Guiding Principles: Best Practices for National Guard Resources was developed by regional wildland fire chiefs, managers, and supervisors to assist states and their constituents in the deployment of National Guard resources. This edition was approved by the National Association of State Foresters’ Wildland Fire Committee in 2018.
The National Guard supports wildland firefighting in various ways. Through comprehensive post-fire reviews, state forestry agencies have identified best practices for utilizing National Guard resources that are shareable and scaleable. These lessons learned are particularly helpful at present given that the need for National Guard resources is likely to increase along with the complexity and scale of future wildfire incidents.
This guide is not intended to be “one size fits all.” Instead, it details common areas of consideration and provides a process for utilizing National Guard resources that respects each state’s internal administrative policies, regulations, automatic and mutual aid agreements, resources constraints, and needs.