Why military base closures could actually happen this time

[nitpicker]

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/why-military-base-closures-could-actually-happen-this-time/article/2615066

Why military base closures could actually happen this time

By Jacqueline Klimas (@jacqklimas) • 2/21/17 12:01 AM

The election of a businessman with a focus on cutting waste to the White House. Growing concern in Congress that military readiness has reached critically low levels. And the military pleading once again to be able to get rid of some of its excess infrastructure.
Combined, these three factors point to 2017 being the first year in many in which base realignment and closures could actually happen, after several years of BRAC being one of those automatic, dead-on-arrival propositions. That's because they equate to lost jobs back home for savings that take years to realize. And analysts warned that while they're more optimistic this year than in the past that closures could occur, it's far from a done deal and could be derailed by political fighting or a lack of commitment to the cause from President Trump.

The Pentagon released a report in March that said the Defense Department has 22 percent excess infrastructure. It asked in its fiscal 2017 budget request for $4 million to begin the planning for another round of BRAC in 2019, which Congress denied. This month, top officers reignited the plea before the House Armed Services Committee, and key lawmakers have brought the issue of base closures back into the spotlight.

Dakota Wood, a senior research fellow for defense with the Heritage Foundation, said "the stars have aligned" to see serious progress on a new round of base realignment and closure this year, especially given Trump's background in business. "Whether it's commercial business, like a hotel or a golf course, or military infrastructure, you're still spending money on facilities," Wood said. "If you were running a business and had warehouses or offices or some part of the business that you were putting money against and that asset wasn't generating some kind of return for you, that's just wasted money."

For a base closure request to be successful, the president must expend a "significant amount" of political capital, said Philip Lohaus, an analyst at the American Enterprise Institute. While Trump's rhetoric has targeted waste in large military aircraft contracts, it's unclear if he will be willing to make calls supporting a BRAC once he understands more about the impact base closures have on a local community.
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"Does the Trump administration make that request? If they do, through Secretary Mattis and the Pentagon and they put in their budget request, the same thing President Obama did, I think that will give it an enormous amount of momentum, certainly with Republican majority," Smith told the Washington Examiner. In terms of the odds of Congress reaching a BRAC deal this year, Smith said he'd "put it at 50/50."
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