John Kerry

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, let me say to the Senator that, for better or worse, the way it works--and I think the Senator acknowledged this in his answer to my question--you do have to go back to the Russians and you have to have a negotiation and there has to be an agreement. If it was changed further, we would have to come back and go through the entire process again, in order to review or do a new treaty because it would be a different treaty submitted to us. Let me say, through the Chair, to my friend, that said, I want to clarify it is not the weight of the words that makes this complicated-- and it is not. I am not trying to have it both ways and say the words are irrelevant, but therefore he is saying why don't you change them. But it is the process. It is what happens as a consequence, in terms of when we ratify a treaty, if we ever ratify a treaty. And because they are not binding and, therefore, don't affect what we are obligated to do, and every bit of our obligations have been defined by the generals, admirals, various agency heads, et cetera, that has all been defined. We have a clarity about where we are going. Here is what is important, and I say this to the Senator from Alabama and the other Senators on the floor, this is part of our advice and consent because we have made it clear--we have done something different. We have gone beyond what they did. We are adding our stamp to this in the resolution of ratification, where we have accepted the DeMint language, which is as forward-leaning as you could be in sending the Russians and the world a notice, regardless of what the administration may or may not have said. We have said it and we control the purse strings and we make that policy about what we are prepared to spend for and develop, and that is a robust missile defense system. That said, let me come back to one other point the Senator raised about the meaning of what happened in the Polish--with the Poles and the switch and phased adaptive system. The fact is--and this is very important--the Obama administration did not come up with this idea for this change. This was not motivated by some different world view of the President or the Obama administration. This is our military. As the chairman of the Armed Services Committee laid out fairly clearly and in detailed fashion, the military came to us. They are the ones who came up and said this is a better way to do this system. In fact, I have a letter from Admiral Mullen. I ask unanimous consent that it be printed in the Record.

Mr. KERRY. Admiral Mullen says: We believe that the Phased Adaptive Approach will adequately protect our European allies and deployed forces, provide the best long-term approach to ballistic missile defense in Europe, and support applying appropriately modified Phased Adaptive Approaches in other key regions as outlined in the Ballistic Missile Defense Review Report. They are the ones who requested to Carl Levin and others, the Joint Chiefs, combatant commanders. And he said: . . . I also fully concur with the Phased Adaptive Approach as outlined in the Ballistic Missile Defense Review Report. As with the Nuclear Posture Review, the Joint Chiefs and combatant commanders were deeply involved throughout the review process.

Mr. KERRY. I thought I had been recognized.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, the process is that it goes from us under any circumstances, if we have acted on it, to the Government of Russia. The Government of Russia makes the decision as to whether they are going to negotiate and whether it is a substantive kind of change they object to. They may refuse to put it to the Duma or they may want to renegotiate it. It opens it up to renegotiation. It is not automatic. They don't have to send it to the Duma. They can sit on it.

Mr. KERRY. No, I agree. I already spoke to that. I said if it is in the four corners of the treaty and has fundamental operative impact on us, I would say, OK, we have to go back and do it. That is not the case here. We are talking about an innocuous, nonbinding, and a recognition of an existing reality that the administrations on both sides have already acknowledged. And Dr. Kissinger and others have said ignore the language, it is meaningless. It is simply a statement of the truth.

