A new commander will take the helm today of the Arkansas Air National Guard, which has been in a constant state of transition for the better part of the past decade.
The 188th Wing in Fort Smith has been reassigned to new missions twice. The 189th Airlift Wing at Little Rock Air Force Base became the military's sole training hub for C-130H aircrews. The Air Guard last year created a cybertraining unit at Little Rock Air Force Base in Jacksonville, which will receive its first trainees next month.
Brig. Gen. James Vogel, who has led the state's Air Guard for the past 18 months, will end his 30-year military career today. Col. Marc Sicard will be promoted to brigadier general and take command of the Arkansas Air National Guard.
Sicard inherits a force with established missions ready to grow and expand. He and Vogel expect a seamless transition after working together for the past year.
"I'm excited to continue the legacy [Vogel] established," Sicard said. "He's accomplished a lot in short order."
Sicard will assume the command of more than 2,000 airmen. He'll become the chief adviser to the adjutant general on matters regarding the Arkansas Air National Guard. In addition to training missions at Little Rock Air Force Base, Sicard will oversee remotely piloted aircraft; intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; and space-focused targeting missions based in Fort Smith.
Vogel expects Sicard's greatest challenge to be the expansion of the Guard's established missions. Guard leaders hope to expand the mission at Little Rock Air Force Base to include C-130Js -- the Air Force's latest version of its main tactical airlifter. The state's Air Guard also hopes to have a cyber protection team to complement the training unit.
"It's limitless the capabilities we have," Vogel said of Arkansas' position as a leader in cyber defense.
Sicard's Air Force career began after he completed the Reserve Officer Training Corps program at Florida State University in 1991. His assignments for the next 10 years took him from Nevada to Texas to North Carolina before finally landing him in 2001 at Little Rock Air Force Base in Jacksonville, where he flew C-130Es.
He retired from the active force in 2003, but he and his wife elected to stay in Arkansas to raise their two children, now 11 and 13.
Sicard never expected to achieve a general's rank.
"I joined the Guard to retire a major, to raise a family and to continue to serve," Sicard of Cabot said. "I just continued to do my job."
His most recent assignment has been as the director of staff for the Arkansas Air National Guard, working full time as an executive assistant to the state's Air Guard commander and the adjutant general.
His new post is a promotion, but he'll become a traditional guardsman, working only about seven days a month.
He hopes to also find work at an airline, but he admitted that he's not quite sure what will come next.
"Not my wife, though. She has a list of projects for me," he joked.
Vogel plans to enjoy some time off before deciding what his next move will be. He lives in Tampa, Fla., with his wife, Col. April Vogel, commander at Tampa's MacDill Air Force Base.
Sicard said the Arkansas Guard will miss Vogel's national perspective. Prior to coming to the Natural State, the retiring general worked at the Pentagon as the director of the National Guard Bureau Office of Legislative Liaison.
Vogel, though, believes he's leaving the state's Guard in good hands.
"[Sicard] trusts his people, believes in them, motivates them," Vogel said. "That's the leader I'd want to work for and to leave to take this to the next level."
Sitting beside him at a conference table atop the hill at Camp Joseph T. Robinson in North Little Rock on Thursday, Sicard looked at Vogel and smiled.
"I'm still going to call you all the time," Sicard said.
Metro on 01/07/2017