In Transition

The Senate Armed Services committee is making good on its promise to enable the new Pentagon staff to hit the ground running. Chairman Carl Levin, D-Mich., will call four top nominees to testify next week, in what committee aides say should be a relatively smooth confirmation process for the officials selected by President-elect Barack Obama and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates.

The session will also mark the return to the committee of ranking Republican and former presidential nominee John McCain of Arizona, who missed most of the committee's hearings last year while campaigning. New senators Mark Udall, D-Colo., and Mark Begich, D-Alaska, will make their committee debuts at the hearing.

The committee will hear from four former Clinton-era defense officials on January 15th at 9:30 in the Senate Dirksen Office Building, Room 106. They are:

• William J. Lynn III to be deputy secretary of Defense.

• Robert F. Hale to be undersecretary of Defense (Comptroller).

• Michèle Flourney to be ujndersecretary of Defense for policy.

• Jeh Charles Johnson to be general counsel, Department of Defense.