WASHINGTON (AP) – The commission reviewing the Pentagon’s recommended base closings will travel to 20 bases this week to learn more about military installations slated to be closed.

The nine commissioners will split into small groups to tour 20 sites in 11 states between Tuesday and Friday. The states are Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, North Carolina, Oregon, Utah, Virginia and Washington.

“The site visits are the main forum by which our commissioners and our staff learn the details of what military activities are really happening at the base, how the Department of Defense recommendations would affect the installation and whether base closure criteria were applied correctly,” Anthony Principi, chairman of the Base Realignment and Closure Commission, said in a statement.

Commissioners “have a lot of hard work ahead of us and not a lot of time to do it,” added Principi, a former U.S. Veterans Affairs secretary. “Each site visit will be packed with detailed briefings, discussions with base personnel and tours of the key facilities.”

The nine-member panel, known as BRAC, has pledged to visit all bases slated for closure or major realignment under a plan announced May 13 by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. The plan would close 33 major bases and downsize 29 others, saving an estimated $48 billion over 20 years.

As a practical matter, groups of two or three commissioners will visit each base, preceded by an analyst who will compile detailed information on the site, its staffing and military function.

For instance, commissioners James Bilbray and Philip Coyle are scheduled to visit Portland International Airport on Tuesday. The airport is home to an Air National Guard Base slated for a drastic downsizing.

Oregon lawmakers say the plan to transfer 452 civilian and 112 military jobs from the Portland base – as well as remove its 23 active planes – could leave the region vulnerable to attack.

Similar complaints have been made by lawmakers across the country.

Earlier this month, the military suggested pulling the Army’s Armor Center and School from Fort Knox, Ky., and adding an Infantry Brigade Combat Team and other units coming home from overseas. This would shift Fort Knox’s historic focus away from heavy armor to war fighting.

“They’re really checking the Army’s homework,” said retired Brig. Gen. James E. Shane, executive director of Kentucky’s Commission on Military Affairs.

The commission has until Sept. 8 to present its recommendations to President Bush. In past years, about 85 percent of base closures recommended by the Pentagon have remained on the BRAC list.

The panel has scheduled a series of public hearings on the plan this summer.