Way cleared for destruction of depot weapons
Pentagon reverses stance on spending

By James R. Carroll
jcarroll@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal

WASHINGTON -- Reversing course, the Pentagon has dropped plans to delay the destruction of 523 tons of chemical weapons at Kentucky's Blue Grass Army Depot and consider moving the munitions elsewhere.

Acting Defense Undersecretary Michael Wynne said in a memo that he is releasing all funding that was withheld this year to build facilities that will destroy such weapons at Blue Grass near Richmond and a similar depot in Colorado.

"I think it's for the most part a capitulation," said Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., one of a number of lawmakers who have pressured the military to stick to its original destruction schedule.

Rep. Ben Chandler, D-6th District, who represents the area around Blue Grass, said the move "is the best news we have heard all year and proof that the Department of Defense is finally honoring its promise to the citizens of Central Kentucky."

Asked why the go-ahead was given, Defense Department spokesman Glenn Flood said last night that "there is nothing else to add beyond that memo," which was dated Friday.

The memo did not say how much money would be released.

It will be about $300 million, said Craig Williams, director of the Berea-based Chemical Weapons Working Group that released Wynne's memo and has acted as a watchdog for the weapons destruction project.

In December, the Pentagon put a hold on work at Blue Grass and a depot at Pueblo, Colo., citing concerns about rising costs and slipping schedules.

The chemicals at Blue Grass include the nerve gas sarin and VX, a toxic liquid, in a variety of weapons, some dating to World War II.

Top Defense Department officials said at House and Senate hearings earlier this month that they needed to delay work in Kentucky and Colorado to focus more on efforts at six other sites.

Work was to be halted in Kentucky until 2011.

Pentagon officials have said that alternatives, including moving the weapons from Blue Grass and Pueblo, were being studied, even though federal law bars moving the munitions across state lines.

McConnell, Chandler and several of their colleagues warned the Pentagon that moving the weapons not only was illegal but would pose safety threats to communities along the routes. Instead, the lawmakers said, the Defense Department needed to get the destruction plans back on track.

McConnell inserted an amendment in a supplemental spending bill now being considered by the Senate that directs the Pentagon to return to its original plans for Blue Grass and Pueblo.

The amendment also directs the Defense Department to release all money that has been held up for the projects, and to report to Congress every two months on how the funds are spent. McConnell said yesterday that he was "not so satisfied" with the latest memo that he would drop his amendment. "To be absolutely certain, I'm still going to try to include the language in the final bill," he said.

Williams called Wynne's memo "a complete 180."

Chandler, in an interview, said, "Moving forward with a plan for destroying or neutralizing these weapons on site is what we want them to do, and as I read this memo now, this is what they are going to do."

The United States has signed an international treaty under which it has committed to destroying its chemical weapons by 2012.

Under the original timetable, construction on access roads, gates and an administration building at Blue Grass was to have started in January. Plant construction was scheduled to begin this fall, with operations under way around 2008 or 2009.

Destruction of the weapons is expected to take about two years.

"We're behind one year, even if we get all the funds," said Mickey Morales, public involvement manager for Bechtel Parsons Blue Grass, the prime contractor charged with designing, building and operating the destruction plant.

He said the company was continuing a review of possible changes to plant design to save money on the project, currently estimated at $2 billion.

Bill Pehlivanian, deputy program manager for the Defense Department office that oversees Blue Grass and Pueblo, agreed with Morales that about a year has been lost in Kentucky.

One reason: Protected Indiana bats are now nesting in the trees that need to be taken down to build a road to the destruction plant site. Trees can only be cut between Oct. 15 and March 31, Pehlivanian said.

After the trees are removed, construction probably couldn't start until around January, he said.

"Until we do that, we're going to work feverishly on the redesign," Pehlivanian said, adding he is aiming to have a recommendation on a final plan for the plant around August.