James Risch

Mr. RISCH

Mr. RISCH. Madam President, with all due respect to my good friend from Maryland, this is exactly the right vehicle to bring this up. This is a vehicle of trust, and it is a vehicle that puts some teeth in an otherwise toothless thing. As far as human rights versus this stolen property, this is very objective, it is hard, you can see it. The human rights violations I think are entirely different. They certainly are important. They certainly rise to as high a level, but this is objective.

Mr. RISCH. Madam President, may I claim my 19 seconds.

Mr. RISCH. Madam President, somehow the debate about the relationship between Russia and Georgia and our relationship as far as Georgia is concerned has crept into this debate. This amendment has nothing to do with Georgia, other than the fact that is where the theft took place. The international criminal offense of theft of our military property took place in Georgia. That is the only thing Georgia has to do with this. This has nothing to do with the relationship. Amendment No. 4879 has a lot to do with it. When we get there, we will talk about that. I regret my good friend from New Hampshire cannot support this amendment, because although I suspect I will support the resolution, we do a lot of these resolutions. We do the resolution and send it off to the Russians. They are going to be laughing up their sleeve at us, whilst they are fondling our equipment that they have possession of. There are no teeth in these resolutions. We actually have the opportunity to do something to get our military equipment back. If they are acting in good faith, if they are people of good will, if they want a relationship with us, then they are going to have to make a choice: Do we keep four humvees or do we give them back so this treaty can go into effect? That is the choice they are going to have to make. That is not too tough a choice to put on them. Do you want to continue to be thieves or do you want to be honest about this and deliver the goods you have stolen? There is nothing wrong about that. This gives us the opportunity, I say to the good Senator, to do what you exactly do on the resolution, but it is going to give it some teeth. I yield the floor.

Mr. RISCH. Madam President, may I respond.

Mr. RISCH. Madam President, I wish to call up amendment No. 4878.

Mr. RISCH. Madam President, I join my colleague from Idaho in underscoring the difficulty we have on this issue. Most people on this floor don't have a full appreciation of what those of us in the West have to deal with. Two out of every three acres in Idaho are owned by the Federal Government. The Federal Government came in, in the mid- 1990s, and forced the wolf upon the State. The Governor didn't want it, the legislature didn't want it, and the congressional delegation didn't want it. Nonetheless, the Federal Government brought us 34 wolves. Now they have turned into well over 1,000, and nobody knows exactly how many breeding pairs there are. The result is that there has been tremendous havoc wreaked on our preferred species in Idaho, the elk. We have done an outstanding job of managing elk, the preferred species, but they are also the preferred species for the wolf to eat. They are not vegetarians. As a result, we have had a tremendous problem with wolves in Idaho, and we have brought a bill to the Senate to turn the management of wolves over to the State. All the other animals are managed by the State. We have done a great job for well over 100 years of managing two other difficult predators, the bear and various cats. We have done it responsibly, on a sustained basis, and we want to do the same thing with wolves. The Federal Government has to let go of this. We have tried. We have the Federal courts that have stepped in. I don't quite understand how the Federal court can claim the wolf is still an endangered species, when they can turn 34 wolves into over 1,000 and the population has exploded. Nonetheless, they have. It is time for Congress to act. I yield back to Senator Crapo.

Mr. RISCH

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, the proponents of the amendment have how much time remaining?

Mr. RISCH. Does that include my 10 minutes of closing?

Mr. RISCH. No.

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, is the next vote going to be on this amendment or are the judges going to be voted on first?

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, Senator Corker has indicated he would like to take those 4\1/2\ minutes, so I yield the floor to Senator Corker.

Mr. RISCH. So we have 15 minutes left to yield time.

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, Senator Sessions was next, so I yield the floor to the Senator from Alabama.

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, under the UC, I believe I have the last 10 minutes. Am I correct on that? I think that was the UC.

Mr. RISCH. So when I finish, at the conclusion of the 10 minutes, we will vote? Is that my understanding?

Mr. RISCH. My understanding is he can use that at any time and I get the last 10.

