The White House quickly backpedaled Thursday on Pentagon plans to cut the combat pay of the 157,000 U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan after disclosure of the idea quickly became a political embarrassment.

The Pentagon's support for the idea of rolling back "imminent danger pay" by $75 a month and "family separation allowances" for the American forces by $150 a month collapsed after a story in The Chronicle Thursday generated intense criticism from military families, veterans groups and Democratic candidates seeking to unseat President Bush in 2004.

"We support extending the pay provisions," White House spokesman Jimmy Orr said late Thursday after a day in which Bush's political opponents bashed him for what they said was a callous attitude toward combat troops who are still suffering casualties.

"We intend to ensure they continue to receive this compensation at least at the current levels," the Defense Department said in a separate statement about members of the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines.

The issue stems from congressional action in April when the House and Senate increased the "imminent danger" pay for the first time in more than a decade to $225 a month from $150. The family allowance was raised from $100 to $250 monthly.

However, the increases, which were retroactive to last October, are set to expire on Sept. 30, the end of the current fiscal year, unless Congress and the president continue them.

Last month, the Pentagon sent Congress an interim budget report detailing requests for spending cuts. It said the Defense Department supported rolling back the increases, which it said would cost more than $25 million a month to continue. It said that in addition to supporting a pay rollback, Pentagon experts would launch a study of the entire issue of combat pay.

Word of the pay cut plans were first disclosed by the Army Times, an independent newspaper for service members, which editorialized against the idea.

When it returns from its August recess, Congress will try to resolve differences in the House and Senate versions of a $369 billion defense spending bill. The Senate version calls for continuing the higher levels of pay for service in Iraq and Afghanistan and other danger zones. The House wants to pay more for service in those two countries than for service in such other areas as Balkan peacekeeping duties.

Orr, the White House spokesman, said the administration now wanted the higher pay kept on the broadest possible basis.

"We'd like to see the pay provision more broadly applied to our men and women in uniform serving in many different capacities of defending our nation and its interests," he said.

If Congress doesn't act by Sept. 30, Orr said, it should make the higher pay scales retroactive so forces in dangerous areas don't lose even a day's pay.

Military base pay ranges from $1,064 a month for the lowliest recruit to almost $12,000 a month for a top general. The complicated military pay system also offers an array of housing and expense allowances for service members and their dependents and income tax breaks, in addition to combat pay.

PENTAGON DEFLECTS CRITICISM

The Pentagon's personnel chief, David Chu, told reporters at a hastily arranged press conference that the outrage was misguided. While it is true that the Pentagon favors allowing the extra combat pay allowances to expire in September, Chu said, it will ensure that overall compensation for troops in Iraq and Afghanistan remains stable by giving them other forms of pay raises.

"I would just like to very quickly put to rest what I understand has been a burgeoning rumor that somehow we are going to reduce compensation for those serving in Iraq and Afghanistan," Chu said. "That is not true. We are not going to reduce that compensation."

Another Pentagon official e-mailed every member of Congress saying that the department never intended to cut service members' pay in combat areas. If congressional authorization for the extra pay lapses on Oct. 1, he said, the Pentagon will use other funds to make sure no one loses pay.

The administration position changed after a day of criticism of the Pentagon call for a pay cut.

Among hundreds of e-mails to The Chronicle, Marianne Leigh, the mother of two sons in the Army, wrote, "I'm appalled that Congress should even consider such a ludicrous idea.

"In my opinion these soldiers are still fighting a WAR. Not until each and every one of them come home is this war over," added Leigh, who has one son in Tikrit, Iraq, and another serving as a peacekeeper in Kosovo.

Since Bush declared an end to major combat operations in Iraq on May 1, 60 U.S. service personnel have died in combat-related incidents. Another 69 have been killed by disease, or from the heat or accidents.

From Petaluma, reader Hans Clever suggested the military pitch a new slogan for the Army: "Pick up service, pick up challenge, pick up an even smaller paycheck."

CANDIDATES SPEAK OUT

Democratic politicians also weighed in.

In San Francisco, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut said, "The idea is just unconscionable. The government can afford the billions they give in tax cuts to millionaires, but there's not enough to give a little something to men and women who are putting their lives on the line."

Another Democratic candidate, Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., said, "Our military deserves every dollar they earn and more. . . . The administration should reverse itself immediately."

Rep. Ellen Tauscher, D-Walnut Creek, said, "How nice of them to clarify their position and reverse course."

Tauscher, a House Armed Services Committee member, said the pay cut idea typified her frustration with the Pentagon. "This was just the tip of the iceberg," she said. "They won't tell us how much the war in Iraq is costing, for instance."

Rep. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena, sent Bush a letter protesting the Pentagon's pay cut idea.

"To call this misguided would be a gross understatement," wrote Thompson, a Purple Heart Vietnam war veteran.

"This is an outrageous and hypocritical affront to our soldiers in the Middle East who are being killed on a daily basis and to their families," he added.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

©2003 San Francisco Chronicle

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