they have this experience. It would be a part of their records. That's the purpose of it. It's, as you can see, only one of many things that we need to do. It's not intended to address the point of training itself, that you mentioned, or the other things.

Mr. BARRETT. You also mention in your statement that the service scretary staffs have been continually decreased over a long period of time. If you use the numbers that Mr. Hopkins used a while ago, it would indicate that two of the secretariat staffs are one-tenth the size of the military headquarters staff.

Rather than continually decreasing the service Secretary staffsthe total is now down to a very low level, a level that you wonder if civilian control can be exercised-why not bring the service Secretary to the table? Why not give him side-by-side access with the Chief to the military staff where the action is?

I think that's the proposal. A service Secretary has to have analytic capability, and these sorts of things. Well, there's nothing in his proposal that would interfere with that. He could certainly have a small personal staff, 30 to 50 people. But why not integrate the research and development staffs of the service secretariats and the military headquarters? the financial management staffs? the military personnel staffs? They are duplicated in each service.

Mr. TAFT. Well, I think that the point you make is a very important one, and it's one that we have been looking at precisely, and you can-and I would recommend that you talk with, and have before you, say, a sample of an Assistant Secretary for R&D matters in one of the services, and the three-star director of the service staff.

What we have tried to do, and what we should do, is to assure that the secretariat, the people reporting to the Assistant Secretary in that area that you mention, or in personnel, or in procurement, do not duplicate the activities of the service staff; that they complement each other; that they can draw on the work that is done.

My constant injunction to the service staffs, and service secretariats is to assure that that happens. I think that because it's been happening is the reason that we have been able to make the reductions in the service secretariats that have been cited because they have become better at taking advantage of the expertise that's in the service staff. That is something that we need to continue to do. We need to continue to watch that we're taking advantage of this. The differences in the size of the service secretariats I think, results principally from the different ways in which they have gone about doing that. One service secretariat might have decided, for instance, as the Navy has done, that it needs to have a much larger general counsel's office in the secretariat, but it does a lot of the work that you would find in the JAG staffs of the other two services, which, therefore, are able to have much smaller general counsel's offices. I happen to be familiar with that structure, having been a general counsel.

The fiscal management side would be the same thing. You'll find that you can go small in the service secretariat if you take advantage of what's there on the service staff side, or you can cut down a little bit on the service staff side if you retain the expertise in the secretariat. And that's historically involved in different ways in the different services for different offices.

But duplication is the thing to get rid of, and, believe me, we would not have been able to reduce the service secretariats by 25 percent in the last 8 years if we hadn't been working on that problem.

Mr. BARRETT. One last question. If you review title 10 you find that the authorities and responsibilities in the law of the service Secretaries, service Chiefs, Assistant Secretaries, and deputy chiefs of staff are different from one service to the other. There seems to be no logical or rational explanation for the difference. In some cases there are, where one service is unique in some respect. But in many cases there seems to be no readily apparent reason for differing responsibilities and authorities.

Would the Department of Defense have a position on action by this subcommittee to write the legislation for each department in a uniform manner?

Mr. TAFT. We have no objection to that. I should say that the Secretary of Defense's authority over each of the services is the same. They are subject to his authority, direction, and control. And from the point of view of his relationship with each of the services, there is no difference. I understand that the wording of each of the statutes is, probably for historical reasons, somewhat different, and we have no objection to cleaning that up, making it uniform. I am not familiar with the detail of the question as it concerns the Navy. There may be some requirement for a different statute because of the existence of two services, two military services in that military department, whereas the others only have one. I'm not sure that that's the case, but that's the only reason that I would be aware of for having a difference. But I know there are slight differences in the wording.

Mr. BARRETT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. NICHOLS. Thank you, Mr. Barrett.

Mr. Secretary, we appreciate you being with us this morning, and I, in closing, would announce that at 2 this afternoon we do expect to hear from the Chairman of JCS who will makeMr. BARRETT. The service Chiefs this afternoon.