Mr. KERRY. I will yield too and Senator Sessions has been very patient. I wish to say two things, if I can, in closing, very quickly. No. 1, the point that the Senator just made about the legal pretext for withdrawing from this treaty, let's go back to the colloquy we had a few minutes ago. You don't need a legal pretext. You don't need anything except a judgment on your part there is an extraordinary circumstance that says you want to get out, and the extraordinary circumstance can be that you see your offensive weapons have been dramatically reduced in their impact by our defense. So they do not need a legal pretext. It has nothing to do with what the Senator has just suggested. The final comment I would make is, perhaps the Senator and I--and I invite this one more time because I think we have moved enormously with the language we have in our resolution of ratification from Senator DeMint. We worked on it together. I embraced it. I think it is an important statement. Perhaps the Senator and I can find some further way to include that in here so we are not taking the risk of what they might or might not do. Neither of us have the ability to predict what their reaction will be. Although I think some people would be pretty clear about the fact that it would not be well received, it could be a serious issue for a lot of different reasons. So if we can avoid that, we have a responsibility to do that in the next day or two. I look forward to working with my colleague, and I thank him for the colloquy. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, as if in legislative session and in morning business, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of H.J. Res. 105, received from the House and at the desk.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, America was founded on the principle of religious freedom. Many of us are descended not just from the Pilgrims, but from so many others Catholics, Jews, and many more who fled persecution in search of a land where they could practice their religion and simply be who they are. Our very Constitution exists to secure the blessings of that freedom to ourselves and to our children. Even so, charges of religious discrimination in the workplace have been on the rise for more than a decade. Between 1992 and 2007, the latest period for which we have data, claims of religious discrimination filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission have more than doubled, from 1,388 to 2,880. There is no way to tell how many people simply quit their job rather than complain. But in a Nation founded on freedom of religion, no American should ever have to choose between keeping a job and keeping faith with their cherished religious beliefs and traditions. I have been deeply involved in this issue since 1996 and once again I am introducing the Workplace Religious Freedom Act. The Workplace Religious Freedom Act is designed to protect people who encounter on-the-job discrimination because of their religious beliefs and practices. It protects, within reason, time off for religious observances. It protects the wearing of yarmulkes, hijabs, turbans and Mormon garments--all the distinctive marks of religious practices, all the things that people of faith should never be forced to hide. Writing religious freedom into law is not easy. I have been trying to make the Workplace Religious Freedom Act law for 15 years. I have worked with a range of partners from Senator Santorum and Senator Brownback to Senator Lieberman, and most recently Senator Hatch and I have been working together behind the scenes to move this issue forward. In doing so, it has been a difficult challenge to balance so many interests and legitimate concerns and to keep up with changing times. This bill represents years of discussion about religious tolerance and equal treatment and is a compromise between many different views. I hope it serves as the beginning of a new discussion as to how we can move forward in the next Congress and beyond because addressing this issue is long overdue. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, America was founded on the principle of religious freedom. Many of us are descended not just from the Pilgrims, but from so many others Catholics, Jews, and many more who fled persecution in search of a land where they could practice their religion and simply be who they are. Our very Constitution exists to secure the blessings of that freedom to ourselves and to our children. Even so, charges of religious discrimination in the workplace have been on the rise for more than a decade. Between 1992 and 2007, the latest period for which we have data, claims of religious discrimination filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission have more than doubled, from 1,388 to 2,880. There is no way to tell how many people simply quit their job rather than complain. But in a Nation founded on freedom of religion, no American should ever have to choose between keeping a job and keeping faith with their cherished religious beliefs and traditions. I have been deeply involved in this issue since 1996 and once again I am introducing the Workplace Religious Freedom Act. The Workplace Religious Freedom Act is designed to protect people who encounter on-the-job discrimination because of their religious beliefs and practices. It protects, within reason, time off for religious observances. It protects the wearing of yarmulkes, hijabs, turbans and Mormon garments--all the distinctive marks of religious practices, all the things that people of faith should never be forced to hide. Writing religious freedom into law is not easy. I have been trying to make the Workplace Religious Freedom Act law for 15 years. I have worked with a range of partners from Senator Santorum and Senator Brownback to Senator Lieberman, and most recently Senator Hatch and I have been working together behind the scenes to move this issue forward. In doing so, it has been a difficult challenge to balance so many interests and legitimate concerns and to keep up with changing times. This bill represents years of discussion about religious tolerance and equal treatment and is a compromise between many different views. I hope it serves as the beginning of a new discussion as to how we can move forward in the next Congress and beyond because addressing this issue is long overdue. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent, on behalf of Senator Manchin, that Sylvia Pletos, a military fellow and New START treaty specialist on his staff, be granted the privilege of the floor during the balance of today's session.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. I wish to ask the Senator, if I can--I don't want to interrupt him, but I wanted to inquire, get a sense here--I appreciate a lot of the comments he has made. First of all, let me say that I have appreciated working very closely with Senator Kyl on this for months now. We have had an enormous amount of dialog; we have had a lot of meetings; we have gone back and forth. I think he would agree that we have tried very hard and in good faith to address many of the concerns he has raised, notwithstanding the ones he just raised in his speech, many of which I will speak to as we go along. But I would like to sort of get a sense from him. He mentioned amendments, others have, but we are now almost at lunchtime, and we don't have an amendment. I would like to get a sense of when we might anticipate really being able to do the business on the treaty.

