European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - June 26, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 the stars and stripes dual Basing would also heighten readiness by rep. Pat Schroeder special to the Washington Post Mannheim West Germany a entering the . Army base at Mannheim is like going Home. Driving through the Gate you leave behind the medieval architecture of a German City on the Banks of the Rhine and enter Middle America. You find yourself in a Small City that might be in Colorado Ohio or Alabama Complete with supermarkets and split level Homes swimming pools and schools Bowling alleys and Barber shops bars and Barbecue pits Barking dogs and screaming kids. American outposts like Mannheim made sense during the height of the cold War but they make Little sense today. They Are incredibly expensive inflexible to changes in threat and packed with support staff who can contribute Little to fighting a War. More than 400,000 american military personnel along with their dependents civilian employees and contractors live in these Little knots landings abroad. The largest number a 250,000 soldiers 220,000 dependents and 125,000 civilian employees a Are in Germany others Are stationed in England Japan South Korea Italy the Philippines Panama and a dozen More countries. This Basing pattern reflects a reality that no longer exists. The number of american troops stationed abroad should and will plummet Over the next decade. In Europe the number will drop from 325,000 to 50,000 in the Pacific from 110,000 to 40,000. Yet some in the Pentagon want to reduce troop Levels without changing How they Are based. This would be a mistake. Heavily armoured troops in a fixed position Are the Way of the past soviet tanks on the Central Plains of Europe no longer pose the greatest threat to our Security. Rather we must be ready for the unexpected with forces that Are Mobile and quickly deployable. That a Why dual Basing is the Best system for the future. Here show it works Only units that cannot perform their missions if based in the United states a like those engaged in intelligence collection Host nation relations maintenance of propositioned War material and treaty verification a would be permanently based outside the United states. The number of these troops would Likely be fewer than 20,000 worldwide. All other units including infantry artillery fighter aircraft and close air support would be permanently based in the United states. On a rotation basis units would be deployed Forward for Short term assignments at Bare boned bases. The soldiers families would remain in the United states near relatives schools churches. Short term deployments could be As Brief As a month or As Long As one year As is now the Case for unaccompanied Tours in Korea. Heavy equipment including tanks and planes As Well As ammunition tents radios rations and the like would remain overseas. Bases in foreign countries would be provided by the Host nation. If Germany is now willing to Pony up $450 million for interim stationing of soviet troops in East Germany it should be willing to pay to keep up Bare Bones deployment bases for us. Dual Basing occurred to me when i was being Briefe Dandrew j. Glass on air Force plans to relocate the f-16s of the 401st tactical fighter Wing from Torrejon Spain to a Brand new base at Croton Italy at a Cost of nearly $ 1 billion. The planes pilots and Crews of the 401st do not operate out of Torrejon and would not operate out of Croton. Rather they deploy to bases in Turkey and Italy to conduct their primary a if outdated a missions of strafing Warsaw pact bases. Each Squadron and its associated personnel is gone from Torrejon about four months a year. The 401st proves that dual Basing works but Why is its Home base in Europe even ignoring new construction costs air Force figures show that it is 16 percent cheaper to operate a Wing in the United states than abroad. Dual Basing should be our Standard method of operation. The advantages would be enormous. Defense experts have Long complained that american troops Are Long on Tail and Short on tooth. That is we May have 325,000 troops in Europe but Many of them Are civil engineers Cooks Drivers Budge Teers and others who Are better suited to managing our extraterritorial american cities than to fighting a War. With dual Basing virtually All american troops abroad will be fighters. This Means that 50,000 troops in a dual Basing Mode can provide As much deterrence in Europe As will 195,000 american troops the number in the Central Region under natos conventional arms limitation proposal living in Middle american outposts. Dual Basing would also heighten readiness. Today . Troops based in the United states get ample training and regular exercise in air to air combat tank Maneu vers and the like. Troops stationed abroad get limited realistic training to minimize citizen complaints about noise environmental damage and safety. In Germany the restrictions Are most severe. And except for a few special units none of our troops gets much training or exercise in rapid deployment. Dual Basing however will Force deployment exercises by its very nature. In addition dual Basing is far less expensive than the current system. True it would entail some added spending for Airlift and sea lift. But that would be More than offset by savings on base operating costs abroad. According to a department of defense report the Cost of our overseas commitment ran $27 billion in fiscal year 1990, excluding any costs for weapons. In 1988, the United states spent $3.5 billion to construct and maintain bases overseas $2.7 billion to hire foreign nationals $1.5 billion for overseas Cost of living differentials $1.5 billion to move troops and $2.5 billion to operate overseas bases. Just to operate the overseas department of defense dependents school program for 150,000 kids costs nearly $ 1 billion a year a Only slightly less than the $1.3 billion we spent on head Start last year. Every month the Pentagon flies 12,000 soldiers and another 10,000 dependents Between the United states and Germany alone a enough to fill two 747s every Day of the week except sunday. It costs about $4,000 to relocate an enlisted Soldier and family to Germany and about $ 13,000 to relocate an officer. To meet the needs of american Consumers at these bases taxpayers