Guard leaders offering ways to end dispute over aircraft

National Guard leaders planned to send the Base Closure and Realignment Commission a memorandum Monday outlining suggestions for resolving a dispute with the Air Force over recommendations to move all aircraft from nearly two dozen Air National Guard bases around the country.

Several dozen adjutants general met Friday in Washington and were unable to come to a specific agreement on the issue. However, the officers devised a general way to proceed that falls within the "bounds of what the law intends," said Maj. Gen. Roger Lempke, the head of Nebraska's National Guard and the president of the Adjutants General Association of the United States.

Lempke last week devised a detailed strategy, but said Monday "there is difficulty in trying to work up a specific line-by-line, aircraft-by-aircraft solution" because the BRAC process is moving forward rapidly, with the commission expected to complete much of its work next month. Lempke and other sources said they could not provide details of the agreement until the nine-member commission receives the memo sometime Monday.

At issue is whether the Pentagon has the authority to alter the state-run Guard units. Already, Democratic Govs. Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania and Rod Blagojevich of Illinois have filed lawsuits challenging Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's Air Guard recommendations, which they say are unconstitutional.

Missouri and other affected states also have threatened to seek legal action. An attorney for the BRAC commission earlier this month sided with the states in a detailed legal brief. But BRAC Chairman Anthony Principi said last week that it would be "irresponsible" for the commission to overturn all of the Pentagon's Air Guard recommendations. Principi threw the issue back to the Air Force and National Guard to sort out.

National Guard officials did not meet Friday with the Air Force, but both Lempke and Maj. Gen. Frank Vavala, the association's vice president and Delaware adjutant general, said they hope to sit down with service officials over the next several weeks. "We really want to work with the Air Force here," Lempke said. "Unfortunately, one of the issues we face right now is the timing and strict timeline the commission and the BRAC process are on."

The commission will mark up its own list of recommendations in late August and then forward that to the White House Sept. 8.