ligence (MASINT), and signals intelligence (SIGINT) systems architecture is essential to providing indications and warning and situational awareness to all echelons of command. We will continue to rely on these systems in tandem with the direct threat warning provided by our theater ISR assets. The current mix of platforms and sensors does not provide the full range of collection required for comprehensive threat warning and support to fast-paced combat operations. Continued congressional support for existing and planned national sensor platforms and upgrades, as provided for in our current out-year funding plan, is essential.

MASINT provides key indications and warning, theater ballistic missile warning and battle damage assessment. However, the current lack of operational sensors and a formal architecture significantly reduces MASINT's ability to support military operations. MASINT has great potential and can provide tremendous support to the warfighter. Your continued support is needed for existing and planned operational sensors and associated architectures to make the system more capable.

It is also essential that we maintain a robust tasking, processing, exploitation, and dissemination (TPED) architecture. This remains a daunting challenge, as current limitations impede our ability to process, exploit and disseminate large imagery files and move this critical data through the “last tactical mile" to our components and their supporting units.

Active duty intelligence personnel manning and systems support also remain challenges at USCENTCOM, given our high operating tempo. That said, our Reserve program is thriving. Reserve personnel have been integrated across all functional lines including systems, counterterrorism, analysis, imagery, targeting, and battle damage assessment. We would be unable to accomplish our missions and meet emerging requirements without this Reserve component contribution.

Working with Regional Forces

As I discussed earlier, key elements of our current national strategy include ensuring continued access for U.S. forces and enhancing the ability of regional states to provide for their own security in concert with us and with each other. To meet these objectives, USCENTCOM has developed a program that includes operations, exercises, security assistance, education, humanitarian demining, and military-tomilitary contacts.

With few permanently-stationed forces in the AOR, a strong mil-to-mil program provides access to our friends and allies. Our engagement program provides not only training to our forces and those of our partners, it also provides an outstanding example of a successful, professional, and apolitical military to nations striving to build their own military traditions. Military-to-military interaction engenders trust and confidence and ultimately translates to greater security for our people. Our combined commitment to aligning resources with these programs will ensure success in achieving our national objectives.

Prepositioning and Forward Presence

Prepositioning in our AOR is the third leg of our strategic deployment triad. The Navy and Marine Corps Maritime Prepositioning Force (MPF) program, comprised of Maritime Prepositioned Ship Squadrons (MPSRONS) 1, 2, and 3, maintains a high materiel readiness rate. It will become more robust when the MPF Enhancement (MPF(E)) Program, scheduled for completion in March 2002, is fully fielded. Each MPSRON will gain a fleet hospital, a Navy mobile construction battalion, an expeditionary airfield, and additional warfighting equipment. The MPSRON-1 Enhancement ship is already on station.

The Army's prepositioning program, with a goal of placing a heavy division of equipment in the region, is advancing on schedule. The brigade set in Kuwait maintains high operational readiness and is exercised regularly. The prepositioned site in Qatar (Camp As Saliyah) houses the second brigade set and a division base set estimated to be completed before the end of fiscal year 2003. The afloat combat brigade, APS-3, is complete, and combat ready, and a second afloat brigade is planned to augment APS-3 with an equipment fill of 83 percent of requirement in the near term. The Army is evaluating other actions which could lead to a fill of 92 percent of requirement.

The Air Force Harvest Falcon bare-based materiel program is also a vital asset to meet our requirements, as these assets support the generation of Air Force combat sorties in the early stages of contingencies. Having these sets positioned in the AOR lets us avoid diverting critical strategic lift assets at the start of a conflict to the movement of bare-base materials, thereby delaying the arrival of warfighting elements. Currently, our on hand Harvest Falcon assets are 45 percent mission capable.

Transformation

Our ability to shape the environment and influence the battlespace is linked to transformation efforts by the Services and members of the joint team. In particular, USCENTCOM supports the development of the doctrine, organization, and training that will enable joint, combined operations in the multinational setting. We support further development of a process for integrating coalition members into our transformation efforts.

Across the board, USCENTCOM endorses Service efforts aimed at transformation of existing force structures to modernized, versatile, full spectrum forces. Of special importance to USCENTCOM is Army transformation, which will provide required adaptive, lethal, and survivable forces responsive to the diverse operating continuum in our AOR.

Quality of Life

Finally, the requirements identified above mean little without our most important resource, people. An essential component of force readiness is continued emphasis on improving the quality of life for service members and their families. I applaud the leadership shown by Congress with passage of the "TRICARE For Life" program for retirees and family members. I ask for your continued support to the Defense Health Program as we fully realize the "TRICARE promise" for our personnel and families stationed overseas and in remote locations. "Taking care of our own" through medical, pay, and other entitlement programs provides the Services a set of powerful recruitment and retention tools.

