Carl Levin

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Then we will clear those amendments after all of that?

Mr. LEVIN. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. I would be happy to yield.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, the pending amendment would prevent deployment of the missile defense system before that missile defense system is shown to be workable by operationally realistic testing. That is what we are supposed to do around here. This is nothing new. What is new is the deployment of a system before it has been realistically tested and operationally tested with no plans to ever test the system. There are a couple of examples where we have deployed systems, but we have never deployed a system without a plan to at least operationally test at some point. There are no such plans here. It violates the spirit and, in one case, the letter of the law relative to testing and relative to ``fly before you buy.'' These laws are intended to prevent the purchase and deployment to the field of billions of dollars in military equipment prior to it being adequately tested. What we have heard on the floor is a giant rationalization for deploying a system which may or may not work. We have been told this morning that we have to deploy in Alaska because that is where the operational testing is going to take place. How can there be operational testing unless these missiles are put in the ground? The problem is, that is not accurate. There is not going to be flight testing of these missiles from Alaska. That is not just me saying that; this is what the Department of Defense has told us. I will quote from the DOT&E fiscal year 2003 annual report: Due to safety considerations, no tests are currently planned to launch interceptors from the operational missile fields. I am going to repeat it: Due to safety considerations, no tests are currently planned to launch interceptors from the operational missile fields. So these missiles are not going to be put in Alaska in order to have some place from which to operationally test a missile. It is not going to happen.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, the amendment of the Senator from Rhode Island simply says that the usual rules will apply in this case, that we are not going to change the rules because some people believe strongly this is an important weapons system. We have lots of important weapons systems of which we apply the rules that you must have operational testing at some point. Now, there have been a couple of instances where operational testing has been delayed until after there has been some deployment, but there has been operational testing then. There have been plans for operational testing. The two examples which are used frequently are JSTARS and an unmanned aerial vehicle called Predator. Those are the two examples that have been used where a system has been deployed or partially deployed, and then the operational testing has occurred after that deployment. But in those two cases--this is the critical issue which the Senator from Rhode Island addresses--as in all other cases, operational testing has occurred; and it has been designed by and implemented by the independent Office of Test and Evaluation. The difference between the amendment offered by the Senator from Rhode Island and the second-degree amendment offered by the Senator from Virginia is that the Senator from Rhode Island preserves the rule, which as far as I can tell has never been violated, that the Office of Test and Evaluation does the testing. That is an independent test office. Too often these days we see rules being ignored in order to meet some particular goal: We are not going to apply the Constitution here because we have needs over here. We are not going to apply the usual rules as to how we treat captives and how we treat prisoners because we have other needs over here. We are going to bend rules. We are going to ignore rules because of some particular goal that exists. In this case, there is a proposal made that we ignore the rule, which has been in place for I don't know how many years, with a very important purpose behind it: that we have independent testing of weapons systems before or during or at some point after deployment by an independent test office--not by the Department of Defense in consultation with the test office but by that test office itself. It is the way we have protected our men and women in the military, to make sure that weapons systems work. It is the way we have protected this Nation, by making sure that weapons systems work. We should not make an exception for it here. No matter how strongly people feel national missile defense will contribute to our national security, it will only contribute to our security if it works. To make sure it works, you need an independent testing office to do the testing and to lay out the criteria--not to consult, not to have a voice, but to do what they do with all other weapons systems that we deploy, which is to do the testing themselves. This amendment does not prevent the administration from deploying missile defenses prior to operational testing. That was the amendment which was just defeated. This amendment allows that deployment but says you have to have operational testing sometime, at some point, and--this is the difference between the first-degree and the second-degree amendment--in the case of the first-degree amendment, that testing has to be done by that independent Office of Test and Evaluation, as all other testing of all other weapons systems that we have been able to research. You have to have plans. You have to make a decision: Yes, we are going to test this, and we are going to have our independent Office of Test and Evaluation do it. Now, as I said, some defense programs have been deployed before operational testing was completed, and among them is the Predator, which was deployed in Kosovo in 1999, prior to the initial operational test and evaluation. But the operational testing for the Predator was planned for long before the Kosovo deployment, and it was completed in the next year after that deployment. The testing was done by that independent office, not by people who are out there in the field arguing for a system, but independently by the independent test office. The JSTARS surveillance aircraft is another example of a military system which was deployed prior to operational testing. There was a great need. It was decided they could do the operational testing after the deployment. So two JSTARS aircraft were deployed during Desert Storm in 1991. Interestingly enough, following that deployment, the Senate Armed Services Committee wanted to accelerate the program, but the Air Force thought the effort in the gulf war had not alleviated the need for operational testing. Indeed, it illuminated areas that needed more attention in development. So operational testing was performed on JSTARS in 1995, and the operational tests revealed some significant problems. Some of those problems in JSTARS, which independent operational testing--and the word ``independent'' is just as important as the word ``operational'' and just as important as the word ``testing''--those independent operational tests revealed some significant problems, including the inability to operate at the required altitude, inadequate tactics and procedures, and inadequate mission reliability and time-on-station. What this amendment would do is to insist that the usual rules about operational testing by an independent test office apply here, not before deployment--that approach was defeated when the Boxer amendment was defeated--but at least sometime, and sometime is critically important, and just as critical is that those tests be done not just in consultation with but by the Office of Test and Evaluation. If you do not like the rules, change the rules, change the law about OT&E, the Office of Test and Evaluation, change the law, but do not simply say we are going to ignore the law here because that law has an important purpose. That law requiring independent test and evaluation is a law which every Member of this body ought to defend. We fought a long time to put it in place. It has had some wonderful results. Our weapons systems have worked better because we have an independent office that does the testing. So it is not good enough, as the second-degree amendment says: Well, we will have some consultation with that independent office. That does not give them the critical decision as to whether a weapons system is effective or is not effective. To put billions of dollars into systems which are not shown to be effective at some point, which are not operationally tested at some point by an independent office, is to increase the likelihood that billions of dollars will be wasted. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. LEVIN. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. LEVIN. I ask the Senator if he will yield me 8 minutes.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, how much time does the Senator from Rhode Island have remaining?

