THE LEDGER-STAR
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, October 17, 1994 TAG: 9410170218
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B4 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: NEWPORT NEWS DAILY PRESS
DATELINE: FORT EUSTIS LENGTH: Long : 105 lines
Fort Eustis could be one of Hampton Roads' biggest targets in the next battle for bases, according to congressional, state and local officials.
The Army transportation base on the James River rated very low in the service's last two base-closing studies and apparently was saved only by the Army's desire not to rush into consolidating training activities, according to two study reports. The fight now is to make Army decision-makers understand Fort Eustis' value, not only as a training base, but as the operational headquarters for the Army's most deployed unit, the 7th Transportation Group, officials say.
``There's been a degree of nervousness locally with respect to both Fort Monroe and Fort Eustis,'' said Rep. Herbert H. Bateman, R-Newport News, recently. ``The concern about Fort Eustis, I think, is more and more a fact that in the last BRAC-driven evaluation, Fort Eustis was not as high in rankings as one would like it to be in order to feel comfortable,'' he said.
In a letter to a constituent in July, Bateman was more blunt.
``Fort Eustis is in danger of being closed, despite valid arguments in its defense, because of the Army's excess capacity in training installations,'' Bateman wrote. ``When compared with other major training bases, it does not fare well.'' That has been the assessment drawn by Army officials in the service's last two base-closing studies, known as the Total Army Basing Study or TABS report.
The 1991 TABS report ranked Fort Eustis ninth among 14 installations.
As the home to the Army's Transportation and Aviation Logistics schools, Fort Eustis, along with Fort Story, a sub-installation in Virginia Beach, is classified as primarily a training base.
Despite its below-mediocre rating, the 1991 report noted that Fort Eustis has the Army's only active port, home to a fleet of Army logistics and cargo ships, tugboats and amphibious watercraft, used both for training and for 7th Group operations. ``Although it has a relative small average daily student load, its facilities are unique,'' the report said of Fort Eustis. ``This complex contains unique port facilities which cannot be duplicated at other Army installations.''
Because of that, the Army determined that, for the time being, closing Fort Eustis would be too difficult, although consolidation of its resources at other bases, including perhaps non-Army installations, should be investigated.
Two years later, Fort Eustis had dropped in ranking to 11th of the training bases, the number of which was then down to 13. The 1993 TABS report deferred Fort Eustis from the Army's list of recommended bases to be closed until the Army could study how to consolidate its combat service support functions.
Meanwhile, the oft-targeted Fort Monroe was left out of the Army's 1993 list, then added for consideration by the national Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission members.
The panel ultimately accepted the Army's reasoning that Fort Monroe should not be closed to prevent moving the Army's Training and Doctrine Command and disrupting the command as the Army restructured itself.
Since then, Fort Monroe has inherited several duties, including the Joint Chiefs' Joint Warfighting Center, making many officials believe it less vulnerable in BRAC 1995.
Yet little has changed at Fort Eustis to improve its chances in the 1995 study, officials say.
The BRAC panel last year rejected the Army's only recommendation to close a training base, Fort McClellan, Ala., putting even more pressure on the service this year to trim its training infrastructure.
In the past 18 months, Fort Eustis has lost some of its teaching duties, such as helicopter test-pilot training, to Fort Rucker, Ala., which in 1991 tied with Fort Eustis in the rankings. In a move expected to offset some of the losses, the Air Force agreed to move its helicopter maintenance training to Eustis.
Earlier this year, Army officials announced that as part of an Armywide reduction in combat service support schools, it was transferring several support duties from the Transportation School and Aviation Logistics School at Fort Eustis to the Combined Arms Command at Fort Lee.
One problem, according to state and congressional officials, is the way the TABS study is done.
``The Army's criteria gives great weight to land area,'' said one local official who asked not to be named. ``They evaluate the value of their bases and give weight to training area. Forts Eustis, Monroe and Story don't have a lot of training area compared to some of the bigger forts. They have water area, but the Army won't give weight to that water area.''
The Army also evaluates Fort Eustis primarily as a training base and does not give adequate weight to what officials believe is a substantial operational stature. ``If you look at all the history of all the recent deployments of American military forces, Fort Eustis has been the first and primary mover and shaper of events,'' Bateman said.
In the past few months, the 4,000-member 7th Transportation Group has responded to all four major world operations, including Rwandan and Cuban refugee relief, the occupation of Haiti, and the current buildup in the Persian Gulf.
Also, in the past five years, the 7th Group moved in the majority of 500,000 troops and their equipment for the Persian Gulf War; supported Just Cause in Panama; spent 16 months in Somalia; deployed boats to help salvage efforts in South Carolina after Hurricane Hugo; and supported numerous other missions and exercises ranging from Korea to Central America to Antarctica.
Bateman and others note that by being at Fort Eustis, the 7th Group has immediate access to air transportation at Langley Air Force Base as well as other area airports. And the Army can move equipment and units by water from Newport News and even Fort Eustis itself.
KEYWORDS: BASE CLOSINGS by CNB