NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 1996 (Senate - August 02, 1995)
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The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Hutchison). Under the previous order, the Senate will proceed to consideration of S. 1026, which the clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
A bill (S. 1026) to authorize appropriations for fiscal year 1996 for military activities of the Department of Defense, for military construction, and for defense activities of the Department of Energy, to prescribe personnel strengths for such fiscal year for the Armed Forces, and for other purposes.
The Senate proceeded to consideration of the bill.
Mr. THURMOND. Madam President, today the Senate begins consideration of S. 1026, the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 1996. The bill we bring to the floor incorporates the Armed Services Committee's best judgments on the Nation's defense requirements. It is based on many long hours of testimony, analysis, debate, and consideration of opposing views.
I would like to thank the distinguished ranking member of the committee, Senator Nunn, for his outstanding leadership, and for his open, fair, and bi-partisan manner. I would also like to thank the members of the committee and the professional staff for their dedication and hard work.
It has been a privilege to work with Senator Nunn to bring this bill to the Senate. Although it is a good bill, not every Member, including me, is happy with every part of it. Throughout the past 6 months the committee worked in its traditional bipartisan manner because the security of the United States and the safety of our people are paramount. The bill reflects this cooperative effort, provides a clear direction for national security, and maintains a solid foundation for the defense of the Nation.
The committee's overarching intent was to revitalize the Armed Forces and enhance or preserve our national security capabilities. That is essential in this post-cold-war world in order to provide the leadership and stability which are critical to the growth of democracy. Our military must be capable and ready in order to provide our men and women in uniform the best possible chance to succeed and survive in every demanding situation. We were reminded recently, with the dedication of the Korean War Memorial, that freedom is not free. We must always remember that courage and sacrifice are the price of freedom.
This bill would fund defense at $264.7 billion in budget authority for fiscal year 1996. I have noted with interest some inaccurate reports in the press that the bill would increase defense spending, and I would like to set the record straight. The funding level in the bill we bring to the floor today is nearly $6.2 billion lower in real terms than last year's bill, and that represents a decline of 2 percent. Although it had been my hope to preserve funding at last year's level, this is the best the committee could do, given the budgetary pressures facing the Congress.
I have stated repeatedly that the administration is cutting defense too far, too fast. Most credible analysts conclude there is a shortfall of at least $150 billion in defense budget authority over the future years defense plan. Although the proposal contained in this bill represents a decline in defense spending, I would note that the funding level is still $7 billion higher than the administration's budget request. The administration requested a defense budget 5 percent lower than the fiscal year 1995 level, and that is simply unwise.
Despite a decline in defense spending, the bill provides the resources to maintain substantial U.S. military power and the ability to project that power wherever our vital interests are at stake. An implicit theme in our bill is that any aggressor or potential adversary should know that our military services will remain the most effective and combat ready in the world.
National security is the most important responsibility of the Federal Government, and as we begin debate on this matter, I would like to explain the priorities which the committee kept in mind in crafting the bill, and highlight a few key decisions. The first objective was to ensure that forces remain viable, and manned at sufficient levels by people of the highest quality. Well-motivated, well-trained, and well-led soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines are the bedrock of national security.
Strong support for equitable pay and benefits, bachelor and family housing, and other quality of life measures are key elements in attracting and retaining high-quality people. Perhaps more importantly, this bill expresses the commitment of the Senate to our men and women in uniform and attempts to uphold our part of the implied contract.
Our second objective was to ensure the military effectiveness and combat readiness of the Armed Forces. We believe the funding levels we have recommended will be barely adequate to take care of current readiness if the Department of Defense manages resources wisely and carefully.
The quality of overall readiness essentially depends on adequate funding for both current and future readiness. Although this funding allocation is often described in shorthand as a balance, I would suggest it is a fundamental obligation of the Federal Government to provide adequate resources for both current and future readiness. However, the mix is important because a disproportionate allocation of scarce resources to operation and maintenance accounts would limit funds for the research, development, and procurement essential to modernization. We sought to achieve a reasonable balance. We also addressed multiyear procurement to avoid creating bow waves of funding requirements in subsequent years.
