It's unlikely that even the most left-leaning, military-hating member of Congress meant to ban the Navy from using sonar to protect our country when passing various laws to protect our wildlife.

Yet a federal judge recently ordered the Navy to stop using certain frequencies of sonar during upcoming training exercises off the Pacific coast, agreeing with activists who sued, saying that sonar might cause harm to marine wildlife .

Regular readers of this column know well how devoted your loyal correspondent is to issues of conservation. From opposing the idiotic proposal to run a new freeway through the San Onofre State Beach to an equally dumbfounding plan to run high-power electrical lines through the Anza Borrego Desert State Park, this space has been devoted to defending wildlife preservation.

But for a federal judge to try to manage our national defense based on maybes and what-ifs is lunacy of the highest order.

While President Bush on Wednesday issued an executive order exempting the Navy from the judge's order on national security grounds, we need more finality on this issue. Frankly, no district judge should be able to dictate national policy on any issue, period. Any decision of that magnitude should only be made by an appeals court. (There is nothing in the Constitution preventing such a policy, either. Congress has the power to set up courts and assign their jurisdiction under Article III, Section 2. Congress has so far resisted the temptation to put any laws off-limits to judicial review, but such power remains.)

In the short term, the Navy should - nay, must - continue its appeal of this ruling, to the Supreme Court if necessary. It is immorality of the most vile sort to send our young men and women off to combat without proper training. And prohibiting them from using sonar is certainly a denial of such training.

While the Navy is doing everything it can to restore sanity to national defense policy regarding sonar training, it's up to Congress to fix this problem over the long haul. For starters, both the House and Senate should take votes expressing their displeasure with the extreme lack of logic in the judge's decision. Congress' intent is key to interpreting any legislation, something this judge clearly neglected to do in issuing her order.

And Congress should go further than that and specifically lay out how the military should balance environmental concerns with national security.

While we are at peace with most of our neighbors in this world right now, including any nations that could conceivably send submarines to our coast with hostile intentions, there are no guarantees about what the future holds. Clearly, our military needs the freedom to do its job properly and completely in defending us from potential enemies.

To put in place a permanent, publicly disclosed policy that we're not going to use sonar in certain areas off our coast is so utterly irresponsible that it's inconceivable Congress or the higher courts will allow such a dangerous decision to stand.

Hopefully, our local representatives can put aside their election-year differences and help set this policy straight.

- Contact columnist Jim Trageser at (760) 631-6628 or jtrageser@nctimes.com.