By Robert Burns
AP Military Writer

WASHINGTON — President Bush said today the Pentagon should review its policy on civilian participation in military exercises like the emergency ascent drill a Navy submarine was performing when it sank a Japanese fishing vessel.

“I think what’s going to be necessary is for Secretary Rumsfeld and the Defense Department to review all policy regarding civilian activity during military exercises,” Bush told reporters at the White House.

Sixteen civilians were aboard the submarine when the accident happened. Two were at control stations, although Navy officials insist they had no connection with errors that caused the collision.

“I look forward to the Defense Department review of the policies, the current policies, particularly in light of the recent tragedy that took place in Hawai'i,” Bush said.

“I want to reiterate what I said to the prime minister of Japan: I’m deeply sorry about the accident that took place, our nation is sorry that the accident happened, and we will do everything we can to help recover the bodies.”

Rear Adm. Stephen Pietropaoli, a Navy spokesman, told reporters that both the Atlantic and Pacific submarine fleets are reviewing procedures involving embarkation of civilian guests on sea maneuvers.

“In the conduct of those embarks, they’re going to take extra care to ensure that they’re done completely safely,” Pietropaoli told a Pentagon news conference.

Pentagon officials said a preliminary Navy investigation of the submarine collision may be finished within days. Adm. Thomas Fargo, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, will then decide whether the findings warrant court-martialing the sub’s captain or crew.

Fargo will have several options: He could ask for more information before taking action, he could convene a board of inquiry to take sworn statements or he could move directly toward a court martial.

The National Transportation Safety Board is doing its own investigation. Board member John Hammerschmidt said today that over the next week, NTSB investigators will interview all the civilians who were aboard the submarine at the time of the collision. Many already have left Hawaii, he said.

The NTSB will not disclose the contents of those interviews until they all have been completed, he said.

The Pentagon also announced that a Japanese foreign ministry official, Seishiro Eto, was to meet tomorrow with Deputy Defense Secretary Rudy de Leon and other Bush administration officials to discuss the accident and prospects for recovering the ship and the nine missing.

The attack submarine USS Greeneville was practicing an emergency ascent Feb. 9 in waters off the coast of Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, when it rammed the Ehime Maru, which was on a two-month training trip with students from a Japanese high school. The Ehime Maru sank; 26 people were rescued and nine are missing — three crewmen, two teachers and four students.

The Navy had planned to send an unmanned submersible today to the sea bottom where the ship went down, but high seas forced a postponement. The weather is not expected to improve enough to perform the mission until Saturday, officials said. The ship lies at a depth of 1,800 feet.

A decision on whether the 190-foot ship or any human remains it may hold can be recovered will depend largely on what the submersible finds, said Thomas Salmon of the Naval Sea Systems Command’s salvage office. He predicted it would be “technically very challenging” to raise the ship. Among the unknowns: Is the ship intact or broken into pieces? What is the condition of the seabed?

The U.S. Coast Guard this morning ended its active search for the nine missing crew members and students of the Japanese training vessel.

Lauren Smith, a Coast Guard petty officer and spokeswoman, said the search ended with the return of a Coast Guard rescue helicopter at Barbers Point this morning.

Smith said the Coast Guard will still be maintaining a “passive search” with the Coast Guard cutter Kittiwake, an 87-foot patrol boat, in the waters to help maintain a “surface safety zone” for the Navy.

Six days after the accident, the central question remained unanswered: Why did the sub’s captain and crew not detect the presence of the Ehime Maru before blowing the sub’s ballast tanks and rocketing to the surface?

One of the 16 civilians aboard the Greeneville at the time of the accident, Todd Thoman, told the NBC “Today” show today that a periscope “most definitely” was used to check the ocean surface before the submarine began its rapid ascent.

The Greeneville also had a sonar used to detect the noise of any vessel at the surface. It is unclear why neither the sonar nor the visual check through the periscope alerted Waddle to the fishing vessel’s presence.

Pietropaoli told reporters the fishing vessel “had to have been within a few miles” of the Greeneville when the sub went down to a depth of 400 feet, after the periscope sweep, and then emptied its ballast tanks and rocketed to the surface. He said surface visibility at the time was five miles.

Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. Craig Quigley said the preliminary inquiry being conducted by Rear Adm. Charles Griffiths Jr. is not intended to resolve all questions about the incident. Rather it is to form the basis for a decision by Fargo on how to proceed with a full-blown investigation. One of Fargo’s options is to convene a hearing, under Article 32 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, that could lead to a court-martial proceeding.

Waddle, the sub’s skipper, was relieved of command after the incident pending the outcome of investigations.

The Advertiser staff contributed to this report.