John Spratt

Mr. SPRATT

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Markey-Moran-Burton-Spratt V- chip amendment. Many of the issues that we deal with in Congress are propagated right here inside the beltway and then they are exported back home where one group or another stirs up support for them. Concern about this issue, trouble about this issue, constant indiscriminate violence on our television airwaves, has grown from the grassroots up. If my colleagues do not believe it, they should go home and listen to their constituents and read just about any poll that has been taken on this subject. Mr. Chairman, vast majorities of the American people and the overwhelming number of our citizens say, it is time we do something to curb the violence on television. According to the American Psychological Association, children see over 8,000 killings on television by the time they reach the seventh grade. The American people quite simply want us to stop this outrage. They do not want us to stop it completely. If they want to watch it, if they want their children to watch it, then this bill says they can continue to watch it. But these parents, and particularly parents who work and children who are coming home in the afternoon or are there by themselves, they want devices for parents to control the entertainment in their own households, to control the violence and vulgarity that comes in over their televisions sets. Mr. Chairman, this bill is about parental empowerment, about controlling the conduct of their own children in their homes. These ratings and this V-chip is not going to purge violence or sex from television. They are not even intended to do that. But they will give parents more power over the television set and the type of viewing that comes into their own homes. Many parents, frankly, may choose not to exercise it. This does not make them use the V-chip. Nonetheless, those who do will send a message to the broadcasters and the producers. It will have an inhibiting effect, I think, on the kind of scripting that they do today; and they will think twice about putting some extra indiscriminate, wanton violence and vulgarity in. I think it will have a salutary effect. Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to vote against the Coburn substitute.

Mr. SPRATT

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, yesterday was Parents Day for the first time ever. A lot of us probably missed it. That is because by now we have a day for nearly every purpose under the sun. But this one, Parents Day, stands for something important: the importance of parents, our parents, in our own lives and in the life of our country. I think one way that Congress can distinguish this occasion and make it a special day is this week or next to pass H.R. 2030, a bill called parental choice in television. This bill gives parents a very simple power, the power to stop their children from watching TV shows that they think are too violent or too vulgar. Nationwide 72 percent of the people, when polled recently, said there is too much violence on TV. An even larger number said they thing that this violence shows up again as violence on the streets and violence in the schools. Our bills will give parents a device to block violence and sex from coming into their homes by TV. When parents have this device built into their own TV sets, I think the networks are going to take note. I think they are going to be a lot more careful about the violence and vulgarity that they script into today's programs. All sorts of groups that care about children, from the PTA, to the elementary school principals, from psychiatrists to pediatricians have endorsed our bill. I urge the Committee on Rules to do the same and allow us the opportunity to offer it as an amendment to the telecommunications bill when it comes up in the House.

