Forest Service Needs More Planes Congress Asked To Legalize Sale Of Military Surplus To Fight Fires

Worried about a shortage of airplanes to battle forest fires, the Clinton administration is asking Congress to legalize the sale of surplus military planes to private Forest Service contractors.

The chairman of a House panel said it was unlikely there would be enough time to pass such a bill in the waning weeks of this session.

But Sens. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, and Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., introduced a bill Tuesday to facilitate the sales and a spokesman for Craig said they were attempting to bring it quickly to the Senate floor for a vote.

Quick legislative action is needed to replace an airplane exchange program that has resulted in a pair of federal grand jury indictments and jeopardized availability of planes on contract this fall, Agriculture Undersecretary James Lyons said.

“We’ve got a problem with air tankers and no one wants to face up to it,” Lyons said.

“As a result of what happened with the Historic Airplane Exchange Act and all the shenanigans, we need clear legislative authority to make sure we have an adequate supply of air tankers,” he said. “We’re down to 35.”

They would like to have at least 40 of the C-130 cargo planes and P-3 Navy sub attack planes available to help drop retardant on hot spots, Lyons said.

The request is the latest development in a series of investigations and congressional inquiries that uncovered allegations dating to 1991 that airplanes on contract to fight fires for the Forest Service were used to fly covert missions for the CIA.

An aviation broker and a former Forest Service official in charge of the aircraft program pleaded innocent to misusing the planes during an arraignment last week in federal district court in Tucson, Ariz.

Roy D. Reagan, 56, of Medford, Ore., and Fred A. Fuchs, 57, of Los Lunas, N.M., face federal charges of conspiring to secure more than $28 million in surplus military aircraft for private use.

Of the 35 air tankers on contract, at least nine were provided to private contractors under the exchange program that the Justice Department maintains was illegal.

Under that program, contractors could trade historic planes to be placed in government museums for working C-130 transport planes and P-3 Navy air tankers.

However, the Agriculture Department’s inspector general reported as early as 1992 that the planes being provided to the museums had no historical value and were basically worthless.

Rep. Charlie Rose, D-N.C., concluded during a 1993 congressional hearing that the planes were involved in CIA missions after two of them turned up hauling cargo for pay in Kuwait after the Persian Gulf War.

Court records indicate that Reagan planned to sell some of the planes to the French government.

The General Services Administration, the government’s property manager, ordered the Forest Service last September to confiscate all 28 airplanes that had been provided to firefighting contractors.

But the Forest Service has taken no action as the federal probe continues.