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, let me first commend the Senator from Washington. She has been tenacious, absolutely determined to provide childcare for military personnel. She has devised this amendment to take care of the ones who are currently employed in Iraq and Afghanistan, because their families surely are the ones who, first and foremost, we have to try to take care of, where they have no other alternative on base because they are geographically dispersed. This amendment provides funds for childcare for members of the Armed Forces who do not have access to military childcare programs because they are geographically dispersed and there is no military childcare program available to them. These will mainly be Guard and Reserve people but not exclusively. There may be families of Active-Duty people who are normally on active duty, who because their loved one is now in Iraq or Afghanistan, for instance, take the family back home and who also will have access to childcare because of this amendment. It is discretionary spending. I note the Department of Defense supports this amendment. It seems to me the fact that the Senator from Washington was able to work with the Department of Defense to actually obtain their support for her amendment is a notable success for which she is entitled to the commendation of this body and the thanks of this Nation. I hope this amendment will be adopted by the Senate. I do not know if a rollcall is necessary. If it is, I hope we strongly support this amendment, and I commend Senator Murray for her tenacity and for the sensitivity which she shows in so many issues, but in this case on the childcare needs of this country.

Mr. LEVIN. In the form of a question to the Senator from Washington, whose amendment fills in such a gap and really meets such an incredibly important need for childcare, but is it not true that in section (a)(3), the bottom of page 2, you do provide specifically: The Secretary shall prescribe in regulations priorities for the allocation of funds for provision of access to child care. . . . So the amendment itself does provide for those regulations to be adopted by the Secretary of Defense?

Mr. LEVIN. Will the Senator yield for a question on that point?

Mr. LEVIN. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. LEVIN. Immediately.

Mr. LEVIN. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, the suggestion of an hour on this side relative to the Reed amendment, would that include the proposed time for the second- degree amendment to be offered by Senator Warner? Does the hour that you have estimated you would need include time for debate on the Warner second degree? The next question is this: If the Warner second-degree amendment prevails, which is a substitute, then the question is, Would the hour that you are referring to, then--without seeing, knowing exactly what would be in the second-degree amendment that would be offered--cover the debate time for your second-degree amendment to the substitute?

Mr. LEVIN. If that substitute were adopted----

Mr. LEVIN. And the second-degree amendment is not available at this point?

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Is Senator Reid here?

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I wonder if Senator Reid and Senator Warner are here. I want to clarify the length of time which the next amendment will take. My understanding is that Senator Reed's amendment might take as little as 10 minutes; in which case, it would make sense to stack his vote with the vote on the Biden amendment which would then be 2 hours later. However, if there is objection to that, I think people should be informed there could be another vote after this final vote on judges in about 10 or 15 minutes. I am wondering if Senator Warner is here.

Mr. LEVIN. So there will be no time agreement on the Sessions amendment until we know which amendment it is.

Mr. LEVIN. Excuse me. Do we have a copy of the Sessions amendment? Is Senator Sessions here?

Mr. LEVIN. I will amend that to ask that immediately after Jack Reed's amendment, there be a Sessions amendment for 30 minutes equally divided, and that we then go to a Biden amendment for perhaps as much as 2 hours, and there be three votes stacked at that point.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I revise that unanimous consent request to ask that immediately after the debate on Senator Reed's amendment, it be laid aside and we proceed to a debate on the Sessions amendment; that it then be laid aside and we then go to the Biden amendment, and we will hopefully have three votes at that time.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that after this vote, there then be a period of time to debate the Senator Jack Reed amendment, which we expect would be short. We would immediately go to the Biden amendment.

Mr. LEVIN. Should I make a unanimous consent request? I think Senator Hatch----

Mr. LEVIN. Senator Harry Reid, too.