William J. Perry
William James Perry is an American mathematician, engineer, businessman, and civil servant who was the United States Secretary of Defense from February 3, 1994, to January 23, 1997, under President Bill Clinton. He also served as Deputy Secretary of Defense and Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering.
Perry is the Michael and Barbara Berberian Professor at Stanford University, with a joint appointment at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and the School of Engineering. He is also a senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. He is the co-founder of the Palo Alto Unitarian Church and serves as director of the Preventive Defense Project. He is an expert in U.S. foreign policy, national security and arms control. In 2013 he founded the William J. Perry Project, a non-profit effort to educate the public on the current dangers of nuclear weapons.
Perry also has extensive business experience and serves on the boards of several high-tech companies. He was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering in 1970 for contributions to communications theory, radio propagation theory, and computer technology in the design of advanced systems. He is also a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Among Perry's numerous awards are the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun, awarded by Japan.
Early life
Born in Vandergrift, Pennsylvania, Perry attended, but did not graduate from Culver Military Academy. He graduated from Butler Senior High School in 1945 and served in the United States Army as an enlisted man from 1946 to 1947, including service in the Occupation of Japan. Perry later received a commission in the United States Army Reserve through ROTC, serving from 1950 to 1955.Perry received his B.S. and M.A. degrees from Stanford University and a Ph.D. in mathematics from Pennsylvania State University in 1957.
Early career
From 1954 to 1964 Perry was director of the Electronic Defense Laboratories of Sylvania/GTE in California, and from 1964 to 1977 president of Electromagnetic Systems Laboratory, Incorporated, an electronics firm that he founded. He was instrumental in demonstrating the technical feasibility of extracting Signals intelligence on the Soviet Union from the overall Rf background with the then proposed Rhyolite/Aquacade surveillance program. In 1967 he was hired as a technical consultant to the Department of Defense.Undersecretary of Defense for R&E
From 1977 to 1981, during the Jimmy Carter administration, Perry served as Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, where he had responsibility for weapon systems procurement and research and development. Among other achievements, he had an influence on the development of the AirLand Battle doctrine, and was instrumental in the development of stealth aircraft technology, specifically the Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk.Mid-career
On leaving the Pentagon in 1981, Perry became managing director until 1985 of Hambrecht & Quist, a San Francisco investment banking firm "specializing in high-tech and defense companies."He was appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1983 to serve on the President's Commission on Strategic Forces. He was also a member of the Packard Commission.
Later in the 1980s he held positions as founder and chairman of Technology Strategies Alliances, professor in the School of Engineering at Stanford University, and served as a co-director of the Preventive Defense Project at the Stanford University Center for International Security and Cooperation.
Undersecretary of Defense
Perry returned to the Pentagon as Under Secretary of Defense after being nominated by Bill Clinton on February 3, 1993,The "frenzy" of defense industry mergers that the US experienced after 1986 was encouraged when in autumn 1993, Perry and his boss Les Aspin invited two dozen industry executives to a dinner "in the secretary's dining room next to his office". The two Secretaries urged their guests to combine into a few, larger companies because Pentagon budget cuts would endanger at least half of the contractors represented there. The event would come to be known as the "Last Supper".
Secretary of Defense
Perry's boss as Undersecretary, Les Aspin, was not a good fit for the job and within a year tendered his resignation. Perry succeeded him after a two-month search. The same day of his confirmation hearing, Perry was confirmed by a unanimous vote to become Defense Secretary.He entered office with broad national security experience, both in industry and government and with an understanding of the challenges that he faced. A hands-on manager, he paid attention both to internal operations in the Pentagon and to international security issues. He worked closely with his deputy secretaries, and he met regularly with the service secretaries, keeping them informed and seeking their advice on issues. He described his style as "management by walking around."
Perry adopted "preventive defense" as his guide to national security policy in the post-Cold War world. During the Cold War the United States had relied on deterrence rather than prevention as the central principle of its security strategy. Perry outlined three basic tenets of a preventive strategy: keep threats from emerging; deter those that actually emerged; and if prevention and deterrence failed, defeat the threat with military force. In practical terms this strategy relied on threat reduction programs, counter-proliferation efforts, the NATO Partnership for Peace and expansion of the alliance, and the maintenance of military forces and weapon systems ready to fight if necessary. To carry out this strategy, Perry thought it necessary to maintain a modern, ready military force, capable of fighting two major regional wars at the same time.