Mr. SPRATT

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment. Mr. Chairman, I think it would be useful to start by correcting a few statements that have been made here on the floor that are just not supported by fact. It has been stated that the Electric Power Research Institute has decided that this technology is not worth pursuing. I have here a fairly thick study by the Electric Power Research Institute done by Commonwealth Edison, Duke Engineering, Yankee Atomic Energy Electric, here is the conclusion in the executive summary. This is a 1991 study: In conclusion, the utility review team recognizes that the high temperature gas reactor design offers a viable potential nuclear option to the power industry for the next century potential and deserves continuing development. This endorsement is consistent with previous opinions expressed by the utility industry and more recently by the endorsement of the Advance Reactor Corporation in the January 10, 1990, report, and the corporation's ad hoc committee on DOE's advanced reactor development plan. By the same token, it has been said here on the floor that this program was terminated by the Reagan administration and terminated by the Bush administration. In fact, the high-temperature gas-cooled reactor was one of two candidates for the new production reactor that would have gone to Savannah River or Idaho National Engineering Laboratory for the next tritium production source. In fact the NPR team, the new production reactor team at the Department of Energy, headed by Dominique Mineta, had settled upon this particular design, the high-temperature modular gas-cooled reactor, for the new tritium production source, when Admiral Watkins as the Secretary of Energy decided that we did not need to incur the expense of building a new production reactor. Why? Because that fall, in late September 1991, the Bush administration had entered into an agreement with the Soviet Union for the drawdown of nuclear weapons, and we had far more tritium generated as a result of that drawdown than we needed and there was no urgent immediacy or need for tritium. Indeed, we do not need any until the next century. That was the reason that the Bush administration did no go forward with the high temperature gas reactor at that time. For the statement here on the floor that that administration canceled it, has nothing to do with the merits of this program, and it does have merits. It had merits, first of all, still for the Department of Energy as a tritium production source. Indeed, the Department of Energy, while they are not pursuing this as their primary source, did single it out and did say themselves, their Energy Research Committee, said a couple of years ago, this concept has the highest probability for success if we choose a second generation reactor. Furthermore, they said that this concept, the high-temperature gas- cooled reactor, presents an opportunity for significant advantages in the level of safety over current commercial reactor experience. Mr. Chairman, it has been stated here on the floor that this particular design has inherent safety features. It is worth taking those one by one to show the House and the committee why it is worth pursuing this particular technology. First of all, the fuel particles, these uranium kernels, are encased in a ceramic coating that is pyrolytic, that is fired, that is made of silicone and carbon, and, as a result, the uranium is in an impermeable, impervious case. Consequently, once it is irradiated, it gives off heat, but it does not give off fissionable products. So you do not get the inner area of the reactor contaminated with fissionable products, with radionuclides. These are still contained in the ceramic case of the fuel particle. Second, to the extent that any of these radionuclides do escape, they are captured by a graphite matrix that is part of the fuel assembly. They absorb them. Third, the reactor itself has a helium moderator or coolant. Rather than using light water or regular water, it uses helium. Helium is inert. It does not chemically react with the reactor itself or with the fuel elements of the fuel assembly. And, unlike water, it does not boil. This gives it another passive safety feature. Finally, the fuel core is arranged so that there is a negative temperature coefficient. As the temperature goes up, radioactivity of the core goes down. All of these are passive safety features. Why is it important? Because this reactor is safe without depending upon the operator's interaction.

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, the important inherent safety features of this reactor means that it does not depend for its safety on an alert, astute operator, who is wide awake. Nor does it depend upon backup systems and a power system to supply these systems. It is passively and inherently safe by its own design. This particular system has been endorsed and supported by a number of people who believe that nuclear power still has a role to play in this country. One of those is Duke Power Co., which is a prominent electric utility in my own district. And the head or chairman emeritus of that company, Bill Lee, wrote us all a letter, wrote the chairman of this committee a letter. I would just like to read what the chairman of that committee said. People in the utility industry, this is Bill Lee talking, who look ahead, want the improvements in nuclear power that are represented by this technology. The electric utility industry supports the light water technology for its immediate potential benefits, but most people in the industry recognize that breakthrough potential of the gas turbine modular helium reactor and belief that these breakthroughs must be pursued and that it is the proper role of our Government for our Nation's longer term energy competitiveness to underwrite them. In my opinion, it is essential that this technology be continued along with the advanced light water reactor. If it is not, I fear we will be buying much of our nuclear power generating equipment in the next century from abroad. This would mean the loss of an industry larger than the commercial airplane market, and it would be sad indeed for the U.S. economy, U.S. jobs and the U.S. standard of living. Mr. Chairman, I urge the defeat of this amendment.

Mr. SPRATT

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Chairman, I would like to say to the Members of the House who do not know what the American Folklife Center is, I did not either, until I came on the House a couple years ago and we had an authorization bill under suspension, and I was told at the door that this was Lawrence Welk's homestead all over again. So like a hoard of other people, I voted no, only to get back to my office and have a phone call from a constituent, who happened to be chairman of the board of the American Folklife Center. I learned out in a hurry what it was all about. I want to say now I am a believer. I have seen it. There are about 12 full-time equivalents there. Last year they served the needs of 9,000 researchers, a wonderful repository of American folklife and folklore. One small example of what they do: Years ago, wax cylinders were made recording Indian chiefs and Indians of western tribes, recollections of their [[Page H 6216]] tribe, native music and things of this kind. These were languishing somewhere in the Library of Congress. This organization brought them forth, perfected them, made them into digitized CD-ROM's, and now we have that resource preserved. We need some organization that is committed to this. For $1.25 million, surely we can continue this kind of enterprise.

