Does the Pentagon have the right to shift Air National Guard units and missions without consulting individual states? “Yes, it does,” said the Justice Department in a special Aug. 10 opinion on the matter. The opinion, however, isn’t likely to cut much ice with the Guard and the Governors, given that Justice serves as the Pentagon’s lawyer in lawsuits filed by the states on this very issue.
The U.S. sent Air Force F-16s over central Syria in a show of force following the Dec. 13 killing of two U.S. Army Soldiers and one American civilian interpreter by a gunman linked to the Islamic State group.
