White House 'assumption': Vieques training to end

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- An administration official traveling with President George Bush in Europe said Thursday that the White House is operating on the assumption that controversial Navy bombing exercises on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques will end as of May 2003.

"There is little reason to believe that training there would continue past May 2003," when a current agreement with the Puerto Rican government allowing use of the Vieques bombing range expires," an administration source familiar with the issue told CNN Wednesday. This source said the Navy's policy would be clear "within a day or two."

One senior administration official told CNN senior Navy officials met Wednesday with Karl Rove, the top Bush adviser. The official said the meeting was "to receive the Navy's guidance" on its needs and plans for Vieques, which has been used by the U.S. military for exercises since World War II.

Rove is Bush's top political adviser, policing how major policy decisions could impact target political constituencies.

Angry reaction put inital announcement on hold

Pentagon sources had told CNN's Jamie McIntyre Wednesday night that the White House was ready to announce that use of the bombing range would end, but that the plans were put on hold in the face of angry reaction from Capitol Hill and the Navy.

Congressional conservatives see such plans as betrayal of the Navy by an administration that professed support for the military.

The discussions over the status of U.S. military training on the island continued in Washington late into the night, said the administration official traveling with the president.

Controversy began with guard death

The military has used the island for training since 1941

The U.S. military has conducted exercises on Vieques since 1941. Controversy over use of the island for bombing practice has grown since October 1999, when an errant bomb killed a civilian security guard. In late April, about 180 protesters were arrested at the main gates of the Navy facility on the island during the Navy's resumption of exercises.

Demonstrators claim that the island's 9,000 residents are at higher risk of cancer and are exposed to dangerous levels of noise. They want the bombing stopped permanently.

Under an agreement negotiated during the Clinton administration, Vieques residents will vote in November on whether to accept a package of economic incentives in return for allowing the Navy to continue using the range after May 2003. Until then, the Navy is using only non-explosive "inert ordinance" in its exercises.

The aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt and its escort ships are scheduled to begin training exercises at Vieques this weekend, and demonstrations are expected.