Base-Closure Panel Adds to List Submitted by Rumsfeld

The Base Realignment and Closure Commission voted Tuesday to add a handful of military facilities in eight states and the nation’s capital to the hundreds that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld wants to close or shrink.

The Navy Broadway Complex in San Diego and the Naval Air Station Brunswick in Maine were added to the list of sites to be closed. Under the commission’s actions, the Naval Master Jet Base at the Naval Air Station Oceana in Virginia and Pope Air Force Base in North Carolina could see more force reductions than the Pentagon proposed, or could be shut down.

Even small facilities were not immune. With an eye on possibly merging administrative, education and medical services, the commission voted to include several installations in Colorado, Ohio, Indiana, California, Virginia and Washington, D.C., for consideration.

The Galena Airport Forward Operating Location in Alaska is now also on the list for closure or downsizing.

The votes showed the independent commission’s willingness to diverge -- at least somewhat -- from the plan Rumsfeld submitted in May, when he proposed closing or reducing forces at 62 major domestic bases and hundreds of smaller installations from coast to coast.

“This commission knows what it is talking about and is not a rubber stamp. We are an independent check on the power of the secretary to close and realign military bases,” commission Chairman Anthony J. Principi said after the vote.

By adding bases to the list, the commission gave itself more flexibility to change what the Pentagon proposed as it considers shifting pieces of the mammoth domestic base network to better suit today’s defense needs.

Earlier, Principi cautioned that adding a base to the list did not “necessarily mean that the base will be realigned or closed,” but will allow the panel to further analyze those bases’ usefulness by visiting sites, collecting data and holding hearings.

The panel will make final decisions next month about which bases to propose for closing or reductions, with President Bush and Congress making a binding decision in the fall.

In a reprieve for some communities, the commission decided against targeting four large bases for closure: the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego; the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard in Hawaii; Moody Air Force Base in Georgia; and Grand Forks Air Force Base in North Dakota.