[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 51 (Thursday, April 30, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H2699-H2704]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
CHINA
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 7, 1997, the gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I would like to commend the gentleman
from Florida for his presentation. I just came back from Southeast Asia
where heroin is being grown, actually it is opium and turned into
heroin, especially in Burma and in Afghanistan, and I was informed by
the DEA agents there that we know exactly where the fields are that
produce about 90 percent of the heroin, and with leadership from the
White House we could attack those fields without hurting anybody before
they ever got beyond those countries.
But like the gentleman stated, since 1992 we have not had leadership
from the White House in the area, in that type of interdiction, plus we
have not had the moral leadership that Ronald Reagan provided during
the 1980s which made the use of illegal drugs something that was
socially unacceptable. It was just something that people did not find
it acceptable to have that in their presence because it was something
that was regarded as insulting and degrading and immoral.
Instead, that attitude has now unfortunately changed again without
that type of rejection from the leadership in the White House.
Unfortunately, we see the trends in heroin use by young people is up.
It is just a terrible trend.
Mr. MICA. If the gentleman will yield, I want to thank him for his
leadership on this issue, in trying to call to the attention of the
American people this drug problem and other problems relating to our
national security that he has so eloquently presented on the floor.
He also mentioned the heroin production out of Asia. I serve on the
national security subcommittee. We have found now 50 percent of the
heroin, and heroin was not even really coming in any quantities out of
Colombia, is now coming out of Colombia, mostly because of the policy
of this administration.
We asked that waivers be granted because Colombia was decertified as
not cooperating. Time and time again over the past 2\1/2\ years we have
asked for equipment, resources, materials to fight the war on drugs in
that country and to stop the production of heroin. This is all new just
in the course of this administration that heroin is being grown in
incredible quantities, poppy fields.
That is coming into Florida, it is coming into California, the
gentleman's State, it is coming into the Nation. We see the results.
The results are, I have heroin deaths in central Florida that equal our
largest metropolitan areas in the United States. Not only the poor
children in Detroit and New York and Los Angeles, but in Orlando and
other suburbs across this country, are dying in the streets, in our
community, now reaching 20,000 deaths, more than any war.
I thank the gentleman again for his great leadership, and also for
his taking time with a special order to bring this and other matters to
the attention of the Congress and the American people.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. This does fit into my special order which is focused
on China because one of the things this administration is totally
ignoring is the Chinese relationship to the drug lords in Burma. China
has become a major distributer of heroin as it takes the heroin from
Burma by providing weapons to the Burmese dictatorship, then takes the
heroin or the opium out of Burma and takes it down through Vietnam and
Cambodia and then out to distribution points in the United States and
elsewhere.
Tonight I would like to discuss China policy. But before I do, I
would like to say that I understand why the American people probably
are a little bit frustrated right now when they turn on their TV, as I
have over these last few months, and heard more about the sex life of
our President than any of us want to know.
Yes, there may be a situation where a person was told to lie on a
legal deposition, which is somewhat of a serious matter. But I for one,
however, have been disappointed with the zeal of our news media in
digging ever deeper into the lurid details of this ongoing circus, not
to shed light on legal issues but instead to sell newspapers and to
boost ratings. Accomplishing this, boosting their ratings or selling
newspapers, has meant appealing not to the public sense of justice or
even offering a better understanding of the legal issues that underlie
this spectacle. No, the exhaustive attention paid to the Monica
Lewinsky-Paula Jones maneuverings has nothing to do with the public
interest and has everything to do with appealing to the public's
purient interest.
For those who claim there is nothing else to cover of such a
magnitude, of something that could attract the attention of the people,
I rise tonight to say nay. We are living in times where decisions are
being made that will determine the fundamental safety and prosperity of
our people for decades to come. In a way, our President should be
grateful that the media has focused on the trivial yet nevertheless
inexcusable decisions that he has made in his personal conduct, rather
than on some of the horrendous decisions he has made that have mind-
boggling implications for our future.
