Senate Armed Services panel plans hearings on Pentagon nominees

The Senate Armed Services Committee is gearing up for a series of confirmation hearings to fill top Pentagon posts, some of which have been held by acting officials for the last several months.

Among the highest profile nominees are Michael Wynne and Donald Winter, President Bush's picks to head the Air Force and Navy, respectively.

Armed Services Chairman John Warner, R-Va., has not yet scheduled the hearings, but several congressional sources said they expect them early this fall.

"We have some procedural steps and paperwork that needs to be done," said one committee aide. "I'm sure we'll be getting hearings on them in the next few weeks."

A committee spokesman said the panel is still waiting for the Pentagon to deliver routine paperwork on the nominees and will schedule hearings once all information is received.

Wynne may draw the most questions from committee members concerned about the direction of the Air Force. The panel was the only committee to investigate the service's overpriced and now-discredited deal to lease a fleet of aerial refueling tankers from Boeing.

In June, the Pentagon inspector general largely cleared Wynne of all wrongdoing but noted that he "was accountable for tacitly accepting" his predecessor's decision to go forward with the lease.

Wynne currently serves as the Pentagon's principal deputy undersecretary for acquisition, technology and logistics.

Since Air Force Secretary James Roche resigned in November 2004, the service has been led by three different acting secretaries. Winter, a Northrop Grumman vice president, could field tough questions about the Pentagon's plan to cut the budget for shipbuilding. In April, committee members -- including Warner and Armed Services Airland Subcommittee Chairman John McCain, R-Ariz. -- pressed Navy Secretary Gordon England on the shipbuilding issue during his nomination to fill the No. 2 position in the Pentagon. England now is Navy secretary and acting deputy defense secretary.

The committee also plans to hold confirmation hearings this fall for John Young, nominated to serve as the director of defense research and engineering. Young currently serves as the assistant secretary of the Navy for research and engineering. Delores Etter, a former deputy defense undersecretary for science and technology, has been nominated to fill Young's Navy position. Sources said her confirmation hearing also could occur in the next several weeks.

Meanwhile, Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, continues to hold up England's nomination. Snowe initially put a hold on it in August because of the Pentagon's base-closure recommendations, which would have affected thousands of jobs in the state. Maine scored a major victory last month when the independent base-closing commission voted to save Portsmouth Naval Shipyard. But the hold is still on, largely because of concerns about shipbuilding plans.

"The senator's going to be speaking with the Defense Department about some of her concerns," a Snowe spokeswoman said Monday.