Mr. SPRATT

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. SPRATT. Would the gentleman in the well explain to me what he meant when he said I wanted to liberalize the amendment when all the plain language of this calls for is compliance with the terms of the amendment as it may be amended and modified----

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, in a debate like this we sometimes lose sight of the ball. This is my amendment. The very first paragraph in it calls for deployment at the earliest practical date of a highly effective theater missile defense. If you listened to the debate, you would think we were opposed to that. I am not. This bill pluses up ballistic missile defense of $3 billion requested by the administration to $3.8 billion. This amendment leaves the funding in place. Second, my amendment says it is a policy of the United States to develop tests and deploy at the earliest practical dates a national missile defense system that complies with the ABM treaty, and there is the rub, that complies with the ABM treaty. What does that mean? It means, and we specify, 100 ground-based interceptors at the site now designated or at such other sites if it is allowed by amendment to the ABM treaty. It amends the language of this amendment so that we can make unmistakable what everyone has asserted here on the floor, it is not our intention to violate it, go beyond the ABM treaty. It says the ABM treaty means a treaty in effect as of this date or with such amendments adopted after that date. It goes on to say nothing in this subtitle shall be interpreted to violate or to authorize a violation by the U.S. of the ABM treaty. Any provision that authorizes or requires the U.S. to deviate from the treaty is premised on the assumption that before any such action is taken amendments will be made to the treaty. Why is this necessary, desirable? Again for reasons that are purely consistent with ballistic missile defense. We want to get rid of 5,000 warheads by the ratification of START II, and that will make ballistic missile defense of this country feasible.

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield the balance of my time, 2 minutes, to the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Hamilton].

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Edwards].

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, may I ask how much time is remaining on each side?

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Alabama [Mr. Cramer].