CONCLUSION

In the near-term, Saddam Hussein will continue to challenge our resolve as we rebuild and strengthen the Gulf coalition. In the long-term, Iran's moves toward regional hegemony could be of greater concern. The Central Region is as dynamic as it is volatile. Weapons of mass destruction, state-to-state conflict, terrorism, and general instability will continue to place special demands on our people and on our ingenuity.

Interaction and cooperation with regional militaries will remain a vital ingredient in enhancing stability and security in this AOR. This interaction equals access and goes a long way toward building trust and confidence with our friends and allies. Our presence strengthens relations with our hosts and improves our ability to protect ourselves by eliminating suspicion, demystifying intent, opening the door to communication, and denying the closed environment in which terrorists thrive.

The volatility of our region requires that USCENTCOM remain adaptable and agile. Without a large footprint in the region, we must be truly "deployable." Responsive command, control, and communications during peace, crisis, and conflict will remain key to our ability to accomplish the mission. We have the finest soldiers, sailors, airmen, coast guardsmen, and marines in the world. Your steadfast, superb and visible support has made it so and you can count on them to do all we ask of them-and more.

Chairman WARNER. Thank you very much.

General Ralston, I am going to pick up on your last presentation about the need for the military construction in your area. I think that is a very important issue. It does not have the drama of conflict and all of the other things that come to the attention of people through media and otherwise, but it is just as important to give your troops the basic requirements of a quality of life which they deserve, commensurate with the onerous burdens of picking up here in the United States, moving overseas and adapting to the local economy. Often it is difficult for the wife to engage in other activities and care for the family if the income level of the family requires her to work.

You and I understand those things through long years, and I am going to very much participate in trying to give you this support, but I have to tell you that that is but one part of the overall concern here in Congress of the United States, and certainly with this Senator on this committee. Another area of concern is a drifting at

titude that I see with respect to NATO, brought along by this European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP).

Yesterday, our committee had the pleasure of receiving the British Secretary of State for Defence, and we had a long discussion with him on that subject. I will speak for myself for the moment— there is a concern about further augmentation of U.S. spending and so forth with regard to NATO.

Now, it may well be that we will have to do this by necessity, because the evolution of this new concept in NATO is going to take a long time. This is an emergency situation that has to be addressed, but I would be less than candid if I did not point out my concern, and I think of others, about this situation.

I remember when I first came to the Senate some 23 years ago, the then-Majority Leader of the Senate, or he had just stepped down, he had an amendment, the Mansfield amendment, to bring our troops out of NATO. In the early years in my Senate career, time and time again we had to go to the floor of the Senate to gain the support of the whole Senate to do an orderly withdrawal of our forces, and not a precipitous one.

I am not suggesting that that is going to happen here tomorrow, but nevertheless, that is a part of Senate history, and it could be brought up in an orderly way. Yesterday with the visit of our British colleague, one of our colleagues brought up the question of whether or not U.S. force levels in Europe need to be kept at the 100,000 figure that you mentioned, in view of the desire for this initiative within NATO. I think it is important to get this into the record every time we have the opportunity, through your appearance and others.

General RALSTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me give a little bit of background on the European Security and Defense Identity (ESDI) and ESDP that we talk about. For years, we as Americans have asked the Europeans to do more to carry their own security, so I would like to be supportive of anything that improves the security posture of our European nations, and so therefore I want to be supportive of ESDI with the caveat that it should be done in a way that does not detract from the NATO alliance.

Now, I think there is a way to do this. Let me give you what I think is the right way ahead, and then I will come back and talk about some of the downsides if we do not do that.

There are four nations, Mr. Chairman, that are in the European Union that are not in NATO: Finland, Sweden, Austria, and Ireland. I think the proper way to do this is to bring those four nations' military planners to Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) headquarters, where we have the 19 NATO nations there, and in terms of operational planning, military planners will do what military planners always do. They will come up with military options. We will have option A, and option A will have a certain set of forces, and a certain risk factor, and a certain chance of success, and option B will have a different set of forces, and a different risk, and different chances of success, and option C, and once those options are designed, then they can be provided simultaneously to the European Union and to the North Atlantic Council. Now, the two political bodies will have the same set of plans, the same set of facts, and the two political bodies can then deliberate

as to who should do this operation, should this be a NATO operation, or should it be a European Union operation, and the United States will be well-represented in that debate as it sits around the table in Brussels.

