Base Nation

13: THE MILCON CON

1. The following exchange comes from United States Senate Committee on Appropriations, Hearings before a Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, 109th Congress, 2nd session, Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2007, part 7, 117–18.

2. United States Senate Committee on Appropriations, Senate Report 113-048, Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Appropriation Bill, 2014, 113th Congress, 1st session, June 27, 2013.

3. Nicolai Ouroussoff, “He Made Antiquity Modern,” New York Times, April 9, 2010, C21; Elisabetta Povoledo, “Coney Island Getting a $30 Million Italian Makeover,” New York Times, April 23, 2010.

4. GlobalSecurity.org, “United States Army Africa (USARAF); Southern European Task Force (SETAF),” http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/agency/army/sertaf.htm.

5. GlobalSecurity.org, “United States Army Africa (USARAF).”

6. U.S. Army Garrison Vicenza, “Del Din Green Building Education Tour.”

7. Michael Wise, “Head East,” Armed Forces Journal, December 3, 2012, 22.

8. U.S. Army Garrison Bavaria, “A Leader’s Guide to the Bavaria Military Community,” website, accessed January 3, 2015, http://www.grafenwoehr.army.mil/smartcard.asp.

9. Sembler cable to Bloomfield, U.S. Embassy Rome, 04ROME2248, June 14, 2004, http://wikileaks.org/cable/2004/06/04ROME2248.html; Andrew Yeo, Activists, Alliances, and Anti-U.S. Base Protests (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 102.

10. Sembler cable to Department of State, U.S. Embassy Rome, 03ROME4736, October 16, 2003, http://wikileaks.org/cable/2003/10/03ROME4736.html.

11. United States Committee on Armed Services, Hearings on S. 2766, 109th Congress, 2nd Session, Department of Defense Authorization for Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2007, part 3, February 7, March 2, 15, April 5, 2006.

12. Parts of this section stem from my Island of Shame, chapter 6.

13. Tazewell Shepard, memorandum for Harry D. Train, January 26, 1970, Naval History and Heritage Command: 00 Files, 1970, Box 111, 11000.

14. Robert A. Frosch, memorandum for the Deputy Secretary of Defense, February 27, 1970, Naval History and Heritage Command: 00 Files, 1970, Box 111, 11000; John H. Chafee, memorandum for the Secretary of Defense, January 31, 1970, Naval History and Heritage Command: 00 Files, 1970, Box 111, 11000.

15. Bandjunis, Diego Garcia, 8–14; J. H. Gibbon et al., “Brief on UK/US London Discussions on United States Defence Interests in the Indian Ocean,” memorandum, March 6, 1964, UK National Archives: CAB 21/5418, 81174, 1–2. See also Vine, Island of Shame, chapter 6.

16. See attachment, Op-605E4, “Proposed Naval Communications Facility on Diego Garcia,” briefing sheet, [January] 1970, Naval History and Heritage Command: 00 Files, 1970, Box 111, 11000. For more detail, see my Island of Shame, chapter 6.

17. Vine, Island of Shame, chapter 6.

18. United States Senate Committee on Armed Services, “Inquiry into U.S. Costs and Allied Contributions to Support the U.S. Military Presence Overseas,” report, Washington, DC, April 15, 2013, ii–iii; Senate Committee on Appropriations, Senate Report 113-048.

19. Senate Committee on Appropriations, Senate Report 113-048; Senate Committee on Armed Services, “Inquiry,” ii–iii.

20. Committee on Appropriations, Senate Report 113-048; Senate Committee on Armed Services, “Inquiry,” ii.

21. Senate Committee on Appropriations, Senate Report 113-048; Senate Committee on Armed Services, “Inquiry,” iv.

22. Senate Committee on Armed Services, “Inquiry,” iv.

23. United States Senate Subcommittee on United States Security Agreements and Commitments Abroad, “United States Security Agreements and Commitments Abroad,” 2433–34.

24. Ibid.

25. Ibid., 2434.

26. Ibid.

27. Dorothy Robyn, Statement before the House Armed Services Committee Subcommittee on Readiness, Washington, DC, March 8, 2012.

28. Heike Hasenauer, “The Army’s Building Boom,” Soldiers Magazine, March 1, 2008.

29. U.S. Department of Defense, “National Defense Budget Estimates For FY 2014 [Green Book],” Washington, DC, May 2013, 146–48.

30. Belasco, “Cost of Iraq,” 33.

31. U.S. Department of Defense, “National Defense Budget Estimates, FY 2014,” 143.

32. Calculation from annual U.S. Department of Defense “Construction Program (C-1)” budget submissions and war spending through for fiscal years 2004–2011 in Belasco, “Cost of Iraq,” 33.

33. Seth Robbins, “Army Missteps in Basing Troops in Europe Could Cost Taxpayers Billions, GAO Report Finds,” Stars and Stripes, September 14, 2010.

34. Thom Shanker, “Pentagon and Congress Argue over Hospital for Troops,” New York Times, June 10, 2012.

35. Matt Millham, “Landstuhl Hospital’s Trauma Status on the Line as Afghan War Winds Down,” Stars and Stripes, May 3, 2013, http://www.stripes.com/news/landstuhl-hospital-s-trauma-status-on-the-line-as-afghan-war-winds-down-1.219529.

36. Chuck Roberts, “Groundbreaking Ceremony Marks Beginning of Construction of New Medical Center,” Army.mil, October 27, 2014, http://www.army.mil/article/136938/Groundbreaking_ceremony_marks_beginning_of_construction_of_new_medical_center/.

37. Loren Thompson, “Congress Wastes More Money on Unneeded Military Bases than Belgium, Sweden or Switzerland Spend on Defense,” Forbes, May 16, 2014.

38. See U.S. Department of Defense, “Construction Program (C-1)” budget submissions for fiscal years 2002–2006.

39. United States Senate Committee on Appropriations, Senate Report 113-048.

40. Department of Defense Dependents Education, “Operations and Maintenance Fiscal Year (FY) 2013 Budget Estimates,” Washington, DC, 2012, 388.

41. John Vandiver, “DOD to Save $60M by Dropping Recreational, Excess Sites in Europe,” Stars and Stripes, May 23, 2014.

42. Government Accountability Office, “Force Structure: Improved Cost Information and Analysis Needed to Guide Overseas Military Posture Decisions,” report, Washington, DC, June 2012, 8, 19. A Senate committee report recently described a $2.5 billion Marine Corps estimate for the costs of moving troops from Okinawa to Hawaii as “highly speculative.” United States Senate Committee on Armed Services, “Inquiry,” vi.

43. Government Accountability Office, “Defense Headquarters: DOD Needs to Reassess Options for Permanent Location of U.S. Africa Command,” Report to Congressional Committees, Washington, DC, September 2013.

44. U.S. Department of Defense “Department of Defense Budget Fiscal Year 2015: Construction Program (C-1),” March 2014, 24, 35.

45. Standing Army, directed by Thomas Fazi and Enrico Parenti (Italy: Effendemfilm and Takae Films, 2010).