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, my good friend, the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Weldon], chairman of the subcommittee, has just said in the well of the House to those who want to abrogate or violate the ABM treaty, he is opposed. It is not timely. And I agree with him. I will come to the reason I agree with him in fuller detail in a minute, but basically it boils down to this. It is not an opportune time to talk about that because the ratification of START II hangs in balance right now. The authors of this bill, therefore, say they don't support violation; they seek abrogation, not now, of the ABM treaty. All my amendment does is call for clarity, for the removal of any ambiguity, for spelling out their intention which they have stated here in the well of the House so that there is no mistake about it. Section 233 of this bill, however, calls on the Secretary of Defense to deploy at the earliest practicable dates a national missile defense, NMD, system designed to protect the United States against limited ballistic missile attacks. This NMD system, according to the bill, shall include up to 100 ground-based interceptors at a single site or at a greater number of sites as determined necessary by the Secretary. Mr. Chairman, the ABM treaty as it is now written limits the United States and Russia to 100 interceptors at 1 site. By requiring in this bill that any national missile defense system protect the entire United States at more than one site, if necessary, we are going beyond the boundaries of the existing treaty. We may need to, and I anticipate that in the very language of my amendment when I say, ``Stay within the ABM treaty or the processes of it and seek amendments where necessary.'' But as I read the bill, the Secretary has no leeway and, in effect, it requires a multisite system and this is a violation of the treaty as now written. As I said, my amendment deals with it by saying any such language would be interpreted to mean that we would seek an amendment to permit it before we went ahead to do it. Now, section 233 also refers to direct queuing of interceptors, that is having an interceptor on the ground queued by the so-called Brilliant Eye, or low-Earth orbit satellite, which will be put into place some time around the turn of the century if we ever deploy a missile defense system. This language is, too, a technical violation of the treaty. Now, I think we probably ought to clarify the amendment and permit it, but my amendment would say simply that if you are going to do it, then go seek a clarification or an agreed statement, or something that will permit it if you want to use that language. My amendment anticipates, calls for, the deployment of a national missle defense system which would include 100 interceptors at 1 or more sites if the additional sites were approved by amendment. A ground- based radar system and space-based sensors plus BMCCC, Battle Management Command, Control, and Communications software. Now, why is all of this so important? It is important because in the next 4 or 5 months the Russian Duma will either take up or not take up, and will either ratify or not ratify, START II. If START II is ratified, we will reduce Russian warheads, a real threat, which can be launched against us by 5,000, which is a significant diminution of the threat to the security of the United States today. It would reduce those by 5,000 down to 3,500 warheads. We cannot build a missile defense system that will effectively shoot down so many Russian missiles, so much ballistic missile threat against us, so cheaply as the ratification of START II. Why put it in jeopardy by leaving any ambiguity in this bill? [[Page H5947]] Ratification by the Duma is shaky at best. It is by no means assured. And any signal this Congress sends that we may be breaking out or reaching beyond the terms of the ABM treaty could doom START II. And now is not the time to send such a signal. START II serves our national security interests, as I said, by reducing the number of warheads that can be launched against us by 5,000 warheads; an enormous number. But it also does something else for our national security. By lowering the number of warheads that we will have to maintain in our arsenal, the launchers, the platforms from which they would be launched, it also frees up resources for other national defense needs which are really more pressing right now. It would save us the cost of maintaining a huge nuclear arsenal with more than 8,000 warheads in it. If START II is not ratified, then Secretary Perry warned in an address at Georgetown more than a year ago that we, the United States, will have no other choice. We will not go below START I levels. And there is no money currently in the DOD budget or the DOE budget to support this higher level of maintaining an arsenal of 8,500 warheads. We will have to cut into funding for conventional forces, for quality of life, for modernization, for readiness, in order to pay to maintain the arsenal at this higher level. I would rather pay to maintain a stronger conventional force. I would rather get rid of those 5,000 warheads potentially aimed at us. This amendment simply seeks to take the authors of the bill before us at their word and say, deploy a national missile system, but stay within the confines of the ABM treaty. If you need to amend it to go to multiple sites, then do so. Amend it. But it sends a signal to the Russians at a critical time here on the eve of ratification of START II that we are not about to break out of the ABM treaty. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. SPRATT. If the gentleman will yield, this amendment calls, first of all, as a first priority, for full speed ahead, theater missile defense development. Second, for the development and deployment of a national missile defense system. And, third, for compliance of that system, a national missile defense system--it only applies to that-- with the ABM treaty as it stands today or as we may amend it. It simply says stay within the processes of the ABM treaty in developing that system.

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield my last minute to the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Skelton].

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Peterson].

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Harman]. (Ms. HARMAN asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 2 minutes. I would like to respond to several points that have been raised by various speakers in this debate. First of all, Mr. Chairman, one of the speakers opened by saying if we had had this program in place and had been moving ahead of it, as though he were speaking in opposition to my amendment, we would not have suffered the casualties we suffered in the Persian Gulf. My amendment, first step says, our first priority is to deploy, and I quote, At the earliest practical date highly effective theater missile defenses to protect forward-deployed and expeditionary elements of the Armed Forces of the United States and to complement the missile defense capabilities of our allies and forces friendly to the United States. This calls for the deployment at the fastest possible rate of the THAAD, the theater high altitude intercept system and the ERINT. I might say here, Mr. Chairman, that we are talking as if we did not have a program. The gentleman from California [Mr. Dellums], our ranking member, just reminded everyone, if you were here in the 1980's, we spent $35 billion on strategic missile defense in the 1980's. And now, today, we have 10 systems in development by my count, a PAC-2 upgrade, a Patriot 2 upgrade, a Patriot 3, the extended range interceptor, the theater high altitude interceptor, so-called the THAAD, an upper tier system which the Navy is developing, it is plussed up by $170 to $200 billion in this bill before, a lower tier system to protect the fleet, a CORSAM system to protect the Army land-based forces, a so-called MEADS system, which would be an interoperable adaptation of that that would be used throughout NATO, a Hawk upgrade for better air defense, a boost phase intercept system which is not yet developed but will be developed to a down select among three contractors in a few years, and the Arrow missile which we are helping the Israelis with. In addition to that, on the strategic or national missile defense side provided for in this bill, we have a ground based interceptor, double the administration's request. And my amendment leaves that in place. We have lasers funded, chemical lasers, and we are fully funding and plussing up the request for Brilliant Eyes. That is a robust program, a step up of $800 million to $3.8 billion in this bill.