Tonight I would like to discuss for the record an issue that has yet
to fully make itself present to the American people. It is not now part
of the public consciousness but will, I predict, once the public is
aware of what is going on, result in widespread rage and ultimately an
equally widespread sense of betrayal by our people. Whether purposely
or as a result of well intentioned but unforgivably wrong policies, our
country has been put in serious jeopardy.
First let me say that in my first 10 years that I have been here in
the House of Representatives, I have suffered great frustration over
our country's China policy, both Republicans and Democrats in charge of
the White House. When Clinton was elected in 1992, in fact, I expected
at least I would be able to work with our new President from Arkansas
on the issues concerning China. After all, candidate Clinton attacked
President Bush for kowtowing to the Chinese despots, and when asked in
an interview a few weeks before the election, candidate Clinton pledged
that he would not support most-favored-nation status for China and that
he was appalled by the human rights abuses of the Communist regime in
Beijing.
But once elected and sworn in as President, Bill Clinton's tune
changed. He was different from President Bush, all right. Instead of
not being tough enough on the Communist Chinese regime, he decided not
to be tough at all. Instead of revoking most-favored-nation status for
Communist China as he pledged during his campaign, President Clinton
waited till Congress was out of town on a break and then announced that
his administration was decoupling Chinese trade issues from any
discussion of human rights. In one single stroke, Bill Clinton earned
an infamous place in history.
{time} 1900
In the years since he has done nothing to rectify or correct this
horrendous violation of our trust. This act was the worst setback for
the cause of human rights at least since the time that I have served in
Congress.
Not only did we step off the high ground in our relations with the
Communist Chinese regime, but we have been wading in the muck with them
ever since. The tough guys in Beijing now know darn well that anything
this administration says or does about human rights is meant for
internal consumption in the United States only. In other words, we are
being played for suckers.
Every time a pronouncement is made by Bill Clinton's White House
about Tibet or the savagery against religious people in China, the
regime in Beijing laughs. I mean, Madeleine Albright is over there now,
and it was reported that she said something really tough on human
rights, and you know she was taken very seriously by, you know, the
gangsters in Beijing.
Any talk of liberty or justice by the President of the United States
or any member of this administration is seen as a joke by Third World
despots and Chinese dictators. This has been a tremendous disservice to
our country as
[[Page H2700]]
well as to the oppressed peoples of the world to whom the United States
is their only real hope of ever living in freedom and in dignity.
So why is this situation? Well, first and foremost, the gangsters who
run China cannot help but notice that, while leaders may make noises
like Madeleine Albright has just done, little noises, they are still
raking in the $50 billion annually from their trade surplus with the
United States, and we are not doing anything to stop that. So they are
going to listen to our noises while we are giving them a situation
where they get $50 billion out of our pockets.
Give me a break. We still let them get away with charging 30 to 40
percent tariffs on our goods that are being exported to China, even
while we let their products that flood into the United States come here
with only 3 or 4 percent tariffs. How can we possibly treat our people,
let our people be treated in such an unfair way and just not even go
after it, not even try?
The trade relationship is so skewed that we let them get away with
outrageous demands. For example, when we want to sell some of our
products to China, like airplanes, for example, we must build airplane
manufacturing parts over there in China. That means that after 10 years
from now they will have technology for a modern aerospace industry in
order to put our people out of work in order to sell our airplanes
today, and we let them get away with those kind of demands, and we even
finance the airplane deals.
We even use, as I say, taxpayer dollars to subsidize or guarantee the
building of manufacturing operations in China and elsewhere in the
Third World where dictators reign.
I can understand the sale that, you know, subsidizing or in some way
trying to subsidize and help along a sale of a product that is just a
transfer of a good made here so that they can afford the credit or
something over there, but, by and large, that is not what is happening.
What is happening is that Most Favored Nation status is really about
not the selling of our products but what it is really about is the
Federal Government taxing you and me. Then through the Export-Import
Bank and other financial institutions supported by our tax dollars they
use those dollars to facilitate the building of factories in China and
other dictatorships that will be used not just to supply goods for the
Chinese market but then it will be turned around and used to provide
goods and manufacture goods that will be exported to the United States
to put our people out of work who are the ones paying for the taxes
that subsidized the deal in the first place.
