Weinberger Rejects Disbanding of Joint Chiefs of Staff : But He Supports Half of Senate Staff’s 91 Recommendations for Reorganizing Pentagon

Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger, in his first public reaction to a Senate staff report on Pentagon reorganization, said Thursday that he opposes the report’s dramatic recommendation to disband the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

In testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Weinberger said he could support about half of the report’s 91 recommendations but “I simply do not agree with the assumption behind the recommendations for fundamental changes” in the Joint Chiefs system.

“That assumption,” Weinberger said, “is that each chief is too parochial and is solely concerned with protecting his own service at the expense of national interests. This is simply not the case with the chiefs with whom I have worked.”

Praises Their Advice

Instead, Weinberger said, he had found their advice to be “consistently timely, accurate, competent and innovative.”

The report, released last month by the Armed Services Committee’s staff, urged that the Joint Chiefs be replaced with a new military advisory panel. It blamed poor interservice coordination for the failure of the Iranian hostage rescue mission in 1980 and for shortcomings in the 1983 invasion of Grenada--findings that Weinberger disputed in heated exchanges with committee members.

Sens. Barry Goldwater (R-Ariz.) and Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), the chairman and ranking minority member of the committee, said that broad Pentagon reform legislation will be introduced in January.

Goldwater, noting he has said many times that “the system is broke and needs to be fixed,” amended the charge slightly: “It’s bent quite a bit, and we just want to straighten it out.”

Reconciling Changes

Any Senate-passed changes would have to be reconciled with legislation the House is expected to approve next week that significantly increases the authority of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs.

In his testimony, Weinberger said one recommendation he could enthusiastically endorse is a reduction in Congress’ “micromanagement” of the Pentagon. He issued a “challenge” to the committee: If Congress reduces the huge number of required reports, studies and hearings that bog down Pentagon officials, the Defense Department would make “substantial reductions” in staff.

But Weinberger clearly opposes making any sweeping changes, saying he has already instituted a long string of reforms that have corrected serious management problems. For example, he said, he instituted a biweekly audit of major weapons systems that has reduced cost overruns from a 13%-15% annual rate several years ago to a current rate of less than 1%.

Clashes With Nunn

Weinberger clashed with Nunn over a charge in the report that communications difficulties between the Navy and Air Force had hampered the 1983 invasion of Grenada and symbolized poor coordination between the military services.

Weinberger discounted the episode, saying the errors were not the fault of the system but were “inherent in any large-scale operation.”

“That is a patent absurdity,” Nunn responded angrily, adding that it was “directly contradicted” by a classified Pentagon report that he held aloft. “You are making unclassified statements that are rebutted by classified material,” Nunn said.