Ike Skelton, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, walks with Chief Warrant Officer James Hess, right, during Skelton’s visit to Fort Huachuca on Friday. (Mark Levy-Herald/Review)
Posted on 12/01/2007 3:36:55 PM PST by SandRat
FORT HUACHUCA — The defense of the United States is going to require highly trained military intelligence professions, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee said Friday.
Preparing critical intelligence providers is being done on this Southern Arizona post, said U.S. Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., who assumed the chairmanship of the committee in January.
Having an intelligence force that is the best will ensure the United States can counter any future enemy, he said.
“It’s going to be the intelligence world that makes the difference,” he said after spending an afternoon on the post. It was Skelton’s first trip to the fort.
The congressman is scheduled to have breakfast this morning with soldiers before heading to Tucson.
The chairman had been invited to visit the post as well as two other military installations in U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’ 8th Congressional District, the Arizona Air National Guard’s 162nd Fighter Wing and Davis-Monthan Air Fore Base, both in Tucson.
The first-term Democratic congresswoman is a member of the House Armed Services Committee.
“Fort Huachuca is one of the best kept secrets in the military,” said Giffords as she sat next to Skelton during a question-and-answer session with the media after the pair finished listening to young intelligence analyst soldiers give a briefing on an exercise.
Skelton, who was elected to the House of Representatives in 1976, has been a member of the committee since 1980, reaching the position as ranking member in 1998 when the Democrats did not control Congress. He is considered to be a moderate Democrat who is hawkish on defense issues.
During his fort tour, he visited the unmanned aerial vehicle training facility, which the 4th Congressional District congressman from Missouri said is a vast improvement from the days when UAVs were just an initial thought for the military.
“We had severe challenges,” he said of the older UAV programs that needed a lot of fine-tuning.
Many times a UAV would not fly in the right direction, Skelton said.
America’s armed forces face the mission of ensuring the men and women have the right equipment, and that is “more of an uphill battle,” he said.
While the Army’s intelligence community has proven itself, there are still skeptics. But Skelton isn’t one of them.
Touching on the constant concerns about torture being taught to human intelligence collectors, Skelton said the Army did the right thing in developing a new training and operational field manual that outlines what can and cannot be done.
Unfortunately, he added, it is limited to the armed forces.
Some people believe torture is taught on the fort. Skelton said those people are incorrect.
For the past four years, demonstrators have protested outside the post’s Main Gate against alleged teaching of torture, trying to make a connection to the former School of he Americas.
“I knew the School of the Americas down in Panama,” he said.
Skelton also knew “some less than savory people” who graduated from the U.S. run school.
But now those problems no longer exist, the congressman said.
Instead, his committee is so taken with the Army field manual that he and others in Congress want the document to be the book for all the nation’s intelligence communities, such as the Central Intelligence Agency. Skelton noted that the White House does not support the idea.
Skelton also talked about the growing budget fight to provide an additional $50 billion for the war on terrorism, saying it is heating up to be a partisan political brawl.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates said this week that without the $50 billion there is a potential to lay off 200,000 civil service employees and contractors by February.
The committee chairman said he supports the Democratic proposal for appropriating the extra $50 billion, which will include a time to start pulling U.S. forces from Iraq, while leaving some for training purposes and to provide security for such things as the U.S. embassy staff.
The bill also will include the requirement for the Army field manual on human intelligence collection procedures to be adopted by all federal intelligence agencies.
As for the potential of a Democratic versus Republican battle over the issue, Skelton hopes cooler heads will prevail.
Giffords said it is important for the committee chairman to meet the military leaders and the missions done at the fort and the two military installations in Tucson.
“We’ve got to let the rest of the country know the assets we have at Fort Huachuca,” she said.
Two committee staff members, a staffer from Skelton’s office and an Army colonel who is the liaison with the committee traveled with the members of Congress to see the high-tech post and its resources.
“It’s important for them to see for themselves,” Giffords said.
The congresswoman made her comments at an evening reception for Skelton at La Casita Mexican restaurant in Sierra Vista. The event, which was hosted by the Fort Huachuca 50, included local elected officials and other community leaders.
At the reception were a trio of senior military leaders: Maj. Gen. John Custer, commander of the Intelligence Center and the fort; Brig. Gen. Carroll Pollett, who commands the Network Enterprise Technology Command/9th Signal Command (Army); and Col. Melissa Surgeon, the garrison commander.
Custer, who spent the afternoon with the congressional delegation, said that from what Skelton said when talking with soldiers, “he was very impressed.”
Equally as important were the soldiers, some not long out of high school, who were able to brief the two members of Congress with confidence, the general said.
A little local politics slipped into Skelton’s evening comments when he asked the audience to support Giffords’ re-election campaign next year.
“Thank you for sending her to Congress,” he said, “and please return her.”
It was on a serious note that the congressman ended his comments.
“There are difficult days ahead for our country,” he said.
Looking back on history, warning signs that World War I was going to happen were missed, Skelton said. But today’s world is more dangerous, especially when it comes to the Middle East, he said.
When it comes to the intelligence arena, there can be no half measures.
“We have to do a better job,” the congressman said, adding “What you do here (at the fort) is very important.”
And intelligence gathering and dissemination training must include an “understanding of this thing called culture,” he said.
The Intelligence Center is the Army’s lead in cultural training.
When it comes to training the military intelligence experts, the post is the backbone, Skelton said.
“You are at the hub of it for our country and worldwide,” he said.
SENIOR REPORTER Bill Hess can be reached at 515-4615 or by e-mail at bill.hess@svherald.com.
Ike Skelton, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, walks with Chief Warrant Officer James Hess, right, during Skelton’s visit to Fort Huachuca on Friday. (Mark Levy-Herald/Review)
Well .. the rest of the gang who are already in the USA somewhere .. will likely try to complete their mission - and now we know why this installation was selected.
But .. I’m stunned to hear once again that a DEMOCRAT cannot keep their big mouth shut about America’s “secrets”. Can we say “treason”!!
It never was secret.
Giffords is engaging in hyperbole.
I didn’t want her elected but to give her a shred of credit she was a factor in keeping the west gate open when yet another ticket-punching staff weenie wanted to close it down to “save money”.
Ft. Huachuca isn’t (or wasn’t) widely known throughout the military because the MI Corps is a pretty small part of the overall force structure.
It’s unusually well know on FR due the litany of SV Herald articles posted here.
For a town not even large enough to be po-dunk, SV gets an unusually high number of rererences on this forum.
CWO James Hess.............no relation to Bill?
Bill who is spoken of almost fondly amongst the retarded, er, retired Sargeants Major I’m acquainted with?
Fort Huachuca is just well off the beaten path...and trains a specialty (intelligence) that doesn't operate tanks or artillery.
As I recall, Huachuca was, for many years, the HQ for the Signal Corps.
"“Fort Huachuca is one of the best kept secrets in the military,” said Giffords as she sat next to Skelton during a question-and-answer session with the media after the pair finished listening to young intelligence analyst soldiers give a briefing on an exercise."
Oh, come now my FRiend - S.V. is beyond Podunk, even bigger than a jerkwater, elevated above even a one horse town.
Why, they even have traffic lights - I have seen them myself.
I still like Bisbee though.....
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Article III: Section 3: "Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court. The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted."
I like Bisbee too.
Its most entertaining aspects are decent restaurants and gullible hippies.
And the pie at Dot’s Diner —yummy.
My dad and uncle grew up in Bisbee, I lived there for a while myself. Interesting place.
Today, not so much.
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