The Defense Secretary's Commission on Base Realignment and Closure was chartered on May 3, 1988 to recommend military installations within the United States, its commonwealths, territories, and possessions for realignment and closure. The Congress and the President subsequently endorsed this approach through legislation that removed some of the previous impediments to successful base-closure actions. This Commission's recommendations for closure and realignment affect 145 installations. Of this number, 86 are to be closed fully, five are to be closed in part, and 54 will experience a change, either an increase or a decrease, as units and activities are relocated. The Commission also makes several additional recommendations that address potential problems in implementing the Commission's closure and realignment recommendations and certain other matters that the Commission has discovered during its review of the military base structure.

This report constitutes the response of the Department of the Navy (DON) to the requirements of the Base Closure Act for the 1995 round of base realignment and closure (BRAC-95). In addition to the Base Closure Act, the DON base closure and realignment process is governed by implementing policy and guidance issued by the Secretary of Defense (SECDEF) and the Secretary of the Navy (SECNA). The chapters which follow will describe the DON process, the analyses: from which its recommendations were derived, and the considerations which led to particular decision.