[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 105 (Thursday, July 30, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9329-S9343]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 1999
The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill.
PRIVILEGE OF THE FLOOR
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Ed Fienga
from my staff be allowed on the floor during the debate on the defense
appropriations bill.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Amendment No. 3397
(Purpose: To achieve the near full funding of the Army National Guard
operation and maintenance account that the Senate provided for in the
concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 1999 (H. Con. Res.
28), as agreed to by the Senate, and to offset that increase by
reducing the amount provided for procurement for the F/A-18E/F aircraft
program to the amount provided by the House of Representatives in H.R.
4103, as passed by the House of Representatives)
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask
for its immediate consideration.
[[Page S9330]]
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. Feingold] proposes an
amendment numbered 3397.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:
On page 13, line 9, increase the amount by $219,700,000.
On page 25, line 25, reduce the amount by $219,700,000.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, my amendment would allow the National
Guard to almost fully fund its operation and maintenance, or O&M
account, for the coming fiscal year. This year's Defense Department
budget request left the National Guard with a $634 million budget
shortfall, including a $450 million shortfall in the Guard's O&M
account. This request fell on the heals of a $743 million shortfall for
the current fiscal year. I think these shortfalls are wrongheaded and
unacceptable.
Fortunately, both Houses of Congress have acted more responsibly in
funding the National Guard. Even with the improvements from both
Houses, though, the Senate appropriations bill we are currently
considering leaves the Guard's operation and maintenance account $225
million short. The House bill leaves an even greater gap of $317
million. My amendment would add $220 million to the National Guard's
O&M account, leaving just a $5 million shortfall to that account.
According to the National Guard, shortfalls in the operation and
maintenance account compromise the Guard's readiness levels,
capabilities, force structure, and end strength. Failing to fully
support these vital areas will have a direct as well as indirect
effect. The shortfall puts the Guard's personnel, schools, training,
full-time support, and retention and recruitment at risk. Perhaps most
importantly, however, I know firsthand that it is eroding the morale of
our citizen-soldiers, as I have had the opportunity to visit some of
the armories in Wisconsin and have heard this concern firsthand.
With that in mind, 26 State adjutants general--a majority of the
adjutants general in this country--have contacted my office to voice
their support for this amendment. The leaders of the National Guard
units in Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware,
Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts,
Michigan, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Dakota,
Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wyoming, and my
own home State of Wisconsin support my amendment. I would like to thank
them for their dedication and support, and I hope we decide to heed
their call for support of the National Guard.
Mr. President, in spite of the National Guard's budget concerns, the
administration continues to deliver insufficient budget requests given
the National Guard's duties; yet, the administration increasingly calls
on the Guard to handle some very wide-ranging tasks. These shortfalls
have an increasingly greater effect given the National Guard's
increased operations burden. This is as a result of new missions,
increased deployments, and training requirements, including the
missions in Bosnia, Iraq, Haiti, and Somalia.
As I am sure my colleagues know by now, the Army National Guard
represents a full 34 percent of total Army forces, including 55 percent
of combat divisions and brigades, 46 percent of combat support, and 25
percent of combat service support; yet, the Guard only receives 9.5
percent of Army funds.
To offer a comparison with the other Army components, the National
Guard receives just 71 percent of requested funding, as opposed to the
Active Army's 80 percent and Army Reserve's 81 percent. I think it is
time we move toward giving the National Guard adequate and equal
funding. This amendment almost achieves funding equity for the National
Guard, and the National Guard is the Nation's only constitutionally
mandated defense force.
Not only have we failed to invest fully in the National Guard, we
have failed to invest fully in the best bargain in the Defense
Department. That should not come as a surprise, however. DOD has never
been known as a frugal or practical department--from $436 hammers to
$640 toilet seats to $2 billion bombers that don't work and the
Department doesn't seem to want to use. The Department of Defense has a
storied history of wasting our tax dollars. Here is an opportunity to
spend defense dollars on something that actually works, that is
worthwhile, and enjoys broad support on both sides of the aisle.
In this regard, the National Guard fits the bill. According to a
National Guard study, the average cost to train and equip an active
duty soldier is $73,000 per year, while it costs only $17,000 per year
to train and equip a National Guard soldier. The cost of maintaining
Army National Guard units is just 23 percent of the cost of maintaining
active Army units. It is time for the Pentagon to quit complaining
about lack of funding and begin using their money a little more wisely
and efficiently.
Finally, my amendment doesn't terminate any program, nor does it
create unsupported cuts to existing programs. This amendment merely
follows the recommendation of the other Chamber.