This is the worst violation, the worst violation of trust that I have
seen, and this body continually refuses to come to grips with it.
Whenever there is a debate on this issue, the issue is skirted, and
they talk about selling our goods over there when the real complaint is
we are building factories over there that will put our people out of
work. And the people on the other side, the Export-Import Bank and
these other issues, continually refuse to come to grips with that
answer.
Then we signed international agreements like the Global Warming
Treaty which exempts China from the strict controls we put on ourselves
and knowing full well that that will mean that more and more investment
into machinery and technology, and plants will go into China, and they
will build manufacturing units in China that will outpace our own
production in the United States. In other words, we are laying the
groundwork for a huge transfer of wealth from the United States to
China and other Third World countries.
And what are the Communist Chinese bosses doing with this technology?
Well, number one, they are not paying any attention to our words that
we are concerned that they do not believe in human rights, but what
they are doing with it is they are taking that and building a modern
military force, a modern Army, Navy, Air Force and missile force to
threaten anyone who gets in their way.
Has there been any liberalization in the meantime? Any change of
thinking? Are there any nicer guys up there in Beijing? Well, to think
well of Bill Clinton and the corporate power brokers who are groveling
to these Chinese Communist thugs and downplaying their overflow, I
might add, we must believe that this strategy of engagement will result
in a modification of the behavior by Communist Chinese.
These are the same Communist Chinese who now hold their fellow
countrymen in a grip of repression and terror. In fact, they are the
world's largest and most grandiose human rights abusers.
This coddle-a-Nazi-and-he-will-become-a-liberal strategy is as
wrongheaded an attitude as the American industrials and bankers had
towards Hitler's Germany and Hirohito's Japan in the 1930s. It did not
work with those thugs, and it is not going to work with these thugs. As
we know, that did not foster peace then but led to war and unfathomable
suffering and death in the 1940s.
If we do not use our heads and act in strength and insure that we
have the strength, we could, with all the best of intentions, stumble
into this same type of murderous conflagration as happened in the third
and fourth decade of this century; and things will not get better, they
will get worse.
Well, 10 years ago there was, you know, has it gotten better since we
have really been bending over backwards for this last decade to try to
work with these people, to engage the Chinese regime? Well, 10 years
ago there was an active populist reform movement in China, and now
there is none.
Although some internal debate is tolerated among the party elite who
seek a means of laying out public steam without endangering the party's
monopoly of power, by and large the good guys, meaning the non-
Communist opposition, have either fled or been murdered or sentenced to
prison. So instead of evolving into a freer society, China is going in
the opposite direction.
Yes, it is more prosperous, but those buildings and those cars and
that technology does not mean they are any less dictatorial or
repressive or immoral.
When you blur the distinctions between right and wrong, between good
and evil, which is what our administration and those people who want to
deal with the Chinese on an equal basis do, do not be surprised if you
find yourself going in the wrong direction.
Bill Clinton and the corporate elite who are pushing this Chinese
policy on America are, if we trust their words, trying to gradually
turn China from a militaristic dictatorship to a hard-driving yet
benevolent player in the world economy. They claim to believe that
China will evolve. Of course, they are making a lot of money, a lot of
money in the process; and, as I pointed out, these people making a lot
of money are doing so by being subsidized and protected by the American
taxpayer.
Let me say that those businessmen who go into China without a
government subsidy, without a guarantee, without political insurance
provided by the American taxpayer, that is okay, good luck. Good luck,
you were taking the risks, and I am not talking about you tonight
because you will be paying for the consequences if you were wrong just
as you will reap the rewards if China does become the vast market that
drives the dreams of so many, and the China dream is what it is all
about.
You know they said that China is the great market of the future, and
it always will be. Well, China has its own national interests and its
totalitarian leaders have their own unchallenged personal power that
holds western concepts of democracy and the rules of law and equitable
political and business relationships in contempt.
Tonight I feel compelled to express my skepticism about those who
loudly advocate the evolutionary engagement theory of the 50 or so
American business leaders who have sat in my office and told me about
doing business on the mainland of China and how it is going to make
these people more liberal and how they will get some values from us.
