Base reductions not about votes

The next four months will prove whether politics can be minimized in the Base Realignment and Closure process. If you’re a betting person, put money on “no.”

In the first hours Friday after the Pentagon revealed its list of military facilities to be closed or realigned, lawmakers from states with bases targeted for closure were in a 4-foot hover, sputtering outrage and calls to arms.

“I am sorely disappointed with this list, and I will fight like hell to change it,” said Rep. Rush Holt, D-N.J., whose district includes part of Fort Monmouth.

“It simply makes no sense to close Otis (Air National Guard Base) in the post-9/11 world,” said Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., of the Cape Cod facility.

“Today’s decision … is nothing short of stunning, devastating and, above all, outrageous,” Sen. Olympia J. Snowe, R-Maine, said Friday about the possible closure of the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard.

One does not repeat in polite company what the folks in New London, Conn., were saying after hearing that the submarine base there (with its 8,460 jobs) may be going away.

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, of Texas, was less dramatic in her phrasing as she assumed the genteel and measured tones that she’s famous for, but her resolve to fight for Texas bases was clear.

“Regarding bases slated for major losses and closure, this recommendation list is a first step in the base realignment process and is by no means final,” Hutchison’s news release said Friday. “Senator (John) Cornyn and I are scheduling meetings with local officials on Sunday as the next step in making sure the final recommendations are in the best interest of our national security and local communities.”

Nice of her to put national security first, but don’t for one minute think that the greater good of the nation will take priority in the senator’s efforts to keep Texas facilities from closing.

Pity the nine members of the BRAC Commission, who will be strong-armed by senators and representatives, military task force chairmen and rent-a-general lobbyists between now and Sept. 8, when they have to send their recommendations to President Bush.

A Navy friend once said the key to a successful career is to underpromise and overperform, but he thought that Donald Rumsfeld may have heard it the other way around when it came to the 2005 BRAC. When the secretary of defense first talked about what he expected to accomplish in this round of BRAC, it was in terms of preparing a nation for 21st-century threats. Think differently, operate differently. Look for “jointness” of operations, how best to be agile and flexible in responding to threats while eliminating facilities that don’t contribute to the lean, mean fighting machine that should be the U.S. armed forces.

By golly, he stood ready to trim 20 percent to 25 percent of the military’s capacity. On Friday, those numbers were scaled down – way down – to 5 percent or 10 percent excess.

Granted, Sept. 11, 2001, happened between the time that Congress approved this round of BRAC and Friday’s announcement. But that event should have strengthened the determination to construct a U.S. military better positioned and prepared to combat future threats. If facilities aren’t being used when the country is engaged in two demanding conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, it’s hard to imagine a scenario in which they would be necessary.

Of course, overall military transformation is impossible to gauge if it’s only viewed through a BRAC lens. The Defense Department is in the midst of a Quadrennial Defense Review that will “inform,” as they said in D.C., how the nation’s military should be structured and equipped.

For the QDR, Rumsfeld’s Pentagon is using a capabilities-based model (how will future enemies fight?) rather than a threat-based model (who will the enemy be, and where will he be fighting from?).

The old threat-based model is what led the United States to having so many bases in Europe and Asia – bases that can be closed because the traditional bogymen are gone.

So how will Americans be able to tell whether this round of BRAC, coupled with the Quadrennial Defense Review, achieves “transformation”? Say this round of BRAC shows big cuts in a particular support structure – for the sake of argument only, let’s pick submarines. If the QDR indicates a change in focus away from sea-based defenses and the ‘07 budget removes funding for future submarine development and construction – well, connect the dots. That would reflect a strategic transformation.

Let’s just hope that our elected officials keep in mind that BRAC is supposed to be about military transformation – maximizing the nation’s forces and facilities to best position them to respond to future threats – and not about garnering votes in the next re-election back home.