Joint Chiefs

WASHINGTON -- NATO Supreme Commander Gen. Wesley Clark, architect of the allied victory in the Kosovo conflict, will leave his post three months ahead of schedule to accommodate the promotion of Air Force Gen. Joseph W. Ralston as his replacement, the White House said yesterday.Ralston, a favorite of Defense Secretary William S. Cohen, had withdrawn from contention for the top job of chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff two years ago after admitting to an extramarital affair.White House spokesman Joe Lockhart strongly denied reports that Clark's early departure signified any reproach of the four-star U.S. Army general, who urged a more aggressive policy against Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic than his superiors in the Pentagon and administration at first desired.

WASHINGTON -- Aging weaponry, inadequate pay and benefits, and too many overseas missions are causing serious strains within the armed forces, top military chiefs warned Congress yesterday, saying tens of billions of dollars will be needed to correct the problems.Gen. Henry H. Shelton, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that while the military can still execute its goal of being able to fight two major wars simultaneously while still meeting its security commitments elsewhere, there are indications it is being stretched too thin.

WASHINGTON -- A third wave of U.S. and British missiles slammed into Iraq last night, as Pentagon officials said that more than 100 targets were struck during the first two days of bombing. One top officer noted the only surprise was Saddam Hussein's lack of a vigorous defense."United States and British forces are continuing to attack a wide range of military targets in order to decrease Iraq's ability to threaten its neighbors," Defense Secretary William S. Cohen told reporters. "We continue to be satisfied with the results."

WASHINGTON -- The candidacy of an Air Force general to become the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff seemed increasingly imperiled yesterday as a growing number of senators said the officer's adulterous affair in the mid-1980s should disqualify him.Defense Secretary William S. Cohen met yesterday morning with a dozen senators from the Armed Services Committee, which would vote on the nomination, to explain his decision to consider Gen. Joseph Ralston for...

WASHINGTON -- Air Force Gen. Joseph W. Ralston withdrew from consideration as the nation's top military officer yesterday, having concluded that he could not win Senate confirmation because of an adulterous affair he had 13 years ago while separated from his wife.Ralston's decision followed a tumultuous week in which he became a flash point for a debate on adultery in the military and whether a double standard excuses the highest-ranking male officers while punishing female or lower-ranking officers.

WASHINGTON -- Gen. John M. Shalikashvili, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who guided U.S. military operations in Haiti and Bosnia, plans to retire from the military in September, a White House spokesman announced yesterday.By stepping down, the 60-year-old general is following other Joint Chiefs chairmen who left office after serving two two-year terms.White House spokesman Mike McCurry said President Clinton had not decided who will replace Shalikashvili or Gen. George Joulwan, NATO's supreme allied commander, who will retire in the spring.

COLIN POWELL, after his compelling call for compassionate conservatism at the Republican National Convention, has quickly let it be known that if there is a Dole administration, "I would consider anything the president asks me to do."This compares to his rebuff to President Clinton when he reportedly offered the general the job of secretary of State late in 1993. "Powell said he had to honor the contract to finish his memoirs and could not consider the appointment," according to journalist Bob Woodward's best-selling book, "The Choice."

Paris. -- One reason the United States has found it necessary to carry out air strikes in Bosnia is that a week earlier Washington had said that it would not do so.On Easter Sunday Defense Secretary William J. Perry said on television that U.S. forces would do nothing to prevent the Bosnian town of Gorazde's falling to the Serbs. He said, ''We will not enter the war to stop that from happening. That is correct. Yes.'' Gen. John Shalikashvili, head of the joint chiefs of staff, later said that the situation at Gorazde was unsuitable for air intervention.

President Clinton, on being accused of weakness for his compromise policy on gays in the military, responded, "I am the first president who ever took on this issue. It may be a sign of madness, sir, but it is not a sign of weakness." We don't think the president has gone mad, but we wonder about some of his critics.The fact is this compromise moves homosexual rights in the military quite far along. This was achieved without provoking bitter acceptance from the Joint Chief of Staffs, much less opposition.

If the Serbs don't get you, the Croats will.Damon Buford will be a great player -- until they give him a multi-year, multi-million contract like any other bum.What if nobody bets on the Preakness this year because they already blew the bundle on keno?The generals and admirals can't be that down on Bill if they all want to be his Chairman of the Joint Chiefs.Cheer up, Bill reshuffled the White House staff.

