The United States Army Reserve Command (USARC) commands all United States Army Reserve units and is responsible for overseeing unit staffing, training, management and deployment. Approximately 205,000 Army Reserve soldiers are assigned to USARC. The major subordinate commands which report directly to USARC consist of operational commands, functional commands, support commands, and training commands. In turn, USARC itself reports to United States Army Forces Command (FORSCOM), where both are garrisoned in the same location at Fort Liberty, North Carolina.
Mission
U.S. Army Reserve Command (USARC) mission is to provide trained and ready units and individuals to mobilize and deploy in support of the national military strategy. USARC is responsible for all of the operational tasks involved in training, equipping, managing, supporting, mobilizing and retaining Soldiers under its command. USARC has over 20 offices, each with an individual mission and function that contributes to the accomplishment of USARC's overall mission.[2]
Operational groups such as personnel, logistics, operations, training and resource management are responsible for the daily work involved in managing, training and equipping the Army Reserve's Soldiers and units across the continental United States.
Special staff offices provide technical support and guidelines to USARC and Army Reserve units across the country. These offices include public affairs, safety and enterprise services.
The Executive staff includes the leaders of the USARC and their personal staff. The leaders are the Commanding General, the Deputy Commanding General, the Chief of Staff and the Command Sergeant Major. The personal staff includes the Staff Judge Advocate (legal), Inspector General, Historian and Chaplain.
Establishment of the Chief, Army Reserve
As the evolutionary process continued, there were more congressional hearings and investigations and major reorganizations of the Army, including Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara's failed attempt between 1965 and 1966 to merge units of the Army Reserve into the National Guard. In 1967, Congress passed watershed legislation in the form of the Reserve Forces Bill of Rights and Vitalization Act. In essence that act, among other features, prescribed reserve leadership for reserve units. For the Army, the act created a statutory Chief, Army Reserve (CAR) who served as an advisor to the Chief of Staff on Army Reserve matters. Command and Control of the Army Reserve, however, was under Continental Army Command (CONARC) until 1973 and after that under Forces Command (FORSCOM). The act also virtually eliminated bitter congressional deliberation over reserve component policy—for a while.
Congress Directs Design of a Command and Control Plan
In 1988, the House Committee on Appropriations Surveys and Investigation rekindled the debate. The committee uncovered two command and control reporting chains for the Army Reserve: FORSCOM and the CAR. Unlike the Air Force Reserve and the Navy Reserve, the CAR did not have sole command of the Army Reserve. In 1989, Congress directed the Army to design a command and control plan for the Army Reserve. Congress and the Army, with FORSCOM in the lead, began the struggle, at times difficult, to produce a mutually agreeable arrangement for the Army Reserve.
FORSCOM, the Office of the Chief Army Reserve (OCAR), the Department of the Army, and Congress each had its own plan. Command and Control options spanned from the creation of an independent major command to a major subordinate command under FORSCOM.
Major Subordinate Command Status
On 18 January 1990, the CAR and the FORSCOM commander reached an agreement, a major step in the evolution of the new command. The Army's plan called for the command to be organized as a major subordinate command. FORSCOM was to develop overall policy for units of the U.S. Army Reserve (USAR), while the Reserve Command was to prepare implementation procedures, plans, and programs in accordance with FORSCOM guidance. Integration of the active component and reserve component into a total force was the ultimate objective.
U.S. Army Reserve Command Planning Group
As the plans were staffed and reviewed, FORSCOM pushed forward in March 1990 by creating the U.S. Army Reserve Command (USARC) Planning Group charged with providing the functional nucleus to plan and develop the details for establishing the USARC (e.g., table of distribution and allowance, organization and functions manual, etc.). The USARC Planning Group was to evolve into the heart of the new USARC headquarters. Meanwhile, Congress and the Army had differing views on the next course of action. In the midst of this came another negotiated agreement between the OCAR and FORSCOM, the management of USAR funds.
U.S. Army Reserve Command (Provisional)
Permanent Order 183-13 dated 1 October 1990 established the U.S. Army Reserve Command (Provisional). Congress legally formalized this arrangement in November 1990 with passage of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1991. The act assigned to the command all Army Reserve forces in the continental United States, save those assigned to Special Operations Forces and those forces as directed by the Secretary of Defense. The act set a test period of two years for operation of the Command and required the Secretary of the Army during the test period to submit semiannual reports on the command to the Committee on Armed Services of both congressional houses. The act directed the Secretary of the Army to establish an independent commission assisting the Secretary of the Army in evaluating the progress and effectiveness of the command. Twenty-three years after passage of the Reserve Forces Bill of Rights and Vitalization Act, the CAR was in statutory command of the Army Reserve.
Evolution of a Fully Operational Command
There was much to be done in a year, the time schedule for evolution of the USARC into a fully operational command. Congress directed the development of a concept plan for the new command. FORSCOM and the USARC Planning Group worked for months on resolving differences, for example, in the organization and functions manual. Other actions ranged from developing a plan to transition functions from the Continental U.S. Armies and FORSCOM to the USARC to finding a home for the USARC and hiring personnel. Evolution into a fully operational command came on 18 October 1991 with Permanent Order 54-15.
In the spring of 1990, building 906 at Fort Gillem served as the temporary headquarters for the planning group from which the USARC evolved. The USARC occupied two other temporary sites, including a leased facility at Camp Creek Business Center, Camp Creek Parkway, Atlanta, until the fall of 1997 when the command relocated to its permanent home on Fort McPherson. In 2011, the Headquarters moved to Fort Liberty, North Carolina.
81st Readiness Division, at Fort Jackson, SC - providing support in Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Puerto Rico
88th Readiness Division, at Fort Snelling, MN - providing support in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, and Ohio
99th Readiness Division, at Fort Dix, NJ - providing support in New Jersey, New York, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Vermont, Rhode Island, West Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, Maine, Connecticut, and Virginia
The Shoulder sleeve insignia of USARC is described as "On a disc divided vertically blue and scarlet with a 1⁄8 inch (0.32 cm) yellow border, 3 inches (7.6 cm) in diameter overall, two white eagles' heads conjoined back to back, beaks yellow, eyes detailed black."[4] The two eagles' heads are symbolic in reference to the command's motto, "Twice the Citizen," and their Reserve mission. The eagle faces in both directions, denoting vigilance and a wide-ranging scope of ability and expertise. Red, white and blue are the colors of the United States, while gold stands for excellence.
The distinctive unit insignia for USARC is a silver color metal and enamel device 1+1⁄8 inches (2.9 cm) in width overall, consisting of a shield divided palewise silver and blue charged with a tree in full foliage counter changed of the field, all upon two silver sabres saltirewise, points down, the tips overlaying a scarlet motto scroll enclosing the device and terminating at the sword hilts, bearing the inscription "TWICE THE CITIZEN" in silver letters.[4] The symbolism of blue and scarlet, with silver (white), represents the United States, while red stands for courage and sacrifice. The dual responsibilities of citizenship and military service are denoted by the two sabers, and the integration of peaceful with soldierly vocations is represented by the tree on the shield. The nature of these two-fold duties is further symbolized by the division and counter change of the shield, which also recalls the motto of the Command. The tree represents the pursuit and preservation of peace through strength, endurance and growth.[4] The USARC distinctive unit insignia was first authorized on 7 March 1991.[4]
Unit honors
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References
^John M. McHugh; George W. Casey Jr (2010). 2010 Army Posture Statement. HQ Department of the Army. p. 9. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
