Overnight Defense: Army leaders worry about troop levels

by Rebecca Kheel - 03/16/16 5:37 PM ET

THE TOPLINE: It’s been more than a decade, but two Marines Corps pilots were finally cleared of fault in a deadly training accident, giving their widows and a congressman who’s worked on their behalf some much needed closure.

The Hill’s Kristina Wong has the story:

Two widows and Congressman Walter Jones have been waiting 13 years for a letter from the Pentagon. At times, the letter seemed like it would never come. But, finally, it arrived.

{mosads}The long-sought missive, signed by Deputy Defense Secretary Robert O. Work, states that Marine Lt. Col. John Brow and Maj. Brooks Gruber were not solely responsible for a deadly training accident that killed the Marine Corps pilots and 17 others in 2000.

The letter is a significant shift from the initial news release about the accident that pinned primary blame on Brow and Gruber.

Jones made exonerating the two men one of the main causes of his career over the past decade, delivering more than 150 speeches on the House floor on the issue, some with posters of the fallen pilots.”

Read the rest here.

ARMY WARNS AGAINST TROOP INCREASES WITHOUT FUNDING: The Army’s civilian and military leaders are warning Congress against increasing the size of the force without providing more funding.

“If someone put into law that the Army would be at number X, but no money came with it for readiness or modernization, that would actually hurt, not help,” Gen. Mark Milley, chief of staff of the Army, told the House Armed Services Committee. “If someone wanted to increase the end strength of the Army, I’m all for it. I think it’s a good thing. I think it’s necessary, but it would need to come with the additional monies for readiness and modernization.”

Bills have been introduced in both the House and Senate that would halt planned troop cuts in the Army and Marine Corps.

Under current plans, the Army would drop from 480,000 to 450,000 active-duty troops by the end of 2018. The Marines would drop from 184,000 to 182,000 troops.

But under the bills introduced last month, the Army would stay at 480,000 and the Marines at 184,000.

Read more here.

CONGRESSIONAL VETS WANT FEMALE PILOTS AT ARLINGTON: Combat veterans in the House and Senate joined together Wednesday to call on the Army to let Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) be interred at Arlington National Cemetery.

Led by retired Air Force colonel Rep. Martha McSally (R-Ariz.) and Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), a group of lawmakers introduced a bipartisan bill that would restore the rights of WASPs to be buried at Arlington.

“These women, 1,074 of them, stepped up to serve when our nation needed them the most in World War II,” McSally said at a press conference. “These women were pioneers. These women were heroes and personal mentors to me.”

There are currently 181 co-sponsors in the House and 29 co-sponsors in the Senate.

The WASPs were pioneering female World War II pilots whose rights to have their ashes laid to rest at Arlington were effectively revoked by the Army last year.

The Hill’s Kristina Wong will have more on this story at TheHill.com later.

KERRY WILL MISS DEADLINE ON ISIS GENOCIDE LABEL: The State Department won’t meet a legal deadline to decide whether or not the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria’s (ISIS) violence against minority groups amounts to genocide.

Congress gave Secretary of State John Kerry until Thursday to decide whether to apply the label to the group’s killing of Christians, Yazidis and other minorities.

“Given the scope and the breadth of the analysis he’s contemplating, he will not have a final decision completed by the congressionally mandated deadline tomorrow,” State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters on Wednesday.

The evaluation is “a vigorous one,” Toner added.

The Hill’s Julian Hattem has more here.

ON TAP FOR TOMORROW:

The Senate Armed Services Committee will hold a hearing with Defense Secretary Ash Carter, Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford and Pentagon comptroller Michael McCord at 9:30 a.m. at Dirksen G-50.

The House Armed Services Committee will hold a hearing with Navy leaders on the 2017 budget request at 9:30 a.m. at Rayburn 2118.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee will hold a hearing on the administration’s nuclear agenda at 10 a.m. at Dirksen 419.

ICYMI:

— The Hill: House bill would help veterans get service dogs

— The Hill: Trump’s unorthodox foreign policy unnerves Republicans

— The Hill: Retired Army general: Next president should be a ‘deep expert on the global economic system’

— The Hill: North Korea sentences American student to 15 years hard labor

— US News and World Report: Millions of U.S. dollars wasted in Afghanistan

Please send tips and comments to Kristina Wong, kwong@digital-staging.thehill.com, and Rebecca Kheel, rkheel@digital-staging.thehill.com