From: CMSgt Mike Bergman <bergman@afnews.pa.af.mil>
Subject: DoD News 09/30/92 
Organization: Hq Air Force News Agency/SCC
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 1992 16:43:05 GMT


From CMSgt Mike Bergman <bergman@afnews.pa.af.mil>

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1.  MEMO:  V-22 Investigation
2.  NEWS RELEASE:  Small Businesses Honored
3.  NEWS RELEASE:  DoD Distinguished Civilian Service Awards
4.  DOD NEWS BRIEFING:  Sept 29 Transcript

                                                                      No.279-M 

MEMORANDUM FOR CORRESPONDENTS                                September 29, 1992

     The Navy Mishap Board investigating the crash of V-22 #4 into the Potomac
River on July 20, 1992, has concluded that the mishap was caused by a sequence
of events that resulted in the failure of the interconnecting drive system and
loss of drive to the prop-rotor system.

      Investigators believe that during the V-22's transition from the airplane
mode to the landing mode (during which the engines rotated to an approximate 60
degree angle), a combustible fluid may have pooled in the forward part of the
right engine housing and was ingested into the engine air inlet area.  When the
fluid ignited in the engine, it caused three "surges" that disrupted the air
flow through the engine, creating backpressure and flames through the engine
inlet, which ultimately caused the engine to fail.  The backpressure also
fractured the fiberglass engine inlet, allowing flames to be drawn into the
upper nacelle.   A flash fire, lasting five-to-ten seconds, ensued, during
which temperatures reached approximately 900 degrees Fahrenheit and damaged the
pylon drive shaft, which subsequently failed.  The V-22 can fly with one engine
only if the pylon drive shaft is working.

     The investigators were unable to determine what caused the combustible
fluid to leak into the upper nacelle.  Investigators believe that the combusti-
ble fluid was about 20 ounces of lubricating oil.  The Navy is developing
recommendations to ensure the integrity of the upper nacelle area is maintained
free from possible flame sources.

     For additional information, contact the Navy Office of Information at
(703) 697-5342.

                                     -END-




                                                  No. 438-92
                                                  (703) 695-0192 (info)
                                                  (703) 697-3189 (copies)
IMMEDIATE  RELEASE             September 30, 1992 (703) 697-5737 (public/indus-
                                                  try)

         SMALL BUSINESSES HONORED DURING DOD'S OBSERVANCE OF MINORITY

                          ENTERPRISE DEVELOPMENT WEEK

     Deputy Secretary of Defense Donald J. Atwood hosted a Pentagon ceremony
today to commemorate the 10th national observance of Minority Enterprise
Development week, which by Presidential Proclamation is being observed Septem-
ber 27 through October 3, 1992.

     Honored during the ceremony were minority businesses whose contract
performance has contributed significantly to the Defense mission and DoD small
business specialists who have made extraordinary efforts to assist small and
disadvantaged contractors.  Those recognized received award plaques presented
by Secretary Atwood.

     The award for DoD Small Disadvantaged Business Contractor of the Year was
presented to Production Products of St. Louis, Mo., Barry Corona, president.
The company was nominated by the Defense Logistics Agency.  The DoD Small
Disadvantaged Business Specialist of the Year award went to the Air Force
nominee Carolyn "Lee" Thompson, Patrick AFB, Fla.

     Runners up for the top awards also received plaques.  They were:   

   7 Army Small Disadvantaged Business Contractor Nominee-- Information
     Technology Solutions, Inc., Hampton, Va., Henry L. Ellison, president 

   7 Army Small Disadvantaged Business Specialist Nominee--Luis Sosa, White
     Sands Missle Range, N. M.

   7 Air Force Small Disadvantaged Business Contractor Nominee-- Westar Corp.,
     Albuquerque, N. M., Joe I. Durant, president

   7 Navy Small Disadvantaged Business Contractor Nominee-- Management Systems
     Applications, Inc., Chesapeake, Va., Frances B. Havens, president

   7 Navy Small Disadvantaged Business Specialist Nominee-- Reva Gail Swango,
     Naval Weapons Support Center, Crane, Ind.

                                    (more)
   7 Defense Logistics Agency Small Disadvantaged Business Specialist Nominee--
     Joan Tobin, Defense Industrial Supply Center, Philadelphia, Pa.       