Department of Defense decisions to cancel or delay modernization programs create unrealistic modernization requirements for the future. The committee has addressed critical modernization needs by adding $5.3 billion in procurement and $1.7 billion in research and development accounts to offset some of these problems. We believe the Department of Defense must continue to fund procurement, and research and development, at similar inflation-adjusted levels in future budget requests.
Congress must also continue to provide sufficient funds for research and development to ensure the military's technological superiority in the future. If we do not, future readiness will be jeopardized. Unless the research and development, and procurement accounts are adequately funded from year to year, the services will not have the right weapons, in sufficient quantity, to be able to fight and win in the next decade. We must remember that the force we sent to war in Desert Storm was conceived in the 1970's and built in the 1980's. We must focus on the future.
Third, we addressed the proliferation of missile technology and weapons of mass destruction. We cannot stand by, idly watching, as an increasing number of foreign states develop and acquire long-range ballistic and cruise missiles. Many people do not realize that we currently have no defense whatsoever against any missile launched against the United States. None. Such missiles are capable of carrying nuclear, biological, and chemical payloads to any point in our country. We, in the Congress, will richly deserve the harsh judgment of our citizens if we fail to prepare for this clear eventuality.
It is our grave responsibility to ensure we develop the capability to defend both our deployed forces and our homeland. The committee provided direction and funds for both these requirements in the Missile Defense Act of 1995. This title of the bill initiates a new program for defense against cruise missiles, while funding robust theater missile defenses. It also mandates a national missile defense program which will lead to the limited defense of the United States by the year 2003. I remind my colleagues that the largest single loss of life in the Persian Gulf war was from one, crude, Iraqi Scud missile that was not even targeted for the building it struck. It is entirely reasonable to spend less than 1 1/2 percent of the defense budget to meet this serious security threat.
The bill's ballistic missile defense provisions also address the administration's attempts to limit theater missile defenses by an inaccurate interpretation of the ABM Treaty. That treaty was intended to limit only defenses against strategic ballistic missiles, not theater defenses. Unless this distinction is enforced, we will end up building less-than-optimally capable systems which may not be effective against the highly capable missile threats emerging in the world's most troubled regions.
Fourth, the committee was deeply concerned about maintaining the viability of the Nation's offensive strategic forces. According to the Nuclear Posture Review, the United States will continue to depend on its nuclear forces for deterrence into the foreseeable future. Safe, reliable, and effective nuclear weapons are at the core of deterrence. In this bill the committee directs the Department of Energy to meet its primary responsibility of maintaining the Nation's nuclear capability. This means the Energy Department must focus on a stockpile management program geared to the near-term refabrication and certification requirements outlined in the NPR. If DOE cannot or will not shoulder this responsibility, then another agency must be assigned the task. Unless steps are taken now to maintain a nuclear weapons manufacturing infrastructure and a safe, reliable nuclear weapons stockpile, we face the very real prospect of not being a first-rate nuclear power in 10 to 15 years.
The committee addressed the role of long-range, heavy bombers in projecting power. Although I regret the committee's vote not to fund the B-2 program, I understand the concerns of Members on both sides about the high cost of the program.
The committee is also concerned that the administration's budget request did not include funding for numerous operations which the Armed Forces are currently conducting, even though the administration knew when it submitted its budget request that these operations would continue into fiscal year 1996. We authorized $125 million to pay for these ongoing operations in order to avoid the kind of problems with curtailed training which emerged last year.
I caution the administration that one consequence of paying for these operations on an unprogrammed, ad hoc basis is ultimately to deny the funds necessary for readiness. Last year, the practice of paying for peacekeeping and other contingency operations without budgetary or supplemental funding was directly responsible for lower readiness ratings and curtailed training in some units. Unless the Department of Defense includes the funds for such operations in the budget request, it will be difficult if not impossible for Congress to assess the impact these operations will have on other accounts. The oversight responsibilities of Congress are hindered, if not usurped, when the Department does not budget for known requirements.
