Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John W. Warner, R-Va., is encouraged
by the Pentagon's proposed increase in defense spending for the second year
in a row, but he warns that a lot more is needed.
Presiding over recent hearings on the Clinton administration's proposed defense
budget for fiscal year 2001, Warner told the leadoff witnesses-Defense Secretary
William S. Cohen and Army Gen. Henry H. Shelton, chairman of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff-that they have just begun to repair the damage done in recent years
to the defense budget.
The 2000 budget, which raised defense spending for the year by $12 billion,
was the first increase since 1982, Warner reminded the witnesses. "A one-year
increase won't do it," he said. "A two-year increase won't do it.
There have to be five or six years of gradual increases. We've got to continue
that momentum."
Warner is unhappy with the $60.3 billion set aside for defense procurement
in 2001. "Seventy billion wouldn't be sufficient," he said. To make
the kinds of changes needed in national security, he said, a figure much higher
than $70 billion is required.
There are, however, many aspects of the proposed budget-which would boost defense
spending by $11.2 billion to $291.1 billion for 2001-"that we are pleased
to see," Warner said. Among them:
- $4.5 billion between 2001 and 2004 for selection and procurement of a medium-weight
armored vehicle for the Army's new lighter combat brigades.
- $12.3 billion for Navy shipbuilding, permitting procurement of the new CVN-77
aircraft carrier, one attack submarine, three DDG-51 destroyers, two LPD-17
amphibious assault ships and one T-ADC(X) logistics support ship. "That's
about as many new platforms as we could expect," Warner told National Defense
at the end of one day's hearings.
- An additional $1.6 billion to address lessons learned from last year's Kosovo
operations, paying for an additional squadron of EA-6B electronic warfare aircraft
and accelerated acquisition of Global Hawk UAVs, or robotic aircraft.
- A 3.7 percent pay increase for military personnel.
- More than $3 billion to eliminate out-of-pocket housing costs for military members
by 2005.
- Elimination of health-care co-payments for active-duty family members enrolled
in TRICARE Prime and receiving civilian care and expansion of TRICARE Prime
Remote for family members living far away from military treatment facilities.
Cohen warned the committee that the TRICARE program has serious "shortcomings
in its implementation" requiring improvements.
No Easy Answers
"Especially difficult will be how to better address the needs of military
retirees," Cohen said. "There are no easy answers. It will cost a
great deal."
Despite the expense, Warner said, the issue of health care has to be faced,
because it affects the services' ability to recruit and especially to retain
good people. Also, he said, the nation has an obligation to its retired military
personnel. Warner said he plans to seek "guidance from our military retirees"
before deciding on a course of action.
The nation needs to do more "to protect the lives of our men and women
who serve in combat," Warner said. The recent experience in Kosovo, where
there were no U.S. combat casualties, strengthened the public's desire for less
and less risk, Warner said.
"I don't think we have adequately utilized the technological ability of
this country" to reduce casualties, Warner said. He proposed making it
a goal to make one third of the nation's deep-strike aircraft unmanned within
10 years and to have one third of the military's ground vehicles unmanned within
15 years.
"Believe me, we're going to address that," he told National Defense.
"I saw UAVs (unmanned aircraft) in Bosnia and Kosovo. I actually stood
on the sight where they were being launched, and I was impressed."
Warner also called upon other members of NATO to do more of their share in
the Balkans.
"That's primarily a European situation, and they've got to keep their
commitments," he said.
Warner said he is convinced that there is a need to defend against missile
attacks by rogue states. "All of our defense planning today is in coalitions,"
Warner told the committee. "If Sadam Hussein had had a missile capable
of threatening Berlin or London, would it have been possible to form a coalition
for Desert Storm? I sincerely doubt it."
Warner is in no hurry, however, to deploy a National Missile Defense system.
"It is far too early to make that judgment," he explained to reporters.
For one thing, he noted, any such deployment would require changes in the Anti-Ballistic
Missile Treaty with Russia, which has a presidential election coming up.
Until the election is past-and Russia has a new president-it is probably unrealistic
to expect the Russian government to agree to allow the United States to build
any new missile system, Warner said.
Currently, Warner is serving his second year as Senate armed services chairman,
having succeeded 97-year-old Sen. Strom Thurmond, R-S.C., in the job. In general,
he gets high marks in his performance in the new assignment.
"Sen. Warner is doing extremely well as chairman," said one Capitol
Hill veteran. "He's really brought that committee back to the forefront
of the debate on national security. He has become a very stabilizing factor.
He has this ability to bring disparate people together to find common ground
on issues."
Part of the reason for his success as chairman, insiders say, is his breadth
of experience in military affairs. He served during World War II as an enlisted
sailor in the Navy. After graduating from Washington and Lee University and
attending the University of Virginia Law School, he became an officer in the
Marine Corps during the Korean War. During the Vietnam War, he became Secretary
of the Navy.
Warner was elected to the Senate in 1978, as a Republican from the state of
Virginia, where he is now serving his fourth term. In large part because of
his efforts, Virginia, for years, has ranked first among states in defense spending
per capita. It is home to more than 20 major military bases, employing more
than 225,000 military and civilian personnel.
Later this month, Warner will receive the James Forrestal Memorial Award for
2000. The Forrestal Award is presented by the National Defense Industrial Association
(NDIA) "to the individual who has most effectively applied Secretary Forrestal's
ideas of a close working relationship between government and industry toward
the requirements of national security," said NDIA President Lawrence F.
Skibbie.