   7 Other Defense Agencies Small Disadvantaged Business Contractor Nominee--
     GLS Associates, Inc., Alexandria, Va., Gilbert L. Sentimore, president.



                                     -END-




                                                  No.   436-92
                                                  (703) 695-0192 (info)
                                                  (703) 697-3189 (copies)
IMMEDIATE  RELEASE           September 29, 1992   (703) 697-5737 (public/indus-
                                                  try)


                     SECRETARY  CHENEY  TO  PRESENT  DOD  

                   DISTINGUISHED   CIVILIAN  SERVICE  AWARDS

     Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney is scheduled to present the Department of
Defense Distinguished Civilian Service Awards to seven DoD employees in a
ceremony in the Pentagon Auditorium, room 5A1070, on Tuesday, October 13, at
3:00 p.m. (EDT).

     The Distinguished Civilian Service Award is the highest DoD civilian
award.  Career employees throughout the Department compete each year for the
coveted award that recognizes exceptional contributions to national security.
This year's recipients are:

   7 Ralph W. Alewine, III, Director of the Nuclear Monitoring Research Office,
     Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency

   7 Maynard C. Anderson, Assistant Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for
     Security Policy

   7 James F. Boatright, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for
     Installations

   7 William W. Fuller, Chief Emergency Management Division, United States Army
     Engineer District, Mobile, Ala.

   7 Eleanor R. Spector, Director of Defense Procurement, Office of the Under
     Secretary of Defense for Acquisition

   7 John P. Springett, Principal Deputy Director of the Defense Finance and
     Accounting Service


   7 Elia T. Vasilopoulos, Civilian Personnel Officer, Chanute AFB Training

     Center, Ill.

     The award ceremony is open to the media.  The point of contact for
audiovisual coverage is Bettie Sprigg, (703) 695-0168.

                                     -END-




DoD News Briefing
Tuesday, September 29, 1992 - Noon
Mr. Pete Williams, ASD (Public Affairs)

     Mr. Williams:  Good afternoon.  

     We just about have you (newsmen) outnumbered by guests today, but we're
pleased to have them all here.  We have a group of distinguished guests from
Chile who are here on a two week program to examine our system of civilian
control of the military.  This group includes three members of the Chilean
Senate, two from the House, along with members of the military and the media
and academia.  Their visit is sponsored by the U.S. Information Agency's Office
of Citizen Exchanges, and administered by the Institute for Representative
Government.  So bien venidas a ustedes.

     We would also like to welcome a group of officials from the Atlantic and
Pacific Exchange Program who are Ministry of Defense officials and business
executives from the Netherlands and Japan who are participating in the Atlantic
and Pacific Exchange Program here in Washington.  We're delighted to have you
as well.  I don't know how to say welcome in Japanese, I apologize. 

     I'd also like to welcome a group of students from The American University
who are here attending a study program to learn how the news media interacts
with various government agencies.  Always gently, is the answer.

     A couple of announcements for you.  Secretary Cheney will speak to the
Business Week Symposium CEO luncheon at 1:00 o'clock Thursday afternoon,
October 1st, at the Crystal Room of the Willard Hotel in Washington at 14th and
Pennsylvania Avenue.  The event is open to your coverage.  The points of
contact are either Kim Gantz, or Celeste Hughes, at (212) 512-4892 today.
Tomorrow, they'll be down at the Willard at (202) 628-9100 at the Business Week
registration desk.

     Q:  There will be a briefing?
     A:  We will pipe it in, and we will brief.

     We'll have a Blue Top for you, I don't know why we're giving this to you
so far in advance, but on Tuesday, October 13th, Secretary Cheney will present
the awards to the seven recipients of this year's Distinguished Civilian
Service Awards.  This is the highest award that can be given to a civilian.
Career employees throughout the Department compete each year for this award.
It recognizes exceptional contributions to national security.  Secretary Cheney
will present the awards.  It gives you their names and so forth.

     That's all my announcements, and I'd be happy to take your questions.

     Q:  Can you acquaint us with the results of the V-22 accident
investigation?
     A:  I'm told that the V-22 accident investigation is not done yet.  The
Navy says, no that's not right.  It says the Navy has informed me...
(laughter)  ...this just in, it will release the cause of the mishap later this
afternoon.  So I will learn, together with you, what it says.