Mr. RISCH. I thank the Senator. I will try not to disappoint in that regard. Mr. President, fellow Senators, distinguished chairman and ranking member, I think certainly we have had a civil and a good airing of an issue that is of considerable concern to, I think, every Member of this body. I am a little disappointed in that we started out acknowledging it was a very deep and serious concern to every Member of this body, as it was to the commission, in their Report on America's Strategic Posture. I felt that along the line a little bit the concern was denigrated. I want to back up on that one more time and say that, in my judgment, and in the judgment of members of this commission, the issue of tactical weapons exceeds, in severity, in concern, the issue of strategic weapons. I understand one might argue that you are arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin as opposed to which is of the most concern. But I come back to the reasons I gave as to why I think the tactical issue is important more than the strategic issue. That is, on the strategic issue, we are in about the same position we were 40 years ago, with the exception, and admittedly an important exception, that the raw numbers are down. When we started this 40 years ago, each party had about 6,000 warheads. As I said, if either party pulled the trigger and launched 6,000 or some significant part of that, obviously that is the deterrence that each party was counting on that neither would do that. Today we are down to--and with all due respect to my good friend from Massachusetts, the numbers reported in the press are 1,100 and 2,100. I understand there is intelligence information that we cannot go into here. But, in any event, I think most people would agree that we have the advantage in numbers from a strategic standpoint. Indeed, if the numbers are even close to that, the--whether it is 6,000 warheads or 1,000 warheads, when someone pulls the trigger, the party is over for this world. So focusing on the raw numbers, when we have got a 40-year history that we are not going to do that and they are not going to do that, and most people agree that neither side is inclined to pull the trigger, what are the real concerns? The real concerns are an accidental launch from them, although remote, possible, but, more importantly, an intentional launch by a rogue nation. Obviously one would look at North Korea or one would look at Iran in that regard. In my judgment, the two issues that need to be focused on are the defensive missile issue and the tactical nuclear weapons issue. Let me say I agree with my good friend from Massachusetts and Senator Levin, that geography is such that the issue of tactical weapons is substantially more important on a direct basis to the Russians than it is to us. After all, we are insulated by oceans on each side of us to the east and the west, which the Russians do not enjoy, and they have a several hundred-year history of seeing invasions come by land and intermediately, which we do not have. So in that regard I will concede certainly that the tactical issue is important for them. And the good Senator from Massachusetts makes a good point in that I think they would like to relocate, if they could, their tactical weapons to be focused more on the Chinese threat and perhaps more on the threat from the south, from other countries. We ought to help them out in that regard by entering into negotiations in that regard on the tactical weapons. But I come back to the tactical weapons are an important issue. Senator Levin says they are a concern. Senator Levin says, we should not kill this treaty simply because of a concern, and I agree with Senator Levin. I have not, from day one, said we ought to kill this treaty. I have said from day one, everyone has convinced me, and I think virtually everyone else, that we are much better off with a treaty than we are without a treaty. I think everyone has worked in good faith in that regard. But, on the other hand, having said that, I do not think we should then throw in the towel and say: Well, okay, we will agree to any treaty. That brings me to the point of where we are. We are exercising our constitutional right that every one of us--not only our right but our duty as a Senator, to advise and consent on this treaty and any other treaty that is put in front of us, and that is where I have problems. The position we have been put in is these negotiations have gone on, the treaty has been negotiated, it has been signed by the President, and it has been put in front of us, and what we are told is, it is a take it or leave it. If you do not vote for this, you are voting to kill the treaty. I disagree with that. I think simply because we amend the preamble to this treaty is not a killer. Indeed, my good friend from Massachusetts keeps telling us, the preamble does not mean anything, it is a throw- away, the language is a throw-away, it does not mean anything. Well, it does mean something, particularly when it comes to the context in which you interpret and you react to the treaty. So to everyone here, I say, you have the opportunity to set the restart button with Russia, and we can do it by focusing on what is an extremely important issue, which most everyone here agrees is an extremely important issue, but nobody ever does anything about it. So let's tell the negotiators: Go back to the table and at least agree that the interrelationship between the strategic and tactical weapons is an important issue, and we are not going to go on as we have over the last 40 years. The times have changed. We trust you are not going to pull the trigger on us, and you trust that we are not going to pull the trigger on you. But this issue of tactical weapons where we enjoy, if you would, a 10-to-1 disadvantage to the Russians, we have tactical weapons that are out there that can be much more easily gotten ahold of by terrorists than strategic weapons. We have tactical weapons that continue to be designed, continue to be manufactured, and continue to be deployed by the other side, in violation of their admittedly individual Presidential initiatives, which needs to be addressed. It is so important that people on this commission said that it should be addressed before strategic weapons. You have the opportunity to put that in here. There is no intent to kill this. It is an intent to make it better. We have the right. We have the duty. We must advise and consent. I urge that my colleagues vote in favor of this very good amendment.

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, I say to Senator Kerry, I respect that. I would remind everyone that I filed a letter dated December 17 to Senator Kerry and Senator Lugar from six members of the commission, including James Schlesinger, which says that: Dealing with this imbalance is urgent-- Referring to the tactical weapons-- Dealing with this imbalance is urgent, and, indeed, some Commissioners would give priority to this over taking further steps to reduce the number of operationally deployed strategic nuclear weapons. I agree. I thank the good chairman and ranking member for a very good dialogue on this particular issue. I yield back my time. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, I understand we have 4\1/2\ minutes remaining, plus my 10 minutes at the very end.

