At War with the Military

As chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Mississippi Democrat John Stennis smoothly guided Defense Department appropriations through the Senate with only desultory debates. Expecting similar treatment in this session, the Pentagon sent up one installment of its customarily laconic request for funds.

This time the request was for $22 billion, a part of the military's total budget of $80 billion for fiscal 1970. The bill was a mere five pages long, which figures to about $22 million a word. Included in the Pentagon package was the Nixon Administration's controversial ABM system, which just barely squeaked by in the Senate by a 51-50 vote. The narrow margin of victory on its major section spelled trouble for the balance of the bill. Last week, before the Senate's adjournment until after Labor Day, other sections of the bill were debated and trimmed. Stennis, an able and astute politician, had anticipated the Senate's antimilitary mood and cut $2 billion from the bill in his committee. Yet he was shocked to find that, once it had reached the floor, his fellow Senators demanded still further cuts. "Take out the tanks, take out the carriers, take out this, take out that," Stennis complained. "I just do not believe that it is the way to proceed."

Too Large. His colleagues in the Senate were of another mind. Last week the Senate military critics successfully passed a series of amendments to the military appropriation bill:

qed Transportation, storage and use of chemical and biological warfare (CBW) agents will be severely restricted. Open-air tests will be allowed only if the Secretary of Defense rules them necessary for national security and the Surgeon General determines that they would not be a menace to public health. Congress will have to specifically approve any money to be spent on CBW, and it must be advised at least 30 days before the agents are transported.

qed A $25 million cut in the Pentagon's "emergency fund," an amendment that was opposed by California Conservative George Murphy, who called it "comfortable money" for the military. Answered Maryland Democrat Joseph Tydings: "I would call it luxury money."

qed Another budget slash, sponsored by William Fulbright, reduced research funds by $46 million. The Arkansas liberal, who for years has complained that much of the research is irrelevant, mocked the Defense Department's projects by ticking off some that have already been funded, including studies of "Militant Hindu Nationalism--The Early Phase" and "The Chinese Warlord System: 1916 to 1928." Fulbright's amendment also specified that the Pentagon cannot use funds to research any nonmilitary subjects.

qed A ceiling of $2.5 billion was placed on the amount that the Department of Defense can spend to support foreign troops in countries such as Viet Nam, Laos and Thailand.

No Carrier. Still pending is an amendment to cut more than $500 million from the bill by limiting the purchase of the controversial C-5A aircraft. The Senate critics also want to deny the Pentagon a $377 million nuclear-powered aircraft carrier. They argue that in the missile age the carrier makes too massive and lumbering a target, and that the U.S. is the only major sea power still building them. Another thorny topic to be discussed is whether the U.S. still needs--and can afford --to maintain 428 major overseas military bases.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee, meanwhile, demanded to see a top-secret 1965 agreement with Thailand, which Idaho Democrat Frank Church said might "contemplate the use of American forces" in the event of a military threat to that small Southeast Asian country. At week's end the exact contents of the pact remained a mystery. It was learned, however, that the U.S. could be committed to send troops into Thailand under certain circumstances. This news caused Church to ask if the pact could lead to another Viet Nam."

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