     Q:  Is that the Navy's release?
     A:  It is Navy's release.

     Q:  What does later this afternoon mean?
     A:  I don't know.  We're learning this together.  We'll see if we can get
a time and a way.

     Q:  Would you also check to see if we can get released the videotape of
the V-22?
     A:  I think we've got that same old problem there.  You have to ask the
contractor, not us.  I don't think we have it to release it to you.

     Q:  Are we going to get the formal report, or are we going to get a
summary, or...
     A:  These are excellent questions, and we are efforting even as we
speak...  Look at these guys!  They're listening to us down the hall, and we'll
get the answer for you here before we end the briefing.

     Q:  Yugoslavia.  Is the United States going to resume those flights,
relief flights?
     A:  I think the answer is yes, we will resume the relief flights.  We
certainly intend to.  We certainly want to.  We are aware of the urgency of
resuming relief flights into the Sarajevo Airport.  I saw one wire story today,
diplomats speculating that it would start within 24 hours.  I can't confirm
that for you.  I can't tell you now the day on which the relief flights will be
resumed because that decision hasn't been made.

     Q:  Who makes that decision?
     A:  It will be a decision...obviously, ultimately the United States has to
decide when its flights will resume, but we will make that decision in
consultation with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and with the other
nations that have been taking part in these humanitarian flights in the past.
So it's ultimately, obviously, each country that is making the flights has to
decide for itself when specifically it will resume its flights, but the
decision will not be made in isolation.  It will be made in consultation with
the UN, with the High Commissioner for Refugees and the other countries that
have been conducting these flights.

     Q:  Well, the High Commissioner for Refugees has been pressing these
countries to resume the flights.  Would you say the resumption is imminent?
     A:  Well, yes.  It's imminent.  The second question is how imminent, and
that's the answer that I can't give you.  I guess I wouldn't encourage you to
repeat the idea that they're going to start within 24 hours.  I don't think
that's the case.  But how many hours or how many days, I just don't  know yet.
But as I said before, we're well aware of the urgency of getting them going
again, that we need to get them going again.  I think that assessment is shared
by everybody in the U.S. government, and we just need to work out the details
of when specifically we can get them going again.

     Q:  What are the criteria for restarting?
     A:  I don't know that there is a specific checklist.  For awhile the UN
was pursuing some discussions with the parties in Yugoslavia trying to get
commitments, for example, to have a secure corridor, and be able to certify
that there were no weapons in that corridor.  I don't know that that's going to
be possible.  There are people from the UN who say that the Sarajevo Airport
itself is secure and ready to accept flights again.  That's part of the
assessment that has to be taken into account.  That's always been the standard
-- that the airport itself be secure.  So we'll have to make a final
determination on that.

     As I say, I think there's a great deal of momentum here to resume the
flights, and we just need to work out the precise details.

     Q:  I have a followup on that.  Number one, there was a period when many
were suggesting that land convoys would be an acceptable and basically less
dangerous substitute for the cargo flights.  Secondly, if you are going to
resume the cargo flights, where does the so-called no-fly zone stand in
conjunction with that issue?
     A:  Number one, on the question of the suitability of, or the desirability
of land convoys versus air flights, there were two periods I think in which
that was discussed.  One was very early on, before the humanitarian flights
really got going this summer.  The second one was with the concern of winter
weather would curtail operations at the airport.  Of course land convoys have
been going on.  We've not been directly involved in those, but land convoys
have continued into Sarajevo and into other parts of Bosnia.

     The fact remains that the air flights into Sarajevo have turned out to be
a very efficient way of getting an enormous amount of material in quickly.  So
if we can resume them, it's something we would like to do.

     The no-fly zone is still being discussed among allies.  There's been no
decision on a no-fly zone.  It's not, by any means, an abandoned issue, though.
It's still under discussion.  But I doubt that it would be resolved before the
flights are resumed.

     Q:  Along the same lines, there were reports of two UN helicopters being
fired on in that same area this morning.  A two-part question.  One, can you
tell us anything about the reports that they were fired on?  And two, if they
are accurate, would it affect whether the U.S. and others would resume the
relief flights?
     A:  We'll certainly be checking into it.  I don't have the details of it
here.  I can't elucidate for you on it at all.  I'm sure it's something we'll
look at as we make that decision, but I don't know how much weight it will
have.  I just don't know the details of it.

