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B1B Bomber Hangar (AP)
$1.8 billion
20-year savings from Ellsworth's closure, projected by Pentagon
$0
20-year savings from Ellsworth's closure, according to base closure panel
$20 million
Cost of moving Ellsworth's B1-B bombers to Texas
Source: AP
Panel Overrules Pentagon on South Dakota Base
WASHINGTON (Aug. 26) -- The base closing commission voted Friday to keep open Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota -- rejecting the Pentagon's plan to close it -- as the panel labored toward conclusion of a politically delicate task that has brought alternating sighs of relief and exasperation in communities across America.
The surprise decision was a setback for Pentagon leaders, a blessing for South Dakotans who feared losing some 4,000 jobs, and a victory for Sen. John Thune and the state's other politicians who lobbied vigorously to save the base. Thune, a freshman Republican, unseated then-Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle partly on the strength of his claim that he would be better positioned to help save the base.
As they made decisions this week on the first round of base closings in a decade, commissioners also bucked Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld by voting to keep open two major Navy bases in New England -- a submarine base in Connecticut and a shipyard in Maine.
Other contentious issues in the Air Force restructuring, especially changes to the Air National Guard, remained to be heard later Friday.
Ellsworth, most famous for its Cold War-era arsenal of missiles and nuclear bombers aimed toward the Soviet Union, is home to half the nation's fleet of B1-B bombers.
The Pentagon had wanted to move all the bombers to their other location, Dyess Air Force Base in Texas.
But the commission found that closing Ellsworth wouldn't save any money over 20 years, and that it actually would cost nearly $20 million to move the planes to the Texas base. The Pentagon had projected saving $1.8 billion over two decades with the closure.
Commissioners worried that putting all the B1-B bombers at one base would hurt force readiness. The panel noted that Ellsworth, located on the South Dakota prairie, had plenty of "unfettered airspace."
[They actually train in Wyoming on reserved land. It takes the bombers 8 minutes to fly there.]
But the panel, which promised not to be a rubber stamp, rejected some of the Pentagon's most controversial decisions on some of its largest bases.
Within minutes of opening its Friday session, the nine-member panel signed off on proposals to shift forces around Lackland Air Force Base in Texas and Langley Air Force Base in Virginia.
Copyright 2005 The Associated Press
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