As our country celebrates this Veterans Day, all of us should reflect on some sobering realities.  Over 1.7 million men and women have deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan in the past seven years, nearly half from the National Guard and Reserves.  Almost one-half of the members of the National Guard and Reserves return from deployments experiencing some form of post-combat psychological injury.  Frontline combat units of the Army and Marine Corps are serving their fourth and fifth tours.  Recruitment standards have dropped to the point where less than 83% of Army recruits have high school diplomas.

Over the past weeks, VFA has been on the ground in Pennsylvania speaking with members of the Keystone State's National Guard and their families. We've seen first hand the devastating impact the deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan are having on these heroes.

In the press articles surrounding the release of our preliminary report, many noted:

Soldiers in the Pennsylvania National Guard "have borne a disproportionate share of the burdens of our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan," according to a veterans advocacy group.

I've mentioned before on this very blog that Veterans For America will not take sides in the Presidential Race. But right now, in Pennsylvania, Senators Barack Obama and John McCain are asking voters to do just that. I hope as everyone in that great state goes about making their decision, they take a moment to look at what Veterans For America has just learned through our research there: like so many other states, the continued multiple deployments of National Guard members to Iraq and Afghanistan has had a devastating effect on the Guard members, their families and their communities - it is a situation that must be addressed and addressed now.

VFA has been on the ground in the Keystone State for most of this month, and has found that the citizen Soldiers of the Pennsylvania Army National Guard have borne a disproportionate share of the burden of our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Between now and November 4th, it is essential that every presidential and congressional candidate and their surrogates campaigning in Pennsylvania address how they will relieve the great strain place on the Pennsylvania National Guard.

Veterans For America has long been focused on issues surrounding our National Guard soldiers and assessing the problems that they face when returning home from Afghanistan and Iraq. Through VFA's nonpartisan National Guard efforts, the group has conducted reports and examined National Guard units on a state-by-state basis to determine their needs and analyze the issues they face.

On Wednesday, VFA released its most recent report that takes a look at the Alaska Army National Guard. The report has garnered plenty of media attention and The Minnesota Independent provided its own look at the report:

VFA stands with our citizen Soldiers of the National Guard are they prepare for Hurricane Ike.

Texas has activated 7,500 National Guard members less than two weeks after the Texas Guard helped evacuate 17,000 residents from the fury of Hurricane Gustav.

Our National Guard has shouldered an incredible burden in the past few years as a result of its heavy use in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as its continued commitment to respond to various contingencies and emergencies within the United States.  As VFA has found, between now and the end of President Bush's term in office, about 20,000 members of the Army National Guard will be deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan.  This constitutes about half of all members of the Army who will be deployed over this timeframe.

This post was co-authored with Garett Reppenhagen, Servicemember Liaison for Veterans For America.

When men and women in our country join the military, we enter into a sacred contract with them that obliges us honor their willingness to serve and sacrifice - end of story.

One of the most egregious violations of this mutual trust is something called "stop loss" - a very disturbing practice by which our men and women in uniform are forced to continue to serve in the military, after they had expected that they could leave.

Between now and the end of President George Bush's term in office on January 20, 2009, almost half of the Soldiers scheduled to deploy to Iraq are members of our National Guard. Never before in the history of our all-volunteer military have we relied so heavily on the National Guard for such a long period of time to serve overseas.

Never.

Over the past six plus years, we have sent over 260,000 members of our National Guard to Iraq and Afghanistan and while the focus and heated debate in Washington may have turned away from Iraq, every day, we are sending more and more members of the National Guard overseas.

Veterans for America (VFA) strongly applauds Rep. Betty Sutton (D-OH) for introducing H.R. 6205, the Stop-loss Compensation Act, which requires that U.S. servicemembers whose tours of duty are involuntarily extended, commonly known as "stop-loss," receive special pay for the duration of their extension.