Senate Panel Votes to Raise Defense Spending for 1996 : Budget: $265-billion package would cut funding for the B-2 Stealth bomber. But House proposal to kill the Seawolf submarine program is rejected.

WASHINGTON — The Senate Armed Services Committee voted Friday to give the Pentagon $7 billion more in spending authority than President Clinton had requested for the coming fiscal year but followed his recommendation to kill the controversial B-2 bomber program.

After a week of closed-door drafting sessions, the panel formally unveiled a $265-billion defense authorization bill that would revamp much of Clinton’s military budget and force the Administration to spend more than it wants on weapons modernization and missile defense.

But committee members, seeking to distance themselves from several GOP-sponsored provisions in the House version of the bill, rejected House-passed proposals that would make deep cuts in aid to Russia, kill the Seawolf submarine program and slash the Pentagon staff.

Friday’s action came on an 18-3 vote amid indications that key Democrats on the panel may propose a number of floor amendments to challenge Republican-drafted provisions that would increase spending for missile defense and cut subsidies for technical development.

In a rare departure from the panel’s traditional bipartisan stance, Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), the ranking minority member, issued a statement warning Republicans to “anticipate debate . . . over a number of issues in the bill,” from missile defense to nuclear testing.

The bill is expected to go to the Senate floor sometime in mid- or late-July, in time for consideration by a joint House-Senate conference committee before the Labor Day recess. The measure covers fiscal 1996, which begins Oct. 1.

If the Senate approves the Armed Services proposal intact, the legislation seems likely to spark a heated battle in conference committee, where the two houses would have to reconcile sharply differing versions of the bill.

The House passed a $267-billion defense bill two weeks ago that would add $9.5 billion to the $258-billion military budget that Clinton sent lawmakers in January. The Administration has said that it opposes both the House and Senate increases as unnecessary.

Budget analysts said that the House likely would have to cut about $2.5 billion from its Pentagon appropriations bill to make it conform to the budget resolution that Congress passed on Thursday. That measure sets a ceiling of $265 billion for defense spending.

By far the biggest difference between the Senate committee’s proposal and the House version of the bill appeared to be in the way each deals with the politically sensitive issue of military readiness.

The House, convinced that the Administration has been letting readiness slip, provided $3 billion more than Clinton had proposed, both to protect overall troop strength from further cuts and to provide relief for personnel such as air controllers who must work long hours because of staffing shortages.

It also voted to give the Pentagon an extra $4.4 billion to update existing weapons systems and to buy additional aircraft and tanks to replace those now wearing out.

But the Senate panel accepted the Pentagon’s statement that it is not worried about readiness. Instead, it voted to put almost all the extra $7 billion that it approved into weapons modernization and procurement, including for the B-2.

As a result, the Senate bill would boost the Pentagon’s plans to buy a spate of replacement weapons, from radar-evading destroyers to F/A-18C/D attack aircraft and Army tanks, trucks and armored personnel carriers.

The Senate measure also omits provisions written into the House bill by Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove) that would require the military to discharge anyone found to have the AIDS virus and would prohibit abortions on U.S. military bases overseas.

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The Senate committee’s push to kill the B-2 bomber program is in line with Clinton’s own recommendation. The Pentagon argues that, although the controversial radar-evading Stealth bomber is effective, the Administration cannot afford to add to the 20 aircraft it now has.

However, House Republicans insisted that there still is enough uncertainty surrounding the B-2 to keep production lines open for another year in case the Pentagon changes its mind. They provided $553 million to buy radar equipment and other components.

The issue has economic implications for California. The bomber is manufactured at the Northrop Grumman Corp. plant in Palmdale and analysts have estimated that the House action, if upheld in conference committee, could save about 10,000 aerospace jobs in the state.

Nevertheless, the fact that the Senate panel voted to kill the B-2 program is expected to make it difficult for proponents to prevail. Congress voted last year to kill the B-2 after the 20 bombers then on order were delivered. Any vote on the Senate floor is apt to be close.