welcome to "this week in defense news," i'm vago muradian. in the wake of a deadly few weeks that started when koran's were accidentally burned and culminating with a u.s. soldier allegedly killing 17 afghan civilians, calls are growing for an accelerated withdrawal from afghanistan. but the obama administration says u.s. troops will stay through 2014 and beyond. what's next in afghanistan? and tensions continue to simmer with iran as the united states boosts its military presence in the region. is conflict over tehran's nuclear program inevitable? back at home, congress is saying no to more u.s. base closures and tensions between the air force and the air national guard are growing as are fears that sequestration may become a reality. here to talk about all of that and more is our roundtable, kate branon, the congressional

reporter for defense news. lauren thompson every the lexington institute, mckenzie eggland of the american enterprise institute and larry corb from the center for american progress. ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. >> nice to be with you. >> let's start with general alann. general alann, the american commander of u.s. central command gave testimony on the house and senate first time for the first time since the koran burning institute and when staff sergeant balancees can accused of having killed 17 afghan civilians, that's increased calls for folks to say, hey, look, it's time to get out of afghanistan. when the french lost a few soldiers a few months ago, president sarkozy says we're going to withdraw a year early. yet the administration is sticking with this 2014 date and saying u.s. troops are going to stay well beyond that. where's this debate going in washington? >> the key thing is that the administration did not overreact. if you're going to change your policy, you don't want to do it under duress. the other thing that happened

is this enhances president kars i-'s bargaining power -- karzai's bargaining power. you've seen us agree to transfer more of the prisoners from bagram. you've already seen us willing to say we'll put some constraints on the night raid and if you want to stay past 2014, you're going to have to do that. öz#f forces in afghanistan is saying i need all nonsurge troops to stay this entire year which means he's basically boxing in the white house to not make some big announcement at the summit in may. now you have members of congress like senators mccain, lieberman and others saying that we want this long-term presence and they don't mean, you know, 10,000 troops, they mean a significant amount because they don't want a repeat of the bungled negotiations that left no u.s. forces in iraq which gave up our ability to see into iran. so the white house is feeling

pressure now from its own commanders and congress. >> the flip side of that is the iraqis didn't want any american troops to actually stay there. so no matter what senators lieberman and mccain want to say. the iraqis didn't want to have any american troops stay there. >> don't forget that senator graham said those conditions that karzai wants, we shouldn't stay there. graham has said if karzai says no night raids without you guys approving and the prisoner transfer, he says i can't look at, you know, a person in south carolina and say our soldiers are fighting with one hand behind their back. >> kate, it seems as though generally congress was overall pretty supportive of general allen. was that the sense? >> definitely. i think you heard a lot of support from capitol hill, but there does seem to be a disconnect, i think, or a sense from the news that's coming out of the region, whether it's the bales incident or the koran burning and what you're hearing on capitol hill, the news sounds really bad, but the

support stays strong. it will be interesting to see what happens with the election if it becomes an issue and what the american public thinks >> general allen has talked a lot about the progress that's been made. he said let's be careful about despite these incidents a huge amount of progress is being made on the ground. >> yeah, but does anyone really believe once we scale down our presence karzai is capable of running the country against an indigenous surgery in power or out of power for decades now? what exactly is the purpose of extending given what we know about the political sulture in afghanistan. >> that's a good point. if you could tell me in five years if you stay, we can be assured, but we don't know that. and at some point we're going to have to leave and it's really going to be up to them. we've achieved our strategic objective, we've got bin laden, decimated al-qaida. we don't want afghanistan to become a haven for groups like that again or to destabilize the region. >> we've reached the point now where this whole thing is beginning to deteriorate. since allen has gotten there,

there's been one embarrassment after another, from the shooting of the pakistani border troops to the koran burning. it just goes on and on and on. as a result we're now doing things like proposing maybe before we do night raids, we should propose the idea, maybe get approval from an afghan force. this is the beginning of the unraveling of a strategy. >> one of the things, though, that the administration has been talking about and wants the nato summit to do is to have everybody in the alliance and that's why there was so much frustration in france is to keep everybody together as 2014 rolls around. any chance others are going to bail? >> the britts are staying. as long as the britts stay, they're the main contributors and i think countries, they will stay. >> i was going to say i think the stakes are getting higher and higher for that summit, whether it's general allen on the hill or senator mccain made a big speech earlier last week saying the security agreement, if it happens, it better happen at nato, it will be the most important achievement at that