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Kennedy].

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding this time to me, and, Mr. Chairman, I would like to speak just briefly now, and more detail later, about the amendment I will offer when the time comes. I would like to highlight three reasons why my amendment ought to be supported. First of all, the language in this bill is ambiguous about full compliance with the ABM Treaty, and I think that is the wrong signal to send to the Russians at this particular time. In the next 3, 4, 5 months the Russian Duma will decide whether or not it will ratify the START II Treaty and take the number of nuclear warheads in its arsenal from around 8,500 down to around 3,500. Now reduction in 5,000 warheads will have a significant effect on the security of this country and the security of the whole world. There will be reciprocal reductions on all sides. That is a critical development, and we dare not do anything that would jeopardize it. If we rattle the cage, the ABM Treaty, if we suggest that we may be breaking out of it, not now, but in the future, sort of an anticipatory breach, if we send that signal to the Russians, then we will put an even greater risk than it already stands now, the ratification of START II, and that is not a good decision. Second, by keeping START II on track not only do we improve our national security, we save money. Without START II we will have to keep in place our arsenal of 8 to 10,000 nuclear warheads on the sea, under the sea, on land. We will have to maintain a much larger arsenal, 8,500 warheads instead of 3,500 warheads, and obviously an arsenal with 3,500 warheads is much cheaper to maintain. So, if we are forced by the nonratification of START II to maintain an arsenal that really exceeds our needs, then in order to have strategic symmetry with the Russians we will have to pay substantial money that will come out of readiness, and modernization, and quality of life. So, a vote for my amendment removes the ambiguity in the bill, does not signal the wrong signals to the Russians, and it means we can maintain a smaller arsenal and have more money to spend on things we need for conventional defense. Third, by voting for my amendment, which simply calls for compliance with the IBM Treaty, we will not leave this country defenseless as some of the opponents to my amendment have claimed. We can put in a ground- based interceptor that will protect the continental United States. Right now the treaty allows it, and we can amend the treaty in the future to allow for more sites if we feel they are needed for the full coverage of the United States, Alaska, and Hawaii. I have a letter from Sid Greybill, Nixon's top negotiator on the ABM Treaty, and I will leave it here in the House for any Member who wishes to see it. It has been sent out by ``Dear Colleague.'' Mr. Greybill supports my amendment, and he agrees that we can say fairly the ABM Treaty does not leave us defenseless. By its faults we can deploy a ground-based system which will give us ample defense. The authors of the ballistic missile provisions in the markup asserted that it was not their intention to break out of the treaty, and I commend them for that. My amendment simply takes them at their word and puts provisions in black and white in this bill which simply say comply with the treaty, and to the extent that we do not find compliance in our national self-interest, then stay within the processes of the treaty and seek amendments, agreed statements and other modifications or changes to it. There is too much at stake to allow ambiguous language to stay in this bill. I say to my colleagues, ``I urge you to support this amendment when it is offered.'' Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SPRATT

