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Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, it is my privilege to rise to join with my colleagues from New Hampshire and Pennsylvania and Colorado in support of the New START treaty, the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty.
I bring a bit of a personal perspective, a bit of affection for this issue, for this reason: When I was in graduate school, I was studying to take on issues of world economic development, issues of international poverty. I had worked in Latin America. I had worked in India. I traveled through Central America. I spent some time in west Africa. I thought global poverty was a very important issue that could be worth investing my career in.
But as I came out of graduate school, I had an opportunity to switch tracks and work on nuclear issues as a Presidential fellow for Caspar Weinberger in the Reagan administration. This was a complete change of direction and one I didn't anticipate. But I went through that door and worked on strategic issues because the greatest threat to our planet was the successful management of nuclear weapons, strategic nuclear weapons, an enormous threat that needed to be smartly managed. I felt that engaging in that discussion, being part of that effort, was a very valuable matter in which to put my energy.
So I spent 2 years at the Pentagon working on strategic nuclear issues and then worked for Congress, the Congressional Budget Office, as a strategic nuclear policy analyst during the 1980s. It gave me a bit of a closeup view and a view particularly of the Reagan administration, working with Mikhail Gorbachev--Reagan and Gorbachev--working on these issues. One related issue--though not a strategic issue, it certainly had strategic implications--was the theater nuclear arms negotiations that resulted in the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. Back then it was called the zero option. It created intrusive inspection regimes to ensure that both nations were complying with the treaty. That, of course, was the hallmark of Reagan's philosophy that we "trust but verify.''
More than the specifics of that treaty, I wish to note that it passed 93 to 5. That treaty, similar to most strategic arms treaties, passed with wide bipartisan support. When it comes to the safety of our Nation, when it comes to minimizing the threat of nuclear devastation, we have set aside red and blue, we have set aside Republican and Democrat, and we have done what is right for our Nation.
Certainly, the threat involving nuclear weapons is as serious today as it was in 1987 when President Reagan signed the INF treaty or when it was ratified in 1998.
Now the Senate must decide whether to ratify the New START treaty. New START limits both the United States and Russia to 1,550 deployed strategic warheads, a significant reduction from the 2002 Moscow Treaty. It limits both parties to 700 deployed strategic delivery vehicles. These reductions continue to reduce both nations' oversized nuclear arsenals, a dangerous legacy of the Cold War, while allowing the U.S. military to preserve a flexible strategic deterrent.
The new treaty improves our strategic relationship with Russia. The new treaty reinforces the U.S. global leadership in nonproliferation.
Verification is a key element in New START, consistent with President Reagan's philosophy of "trust but verify.'' With the expiration of START a year ago, U.S. officials have been without their ability to conduct onsite inspections in Russia for the first time in a decade and a half, and that increases the nuclear threat.
The new treaty allows both parties to verify compliance through data exchanges, through onsite inspections, and through reconnaissance satellites. Both countries must maintain a database listing the types of locations of all accountable warheads and delivery vehicles. Each delivery vehicle is assigned a unique identifier, which is used to track it from the moment of production through its various deployments and to its dismantlement. U.S. inspectors can verify using short notice, onsite inspections.
This treaty is critical in safeguarding nuclear material and preventing proliferation of weapons and it is critical for our relationship with Russia and our authority on nuclear issues. Let me quote one expert:
The principal result of nonratification would be to throw the whole nuclear negotiating situation into a state of chaos.
That quote comes from GEN Brent Scowcroft, who was the first President Bush's National Security Adviser, or let's listen to this expert:
A rejection of [this treaty] would indicate that a new period of American policy had started that might rely largely on the unilateral reliance of its nuclear weapons, and would therefore create an element of uncertainty in the calculations of adversaries and allies. And therefore, I think it would have an unsettling impact on the international environment.
That is Dr. Henry Kissinger.
Today there is an article in the Washington Post: "Why New START Deserves GOP Support.'' This is written by Dr. Kissinger, George Shultz, James Baker, III, Lawrence Eagleburger, and Colin Powell. These are Secretaries of State for the last five Republican Presidents joining together in a detailed analysis of the New START and why the Senate should ratify this treaty.
There are some who may say it is not an issue of the substance but, rather, we just need more time to consider the provisions. Consider this: The treaty was signed on April 8 of this year. The treaty went through extensive and thorough hearings and briefings on the Foreign Relations Committee. The committee favorably reported it out with bipartisan support on September 16. In the 34 weeks since the treaty was signed and the 10 weeks since it was reported from the Committee on Foreign Relations, every Member of our body has had an opportunity to read the testimony, to explore the content, to consult with the experts, to consult with the administration, and to reach a conclusion. In fact, we have had more opportunity to review this treaty than the 100th Congress did for the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty under Ronald Reagan.
Finally, I think it is useful to hear President Reagan's thoughts on nuclear weapons. In 1985, he said this:
There is only one way safely and legitimately to reduce the cost of national security, and that is to reduce the need for it. And this we are trying to do in negotiations with the Soviet Union. We are not just discussing limits on a further increase of nuclear weapons. We seek, instead, to reduce their number. We seek total elimination one day of nuclear weapons from the face of the Earth.
Well, this treaty does not eliminate nuclear weapons, but it does reduce them and it does, in the eyes of expert after expert after expert--Democratic experts and Republican experts--make our Nation more secure. So there can be no better reason to ratify it as soon as possible.
I thank the Chair.
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