While I remain confident that this is a good defense bill under the present circumstances, I remain troubled. The defense budget trend over the past 10 years has been in constant decline, principally in response to budget pressures. The administration's request for procurement this year is at the lowest level since 1950, declining more than 71 percent in real terms since 1985. The defense budget is at its lowest level as a percentage of gross domestic product since 1940, just before a grossly unprepared United States entered World War II. Each successive budget since 1993 has continued to push recapitalization farther into the future. As a result, the Services have been forced to delay the fielding of critical modern systems while maintaining aging equipment at ever-increasing operating and maintenance costs.
The prospects of not having adequate defense funds in the coming years should alarm us all. Despite the recommended fiscal year 1996 funding increase of $7.1 billion above the administration request, proposed future year budgets do not adequately fund the administration's Bottom-Up Review Force, which is itself barely adequate. These funding levels cannot meet known modernization needs and they do not even cover inflation. Shortfalls of the magnitude projected by the GAO and others will seriously impair the ability of the Department of Defense to field the combat-ready, modern forces essential to our national security. The limited progress reflected in this bill cannot be maintained unless future funding is increased.
As the Senate takes up this defense bill, some Members will no doubt argue that my concerns about steadily declining defense spending and emerging threats are misplaced.
They will point out that the cold war is over and provide long lists of other programs that could absorb the money. Such criticisms always surface after a major victory, and just before the emergence of the next major threat. They are always shown in the long run to have been naive and shortsighted. They consistently fail to realize the usefulness of effective military power in shaping future events in ways that are favorable to us. They fail to recognize the instability and uncertainty of the times, and they fail to consider the future.
We cannot predict what challenges and dangers we will face in the future. We do not know with any certainty who will be our next peer competitor. I assure you, however, that a peer competitor will emerge and if such competitor believes there is an advantage because our military has been weakened, he will become bold and our challenge will be more significant. I encourage every Senator to keep this in mind as we debate this bill over the next few days.
I thank the Chair, and yield the floor.
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The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia is recognized.
Mr. NUNN. Madam President, as we begin debate on the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 1996, I first want to congratulate Senator Thurmond and his staff on reporting together the first defense authorization bill that has been reported with Senator Thurmond as committee chairman. Although he has been a stalwart for many years on the committee and has helped prepare the bills in the past, this is his first bill as the official chairman of the committee.
The major themes of this bill reflect Senator Thurmond's longstanding and strong and effective support for our national security. It has been my great privilege and honor to have worked with Senator Thurmond in the Senate and on the Armed Services Committee for all of my 22 years, and for at least maybe slightly more than half of his time here in the U.S. Senate. His career--and his decorated service in World War II and unwavering support for strong national defense, and his devotion to the men and women of the Armed Forces--has served as a model and an inspiration to me, and to, I believe, his fellow members of the Armed Services Committee and the Senate.
The 18 to 3 vote in favor of the bill in the Armed Services Committee reflects the fact that the bill continues many bipartisan efforts initiated by our committee in recent years, such as improvements in military pay and benefits, modernization of weapons systems, and protecting, as Senator Thurmond laid out, military readiness and personnel quality. This bipartisan support also reflects the actions taken by the committee to address concerns raised by Secretary of Defense Bill Perry about a number of the provisions in the House bill. In contrast to the action taken by the House, for example, our bill provides full funding for the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program,
the program that is aimed at trying to prevent proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons all over the globe. It also avoids micromanaging the Office of Secretary of Defense, as was done in the House bill, and we do not have unworkable restrictions on military operations as the Secretary of Defense specified very clearly he feared was being done in the House bill.