Early this year, the House overwhelmingly supported DOD authorization
and appropriations bills that provide $2.6 billion to procure 27 Super
Hornet aircraft. I think, and the General Accounting Office thinks,
that is actually far too much money for a plane that provides only
marginal benefits over the current, reliable Hornet. But it is better
than the $2.8 billion for 30 Super Hornets that the bill contains. I
think we should follow the prudent lead of our colleagues in the other
body on this issue.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the House
National Security Committee's report on its fiscal year 1999 DOD
authorization bill, which specifically addresses the Super Hornet, be
printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the report was ordered to be printed in the
Record, as follows:
F/A-18E/F
The budget request contained $2,787.8 million for 30 F/A-
18E/F aircraft and $109.4 million for advanced procurement of
36 aircraft in fiscal year 2000.
Based on the results of the Quadrennial Defense Review
(QDR), the committee notes that the Department has reduced
the total procurement objective from 1,000 to 548 aircraft
and has also reduced procurement in the future years defense
program (FYDP) from 248 to 224. The committee notes that the
Department plans to request increases of six aircraft per
year for each of the next three fiscal years until its
maximum production rate of 48 aircraft per year is attained
in fiscal year 2002. However, for fiscal year 1999, the
requested increase from fiscal year 1998 is 10 aircraft.
The committee is also aware that the Department has
increased the number of low rate initial production (LRIP)
aircraft in fiscal years 1997, 1998 and 1999 from 42, as
approved in 1992 by the Defense Acquisition Board (DAB), to
its current plan of 62 aircraft. The Department's Selected
Acquisition Reports indicate that both its initial plan of 42
LRIP aircraft and its current plan of 62 LRIP aircraft were
predicated on a procurement objective of 1,000 aircraft. The
committee notes that were the Department to comply with the
10 percent LRIP guideline contained in section 2400 of title
10, United States Code, 55 LRIP aircraft should be
sufficient.
During the past year, the committee has followed the
Department's challenges in solving an uncommanded rolling
motion problem that occurs at altitudes and angles of attack
in that portion of the flight envelop where the F/A-18E/F
performs air combat maneuvers. The Department's Director of
Operational Test and Evaluation recently testified that the
most promising solution to this problem--a porous wing
fairing--causes unacceptable airframe buffeting and that the
final solution to the problem may include other combinations
of aerodynamic alternations to the wing surface. According to
the Director, the root cause of the problem and modifications
to the porous wing fairing are still being investigated, and
the wing fairing configuration flown during developmental
testing does not incorporate the production representative
wing fold mechanism. Additionally, the Director stated that
the Department would not have a complete understanding of the
impact of the design fix, including uncertainty over air flow
effects around the weapons pylons, until the conclusion of
operational testing in 1999. Moreover, the Director also
noted other concerns with the aircraft such as deficiencies
in the performance of its survivability and radar jamming
systems.
In light of the significantly higher increase in production
proposed for fiscal year 1999, the apparent excess number of
LRIP aircraft,
[[Page S9331]]
and the development and testing issues yet to be fully
resolved, the committee recommends a reduction of $213.1
million and three aircraft. Of the total $213.1 million
reduction, initial spares is reduced by $8.4 million. The
committee believes that an increase of seven aircraft from
the approved fiscal year 1998 level is appropriate and
further believes that a total of 59 LRIP aircraft,
approximately 11 percent of the total procurement objective,
will meet requirements for operational testing and evaluation
and will also be sufficient to meet both initial training
requirements and the first operational deployment scheduled
for fiscal year 2002.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I would like to quote the chairman of
the House Military Procurement Subcommittee, Duncan Hunter. Speaking of
the National Security Committee's Super Hornet procurement decision,
Representative Hunter said, ``We think it's a rational, responsible
reduction, a balanced reduction.''
Mr. President, it is time we prioritized this Nation's defense needs.
The National Guard provides a wide range of services, from combat in
foreign lands to support in local weather emergencies, all at a
fraction of the cost of the Active Army. The National Guard needs and
deserves our full support. And it is for that reason that I ask for the
yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There is a sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I intend to move to table this amendment.
Mr. INOUYE addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.
Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, I would like to commend the Senator from
Wisconsin for presenting this amendment. I would have to speak against
that.
It is true that the budget request submitted by the administration
for the National Guard had a shortfall for O&M activities in the Guard
in the amount of about $770 million. On our chairman's initiative, we
placed an amount of $320 million to make up for part of the shortfall.
In addition to that, the administration had zero dollars for
procurement of new equipment based upon the philosophy that if the
regular services, the Regular Army, purchases equipment, some of the
leftovers may go for the Guard. We did not concur with that. We
appropriated $500 million for the Guard to get new equipment.
Having said that, Mr. President, I believe it should be noted that
every service, every component of every service, is faced with
shortfalls. There is a shortfall in Navy O&M. They would like to have
more steaming time. They want their ships to be out there for
maneuvers. We can't do that. The Army Tank Corps would like to have
more petroleum and gasoline so that the men who drive these tanks may
get more experience and be ready for combat, if such is necessary.
Artillerymen would like to have more ammunition for firing range
practice.
Mr. President, we have the sad chore of trying to balance all of the
accounts and, at the same time, realizing that if this Nation is to
continue being the superpower of this world and thereby deter any
nation from any mischievous action, we have to provide funds to
modernize. The accounts that may be affected by this amendment would
stop the modernization program.