Mr. RISCH

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President and fellow Senators, what we are going to do is, tomorrow, at noon, we are going to start with amendment No. 4839. Amendment No. 4839 deals with the relationship between strategic weapons, which this treaty deals with, and tactical weapons, which this treaty does not deal with but should. That is essentially the purpose of this amendment. I think virtually everyone who is involved in this debate has an opinion on this, No. 1. But almost everyone agrees that the issue of tactical weapons, namely, short-range weapons, is a very serious issue and rises to at least the level of the discussion on strategic weapons, and perhaps even more so. So tomorrow we are going to have a spirited discussion about those issues. There has actually been quite a bit of debate already on this, and for those of you who are like me, and you take the Congressional Record home and read it in the evening, if you go back and look at the debates on the various treaties that dealt with nuclear weapons treaties, you will see that some very bright people, some of whom are still Members of this body, have already spoken on this issue. I am looking forward to having this discussion tomorrow. With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, is amendment No. 4839 at the desk?

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. RISCH

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, I wish to respond briefly to my good friend from Montana. First of all, let me say that I, of course, was at the hearings the Senator referred to in our Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Ordinarily, I wouldn't involve myself at all in the internal matters in Montana. Natural resource issues are best decided by the people who live in the particular counties and in the particular States where that resource is located. On this particular issue, however, one of the areas of land included in the landmass my good friend from Montana described in his bill is an area that is referred to as Mount Jefferson. Mount Jefferson and the area included admittedly are entirely within the State of Montana. However, the only way the southern part can be accessed is through the State of Idaho. I couldn't agree more with my good friend from Montana in saying that we need to keep our eye on the ball, and that is jobs, jobs, jobs. The particular area in question is not a large area. I think the total amount is 4,400 acres. The amount I am talking about is about 2,200 acres, but it is used intensively by Idaho people engaging in recreation in the wintertime. Under my good friend's bill, that would have been closed out, and the snowmobiling particularly would have been prohibited in this area, which is the south side of Mount Jefferson. I sincerely appreciate my friend's willingness to talk about this and to work on this particular issue. As we go forward with this--and I have no doubt that his commitment to his State will cause him to continue to work with us on this issue and to deal with this particular bill and the areas of land he is talking about in this bill as we go into the next Congress. I commit to work with him, and I hope we can resolve this issue. As I say, the issue of winter snowmobiling only as far as motorized use of this particular area is of great importance to the people of the State of Idaho. I thank the Senator for his courtesies thus far, and I look forward to working with Senator Tester in the next Congress on this issue. With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. RISCH

Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to make some general comments about the matter under consideration, and that being the possible ratification of the New START treaty. First, let me say I come with what I think is a unique perspective, in that I sit on both the Foreign Relations Committee and the Intelligence Committee. In addition to that, I am rather new here so I have a fresh set of eyes, if you will, on these kinds of issues. The ability to be able to talk about these issues and to debate them and then cast a vote is somewhat frustrating, and that is a view I share with my friend and the distinguished Senator from California, Senator Feinstein, the chairman of the Intelligence Committee. Just like her, my views of this matter are colored to some degree and are affected to some degree by matters that we can't talk about here and that we can't disclose. Nonetheless, that obviously cannot stop us from having hopefully as productive a discussion as possible about this subject matter, and it has been a productive discussion. There are good things that have come out of this so far, and I am going to talk about those in a minute. But let me say one thing I have been impressed with throughout. I have sat through I can't tell you how many hours of meetings, of briefings, of actual field trips out to facilities, and all those kinds of things, but I have been impressed with the good faith of everyone who is working on this matter. This is a unique situation that we as Senators have a constitutional responsibility to focus on. Our responsibility in this is equal to the President of the United States. A foreign treaty such as this, the Founding Fathers said, can only come into play if, on the one hand, the President of the United States signs off on it; and if, on the other hand, two-thirds of the Senators sign off on it. So our responsibilities are equal in that regard. As a result of that, all of us need to, in my judgment, approach this on a good-faith basis and on a what-is-best-for-America basis. All of us have seen the people on TV who are very sarcastic about who is going to win and who is going to lose. The only ones we need to be concerned about who will win and lose are the American people. I have come to some conclusions throughout this that are new to me. One, of course, is the fact--and these are some observations I want to make about the whole process--that everyone is approaching this in good faith. The second conclusion that I have reached--and I think is widely held--is that we are much better off if we have a treaty than if we don't have a treaty. I would, however, modify that by saying but not just any treaty. Those are just observations, along with one other that I have, which is that there are some good things in this particular treaty, not the least of which are the things people have talked about here, and that is, first of all, having a relationship with the Russians; and secondly, having actual inspections, even though they are very attenuated, but nonetheless having inspections; and thirdly, having a table around which people can get around and discuss possible violations or accusations one might have against the other. That brings me to the next subject I want to talk about, and that is the historical basis we find ourselves in. The people who did this 40 years ago and actually started the dialog and took us to the first treaty with the Russians are real heroes. They are people who were patriots and people to whom we owe a great deal of gratitude. They have set this stage, if you would, for where we are today. Probably the most important thing they have given us is a 40-year history of dealing with this. When they sat down at the table, they did the things they did to come to the agreements they did, but the overriding philosophy on the defense of the United States against Russia and the defense of Russia against the United States was that if either one launched against the other, the other would launch, which would ensure the mutual destruction of both parties. That has been the philosophy under which we have operated for the 40 years. Over the 40 years--sometimes things take a long time to sink in, but I think the Russians have come to the conclusion, as Americans have come to the conclusion, that is not a good thing. The likelihood of either party pulling the trigger on the other, in my judgment, and I think probably in the judgment of most people, is not very likely. Is it possible? Of course, it is possible. Anything is possible. An accidental launch is possible--I do not believe from our side. Without going into the details of this, but through my intelligence work I have looked at the failsafe things we have in place, and I do not believe we are going to have an accidental launch. I do not have the same level of confidence with the other side. Nonetheless, I believe the likelihood of either party doing this is highly unlikely. Where does that take us to today? The world has changed in 40 years. Forty years ago, when we sat down with the Russians, we were the two superpowers in the world. We were essentially the two that had these kinds of arms. We were worried about each other--for good reason. Today that is a very different situation. I am much more concerned, and I think most people are much more concerned, about North Korea, about Iran, and for that matter some other countries that have nuclear weapons, as far as being a threat to us in the United States. One of the overriding concerns I have had and criticisms, if you would, is that we are focusing in this exercise, again on this 40-year history and relationship we have with Russia without bringing into the mix the other real issues--and there are real issues. The first one I will talk about is modernization. That is one of the good things that has come out of this. There has been tremendous movement since the beginning of this on people's realization that our need to modernize our nuclear stockpile is very real. I commend the administration. I commend the chairman and the cochairman of the committee for pursuing that issue. Great strides have been made in that regard. The other issue we are going to talk about a lot--in fact, my distinguished colleagues from Wyoming and Arizona are going to lay down an amendment in a moment about an issue that is of top priority to me, and that is the missile defense issue. I am going to talk more about the details of that when we actually get into debating this amendment. Suffice it to say, the concerns I have had and the criticism I have had of this process is we are still talking about this in terms that existed 40 years ago, instead of the terms of the real world we live in today, where we have an overhead threat from nations that we, in my judgment, have not adequately addressed. I think one of the criticisms I have is we have missed an opportunity on missile defense. We did not miss that opportunity on modernization, but we have missed it on missile defense. I am going to close with this. It brings me to my last two points. Time is important as you go through these things. I do not like us being up against the deadline we are up against when we have a matter of this magnitude we should be debating. That colors my judgment, what I think is the lack of time for consideration for the most deliberative body of the world to actually deliberate on this issue. The last one that I have real difficulty with is a matter of what we call the transcripts. You heard me talk earlier about the fact that we have the same responsibilities as the President of the United States in making the decision on this. Yet he has access to the transcripts of the negotiators, and we have been denied access to the transcript of the negotiators, which gives me pause. Most reasonable people would not accept something, sign on to a contract--which is what we are doing with ratifying this--without knowing all the facts. I can tell you we do not know all the facts. That particularly becomes important. I am troubled by the missile defense issues we have. I would like to know what assurances were given to the Russians regarding missile defense, particularly when I read their independent statements, their third- party statements about this. I would like to know what is in those transcripts. So that is a very difficult bridge I am going to have to cross. Nonetheless, my vote on this depends upon the amendments--and there are real amendments addressing real issues in this discussion. My final vote is going to depend upon what actually happens in the amendment process. I yield the floor for my distinguished colleague from Arizona, Senator McCain.

Mr. RISCH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You have correctly identified the serious concerns that I and a number of others have. I am delighted to hear your invitation to attempt to clarify these matters where we can protect the American people, which is the highest objective that both he and I share. Regarding the transcripts, I am not satisfied with a summary. I would like to see the transcripts. That is a point we can discuss at another time. I thank the Senator for his consideration.