Not one has ever spoken to a Chinese official near or around his
place of business in China about human rights, not one. Many of them
have even admitted that they would permit Communist officials to arrest
their own employees if that employee belonged to an unrecognized
Christian church.
This is a pitiful reality. It is a disgrace that any American, it is
a total
[[Page H2701]]
disgrace that any American would stand by as a Christian or a person of
any religious faith was dragged out of their offices kicking and
screaming by some Gestapo, whether it was a Communist, Nazi or Fascist
or whatever type of Gestapo it was.
I guess it comes down to this. Just because you are free to do
business in a dictatorship like China does not mean you are free from
the responsibility of being an American and standing up for our ideals
of freedom, and at the very least you are not expected to participate
in activities that threaten the security of our country just because
you are making money.
Tonight I wanted to discuss the inane policies of our government and
the activities of some of our corporate citizens that are both
deplorable and alarming. Tonight I want to discuss for the record for
the first time the possibility that this administration and some
powerful high-technology companies may well have put our country in
grave danger, perhaps putting in harm's way millions of our citizens.
If accurate, the information I have been examining describes one of the
worst betrayals of America's security interests since the Rosenbergs.
I will go right to the heart of the issue. It appears that several
high-tech corporations doing business with the Communist Chinese may
have gone not only over the line of propriety but over the line of
loyalty to the security interests of our country. These aerospace and
technology companies, many have provided the Communist Chinese regime
with the technology and know-how to perfect rockets and
intercontinental missiles.
Because of this assistance from American citizens, the Chinese now
have the capability of delivering nuclear weapons to the United States.
This puts millions of Americans in danger of nuclear incineration
should we ever again confront the Chinese Communists about their
belligerent actions or aggressive behavior.
Making matters worse, the Clinton administration appears to have been
a willing accomplice to this crime against our people; and the
President himself may have been involved in actions aimed at preventing
legal action by the Justice Department from being taken against the
perpetrators of these outrageous impossible crimes.
What I am saying is as serious as anything that I have ever said in
the 10 years that I have been a Member of Congress. As chairman of the
House Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee, it is my responsibility to
oversee NASA and America's space effort. Because of this, I have a
certain degree of knowledge about missiles and rockets. This expertise
allowed me to understand the horrific implications of the cooperation
between American companies and the Chinese in the improvement of the
Chinese aerospace launch systems which I first heard about several
months ago.
The story probably began several years ago when I was asked to
support an effort then being made by Hughes Electronics to assist in
their sales of communication satellites to China. Some countries like
China were insisting on launching purchased satellites, satellites that
had been purchased from Hughes on their own rockets.
It made sense to me that setting up a telecommunication system for
China was a good idea. Launching these satellites up there, putting the
satellites up so they could have a telephone system and they make long
distance calls and such, that was a good idea, would connect them to
the rest of the world. It would link them to the world, and our folks
would make a profit in doing it, so why not give them permission? It
was a good idea.
Was it a good idea for our U.S. firms to launch satellites on foreign
rockets? Well, yes, they could do so if they were willing to do it at
their own risk.
I supported the request. But at no time did I or anyone else in
Congress support the idea that any American company or any American
citizen should be upgrading Chinese rockets to launch those satellites;
and that, my friends, looks like what has happened. Americans and
American companies using their skill and their technology, some of it
developed by American tax dollars during the Cold War, being used to
upgrade the capabilities of Chinese rockets and missiles.
The Chinese Communist regime who was unable to hit us with rockets
and missiles 5 years ago, I am very sad to say, now has the capability
of landing nuclear weapons transported by rockets landing those nuclear
weapons in the United States, and we are the ones who perfected their
rockets.
{time} 1915
In a nutshell, until last year, the Chinese Long March Rocket had a
shaky history of misfires, explosions and unreliability. It took three
or four Long March Rocket launches to complete one successful mission.
That is why it was a shock to learn a few months ago that the Long
March now is more reliable. It has, it seems, been perfected.
This became evident when I heard that two satellites from Motorola's
iridium project were launched into orbit, and it only took two Long
March Rockets to do it. Two out of two successful shots. How could this
be, I asked myself? And then I got a sinking feeling in my stomach that
I knew the answer.
