Posted on 04/18/2002 8:31:43 AM PDT by xzins
By Lisa Burgess, Washington bureau
European edition, Thursday, April 18, 2002
For a map (in Adobe PDF format, 175K file size) showing
ARLINGTON, Va. — The Pentagon’s new U.S. Northern Command and other changes to its war-fighting blueprint are designed to make it easier to react to surprise attacks such as Sept. 11 — not to expand roles and missions, Pentagon leaders said Wednesday.
Rolling out the new version of that blueprint, which is known as the Unified Command Plan, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld touted what he called "a historical first:" the first time defense of the continental United States has been assigned to a military commander.
But creating Northern Command, or NORTHCOM, is not a Pentagon attempt to expand its influence or to circumvent federal law, which forbids U.S. military troops from performing law-enforcement duties inside the United States or acting independently of individual states’ control, Rumsfeld said.
"No new roles are being created here," Rumsfeld said.
"Some people have worried that the creation of [Northern Command] would be inward-looking, but nothing could be farther from the truth …. The highest priority of our military is to defend the United States."
NORTHCOM’s mission is "to provide support the full range of military assistance to civil authorities," Rumsfeld said.
Northern Command will streamline the Pentagon’s various agencies and commands now assigned to support homeland defense roles, putting them "under one commander," Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Richard Myers said.
NORTHCOM also will have responsibility for day-to-day management of military relations with Canada, parts of the Caribbean, and Mexico — the first time that Mexico has ever been assigned to one of the Pentagon’s commands.
On the civilian side, NORTHCOM will coordinate with the White House’s Office of Homeland Defense.
The new command plan also re-jiggers U.S. Joint Forces Command, based at Norfolk, Va., giving its geographic responsibilities to NORTHCOM and U.S. European Command and focusing most of its activities on combat experimentation and training.
Northern Command will also take over Joint Forces Command’s current responsibility to assist federal civilian agencies in responding to any nuclear, chemical or biological attack on the United States.
Pacific Command, which is based in Hawaii, will lose operational control of forces based on the West Coast. Its geographic area of responsibility will be expanded to include Antarctica.
But defense officials still have much work to do before the Unified Command Plan changes take effect Oct. 1, particularly regarding NORTHCOM.
Rumsfeld, Myers and other defense chiefs are still debating exactly which forces might be detailed on a permanent basis to the NORTHCOM commander, although they have decided that air defense will remain the business of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD, in Colorado Springs, Colo.
Lawmakers will have to approve the final plan for Northern Command, including the location of the headquarters, which military officials want to be located at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs.
President Bush is expected to nominate Air Force Gen. Ralph Eberhart as the first commander of Northern Command. Eberhart is currently responsible for both NORAD and U.S. Space Command.
If Eberhart is tapped to head NORTHCOM, he will keep the NORAD command but give up his Space Command responsibilities, which will be taken by another four-star general.
The Unified Command Plan dates back to 1946, when it was developed to reflect global power changes brought about by World War II.
A commander-in-chief of a major command takes presidential orders from the secretary of defense through the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The 1986 law that created this system also required that the UCP be reviewed at least every two years. The last time changes were made was in 1999 under then-Defense Secretary William Cohen.
Rumsfeld called the new UCP structure "the most significant [change] since the first plan was issued."
It's hard to imagine it took all these years to decide to put together a military plan to defend our OWN territory. In the world of contingency planning, it seems like that would have been on the "no brainer" list.
Cuba is included in NORTHCOM -- interesting. I assume that this is because of Gitmo, although I don't understand why that would not be assigned to SOUTHCOM. Are we to read into this that we consider Cuba to be a major Homeland Security threat?
Syria is not in CENTCOM, but rather in USEUCOM? That makes no sense to me at all. Surely this is an error on the map?
Surely they don't mean to imply that, should we ever get into a conflict with Russia, that USEUCOM will be in charge of operations against Vladivostok or Kamchatka?!?! This makes me wonder if this is the REAL map.
It really annoys me that Greenland is considered part of Europe rather than of N. America. I wish that we could do some deal with the Danes to pry it out of their grasp and bring it into the NAFTA and NORTHCOM umbrella. We're only talking about ice, fish, and a few thousand people, for crying out loud.
Typical gov SNAFU. Your tax dollars at work. Thanks, Tom Ridge, you useless boob.
BTW, it will be very interesting to see which service winds up supplying the NORTHCOM CINC. Creating a new unified command always gets their juices flowing, because it means another four-star billet on the books, and that service tends to dominate the headquarters and staff structure. However, President Bush and Rumsfeld have shown a willingness to break with past practices and send the best man to the job. I'll go out on a limb and say the Marine Corps will get the NORTHCOM job. The Marines have done more to prepare for the domestic WMD threat that any of the services, and their ability to move and move quickly gives them an inside track over the less nimble Army. A Marine in charge of NORTHCOM? That ought to get the CNO and Army Chief of Staff spun up....
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