SPREAD TOO THIN? The war over Kosovo has prompted many questions in the minds
of key congressional leaders, who view the conflict as proof that U.S. forces
may be overstretched. For that reason, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman
John Warner, R-Va., plans to hold hearings this month "on the war and its
implications," said the committee's staff director, Les Brownlee. "We
will look at force structure and the technology disparity between the United
States and NATO," he said.
HOSTILE FIRE - Serb forces may be out of Kosovo, but U.S. peacekeepers there
are likely to continue to draw hostile fire for some time to come, warned Army
Brig. Gen. John Craddock, U.S. commander on the scene. He attributed most of
the shooting to "lawless elements"-rogue elements of the Kosovo Liberation
Army (KLA), KLA wannabes, "or just a bad lot out there ...Whatever the
case may be, they've got weapons."
MORE BOMBERS? Pentagon planners are debating the pros and cons of starting
a new long-range bomber program-versus buying more advanced weapons for existing
bombers. Acquisition czar Jacques S. Gansler hinted he supports breaking away
from the status-quo. "The studies that I've seen on the difficulty of restarting
a bomber line all indicate that it is easier to start a new line rather than
simply maintain one. Almost every time there's been a new competition for a
major bomber, a different contractor was picked," he said. "There
is enough of an industrial base out there that if we wanted to start up a new
line, it could be done," Gansler said. But in the race for dollars, he
noted, "bombers are in competition with long-range precision weapons."
LESSONS FROM PAST FAILURES - The Army's military acquisition chief, Lt. Gen.
Paul Kern, has asked the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to
come up with new design concepts for a light tank. A series of proposals "will
be taken back to the Army" by 2001, said DARPA Director Frank Fernandez.
He said he wants to establish a long-term "partnership" with the Army
so that the project won't fall apart like the Arsenal Ship did four years ago.
That was a Navy-DARPA program seeking to design a new, low-cost warship. "The
lesson from the Arsenal Ship was that you need a [solid] partnership" for
the program to survive, Fernandez said during a breakfast with reporters.
REMAINING ON STAGE - Greece-a member of NATO whose support was critical in
the recent conflict with Yugoslavia-will continue to play a major role in the
reconstruction of Kosovo, Defense Secretary William Cohen said. Greek soldiers
are part of the peacekeeping force in Kosovo. But Greece's most important contribution
to the NATO operation was to open its ancient port of Thessaloniki to U.S. troops,
enabling them to drive through Greece, through neighboring Macedonia and into
Kosovo. Now, Thessaloniki will remain open as a port of entry for equipment
and supplies for the reconstruction of Kosovo. The United States is opening
a commercial office in the city "to encourage investment in the reconstruction
effort itself," Cohen said.
STAYING ALIVE - Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska,
says he returned from a trip to North Korea convinced that there may be only
one way for that nation to earn money-to sell missile technology to other rogue
states. "If they want to feed the food chain of terrorism," Stevens
told a recent defense writers breakfast, "they might survive."
FOCUS ON THE MISSION - Shortly after resigning as assistant secretary of energy
for defense programs, Victor H. Reis told the House Armed Services Committee
that he believes the Energy Department can be reformed not only to correct lax
security, but also to fortify what he calls the "primary mission"
of the department's national laboratories-stewardship of the U.S. nuclear weapons
stockpile. Putting the labs into a new semi-autonomous agency within the department
would resolve many problems, said Reis, who resigned following the Chinese espionage
scandal.
THE IMPORTANCE OF 'YES' - The Marine Corps' new Commandant, Gen. James L. Jones,
who assumed his new post in July, raised a few eyebrows in his "Commandant's
Guidance"-a document explaining his perspective and plans for the service.
In it, he said that it was important for high-ranking Marine officers to approve
requests from subordinates, whenever possible. "When a Marine asks for
something, and it is a sensible request, we should do everything in our power
to provide it," Jones said.
BATTLEFIELD ROBOTS - The Marine Corps undoubtedly wants to incorporate unmanned
platforms into its arsenal for the future. But that does not mean the Corps
plans to rely on robots in order to achieve "low casualties" on the
battlefield, said Assistant Commandant Gen. T.R. Dake. "I don't like the
term [low casualties]," he told a conference on unmanned vehicles in Baltimore.
"I don't want to endorse that term [even if] it is one of the imperatives"
in war-fighting today.
REDUCING THE DANGER - The Army, meanwhile, is so enthusiastic about the use
of ground robots-to conduct dangerous tasks such as de-mining and chemical-biological
detection-that it plans to contribute more dollars to the Pentagon's joint program
office in charge of unmanned ground vehicles (UGV). Currently the research and
development budget for those systems is about $30 million to $40 million, said
Michael Toscano, who runs the UGV program at the Defense Department. "The
Army is looking to add $10 million more," he told industry executives.