Mr. President, although I agree that the Guard should be receiving
much more, I will have to concur with my chairman's action when he
moves to table this.
Thank you.
Mr. STEVENS addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alaska.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, we have had a series of visits with the
Joint Chiefs of Staff. I particularly recall the discussion I had with
Secretary of the Navy John Dalton and with Admiral Johnson. There is no
question that the Navy representatives have informed our committee that
full F/A-18E/F funding is the administration's top appropriations
priority for defense and the Navy.
This amendment would take these funds from that priority, the F/A-
18E/F, and move it to the National Guard.
We have added, as I stated this morning, $95 million to augment the
Guard and Reserve personnel accounts.
We have added for the Guard and Reserve operation and maintenance
funds an additional $225 million.
Finally, we added $450 million to the Guard and Reserve procurement
account.
I have to tell the Senator we have exceeded the requests in many
instances. We added almost $1 billion in the zero sum budget for the
Guard and Reserve priorities.
Furthermore, the F/A/-18E/F is just entering production. The
Senator's amendment will seriously disrupt the production program, and
substantially increase the unit cost, if the Senate approves this
amendment. To me it does not make common sense to increase the cost of
the F-18, the Navy's top priority planes which we must buy to meet the
Navy's previously approved program requirements. We have helped the
Guard and Reserve. I do not think we should punish the Navy in order to
help them any more.
If the Senator wishes to make any comments, I yield to him for those
comments.
I intend to make a motion to table his amendment. But before I do
that, I ask unanimous consent that, on any votes that are laid aside in
order to join the priority list that is already in existence under the
Guard and Reserve the common procedure of a minute on each side be the
procedure for this bill: That there be 2 minutes equally divided on any
vote that occurs on this bill on an amendment that is set aside for a
later time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. FEINGOLD addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wisconsin.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, let me first of all say that the two
Senators who have spoken in opposition to this amendment are not only
very sincere in their support of the National Guard but they have
demonstrated in committee a serious concern about increasing funding.
And their efforts have gone a long way to make sure that we have less
of a shortfall than was originally occurring. That is encouraging.
However, as was admitted by those opposed to this amendment, we still
have a $225 million shortfall in the O&M account at the National Guard.
This is a serious shortfall.
I am not suggesting that we remove this funding from vital areas, but
this is about priorities within the defense budget. I think it is a
pretty easy call. Although I would prefer that we not move forward with
the Super Hornet airplane, what I am suggesting here is not a dramatic
reduction in those planes. I am simply suggesting we take what has
already been passed in the House; that is, instead of having 30 of the
Super Hornets, we procure 27--3 fewer. For three fewer of these planes,
we could fully fund the National Guard O&M account.
This is not an attempt, as the Senator from Alaska, suggested, to
seriously disrupt the production of the Super Hornet. Very candidly,
Mr. President, I would prefer to do that, because the General
Accounting Office has pointed out that the Super Hornet is not
substantially better than the current plane. It is going to cost $17
billion more than the current plane. That is a huge amount of money.
But that is not what this amendment does. All this amendment does is
say let's adopt what the House did, which is have 27 Super Hornets
instead of 30, and use the money that is saved to fully fund the
National Guard, or virtually fully fund the National Guard O&M account.
Mr. President, these shortfalls for the National Guard are serious. I
have had the opportunity to visit armories in Oak Creek, WI, and
Appleton, WI, and spend a fair amount of time speaking to the officers
and the guardsmen and guardswomen who are trying so hard to do the job
that they are expected to do, constituting 34 percent of our entire
Army's sources and resources. They are having morale problems.
Otherwise, why would 26 adjutant generals in this country write in
support of this amendment? They are very concerned.
Mr. President, my amendment is simply about priorities. It is a
modest reduction in the number of these Super Hornets that are going to
be procured, and in return for something that is far more vital at this
point. And that is fully funding the O&M account for the National
Guard.
Mr. President, in light of the fact there will be a motion to table
at some
[[Page S9332]]
point, I strongly urge my colleagues to put these modest resources in
the National Guard, which supports our Army and which exists in our
communities in every one of our States, rather than three more
airplanes that, frankly, have not been proven to be substantially
better than the current plane that has done a good job in the Gulf war
and other situations.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, if there is no further debate on this
matter, I move to table the Senator's amendment and ask for the yeas
and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
Mr. STEVENS. I now ask that that amendment be set aside.
Is the standing order that all of the votes we ask for the yeas and
nays on prior to 2 o'clock will be automatically set aside?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is correct.
Mr. STEVENS. I thank the Chair.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Gregg). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Amendment No. 3398
(Purpose: To limit the use of funds pending establishment of the
position of Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Technology Security
Policy)
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, if it is in order, I would like to send an
amendment to the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
Mr. KYL. And ask for its immediate consideration.
