Lawmakers unveil $4 billion plan to increase military

Lawmakers on the House Armed Services Committee announced a plan Wednesday to increase the U.S. military by nearly 40,000 troops over the next three years at an estimated cost of $4 billion per year.

The plan calls for increasing the active-duty Army by 30,000 soldiers and Marine Corps by 9,000 soldiers, said committee chairman Duncan Hunter, R-Calif. The price tag includes personnel and training, but not additional equipment. Hunter said he believes the Pentagon and White House will support the plan because the committee will provide additional resources to fund the increase.

"My feeling is that we're going to have the administration and the rest of the Congress strongly behind us on this initiative. We think it's reasonable, it's prudent, and it's eminently affordable," Hunter said.

Hunter added that costs for additional equipment would be announced in the coming days by subcommittees.

Lawmakers downplayed speculation that increasing strength is needed because operations in Iraq and Afghanistan are draining the military. On Tuesday, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld announced that he approved keeping the number of U.S. troops in Iraq at between 135,000 and 138,000 through 2005.

"We're not trying to manage this war; I don't feel capable enough to do that," said Rep. John McHugh, R-N.Y., chairman of the total force subcommittee. "And we're not trying to validate an argument on one side or the other with this increase. Rather, what we're trying to do is to provide available forces so the combatant commanders and military experts don't have to worry about" troop rotations and shortages.

Rep. Heather Wilson, R- N.M., said she is particularly concerned that extended deployment for National Guard and Reserve soldiers will hurt retention and recruitment rates.

"When they rotate back home, sometimes having been on active duty longer than they initially anticipated, they're going to be making important decisions about whether they stay in the Guard or the Reserve. And I think it's much easier for someone in the Guard or the Reserve to decide that they no longer can sustain that commitment than it is for someone on active duty," Wilson said. "We can't over-rely on our Guard and Reserve, not because they're not willing to do the job, but because we risk hollowing out the force if we lose our senior [noncommissioned officers] and our mid-level officers."

The Pentagon has been relying in part on stop-loss orders to maintain forces in Iraq. The orders prevent soldiers from leaving the military for a certain period of time. McHugh said stop-loss orders are "a terrible way to manage the force."

"A big reason why we're doing this is to end a long-term reliance on artificial measures like stop loss," he added.

It is unclear whether John Warner, R-Va., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, will pursue similar legislation on military troop levels and supplemental funding, although Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Jack Reed, D-R.I., have urged a permanent increase of 30,000 soldiers to Army troop levels. Earlier this year, Reed and Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., introduced a bill to increase the active-duty end-strength of the Army by 30,000-a move they estimated would cost the Pentagon roughly $3.6 billion over three years.