Rep. Randy Forbes was asked a simple question Tuesday: When would he, the House Armed Services seapower subcommittee chairman, and his colleagues bend on base closure?
The Virginia Republican’s answer was straight and fast: “We’re not.”
It’s the fourth time the Pentagon has requested in its annual budget that Congress give it the authority to conduct another round of base closures. The Pentagon argues it has an excess of facilities among the 557,000 buildings it manages, and the closures could save money that it could otherwise use to modernize and feel less squeezed.
But Forbes said that from his point of view, shuttering facilities would lock in the current size of the military to fit to the facilities — and based on current threats, in his view, it’s time for the military to grow.
“If you believe as I believe that these force structures are not right — that we have to build these force structures up, greater, then you’d better fight like the dickens to make sure you don’t have a BRAC,” Forbes said, using the acronym for “base realignment and closure.”
“Because if we shut some of these capabilities, some of these facilities, we will never be able to afford to build them back up.”
