I hope I'm just being paranoid, but...

The news that four brigades of National Guardsmen will be redeployed to combat in Iraq in December is being met with a reaction that falls far short of enthusiastic.

Guardsmen are supposed to be limited in the time they can spend deployed to a combat zone. That was not the deal that was made when these people joined up. There was a 24 month limit on the time Guardsmen could be deployed to combat zones in a five-year period.

But stretched thin by the ongoing quagmire in Iraq – a debacle that is destroying men and materiel at a phenomenal rate – the Pentagon just changed the rules and struck the limits on deployments.

The four National Guard brigade combat teams given that were informed they would be deployed in December are:

• The 39th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, Little Rock, Ark.
• The 45th Infantry Brigade, Oklahoma City.
• The 76th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, Indianapolis.
• The 37th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, Columbus, Ohio.

Call me paranoid, call me overly suspicious of the motives, but at least the brigades from Ohio and Arkansas raises questions in my fevered brain.

Okay – follow the bouncing ball – I’ll try to explain…

They are deploying in December, from states that will prove critical in the 2008 election.

Is there at least an element of politics at work here? Think about it…Send a Guard brigade from a swing state back to battle, and then bring them home early – four to six weeks before the general election.

Did someone at the Pentagon start cross-referencing deployment dates with election maps?