Mr. NICHOLS. Service Chiefs this afternoon. Thank you, Mr. Barrett. And

Mr. BARRETT. Service Secretaries, Mr. Chairman. I'm sorry again. The service Secretaries this afternoon.

Mr. NICHOLS. You're blushing, Mr. Barrett.

We're having the service Secretaries this afternoon at 2 p.m. I would only add that in talking with Mr. Barrett he has been working very diligently for some weeks now on a vehicle, a piece of legislation, that we hope to introduce perhaps as early as next week. It will bear Mr. Aspin's name, Mr. Skelton's name, and my name. I want to make it abundantly clear that for my part I'm not necessarily wedded to each and every provision that may appear in this particular piece of legislation. It's the consensus piece of legislation. But we will make available to your office a copy of this at the time it's introduced, and we would appreciate your comments, and any analysis that you would want to give us at that time on it.

Mr. TAFT. Mr. Chairman, we'd be delighted to do that, and as I said at the outset, in the course of your hearing we are delighted to assist you in any way by providing witnesses that you request, or

assistance in knowing our views. And, as I say, I speak not only for myself in that respect, but the Secretary would very much be available to you, as you know.

Mr. NICHOLS. Thank you very much. The subcommittee stands recessed until 2 p.m.

[Whereupon, at 11:30 a.m., the hearing was recessed, to reconvene at 2 p.m., this same day, Wednesday, February 19, 1986.]

AFTERNOON SESSION

Mr. NICHOLS. The subcommittee will come to order.

This afternoon it's the pleasure of the subcommittee to hear from the Secretaries. I don't know which order you want to testify in. Secretary Marsh from the Army; Secretary Lehman from the Navy; and Secretary Russ Rourke from the Air Force.

I believe, Jack, you are the senior man. We'll start with you.

STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN O. MARSH, JR., SECRETARY OF THE

ARMY

Mr. MARSH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the opportunity to appear before your subcommittee. I request permission to submit my statement and ask that it be incorporated in the record, and make an oral summary at this time.

Mr. NICHOLS. Without objection.

Mr. MARSH. In reference to the organization of the Department of Defense, and the various services, I would point out to you that there have been a number of changes that have occurred inside the building, not just under Mr. Weinberger, but over a period of years.

I would point out to you, in reference to reforms as we look at them, we have 40 years of empirical experience of how the Pentagon is presently structured, and none of us really know for certain what some of the proposed changes might eventually do.

My own views on the organization of the Department, of course, are based on my personal experience which relates to service in World War II, service as a Member of Congress, as a former defense official, as the advisor in national security affairs to the Vice President, as counselor to the President, and 5 years of service as Secretary in the present role, plus having served on behalf of President Ford as the chairman of the Organization Task Force of the Intelligence Community of the U.S. Government.

I would say to you, as you address changes to the Department, that every department and every organization reflects the style and approach of the senior leader, which, in this case, is Mr. Weinberger. He has given the military departments greater autonomy, he has given them greater responsibility, and he has demanded of them greater accountability.

One of the things that I think marks in a very significant way, his role as Secretary of Defense is the enhanced role of the Defense Resources Board, and the very important part that it plays in formulating defense policy, and allocating defense resources. This is generally unknown, but I would say it is a very major management accomplishment. I believe the other service Secretaries would agree with me.

As you look at organization, and reorganization, I would say a guiding precept and premise is the concept of civilian control. Civilian control of the Department is something that is a hallmark, not just of the Congress, but, indeed, the structure of the Department as we know it today.

It's important that we keep our lines of communication open to the Congress. I would emphasize to you that title 10 of the U.S. Code that establishes the military departments, and particularly the service Secretaries, is quite clear.

I would also say that I am not certain that we have ever fully implemented the powers and authorities that are invested in the service Secretaries under title 10. I would say to you that that authority is in its broadest application, and I simply quote from one portion of the statute defining the duties of the Secretary of the Army, and the Secretary of the Air Force and it's very similar to the Navy. "Functions necessary for the training, operations, administration, logistical support, maintenance, welfare, and preparedness, and research and development."

I think that there have been, within the last 5 years, significant gains by the civilian Secretaries of the departments in exercising their authority in each of the various services.

