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Politics & The Nation
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Push to cut top brass causing much unease Generals and admirals
worry about fewer jobs and earlier retirements
by Craig Whitlock Of all the spending cuts and
budget battles the Pentagon is confronting, none is causing more angst than Defense Secre- tary Robert M. Gates’s vow to start getting rid of generals and admirals.
By almost any measure, the
military is more top-heavy an in- stitution than it has been for dec- ades. Today, there are 40 four- star generals and admirals — one more than in 1971, during the Vietnam War, even though the number of active-duty troops has shrunk by almost half. The number of active-duty
generals and admirals of all rank, meanwhile, has increased by about 13 percent since 1996. It is, as Gates puts it, “brass
creep.” But the defense secretary’s
pledge Monday to cut about 5 percent of the brass is nothing short of seismic for many at the Pentagon. The cuts would be the largest in the upper ranks since a similar squeeze at the end of the Cold War, when the collapse of the Soviet Union prompted the military to downsize. The defense secretary has said he also wants to make similar trims in the civilian leadership, noting that the number of people assigned to his office has grown by nearly 1,000 over the past dec- ade.
“Our headquarters and sup-
port bureaucracies — military and civilian alike — have swelled to cumbersome and top-heavy proportions,” Gates said in a speech Thursday to the Marines’ Memorial Association in San Francisco, adding that the top layers have “grown accustomed to operating with little consider- ation for cost.” The push has caused some squealing at the Pentagon, as one- and two-star generals and admirals privately fret that they
could be forced to retire early. Up-and-coming colonels and captains worry that fewer plum posts will be available. Gates has acknowledged that he faces stiff resistance. “Every flag officer will think I’m after him or her,” he told reporters in May, when he first suggested that the brass might need to go on a diet. “But we have to be willing to look at everything.” On Monday, Gates named the
first casualty by announcing plans to dismantle the Joint Forces Command, a unit based in Norfolk that coordinates military doctrine among the armed ser- vices and is traditionally headed by a four-star commander. He has told aides that they have un- til Nov. 1 to come up with a list of at least 50 other brass jobs that will get the ax. Officials said that most of the positions probably will be eliminated by attrition. Among the likely targets are
officers in Europe. U.S military and NATO forces in Europe are jointly led by a four-star com- mander. In a vestige of World War II, however, the Army, Navy and Air Force have four-star offi- cers overseeing their individual forces in Europe as well. “The ranks of the major com- mands there have remained in- tact since the Cold War,” Gen. James E. Cartwright, vice chair- man of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters Monday. “So is that appropriate? Should we go back and adjust it? Not only the rank structure, but the size of the headquarters and what they do.” Analysts said the brass squeeze
won’t result in significant sav- ings. Terminating a single gener- al’s billet might save about $200,000 a year in salary and benefits, barely a rounding error in the Pentagon’s base budget this year of $535 billion. But they said the effort is nec-
essary as part of Gates’s broader drive to stave off budget-cutting lawmakers who argue that de- fense spending should no longer be exempt as Congress grapples with record deficits. “He’s pretty clearly trying to send a message that the Penta- gon is going to get leaner, and
‘Brass creep’ Te number of generals and admirals in the U.S. military has declined only slightly since the end of the Cold War, even though the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps are much smaller overall. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates says he wants to cut at least 50 slots for generals and admirals over the next two years.
Active-duty military personnel In millions
0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5
0 ’90 ’95 ’00
SOURCE: Department of Defense *As of May 2010
that includes the people at the top,” said Todd S. Harrison, a military spending expert at the Center for Strategic and Budget- ary Assessments, a Washington think tank.
“If he had done nothing, if he had not trimmed the number of generals, then he would have been more vulnerable to the ar- gument that the Department of Defense is fat and bloated and can take a cut.”
Another reason, Gates said, is
that the military’s decision-mak- ing process has become bogged down.
By way of illustration, Gates recounted the beleaguered his- tory of a deployment request that landed on his desk to send a sin- gle dog-handling team to Af- ghanistan. The paperwork first had to be approved by five four- star commanders: the chief of U.S. Central Command, the com- mander of the International Se- curity Assistance Force in Af- ghanistan; the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; the Army chief of staff; and the supreme al- lied commander for Europe. Analysts said there are some legitimate reasons why the num- ber of brass has increased dis- proportionately to the size of the armed forces. Some commanders
’05 ’10* 2.04 million 1.43 million Generals and admirals
1,000 1,200
-30.1% 1990-2010
200 400 600 800
0 ’90 ’95 ’00 ’05 ’10* THE WASHINGTON POST 1,068 964 by Ashley Halsey III
-9.7% 1990-2010
199 1 0-2010 1990-2010
The effort to determine the cause of a plane crash that killed former Alaska senator Ted Ste- vens and four others was slowed Thursday by bad weather that shrouded the remote crash site and by the extent of the injuries to those who survived it. “We are working to interview
the survivors now,” said Deborah A.P. Hersman, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board. “We’ve got folks at the hos- pital trying to make contact with them. We’ve got to understand why they can’t talk.” The four survivors, all from the
have been activated temporarily from the reserves to take part in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The military has also placed more emphasis on joint opera- tions involving all the armed ser- vices, resulting in more high- level commands. Raymond F. DuBois, a defense
official during the George W. Bush administration, said he would advise Gates to take a me- thodical approach by targeting 20 percent of all four-star com- manders and reclassifying their jobs as three-star generals and admirals. Then he would take 20 percent of the three-star officers and take them down to two stars, and keep doing the same until the ranks are flattened out. “Start with the top, don’t start with the bottom,” he said.