I will tell my colleagues how it could be. After the blow-up of a
Long March Rocket, a team of American engineers working for an American
firm sat down and rolled up their sleeves in what they treated as
nothing more than an engineering project. They thought that what they
were doing was just engineering. And when it was all over, the Red
Chinese had the ability to reliably put into orbit commercial
satellites. That alone was a betrayal of American aerospace workers who
built competitive launch systems like the Delta Rocket. And by the way,
the Delta Rocket just happens to be built in my congressional district.
So for us to upgrade their rocket capability using our technology, that
was a betrayal in and of itself of the economic responsibility we have
to watch out for our own people.
But putting their fellow American aerospace workers out of jobs is
not all these companies did by helping the Chinese upgrade their
missiles. They put all of us in the crosshairs of a Communist
Government, which, thanks to this assistance, now has the ability not
just to put satellites into space, but to deliver nuclear weapons to a
majority of American cities.
When this realization first hit me, it knocked the wind right out of
my lungs. I could hardly breathe. And when I queried an executive from
one of the corporations who were involved in upgrading this Chinese
missile capability, he quickly stated that I should not worry, because
he understood that his company was operating with a national security
waiver signed by the President of the United States. He did not say
that he had seen this waiver personally.
The engineering achievement this gentleman talked about was Rocket
Stage Separation technology and Multiple Independent Reentry Vehicle
technology. If my colleagues cannot understand it, the first one is the
stage technology that permits the stages of the rockets to separate;
the last one I talked about is called MIRV technology.
But before these technologies were given to the Chinese, the Long
March would often blow up, and they would blow up when the stages tried
to separate, and if it survived the stages' separation and made it into
space, there was often a problem with the satellite dispenser. That is
where the MIRV technology comes in.
So the American companies proceeded to provide stage separation
technology as well as technology that enabled the rocket to spit out
satellites, or nuclear warheads, whichever the Communist Chinese might
want to use on any particular day.
About the same time, and perhaps as part of the same team, even
perhaps as part of the same effort, two other aerospace firms were
involved in a project to upgrade and perfect the Long March Rocket's
flight control and guidance systems. Apparently an electrical flaw had
caused a malfunction which blew up a Long March Rocket attempting to
launch a satellite by Loral Space and Communications of Manhattan.
Again, the American technological cavalry came to the rescue.
Engineers from Loral, assisted by engineers from Hughes Electronics,
and at the direction of their superiors, charged forward to correct the
problems in the Long March. It seems what
[[Page H2702]]
happened was a sterile, coldly calculated decision to fix these
problems with no consideration of the national security implications to
the United States.
One must hope that no consideration was given to our security,
because if there was consideration given to our security, it means
these company officials said to themselves, to hell with the safety of
every man, woman and child in the United States; this is a lucrative
contract and we are not going to lose it. Well, where the hell do they
think they are going to go home to once the contract is over?
A few years ago it was unlikely that the Chinese Communists could
threaten us with a nuclear strike. Confronting their misdeeds then
could be accomplished with limited risk. Our leaders have tremendous
leverage to prevent aggression and to keep the lid on volatile
situations. Now, all of that has changed, much of it due perhaps to the
assistance to the Chinese Communists by American citizens and American
companies.
In a recent report by the U.S. National Air Force Intelligence
Center, that report indicates that China now has a new three-stage
intercontinental ballistic missile that can reach every State in our
country, except southern Florida. The report states that these missiles
carry only a single warhead. But the Communists are close to producing
a new system with multiple independent reentry vehicles, MIRVs. The
security of our country will never be the same.
The young people who are watching on their televisions or are here
with us tonight, their lives will be far less secure than it ever would
have been had we not permitted this to happen. The security that people
expected that we would take into consideration was not part of the
equation. Unfortunately, the young people of our country now will have
to live under a cloud that they could be pulverized by nuclear weapons
sent from mainland China on a rocket that American technology helped
build for our adversaries.
