Tracking Number: 180249
Title: "D'Amato Criticizes Sale of Jet Technology to Korea."
Senator D'Amato says the jet fighter deal between General Dynamics and South Korea lays the seed of a future South Korean challenge to the US aerospace industry for the short-term profit of a tiny few. (910415)
Source: CONGRESSIONAL RECORD (PERIODICAL), Apr 11
Date: 19910415
Text:
*EPF104
04/15/91 *
D'AMATO CRITICIZES SALE OF JET TECHNOLOGY TO KOREA
(Text: Senator D'Amato in CR of April 11) (550)
Washington -- Senator Alfonse D'Amato (Republican of New York) says the jet fighter deal between General Dynamics and the Republic of Korea means that "for a few billion dollars in short-term profit shared by a tiny few, we will have widened the field of nations capable of producing sophisticated aircraft.
"The Koreans' infant aerospace industry may not be able to challenge United States aircraft manufacturers in 5 years, maybe not even in 10 years, but, given time, I have every confidence in the ability of Korean manufacturers to take us on," D'Amato said.
Following is text from April 11 CR:
(begin text)
Remarks by D'AMATO (R-NY): KOREAN FIGHTER DEAL
Mr. D'AMATO. Mr. President, the Korean fighter deal has just gone from bad to worse.
To those of us who opposed the FSX co-development project with Japan, and oppose this sale, the news that the General Dynamics F-16 has edged out the McDonnell-Douglas F/A-18 is hardly welcome. The Koreans have traded up. We're handing them one of our best designs.
Aerospace is our ace in the hole. We've played every other trade card. Are we so arrogant as to believe that if we teach the Koreans how to build aircraft that they will not challenge us in the marketplace with designs of their own?
Who gains from this deal? Certainly, General Dynamics. But what about the American people? How do they benefit from this latest technology transfer? For a few billion dollars in short-term profit shared by a tiny few, we will have widened the field of nations capable of producing sophisticated aircraft. The Koreans' infant aerospace industry may not be able to challenge United States aircraft manufacturers in 5 years, maybe not even in 10 years, but, given time, I have every confidence in the ability of Korean manufacturers to take us on.
We are selling, on the cheap, technology developed over decades at a cost of hundreds of billions of dollars to the American taxpayer. It is the American people who own this technology, not this corporation or that. The people whose
GE 2 EPF104 hard-earned tax dollars paid for the F-16 must have a say in the use of that technology, or, in this case, its squandering in the name of greed.
If the point is to keep workers on the job for another year or two, I understand that. Let's keep them employed. But let's do it by increasing necessary American defense expenditures. If we want to remain the best, if our aerospace products are to remain the envy of the world, then we should be willing to pay for it.
What we shouldn't do is keep American workers productive by subsidizing the development of the very competitors who will someday run us into the ground. We did it with automobiles, we did it with electronics, and we are starting to do it with aircraft. Make no mistake. The Koreans, as do the Japanese, understand the profitability of the aerospace market, have targeted that market for penetration, and, if we help them, will someday be selling to us the very products we once taught them to produce.
(end text)
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File Identification: 04/15/91, EP-104
Product Name: Wireless File
Product Code: WF
Keywords: D'AMATO, ALFONSE; GENERAL DYNAMICS CORPORATION; INTERNATIONAL
BUSINESS; KOREA (SOUTH)-US RELATIONS; AEROSPACE INDUSTRY; COMPETITIVENESS; MILITARY BUDGETS; LABOR FORCE
Document Type: REP
Thematic Codes: 140; 5TT
Target Areas: EA
PDQ Text
Link: 180249
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