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[Page: S11448]

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ACDA was founded on a bipartisan basis to serve as the lead agency for U.S. disarmament and arms control activities, with its director as the principal advisor to the President on these matters. It was created not only to provide increased focus on arms control, but also to elevate these issues so that they wouldn't get lost in the bureaucracies of the State and Defense Departments.

The list of arms control agreements during the three and a half decades of ACDA is staggering: the 1963 Limited Test Ban Treaty, the 1968 Non-Proliferation Treaty, the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the 1987 Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty, the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaties and the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention, as well as many others. These successes have immeasurably improved the security of the United States. During the cold war, we faced the persistent and ominous threat of nuclear warfare, and today we see the dangers of nuclear, chemical and biological terrorism. Would we be safer today without these treaties? Of course we wouldn't. Will we be safer tomorrow with continued pursuit of arms control? Yes, and this compels the continued existence of a strong and independent ACDA.

Considering the billions that have been saved through reductions in nuclear arsenals, the ending of the testing program and other arms control measures, ACDA's annual budget of around $40 million and its staff of 250 proves to be a real bargain. In the coming years ACDA responsibilities will include monitoring the START II nuclear arms reductions, verifying the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and implementing the Chemical Weapons Convention, provided these last two treaties are ratified in the next Congress, and I strongly believe that they should be.

I cannot comment on the importance of ACDA without mentioning my colleague, Senator Claiborne Pell of Rhode Island, who has throughout his career been a tireless champion of ACDA, from its creation in 1961 to the revitalization legislation passed in 1994. His leadership on arms control and as an advocate for multilateral solutions to security problems will be sorely missed by the Senate and the Nation.

Arms control is not obsolete, and we need ACDA to make it happen. I commend Director John Holum and the rest of the staff of ACDA on the agency's 35th anniversary, and wish them the best of success in the future.

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