Senate Fails in Attempt to Lift Abortion Ban at U.S. Military Hospitals Overseas : Defense: 58-40 vote to end filibuster falls two short. Need for safe medical facilities is cited. $291-billion authorization measure is passed.

WASHINGTON —  A Senate bid Friday to lift a Pentagon ban on abortions at U.S military hospitals overseas failed narrowly as the chamber passed a $291-billion defense authorization bill.

The failure occurred on a 58-40 vote that would have ended a filibuster and enabled the Senate to vote on a proposal to allow foreign-based military women and dependents to undergo the procedure at their own expense. Proponents fell two short of the 60 votes needed to end the filibuster.

The proposal was offered by Sen. Timothy E. Wirth (D-Colo.) as an amendment to the bill, which the Senate approved on a voice vote Friday night before departing with the House on a monthlong summer vacation.

The defense measure would give President Bush what he wants on the controversial B-2 Stealth bomber but would substantially redirect his “Star Wars” anti-missile program. It would also allow women in the Air Force and Navy to fly combat missions and permit the combat assignment of all other servicewomen on a 14-month trial basis.

The House voted, 220 to 208, in May to cancel the ban on abortions at overseas bases, responding to complaints that many servicewomen abroad lack access to safe and convenient private medical facilities.

Wirth said that the problem of obtaining good private care is particularly acute in Saudi Arabia, the Philippines and Panama, where abortion is illegal.

“Why should we treat military women (based overseas) as second-class citizens?” Wirth asked. “They should have the same right that women in the United States have.”

Sen. Dan Coats (R-Ind.) voiced strong opposition to Wirth’s amendment, contending that women stationed abroad who cannot find satisfactory care are provided free transportation to medical facilities in the United States. Despite many individual complaints cited by Wirth and others, Coats said that none had been filed with the Pentagon.

“The amendment is a solution in search of a problem that does not exist,” Coats said.

Wirth held out hope of prevailing on the issue at another time, saying that four senators who voted to sustain the filibuster Friday had indicated that they might switch sides.

Both the Senate and the House voted recently to overturn an Administration ban on abortion counseling at federally funded family planning clinics. Bush has threatened to veto any legislation that lifts abortion bans imposed by his Administration.

The Senate defense bill would authorize spending about the same total requested by President Bush and approved by the House for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1. The $291-billion figure was agreed on by the White House and Congress last fall and virtually all of it is expected to be appropriated in separate legislation.

Despite the similar spending totals, the Senate and House bills are markedly different and will have to be reconciled by negotiators for the two chambers before the legislation is sent to the White House. The Senate version, for example, comes much closer than the House’s to giving Bush what he seeks on two costly, controversial programs: production of the B-2 and development of the “Star Wars” missile-defense system.

The Senate voted to approve Bush’s request for $3.2 billion to continue production of the B-2, authorizing four new aircraft in fiscal 1992. The House would halt production at the 15 planes already funded, saving $30 billion.

The Air Force wants to build 75 of the radar-evading long-range bombers, which are being produced by Northrop Corp. in the Los Angeles area.

The Senate adopted a significantly new “Star Wars” plan that downplays the threat of a massive Soviet nuclear strike and focuses on defending against accidental missile launchings and attacks by Third World dictators.

The proposal stresses early deployment of a limited ground-based missile defense while moving more slowly toward more extensive shields, including a space-based system preferred by Bush.

The Senate plan, drafted by Sens. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) and John W. Warner (R-Va.), would authorize work on a 100-missile deployment at Grand Forks, N. D., scheduled to enter service in 1996 at a cost of $7 billion to $10 billion.

The most controversial part of the plan calls for seeking changes in a 1972 U.S.-Soviet treaty to permit ground defenses at more than one site as well as missile interceptors in space. Both are currently barred by the treaty.

The changes would accommodate “Brilliant Pebbles,” a space-based system of missile-killing rockets that Bush had hoped to deploy this decade.

The Senate plan would provide $630 million for research on “Brilliant Pebbles,” but the House bill would eliminate all funding for it.

Overall, the Senate version would authorize $4.6 billion for “Star Wars,” formally known as the Strategic Defense Initiative. That is $550 million less than Bush’s request but 50% more than this year’s spending level and $1.1 billion more than approved by the House for 1992.

In rejecting the Administration’s decision to end production of the MX long-range missile, the Senate voted $191 million for a dozen more of the 10-warhead nuclear weapons.

By a 49-48 vote, the Senate rejected a bid by Sen. J. James Exon (D-Neb.) to drop from the bill $225 million for a rail car to shuttle the MX between hiding places.

“It’s a Cold War museum piece,” he declared, citing the sharply reduced Soviet threat.

With a final flourish on the bill, the Senate voted, 60 to 34, to require that the black and white POW/MIA flag of the National League of Families be flown on federal buildings until there has been the “fullest possible accounting” of those missing in the Vietnam War.

In adopting the amendment of Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.), the Senate brushed aside Warner’s objection that “the POWs have a flag flying now--it’s the American flag.”