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama said after meeting with top U.S. military leaders yesterday that targeting extremists will be a top priority for the armed forces in Afghanistan. Obama met with the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the secure Pentagon conference room known as the "Tank" for nearly two hours. He emerged to shake hands with troops and pledged to increase involvement in Afghanistan by civilian government agencies, addressing a longstanding Pentagon complaint. The meeting and Obama's comments follow recent indications that the new administration intends to limit U.S. goals in Afghanistan while intensifying the military aspects of the war. Vice President Joe Biden, who accompanied Obama yesterday, said earlier in the week that U.S. forces would step up action to counter recent Taliban advances.

WASHINGTON -- Bowing to congressional anger over the course and management of the Iraq war, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said yesterday that he will recommend that Gen. Peter Pace, who has been at the highest levels of war strategy and decision-making since 2001, be replaced as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff when his term ends in September. Thwarted in his desire to keep Pace on for another two years, Gates' decision cuts short what normally is a four-year stint as the nation's senior military officer and chief military adviser to the president.

WASHINGTON -- Gen. James L. Jones, once the U.S. Marine Corps top officer who now is NATO's supreme commander, acknowledged yesterday that he had expressed concerns about the diminished role of the military's uniformed leadership to Gen. Peter Pace just before Pace rose to the chairmanship of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as reported in a new book. But Jones insisted that the concerns he expressed focused more on the legal structure of the Pentagon's upper echelons than on personalities. In State of Denial, by Washington Post journalist Bob Woodward, Jones is quoted as telling Pace that the Joint Chiefs - the top uniformed officers of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines - had improperly "surrendered" authority to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

President Bush yesterday nominated Gen. Peter Pace, the son of an Italian immigrant, to be chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the nation's top military post. Pace, a 1967 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis and commander of a rifle platoon during the Vietnam War, would be the first Marine to be chairman should he be confirmed by the U.S. Senate. Bush called the 59-year-old "the story of the American dream." Guiding the armed forces into the 21st century, Pace would inherit a military challenged by a global war on terrorism.

WASHINGTON - Earlier this year, Gen. George W. Casey Jr., just three months into his job as vice chief of staff of the Army, appeared at a luncheon at Fort Myer, Va. He recalled visiting soldiers in Iraq and talking with National Guard troops in the United States as they prepared to go to the Persian Gulf. Casey said he could see their focus and determination. The challenges of his own three-decade career, from preparing to battle the Soviet Union to peacekeeping in the Balkans, "pale in comparison to what our soldiers and leaders are dealing with in Iraq today," he told the gathering of active-duty and retired officers.

Comcast set to televise Naval Academy graduation Comcast plans to televise the U.S. Naval Academy's graduation this morning on cable Channel 8 in Annapolis and Anne Arundel County. Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will speak at the ceremony. Comcast will carry a live shot from the stadium beginning at 8 a.m. and then cover the actual graduation at 11 a.m.

In Carroll County Ravens to continue training at McDaniel through 2010 WESTMINSTER - Purple, black and gold will continue to reign in Westminster. The Baltimore Ravens have agreed to hold their summer training camp at McDaniel College through 2010. The new contract, announced yesterday by officials of the school and the National Football League team, means tens of thousands of fans will continue to flock to the campus to catch a glimpse of their favorite players and bring business to the city's downtown restaurants and shops.

Assembly bill protects cemetery at Crownsville hospital The General Assembly has passed a bill that would protect the historic cemetery at Crownsville Hospital Center, even if the hospital closes this year as expected. The bill would require the state to maintain the cemetery and mark it with a monument. It also bans the state from selling the cemetery and land that allows access to it. Attempts by legislators to prevent the hospital from closing failed, so the facility is expected to be vacated as soon as July 1. The cemetery sits on a hilly, wooded plot next to Interstate 97 north of Annapolis.

WASHINGTON -- As policy director for the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1995, Wesley K. Clark accompanied President Clinton's national security adviser, Anthony Lake, on a trip to try to sell a peace plan for Bosnia to leaders in Europe. Settling into a small Air Force plane, Clark started to make small talk. "Nice suit," he quipped to Lake. Lake gestured to Clark's attire -- Army greens adorned with a general's three stars, ribbons and a shoulder combat patch. "I'll trade you," he said. Clark realized then that he was wearing "the ultimate power suit," as he would later write, describing his uniform as an ensemble "connoting authority and experience and helping its wearer stand out in a crowd."

Marion Block Anderson,70, a peace activist who took her cause to the Joint Chiefs of Staff by crashing one of their meetings, died Dec. 7 of cancer in East Lansing, Mich. The threat of nuclear war moved Mrs. Anderson to action, said her son, Dave Anderson. In 1958, she went to the nation's capital and testified before the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy. On her way to a demonstration against the Vietnam War in Washington in 1970, she changed her mind and asked her taxi driver to take her to the Pentagon.