Guard

While Maryland National Guard units have had high-profile assignments in the Persian Gulf war, Liberia, Bosnia, Haiti and Somalia, a small group of its members have been quietly -- almost secretly -- working to help rebuild the tiny Baltic nation of Estonia."

About 1,500 people gathered last night amid pomp andpageantry for the Maryland National Guard's military ball marking the 50th anniversary of the D-Day invasion in World War II and the promotion of the guard's first black brigadier general.Maj. Gen. James F. Frettered, the guard's adjutant general, also used the occasion of the 22nd annual ball at Baltimore's Fifth Regiment Army to officially announce that 200 Maryland National Guard volunteers will embark on an 11-month peacekeeping mission in the Middle East.

A Maryland National Guard paratrooper was killed Friday night while making a practice jump at a baseball stadium in Delaware before the home opener for the Wilmington Blue Rocks minor league baseball team.Master Sgt. David C. Horan Sr., 50, of Kent Island, was killed about 4 p.m. when he got tangled in a cable and fell about 90 feet, hitting a fence outside the stadium, said Capt. Drew Sullins, a National Guard spokesman. Horan was pronounced dead at Christiana Hospital in Delaware.The parachute program scheduled to take place during opening day ceremonies for the Kansas City Royals farm team was canceled, but the game was played.

The Maryland National Guard has received its second consecutive first-place award in the Army Communities of Excellence competition, winning over Guard commands from the U.S. states and territories.Gen. Dennis J. Reimer, Army chief of staff, praised the Maryland Guard for its community commitment and for "creating an environment in which soldiers, civilians and their families can attain their highest aspirations for personal and professional growth."Among the Maryland Guard's efforts are the Freestate Challenge, a five-month military-style residential program for at-risk youth; and the Distance Learning Network, an interactive video education network based in state armories.

Two armed men entered a crowded McDonald's restaurant today, ordered an armored truck guard to the floor and fled with a bag containing an undisclosed amount of money.Police said no shots were fired and no one was injured in what police described as a very quick robbery that went unnoticed by a second guard waiting in the armored vehicle.Investigators said the Federal Armored Express guard entered the McDonald's in the 4200 block of W. Northern Parkway about 10:15 a.m. to pick up cash receipts.

NEAR DHAHRAN, Saudi Arabia -- When Maryland National Guard Spc. Bridgett Novak set out for the latrines in her desert camp late one night, a male colleague pulled his 12-inch Rambo-style knife from his sheath and insisted she take it with her.She politely refused.While building a defense bunker on the perimeter of the Guard's desert camp one recent morning, Specialist Novak wedged a sandbag along the roofline and packed it in tight. A buddy in her squad stepped up and placed another piece of wood on top of the sandbags to give Specialist Novak an extra bit of cover should the enemy start firing.

The Navy's inspector general is investigating a confrontation between the Naval Academy superintendent, Vice Adm. Richard J. Naughton, and a Marine guard who asked to see his identification at a school gate, a Navy spokeswoman confirmed yesterday. Investigators are looking into whether, among other things, there was physical contact between the two after Naughton, a three-star admiral, became angry at the young guard's request for his ID on New Year's Eve. The guard was reassigned to a base in Washington after the encounter, a move "considered to be in the best interest of both parties," Lt. Cmdr.

Talk about career changes: Norman C. Swift III has gone from police chief to prisoner to active-duty National Guardsman, all in nine months.Swift, the former Crisfield police chief, pleaded guilty to nonfeasance in office this month and was sentenced to one year in a work-release program at the Somerset County Detention Center, with an additional four years suspended.But starting next week, Swift apparently won't be spending hisnights behind bars, but with an M-16 automatic rifle by his side as a member of the Crisfield-based 1229th Transportation Company of the Maryland National Guard.

As wildfires, floods and tornadoes batter the nation, the readiness of the National Guard to deal with those disasters, as well as any attacks, is so depleted by deployments to foreign wars and equipment shortfalls that Congress is considering moves to curtail the president's powers over the Guard and require the Defense Department to analyze how prepared the country is for domestic emergencies. The debate over the state of the National Guard has been intensifying for several years, but a powerful tornado in Kansas early this month has spun the topic back into the spotlight.

The Maryland National Guard will become a full partner in community education tomorrow with the opening of the first two classrooms of an interactive video education network planned with colleges across the country.Vice President Al Gore and Gov. Parris N. Glendening will inaugurate the network's first classrooms at the Laurel Armory; similar distance-learning and computer-assisted classrooms should be available in mid-August at Camp Fretterd in Reisterstown.Plans are to have classrooms in 1,000 National Guard armories across the United States, as many as five of them in Maryland, said Lt. Col. Milton P. Davis, education officer for the Maryland Army and Air Guards.