GlobalSecurity.org In the News

The Gazette April 08, 2007

Command move to cost $50 million

By Pam Zubeck

Moving air and space surveillance missions from Cheyenne Mountain will cost more than $50 million, according to a draft of a government analysis obtained by The Gazette.

The draft report said no estimates are available on how much it will cost to fortify the new location at Peterson Air Force Base.

Nor has it been determined how the move will affect national security, the Government Accountability Office report said.

At issue is relocation of the Cheyenne Mountain Operations Center’s primary occupants — North American Aerospace Defense Command and Northern Command — from the 1960s granite bunker to the headquarters at Peterson. There, the commands are housed aboveground about 100 yards from the base’s boundary.

“At a time when bunkers are coming back into style, the best bunker we’ve ever had is getting closed down,” said defense expert John Pike, who runs GlobalSecurity.org.

He said Cold War bunker Raven Rock in Maryland was recently reactivated by the Pentagon after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, as was Mount Weather in Virginia by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

On Sept. 11, 2001, former NORAD/NorthCom commander Gen. Ed Eberhart lost contact with the White House while driving to Cheyenne Mountain.

Adm. Timothy Keating succeeded Eberhart in November 2004, and the next year he identified “unity of effort and command” problems during a NORAD/NorthCom exercise, the GAO briefing said.

Keating, recently reassigned to Pacific Command, then instigated the NORAD/ NorthCom move “to improve operational efficiencies.” The GAO briefing said no cost-benefit analysis was conducted.

Keating wants the mountain put on “warm standby” status for use as a training facility or emergency command center.

The GAO study was ordered last year by the House Armed Services Committee after NORAD/NorthCom didn’t provide a written report about the move. It’s due for completion in May.
The draft briefing contains these “preliminary observations”:

- NORAD will move its air warning center, missile correlation function and Cheyenne Mountain Command Center, with full capability planned for May 2008. Construction begins at Peterson in June.

Of the 112 NORAD people in the mountain, 73 will move to Peterson. The rest will stay. Of NorthCom’s 42 people at Cheyenne Mountain, 18 will move to Peterson and 24 will stay.

Cost: $41.6 million for the move, with an annual operational cost of $5.5 million. That doesn’t include steps to better protect the Peterson building.

- Strategic Command plans to move its missile warning function to Schriever Air Force Base, also east of Colorado Springs. The command surveyed the site on March 8 to determine facility and equipment needs. Of its 81 personnel in the mountain, up to 13 will move to Peterson. Where the others will go hasn’t been decided. StratCom already has elements at Schriever. No cost estimate has been compiled.

- Air Force Space Command is moving its space control center and operation that tracks orbiting objects for satellite customers and NASA to Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The new operation should be on line late this year. Of its 140 people in the mountain, up to 12 will work at Peterson until expertise is developed at Vandenberg. The rest are moving to Vandenberg.
Cost: $10 million.

All 263 of Space Command’s support personnel, such as janitors, cooks and maintenance workers, will remain in the mountain.

After the move, Cheyenne Mountain would become an alternate command center, provide nuclear command and control, or be used for training.
The GAO report has not made a finding about whether the move is a good idea.

Two studies are analyzing the security implications and costs of protecting a consolidated command center at Peterson, depending on level of protection. Among study topics: developing a way to protect computer systems against radio-wave surges, and the possibility of building an underground center.

Pike, the defense expert, said the cost depends on how fortified the new center will be. Though protection against a small band of terrorists would cost less than fortifying against a nuclear threat, Pike said, “It’s hard to duplicate the mountain.”

In July 2006, the GAO reported that the most recent system upgrade at Cheyenne Mountain, handled by Lockheed Martin Mission Systems, began in 2000 and by last summer was $240 million over budget with no estimated completion date and most mission critical capabilities yet to be delivered.

An earlier upgrade program was declared operational in 1998, nearly $1 billion over cost and 11 years late, the GAO reported.
CONTACT THE WRITER: 636-0238 or pam.zubeck@gazette.com

CHEYENNE MOUNTAIN AIR FORCE STATION FACTS

Date opened: April 1966

Fortification:Built to withstand an attack by the Soviet Union. It could not withstand a hit by a modern intercontinental ballistic missile but is considered a stronghold against many threats.

Construction:The Army Corps of Engineers used 1.5 million pounds of dynamite to excavate about 700,000 tons of granite.

The inside:15 buildings, 12 of which have three stories. The complex rests on 1,319, 1,000-pound springs that allow the complex to sway up to a foot horizontally in any direction.

The tunnel:Reinforced by 110,000 rock bolts 6 to 32 feet in length that push outward on the walls to prevent implosion or cave-in. The two blast doors are 25 tons, 3 1/2-foot-thick baffled steel.