The bill clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Arizona [Mr. Kyl] proposes an amendment
numbered 3398.
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the
amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:
On page 99, between lines 17 and 18, insert the following:
Sec. 8104. (a) None of the funds appropriated by this Act
may be obligated or expended for the establishment or
operation of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency until the
Secretary of Defense takes the following actions:
(1) Establishes within the Office of the Under Secretary of
Defense for Policy the position of Deputy Under Secretary of
Defense for Technology Security Policy and designates that
official to serve as the Director of the Defense Security
Technology Agency with only the following duties:
(A) To develop for the Department of Defense policies and
positions regarding the appropriate export control policies
and procedures that are necessary to protect the national
security interests of the United States.
(B) To supervise activities of the Department of Defense
relating to export controls.
(C) As the Director of the Defense Security Technology
Agency--
(i) to administer the technology security program of the
Department of Defense;
(ii) to review, under that program, international transfers
of defense-related technology, goods, services, and munitions
in order to determine whether such transfers are consistent
with United States foreign policy and national security
interests and to ensure that such international transfers
comply with Department of Defense technology security
policies;
(iii) to ensure (using automation and other computerized
techniques to the maximum extent practicable) that the
Department of Defense role in the processing of export
license applications is carried out as expeditiously as is
practicable consistent with the national security interests
of the United States; and
(iv) to actively support intelligence and enforcement
activities of the Federal Government to restrain the flow of
defense-related technology, goods, services, and munitions to
potential adversaries.
(2) Submits to Congress a written certification that--
(A) the Defense Security Technology Agency is to remain a
Defense Agency independent of all other Defense Agencies of
the Department of Defense and the military departments; and
(B) no funds are to be obligated or expended for
integrating the Defense Security Technology Agency into
another Defense Agency.
(b) The Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Technology
Security Policy may report directly to the Secretary of
Defense on the matters that are within the duties of the
Deputy Under Secretary.
(c) Not later than 10 days after the Secretary of Defense
establishes the position of Deputy Under Secretary of Defense
for Technology Security Policy, the Secretary shall submit to
the Committees on Armed Services and on Appropriations of the
Senate and the Committees on National Security and on
Appropriations of the House of Representatives a report on
the establishment of the position. The report shall include
the following:
(1) A description of any organizational changes that have
been made or are to be made within the Department of Defense
to satisfy the conditions set forth in subsection (a) and
otherwise to implement this section.
(2) A description of the role of the Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff in the export control activities of the
Department of Defense after the establishment of the
position, together with a discussion of how that role
compares to the Chairman's role in those activities before
the establishment of the position.
(d) Unless specifically authorized and appropriated for
such purpose, funds may not be obligated to relocate any
office or personnel of the Defense Technology Security
Administration to any location that is more than five miles
from the Pentagon Reservation (as defined in section 2674(f)
of title 10, United States Code).
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, might I ask of the distinguished chairman
whether this would be an appropriate time to discuss briefly the
amendment or whether we should lay it aside and move to other business?
What would be the chairman's pleasure?
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I just delivered a copy of the Senator's
amendment to the minority and other committees affected. He is at
liberty to make such comments he wishes to make, but we will not be
able to have final consideration of the matter until we have heard back
from Senator Inouye and his people on his side of the aisle. The
Governmental Affairs Committee is also considering this issue.
Mr. KYL. What I might do then, Mr. President, since we want to handle
this in a way agreeable to the chairman, if there is no one else to
present an amendment right now, rather than defer business, I will go
ahead and describe the amendment but do it briefly and then, when the
chairman is ready to proceed with other business, lay it aside and
handle it in that fashion, if that is agreeable with the chairman.
Mr. STEVENS. Fine.
Privilege of the Floor
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, in that event, let me first ask unanimous
consent that two fellows from my office, John Rood and David Stephens,
be granted floor privileges for the debate on this matter.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. KYL. I thank the Chair.
Mr. President, I will describe this amendment briefly.
Frankly, this came out of the revelations concerning the alleged
transfer of certain technology to the Chinese Government as a part of
the process of launching American satellites on Chinese rockets, the
so-called Loral-Hughes matter. But it really goes beyond that. It is a
question of whether or not the Defense Department has in process an
adequate way of reviewing the requests for export licensure and the
conditions attached to those licenses to ensure that national security
is not jeopardized.
That role has in the past been played by an agency of the Defense
Department called the Defense Technology Security Agency. It goes by
the name of DTSA for the people who understand it. The point of this
memorandum is to ensure that DTSA will continue to have a prominent
role in the evaluation of export licenses and the kinds of conditions
that would be attached to them.
In fact, we ensure as a result of this amendment that the role is
prominent by restoring the position of the Deputy Under Secretary for
Technology Security Policy within the Office of the Under Secretary of
Defense for Policy, and thereby ensure, as I say, a prominent role for
this agency. The Deputy Under Secretary would have access to both the
Under Secretary of Policy and the Secretary of Defense himself.