Mr. KERRY. I wanted to ask the Senator before he leaves, it is now 1:30 in the afternoon, and we have yet to have one amendment presented to us. I recognize there is a value to having some of these comments help frame it, but it also can be done in the context of a specific amendment. I would ask the Senator if he has an amendment he is prepared to offer that could help us move forward?

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. KERRY. I know. I am just asking if the Senator would yield for a question.

Mr. KERRY. I appreciate it.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I wish to say to my colleague from Texas, I am a little surprised to hear him be quite so harsh about the--I think he used the word ``irresponsible''--about why we are here in this predicament right now. I shouldn't have to remind him, but in this session of Congress there have been more filibusters by his party than at any time from World War I all the way through until the late 1970s. We have nominees waiting to be passed who have sat there for months who cannot get a vote. When we finally have a cloture vote to get 60 votes to get them out, they get 90, 95 votes in the Senate. They just delay and delay and delay. I am not going to stand here and listen to them come to the floor of the Senate asking why we are trying to do the important business of the country at the last minute because all they have to do is look in the mirror. That is all they have to do, and they will see why we are here. Then to say we can't do the important business of this treaty in the amount of time we have is totally contradicted by history of every treaty we have worked on. Earlier today we had a Senator say: Well, we can't do that. We have to--we can't dual-track. I pointed out that START I, which was a much more complicated treaty, took 4\1/2\ days. On the day they passed it, they passed two or three other pieces of legislation. On the day we went to it, we passed a tax bill and an appropriations bill. We have reached a new stage in America where we just say something. It doesn't matter if it is based on the truth. Just say it, put it out there, and somebody is going to believe it. Somebody will pick it up. So I regret that. We have been here for a day. We still haven't had an amendment, and all this talk about serious consideration. I am going to release a breakdown of who has spoken and for how long because it is interesting to take a look at what is going on. By the way, why would we have to read something? I understand we may have to read the appropriations bill for about a day and a half; have the clerk up here just reading the bill. Now, there is an act of stunning responsibility. Let's just chew up the time of the Senate, keeping everybody up all night reading a bill rather than working on it. So I have said enough about it. I think what we need to do is do the business of the country, and there is plenty of time to do it and still plenty of time to get home for Christmas if we would spend our time doing that rather than a lot of delay tactics. Some Senators have also cited an early statement by General Cartwright, the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, suggesting he had some concern about the numbers. Let me make clear, here is what General Cartwright said today: ``We need START and we need it badly.'' Now, are you going to listen to General Cartwright or are you going to listen to some of these sort of vague and somewhat similar talking points that keep coming to the floor without an amendment, without any substantive work? At this point I ask unanimous consent that at 6 p.m. today, the Senate resume legislative session and the majority leader be recognized at that time.

Mr. KERRY. We are staying on the START agreement at that time.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I intend to yield the floor. I ask unanimous consent that when I yield the floor, the Senator from California be recognized.

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I ask for your ruling on the unanimous consent request with respect to 6 p.m. today we move to legislative session and the majority leader be recognized.