Now, my concern is if we do not do it the way I have outlined, and instead the European Union sets up their own planning mechanism over here, that has three major downsides. First, it is wasteful of resources. The last thing that the European nations need to be doing is spending money on more jobs for generals in headquarters in Paris. That is money that needs to be going into the battalions and the squadrons and the ships, not in more headquarters.

Second, if we do not do the planning the way I said, then the European Union will come up with options 1, 2, and 3, NATO will have A, B, and C, and when it gets to the two political bodies, there will be more confusion than normal in times of crisis. We do not need that.

Third, the European Union, if they pick battalion X that they want on their operation, how do they know that battalion X is not assigned to a NATO plan, and a NATO operation?

So if we do it the way that I said, where we bring the European Union planners that are not already part of NATO, those four nations to SHAPE, I think this can be well-managed, and I think it can, in fact, be an improvement, but we do not have those details ironed out yet, and that is something I am very concerned about. It is something that we need to keep pushing on, and I think we need to do it in the next few months to get that tied down the way that it should be.

Chairman WARNER. I thank you. So it is in the next few months that we will get some clarity to this situation.

General RALSTON. That is certainly my hope.

Chairman WARNER. I want to address an article which appeared on March 21 in the London Daily Telegraph, and I will give you a copy of it. Would you quickly pick up on the point they are trying to raise here. I think this record today should incorporate your testimony to strongly refute the principle they are trying to advocate. "NATO's attempt to quell the growing conflict in the Balkans is being hampered by Americans' reluctance to risk casualties, alliance officials said yesterday." Now, that is attributing it to alliance officials, who I presume would be persons who work in the same command structure that you are working in, if there is credibility to this.

The problem is not discussed openly, but British officers speak of "body bag syndrome," as the major brake on NATO operations to stop infiltrations of Albanian extremists from Kosovo into Serbia and Macedonia.

The U.S. forces may be highly motivated by fighters and superbly equipped, but there is frustration with the perception that American commanders are under the intense political pressure not to shed soldiers' blood. "The body bag syndrome is a real problem now, said a senior European officer. It is not that the American soldier doesn't want to fight. The politicians won't let him."

The issue has become urgent, since ethnic Albanian rebels began to infiltrate both Yugoslavia and Macedonia late last year, using the American sector of Kosovo as a base of operations.

Now, certainly, whether we are military field commanders like yourself, or those of us here at home in Congress, we have foremost in our mind the safety of our military in the forefronts of the world, and the same may be said of this article about your AOR, General Franks, but the Kosovo war was fought in a unique way, unprecedented with almost total dependence on air, as opposed to any ground elements. The planners devised that and essentially brought about the cessation of hostilities in that region, and I think it was a successful operation. That is my personal opinion.

We were very proud of the fact that the performance of our military, under the command of the leadership of their senior officers, performed this mission with a minimum of casualties.

Clearly it is my perception that our military is willing to accept the risks for which they chose this profession, and that they will follow the orders of the Commander in Chief, our President. Congress does not issue any orders, but we are very vocal, and a very important co-equal partner of the infrastructure supporting our troops, but I do not know that anything has emanated from Congress that would give rise to the accusation in this article.

I know of no commands or orders given by the senior military commanders that give rise to it. To the contrary, I feel that our forward-deployed troops will accept those risks professionally associated with their mission, and if it results in casualties, it is highly regrettable, but that from time immemorial has been the role of those in uniform.

Now, I would like to have your comment. I presume your views coincide with mine, but this is a fairly serious indictment that was raised in the British press, particularly at a time when we see requests coming in for additional troops. I think it is important that you speak out with clarity on this article, because while you may not be familiar with this article, you have heard this accusation before.

General RALSTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I did read the article, and I will tell you that I take strong exception to the sentiments expressed in that article. Soldiers that are in Kosovo today that are on the border are doing, in my judgment, a magnificent job.

Chairman WARNER. Incidentally, Senator Stevens and I and others were there just 3 weeks ago. We were on that very border where the fighting is taking place in the valley with you and our troops.

General RALSTON. Yes, sir, and Mr. Chairman, I very much appreciate the fact that so many members of the Senate took the time to go and look at that, and you saw those magnificent young_soldiers up there. They were not afraid of anything, they were there to do their job.

Just a couple of weeks ago, on the Macedonian border, we had a case where an American patrol was there. They were threatened by armed extremists, and they shot two of them. They followed the rules of engagement exactly as they should have, and they did that, but that is a risk that they take every night and every day. It could