, let's say a New York Guard soldier,
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a Texas Guard soldiers, you know, and wants to do more.
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They get activated for you know, you know, Operation Loan
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Star or you know, Operation Border.
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Health Preparedness, but they want to do more.
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They want to support their National Guard more. Right, they
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want to do more. And you know, the National Guard
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comes up to them and say, hey, we need sixty bodies.
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Twenty that's going to be doing warehouse work. Ten that's
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gonna be do chow hole work. We need five people
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that are good with humvee's mechanics kind of thing. And
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and then we need two guys for administration.
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You're like, hey, I could do administration, right. I do
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administration my job. Right.
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You raise your hands, say hey, it's going to be
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a month. It's volunteer. You're gonna have to sign waivers
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for whatever. And you keep your hand up right, you
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deploy with them to whatever country.
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Right.
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That's going to motivate them, you know, and that's going
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to motivate other people around them saying wow, I can
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actually go over se and and contribute overseas, you know.
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I And there's a big difference between contributing here and
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contributing overseas because you know, there's there's this I guess
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unwritten rule I feel personally and this is my own
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personal is when you are responding to emergencies here, and
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there are emergencies here. We have hurricanes, we have tornadoes,
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we have cyber threats, we have a lot of things.
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And the National Guard, DoD and a lot of other
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agency are very appreciative of what the defense forces do.
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When you go overseas, it's a bigger sacrifice.
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Right. You're away from your family, You're away from your friends. Right,
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You're still serving your country in a in some ways
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in a bigger role because you're sacrificing more to ensure
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American interests, Americans a stability in certain parts of the
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world remain stable. Right. Our commitments overseas increased stability in
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those regions. The sacrifices are that, you know, those soldiers
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or volunteers, right, are sacrificing time with their friends and family. Right,
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you're deploying for a month. That means that it's a
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month away from your kids. That's a month away from
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your being away from your wife. You know your kids graduation,
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you know your anniversary with your wife. And if you're
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a state Defense Force member, that volunteer for it, you're
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not getting paid for that event, right, So for me,
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that's a bigger thing, and I feel there's an appreciation
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from the National.
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Guard side, right or in the US military side for that. Right.
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That's why like National Guard, whether you're Army, National Guard
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or US Army, US Army respects Army, National Guard and
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US Army Reserve just as they're all equals, because they
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all are the same sacrifice. If State Defense force troops
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do such things where they're volunteering and deploying overseas not
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getting paid for it, they're sharing that same sacrifice, right.
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So I feel that you would uh the interpersonal relationships
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between the US Army, US military and state defense verses
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would drastically improve. But then also it would also improve
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on the HQ level, the DODHQ, the National Guard Bureau HQ.
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I guarantee you if you had State Defense Force troops
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volunteer for these kind of missions and these things were happening,
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they would have been no uniform revision in twenty twenty four.
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I guarantee you. If anything, the National Guard would have said, Hey,
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I noticed some of you guys wearing the state flags.
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Feel free to wear the US flag. I guarantee you
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would have had that because they would have said they
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would have. Those generals that have been at the National
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Guard Bureau would have been on base in Afghanistan. We're
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in South Africa where you know, the Middle East, and said,
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walk past somebody that says New York Garden.
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Like, who the heck is that? What are you doing here?
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It's like, well, I volunteered, you volunteer to come here.
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It's like, are you getting paid?
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Says no, I volunteer for a month deployment, So you're
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not getting paid. Do you have life insurance workers comp? No?
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I'm here just to you know, do my service.
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You know, I you know I took a month, I
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pulling my vacation time for my job, you know, pulling
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from savings. I guarantee you that National Guard General colonel
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whoever comes back is going to be like, Wow, this
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guy went to a you know, a conflict zone, not
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getting paid and is doing this because of you know,
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he wants to serve his country more. I guarantee you
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that twenty twenty four revision would have never happened. We
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would never be fight, we would never see I don't
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know if you saw on Statedefenseforce dot com. The new
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Virginia Defense Force uniforms. We would never have anything like that.
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We would have Virginia Defense Force troops in ocps with
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Virginia name tapes, possibly US flag even. But because we're
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not in that and we do have opponents in the
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State Guard, they are like, no, we don't want to
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do that. That's fine. If you don't want to do that,
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you don't have to. But give the option for other
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people in the defense forces to volunteer for that. That's
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all I'm asking for from the commanders of the State
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Guard to say, hey, listen, offer your troops this, this
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opportunity to deploy with the National Guard. It's not only
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gonna benefit you as a general or a colonel in
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the State Defense Force because you're gonna get you know,
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you're gonna get more or not more, but you're gonna
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get a better relationship with your National Guard because of it.
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