THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Monday, October 17, 1994               TAG: 9410170072
SECTION: FRONT                    PAGE: A2   EDITION: FINAL 
SOURCE: THE NEW YORK TIMES 
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                         LENGTH: Medium:   52 lines

PENTAGON MIGHT BE UNABLE TO FIGHT TWO WARS AT ONCE THE PROBLEM IS NOT IN NUMBERS BUT IN TRANSPORT CAPACITY.

America's latest military showdown with Iraq, at a time when U.S. forces are in Haiti, is raising questions about the Pentagon's ability to meet its strategy to win two major wars at nearly the same time.

With about 20,000 troops in Haiti, the U.S. involvement barely ranks as a minor contingency. And the more than 30,000 Americans in or bound for the Persian Gulf now, as well as the 155,000 additional ground troops on alert, are a far cry from the more than 500,000 who fought the 1991 gulf war.

Executing these two missions at the same time has not strained the military's combat power or logistical support. But fighting major land wars in the gulf and - as the strategy envisions - on the Korean peninsula simultaneously would pose serious problems.

The issue is not whether the United States has enough troops or firepower to vanquish two separate foes. Most military experts say it probably has. But critics contend that the Pentagon's main bottleneck centers on a shortage of transport planes and cargo ships to haul tanks, artillery and equipment to two far-flung battlefields at once.

``Logistically, you just can't do it,'' said Eliot A. Cohen, a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, who was a director of a Pentagon study of air power in the gulf war.

In testimony before a Senate committee this year, Gen. Joseph P. Hoar, then head of the U.S. Central Command, which is responsible for military operations in the Middle East, said: ``Strategic airlift in this country today is broken. I'm not sure it is workable today for one major regional contingency.''

Senior Defense Department officials insist that their strategy is sound, particularly because several improvements were made in the aftermath of the gulf war in 1991.

In an unusual step, Deputy Defense Secretary John M. Deutch held a news conference last week to quiet detractors of the new strategy. He cited the Pentagon's rapid response to the latest gulf crisis as evidence of the American readiness to defend its overseas interests ably.

``Sure, it's tight, but we can deal with two major regional conflicts occurring almost simultaneously, successfully,'' Deutch said.

But he also acknowledged vulnerabilities in the plan. ``If there are places which are of concern to us,'' he said, ``they have to do not with the number of troops or the number of airplanes or the number of ships, but rather with the strategic mobility and the logistical support to deal with this matter.'' by CNB