This is important, Mr. President, for the following reasons:
No. 1, DTSA is the single agency in the Government reviewing the
national security implications of an item for export;
No. 2, DTSA coordinates input from the services, military branches,
the Joint Chiefs and the defense agencies;
[[Page S9333]]
No. 3, DTSA routinely supports the Department of State in its
investigations of these matters;
No. 4, creating a Deputy Secretary of Technology Security will ensure
that the Department of Defense is represented at a sufficiently high
level at the interagency meetings that occur to discuss these export
licenses.
And, finally, providing the Deputy Under Secretary with the authority
to interact directly with the Secretary of Defense will enable the
Deputy Secretary to bring items of immediate concern directly to the
Secretary to discuss with the Secretary of Commerce and the President.
The Department of Defense is the only agency with the expertise, the
personnel, and the ability to assess the impact of exports on the
national security of the United States, and this ought to be our No. 1
concern. The Persian Gulf war demonstrated the value of the United
States maintaining a technical edge on the battlefield. Maintaining
that edge in the future is dependent upon keeping sensitive
technologies out of the hands of potential adversaries.
Questions regarding the appropriate role of the Department of Defense
in considering exports of dual-use items have obviously been of concern
for a number of years. But, as I said, the alleged transfer technology
to the Chinese Government has really elevated this concern to the point
that there are those of us in Congress who want to ensure that the
Department of Defense continues to have an important role here.
Early in the 1990s, Congress examined the problems with export
control and how it was possible that American companies, with the
knowledge of the Department of Commerce, could have contributed to the
Iraqi arms buildup, as we know occurred. We learned, for example, that
between 1985 and the imposition of the U.N. embargo on Iraq in August
of 1990, the Department of Commerce approved for sale to Iraq 771
export licenses for dual-use goods. Some of these sales involved
technologies that very probably helped the Iraqis develop ballistic
missile, nuclear, and chemical weapons. In some cases, Commerce
approved the sale over strong objections from Defense or without even
consulting the Department of Defense at all.
In 1994, the Export Administration Act expired and in 1996 dissolved,
leaving no overarching legal forum to guide the export control policies
of the United States. Export controls were at that point directed by
Executive order. And this resulted in relaxed control over national-
security-related equipment and technologies. The GAO has documented
potential problems with changes that occurred in 1996 and with the
Department of Commerce retaining the primary responsibility for
oversight of important national security equipment or technology.
Let me just give a couple of examples here. On September 14, 1994,
the Department of Commerce approved an export of machine tools to
China. The tools had been used in a plant in Ohio that produced
aircraft and missiles for the U.S. military. Some of the more
sophisticated machine tools were diverted to a Chinese facility engaged
in military production, possibly cruise missile production.
Under current referral practices, the majority of applications for
the export of categories related to stealth are not sent to the
Department of Defense or the Department of State for review. Without
such referrals, it cannot be ensured that export licenses for
militarily significant stealth technology are properly reviewed and
controlled.
A third example: Commercial jet engine hot section technology was
transferred to the Department of Commerce in 1996. Defense officials
are concerned about the diffusion of technology and the availability of
hot section components that could negatively affect the combat
advantage of our aircraft and pose a threat to U.S. national security
concerns. So the Defense Department must have an active role and a
strong position in advising the President about the national security
implications of exporting these and other important dual-use
technologies. In order to do this, the Secretary of Defense must have
the best advice available. This amendment will ensure that Secretary
Cohen and all subsequent Secretaries have that advice.
Mr. President, at the appropriate time I hope we can engage in
further discussion of this to ensure that the national security of the
United States is not impaired.
At this time, unless there is anyone else who would like to discuss
it, I am happy to have the chairman or the ranking member move to other
business.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I ask this amendment be set aside for
later consideration so we may have consultation with other committees
and Members involved in this subject. We did not have this on our list
and have not distributed it until just now. I ask unanimous consent it
be put aside until other Members have a chance to review it.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. BOND. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Amendment No. 3397
Mr. BOND. Mr. President, we have had a brief debate. The manager of
the bill, the chairman of the committee, has moved to table the
Feingold amendment. I want to add my comments to the debate on that
issue.
This is an amendment which I strongly oppose and I urge my colleagues
on both sides of the aisle to oppose it. This is part of a continuing
campaign of harassment against the Navy's No. 1 program, the No. 1
program of the U.S. Navy. This campaign has had a long, and to date
totally unsuccessful, history. We all know the problems in the court
systems when individuals flood the courts with frivolous lawsuits. We,
in providing procurement funds for the Navy, have had a string of what
I consider to be less than good-faith, responsible amendments directed
at this program.
