By An amendment to delete a ban on base closures from the House version of the 2018 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) failed Thursday prior to consideration of the bill.
The measure, which would strike language preventing a new round of base realignment and closure from the 1,000-page bill, was voted down 175 to 248 during consideration of some of the 210 amendments to the legislation.
Rep. Tom McClintock (R-Calif.), sought to strike a section of the NDAA that states “this section would affirm that nothing in this Act shall be construed to authorize an additional Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) round.”
The ban stops the Defense Department for the sixth year in a row from studying or implementing closure of excess infrastructure. The bill increases authorized spending on ongoing BRAC activities resulting from the previous round of closures in 2005.
The Pentagon’s budget request contained $255.8 million for BRAC but the House would allocate $290.8 million. The $35 million increase is for Navy base closures, the bill says.
Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), pointed out that the Pentagon included a request for BRAC in its budget submission and that Congress has repeatedly denied the Defense Department authorization even to study shuttering its excess bases.
“The Pentagon – President Donald Trump’s Pentagon and Secretary Mattis’ Pentagon – recommended a BRAC round that we rejected,” Smith said. “Make no mistake about it, the Republican President and Secretary Mattis support a BRAC round.”
Opponents argue that the Pentagon has not sufficiently studied the effects of another BRAC round, although the Defense Department is legally prohibited from performing a detailed analysis of the ups and downs.
“Let’s at least let them take a look at it to give us the numbers, because … we have crucial readiness shortfalls. … We are right now not doing right by the men and women who serve in the military by not providing them with the training and equipment they need to do the missions that we are contemplating having them do. If we can find savings by not building as many nuclear weapons as we need or by closing institutions that we do not need, then I think that is something we owe the men and women in the military, Smith said.”
House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) said he welcomes a cost-benefit analysis of another BRAC round and that he would not oppose authorizing the Pentagon to conduct such a study to update the 2004 estimate that DoD has about 22 percent excess infrastructure.
“What I am interested in is a real, updated, data-driven study that shows whether we have excess infrastructure and of what sort,” Thornberry said. There is no provision or requirement in the 2018 NDAA for such a study.
“What we need is an updated study and if it shows we’ve got excess infrastructure, I am not at all opposed to having another round of BRAC,” Thornberry said. “I am very opposed to having another round like 2005 which … has not broken even 12 years later.”
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis in June told HASC he does not have confidence in current assessments of what a BRAC round would ultimately save and wants to review the data on excess capacity.
“I am not comfortable right now that we have a full 20-some percent excess infrastructure,” Thornberry quoted Mattis as testifying during the June HASC hearing. “I need to go back through and look at this again because I don’t want to, you know, get rid of something or come to you with something that we can’t sustain and then we try to say we got to buy some land here in 10 years.”
