How decay overtook Walter Reed
The problems at the US Army hospital show how strained military resources have become.
By Gordon Lubold | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitorfrom the March 7, 2007 edition
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WASHINGTON - Lawmakers probing the scandal at Walter Reed Army Medical Center are saying it wasn't just a failure of leadership.
Constrained resources during a war lasting longer and costing more than anyone in the administration had expected, along with a controversial privatization initiative at the hospital, also played a role. But beyond these circumstances, one key factor has come up during congressional testimony this week: The facility was due to be shuttered in coming years, raising the possibility that officials were reluctant to make large financial commitments to it.
This combination of challenges illustrates just how strained military resources have become as the US grapples with its longest conflict since the Vietnam War. And as the current center of attention, Walter Reed has emerged as a symbol of the difficult decisions confronting the Pentagon. A core question: How can the Defense Department maintain facilities that are to be closed, including its premier Army hospital, without essentially throwing money away?
"You've got to pay the money, and the reason is simple: Up until the moment you cease operations, and you pull down the flag, it's a US military installation, and it has vital services it has to provide," says Christopher Hellman, a former congressional staffer who has followed the base-closure process closely. (Walter Reed is part of the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process.) "The reality is you don't have the luxury of canceling contracts and delaying maintenance work at what is still an operational facility," says Mr. Hellman, now a military policy analyst at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation in Washington.
Still, some experts don't necessarily see that the Army made a conscious decision to stop paying maintenance bills on the facilities at Walter Reed just because it was closing.
"Buildings don't fall apart in the year and a half since the base closure commission issued its recommendations," says Jeremiah Gertler, a senior analyst on the 1995 base closure commission.
Merging operations
Under a decision made by former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Walter Reed was to be shuttered completely. Its medical and other operations were to merge with other military installations in the area. Much of the operation was to be folded into the existing National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., and the result was to become a new-and-improved facility called the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.
"The [BRAC] commission acknowledged Walter Reed Army Medical Center's rich heritage and earned reputation as a world-class medical center," the commission recommended. "However, the commission found that service members deserve a state-of-the-art 21st century medical center and that [Mr. Rumsfeld]'s proposal would increase military value."
The plan has a one-time cost of $989 million, but would save $145 million each year.
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