     Q:  The UN Military Peacekeeping Force I think announced that three
helicopters were fired on yesterday near Zagreb.
     A:  I've seen the wire service reports, but I don't have any independent
information.  I'm sure it's something that our folks are discussing with the
UN, but I don't have anything on it for you yet.

     Q:  Does it give you pause?
     A:  We would look at it and we're not going to ignore it, but I don't know
how much weight it will carry in our final decision.

     Q:  Can you confirm they were not U.S. helicopters?
     A:  I don't think they were.  I haven't heard that they were.  I've seen
no incident reports that they were U.S. helicopters.  I haven't seen anything
that positively says they weren't, but I wouldn't think they were.  I would
have seen some sort of reporting through the system if they were ours.

     Q:  When you say the discussions about the no-flying zone are taking place
among allies, are you indicating that a no-fly zone over former Yugoslavia
would be distinctly different from that over southern Iraq in some sense?
     A:  I'm sure it will be.  If it is undertaken, I can't imagine that it
would be the same as the one over southern Iraq, but you raise a question of
how it would work, and that's something that hasn't been decided.  Number one,
it hasn't been decided whether we'll do it or not; and number two, it hasn't
been decided how it would work if we did.  So both those questions are still up
in the air.

     Q:  Can you do southern Iraq for us?  What's the latest number of average
sorties?  Is Nelson coming home, that kind of stuff?
     A:  Since our last briefing on Thursday, the United States flew 498
sorties.  Our daily totals range from a low of 57 to a high of 154.  The total
sorties to date, as of last night at 8:00 p.m. Eastern time, was 3,540.  That's
the U.S. only total.  I don't have the totals for the other nations that are
taking part.

     There have been no incidents.  Iraq continues to obey the no-fly zone.
There have been no violations.  There have been no confirmed contacts with any
Iraqi aircraft south of the 32nd parallel or any use of threat radar.

     Q:  Have there been any reports of any ground action in southern Iraq
observed by us?
     A:  The ground action in southern Iraq continues.  It's small scale
insurgency and counterinsurgency operations.  That's been the pattern for
several months now.  It's certainly been the pattern since the operation
stated.  There's really been no change there.

     Q:  Can you tell us whether General Nelson is going to stay over there, or
is he coming home?
     A:  He's been traveling, doing some bilateral discussions with nations in
the region.  I, frankly, don't know what his plans are.  I'll have to check
into that and see.

     Q:  Can you bring us up to date on what our discussions are with Israel
and the business of transferring weapons to them, and what additional plans
they may have in that area or in the area of pre-positioning?
     A:  Beyond what was announced over the weekend, you mean?

     Q:  Can you clarify any of the White House announcement -- types of
helicopters, numbers, the arrangements, are they gifts, are they transfers, are
they surplus?
     A:  Good questions.  I will do so, but let me first answer what your
question was, and then I'll answer what you said it was.

     In terms of whether there would be future discussions with Israel on
additional equipment to be either pre-positioned or transferred, the
pre-positioned authority we've about run out on, and I'll get to that in a
moment.  We still have additional transfer authority.  The announcement that
was made on Saturday, that I'll be happy to run through the detail on here, is
the result of continued discussions that we've had with the Israeli government
over the last several years on maintaining Israel's qualitative edge.  It
continues to be a hallmark of our policy with Israel, and I'm sure those
discussions will continue, and doubtless there will be future things to say in
the coming years.

     To go back now and specifically discuss in more detail what was announced
over the weekend, let me go back and discuss the authority, the legal authority
under which this material was provided.  In the FY91 defense budget, the
Congress authorized the United States to draw down as much as $700 million
worth of equipment from active duty stocks for transfer to Israel.  Note here,
it doesn't say excess, and that's an important thing that I think some folks
have jumped to the conclusion on.  So FY91, the Congress authorized the U.S. to
draw down as much as $700 million in equipment from active duty stocks for
transfer to Israel.

     That same action, a separate category now, the same action also allowed
the United States to preposition up to $300 million worth of U.S.-owned
equipment in Israel.  So two separate programs.  

