The right stuff

DURING the last phase of the Carter Administration, with Harold Brown at Defense, a U.S. military buildup tardily got under way. The Brezhnev crash program, the invasion of Afghanistan, and the inadequacy of the "Desert 1" helicopter fiasco were just too much. The military buildup accelerated in the Reagan-Weinberger years, with the expenditure of $2 trillion.

This was said to reflect a "bloated" military-industrial complex, and, indeed, there was waste and profiteering, probably inseparable from an accelerated military buildup. But the present secretary of defense, Richard Cheney, has signaled a serious attempt to root it out with his cancellation of the A-12 Navy attack bomber. The project was 18 months behind schedule and $2.7 billion over budget.

Nonetheless, the Reagan-Weinberger state-of-the-art weapons went into devastating operation in the opening days of the Gulf war. A mini-SDI, the Patriot anti-missile missile, shot Scuds out of the sky. The cruise missiles were accurate, devastating in effect, and because of their extreme accuracy saved many Iraqi civilian lives. Yet both of these advanced systems were almost scrapped in the congressional budgeting process.

Reagan and Weinberger were not just buying coffee makers and toilet seats. Their defense buildup, having won the cold war, may now lay the foundations for a more stable world. And their enthusiasm for Star Wars has been justified by the success of the Patriot against Saddam's Scuds. Maybe we will now get a defense debate as sophisticated as our weaponry.