The amendment before us purports to cut funds from a Navy procurement
program and earmark them for the National Guard operations and
maintenance fund. As a long-time and strong supporter of the National
Guard, I recognize the limited funding the Guard has, and I have worked
with my colleagues, the chairman and the ranking member of the Defense
Appropriations Committee, and the Senator from Kentucky, my cochairman
of the National Guard caucus, to fund adequately the Guard component of
the total force. But I do not believe that pitting one service against
the other, raiding the Navy's No. 1 procurement program, is the way to
fill that funding requirement. No, this amendment is not a step forward
for good government. It has been proposed for no other reason than as a
reckless assault on a program which has successfully cleared every
production hurdle with room to spare.
I have been advised by Major General Edward Philbin, Executive
Director of the National Guard Association of the U.S., that NGAUS is
not supporting this program because, among other things, it would
simply create problems between the National Guard and the Navy. This,
to me, is a very unfortunate step when, as pointed out by the
distinguished Senator from Hawaii, all services are facing shortfalls.
We have to address the inadequacy in funding for the National Guard and
all of the other services. But I can tell you that this amendment is
totally uncalled for.
The F/A-18E/F is the Navy's No. 1 priority procurement program. If
you ask the Secretary of the Navy or any of the fleet carrier strike-
fighter aviators what will enable the Navy to be viable in the 21st
century and beyond, they will tell you it is the Super Hornet.
Yesterday the CNO was in my office with one of the fine young men who
fly the F/A-18. They reemphasize this is their No. 1 program. They
cannot afford to take cuts in the program such as proposed on the House
side, or particularly as proposed in this amendment. I think it is a
sad day when some Members, for reasons known to themselves, would wish
to pit the National Guard against the Navy. I think it is irresponsible
and could lead to services raiding each other's accounts to achieve an
individual Senator's political goals.
In January of 1997, the Senator from Wisconsin led an effort to
terminate
[[Page S9334]]
the F/A-18E/F. He failed. Since then, he has continued what appears to
be a vendetta against the program, and now his intent is slowly to
drain the money from the aircraft by continuing a plan to reduce the
number of aircraft and the funding available, to make a full-rate
production decision nearly impossible.
When you talk with the people in the Navy who know what their needs
are, who know what the future of naval aviation is, they will insist,
and they will tell you that this is the airplane that they must have.
If we want our men and women in naval aviation to carry out the
missions we demand of them, then we have to provide them the modern,
up-to-date, efficient aircraft, technologically superior, that the E/F
F-18 gives us.
I remember full well several years ago when the distinguished ranking
member of this committee, the Senator from Hawaii, said, ``We don't
ever want to send American fighting men and women into a battle evenly
matched. We want to send them in with the technological superiority,
the training, and the capability and resources to make sure they win.''
Mr. President, that is what the 18E/F gives us. It gives us that
technological superiority. It gives us the ability to make sure we have
the best chance possible of bringing our naval aviators home safely,
having accomplished their mission.
The F/A-18E/F has already been scrutinized in the Quadrennial Defense
Review. It has been scrutinized by the National Defense Panel. It has
undergone GAO study after GAO study. It has been tested by pilots at
the Patuxent River Naval Air Station and the Naval Air Weapons Station,
China Lake. It has accumulated 2,749 test flight hours, over 1,800
flights, and numerous aircraft carrier landings. It has never had a
catastrophic failure. I wish other tactical air programs could meet
these standards. It has test fired just about every weapon the Navy
might need it to carry. It is on time, it is on budget, and it needs to
get underway.
I ask my colleagues, if they have any question about the value of
this plane, ask somebody who flies one. Ask somebody who has had the
opportunity to fly it. Ask somebody who we are sending in harm's way,
asking them to fly a fighter and attack aircraft off a carrier, ask
them how important they think the F/A-18E/F is to their ability to
carry out their mission and to come home safely. If you will ask the
naval aviators, whose lives are on the line, I have no question what
their response is going to be. I have heard it myself. Any of my
colleagues who wish to contact somebody they know in naval aviation or
in the Navy itself, I believe they will tell you it is the No. 1
priority.
Mr. President, this is simply a bad amendment, and I sincerely hope
that my colleagues will vote overwhelmingly with the chairman of the
committee and the ranking member to table this unwise amendment. I
thank the Chair. I yield the floor.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, the distinguished Senator from Missouri
states that my amendment is a ``reckless assault'' on the Navy's Super
Hornet program. This could not be further from the truth.
My amendment to increase funding for the National Guard is simply
that; an amendment to correct most of a dangerous shortfall in funding
for the National Guard's operations and maintenance account. To raise
as little controversy as possible in finding an offset to the funding
increase, I chose a provision already agreed to by the other chamber.
Not only did the House agree to funding procurement of 27 Super Hornets
in FY99, the body authorized funding for the identical amount.
In speaking to the reduction, Chairman of the House Military
Procurement subcommittee, Duncan Hunter said, ``We think it's a
rational, responsible reduction, a balanced reduction.'' Does this mean
Chairman Hunter is recklessly assaulting the Super Hornet program? Is
Chairman Hunter diminishing the value of the Navy's aviation fleet? Is
Chairman Hunter questioning the value of the Super Hornet? I don't
think Chairman Hunter was, or ever will be, accused of any of those
things. That's why, Mr. President, it boggles my mind why I now stand
accused of all those things. It's a plain mischaracterization of my
amendment.
