Halperin Bid for Defense Post to Be Dropped

President Clinton, bowing to opposition from conservatives, has decided to drop the controversial nomination of Morton H. Halperin as assistant secretary of defense for peacekeeping, officials here said Sunday.

The White House is expected to announce today that Halperin, a 55-year-old former National Security Council staffer and civil libertarian, has asked that his name be withdrawn from consideration.

Administration officials said that the Pentagon will also eliminate the new peacekeeping post, which had been created by outgoing Defense Secretary Les Aspin when officials expected heavy U.S. participation in such operations.

The move had been widely anticipated since mid-December, when Aspin himself resigned in response to White House suggestions that Clinton wanted to replace him as defense secretary.

Although incoming Defense Secretary-designate Bobby Ray Inman had publicly supported the Halperin nomination, insiders said it was unlikely that the retired admiral would want to do battle with Capitol Hill over the issue.

Halperin could not be reached Sunday night, but Administration officials said there was no doubt that the nomination will not be resubmitted to Capitol Hill this year.

Halperin’s nomination had sparked a storm of protest from conservative Republicans, particularly on the Senate Armed Services Committee, which would have had to recommend the nomination for Senate confirmation.

Sen. Strom Thurmond (D-S.C.), ranking Republican on the panel, had pronounced Halperin unfit for the position because he had taken “extreme and irresponsible positions” on key national security issues.

The Republicans also objected to creating an assistant secretary’s post to deal with peacekeeping and human rights affairs, contending that such matters should be handled by the State Department.

The Administration initially had expected peacekeeping operations to be a major factor in the post-Cold War world, but the U.S. experience in Somalia this past year has soured enthusiasm for such ventures.

Halperin, who served as a junior Pentagon staffer with Aspin in the late 1960s before going to the National Security Council, left his NSC job to protest the 1970 U.S. invasion of Cambodia.

He then sued his boss--Henry A. Kissinger--for wiretapping his home to learn whether he had leaked documents about secret American bombing in that country. Almost two decades later, Kissinger apologized.

Over the last 23 years, Halperin has advocated deep cuts in nuclear weapons, opposed covert military operations abroad and sought leniency for Philip Agee, the former CIA operative who leaked the names of other agents.

He has also become a recognized defense expert, winning support from a parade of respected mainstream foreign affairs specialists.

Although Aspin announced his choice for the position in February, the White House did not formally send the nomination to Capitol Hill until early August. And the appointment drew vigorous conservative opposition from the start.

While critics argued that Halperin acquitted himself reasonably well at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on the nomination in November, Republicans on the panel vowed to continue their opposition.

Political analysts warned that had Halperin stayed on, Inman would have had to expend valuable political capital to get the nomination confirmed--a step he was thought to be loathe to take so soon after taking office.