Newly installed National Guard Bureau chief, Air Force Gen. Craig McKinley, shared sponsorship of the annual NGB hurricane season planning workshop last week for the first time with NORAD and US Northern Command boss, Air Force Gen. Victor Renuart, and they were joined by federal and state partners and other military entities. McKinley noted that predictions of nine major storms in the coming hurricane season made the gathering “vital to use being ready.” He added, “The American public expects this team to pull together to do the job right. … You don’t want to exchange business cards at the scene of a disaster.” Renuart believes this workshop was the first of many future joint hurricane planning workshops. He noted, “Clearly the governors, the state emergency managers, the adjutants general will have the lead … but bringing in the federal partners … allows us to integrate our efforts ahead of time” to produce a “more effective and certainly more timely” response. (NGB report)
The Pentagon’s new counter-drone task force will play a direct role in arming Airmen with new weapons to defend Air Force agile combat employment, or ACE, air bases in austere locations against enemy drone attacks, the director of Joint Interagency Task Force 401 said Oct. 14.