summit and if it doesn't, we're in trouble. >> we've got two minutes. i want to cover two topics very quickly. the bales incident. it's remarkable to me how this staff sergeant is being portrayed almost as a poster child for ptsd, traumatic brain injury, yet, you know, what he's alleged of committing a heinous crime and he has things in his record that would have drawn him out a few years ago. is this somewhat of an overall poster child for anti-war opposition? i mean -- >> no doubt about it. he's become a symbol for all sides, no matter what your position is on the subject. but maybe instead of asking what repeated deployments have done to bales, we ought to ask what repeated deployments have done to our political culture. this guy is a war criminal if the allegations are right. i don't know what conceivable extenuating circumstances could justify killing 17 innocent noncombatants. >> wait a second. we have a policy which i set up when i was there, based on our experience in korea and

vietnam. for every month you spend in a combat zone, you should have at least two at home. we haven't done that. the other is from 2003 to 2008 the army gave 80,000 more -- moral waivers to take people in. we look at this young man's record. we found out there's a lot of things in there. in normal times -- >> you would have drawn him out. you would have put him out. in other words, he has been deployed almost 1,200 days in the last seven years. that's too much for anyone. >> what is also exposing is an army under stress at the same time the president is going to shrink it pretty dra mattically and combat operations are going to stay pretty high in iraq. >> afghanistan. >> i'm sorry, afghanistan. you heard this week 50,000 other u.s. soldiers are facing the fourth or fifth deployment and not just sergeant bales. so it's exposing to the nation the strain on individual soldiers. it's not excusable, but it's just the face of this challenge. >> before we go, let's talk about iran. obviously this is sort of a

simmering tension issue. the u.s. is bolstering forces in the region, enterprise strike group is headed over there now, lincoln strike group is already over there. chief of naval operations said there were going to be more mine sweeping and mine-sweeping helicopters going over there. israel is saying we're going to attack them if you don't, washington, in that is implicit washington gets pulled into this. is war inevitable or is this a bargaining chip to put pressure on the iranians to come to the table with a deal. >> one key point, israel doesn't need us to prosecute a strike against iran and it could happen on no notice to the united states. the central command is definitely sending signals that they are worried, they're talking more and more about red lines, making those more clear and having the administration take the lead on that. >> are you attack against the iranian nuclear attack? >> i know israelis who don't think so. they think they could do some initial strikes but not be able to do a prolonged campaign. >> i think what the president is doing, just like his speech when he said i'm not bluffing, i'm going to do something.

that's the way you get deterrents by putting forces in and saying you'll be willing to use them. i think it's a very smart strategy to kick this thing down the road until you can see what happens in the negotiations. >> feel up on congress? >> i think there's confusion and a mixed bag. i think the question is how much time do we have and the signals are very different depending on who you talk to and what the status of the iranian nuclear program is. >> up next, the fight over brac and

welcome back. for more with our roundtable. mckendzy, i want to start with you and get your guys' take on it. house budget committee chairman puts in cuts to the social services as well as tax cuts, things that are pretty much on the democrat side 0 who are looking for tax increases. what does this proposal mean for defense and how does it effect the whole sequestration debate? >> paul ryan is trying to present a vision to voters that this is a party that is differentiated from president obama's view of the world and of government and its role and place in society that also includes defense spending by trying to reverse the 2013 sequestration cuts as well as possibly buy back some more in the future. he's preemptively laying the groundwork for house leadership who want to pass bills before memorial day to take away the defense cuts in 2013 under sequestration so that out on the campaign trail they are not

held responsible because these are going to hurt jobs and hurt those in uniform. >> he's certainly done the partisan differentiation in terms of his priorities, but i think he's merely underscored what the likely past forward is on sequestration. if we get a split election outcome that we're going to get sequestration because this system is too polarized to come to a compromise, and i have a suspicious that if we get it for a few months, we'll get it for a few years because the system won't be able to repeal it or do anything different. >> kate. >> i think with paul ryan's plan and buck mckeeon's plan, chairman of the house armed services committee, you're starting to see various plans cobbled together to roll back sequestration. if anything, i think that shows an acknowledgement of how sort of devastating it will be, and i think what you're hearing really is just fear mongering in an election year and i think the conventional wisdom is still there's not a chance they'll do this to themselves. >> the one thing he's hurt security, even though he's increased defense, he's cut back diplomacy and development

