Panel Reopens Gays-in-Military Hearings

Senate Republicans forced a new round of hearings on the gays-in-the-military controversy Thursday, prompting the Pentagon to delay publishing long-awaited final regulations on the issue.

Only hours before the new regulations were to have been made public, the Senate Armed Services Committee announced that, at the insistence of its GOP members, it would conduct further hearings. It said that the sessions could start as early as next week.

A few minutes later, the Defense Department said that the regulations, which had been scheduled to be distributed today, would be delayed indefinitely--ostensibly because of the heavy volume of paperwork involved.

Officials on both sides said that the delay was prompted by eleventh-hour objections by Sen. Dan Coats (R-Ind.), one of the Senate’s most vocal opponents of allowing homosexuals to serve in the military.

Besides insisting on new hearings, Coats has demanded changes in the wording of some of the regulations. Congressional insiders said that the alterations are not major, but the Pentagon has opposed them as unnecessary. The two sides have been negotiating for several days.

It was not immediately clear how long the latest dispute would delay publication of the new regulations. Pentagon officials said that they expect a holdup of only a couple of weeks, but some analysts warned that it could be longer if tempers flare.

Despite the acquiescence of the Armed Services Committee Thursday, there were indications that the panel’s leadership was embarrassed over Coats’ move. Chairman Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) had been working closely with the Defense Department and had endorsed the new rules.

Moreover, GOP strategists said that the push for new hearings had only lukewarm backing from the panel’s Republicans. Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.), the committee’s ranking minority leader, publicly supported Coats’ proposal.

Ironically, the new policies that Clinton has ordered--dubbed “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Don’t Pursue,” after the changes that they would make, would result in only modest differences from restrictions on homosexuals currently enforced in the military.

On Wednesday, Les Aspin’s successor as defense secretary, William J. Perry, provided Nunn’s committee with detailed answers to legal questions about the new regulations but apparently failed to persuade Coats, at least, that the wording in the rules is sound.

BACKGROUND

The series of new regulations essentially continue the longstanding ban on homosexual activity in the military, but prohibit “witch hunts” against suspected gays and mandate more humane handling of such cases than has been the practice in the past. The Pentagon made public the broad outlines of the new regulations on Dec. 22. They were drafted by former Defense Secretary Les Aspin. The regulations were designed in part to follow legislation Congress passed last year setting down restrictions on service by homosexuals. President Clinton initially had sought to lift any ban on gays in the military but ran into heated opposition on Capitol Hill.