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I spent 2 years of my life in defense procurement and what I learned mostly is how little I know. But I do know this: I would tread lightly when departing from the standard of full and open competition. So I rise to raise a caution flag as to the language in the bill before us and to commend the gentlewoman from Illinois [Mrs. Collins] our ranking member, for the amendment she is now offering, which I support. For those Members of this body who do not remember the passage of CICA, who were not here, CICA is the Competition in Contracting Act, I think it is important to recall some of its successes. CICA was a landmark piece of legislation which originated in the Congress, and originated in response to widely perceived abuses in the defense procurement arena which I need not enumerate here. CICA said in effect if we can have full and open competition, that we do not have to have post-award audits, because we can tell the public this has been vigorously competed and awarded in that manner. So it narrowed the exceptions to the use of full and open competition from 17 to 7. It required competition advocates to be established at each procurement activity as a way of checking routine use or abuse of any one of the exceptions to full and open competition. In effect, these advocates also served the role of breaking the code on how to do business with the Defense Department for firms that have not been bidders in the past. It required that notices of intent to procure be published daily in the Commerce Business Daily so that industry as a whole, the whole spectrum, would know of upcoming procurements, not just some selected groups. It reformed the protest procedure so that losing bidders could self-police the system, make it more competitive. What are the results after about 10 years? As a result of CCA, the Competition in Contracting Act, the Navy more than doubled the annual value of its competitive awards going from $9 billion in fiscal 1982 to $21 billion in fiscal 1994. The Army increased the percentage of its competitive actions from 40 percent in 1982 to 88 percent in fiscal year 1994. At a time when the investment accounts, procurement and R&D were declining, those are significant results, Mr. Chairman. I would not like to see us make the mistake today of turning back from this vigorous competition which we have been able to build into our system. Yet we have here before us an act which uses a new term, maximum practicable competition. I am told it was used in prior law. But when the gentlewoman from Illinois [Mrs. Collins], as the ranking member, was going [[Page H5933]] through this legislation in the process of the first hearing on it and she simply asked a question for starters to the board of industry people who were testifying, what does it mean, not one of them could articulate a definition that was usable in practice. Then it provides, in addition to narrowing down competition from free and open to maximum practicable, it provides for a verification system so that certain contractors will become select contractors, and an elite set, a club of contractors. That is a very important and potentially dangerous step. It is potentially a move away from free and open competition all the way to cartelization. This is not streamlining potentially. It is potentially setting up a cartelized club of competitors, the established defense contractors. So I ask the question: What is the definition? What are the criteria for getting in this select club, being a verified contractor? Once again, we could not get from the witnesses before us an elaboration of what this meant. It is all left to the discretion of the procurement agencies. Let me tell you, we have found in the past that these procuring officers and these procuring activities and these procurement agencies do indeed wanted to streamline what they do. They would like to simplify. Vigorous competition comes down as a burden on their back to bear. They like to make it as simple and direct as possible. But we have to be careful here that, as we move to streamline, before just willy-nilly putting provisions like these in the code and turning back on something that has worked well, we will move, I fear, from competition to cartelization. There are other things in here: commercial exceptions for commercial buying which I support but we need better definition. We are moving away from using GAO and the dispute resolution process to a new appellate procedure. I have not any idea whether that is a good idea or not. I will say to the chairman I was there until midday with the hearing, I could not stay for the rest of the hearing. It may well have been worked out then. I am not criticizing him or the committee. I am simply raising a caution flag saying, let us be diligent, let us be careful, let us do the right thing here. Our objective in this bill and in the years ahead is to defend the country for about $250 to $260 billion. That is a lot less money than it used to be, but it is still a lot of money. If we are not--we simply cannot do what we need to do, fund four military services, if we spend the money the way we spent it in the 1980's. We have to spend it smarter than we did in the 1980's. We should take care here that we do not build into title 10 of the code a bias toward high cost contractors who bid without the fear or discipline of rigorous competition and charge us more than we have to pay, or we will undo the whole quest that lies before us in this bill. So the gentlewoman and I are saying is that, when we go into the markup, I support the gentlewoman's amendment, I think it is a substantially positive improvement to this bill and hope everybody will vote for it. But as we go into the markup of this bill, I think it still needs a thorough scrubbing.

Mr. SPRATT

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Hamilton].

Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Chairman, I oppose the Dornan amendment because the Dornan amendment would in effect wipe out what is a very good program, a bipartisan program, Nunn-Lugar. I would be the first to admit that Nunn-Lugar can be improved, but this amendment before us just goes too far. It throws out every baby with the bath water. Nunn-Lugar has three major objectives: First, to destroy weapons of mass destruction, nuclear, chemical, biological, that belong to the Soviet Union; second, to prevent the proliferation of the components of these weapons, nuclear materials and missile guidance devices after they have been dismantled and before they are destroyed; and, three, to prevent the diversion of scientists and engineers who made these weapons to other countries [[Page H5868]] where they could make them again and use them against us. Nobody can dispute those objectives. Nobody can claim that those are not worthy objectives. And this must be made clear, Nunn-Lugar is not a handout for the benefit of Russia, Belarus or Kazakhstan. This is a program which is in our best interests as well as theirs. Has it worked? That is a key question. I have a report card from the Pentagon, and this is how they would grade it. First of all, Nunn-Lugar has helped remove more than 2,800 warheads from missiles in the former Soviet Union, 2,800 warheads have been removed from missiles in the former Soviet Union. About 1,800 of these warheads were on missiles in the Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan. All of the Kazakhstan warheads have been removed and returned to Russia. Ukrainian and Belarusian warheads will be returned by the end of next summer. That is significant process: 2,800 warheads, 1,800 of these have been removed. Nunn-Lugar has also helped destroy 630 strategic launchers and bombers, deactivated another 1,000 bombers in the Ukraine and Kazakhstan, all of this in our interests. Third, Nunn-Lugar partly funded the transportation of 600 kilograms of highly enriched uranium, enough to make at least 20 weapons, from Kazakhstan to safe storage in this country at Oak Ridge, TN. Fourth, Nunn-Lugar is constructing a plutonium storage facility in Tomsk, Siberia. That has been one of the earliest objectives of it. From the outset we said we want to not only dismantle these weapons and remove them from the silos, we want to get them under tight control where they can be accounted for in a facility built specifically for that purpose. It has taken some time to get off the ground. A facility built to store plutonium components, the pits, that comes out of warheads, critically important components that we do not want to escape the Soviet Union. That facility is finally under way in Tomsk, Siberia. For goodness sake, we do not want to stop that. Fifth, Nunn-Lugar has helped employ 8,200 weapons scientists and engineers in civilian research projects. Instead of going somewhere else, bending their talents to the use of some other country which might have policies that are intense and hostile to us, instead of using them to build weapons against us in the former Soviet Union, 8,200 weapons scientists are employed in civilian research at a very favorable exchange rate for our money. Personally, I would give Nunn-Lugar, based on that report card, a solid B plus. Maybe because it was slow to get out of the starting blocks, a little bit slow to pick up speed, momentum, we would give it a solid B, but no less than that. And on certain important tests, it has literally aced out. It has achieved its intended purposes. For example, it has denuclearized Kazakhstan, and Ukraine and Belarus will be denuclearized. There will be no weapons, nuclear weapons in those three countries by the end of next summer, which is an extraordinary achievement by any yardstick. If we do not stop this program, three of the four nuclear weapons states of the former Soviet Union will have no nuclear weapons by the end of next summer. Do we want to stop that kind of progress? This program may not grade well on chemical and biological weapons. I understand and share the frustration of the gentleman from California [Mr. Dornan] in that respect. I do not blame him there in the least. The former Soviet Union is not doing nearly enough. But his amendment, if I can continue the metaphor, would expel, if you will, the whole Nunn-Lugar program for poor grades in this particular area on biological and chemical weapons, and this is shortsighted for the reasons just mentioned. Why slow down the efforts to get nuclear warheads out of Ukraine and Belarus because of the sins of Russia? Why stop what is a fundamentally extraordinary program in those two countries because of disagreement with Russia on chemical and biological weapons? Second, why stop dismantling nuclear weapons in Russia because progress on other weapons is not all yet that it can be? I have here some photographs that I would invite everyone to take note of, photographic evidence of what is taking place. It just gives a little graphic emphasis. Here is a missile, an SS-19 being removed from a silo with Nunn-Lugar money. Here is a bomber being cut up with a chain saw, the equivalent of it, Nunn-Lugar money. Here is another. And here is Secretary Perry standing with a Russian officer looking at a silo where a weapon has been removed, about to be dismantled and destroyed. Let us not stop this program because of our disagreement with the Russians over their chemical and biological program. Let us vote against this Dornan amendment.