Mr. KERRY. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. KERRY. Madam President, I thank the Senator from New Jersey. He is a valuable member of our committee, diligent and articulate on these issues. I appreciate the comments he made, particularly reinforcing the comments about the delay. I remind colleagues that earlier the Senator from Arizona mentioned it is sort of unfair to be doing this at the same time we are doing something else. I remind colleagues that he said START I was completed sort of on its own, freestanding. I wish to correct the record. START I did not, in fact, go through freestanding. On the same day the Senate held the cloture vote on the treaty on START I, it voted on two amendments related to the treaty, and it also voted on the final passage of a tax bill. They managed to do two things at the same time. The following day, the Senate voted on another amendment related to the treaty. It also agreed on that day to the conference report on Interior appropriations. It passed the DC appropriations bill. Those are two separate items. And it debated and held two rollcall votes on the Foreign Operations bill. Those are four separate bills and items dealt with at the same time they were dealing with START I. The following day, it had the final passage on the START treaty, in about 4 days-plus-and-a-half, I think. Also, I remind my colleagues, as I should have reminded the Senator from Texas, 13 times colleagues came on the other side of the aisle to Senator Lugar and asked him to slow down the process of the legislation piece of the treaty because of the need to work on modernization. We did that. Again, colleagues came to us. Way back last summer, we were prepared to move the treaty out of committee so we wouldn't wind up in this situation. Guess who came to us and said: No, it would be better if we had a little more time. Our friends on the other side of the aisle said: Please don't do that vote. I think it would be better for the treaty if we took our time. So we provided another 6 weeks to file questions, get answers, work on modernization, pull people together. Frankly, it was a constructive process. I am not suggesting it didn't provide some benefits. But we accommodated a request to slow it down to meet the needs of our friends on the other side of the aisle. Then, subsequently, when there were potential complaints that it would be politicizing the Senate and this treaty to have the vote and this debate before the election--we could have done that, but we didn't want the treaty to get caught up in the election process--we voluntarily delayed the process to meet and accommodate some of the concerns of colleagues on the other side of the aisle. Then, when we come back after the election, all of a sudden, we can't do it in a lameduck. We have to do it down the road. One colleague came to the floor defending the rights of people who are not even sworn in as Senators to somehow weigh in on this treaty. They are not Senators. They may have been elected in this election, but they haven't taken part in the year-and-a-half-long effort of preparing to deal with this treaty. Every Senator here has. All 100 of us walked up to the well, raised our hands, swore to uphold the Constitution of the United States. That Constitution gives us the specific responsibility of advice and consent on a treaty. That is why we are here at this moment. If I had had my druthers, we would have been here weeks ago, but there was always a filibuster, always a delay, always some longer period that some other piece of legislation was taking. It is important for colleagues to be honest about that. We have had 125 cloture motions since January of 2009. That is as many cloture motions as had been filed between 1919 and 1974, between World War I and the Vietnam war. That is how many cloture motions we had filed since last year alone. In addition, the Republicans came back to the minority in 2007, and we have had to file 264 cloture motions to end a filibuster since 2007. That averages out to 66 per year. In the first 44 years of the existence of this filibuster rule, it was only used about once a year. For 44 years, it was used once a year. In the last few years, it has been used 66 times a year. That is why we are here. That is why we were delayed. I, personally, look forward, when we return next year, to seeing us adjust that rule. I respect the rights of the minority because I know that is what the Founding Fathers intended. But nobody intended that we have to vote twice to get to a bill, filibuster on the motion to proceed, filibuster on the substance. It simply doesn't make sense, and the American people do not support it. It negates the fundamental concept of majority rule. I am willing to take my lumps, but I think there is a way to not necessarily undo it completely and still create responsible action in the Senate. Since President Obama took office last year, the Senate has had rollcall votes on 62 nominations. Of those 62, 27 were confirmed with 90 votes or more; 23 were confirmed with 70 votes or more. That means that of the 62 nominations, fully 60 of them were confirmed with more than 70 votes. Over 80 percent of the nominations we have taken votes on have passed with overwhelming support, and almost all of those votes, many of them anyway, took place only after an extraordinarily lengthy delay. Many of these nominations sat on the calendar for over 100 days while people waited for the Senate to act. On average, the Senate has taken more than five times longer to confirm a circuit court nomination after it was favorably reported by the Judiciary and so forth. I don't want to chew up all our time going through that, but the record should be fundamentally clear that nobody is rushing anything here. The