The bill before us provides $264.7 billion in budget authority, the amount specified in the budget resolution. This amount, which is $7 billion above the budget request, will enable us to fund the types of initiatives that have received bipartisan support in the past. This includes personnel programs such as the 2.4-percent pay raise for members of the Armed Forces and modernization programs from fighter aircraft such as the F-22 to unglamorous but essential items such as Army trucks. Most of the programs authorized by the committee reflect the administration's priorities as set forth in the current year budget request or in the future years defense program which covers the next 5 years. Dr. Perry, in his discussions with the committee, urged us to focus any additions to the budget on acquisition programs that are in DOD's future years defense program. The bill before us largely follows this recommendation.
And I believe as various Members may come to the floor and say that we do not now need this program or that program which is funded with the additional money that has been put in this bill that was provided in the budget resolution, I think it is very important for Members to keep in mind that these programs--most of them, not every, but most of them--that have been added are in the 5-year defense plan that Secretary Perry favors. And I think that is important for people to keep that in mind. That was the request that Dr. Perry made of this committee, and I think we have largely honored that request.
Madam President, this bill contains important legislative initiatives such as the authority to use innovative programs to finance military housing and housing for unaccompanied troops. This was a strong request and initiative by Dr. Perry and the Defense Department.
In addition, we establish a defense modernization account, which I sponsored and our committee supported, which for the first time that I have any knowledge about will provide incentives for savings in defense programs for use of those savings to modernize the equipment for our men and women in uniform.
In other words, Madam President, if the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps can find savings, we will let them put those savings in a carefully monitored account that will have to be, of course, monitored by the Congress and will have to follow our normal procedures. But those savings will be able to be used for the most critical deficiencies we face in modernization. And modernization in the outyears, the years ahead, is the biggest challenge we face.
I think everyone would acknowledge that we are, even with the increases in this budget, underfunding the outyear modernization. When our equipment starts to wear out, which much of it will toward the end of this century, we are not going to have sufficient funding even with the increases in this bill to cover that.
So what we want to do in this defense modernization account--I know some Members will have some suggestions and concerns which we will certainly listen carefully to--but this account will be controlled by the Congress. It will be subject to the normal reprogramming and authorization and appropriation procedures which we have now.
There is a limit on how much can be accumulated. But for the first time we will be saying to each of the services, `You will now have an incentive. If you figure out how to save money, it can go into an account. We are not going to grab that money and take it away from you as your punishment for saving it. We are going to let you spend it subject to the congressional oversight as outlined on the critical programs you need in the future.'
I believe this kind of initiative has real potential and promise in terms of giving people throughout the military services a real incentive to try to save money. We all know the horror stories of what we have heard for years, not just in the military but in all areas of Government where, when you get down toward the last couple of months of the fiscal year, there is money that has not been spent, and the people involved in those decisions decide that if the money is not spent, not only will it lapse but also they will have the budget cut the next year.
So there is almost a perverse incentive throughout Government now to take whatever is not spent and spend it so that you do not have your budget cut the next year. We want to reverse that psychology. This is at least a beginning along that line.
My outline of the bill's highlights should not, however, be viewed as representing unqualified support for all the provisions of this bill. The numerous rollcall votes during our committee markup reflect the serious concerns of many Members about inadequate funding of important programs as well as questions about some of the priorities reflected in this bill.
There is much in this bill that I support, and I do support the overall bill. But I do have serious reservations about those aspects of the bill that appear to head back without very much thought given to the period of the cold war.
For example, the proposed new Missile Defense Act of 1995 sets forth a commitment to the deployment of missile defenses without regard, without any regard for the legal requirements of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty which we are a party to and which we signed and which is an international obligation of the United States of America, until changed or until we withdraw from the treaty under the terms of the treaty. That is our obligation. That is a law. That is a treaty. It is binding.
The same provision contains legally binding timetables in our bill for deployment of missile defense systems. For example, section 235 requires a multiple site national defense system to reach the initial operational capacity in 2003. These timetables are though exempt from adequate testing. I hope we can have a system by then. I hope we can have one that really works, and I hope it will be calibrated to meet the threat that we may have in those outyears. But since the applicable missile testing statutes that were in previous laws are repealed in this National Defense Act we have before us, what we have is a timetable for actual deployment stated as a part of the law and repealing the testing that would be required to determine if the systems are ready to deploy or whether they are going to be effective when they are deployed.
