Clinton Reluctantly Gives Nod To Commission’s Base Closing List President Put Between Political Rock And Economic Hard Place

President Clinton gave a grudging go-ahead on Thursday to closing or consolidating 105 military bases. The shutdowns, a consequence of the end of the Cold War, are expected to save billions of federal dollars but put tens of thousands of people out of work.

Furiously pounding the lectern in a Rose Garden talk with reporters, the president called an independent commission’s recommendations to close two large Air Force depots in California and Texas “an outrage” that ignored the economic pain it inflicted. He said his political enemies had made “a calculated, deliberate attempt” to turn his efforts to preserve jobs at those bases “into a political thing, and to obscure the real economic impact.”

The president was caught between a consensus in Congress that the nation needs to close military bases - as long as they are in someone else’s district - and the prospect of throwing thousands of voters off the federal payroll in two states crucial to his re-election. But Clinton said his sole political concern was “the political economy of America, and what happens to the people in these communities, and are they being treated fairly.”

But Haley Barbour, the Republican National Committee chairman, said the White House itself had politicized the process “because they were trying to curry favor, or thought they were, with voters in California.” And the White House press secretary, Mike McCurry, said the president’s pique was in some part due to the “political fallout” of the base closings.

Clinton’s anger focused on the recommendations to close maintenance depots at McClellan Air Force Base in Sacramento, Calif., and Kelly Air Force Base in San Antonio. He had been seeking assurances from the Pentagon that thousands of jobs could be shifted to the private sector in those states.

California’s Democratic senators, Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, expressed displeasure at the decision, and Senator Boxer said she was skeptical that the Pentagon’s privatization plans would preserve jobs in Sacramento. Rep. Henry B. Gonzales, a Democrat from San Antonio, called the decision “a tragedy.”

McClellan and Kelly were the biggest military bases listed by the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission, which recommended that 79 be closed and 26 others realigned, saving $19.3 billion during 20 years. Nationwide, 43,742 soldiers and civilians could lose their jobs as a direct result; thousands more could be put out of work at fastfood outlets and other businesses surrounding the bases. Congress must now vote to reject the list in 45 days or it will automatically take effect.

The commission, an independent body created to remove politics from the post-Cold War process of scaling back military bases, said California stood to lose 19,372 military and civilian jobs as a result of the closings - about 11,000 of them at McClellan.

The effect will not be immediate, Deputy Defense Secretary John White said on Thursday. About 8,700 jobs at the base will be maintained as it slowly closes during the next five years, he said.