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Thursday, March 15, 2001

According to these officials, the shift would be away from conventional weapons and toward greater emphasis on high-technology systems. The changes would mean less money for projects such as manned fighter aircraft, battle tanks and aircraft carrier battle groups, in favor of a new generation of weapons such as National Missile Defense, laser and particle-beam weapons, and so-called standoff missiles: long-range intelligent tactical weapons.

During last year's election campaign, President Bush pledged his administration would "skip a generation" of weapons systems by boosting research and development into military technology. But defense officials and experts say the changes might take several years to work their way through the Pentagon's budgeting and procurement process.

"The new Defense Department leadership sees a lot of fat, a lot of flabbiness in the way the Pentagon is being managed," said an administration official.

One target of significant cuts could be the nearly 100,000 troops stationed in Europe. These troops were "absolutely key to the defense of Western Europe during the days of the Cold War, but with the Cold War at an end, there is no need at all to maintain that number of troops at that station," another U.S. government official said.

Another target for troop cuts might be the 100,000 troops stationed in Asia, more than one-third of them in South Korea. One U.S. defense official said that with reconciliation between North and South Korea making progress, the need for "such large numbers" of troops simply is not there.

Instead, the Bush administration would try, over time, to nudge South Korea and Japan into assuming a greater regional role and bearing a larger share of their region's defense burden, administration officials said. The Defense Department rates the Japanese and South Korean military as being better trained and equipped – albeit much smaller – than China's.

Another place where the U.S. presence might be reduced is the Middle East, Defense Department officials said. There are about 25,000 U.S. troops stationed there at any one time, but if Marshall's proposals were approved, this number could be significantly reduced.

In particular, there is concern that the presence of U.S. forces in Saudi Arabia has acted as "a lightning rod" for Islamic fundamentalists there, a U.S. government official said. He added that the ruling house of al-Saud bases its legitimacy on being the defenders of the holy Muslim places at Mecca and Medina, and the continuing presence of U.S. forces in the kingdom "only undermines that legitimacy," handing a propaganda opportunity to Islamic extremists.

The July 25, 1996, bombing attack on the Khobar Towers complex in Dhahran that killed 19 Americans was widely believed to have been carried out by Islamic fundamentalists as part of the self-declared strategy of such militants to drive U.S. forces away from the holy places of Islam.

"After Khobar, we lowered our profile way down," said a former State Department official, referring to the decision to move the U.S. airbase from downtown Dhahran to a remote desert location.

The new program could also include sizeable unilateral cuts in the U.S. nuclear arsenal, which numbers about 7,000 deployed nuclear weapons, in accordance with campaign pledges made by Bush last year.

Russia has about 6,000 deployed strategic nukes, while China has an arsenal of about 20 nuclear-equipped intercontinental ballistic missiles. The United States and Russia are already committed to nearly halving their nuclear arsenals under the START II treaty, but Bush said he would consider unilateral cuts to even lower levels.

Such cuts would free funds, possibly for an advanced research and development program to which Bush has pledged billions.

Pentagon officials expect parts of the study to be finished in early April, in time to shape the pentagon's $310 billion budget for 2002. Experts therefore caution that any moves by the Defense Department are unlikely to come quickly.

"You have to understand, this is all in the studies stage," said Tony Cordesman, national security specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "There's no rush about any of this."

The Office of Net Assessment and Pentagon public affairs office would not comment specifically on these proposals, but in the past, Pentagon spokesmen have said that Marshall is just one of a series of analysts that the defense secretary will consult during the course of his review.

Copyright 2001 by United Press International. All rights reserved.

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