I do not think that is a good combination. Finally, there is an arbitrary--and possibly unconstitutional--restriction on the obligation of funds by the executive branch to enforce the terms of the ABM Treaty.
I invite all of our colleagues to look at those aspects where there is a demarcation definition between the theater ballistic missile and the national missile defense that is precluded except under certain conditions in the ABM Treaty. I have no quarrel with those definitions. I think they are sensible definitions, and I think we do have to have a demarcation point because clearly theater missile defenses are not intended to be covered under the ABM Treaty. They never were covered. They should not be covered now.
The problem is once this definition is set forth, the executive branch is barred from doing anything at all regarding the ABM Treaty in terms of its own negotiations, and I think that that goes way too far. In fact, the wording of the proposal we have before us is so broad that any Federal official including Members of Congress would be precluded, as that statute now would read, from doing anything contrary to that definition. I think that goes too far, and I do not think that is what we want. I hope we can work in a cooperative way to iron out some of those difficulties, which I believe can be done, while continuing the strong goal and endorsement of moving forward with defenses without doing so in a way that is counterproductive.
The Department of Energy portions of the bill contain provisions that direct the creation of new capabilities for the remanufacture of nuclear weapons.
Madam President, I have serious questions about whether this is a premature judgment at this time. The Department of Energy `Stockpile Stewardship' plan is only now under review by the Department of Defense. I know that Mr. Domenici, the Senator from New Mexico, and others have been in discussion with Senator Thurmond and his staff and Senator Lott and his staff, Senator Kempthorne, on these energy questions, and I hope we can work something out here that makes sense, that moves us in the right direction without making premature judgments that are not ripe for decision.
Madam President, these are important issues for discussion and debate. There are questions about the potential international implications of a number of these provisions. For instance, the Russian leadership and their Parliament have stressed repeatedly, both to this administration and to various Members of the Senate and House, both parties, the importance they attach to continued compliance with the ABM Treaty. They have indicated that should they judge the United States no longer intends to adhere to that treaty, then they would abandon their efforts to ratify the START II Treaty, which is now pending in the Russian Duma.
Further, they warned that they would stop further compliance with other existing treaties including the drawdowns mandated by START I. In my judgment, there is a real danger that the provisions of the Missile Defense Act will be considered by the Russians as what is known as `anticipatory breach' of the ABM Treaty.
Madam President, if this bill leads to that outcome, it will not enhance our national security. It will be adverse to our national security. Under START I and START II, the arms control treaties which have been entered into by Republican Presidents and adhered to by Democratic Presidents, the Russians are obliged under the terms of these treaties to remove more than 6,000 ballistic missile warheads from atop their arsenal of ICBM's and submarine-launched ballistic missiles. This includes the very formidable MIRV'd SS-18 ICBM's, the very ones that threaten our land-based Minuteman and MX missiles with first-strike possibilities.
These are not insignificant treaties, Madam President. They basically remove much of the first-strike capability that we spent 10, 15 years being concerned about and spending hundreds of billions of dollars trying to defend against.
They will also have to remove all of their MIRV'd SS-24 missiles and completely refit their ICBM force with single warhead missiles. These are goals that were worked on in a bipartisan fashion for several decades by both Democrats and Republicans with a lot of the leadership coming from Republican Presidents in the White House.
This removal of 6,000 warheads by treaty is a far more cost effective form of missile defense than any ABM system that the SDI Program has ever envisioned. I am not one of those who believes we ought to be so locked into every provision of the ABM Treaty that we do not believe it is a document that has to be improved, that has to be amended. I think it does. I do not think it is completely up to date. I think we need to take another look at it. I think we need to review it. I think there are changes that can be made and should be made in accordance with the provisions of the treaty.