But DuBois added that he would be reluctant to cut many one-star jobs, which he said are necessary to keep as career in- centives for ambitious colonels and captains. “In a military that needs to re- tain its best and brightest,” said DuBois, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and Interna- tional Studies, “it is an enor- mously important retention fac- tor.”
whitlockc@washpost.com
Washington area, remained hos- pitalized Thursday in Anchorage’s Providence Hospital. Hersman did not provide details of their emotional or physical states but said members of her team were awaiting clearance from doctors to begin interviews. As investigators gathered infor-
mation from other sources, they pieced together a new timeline of Monday’s fatal hillside crash of the 53-year-old DeHavilland float- plane. Initial reports had suggested the plane went down while re- turning to a lodge after a day of salmon fishing. Now investigators think it crashed in the early after- noon while bound from the lodge to a remote fishing camp about 50 miles away. “We believe the crash occurred 15 to 20 minutes after takeoff from the lodge,” Hersman said. She said initial indications were that the ruby-red plane was pointed in the direction of the camp when it slammed into a hill- side, skidded about 100 feet uphill and came to rest on its left side. The cockpit apparently snapped from the fuselage, but the body of the plane was largely intact and the passengers remained inside. There was no fire, she said. “The timelines are not tight
now,” Hersman said. “That could be the challenge with people’s memories.”
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Aide to New York governor charged in domestic assault case
Associated Press
new york — An aide to New York Gov. David A. Paterson (D) was charged Thursday after a do- mestic violence complaint that touched off an evidence-tamper- ing investigation and ultimately helped the governor decide to abandon his bid for a full term. The now-suspended aide, Da-
vid Johnson, did not enter a plea at his arraignment Thursday in Bronx Criminal Court and was re- leased, but he was ordered to stay away from his accuser, ex-girl- friend Sherr-una Booker. He had surrendered earlier in the day on charges of assault, menacing, ha- rassment and criminal mischief, all misdemeanors. Johnson, wearing a suit, did
not comment outside court, while Booker’s attorney said his client felt a step closer to getting justice.
“She also believes that no woman should ever have to go through what happened to her,” attorney Kenneth Thompson said. Johnson was suspended in
February without pay, and Pater- son spokesman Morgan Hook said Thursday that his status has not changed. The governor’s of- fice had no further comment. Paterson’s involvement in the case — he made a phone call to Booker before she let the case drop initially by not appearing in court — caused him serious polit- ical damage, even though investi- gators found no evidence of wit- ness tampering.
Small planes that are the com- mon conveyance in Alaska’s vast wilderness are not tracked by air traffic controllers or required to file flight plans as they skip from one remote location to another, often landing on unmanned grass runways and lakes and rivers. Un- like larger commercial airliners,
FRIDAY, AUGUST 13, 2010
Weather slows probe of Alaska plane crash
Accident that killed ex-senator occurred earlier than thought
they aren’t required to carry black-box flight recorders to tell the tale if something goes wrong. In this case, where the physical
evidence might not fully reveal what went wrong, and given that the pilot died in the crash, estab- lishing a solid timeline based on interviews might help determine the cause.
One potential culprit is Alaska’s
volatile summer weather, which has socked in the rugged crash scene for all but a few hours since Monday. Knowing just when the plane crashed will allow investi- gators to match conditions to the moment of impact. The nearest weather station was about 20 miles away in Dillingham, and Hersman said investigators will interview pilots of other planes who were closer to the site at the time of the crash. The timeline also plays a factor
in determining how long the pas- sengers were trapped before the first help — a doctor-led team that struggled through the under- brush for 40 minutes — arrived at the crash scene. It is unclear whether any of those who died — Stevens, 86; Washington lobbyist William “Bill” Phillips Sr., 56; pilot Theron “Terry” Smith, 62; Dana Tindall, 48, an executive with the com- pany that owned the plane; and her daughter, Corey Tindall, 16 — survived the initial impact. If the crash occurred before 2:30 p.m. rather than in early eve- ning, however, the survivors en- dured a longer wait for help than first thought. Even after the initial rescue team arrived, the survivors could not be airlifted out until the following morning. Hersman said the lodge first learned the plane never made it to the fishing camp when lodge staff members contacted the camp to determine whether the group would return in time for dinner. They then called flight service personnel at the Dillingham air- port to see whether they had word of the plane, which they did not. The lodge staff called the airport again minutes later to request a search-and-rescue effort. It was shortly before 8 p.m. when a pilot radioed in that the wreckage had been spotted. Hersman said two NTSB inves-
tigators reached the crash site during a brief break in the weath- er Wednesday and completed their on-site inspection, but re- newed bad weather postponed the next step, bringing in a heli- copter capable of lifting the wreckage back to Dillingham for more detailed scrutiny.
halseya@washpost.com
Senate passes $600 million bill to beef up border security Associated Press
In a special session Thursday, the Senate passed a $600 million bill to put more agents and equipment along the Mexican border. The voice vote in a nearly emp-
ty chamber sends the legislation to President Obama, who planned to sign it into law Friday. Obama had urged Congress to channel more money toward border security amid complaints from states besieged by undocu- mented immigrants and illegal drug trafficking. The border security measure
would fund the hiring of 1,000 new Border Patrol agents to be deployed at critical areas along the border, 250 more Immigra- tion and Customs Enforcement agents, and 250 more Customs and Border Protection officers. It provides for new communi-
cations equipment and greater use of unmanned surveillance drones. There are currently sev- en such drones along the border. Senate historian Donald Ritchie said it was only the sec- ond time since the August break became official policy in 1970 that the Senate had reconvened. The first time was after Hurri- cane Katrina in 2005.
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