[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 50 (Thursday, April 24, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3692-S3693]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   SENATOR SAM NUNN SUPPORTS THE B-2

 Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, there have been many supportive 
comments on the remarks I presented last week on the need to acquire 
nine additional B-2 global precision strike aircraft. There is one 
response, in particular, which I wish to share with my colleagues.
  Former Senator Sam Nunn of Georgia served the Senate for many years. 
Through dedicated work and thoughtful analysis, Senator Nunn came to be 
regarded as a national authority on defense issues. I now ask that a 
letter in support of additional B-2 procurement, which Senator Nunn 
sent to Congressman Duncan Hunter, chairman of the House Committee on 
National Security, Subcommittee on Military Procurement, be printed in 
today's Record. I believe that all Senators will benefit from a close 
and thoughtful reading of former Senator Nunn's letter.
  The letter follows:


                                               King & Spalding

                                   Washington, DC, March 10, 1997.
     Hon. Duncan Hunter,
     Chairman, Subcommittee on Military Procurement,
     Committee on National Security,
     U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, DC
       Dear Mr. Chairman: Thank you for asking me to provide 
     testimony for your March 12, 1997, hearing on bomber force 
     structure. As you know, I have been a strong supporter of the 
     B-2 bomber program since its inception as the Advanced 
     Technology Bomber in the early 1980's. I continue to believe 
     that 21 B-2 bombers will not constitute an adequate force 
     level to deal with many likely future contingencies and 
     crises, and that no other military systems in existence or on 
     the drawing boards can adequately substitute for the 
     capabilities the B-2 offers. Therefore, I strongly endorse 
     the Subcommittee's reconsideration of the future bomber force 
     structure to include the issue of resuming production of the 
     B-2 bomber. I believe the Subcommittee needs to carefully 
     consider the following points in its deliberations.
       * For the foreseeable future, two major hot spots will 
     remain in the Middle East and on the Korean peninsula. Yet 
     these set-piece scenarios should not be the only scenarios 
     against which the adequacy of our forces (and our military 
     strategy) are tested.
       * Potential enemies have learned several valuable lessons 
     from Iraq's experience during Operation Desert Storm don't 
     give the U.S. time to deploy forces and their support to the 
     theater, do focus on disrupting U.S. air operations, do 
     target strategic objectives that allies will be reluctant to 
     counterattack (Seoul, Saudi oil field, etc.) and plan to 
     seize them rapidly, before U.S. power can be brought to bear.
       * Future conflicts are likely to confront the U.S. with a 
     race against time and the advance of enemy forces toward 
     important strategic objectives (think how different it might 
     have been if Saddam's troops had not stopped after taking 
     Kuwait.)
       * U.S. contingency planning, including the BUR analyses and 
     the JCS ``Nimble Dancer'' wargames (and the widely criticized 
     1995 DOD Heavy Bomber Study), assumes the U.S. will enjoy two 
     weeks of actionable warning prior to an enemy attack--
     valuable time during which our military plans to deploy 
     forces from CONUS and Europe, and more important, to start 
     the sealift bridge from CONUS to the theater.
       * This sealift link is crucial to U.S. performance in 1990, 
     the U.S. needed six months in which to build up forces levels 
     and to establish the sealift pipeline to support those forces 
     during high-intensity conflict. Yet, the adequacy of 
     logistics support has never been adequately modeled in JCS 
     wargames.
       * In 1994, Iraq suddenly mobilized troops and sent them to 
     the border with Kuwait The U.S. response capability raises 
     serious questions. U.S. planning assumes two carriers in the 
     Persian Gulf, yet there were none, U.S. planning assumes 
     deployment of many hundreds of tactical aircraft to the 
     theater in the first week, yet only about one hundred 
     arrived, U.S. planning assumes prepositioned equipment aboard 
     ships berthed at Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean are 
     important assets, yet these ships did not arrive until after 
     the crisis was ended, U.S. planning assumes many precision 
     munitions, yet supplies in the theater were low.
       * If an important class of future contingencies will be 
     those in which U.S. forces are trying to prevent an enemy 
     surprise attack from seizing high-value targets, then U.S. 
     forces will have to place a premium either on combat-ready 
     forces stationed within the theater or on forces that can 
     reach the theater and conduct effective operations in a 
     timely fashion.

[[Page S3693]]

       * We cannot count on having stationed forces in the right 
     place at the right time, all the time. This suggests the 
     importance of long-range assets, to provide the flexibility 
     to respond rapidly from CONUS to trouble spots around the 
     globe. The B-2 can reach any point on the globe from just 
     three bases--Guam, Diego Garcia, and the U.S.
       * Once in the theater, U.S. assets must be both survivable 
     and highly effective against an invading enemy force. The B-2 
     bomber has a combination of range, payload, and stealth that 
     is unmatched by any other system. And, precision munitions 
     are continuing to enhance the value of all tactical aircraft, 
     including the B-2 bomber.
       * The value of stealth for conducting operations in a high-
     threat environment has been clear ever since the air 
     operations against Iraq began in early 1991. The F-117A 
     Stealth Fighter conducted countless missions over Baghdad 
     without any loses and are widely cited for the success of the 
     air war. Yet the F-117A has many operational limitations--it 
     is a medium altitude attack platform capable of effective 
     operations only at night in clear weather.
       * The B-2 is an all-altitude, all-weather platform that is 
     more stealthy than the F-117A and that carries many more 
     individually-targetable weapons. The B-2's advanced 
     capabilities go well beyond those of the F-117A or any other 
     non-stealthy bomber.
       * A number of recent analytic studies have shown that 
     against many plausible invading forces, 20 or 21 B-2 bombers 
     are simply not enough force to stop enemy invaders short of 
     their important strategic objectives.
       * The cost of additional B-2's is high relative to non-
     stealthy, short-range tactical aircraft. But so is the cost 
     of failing to stop a determined enemy short of his strategic 
     objectives. The inherent flexibility and capability of the B-
     2 bomber will be most important in those cases where we are 
     surprised, where an enemy doesn't do what we had expected, 
     and/or where we did not plan to have to fight.
       I commend these points to the attention of your 
     Subcommittee, and would urge you to undertake a searching 
     review of the assumptions and assertions that underlie 
     present U.S. military contingency plans. I thank you for 
     inviting me to submit these thoughts for the Subcommittee's 
     consideration and for your Subcommittee's careful attention 
     to these important questions for national security.
           Sincerely,
     Sam Nunn.

                          ____________________