significantly. you remember what admirable mullen and secretary gates said that these are key components of national security. >> it started mid point of the bush administration pushing that whole idea of smart power and then doug fites underwriting costs over at the state department. i want to ask about base closures. base closures have been sort of a centerpiece part of the proposal the administration has put out for its budget plan, two rounds of it. yet over the last week we saw claire mccaskill, chairwoman of the senate committee where the process would begin basically say no, carl levin -- i mean, everybody pretty much has said no, is base closures dead or is it the first step of the long tango? >> it sure did for this year. because the problem is all the difficulties, all the objections come in the near term and the payoff comes way off in the future. in fact, beyond obama even if he's reelected. there's no incentive to go forward. >> the other thing is you never get it in an election year. they're also going to demand that we look at overseas bases before we look at the bases here at home.

i think that's a good thing. we ought to take a look at our forces around the world and if we want to keep the same kind of deployments. >> i think what you're hearing on the hill from former brac officials i've talked to is pretty predictable. you introduce the topic, congress asks for studies, asks for overseas closures and then in the following year it might authorize it or not. so it's not -- i don't think it's dead yet. >> it's the first act of a five- year long cavookie dance. >> four years to years together. >> at a hearing brac officials told congress we're going to use every bit of authority and resources internally within the executive branch to start closing and realigning stawtions and they will and -- installations and they will and have. the space force is reducing, the vermont air national guard lost their alert missions. this lead to an eventual closure of those missions. >> it's surprising the services haven't turned on each other. the guard accuses with the c- 27j transport, the twin-engine

light transport that was canceled, the accusations you guys are getting rid of the airplane to get rid of us. that's an accusation that has been made. but the guard is an organization that has enormous power. they have the governors behind them if they band together. i want to start with you on this, larry. do you win a battle against the guard when it comes to cutting unit? >> if you're going to win, you better really have all the facts on your side and their case is not that good. that's the problem. they said they want to rebalance it, but of the 10,000 cuts, 6,000 are from the garden reserve and they're a smaller portion of the air force. and, of course, they can't seem to figure out how much the c-37 -- c-27j costs. >> they backed into this position because it was such a short time frame when congress decided what it was going to ultimately do with the '13 budget. what you're seeing is the air force leadership admit fault and flimsy analysis by saying we're going to review that governor's proposal after all. >> if this was 10 days after 9/11, we wouldn't be having

this discussion. this shows what happens when threats recede, defense politics fills the vacuum. >> i've heard from some army guard officials and army officials that the army is watching this fight pretty closely, see how the active duty air force fares before, when they start having to eliminate brigade combat teams whether they do it in the guard or the air force. if the army can win this fight, it might feel more comfortable targeting its own army. >> the guard kind of falls through the cracks. >> so they are going to get likely the reserve like it always does is going to get hammered. >> right. >> let me just go a little bit on the guard side of it. but, i mean, air force chief schwartz pretty much sort of told the guard that he was going to go after them. >> he did put the gauntlet down, but, çd:sú[drl!'16ñ the scenes and behind closed doors for a couple of years now, i'd say the last four years. the guard has been pushing back against a lot of budget cuts and forestructure cuts. this has spilled it out into

the open because it affects all 50 states. there's no way of keeping it inside the building and not airing the dirty laundry. >> i think the fight went public too over whether or not the guard chief should join the chiefs of staff. >> don't forget, in brac of 2005 they tried to close some guard bases and they didn't get closed, the one up in new york state. >> thanks, everybody. we really appreciate it. coming up, how one organization is making a

we're excited to launch a new monthly segment profiling organizations and individuals that support u.s. military members, veterans and their families. helping families stay together is a top priority for hero mile the, a program by fisher house in partnership with the pentagon that uses donated frequent flyer miles to buy airline tickets for family members or close friends of servicemembers. to date they've bought 27,000 tickets. fisher house is a nonprofit founded to provide housing for

