WASHINGTON — The Defense Department needs a plan to maintain the country's missile supplies, which are now partly built at Hill Air Force base and other places around Utah.

Sens. Orrin Hatch and Bob Bennett, R-Utah, introduced a bill late Tuesday that would require the Pentagon to figure out a plan to maintain the Minuteman III missile fleet until after 2030.

"The cost of maintaining a missile system is modest compared to the cost of rebuilding our industrial infrastructure, or worse, getting caught flat-footed in the event of a nuclear threat," Hatch said in a statement.

The bill, titled the Strategic Deterrent Sustainment Act of 2007, would give the country a "roadmap to a more secure long-term defense strategy" Hatch said, by keeping options open to make sure the missiles are in working condition.

After work is done on 500 Minuteman III system, there are no plans for other work on land-based missile systems, according to Hatch's office. A 2002 policy allowed the Defense Department to modernize the missiles, but that's it.

"As we have learned from experience, building (ICBMs) is an extremely complex feat of engineering," Hatch said. "It requires engineers with years of experience and highly trained and professional manufacturing specialists to build successfully and safely a missile system."

The senator is concerned that if work on the missiles stops, those working on it now would be forced to work elsewhere, taking their knowledge of the systems with them.

---

E-mail: suzanne@desnews.com