Yet, this bill, if enacted, would create a very high risk of throwing away both the START II reductions which have not yet taken place, and the START I reductions which are taking place now. Because this bill, No. 1, acts as if the ABM Treaty does not exist; it does not even really acknowledge that there are any concerns. No. 2, it ignores the opportunity to negotiate sensible amendments with the Russians. And I think it is premature to believe that that effort cannot succeed. I do not think we have even started real serious efforts, and I think that those efforts at least have a strong possibility of success. And No. 3, this bill does not acknowledge that we can get out of that treaty. We can exit the treaty under its own terms if our national security is threatened.
If we are going to get out from under the ABM Treaty, if we are going to basically decide it no longer is in our national security interests, then we ought to get out of the treaty the way the treaty itself provides, which is our obligation under international law and our obligation under the treaty itself. We can serve 6 months' notice and exit the treaty if the Russians are not willing to make changes which we believe are necessary for our national security. That is the way to get out of the treaty. We should not get out of the treaty by anticipatory breach with provisions of the law that we have not carefully thought through.
Indeed, Madam President, in this respect the actions proposed in the bill could be self-fulfilling. They could provoke Russia to stop its adherence to the START Treaties which would leave a huge arsenal of Russian missiles in place and we would then have to move from a thin missile defense to protect against accidental launch or to protect some kind of small nation, radical nation, or terrorist group launch, we would then have to start worrying about the SS-18's again.
Now, do we really want to do that? Do we want a self-fulfilling circle? We take action without regard to the ABM Treaty in this bill. The Russians react by not basically going through with START II. Then they decide they are not going to comply with START I. Then they decide they are not going to comply with the conventional forces reduction in Europe causing all sorts of problems there.
Then, of course, we have to increase our defense. We have to go from the kind of system that President Bush wanted, which is an accidental launch type thin system that does not cost hundreds of billions of dollars, is achievable, that we can do. We could go to a much different kind of system. We are back in a spiral of action and reaction between the United States and Russia. I do not think we really want to go back into that atmosphere. That is one of the accomplishments we have had in the last 10 years. I do not think that is what the authors of these provisions in the bill really intend. But I think it has got to be thought about because those are the implications of where this bill will head.
Madam President, this leads me to pose several questions. Are we as a nation better off if the START I and START II treaties are abandoned than if they remain in force? If somebody thinks we ought to abandon them and we are better off without them, why do we not say so? Why do we not say so? We have got to stop legislating as if there are no consequences to what we legislate. Other people in the world react. I think that is the way we have legislated too many times on foreign policy. I see it increasingly taking place. We act as if we can take part of a cake, legislate, forget the consequences, and not even own up to what is likely to happen based on what we ourselves are doing.
The second question. Are we and our NATO allies better off if the Russians decline to be bound by the limits on deployments of conventional forces contained in the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty? We have already drawn down our forces to 100,000. The allies are reducing significantly, in many cases more than we are. We are drawing down based on the CFE Treaty and based on the Russians' behavior because they have indeed dramatically reduced their forces. Do we really want to reverse that?
Of course, someone can say, well, the Russians cannot afford it now. They are not going to be able to build up. That is probably true. I think for the next 5 to 6 to 7 years, they will not be able to afford a conventional buildup. What they can do is start relying on their early use of nuclear weapons very quickly, like tomorrow morning. If they are going to decide they are going to give their battlefield commanders tactical nuclear weapons again, we are going to go right back to a hair trigger situation. That is what they can do. That is cheap. That is the cheap way. I do not think that is what we want. I do not think that is what the Russian leadership wants at this stage. But are we thinking about what we are doing?
Next question. What will be the effect on Russian cooperation with us in forums such as the U.N. Security Council if arms control agreements are abandoned, even if it is an inadvertent abandonment on our part?