     The transfer of equipment that was announced last weekend under the $700
million transfer authority, involves the proposed transfer of Apache-64
helicopters, AH-64's, Harpoon missiles, and Black Hawk helicopters.  That's
part of the $700 million draw down.  I don't have a dollar figure yet, because
what we have to do is take the specific helicopters, and the value of those
helicopters is going to be determined by specifically which model helicopter is
it, what sort of stuff does it have on it, and how old is it?  Because when you
compute the value of it, you have to look at how old it is, and amortization,
and all those sorts of considerations.

     Q:  Do you have a number?
     A:  So the exact cost will be determined by the replacement cost of the
helicopters and the Harpoon missiles, and that will be decided by the military
departments that administer the appropriate weapons programs.

     Q: When you say replacement costs, we're not charging the Israelis for
this, this is a gift.
     A:  Correct.  But we have to compute it because we're authorized up to
$700 million in authority, so you have to have some way to figure out when
you've hit the bell, when you've hit the $700 million.

     Q:  And the only thing we've given them other than this stuff is the
F-15's?
     A:  Earlier this year, the United States authorized the transfer of ten
F-15A's to Israel under this same authority.  The cost of the aircraft
transferred was about $45 million.

     John Tirpak said, how many, what numbers?

     Q:  Helicopters and Harpoons.
     A:  The statute under which we do this requires that we make a formal
notification to Congress, and once the transfer has been fully negotiated with
the Israeli government, and once we've got in mind which helicopters we're
going to give them and which exact Apaches and Black Hawks, then we will make a
notification, and that will cite the numbers, but I don't have them for you
here today.  So I don't have the number, I don't have which helos and the
model, so I can't give you a value.  Either the number of helicopters or the
value of it.

     Q:  Does it necessarily follow that you're talking about about $650
million worth of these two kinds of helicopters and Harpoons, or will that only
be part of the $650 million in transfers that are left?  See what I mean?  You
have about $650 million left to transfer.  Is all that going to be taken up
by...
     A:  I don't know.

     Q:  But you did say 64 Apaches, right?
     A: No, I said AH-64's.  That's the model number.

     Q:  Were there Patriots also transferred under this program?  So there
have been F-15's and Patriots?
     A:  Good question, I don't know.  Have we ever transferred anything other
than this material and the F-15's to Israel under the $700 million draw-down
authority.  We'll double check.  I'm not sure about that.  I don't want to
guess.

     Q:  The Israelis are saying 24 Apaches and 10 Black Hawks.  Is that...
     A:  I just can't confirm a number for you here today.

     As I said, the second category was the congressional allowance that we
preposition up to $300 million worth of U.S.-owned equipment in Israel.  Now
that we have this agreement over the weekend, we pretty well maxed that one
out, because we have agreed under this latest agreement announced over the
weekend to pre-position about $200 million worth of advanced defense equipment
in Israel.  This is basically munitions.  We've already transferred $100
million worth of war-ready supplies, and they're already in place.  So that,
plus the $200 million worth that we did over the weekend, basically meets the
$300 million limit passed by Congress.

     Now as a matter of longstanding policy, we don't identify the type of
equipment that we pre-position with other nations, with any other nations, so I
can only say this is munitions.  If I get questions about specific types of
munitions, I'll have to take a pass on that.

     Q:  No air-to-air missiles though?  As opposed to specific air-to-air
missiles?
     A:  Pass number one.  (Laughter)

     Q:  Are these Patriots?
     A:  Pass number two.

     Q:  Israel has the ability to drawdown in a state of crisis, to draw from
these stocks as well, does it not?
     A:  The question is:  what happens if Israel wants to use the U.S.-owned
equipment?  The United States, obviously, has to give Israel permission to use
that material.  I don't know exactly how that works.  Let me take the question
of what happens, how does Israel get permission to use that in a time of
crisis, who authorizes it.  Does the President authorize it, does it take
congressional authorization?  I don't know.  Let me check that.

     We anticipate that the helicopters and missiles that will be transferred
to Israel from active duty U.S. stocks and the pre-positioned equipment will be
delivered to Israel next year.  There's no specified deadline in the statue for
that $700 million draw down.  They gave it to us in FY91.  It doesn't expire at
the end of any fiscal year.  It stands there, the authority continues until the
$700 million limit has been reached.