Defense budget
The formulation of the Defense budget and shepherding it through Congress was one of Perry's most important duties. The problem of how to deal with a large projected Defense budget shortfall from 1995 to 2000, an issue that weakened Perry's predecessor Les Aspin and contributed to his resignation, persisted when Perry took office. Immediately on presenting his 1995 budget request, which he termed "a post-Cold War budget," Perry stated that Defense required a few more years of downsizing and that its infrastructure needed streamlining as well. The proposal, he said, maintained a ready-to-fight force, redirected a modernization program, initiated a program to do business differently, and reinvested defense dollars in the economy.Perry asked for $252.2 billion for FY 1995, including funds for numerous weapon systems, such as a new aircraft carrier, three Aegis cruisers, and six C-17 cargo aircraft. The budget projected a further cut of 85,500 in active duty military personnel, leaving a force of 1.52 million. Ultimately Congress provided $253.9 billion TOA, about $2 billion more than in FY 1994, but actually a 1.2% cut in inflation-adjusted growth.
In February 1995, Perry asked for $246 billion for the Department of Defense for FY 1996. This proposal became entangled in the controversy during 1995 over the House Republicans' Contract with America, their efforts to spend more on defense than the administration wanted, and the continuing need for deficit reduction.
Perry cautioned Congress in September of the possibility that President Clinton would veto the FY 1996 Defense budget bill because Congress had added $7 billion in overall spending, mainly for weapon systems that the Defense Department did not want, and because of restrictions on contingency operations Congress had put in the bill. Three months later he recommended that the president veto the bill. When Congress and the administration finally settled on a budget compromise midway through FY 1996, DoD received $254.4 billion TOA, slightly more than in FY 1995, but in terms of real growth a 2% cut.
The question of a national missile defense system figured prominently in the budget struggles Perry experienced. Aspin had declared an end to the Strategic Defense Initiative program, but long-standing supporters both inside and outside of Congress called for its resurrection, especially when the Defense budget came up. Perry rejected calls for revival of SDI, arguing that the money would be better spent on battlefield antimissile defenses and force modernization, that the United States at the moment did not face a real threat, and that if the system were built and deployed it would endanger the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks with the Russians. The secretary was willing to continue funding development work on a national system, so that if a need emerged the United States could build and deploy it in three years. President Clinton signed the FY 1996 Defense bill early in 1996 only after Congress agreed to delete funding for a national missile defense system.
Shortly before he introduced his FY 1997 budget request in March 1996, Perry warned that the United States might have to give up the strategy of preparing for two major regional conflicts if the armed forces suffered further reductions. The Five-Year Modernization Plan Perry introduced in March 1996 reflected his basic assumptions that the Defense budget would not decline in FY 1997 and would grow thereafter; that DoD would realize significant savings from infrastructure cuts, most importantly base closings; and that other savings would come by contracting out many support activities and reforming the defense acquisition system.
For FY 1997 the Clinton administration requested a DoD appropriation of $242.6 billion, about 6% less in inflation-adjusted dollars than the FY 1996 budget. The budget proposal delayed modernization for another year, even though the administration earlier had said it would recommend increased funding for new weapons and equipment for FY 1997. The proposal included advance funding for contingency military operations, which had been financed in previous years through supplemental appropriations. Modest real growth in the Defense budget would not begin until FY 2000 under DoD's six-year projections. The procurement budget would increase during the period from $38.9 billion to $60.1 billion. For FY 1997 Congress eventually provided $244 billion TOA, including funds for some weapon systems not wanted by the Clinton administration.
Although he had not thought so earlier, by the end of his tenure in early 1997 Perry believed it possible to modernize the U.S. armed forces within a balanced federal budget. Perry argued for the current force level of just under 1.5 million as the minimum needed by the United States to maintain its global role. Further reductions in the Defense budget after 1997 would require cuts in the force structure and make it impossible for the United States to remain a global power.