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The floodgates haven't blown back open just yet.
But the next few years will bring combat tours for thousands of Utah National Guard members, according to the state's top soldier.
In the months surrounding the 2003 invasion of Iraq, about 80 percent of all Utah Guard members were on active-duty orders. By comparison, less than 5 percent of the state's 6,500 Guard members are currently deployed.
"We've had a bit of a rest, which is good," said Maj. Gen. Brian Tarbet. "This is as quiet as we have been in eight years, but it's sort of the calm before the storm."
And from Tarbet's perspective, the calm hasn't been all that calm. With the Army planning deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan as far out as 2012, Tarbet's organization has been busy training and equipping its members for war.
And even in the months, earlier this year, in which just a few dozen soldiers were deployed in combat zones, Tarbet still worried constantly about his subordinates.
He'll have even more to worry about in the coming months. A 45-man helicopter unit departed Utah last week, en route to Iraq. And a number of larger company-sized and battalion-sized units are already slated for combat tours in 2010, 2011 and 2012.
Among those on deck are the Guard's 109th Air Control Squadron, which has already served three tours of duty overseas.
Given the pace of deployments -- Tarbet has hundreds of soldiers and airmen who have already done two
But eight years after the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, sent the Guard into a cycle of constant combat deployments, every member of the Utah Guard has had an opportunity to re-enlist or leave the service. Those who remain, then, are dedicated to the mission at hand.
"We've been an all-volunteer military since the early 1970s, but for the young men and women who join today, the issue is not, 'Will I be mobilized?' The issue is 'When will I be mobilized?'" he said. "So we get a tremendous amount of young people coming in knowing precisely what is looking at them through the windshield."
Although expectations about what it means to be a citizen soldier have changed over the past eight years, the effects of war on soldiers have remained the same. "Some guys have been over there three times now," Tarbet said. "I don't care who you are, that's a tremendous pressure on soldiers, their kids, their spouses, their employers."
Tarbet said he wouldn't have believed, back in 2001, that his organization could have sustained "a persistent state of warfare." And he's still not sure how much longer it can last.
"How long can we do this? That's an open question," he said.
For the moment, the answer is at least through 2012 -- the same year Tarbet says he's planning to hang up his stars. It's unlikely, then, that the general who took command of the Utah Guard in October 2000 will retire from an Army at peace.
But, he said, the next generation of military leaders -- those who have earned their brass while leading troops in battle -- are more qualified for wartime leadership anyway.
"They're ready to go," Tarbet said. "I can guarantee that the future of the Guard is in good hands."
