UXO PLANNING

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@igc.org>]

From: Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@igc.org>

DOD ORGANIZES TO CONFRONT UXO CHALLENGE
The Defense Department has recently approved two organizational 
structures to confront the twin challenges of unexploded ordnance (UXO) 
remediation and wide-area de-mining. These efforts appear to be the 
result of internal pressure from within the military, last year's GAO 
report calling for increased coordination, and the controversy 
surrounding the EPA Munitions Rule and DOD Range Rule.
I. The Department is forming a high-level UXO Executive Committee, 
headed by the Under Secretary of Defense (Acquisition & Technology) or 
his designee. Its Charter/Plan, though couched in bureaucratic 
language, represents a serious effort to elevate UXO clearance issues 
and provide coordination within the Department of Defense. Its 
objective is "to have an effective, fully-coordinated, 
requirements-driven research and development program for countermine, 
de-mining, site remediation, range clearance, and explosive ordnance 
disposal."
Participation will be broad-based within the Pentagon. Members will 
include the Director, Strategic and Tactical Systems; the Service 
Acquisition Executives; representation from the Joint Staff's Force 
Structure, Resources, and Assessment Directorate; the Deputy Under 
Secretary of Defense, Environmental Security; Director, Test Systems 
Engineering and Evaluation; Assistant Secretary of Defense (Special 
Operations/Low Intensity Conflict); and the Director of Defense 
Research and Engineering; among others.
The Executive Committee will provide policy guidance, ensure liaison 
with other federal agencies, and oversee an inter-service steering 
group and three subgroups in the development of the Defense-wise UXO 
Clearance Plan.
The first subgroup, Requirements Coordinating, "will provide input to 
the UXO clearance plan from the UXO user communities as to current 
requirements and anticipated program initiatives" in each of five 
areas: combat countermine activities, humanitarian de-mining, UXO site 
remediation, active range UXO clearance, and UXO disposal.
A second subgroup will focus on detection technology, while the third 
will coordinate activities pertaining to removal, render safe, 
breaching, and related technologies.
II. The Department is creating a Task Force to conduct a two-phase 
study of U.S. landmine and UXO related programs. Led by the Director, 
Strategic and Tactical Systems, the Task Force will be co-sponsored by 
the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (Environmental Security).
The first phase, to be completed by December 13, 1996, will examine 
U.S. landmine, landmine detection, and demining efforts and 
alternatives to anti-personnel landmines on a global basis. While the 
Task Force will study ways to make de-mining cheaper, safer, or faster, 
it will also look at the strategic role of landmines.
The second phase, to be completed by April 25, 1997, will examine UXO 
remediation, active range UXO clearance, and explosive ordnance 
disposal efforts, including the relationship of those objectives to 
landmine clearance. It will not only study the remediation of UXO from 
past activities, but it will consider technologies to prevent the 
creation of UXO - pollution prevention for munitions.
These plans are a major step forward, and they could lead to a 
comprehensive strategy, backed by real dollars, to develop new ways of 
dealing with the millions of acres around the world littered with 
deadly or maiming anti-personnel mines and the millions of domestic 
acres contaminated with UXO.
The DOD plans provide for liaison with other federal agencies, but as 
written they make no specific provision for state and community 
participation in development of the plans. Such participation could 
improve the resulting plan and studies, and equally important, build 
support for what could be a costly program.
Lenny Siegel