START treaty debate, the original START treaty began on September 28, 1992, and amendments were proposed. As early as the first day of the debate, they were debating amendments. There were two votes on amendments on the second day of debate. On the third day, there were three amendments, and they ratified the treaty. We ought to be able to move here. I wish to add a couple thoughts quickly on the subject of the tactical nukes. A number of Senators have expressed concern about why this treaty doesn't deal with tactical nuclear weapons. All of us would agree, you have to acknowledge upfront there is an asymmetry, an imbalance between the numbers of tactical weapons that the Russians have and have deployed and what we have. Remember, first, we needed to replace the original START agreement in order to get verification measures back into place in order to take the steps then necessary to go to sort of the next tier. Secretary Clinton and Secretary Gates explained for the record: A more ambitious treaty that addressed tactical nuclear weapons would have taken a lot longer to complete, adding significantly to the time before a successor agreement, including the verification measures, could enter into force following START'S expiration in December 2009. Their fundamental judgment was, yes, we want to get there, but START itself helps you get there. If we sit without those verification measures in place that come with START, we make it much harder to actually reach the agreement we are trying to get to on the tactical. The logic said: Get this agreement back into place. Revitalize the cooperation on arms control. That will empower you subsequently to be able to achieve your goal. That is not something the Obama administration dreamed up. I emphasize that to our colleagues on the other side of the aisle. The very respected former Secretaries of Defense, Secretary Bill Perry and Secretary Jim Schlesinger, were part of a bipartisan commission. They reported that the first step they thought necessary was to deal with this. They knew nuclear tactical weapons were an issue. But they also knew our military leaders made it clear they didn't need actual parity on those weapons. Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen both stated, in response to a question: Because of the limited range of the tactical weapons and very different roles from those played by strategic nuclear forces, the vast majority of Russian tactical nuclear weapons could not directly influence the strategic nuclear balance between the United States and Russia. Donald Rumsfeld told the Foreign Relations Committee in 2002: I don't know that we would ever want to have symmetry between the United States and Russia. Their circumstance is different and their geography's different. What he is referring to is the vast gulf of the Atlantic Ocean and then Western Europe that is in between Russia and us and the whole original tactical decision of Russia in terms of the Warsaw Pact versus NATO that existed for so many years in the course of the Cold War. I don't want to be mistaken by my colleagues on the other side. Yes, we want to limit Russia's nuclear tactical weapons. But a desire to limit those tactical weapons is not a reason to reject the START treaty. Frank Miller, who was a senior NSC staffer in the Bush administration, testified to the Arms Services Committee on July 22: I believe this Treaty is properly focused on the strategic forces of both sides. . . . The tactical forces are clearly a political and military threat to our allies. . . . But I think throwing this treaty away because we haven't gotten our hands on the tacticals is not the way to approach this. I think we have to go after the tacticals separately. That is exactly what President Obama, Vice President Biden, Secretary Clinton, and the rest of our military establishment want to do, but they want the START treaty as the foundation on which to build that effort to try to secure something in terms of tactical weapons. We should pursue a treaty on tactical nuclear weapons, one that can give us adequate transparency about how many Russia has and that ultimately reduces that number. Let me say to my colleagues on the other side, that is precisely why we put into the resolution of ratification declaration 11, which says: The Senate calls upon the President to pursue, following consultation with allies, an agreement with the Russian Federation that would address the disparity between the tactical nuclear weapons stockpiles of the Russian Federation and of the United States and would secure and reduce tactical nuclear weapons in a verifiable manner. We address the issues of tactical nuclear weapons, and it was not an oversight. It was a calculated, tactical decision to lay the foundation, renew the relationship with Russia, renew our arms control understandings, and lay the foundation to be able to reach an agreement. That is what Secretary Gates said when he testified before the Armed Services Committee on June 17. He said: We will never get to that step [of reductions] with the Russians on tactical nukes if this treaty on strategic nuclear weapons is not ratified. Secretary Gates, appointed by President Bush, said clearly: If we do not ratify this treaty, we do not get to the treaty on tactical nuclear weapons. So I think the imperative could not be more clear. The Eastern European leaders see this the same way. And they, after all, are the ones more directly threatened by those weapons. Poland's foreign minister wrote, on November 20, our NATO allies see ``New START is a necessary stepping-stone to future negotiations with Russia about reductions in tactical nuclear arsenals, and a prerequisite for the successful revival of the Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe.'' The Secretary-General of NATO said the same thing. He said that we need ``transparency and reductions of short-range, tactical nuclear weapons in Europe. . . . This is a key concern for allies. . . . But we cannot address this disparity until the New Start treaty is ratified.'' I hope our colleagues will stand with our allies and stand with common sense and ratify this treaty so we can get to the issue of tactical nuclear weapons. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERRY. Madam President, I wish to thank the Senator very much for his comments and his support. It is my understanding that Senator Ensign was going to speak at this point in time. He is on his way. We are happy to accommodate that. Let me say to colleagues that we are open for business. We are ready to entertain amendments people may have. We encourage colleagues to come down here. Obviously, some people have raised the question of the press of time, but it does not seem, from both yesterday and today, that anybody is actually in a rush to bring an amendment. We are prepared to vote on our side of the aisle. I want to make that very clear. There are 58 Democratic Senators and Senator Lugar who obviously are working to advance this treaty. We do not have any amendments. We are prepared to vote. So if colleagues want to bring an amendment, now is the time to do it, and we encourage them to do so. Let me just say that I know Senator Barrasso just spoke with respect to missile defense. I understand the legitimate concerns that have been expressed by a number of colleagues about the question of missile defense. I wish to make it as clear as possible, from all of the record to date, that the treaty's preamble, first of all, requires nothing legally whatsoever. There is no legal, binding effect of the preamble-- none whatsoever. Secondly, Secretary Clinton said this and Secretary Henry Kissinger said this: All it is is a statement of fact about the existence of a relationship. It has no restraint whatsoever on our ability to proceed with missile defense. Moreover, the resolution of ratification could not be more clear about that. There are pages within the resolution and several different individual references to the fact that the missile defense is not affected. Let me read from it. This is from ``Understandings,'' and this is the missile defense understanding No. 1: It is the understanding of the United States-- This is what we will pass when we pass this, and I am quoting from it-- that the New START Treaty does not impose any limitations on the deployment of missile defenses other than the requirements of paragraph 3 of Article V of the New START Treaty, which states, ``Each Party shall not convert and shall not use ICBM launchers and SLBM launchers for placement of missile defense interceptors therein. Each Party further shall not convert and shall not use launchers of missile defense interceptors for placement of ICBMs and SLBMs therein.'' It goes on to say that any New START treaty limitations on the deployment of missile defenses beyond those specifically contained--and I will speak to what they are in a moment--would require an amendment to the New START treaty. That would require an entire new process of ratification in order to live up to the requirements of the treaty process itself. Now, the specific, tiny, little limitation they are talking about in there is one that the Secretary of Defense said: We don't want; that is, the conversion of a current ICBM silo. There are four of them that are grandfathered into existence here, but the military has determined it is more expensive to do that than to simply build a new silo for a ground-based missile, which is what we plan to do in the event we want to--when we deploy. So there is, in effect, zero limitation. Every single member of the Strategic Command and the current command has said there is no limitation. Secretary Gates has said there is no limitation. And I believe we will be able to have even some further clarification of the absence of any limitation. The fact is, if you change that preamble now, you are effectively killing the treaty because it requires the President to go back to the Russians, renegotiate the treaty, and then you have to come back and go through months and months of hearings and resubmission and so forth. The important thing to focus on is the fact that--and let me quote Henry Kissinger about the language Senator Barrasso has referred to. He said, ``It is a truism, it is not an obligation.'' Secretary Gates also emphasized the fact that it has no impact whatsoever on the United States. Secretary Gates reminded us in May that the Russians have always reacted adversely to our plans for missile defense, so they have tried a number of times to try to interrupt that. Secretary Gates said in his testimony: This treaty does not accomplish any restraint for them at all. He also said: We have a comprehensive missile defense program, and we are going forward with all of it. In addition to that, General Chilton reported on how he informed the Russians in full about exactly what program we were going forward with, including the recently agreed on deployment at Lisbon for the deployment of missile defense in Europe. They understand exactly what we are doing, what our plans are, and, notwithstanding that, they signed the treaty. So I think the comfort level of all of our military, of all of those involved with the laboratories, and all of those involved with the Strategic Command ought to speak for itself. I see Senator Ensign is here. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERRY. Madam President, I ask my colleague from Nevada--he mentioned he had some amendments, and we are ready to do amendments. Is he prepared to go forward with his amendments?