     Q:  I'm still confused about one thing.  Do you have authority now to
request these stocks for the U.S.?  Or, even though they're not technically
excess, in fact, are they literally excess because of the draw down in the
U.S.?  Or do you go out and buy replacement Apaches, Harpoons, and Black Hawks?
     A:  The legislation called for a drawdown from active duty stocks defined
as defense articles and services.  Legally defined, any article that's in our
inventory or any services performed by DoD or civilian or military personnel,
for example, contracting out services for Israel, would not be allowed.

     Q:  Could you go out and replace it?
     A:  I don't believe the statute is silent on the question of whether we
replace it.  I assume if we wanted to replace it we would have to get an
appropriation to do so, but we'll double check that as well.

     Q:  Do all these agreements include any provisions for exercising with
Israel in new military exercises?  Or exercising of the pre-positioned
equipment?
     A:  They don't say anything about exercises.  We have undertaken exercises
with Israel before.  We've made port calls there and so forth.  But this
provision doesn't specifically call for exercises.

     I'm told in answer to your earlier question, that the United States has
not transferred any other equipment under this authority.  Only the F-15's, the
F-15A's with a value of $45 million, ten F-15A's that were transferred earlier
this year; and now the Apaches, Harpoons, and Black Hawks.  No other equipment
transferred under the $700 million authority.

     Q:  Is the Department of Defense or the Navy looking at the feasibility of
homeporting a carrier in Haifa?
     A:  I don't know.  State could tell you that, I'm sure.

     Q:  When you talked about prepositioned stuff you said munitions, which
implies ordnance of some type.  Is there hardware also included in that?
     A:  I can't get more specific than that.  Munitions is the way I'm told I
can describe it.

     Q:  Why would State look at that?  Why wouldn't this building have a
comment about that?
     A:  They would negotiate it with Israel.  We would not discuss anything
publicly before we had discussed it with Israel.  Or any other nation,  indeed,
if we were going to homeport anywhere else.

     Q:  There's a GAO report that's coming out today or tomorrow that says the
accuracy of the Patriot missile is down to nine percent of what they claim.  It
gets lower all the time.  Have you seen that?  Are you aware of it?  Would you
hazard a comment on it?  Or do you care?
     A:  I've not seen it, I would hazard a comment on it, and I do care.

     I think that we clearly want to go back and take the most careful look we
can at the performance of the Patriot during the war.  We're very interested in
that subject.  But I think a lot of what this Monday morning quarterbacking
ignores is what the Patriot is and what it was at the time and what we've done
about it since.  I think all of this sort of nit-picking and hand-wringing
about the Patriot would be a little more on target if in fact the Patriot was
designed originally as an anti-missile defense.  It wasn't.  It was originally
intended to be an anti-aircraft defense.  It was intended to shoot down
something that's a lot bigger and flies a lot slower.  We didn't have an
anti-missile defense system.  Zilch.  Nothing on the shelf.

     So the question for the United States at the time was not, gee, how
accurate would the Patriot be if you made it shoot down missiles; but rather,
is it better to have something to give you some defense against incoming
ballistic missiles.  The answer to that is yes.  So the manufacturer said we
can make some software designs and we can enhance the capability and give
Patriot some ability to defend against incoming missiles.  That was done.
During the war there were a lot of lessons learned and a lot of modifications
made to the Patriot.  Since then, the manufacturer and the Army have taken a
very close look at it.  We had a better missile package, the Pak-2 missiles
designed and installed in the Patriots.  Now we're engaged with the
manufacturer to look at a much enhanced version of the Patriot that will do a
much better job of handling incoming ballistic missiles.  It's the only missile
system we have.

     Secondly, I think, there is a lot of sort of scholarly tongue clacking
going on about the claims made by the Department and by the military at the
time.  I think there was a lot of excitement about Patriot.  It was the first
time it had been used.  I think the troops were pleased that they had something
that they could use against incoming missiles.  And we gave the best assessment
we had at the time.  There was a lot of confusion about how effective Patriot
was.  But the conduct of the war report, which is the last and most
authoritative word from the Department on this subject, takes a pretty sober
look at how effective Patriot was.  Somehow we're getting clobbered over the
head with some of the initial euphoria about the Patriot as though that was the
last word on the subject, and it wasn't.