spend a Quarter of a billion dollars to transport goods to commissaries and Post exchanges. Like bringing coals to Newcastle . Taxpayers pay to ship Beer to Germany. And we transport 432,000 cases of cat and Doe fond abroad each year to feed the pets of soldiers in fact the army even ships pet food to Korea where Soldier Are not allowed to take their pets. The defense department ships 750 million pounds of household goods overseas each year at a Cost of about $500 million. In 1989, the army sent nearly 50,000 service members cars to Europe at a Cost of $ 1,000 per car. Not infrequently the Cost of shipping exceeds the value of the vehicle. Each year the Pentagon spends about the same amount of Money to ship ammunition to overseas bases As it does to transport service members cars. Currently troops Are reassigned every two or three years to new bases. This frenzied rotation schedule costs Money and often Means that no one Ever becomes expert in his or her Job. Having one Quarter of All . Troops stationed abroad is what drives this rotation. With Many fewer troops assigned abroad tour lengths can be extended to four or five years. At the same time the less expensive forces of the National guard and reserves can take Over More jobs from the Active forces. As a result we will have higher Quality More experienced staff. A moreover while dual Basing would Cut costs abroad it would not require any new construction in the United states. We Are now closing bases because of excess capacity. It would also eliminate a potential logistical Nightmare were the soviets Ever to March through Europe or revolution to break out in the Philippines we would be saddled with a horrendous problem of evacuating dependents. Not under dual Basing. Meanwhile permanent overseas bases Are getting harder to sustain. As the current Philippines negotiations show some countries regard our bases As violations of sovereignty and extensions of colonialism. Many countries cannot politically allow us to maintain permanent bases on their soil. Where we Are permitted it is often because we pay through the Teeth. According to a 1987 Pentagon study we Are being held up to the tune of $2 billion a year in rental payments for bases disguised As foreign Aid linked to foreign base rights. Now some in the Philippines Are talking about raising their rental charge from $500 million to $2 billion a year. Dual Basing is a stable Model for Burden sharing. Fair sharing of the common defense Burden is More than an equal division of costs. It also Means a regime whereby each partner provides what it can Best offer. In Germany for example dual Basing would mean that the germans provide and maintain training areas Cantonment areas and storage facilities. We would provide the level of troops necessary to provide stability. Though the world is changing fast we remain the single benign superpower with global obligations. Threats can come from any direction and Call for carefully calibrated responses. Who knows where we might want to deploy troops tomorrow dual Basing permits us to Deal with these threats As they arise. It is not withdrawing from the world but preparing for new world conditions. It Means a stronger military at a lower Price. Schroeder d-colo., serves on the House armed services committee. In Short lifetime he made a huge contribution a cuter Taxt ii a a. Washington a his name was Howard Benner and he introduced me to hundreds of people. When he died a few weeks ago at age 44, of malignant Melanoma i mourned him As a Friend a although we had never met. Benner advanced the information revolution by expanding the worlds collective memory. He helped magnify what Marshall Mcluhan called the a global  but where Mcluhan had in mind television a passive system Benner sought to Foster two Way exchanges. To do that you need computers and you need phone lines and you need a device called a Modem that links the two of them together. The technology required to reach a Remote data base or an electronic message Center and retrieve useful information is both Complex and costly. That a Why Many folks shy away from computers this is what Benner a marketing executive from Wilmington del., found to his dismay when in 1981, he joined Compuserve a fledgling electronic bulletin Board in Columbus Ohio. To do so he used a 4-Pound Tandy Model 100, the first practical Laptop computer. Compuserve had been launched in the summer of 1979 by a hard Core group of 1,200 dedicated computer buffs who shared a certain Joy in mastering the arcane commands required to navigate the labyrinth. Benner an Amateur Programmer wrote a routine that greatly simplified the process. Through Compuserve he passed it along to others who in turn suggested further refinements. Within two years he had quit his Job to fashion a series of increasingly sophisticated interface sys tems Zap is and tapis. The current version a and others like it a makes it a snap to Send messages to Montana faxes to France or Tel exes to Tunis. More importantly they permit people with an abiding interest in anything from aids to zoology to Converse electronically on transparent global networks a at moderate expense and without hassle. Today Compuserve has More than 585,000 subscribers making it one of the largest of the nations 20,000-plus com Euter bulletin boards. These systems ave spawned a subculture in which people Are ranked for what they can contribute. In that realm John h. Sununu the White House chief of staff a longtime computer aficionado and William Gates the billionaire chairman of Microsoft corp., Deal As Peers with a 17-year old French lad who wrote a free program that compresses other computer programs to about half their original size. Computers will never think the Way humans do because the Laws of nature wont permit it. So argues Roger Penrose the British physicist in his 198? Book a the emperors new  he reasons that machines need to run under a problem solving set of rules called algorithms even though there Are problems which cannot be solved by any known system of rules. Yet the True test of these machines is not whether they can outperform the of human mind through mastering Cial  it is the More Basic Issue of How we can put them to Good use to enhance our existence. That is the question that Howard Benner helped answer so Well in his Brief lifetime. C Cox news service