Omaha World-Herald April 17, 2002
Colorado may get new command Offutt's Strategic Command is the subject of a study on a possible merger with Space Command, which also is in Colorado.
By Jake Thompson, Joe Dejka
The new headquarters for homeland defense likely will be in Colorado, not Nebraska.
Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs is the preferred site for the Northern Command, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said at a press conference Wednesday. Offutt Air Force Base near Bellevue and other bases had been considered for the command, which will be in charge of protecting U.S. soil from attacks. President Bush is expected to nominate Air Force Gen. Ralph Eberhart as the first commander of Northern Command.
Offutt is home to the U.S. Strategic Command, which oversees the nation's nuclear arsenal. Peterson already hosts the U.S. Space Command, which oversees military operations in space.
Defense Department officials are studying whether to merge Strategic Command and Space Command, said Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Asked if a merger could mean moving Space Command to Offutt, Rumsfeld said, "We don't anticipate big moves, if you're talking about buildings and people and communications."
Rumsfeld said he could not address the question of whether the duties of Strategic Command and Space Command could one day be assigned to a single military commander in chief.
Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, was briefed by a senior Defense Department official Wednesday morning. Nelson said the study of merging Space Command with Strategic Command has just begun and is likely to take 90 days.
Nelson also said the defense official told him that the hope is the final decision about the future of the commands will be made by the time the new Northern Command becomes operational Oct. 1.
John Pike, a defense analyst with GlobalSecurity.com, said that when Pentagon leaders sit down to rejigger the wiring diagram of their command structure, the idea of merging StratCom and SpaceCom always comes up.
"It has been talked about for 15 years, but nothing's ever come of it," he said.
Pike said he suspects that's because the merger, while improving the chain of command, isn't needed to address any glaring problems.
"I can't detect anything that's broken that would get fixed by doing this," he said.
Northern Command will coordinate with the White House's Office of Homeland Defense.
The announcement about the new command came as Pentagon officials unveiled a military reorganization meant to streamline its command structure and account for the threat of terrorism.
Establishing the Northern Command took on an urgency after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. The new command would be responsible for the geographic area that includes the continental United States and Alaska, Mexico, Canada, parts of the Caribbean and 500 miles of ocean beyond the coasts.
The likely assignment of Northern Command to Colorado left Bellevue Mayor Jerry Ryan disappointed.
"That's too bad," he said. "We certainly have the facilities here."
Peterson Air Force Base also is home to Northern American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD. The Pentagon said NORAD will remain there.
The Northern Command commander will also head NORAD.
Copyright 2002 The Omaha World-Herald Company
