DEFENSE

By MARK THOMPSON

Pentagon officials, it seems, could use some remedial mathematics instruction. The Pentagon's timetable for building a national missile shield to protect Americans against a handful of incoming enemy missiles keeps slipping. In each of the past three years, Defense officials have said they were six years away from operating a scaled-down, ground-based "Star Wars" system that could cost up to $10 billion.

Back in 1995, then Defense Secretary WILLIAM PERRY said building the shield would take three years of research and development and another three of construction. The shield, he vowed, "will be ready for production in three years and, if the decision is made, could be ready for deployment three years after that." Summing up, he added, "So we are about...six years away from deployment of national missile-defense systems." After a year, Perry said the U.S. was still six years away from a national missile umbrella. "Our plan is to complete the development of a national missile-defense system over the next three years," he said. "At that time, if such a threat is emerging, we would be ready to deploy this defense system in another three years."

Last week an Army general said--you guessed it--the same thing. "Our first opportunity to make a decision to deploy is in the year 2000," said Army Brigadier General JOSEPH COSUMANO, head of the Pentagon's national missile-defense program. It will take another three years, he added, to actually build it. The Pentagon will have what Cosumano called "a rolling three-year deployment capability" to delay deployment into the future. That adds up to--well, who's counting?

--By Mark Thompson