Mr. KERRY. Madam President, let me speak to a couple points the Senator from Nevada raised. He talked about the article V ban. I discussed this a few minutes ago with respect to the conversion of ICBM silo launchers. There is a one-paragraph restraint in the treaty with respect to the conversion of those missile defense interceptors. The Foreign Relations Committee, in the course of our hearings, pressed the administration on this question very extensively. There were a lot of questions asked by colleagues on both sides of the aisle. The record unequivocally counters the argument just made by the Senator from Nevada. The ban does not prevent us from deploying the most effective missile defenses possible. I will be specific. We will soon have some 30 missile defense interceptors in silos in California and Alaska. We are going to have an additional eight extra launchers in Alaska, if we need them. If we need more interceptors, the Missile Defense Agency Director, LTG Patrick O'Reilly, who was originally appointed to that post in the administration of President Bush, told the committee: ``For many different reasons,'' they would ``never'' recommend converting either ICBM silos or SLBM launchers into missile defense interceptor launchers. What we are hearing is a completely red herring argument, sort of throw it out there and say that somehow this is a restraint on missile defense. Why is it not a restraint? One reason is cost. It is intriguing to me to hear a lot of colleagues raise this particular missile defense issue in the treaty, when they also raise the issue of the deficit and how much we are spending and how we should not be spending on things people don't want and the military doesn't want. Here is something the military doesn't want. They don't want it because the conversion cost of the last ICBM launcher at Vandenberg into a missile defense interceptor launcher was about $55 million. The average cost for a new hardened missile defense interceptor silo in a new missile field is $36 million. The reason for that is because the Missile Defense Agency has developed a smaller, more effective, special purpose silo to meet its needs. The annual operating cost for a separate converted silo, which is what our colleagues are complaining about, is actually $2 million higher per silo, and it is $2 million higher than a silo which the military thinks is more effective and less expensive to maintain. As Strategic Command General Chilton noted, we also don't want to force Russia to make a split-second guess as to whether a missile that is flying out of a U.S. silo field is either a missile defense interceptor which may be aimed at a rogue missile or a nuclear-tipped missile aimed at Moscow. That confusion is impossible to distinguish unless we have a completely separate silo field. So converting an old ICBM silo in a particular field where we can't distinguish between an interceptor or an ICBM actually increases the potential of confusion and threat and possibly a dangerous mistake and decision. With regard to putting a missile defense interceptor in a submarine launch tube, Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen both said this is not a cost-effective step, and it presents very unique operational challenges. We need to take these red herrings off the table. Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen both noted it would make much more sense to put missile defense interceptors on aegis-capable surface ships, which is what they are doing, and that is not constrained by any treaty. There is no constraint whatsoever in our ability to go out and do what best meets the needs as defined by the military themselves. The bottom line is, article V, paragraph 3 does not constrain us one iota. I yield the floor.

Mr. KERRY

Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I thank the Senator very much. I just thought it would be helpful if we can talk about a few of these things as we go along. What I want to ask the Senator is what he thinks is inadequate in the resolution of ratification. Declaration 13 makes it clear that the United States is committed to accomplishing the modernization and replacement of the strategic delivery vehicles. The service lives of the existing strategic delivery vehicles run well past the 10-year life of this treaty. So my question would be, since the DOD has already scheduled study and decision deadlines, timelines, for the replacement of all of these systems--so since that is outside of the four corners of the treaty, so to speak, why would declaration 13 not state that we are committed to proceeding to the full modernization and replacement of the adequate delivery vehicles?