In May 1997, the Pentagon produced a classified report on missile
expertise transferred to China which concluded that the United States
national security was probably damaged by the Loral-Hughes technology
transfers I have just described. This was followed by an investigation
into the deal by the U.S. Justice Department. Then, only a few weeks
ago it was revealed by the press that a Federal grand jury was
investigating Loral and Hughes for possible violations of law in this
outrageous transfer of weapons know-how to the Communist Chinese.
Now comes the kicker of this story. President Clinton and his
administration have been doing everything they can to quash the
investigation of this possible violation of law, this betrayal of our
country. According to press accounts, Justice Department officials
claim that 2 months ago, their investigation was seriously undermined
when President Clinton quietly approved the export to China of similar
rocketry expertise by Loral. Our President cut the legs out right from
under the law enforcement agencies trying to investigate this matter, a
matter which is obviously of great importance to our national security.
This move reflects a horrifyingly cavalier attitude toward the safety
of our people from the nuclear weapons capabilities of the Communist
Chinese, or it could be even worse. Worse? Yes, worse than a cavalier
attitude about the Chinese Communists being able to hit us with nuclear
weapons. What is worse than that? An attitude that is not cavalier, but
it was a conscious decision.
The CEO of Loral is Bernard Schwartz. This gentleman also has the
distinction of being one of the largest single contributors to
President Clinton's reelection campaign; and unlike other aerospace
companies, would strive to have a balanced portfolio of campaign
contributions. This company obviously had its man, and his name was
Bill Clinton.
Mr. Schwartz was the largest individual contributor to the Democratic
Party in 1997, and in 1996, together with Loral and Hughes Companies,
contributed $2.5 million to the Democratic Party that we know about,
almost triple their contributions that they gave to the Republican
Party.
We are also aware of the likelihood that the Communist Chinese had
contributions of their own that made their way into President Clinton's
campaign coffers. The total dollar figure is unknown because, it is
unknown because those who have that information are currently on the
lam. They are hiding so they will not have to testify as to Chinese
Communist money going into President Clinton's campaign. Many of them
have left the country, and those who have come back are looking for
immunity to testify before Congress, but they are now in the process of
having their immunity denied by Democrat Members of this body who are
part of the investigating committee. They will not grant them immunity,
because they do not want that information coming out.
What, if any, have these Chinese Communist donations purchased?
Direct evidence is sketchy, but we do know that since President Clinton
was elected in November 1992, China has violated its nonproliferation
commitments no less than 20 times according to the Congressional
Research Service.
In response, the administration has only twice imposed sanctions in
accordance with U.S. law, and in one of these cases, the sanctions were
waived in one of these cases after only 1 year. In addition, China has
repeatedly transferred or discussed transferring weapons of mass
destruction to rogue nations such as Iran and Libya, after assuring our
country that all such actions had ceased.
Today, it is Israel's 50th anniversary. Fifty years, Israel has been
in conflict for 50 years. One of the greatest threats to Israel is
what? Rockets that can hit their targets fired at them from extremist
countries and terrorist countries like Iran. And yet, President Clinton
seems to have undercut the investigations and greased the skids for
providing the Communist Chinese technology that, even after the Chinese
have repeatedly provided technology to people like the Iranians and
others who are enemies not only of the United States, but enemies of
Israel.
In giving the Iranians guidance system technology for rockets, this
is quite a birthday present for Israel, and quite a birthday present
for anybody in the Western world who sides with the United States and
sides with the Western democracies.
And of course now, the administration claims, we are going to reach
out again and accept the Chinese Communist word again that they will
not do it anymore, they will not give any more information, and in
exchange for that agreement not to give any more information, we are
going to give them all the rest of our technological secrets. We are
going to extend the cooperation with the Communist Chinese to a greater
extent than it has ever been. That is a proposal right now going on
that the President is preparing to offer when he goes to China next
month. This is a travesty, it is a travesty.
In this atmosphere, President Clinton will go to China next month,
and the papers suggest that he is going to offer the Communist Chinese
to share with them our space technology if they just agree not to
transfer it to others. This, of course, is nonsense on the face of it.