I would say that there has also been developed in the last several years in the Army, greater oversight of the Army intelligence community than we've had in the past.

There's one area that I would specifically address. Each of us was asked to comment on this particular question by the Senate, and I recognize that your subcommittee is getting certain reflections based on the Senate report. We were asked if the service Secretaries were circumvented in the Department, either by the military representatives, or by the Secretary of Defense, and by others at his level. I would say to you that I have had a very good relationship both with General Wickam and with General Meyer. It's been a very constructive and a very positive relationship. I would not use the word "circumvention" in addressing what might occur there. I would say that what does happen, as I said in the statement to the Senate, and as I would reiterate in my statement here, it's more likely to be a situation of noninvolvement. It's often overlooked that the service Secretary is not in the chain of the national command authority. I am not advocating that he should be, and I am not recommending that. What has happened, in operationsand the word "operation" has become a sort of exclusive domain of the Joint Chiefs. Consequently, there has been a diminishing of the role of the service Secretary because operational matters have a tendency to be relegated to the military side even though the statute gives the service Secretary, in the Army's case, a specific responsibility in that regard.

Now, this noninvolvement arising largely out of the interpretation of the word "operations," has had a particular impact in the intelligence area which has its own special requirements for oversight. In the Department of the Army-and I'll not get into details in this forum-there have been a number of very positive significant changes that relate to controls, to finance reporting, and to oversight. This has been thoroughly and completely supported by the Secretary of Defense, and has been enormously helpful in ef

fecting changes by the Chief of Staff of the Army. I would say unequivocally that Mr. Weinberger has taken pains not to bypass the service Secretaries. Indeed, there are written procedures in the Pentagon which stipulate the taskings that go to the military departments should come down through the Office of the Secretariat. Now, there may be, from time to time, largely through inadvertence, some circumvention of the service Secretary by the Chief of Staff, and that occurs because of the unique role that he has by statute.

First, the Chief of Staff is charged by statute to give military advice to the Secretary of Defense and to the President. As a result there may be some matters that would, by virtue of statute, and properly so, go to the attention of the Secretary of Defense.

Second, the Chief of Staff presides over the Army staff. He supervises the Army. He is the military adviser to the Secretary of the Army, and he's the Army representative in the Joint Chiefs.

The key in both the operational sense, and in other areas, is to be certain that the service Secretary is thoroughly and carefully informed and kept apprised of the operational side of what goes on in the Pentagon. Because, in the operational side, although an operation may originate at a high level, or may come from a low level, at some point in time that operation must become involved in logis tics, training, personnel, and a whole host of things that are within the area of responsibility of the service Secretary.

The question has been raised as to whether or not there's too much layering in the staffs of the departments, meaning OSD, the military staffs-the Army staff-or, the civilian staff in the Army. I would say to you that it always seems the greatest focus, in my view is in the wrong place on this issue and that focus is on the staff of the Secretary, the smallest by far of all the staffs. The staff of the Secretary of the Army is less than 375 people. Size notwithstanding, it is an essential staff because that staff, from the standpoint of civilian oversight, plays a very effective role in planning, coordinating, supervising, and expediting inside the Pentagon. It also plays a very effective role, I believe, of advocacy within the Pentagon.

The proposal that's been suggested, and which is before your committee, to combine the staffs of the military and the civilians, in my view is not a good solution, and I would not recommend it to you. The suggestion that has been made that would abolish, in the Army a certain number of the Assistant Secretaries would be a step in the wrong direction. One proposal would keep two Secretaries and abolish three positions. The two remaining Secretaries would then be placed under the Director of the Army Staff. That is not, in my view, either good management, or a good way to pursue that proposal.

To bring the Office of the General Counsel under the Office of the Judge Advocate, in my view, is going the wrong way. The General Counsel and the service Secretary is one of the most effective combinations that we have. It's one that can be used very effectively by the service Secretary in dealing with individuals and organizations outside, and in dealing with many controversial legal issues in which you do not wish to involve your Judge Advocate General [JAG].