This amendment is not about gutting the Super Hornet program. This
amendment is not about pitting one service against another. This
amendment is not about diminishing the Navy's aviation fleet. This
amendment does not question the value of the Super Hornet.
Mr. President, this amendment is about an adequate level of funding
for the National Guard and priorities in our armed forces. This
amendment is about giving priority to the National Guard's readiness
levels, capabilities, force structure, and end strength. This amendment
is about bringing the Guard's personnel, schools, training, full-time
support, and retention and recruitment to adequate levels. This
amendment, is about ending a slide in the morale of our citizen-
soldiers.
Finally, my friend from Missouri states that the National Guard
Association of the United States does not support this amendment. I'm
sure he made his case very forcefully to them. I counter by saying that
the association does not oppose this amendment either. In fact, a
majority of State Adjutants General, 26 of them so far, have contacted
my office to add their names in support for my amendment. I hope my
colleagues will draw their own conclusions from that figure. Indeed, I
urge my colleagues to contact their State Adjutant General and ask them
for their opinion of my amendment.
I urge my colleagues to support the National Guard, as I do. I urge
my colleagues to vote against tabling my amendment.
Amendment No. 3124
(Purpose: Relating to human rights in the People's Republic of China)
Mr. HUTCHINSON. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 3124 which I
filed previously.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Arkansas [Mr. Hutchinson] proposes an
amendment numbered 3124.
Mr. HUTCHINSON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the
reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:
On page 99, between lines 17 and 18, insert the following:
TITLE IX
HUMAN RIGHTS IN CHINA
Subtitle A--Forced Abortions in China
Sec. 9001. This subtitle may be cited as the ``Forced
Abortion Condemnation Act''.
Sec. 9002. Congress makes the following findings:
(1) Forced abortion was rightly denounced as a crime
against humanity by the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal.
(2) For over 15 years there have been frequent and credible
reports of forced abortion and forced sterilization in
connection with the population control policies of the
People's Republic of China. These reports indicate the
following:
(A) Although it is the stated position of the politburo of
the Chinese Communist Party that forced abortion and forced
sterilization have no role in the population control program,
in fact the Communist Chinese Government encourages both
forced abortion and forced sterilization through a
combination of strictly enforced birth quotas and immunity
for local population control officials who engage in
coercion. Officials acknowledge that there have been
instances of forced abortions and sterilization, and no
evidence has been made available to suggest that the
perpetrators have been punished.
(B) People's Republic of China population control
officials, in cooperation with employers and works unit
officials, routinely monitor women's menstrual cycles and
subject women who conceive without government authorization
to extreme psychological pressure, to harsh economic
sanctions, including unpayable fines and loss of employment,
and often to physical force.
(C) Official sanctions for giving birth to unauthorized
children include fines in amounts several times larger than
the per capita annual incomes of residents of the People's
Republic of China. In Fujian, for example, the average fine
is estimated to be twice a family's gross annual income.
Families which cannot pay the fine may be subject to
confiscation and destruction of their homes and personal
property.
(D) Especially harsh punishments have been inflicted on
those whose resistance is motivated by religion. For example,
according to a 1995 Amnesty International report, the
Catholic inhabitants of 2 villages in Hebei Province were
subjected to population control under the slogan ``better to
have more graves than one more child''. Enforcement measures
included torture, sexual abuse, and the detention of
resisters' relatives as hostages.
(E) Forced abortions in Communist China often have taken
place in the very late stages of pregnancy.
[[Page S9335]]
(F) Since 1994 forced abortion and sterilization have been
used in Communist China not only to regulate the number of
children, but also to eliminate those who are regarded as
defective in accordance with the official eugenic policy
known as the ``Natal and Health Care Law''.
Sec. 9003. (a) Notwithstanding any other provision of law,
the Secretary of State may not utilize any funds appropriated
or otherwise available for the Department of State for fiscal
year 1999 to issue any visa to any national of the People's
Republic of China, including any official of the Communist
Party or the Government of the People's Republic of China and
its regional, local, and village authorities (except the head
of state, the head of government, and cabinet level
ministers) who the Secretary finds, based on credible
information, has been involved in the establishment or
enforcement of population control policies resulting in a
woman being forced to undergo an abortion against her free
choice, or resulting in a man or woman being forced to
undergo sterilization against his or her free choice.
(b) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the
Attorney General may not utilize any funds appropriated or
otherwise available for the Department of Justice for fiscal
year 1999 to admit to the United States any national covered
by subsection (a).
(c) The President may waive the prohibition in subsection
(a) or (b) with respect to a national of the People's
Republic of China if the President--
(1) determines that it is in the national interest of the
United States to do so; and
(2) provides written notification to Congress containing a
justification for the waiver.
