Biting The Bullet

In the halcyon days when there was more than enough federal pork to go around, closing an outmoded military base was a rather simple operation. Between 1961 and 1977, for example, the Pentagon disposed of hundreds of military installations by executive fiat. But in 1975 the Air Force made the mistake of trying to shut down its Loring base in northern Maine. The state's Republican Congressman, William Cohen (now a Senator), joined then House Majority Leader Tip O'Neill to require the Pentagon to submit costly and time-consuming environmental impact studies before any base could be shuttered. Loring was saved, as were such anchors of the nation's defense as Virginia's moated Fort Monroe, commissioned shortly after the War of 1812, and Utah's Fort Douglas, built in 1862 to guard against attacks by hostile Indians.

Last week the House moved to break the political impasse that has prevented any major military base in the U.S. from being decommissioned during the past eleven years. The bill, sponsored by Texas Republican Richard Armey, is designed to fend off angry finger-pointing from constituents by putting the onus on a nine-member bipartisan commission.

By year's end the panel would submit a list of proposed base closings to Defense Secretary Frank Carlucci, waiving environmental-impact statements. Carlucci must approve or reject the entire list. If Congress votes to save the bases, it could be overruled by a presidential veto. The House bill is similar to a plan passed by the Senate; after the two bills are reconciled, President Reagan is expected to approve. The savings from the shutdowns could be as much as $5 billion annually.

Ironically, congressional trepidation about base closings may be misplaced. A 1977 study of 100 shutdowns found that most local economies were better off without the presence of the military. The Pentagon's Office of Economic Adjustment reported that barracks and bunkers had been transformed into industrial parks, colleges, vocational schools and airports. Where the 100 bases had once provided 93,000 civilian jobs, there were now 138,000 jobs -- a statistic Congressmen may want to have handy in December, when the base hit list is made public.