We are going to share our technology with someone who has already given
it to our enemies, somebody who themselves are a Communist dictatorship
and one of the worst violators of human rights on this planet? People
who are torturing Christians and other believers, we are going to give
our space technology to them?
Well, I suggest that this is nonsense on the face of it, and that is
not what this is all about. This proposal by the President, I believe,
is trying to do something that he did before when he undercut the
investigation into Loral and Hughes. What this is is trying to offer a
mask, this new policy the administration is offering, is doing nothing
more than trying to give a mask to deeds that have already been done,
just as the move in granting Loral approval to transfer rocket
technology undercut the investigation into the wrongdoing that they
have already done.
So in other words, this grandiose plan that we have read about in the
newspapers may well be nothing more than a cover for misdeeds that have
already taken place because the President knows that this information
is going to come out about American technology being used by Chinese
Communists to build their rockets which
[[Page H2703]]
are aimed in our direction. The President knows how volatile that is,
and the story has been coming out slowly but surely, and this speech
tonight I think will even accelerate the information about this
terrible betrayal of America's interests.
{time} 1930
What seems to have happened is that instead of civilizing the
communist Chinese, our engagement with that government has corrupted
our democracy. Instead of providing us wealth, it has undercut our
domestic production and has transferred our technology to our
adversaries. Instead of promoting peace, it has massively extended the
raw destructive power of a regime that remains one of this world's
worst human rights offenders and a country that threatens the peace and
stability of the planet.
A recent confirmation of that expanded destructive power comes from
General Haber, a commander of the U.S. Strategic Command. General Haber
recently stated, and I quote, ``The Chinese do have the deployment of
an intercontinental missile that can reach most of the United States,
except for southern Florida.''
Because of this new threat from communist China, because it is so
overwhelming, this speech is going to be only the first of many I will
make on the subject. But let me add one point here.
Here we have a President and an administration that is willing to
undercut investigations into these companies and he may well, for all
we know, by his own attitude have fostered an idea among these
companies that they could get away with this type of betrayal of
America's interests. Perhaps they saw the President and his dealings
with China and how he makes a joke out of human rights, and they
thought why should they consider America's national security interests.
But this is the same group of people, the President of the United
States and his administration, who because of what they have done, now
that the communist Chinese have the ability to hit our country with
nuclear weapons, this is the same President that has gone out of his
way to prevent us from developing a defense system that would defend us
against an attack, a missile attack. This is the same administration
that has done everything they can to prevent the Republicans from
developing a missile defense system for the United States of America
and for our allies. The standard is incredible. It is overwhelming. It
still almost takes the air out of my lungs when I think about this.
I mean, just where is the interest of the American people? Who is
concerned about it? Who is protecting us? It certainly is not people
who would permit the technology that was developed during the Cold War
for our own weapons systems to be handed over to the communist Chinese
even before they have had any liberalization of their system.
Once the American people realize what has happened, I predict a wave
of outrage will sweep across our country, even to Florida, even though
they are the only ones who have not been made vulnerable by this.
Though the Floridians cannot be hit by land-based missiles, the folks
down there understand that being an American is more important that the
almighty dollar and they understand that being an American is something
special and they would never betray the interests of their country.
It seems like some of our citizens, including some prominent
individuals, may have forgotten that and may be operating at a much
lower level of value than that.
Perhaps President Clinton really was converted to the theory and
convinced that these gangsters who now control the mainland of China
could be civilized by luring them into economic dependency and
technological dependency. If we make them economically dependent and so
technologically dependent by giving them technology and building their
economy up, that that will make things better. Maybe he really believes
that.
Maybe he believes that once that happens and they have prosperity,
that their iron fist can be unclenched because we will have proven to
them our sincere desire for peace and, therefore, the insecurity and
the vulnerability that the Chinese have, that will be satisfied and
they can disarm and they will longer be this monstrous totalitarian
regime that they are.
Let us give the President the benefit of the doubt. Maybe that is
what he believes. That is the most foolish thing that I have ever
heard, but I have heard it expressed so many times that we are going to
have to give people good motives. But whether they have good motives or
not, let us look at what is happening here. These are the same type of
assurances and feeling that Neville Chamberlain gave the people of
England about the Nazi regime shortly before the bombings of London
that caused World War II. World War II was brought on by people trying
to prove their sincerity to Hitler. Let him take the Rhineland back.
