Pentagon Purgatory

Charges of inefficiency and worse are becoming a serious political problem for the Pentagon, and last week Defense Secretary Melvin Laird attempted to demonstrate that there is some movement toward reform. He named an in dependent committee to review the big department's management, research, procurement and decision-making operations. He also anticipated complaints of conflicts of interest. The year-long study will be headed by Gilbert W. Fitzhugh, 59, chief executive of Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., who is, significantly, a man free of any military-industrial connections.

Chances are that when Fitzhugh begins to look for witnesses, one of the most cooperative and informative will be another Fitz -- Arthur E. Fitzgerald.

An efficiency expert and auditor at the Pentagon, Fitzgerald has been giving interested Congressmen detailed, inside descriptions of how multibillion-dollar contracts grow between the assignment and delivery dates. Though he has found eager listeners among critics of the military on Capitol Hill, the Pentagon has chosen to treat him as a mildly treasonous pest.

Violated Integrity. Fitzgerald has told a Capitol Hill committee, among other things, that the Air Force paid a $2 bil lion cost "overrun" on the C-5A trans port plane. He estimated that overruns on the development of the Minuteman II missiles were "better than $4 billion." He confirmed earlier rumors that the Pentagon paid $2.5 billion more than originally anticipated for the avionics of the F-l11.

Since he began to testify, Fitzgerald has himself become as much the center of controversy as his revelations. "What's in it for him?" is a question that fascinates both Fitzgerald's friends and his foes. Cynics view him as an empire builder and opportunist who wants to push his own management schemes on his superiors. Those who are anxious to curb military influence call him a patriot, however. Fitzgerald, 42, explains that his "conscience and professional integrity were violated by the sight of the Pentagon's inefficiency and waste."

Reared in Birmingham during the Depression, Fitzgerald became thrift-conscious early. Despite his family's modest circumstances, he managed to graduate from the University of Alabama with an industrial engineering degree. Later he formed his own management-consultant firm called Performance Technology Corp. After doing some military contract work, he was hired by the Pentagon in 1965 and given the title of Deputy to the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Financial Affairs. Fitzgerald says that he took the $28,000-a-year job in hope of making reforms from within. "I had hoped," he recalls, "that once inside the Pentagon I could identify dramatic opportunities for cost reductions without endangering the nation's security."

Beaten Back. At first, Fitzgerald saw some progress in checking inefficiency. But by early 1967, he says, "we lost control." He recalls: "We were bringing out too much visibility in the cost of contracts. They [officials charged with procurement] were afraid that if McNamara found out, he'd land all over them." Fitzgerald claims that he spotted the C-5A overrun in 1966, but when he pointed it out to his superiors, he was "beaten back."

Fitzgerald's cause came to the attention of Wisconsin Democrat William Proxmire, one of the military's harshest critics. Overcoming an attempt by Pentagon officials to restrict Fitzgerald's testimony before the Joint Economic Committee, Proxmire then launched into a smooth exchange with his prize witness. The dialogue was so smooth, in fact, that some observers wondered if the lines had not been well rehearsed in advance.

Ever since his disclosures, Fitzgerald --who was nominated by the Air Force in 1967 for a Distinguished Service Award--has labored in a kind of Pentagon purgatory. His civil service status, routinely given any appointee at his level after three years of service, was revoked because of "a computer error." He says that his mail is being opened. One letter even bore the initials and stamp of the "action officer" who had opened it. He still toils quietly in the same windowless, fifth-floor office. Instead of monitoring the costs of the multibillion-dollar C-5A and F-lll, he now spends his time evaluating relatively minor projects. His first assignment was to review construction of a bowling alley in Thailand. His finding: a $100,000 overrun.

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