________________________________________________________________________Richard S. Kem
Well, Fort Drum was understandable because we were just about wrapped up there. Army
strategy, really, was to do that. Then to add an AMC headquarters into a pot already filled
with a TRADOC headquarters--that is two headquarters in the same program--didn't seem
like that would ever fly in the Congress. I didn't think we, basically, had a method of coming
up with a capital investment strategy in the Army.
So, on return to Europe, I prepared a briefing for General Otis, and later to General Vuono,
and sent it back to General Heiberg and General Dacey, which proposed a capital investment
approach instead of the usual--everybody throw your projects through your headquarters to
the ACE, who then had to grapple with such a large number of projects. This also included a
lot of up-front executive time spent on developing the forums and everything to have the
support for a project, when most of the projects wouldn't have a chance of making the
program, and then all the late entries from the higher headquarters would stuff things out.
Then came the annual, "Gotta cut it back," and we would get a budget number from the
ACE's shop to cut back the military construction program.
A better approach, I thought, would be to come up with a concept strategy over what the
banding might be, have that portrayed to the senior Army commanders at the Army
commanders conferences, get a buy in up front about how much should be spent for
headquarters, how much should be spent to finish Fort Drum, how much should be spent for
Patriot facilities worldwide, how much should be spent to take care of troops, how much
should be spent for the Chapel of the Year program, et cetera.
The problem had been that anytime something got stuffed in, the things that fell out were the
things that took care of troops. So, we in Europe were hollering, "Top priority." In Korea,
they were hollering, "Top priority." Then when the budget pinches came, you had to finish
Drum, you had to have the headquarters, and the chaplain had to have his chapel, and the
troop projects fell out.
So, the thought was get the commanders to agree on what were the bounds. They could agree
that we had room for two headquarters, AMC and TRADOC, or only one this year and one
next year. They could make those kinds of decisions. Then the commands could stuff things
in and compete for, in terms of justification, the right to fill up the bands with certain types of
projects. Then, when the cutting came, or when another great new idea came, somebody
could then look at that band and say, "If it is a new headquarters, it ought to compete in the
headquarters band, and let it compete there, not over the whole program, knocking off the
troop projects."
It seemed like a better way to run the process. So, I proposed the change, yet it's never come
about.
Q:
It's still pretty much a large hopper with hundreds of projects in it.
A:
Well, I don't know. I've been away from it too long to know, but I'd say that. Then there is
this new thing called moratoriums. You put the whole construction program in a moratorium,
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