Overseas contamination: an open sore in the Pentagons improving environmental record.

As the US has closed about half of its foreign military bases in the 1990s it has left behind industrial hazardous wastes and unexploded munitions. This should not be surprising since in 4000 active closing and former domestic military properties (including US territories) the Pentagon identified 25000 sites of potential contamination. On the domestic front however the military receives Congressional funding to perform mandated clean-ups and the Department of Defense (DOD) has begun to implement innovative technologies and work well with host communities. In many foreign countries however there is no external regulation and the DOD provides little official information. Leaked information however indicates that 1) the Air Force estimated in 1992 a cost of $423 million to restore the sites of three bases in Germany; 2) Icelandic landowners are unable to bring the US to court over ground water contamination beneath a former US radar tracking station; 3) heavy metals from a US ship repair facility drain directly into Subic Bay in the Philippines or are buried in a landfill; and 4) live munitions deserted at a bombing range in Panama have caused civilian deaths and injuries. The US position to only clean up foreign sites when it is forced to do so should be reversed and as the polluter the US should pay the several billion dollars necessary to restore the sites of foreign bases. First the US should identify the contamination that its forces created. Second it should build the regulatory capacity of the host countries. Finally it should promote partnerships between US environmental companies and local enterprises.