Fourth question. What is the ballistic missile threat to U.S. territory that requires us to abandon compliance with the ABM Treaty and to abandon the pursuit of possible amendments to that treaty even when there is nothing whatsoever in that treaty that prevents us from taking every step we would otherwise take in the next fiscal year? Why are we doing this at this point in time? I think that is the question. If we were at a point where we had to make a decision, then I could understand some of the pressure in this regard. But there is nothing, according to all the testimony, there is nothing whatsoever in the ABM Treaty, even as now interpreted, that prevents us from taking every step we need to take in the next fiscal year. So why are we doing this? I do not have an answer to that.
Finally, what is the nature of the theater missile threat? And that is what I believe everyone would acknowledge is the greatest priority, the greatest threat we have now. It is not a future threat. It is a present threat, theater ballistic missiles. We already face those. As Senator Thurmond outlined in his opening statement, we faced those in the Persian Gulf war.
What is the change that has taken place? That basically would have us, as we are doing in this bill, have the money for developing and deploying no less than four overlapping-coverage missile defense systems to protect the rear area of the theater while leaving our U.S. forward-deployed ground troops totally unprotected from attack by existing enemy short-range missiles.
Madam President, I will have an amendment later in this process that will add back in the only program we have to protect our frontline troops from short-range missiles. Those are the threats we face right now. We have a program called Corps SAM that is aimed at making those systems that can protect frontline troops. That system has been totally zeroed out in this bill; $35 million has been taken out. I assume that was part of the money that went into the beef-up of $300 million for national missile defense. I think that is a reverse priority. We ought the deal with the most imminent threats first. The most imminent threat we face now is the theater ballistic missile threat, particularly the frontline effect on our troops from short-range missiles. So I will have an amendment that I hope we can get some attention to in adding back that program at a later point in this debate.
Madam President, I have a number of other concerns about the bill. First, our ability to monitor and control treaty-mandated strategic weapons reductions could be affected by the failure of the bill to fully fund the Department of Energy's arms control and nonproliferation activities. I am not certain whether that provision is part of the negotiation that is ongoing now with the Senator from New Mexico, Senator Domenici, and Senator Bingaman who has taken a great lead in this, but I am sure that will be the subject of some debate here on the floor.
The other provisions, I think there are questionable priorities, as mentioned for the missile defense programs. While the bill provides an additional $300 million in funding for the national defense program and $470 million for other missile defense programs which were not requested by the administration, the Corps SAM missile defense system, which is strongly supported by the war-fighting commanders. That program is terminating. We will have a letter from our war-fighting commanders showing that is one of their top priorities. It makes no sense to provide vast increases for long-range speculative programs that will require billions in expenditure before their validity can be assessed while denying funds for specific theater missile defense initiatives designed to protect our frontline troops which we have the possibility of securing in the very short-range distant future--in the very next few years.
Madam President, also, I am concerned that the bill fails to fund certain ongoing Department of Defense programs on the theory that the programs should be funded by other agencies, even though neither the budget resolution nor the committee bill makes any provision for any other agency to assume DOD's responsibilities. These include programs that have received bipartisan support for many years, such as humanitarian assistance, which was initiated by our former colleague, Republican Senator Gordon Humphrey; foreign disaster relief, which was initiated by another former colleague, Republican Senator Jeremiah Denton; and the civil-military cooperative action program, which was developed on a completely bipartisan basis by the Armed Services Committee.
Madam President, there are many good features in this bill, but there are a number of key areas where this bill can be improved during the consideration by the Senate. I look forward to working with Senator Thurmond, the other members of the committee, and the Senate in a cooperative fashion to move this bill along so we can complete our work in a timely fashion, and so that we can come out with a solid bill that will move our national security in the right direction.
Madam President, I yield the floor.
[Page: S11132]
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina, the President pro tempore.
Mr. THURMOND. Madam President, I wish to thank the able ranking member for his kind remarks and also thank him for his fine cooperation in getting this bill to the floor.
Madam President, I will now ask that the able Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Inhofe] be recognized.
Mr. FEINGOLD addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
Mr. INHOFE. I do have an opening statement.
Madam President, before presenting my opening statement, I would like to yield momentarily to Senator Kyl for the purpose of proposing an amendment.
Mr. KYL addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
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