Two Key Bases Spared, Others Nixed
Base Closing Recommendations Go To Congress, President Bush
-
Play CBS Video Video Second Life For A Navy Base After being shut down in 1992, the Glenview Naval Air Station is now a billion dollar downtown. Cynthia Bowers reports that the base may offer hope for other cities currently facing closure.
-
Video Some Bases Getting The Boot During day one of a three-day hearing, a special commission began naming which Army and Navy bases would likely be closed or downsized. Susan Roberts reports.
-
Video Life After Base Closings CBS News' Cynthia Bowers talks at length with Don Owen, the Glenview Illinois Planning Director, about what communities can do after their military base is closed by the government.
-
-
A retired Navy jet is on display outside the Naval Air Station Atlanta in Marietta, Ga., one of four Georgia military bases targeted for closure. (CBS/AP)
-
An aerial view of Fort Monroe in Virginia, which will be closed if the commission's recommendations are accepted. (AP)
-
Union Representative John Joyal, with American flag, leads workers at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine to a noontime rally. The shipyard was taken off the closure list. (AP)
-
-
Interactive Base Closings Map A state-by-state look at proposed base closings and those that would get bigger.
-
Interactive Military 101 Basic training to learn all about America's fighting force.
In other moves Wednesday, the commission:
Before voting started, commission chairman Anthony Principi said the task was especially difficult because Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's proposal included more than double the recommendations in the four previous rounds of base closings combined.
Principi said the commission recognized that closing bases was necessary to save money and transform the military to meet new challenges.
"At the same time, we know that the decisions we reach will have a profound impact on the communities hosting our military installations, and more importantly, on the people who bring those communities to life," he said.
To reject a recommendation, the commission had to find that the Pentagon substantially deviated from criteria that focused mainly on the military value of each facility.
Previous commissions — in 1988, 1991, 1993 and 1995 — altered about 15 percent of what the Pentagon proposed in seeking to get rid of bases considered no longer needed. This round was also affected by the post-Sept. 11 threat of terrorism.
©MMV CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Best-selling author Mitch Albom on his first nonfiction work since "Tuesdays with Morrie."
