17 March 2003
"Success Hinges on Verifying," by Representative Duncan Hunter
(USA Today 03/17/03 op-ed) (450) (This column by Representative Duncan Hunter, Republican of California, who is chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, was published in USA Today March 17. The column is in the public domain. No republication restrictions.) (begin byliner) Success Hinges on Verifying By Duncan Hunter A long shadow hangs over the horizon of Krasnoyarsk, a city in central Russia. It is a $10-million plant built to neutralize volatile missile fuel that American taxpayers funded but will never benefit from. It will never be operated because the Russians diverted the fuel to their space program before the plant was even completed. This giant, empty facility is another example of the problems plaguing efforts to control weapons of mass destruction in the former Soviet Union. The proliferation of these weapons remains a serious danger -- but not because of a lack of funding or congressional support. The Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) initiative has stumbled in recent years because of three basic, but fixable, problems. -- Access. Today, we are barred from entering 56 of the 80 known Russian biological-weapons facilities. Of those we are allowed to enter, we do not have full access. Clearly, we cannot fix what we are not allowed to see. As a result, only two sites can be certified as secure today. -- Cooperation. On top of money wasted in Krasnoyarsk, we recently lost another $95 million on a proposed facility in Votkinsk, where a local politician denied a land-use permit for a plant to dismantle missile engines. There are also plans to build a $1 billion plant to destroy poisonous gas. This time, we should require that Russia guarantee the necessary permits and regular meetings with Russian officials. This would ensure full cooperation throughout the construction and utilization stages. Further, we should mandate that U.S. site managers be present to oversee these stages. -- Focus. Department of Defense funding for CTR should remain focused on the former Soviet Union, where 99% of the world's potentially loose weapons of mass destruction are stored. The Energy and State departments should address problems elsewhere, as those institutions are better suited to traditional foreign aid. CTR earned my support because it made America safer. The initiative is drifting away from its original charter, but it can once again serve U.S. security needs if cooperation and access improve and the Defense Department keeps its focus on the most hazardous threats. In the 1980s, Ronald Reagan said we should "trust, but verify." That was a prudent plan then, and it should guide us again today. (Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., is chairman of the House Armed Services Committee.) (end byliner) (Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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