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By Matthew Hansen
From: Omaha World Herald
The Bellevue-based U.S. Strategic Command had a hand in the mission that killed Osama bin Laden, StratCom's commander said Friday.
Gen. Robert Kehler, testifying at a U.S. Senate subcommittee field hearing organized by Sen. Ben Nelson, refused to be specific about StratCom's involvement in the May 1 operation that killed the al-Qaida leader, citing security concerns.
“Sir, not really,” Kehler said when Nelson asked if the StratCom commander could provide more detail on the mission for the 50 people who attended Friday's field hearing, held near Offutt Air Force Base.
“However, I would say we did have some involvement,” he said, drawing murmurs from the crowd.
StratCom has a wide-ranging set of missions, including overseeing the country's nuclear arsenal, locating weapons of mass destruction and protecting the Department of Defense's computer network from an estimated 5,000 cyberattacks a day.
A StratCom component based in Washington, D.C., also plays a part in high-priority intelligence missions, often recommending and locating the resources needed for such missions.
After the hearing, Nelson said he knew more about StratCom's role in bin Laden's death but, like Kehler, wasn't able to elaborate.
Nelson, chairman of the Senate's subcommittee on strategic forces, said he asked Kehler about bin Laden's death to illustrate the importance of the Strategic Command, which he called, “the glue that holds our war-fighting machine together.”
“That's how intertwined StratCom's role is in every mission,” the Nebraska senator said.
Nelson has ample reason to trumpet the importance of the Strategic Command this summer.
He, other members of Nebraska's congressional delegation and Bellevue officials are close to realizing a long-held dream: a new state-of-the-art StratCom headquarters. If built, the headquarters would make it highly likely that Offutt Air Force Base endures and prospers even if the military's overall funding is cut in the years ahead.
The new headquarters is slated to open at Offutt in 2017. It would replace the current building, which opened in 1957 and which, in recent years, has faced problems with flooding and failures to the building's electrical and cooling systems.
It won't come cheap. The new headquarters will likely cost around $1 billion to build and equip with technology, according to StratCom's director of capability and resource integration.
The project took another step forward Friday when the House of Representatives passed a military construction spending bill that includes $150 million in funding for the headquarters' construction.
President Barack Obama's budget called for the $150 million for the project this year and further funding in the next several years.
Before the vote, Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb., said he was comforted to see the amount enshrined in a piece of legislation.
“In this type of fiscal atmosphere and uncertainty, especially in the Department of Defense, it's just a secure feeling to see it in writing,” Terry said.
But uncertainty does remain.
It's unclear how the Senate will tackle military spending this year, and it's unclear what kind of budget deal will be struck to avoid busting through the current debt ceiling, which the nation is on course to do by August.
Nelson brushed aside those potential snags Friday, saying he thought the importance of the StratCom headquarters would trump looming budgetary debates.
“This is our national defense,” he said. “This is what stands between us and the bad guys."
subcommittee hearing held Friday morning in Bellevue was one that usually takes place in Washington. But Nelson, the subcommittee's chairman, moved this meeting into the shadow of Offutt Air Force Base and invited Kehler, who took over at StratCom in January, to testify in front of a hometown crowd.
It made for unusual congressional business: Nelson, the only subcommittee member present, gaveled the meeting to order, asked every question and closed the proceedings after 90 minutes.
Nelson was wearing a sling after rotator cuff surgery a week ago. He has held previous subcommittee hearings on agriculture in Nebraska. He said after the meeting that Terry and Sen. Mike Johanns, R-Neb., have also conducted field hearings inside the state.
Kehler and Nelson spent 15 minutes discussing the need for a new StratCom headquarters.
Kehler said StratCom's current command-and-control center lacks “the capability and capacity” to support its missions in the long term.
He likened the building to an old house with too few electrical outlets and said stuffing high-tech infrastructure into an antiquated building increased the chances for malfunctions and other problems.
“We've essentially cobbled together systems on top of systems,” he said. “If we're not careful, we've created a very vulnerable place.”
The crowd perked up during the final minutes of the hearing, when Nelson asked questions about Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and finally bin Laden.
Kehler said Saddam Hussein actually tried to employ jammers to block GPS signals during the early days of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Those jammers were unsuccessful, he said, but highlighted the importance of protecting space satellites, a StratCom role.
StratCom had a role in the initial bombing of Libya, Kehler said, after the U.S. military leaders of the Africa Command requested StratCom's help.
Then Kehler dropped his tantalizing tidbit about bin Laden. He twice confirmed StratCom's role and vaguely alluded to “planning” before quickly pointing out that StratCom has a role in most major military operations.
“We did have some involvement,” he said. “We provide that, across the board … all the time.”
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