Let us prove to him that he can take these territories. Where there is
any question at all, always give him the benefit of the doubt. And our
businessmen did business with Hitler and Hirohito up until the day that
World War II started.
Mr. Speaker, these things did not make Hitler and the dictators in
Japan and Italy any less aggressive or less likely to cause war. These
things actually are foolishness and nonsense, and trying to prove that
we were not a threat did just the opposite to these bosses.
We must never forget that the real reason for the communist Chinese
and their monstrously bad human rights record, and for their continued
military buildup, and for the unrelenting repression in China of
Christians and Muslims and Buddhists, and for the continued genocide
that is going on in Tibet, the main reason this is happening is the
fundamental nature of the communist regime, the vile nature of their
own political system. It is meant to be a communist dictatorship. They
have never stepped back one inch from the idea that they will control
their society with an iron fist.
Just the other day we read about what? It came out in the paper, I
guess it was today in fact, a rock and roll singer was arrested in Hong
Kong. And why? The rock and roll figure was arrested and put into
prison because he is a threat to that country's national security. A
rock and roll singer. Yes.
And Christians, and Muslims, and Buddhists, and the Dalai Lama's
followers and anyone else who would speak up against this system. Any
artist who would dare to show their work without permission. Anyone who
would say anything against the regime outside of the communist party
structure.
The solution that we need to have is not to try to prove our
sincerity to the communist Chinese. We need to work with the people of
China to overthrow and eliminate this corrupt, this vile, this
tyrannical system and kick out these people who oppress them. The
younger people in China do not believe in this, just like the younger
people in Russia did not. Our goal should not be trying to give
legitimacy and trying to make them not feel threatened by giving them
our technology. That will only result in America being placed in
jeopardy. It will only result in our people living less prosperous
lives and now our people living under a cloud, under a threat of
nuclear attack when five years ago they were not.
The solution, of course, is ending their system and bringing them in
and demanding, demanding, yes demanding that there be real changes for
us to have any closer relationships with them.
Finally, let me just summarize what we have talked about tonight,
what I have talked about tonight. Tonight, we have opened a discussion
which I believe will continue and intensify in the weeks ahead. I have
given details about a transfer of American technology by American
companies to the communist Chinese. This transfer of American
technology has perfected communist Chinese rocket systems which now
enables these communist Chinese rockets to reach targets in the United
States of America.
When Bill Clinton was elected President of the United States, the
communist Chinese could not launch with a rocket from the mainland of
China on a nuclear attack of the United States. They are now capable of
that. The MIRV technology which our companies transferred to them also
permits these same rockets not to carry a single warhead but to have
several warheads. The same technology that spits out a satellite can be
used to spit out nuclear warheads.
[[Page H2704]]
There was an investigation into this transfer of technology, an
investigation by government officials who were convinced that America's
national security had been put in jeopardy and that the law had been
violated. President Clinton took actions that undermined and undercut
that investigation.
At least one of the heads of the U.S. companies that were providing
this technology to the communist Chinese is one of President Clinton's
biggest campaign contributors and indeed the biggest campaign
contributor to the Democratic Party in 1996. We do not know about the
campaign contributions from the communist Chinese to President
Clinton's campaign in the last presidential reelection campaign because
the witnesses are on the lam, and the Democratic Party Members in the
investigating committee are refusing to grant them immunity so that
they can tell their story to the American people.
I do not like to come to the floor of the House to talk about
something so horrendous as this. This has implications about the safety
of every one of our families. I hope that everyone who is reading this
in the Congressional Record and I hope that everyone who is seeing this
on C-SPAN will make sure they contact their Member of Congress and make
it clear that we should get to the bottom of this. And I assure my
colleagues that this is one Member of Congress that will not stop until
we get all of the information about this horrendous transfer of weapons
and technology that has put us in jeopardy.
Speaker Gingrich and others now are in the process of requesting the
information, and if this administration does not cooperate there will
be hearings on this subject.
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