Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 6, 1991                   TAG: 9103061100
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-11   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: CAL THOMAS
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

DEFENSE SPENDING/ THE ERA OF $600 TOILET SEATS HAS BEEN VINDICATED

For the Persian Gulf War, the slogan should be, "Remember the $600 toilet seat."

The overpriced toilet seat was the symbol in the 1980s for critics of the defense budget. Political cartoonist Herblock once drew former Defense Secretary Casper Weinberger with a toilet seat hanging like an albatross around his neck. Although few would defend overpriced plumbing equipment, hammers and the like, these excesses were used by liberals to condemn all military spending.

While there are no reports on how well the toilet seats performed during the Gulf War, the weapons systems so often attacked for their high cost and presumed inefficiency have been vindicated, along with the people who supported their development, funding and deployment.

As a new political season approaches, it would be useful to keep in mind that some now leading cheers for the success of American forces once opposed the very equipment the military has been using with such astounding success.

While it is true that some of these weapons had their genesis in the administrations of Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford and Richard Nixon, Presidents Reagan and Bush provided the funding and, just as important, unrelenting political support to get the new technology into the field.

The list of critics is long and, unfortunately for their already leaderless and beleaguered party, almost all of them are liberal Democrats.

Former Colorado Sen. Gary Hart called the aircraft carriers that have sent waves of planes over Iraq and the battleships that launched Tomahawk cruise missiles against Baghdad "obsolete." Rep. Ron Dellums, D-Calif., called the M-1 Abrams tank, which is wiping out everything in its path, "vulnerable" and a "questionable buy." Dellums also charged that aircraft like the F-15 Eagle were "gold plated." Gold never looked so good.

Most of the weapons systems, including the Patriot anti-missile systems, were attacked by liberal Democrats, as was the Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (JSTARS), airborne radar that locates enemy armored forces, and the Army Tactical Missile System, a newly produced anti-armor missile system. A House Armed Services Committee report, issued at the time of Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, recommended their cancellation.

On Aug. 3, 1990, the day after Saddam sent troops into Kuwait, a House Armed Services Committee report said, "The requirement for the system is unique to the U.S. European Command . . .. Given the changes in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union and the balancing of NATO/Warsaw Pact force ratios that will be driven by unilateral reductions, the requirement for JSTARS is no longer valid."

Most of the tanks and armored personnel carriers used by Saddam in Kuwait are Soviet-made, the type U.S. forces would have faced in Europe. If JSTARS had not been available, the air campaign would have had more difficulty stopping Iraqi forces.

Planes, aircraft carriers, missiles and much more were all targets of liberal Democrats who tried to shoot them down in Congress. President Bush was also a target. Rep. Henry Gonzalez, D-Tex., introduced a resolution charging the president with committing impeachable offenses. Forty-five House Democrats sought a court injunction against his ordering offensive military action. House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt of Missouri suggested Congress might cut off funding.

A Heritage Foundation report recently noted, "If Congress had reduced drastically the numbers of aircraft carriers, the U.S. would have lacked the air power needed to stop Iraqi forces without leaving U.S. interests dangerously vulnerable elsewhere around the globe . . . . Without the anti-missile Patriot, which the House Armed Services Committee tried to terminate in the mid-1980s, thousands of Israeli and Saudi civilians would have been victims of Saddam Hussein's Scud attacks . . . .Technology is the `force multiplier' that allows U.S. forces to shoot farther and more precisely than their enemies."

Of course, it has been expensive. The best always is. But what would the critics have preferred - lower weapons costs, a longer war and more body bags?

As for the critics, a perfect symbol for next year's political season would be their picture with a toilet seat hanging around their necks. Los Angeles Times Syndicate