The commission formed to recommend changes to the Army's force structure is bucking the service's plan to move all AH-64 Apache attack helicopter units from National Guard into the active component.
Instead, the National Commission on the Future of the Army is calling for four Apache units to remain in the Guard and for 20 Apache units to be maintained by the active force.
"Compared with the ARI, the Commission's recommended plan offers advantages in wartime capacity, wartime surge, and peacetime operational tempo," the commissions states in its 200-page report released Thursday afternoon, referring to the acronym for the Aviation Restructuring Initiative.
The Guard had put forward its own proposal to retain six Apache units. But six units with the Guard would reduce wartime capacity and increase costs, according to the report released by the commission, which was chaired by Carter Ham, a retired Army general who as head of Africa Command in 2011 led the U.S. military intervention in Libya.
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