THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, August 24, 1994 TAG: 9408240526
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DALE EISMAN, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium: 92 lines
The Pentagon signaled Tuesday that pleas from commanders and troops for higher pay and a better quality of life are driving defense planners to shift more dollars to those areas and cut new weapons procurement.
``There's a change in emphasis from systems to people,'' said Deputy Defense Secretary John M. Deutch, the nation's second-highest ranking defense official.
Deutch's comments came as some congressional leaders and defense industry lobbyists expressed alarm over possible weapons cuts Deutch had outlined in a memorandum last week to leaders of the four military services.
The memo, which became public on Monday, put on the table for discussion nearly every major weapons system now under development.
Deutch emphasized Tuesday that ``no decisions have been made'' and said only ``a handful'' of the weapons he named actually will be cut.
The dollars saved would pay for annual raises of 2.5 percent through the year 2001 - about 1 percent per year more than currently projected. Pay raises the last two years have been 2.5 percent and 2.6 percent.
One Virginia congressman, Rep. Norman Sisisky of Petersburg, suggested that the talk of a tradeoff between weapons and pay may be an effort to encourage President Clinton to increase defense spending in 1996.
``I've said all along that we're cutting too fast and too much,'' said Sisisky, a Democrat whose district includes western Hampton Roads. A leaner military is critical to Clinton's plans to increase social spending while cutting the federal deficit.
But Sisisky and other critics have warned that the administration's 1995 defense budget and its plans for later years could lead to a return of the ``hollow force'' of the late 1970s.
Unless Clinton commits more money to defense, ``we're going to have a tough time'' maintaining military readiness, Sisisky predicted. Since the end of the cold war, cuts in troop levels and weapons inventories have freed money for procuring new weapons, he said, ``but that's going to wear thin after awhile.''
Congress has increased military pay in excess of Clinton's recommendations in each of the last two budgets. While the Deutch memo seemed calculated to force a choice by lawmakers, at least one independent analyst said many of the targeted weapons aren't needed or could be purchased in smaller numbers.
For example, the Air Force should build some of its planned F-22 jets to assure that the United States has a fighter aircraft superior to that of any potential foe, said James T. Bush, a retired Navy captain and associate director of the Center for Defense Information.
But because the F-15, the service's current workhorse, is superior to any current foe, there is no need for all 422 of the F-22s now planned, he argued.
The center, a non-partisan think tank on defense issues, ``strongly supports this move'' by Deutch, Bush said. The ``hollow force'' of the 1970s, he said, grew out of the services' attempt to keep all their weapons and acquire new ones without improving the pay and working conditions of soldiers and sailors.
``This is what we've been preaching for years,'' Bush said.
Deutch and his boss, Defense Secretary William Perry, are former corporate executives who have been strong proponents of new high-tech weapons. They say those systems can help the military stay strong even as it cuts expenses.
But they've also concluded that pay increases and quality-of-life improvements are essential in the short term, Deutch said Tuesday. And because budgets are tight, procurement cuts are needed to produce money for personnel increases, he said.
Deutch also conceded that a a shift of money from weapons to personnel would be helpful now, but would have a negative long-term impact on readiness. To have the weapons it believes it will need in the next century, the military says it must begin to develop them now.
In addition to the F-22, by itself a $70 billion program, the possible targets on Deutch's list include several major Navy and Marine Corps programs. Among those weapons are a proposed new attack submarine, the Marines' V-22 Osprey aircraft and up to five Arleigh Burke class destroyers.
Deutch's memo suggested that the submarine and the V-22, which takes off and lands like a helicopter but tilts its rotor to fly like an airplane, might be eliminated entirely. He told the Navy to prepare a contingency plan to reduce acquisition of Burke class destroyers from 3 per year to 2 or 2.5 per year.
Pentagon planners have tried before to kill the V-22, only to have it resurrected by congressmen sympathetic to the Marines' pleas for a new helicopter to replace their aging CH-46s. The Vietnam-era Marine choppers require several hours of maintenance for every hour of operations.
``If the Marines say they need the V-22, I'll accept that,'' said Bush of the Center for Defense Information. But as a replacement for an outdated helicopter, the Marine plane is far different from weapons such as the F-22, which would supplant systems that already are better than those of America's adversaries, he said.
KEYWORDS: DEFENSE BUDGET BUDGET CUTS MILITARY BUDGET by CNB