     Finally I would say, you have to also look at the political effectiveness
of Patriot.  The Patriot had the effect, perhaps, of helping the Israeli
government with its decision not to enter the war, which I think everybody
agrees was a good decision.

     So I just think a lot of these comments about the Patriot are extraneous
and a little off the mark.

     Q:  Forgive me if I pursue this.  I think one of the central questions
about all this was not only the crowing after the war with 48 out of 49 or
whatever, but the fact that as much as a year after the war, the Army was still
maintaining that the Patriot was I think 70 percent effective in Saudi Arabia,
and 40 to 50 percent effective in Israel.  At least the GAO that looked at this
found that the Army simply, as a matter of evidence and a matter of being able
to support these claims and assessments, was not being candid.  That its own
data did not support these claims which were still being made a year after the
war.  Nobody's criticizing you for doing the best you could under the
circumstances, or for rushing the thing through, or for trying to make a lot of
fixes on it during the war.  That's understandable and admirable.  Nobody's
criticizing you for trying to present a picture of this effective missile
defense that might have had some psychological impact on Iraq during the war.
But it's a question of integrity of process and integrity of claims many, many
months after the fact.
     A:  It's a fair question, and I think it requires a couple of answers.
One is, I don't know in what way the Army is using the figures that the GAO
says they used.  I don't think we've used any figures in here publicly that I
recall, and I don't think the conduct of the war report gets into this business
of percentages.  I'll go back and look.

     Secondly, part of the problem is, sort of two problems that the Army has.
One is, the Patriot doesn't have an on-board score keeper system.  It doesn't
have a data recording gizmo on the Patriot system itself.  So part of the
problem is going back and reconstructing the engagements and how did they work.
That's something of a problem.  And I gather that the later versions of Patriot
will have a more aggressive system on it for keeping score.

     The second thing is, how do you score a successful engagement by the
Patriot against a SCUD missile?  It's pretty easy in basketball, the ball has
to go through the hoop and then you get two points.  But what is  a successful
engagement by Patriot of a SCUD?  A, does it have to destroy the warhead in the
air?  B, can it hit the missile anywhere and knock it off target?

     That's kind of an interesting question because again, I think, and I'm not
accusing you of this and I haven't seen the GAO report so I have to reserve
judgment on that, but I think in some of the discussions about Patriot, the
other thing that's ignored is what Patriot's mission was.  Patriot is a point
defense.  It is intended to defend an air base, a munitions dump, a
concentration of troops, whatever.  It is not an area defense.  It's not
intended to shoot down anything and defend whole cities, for example.  So the
question, and this becomes somewhat theological, but if an incoming SCUD would
have landed at, would have smacked into a munitions dump, Patriot goes up and
sort of nudges it in the mid-section and it lands somewhere else, do you score
that for Patriot or not?  You could make the argument that that's really not a
hit or not a completely successful engagement because you didn't blow up the
warhead and it still did damage when it hit the ground.  You could also argue
that it didn't hit the munitions dump so it did its job.  That argument is part
of what the debate's been about.

     Q:  Just for the record, I have put that question on several occasions to
the Army, and while they've always maintained that the precise number of this
or that is classified, they have acknowledged, and I'll be happy to stand
corrected if they have later studies on the subject, but they have acknowledged
that the number of Patriots that did not destroy the warhead but pushed it off
course is not statistically significant.
     A:  Okay.  I think that's something that entered into the early criticism
about Patriot and Israel, for example.

     Q:  Are we any closer to an estimate from when the V-22...
     A:  This says we will release a memorandum, we I assume is the Navy.  It's
a Navy Memorandum for Correspondents at 1400, and the Navy will answer
questions.

     Q:  In the briefing room?
     A:  No.  The Navy at CHINFO will take the questions.

     Q:  How complete is this memorandum?  Is it a one draft thing, or does it
have some explanation in it?  You've seen it?
     A:  No, we have not.

     Q:  I thought you said you had it.
     A:  We'll give to you whatever the Navy has.

     Q:  Do we know the nature of the report they're putting out?  Are they
going to say the cause of the crash is this, or is it still under
investigation?
     A:  I don't know.  The thing that I read to you with astonishment at the
beginning of the briefing was handed to me just before I came in.

     Mr. Williams:  Anything else?
     Press:  No.  Thank you.

                                     (END)


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