148th at a glance

Opinion by news@duluthnewstribune.com

March 01, 2014 at 11:00 PM

Name: 148th Fighter Wing

Military branch: Minnesota Air National Guard

Based: At Duluth International Airport

Members: About 1,100, including 400 full-time; the workforce makes the Air Guard the ninth-largest employer in the Twin Ports

Pilots: About 35, many of whom are part-time traditional Guard members who fly commercial airliners for a living

Federal missions include: Air defense (guard members are trained to identify enemy aircraft and then either shoot them down, escort them or observe their activities) and bombing (guard members also are trained to bomb enemy targets, sometimes in support of soldiers on the ground)

State missions include: Disaster assistance, protection of life and property, maintaining peace and order, civil defense, responding to air-crash scenes, first-responder medical aid, air-crash recovery, disposal and storage of explosives, and specialized emergency response

Annual economic impact: $85.1 million, including $41.4 million in payroll

Proposed military cuts

Among other cuts, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel last week proposed:

Shrinking the active-duty Army from 522,000 soldiers to between 440,000 and 450,000, the smallest number since 1940

Shrinking the Army National Guard from 355,000 soldiers to 335,000 by 2017

Shrinking the Army Reserve by 10,000 to 195,000 reservists

Shrinking the Marine Corps from 190,000 to 182,000

Laying up, or temporarily removing from active service, 11 of the Navy's 22 cruisers so they can be modernized

Reducing from 52 to 32 the Navy's purchase of smaller combat ships that operate closer to shore

Retiring the Air Force's fleet of A-10 Warthog tank-killer planes

Retiring the U-2 spy plane, a stalwart of U.S. intelligence during the Cold War

148th at a glance

Name: 148th Fighter Wing Military branch: Minnesota Air National Guard Based: At Duluth International Airport Members: About 1,100, including 400 full-time; the workforce makes the Air Guard the ninth-largest employer in the Twin Ports Pilots: Ab...