military families so they can be close to a loved one during hospitalization. tish stropes is the director of the hero miles program. tish, welcome to the show. >> thanks for having me. >> how did the program start and how does it work? >> the program started back in 2003 when they saw a need for families to get to the bedside of injured servicemembers. and so the program was launched and in 2005 they allowed for servicemembers and their families to receive airline tickets. >> so how -- folks just donate their air miles and you guys just coordinate tickets, how does the mechanics of this work out? >> what happens is the great citizens of this country donate their frequent flyer miles to our accounts. we are partners with six different airlines, the major airlines. and then we use those miles to book airline tickets and fly members to wherever they need to be, family members or servicemembers sometimes. >> why do families need this service and what are the kind of trips that they tend to make with them? >> at fisher house we believe

in removing the burden from the family so that they can focus on the healing process and buying an airline ticket at the last minute for $1500 can truly be a burden on a family. and so by taking that away, they can focus, the servicemember can get better and they don't need to worry about that. >> some of this travel also is to welcome a family member back for the last time at dover, isn't it? >> absolutely. we also bridge the gap between what the military does and what they can't do. a lot of times they'll fly a mom and a dad, a wife, maybe some kids, but they can't bring a grandmother and a grandfather to be there when that loved one arrives in the united states after being killed in action overseas, and we buy those plane tickets and get the family there. >> what are some special stories that you've accumulated over the years? i know there's one particular family about a -- one particular story about a family from tennessee. >> the servicemember sthepped on an ied, was blown up, lost both legs instantly. within a couple of days his wife called and said how many ;)

and white. we don't have an answer to that. i said tell me why you want to know. and she said i have a family in tennessee, two young children and i have an injured husband laying in a bed at walter reed and i need to take care of both and somehow we need to keep our family together. and so they came up with a plan and decided that every wednesday she would fly between tennessee and washington d.c. or washington d.c. and tennessee, and for seven months she flew back and forth so she could be a week with her kids and a week with her husband. >> that's extraordinary. if you are a military family member, how do you get in touch with hero miles, how do you do it, and also to the public, how is it that they can donate? let's take the first one first. how do they get in touch with you, how do they take advantage of this program? >> whether it's a servicemember or a family member of a wounded, injured or ill servicemember, they contact their social worker, their caseworker at a hospital and let them know, hey, i need a plane ticket, whether to get

home, to get a family member here at the hospital, and they can do that with the military hospitals have plenty of contacts there, the soldier family assistance centers and they get in touch with us. if for some reason they don't have a person like that that they can truly get their hands on, they can contact fisher house and we'll connect them with the right people. >> and what does the public need to know and what are the things you need from the public and how can people donate? >> we need people to donate frequent flyer miles. they can go to the website fisherhouse.org. go to programs, hero miles is is listed there and we have links taking you directly to most of the airline partners to show how you can donate. i always say that, you know, you don't have to donate money. some people don't have money to donate. but if you do have frequent flyer miles, we can get them, we can put them together and truly make a difference. >> tish, thanks so much. we appreciate it. you can learn more about donating your airline miles by visiting fisherhouse.org and clicking on programs. coming up in my notebook, a

different take on base closings. stay tuned.

since the obama administration proposed two new rounds of base closures, the reaction from congress has been to say the least unenthusiastic. and last week the senator who chairs the committee that would launch the process, mo democrat clare mccaskill said instead of closing u.s. bases, the pentagon should focus on shouldering overseas disawlings installations. days earlier the chairman armed service committee carl levin said the same thing. closures are ugly business. past closures have been rife with poor decisions and little consideration for the small

communities that grow up around military installations and depend on them for jobs and commerce. more base closings are not only small, but inef- tabl. indeed as more than 100,000 troops are cut from the force as well as the units, installations will need to be cut as well. the secretary of defense already has the authority to close and realign military bases, but the current brac or base realignment and closure process was made to make it more politically palatable in the wake of the cold war when deep cuts were needed. swearing off future closures is disingenuous, especially to the communities that over the next few years will see their bases change or go away entirely. thanks for joining us for "this week in defense news." i'm vago muradian. you can watch this program online at defensenewstv.com or you can e-mail me at vago@defensenewstv.com. i'll be back next week at the same time. until then, have a great week.