Battle rages over Joint Chiefs chairman post

While President-elect George W. Bush concentrates on putting together his civilian defense team, which is expected to be headed by former Sen. Daniel R. Coats, R-Ind., a separate battle rages behind the scenes over who should be the next chairman of the nation's highest military body, the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The chairman serves as the principal military adviser to the president and referees fights among the armed services.

Although Army Gen. Hugh H. Shelton will not complete his second two-year term as chairman until Sept. 30, the intraservice lobbying for the prestigious post is already well underway. For the first time ever, the Marine Corps has a good shot at the chairmanship because its Commandant, James L. Jones, enjoys unusually strong political backing in Congress and elsewhere. No Marine has ever chaired the Joint Chiefs.

"The Air Force really wants it," said one flag officer familiar with the fight over the chairmanship. Bush, a former Air National Guard officer, is expected to see Air Force Gens. Ralph E. Eberhart, commander on the U.S. Space Command, and Richard B. Myers, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs, on the Pentagon's short list of chairman candidates. Gen. Michael F. Ryan, who retires this summer as Air Force chief of staff, is pushing Eberhart for the post but Air Force Secretary F. Whitten Peters does not share Ryan's enthusiasm for the officer, according to Pentagon insiders.

Myers is considered a brilliant, thinking man's officer. Although he is not Ryan's candidate, Pentagon leaders point out that Myers will have nine months to establish rapport with Bush administration officials through his direct dealings with them as vice chairman. The vice chairman represents the chairman in the highest government counsels when the chairman is traveling.

Adms. Vern Clark, chief of naval operations, and Dennis C. Blair, commander of the Pacific Command, are the Navy's leading contenders for the chairmanship. Although Clark has only been the Navy's top sailor since July, he is popular with civilian leaders because of his willingness to knock down walls between the armed services and champion joint operations with other services. He has considerable experience with negotiating through the Pentagon bureaucracy from his experience as staff director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Although retired Army Gen. Colin L. Powell, Bush's designated secretary of state and former chairman of the Joint Chiefs, will no doubt influence Bush's selection of chairman, he would run into charges of service bias if he recommended an Army general as chairman. Four out of the last five chairmen dating back to Gen. John W. Vessey, Jr. in 1982 have been Army generals.

Ordinarily, it would be highly unlikely for a president to choose the head of the smallest service, the Marine Corps, to chair the Joint Chiefs, which comprises the commanders of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps. But Jones is a rare combination of warrior and politician at a time the American president to an unprecedented extent needs both those qualities in his top military advisers. Today's primary military threats, like those that have plagued President Clinton in the Balkans, are a combination of military, political and cultural forces. Jones has seen them play out on the ground as a warrior in Iraq and within the Washington bureaucracy as top military adviser to Defense Secretary William S. Cohen.

Besides those and other qualities--including looking like a general right out of Hollywood casting--Jones has staunch supporters in Congress, including Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. "The ways things are lined up, it could happen," said one veteran military officer of Jones' chance to become the first Marine chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

If Coats does become defense secretary, his choice for chairman will carry considerable weight. A defense secretary to be successful has to have the Joint Chiefs aboard to get through Congress such major programs as the president's defense budget and his plan for a missile defense for the nation. Otherwise, lawmakers will exploit the rift for their own purposes, jeopardizing the president's entire legislative program. The chairman is not in the chain of command as far as conducting military operations, however.

Also influential on the choice of chairman will be the deputy secretary of defense. Right now Richard Armitage, a friend and adviser to Powell who has been close to the Bush camp, is considered the leading candidate for the deputy post. He has been a blunt player of the Washington power game in the past and would be expected to be heavy-handed with generals, admirals and defense contractors in pushing through the president's defense program.

Paul Wolfowitz, a former undersecretary of defense and ambassador, has been mentioned for a top defense post. But some government officials predict Bush will offer him a State Department job instead, perhaps even ambassador to the United Nations, despite his past criticism of how former Defense Secretary, and now Vice President-elect, Richard B. Cheney and Powell conducted the Persian Gulf War.