Subtitle B--Freedom on Religion in China
Sec. 9011. (a) It is the sense of Congress that the
President should make freedom of religion one of the major
objectives of United States foreign policy with respect to
China.
(b) As part of this policy, the Department of State should
raise in every relevant bilateral and multilateral forum the
issue of individuals imprisoned, detained, confined, or
otherwise harassed by the Chinese Government on religious
grounds.
(c) In its communications with the Chinese Government, the
Department of State should provide specific names of
individuals of concern and request a complete and timely
response from the Chinese Government regarding the
individuals' whereabouts and condition, the charges against
them, and sentence imposed.
(d) The goal of these official communications should be the
expeditious release of all religious prisoners in China and
Tibet and the end of the Chinese Government's policy and
practice of harassing and repressing religious believers.
Sec. 9012. (a) Notwithstanding any other provision of law,
no funds appropriated or otherwise made available for the
Department of State for fiscal year 1999 for the United
States Information Agency or the United States Agency for
International Development may be used for the purpose of
providing travel expenses and per diem for the participation
in conferences, exchanges, programs, and activities of the
following nationals of the People's Republic of China:
(1) The head or political secretary of any of the following
Chinese Government-created or approved organizations:
(A) The Chinese Buddhist Association.
(B) The Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association.
(C) The National Congress of Catholic Representatives.
(D) The Chinese Catholic Bishops' Conference.
(E) The Chinese Protestant ``Three Self'' Patriotic
Movement.
(F) The China Christian Council.
(G) The Chinese Taoist Association.
(H) The Chinese Islamic Association.
(2) Any military or civilian official or employee of the
Government of the People's Republic of China who carried out
or directed the carrying out of any of the following policies
or practices:
(A) Formulating, drafting, or implementing repressive
religious policies.
(B) Imprisoning, detaining, or harassing individuals on
religious grounds.
(C) Promoting or participating in policies or practices
which hinder religious activities or the free expression of
religious beliefs.
(b)(1) Each Federal agency subject to the prohibition in
subsection (a) shall certify in writing to the appropriate
congressional committees, on a quarterly basis during fiscal
year 1999, that it did not pay, either directly or through a
contractor or grantee, for travel expenses or per diem of any
national of the People's Republic of China described in
subsection (a).
(2) Each certification under paragraph (1) shall be
supported by the following information:
(A) The name of each employee of any agency of the
Government of the People's Republic of China whose travel
expenses or per diem were paid by funds of the reporting
agency of the United States Government.
(B) The procedures employed by the reporting agency of the
United States Government to ascertain whether each individual
under subparagraph (A) did or did not participate in
activities described in subsection (a)(2).
(C) The reporting agency's basis for concluding that each
individual under subparagraph (A) did not participate in such
activities.
Sec. 9013. (a) Notwithstanding any other provision of law,
the Secretary of State may not utilize any funds appropriated
or otherwise available for the Department of State for fiscal
year 1999 to issue a visa to any national of the People's
Republic of China described in section 9012(a)(2) (except the
head of state, the head of government, and cabinet level
ministers).
(b) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the
Attorney General may not utilize any funds appropriated or
otherwise available for the Department of Justice for fiscal
year 1999 to admit to the United States any national covered
by subsection (a).
(c) The President may waive the prohibition in subsection
(a) or (b) with respect to an individual described in such
subsection if the President--
(1) determines that it is vital to the national interest to
do so; and
(2) provides written notification to the appropriate
congressional committees containing a justification for the
waiver.
Sec. 9014. In this subtitle, the term ``appropriate
congressional committees'' means the Committee on Foreign
Relations of the Senate and the Committee on International
Relations of the House of Representatives.
Mr. HUTCHINSON. Mr. President, I turn, I believe, to an issue of
great, great importance to this body and to the Nation. In defending
his policy before he left for China, President Clinton said:
We do not ignore the value of symbols, but in the end, if
the choice is between making a symbolic point and making a
real difference, I choose to make a difference.
I say to my colleagues, today we have a chance to make a difference.
The President went on and said:
When it comes to advancing human rights and religious
freedom, dealing directly, speaking honestly with the Chinese
is clearly the best way to make a difference.
While in China, President Clinton was allowed to make some tempered
remarks on human rights abuses in China, though, unfortunately, he was
quick to equate them with problems in America. He came back from China
hailing his trip as a success and praising President Jiang and saying--
I quote again-- ``feeling the breeze of freedom.''
Only a week after President Clinton's return from China, China
demonstrated the impact of this rhetoric on their attitude and their
policies by arresting 10 democracy advocates. There their crime was not
rape. It was not theft. It was not burglary. It was not grand larceny.
It was not fraud. Their crime was that they dared to start a democratic
opposition party.
The Washington Post reported--it is obvious in the headline--on
Sunday, July 12, on the front page, ``Chinese Resume Arrests, 10
Detained a Week after Clinton Visit.''
Fortunately, five of these activists were subsequently released. But
when the supporters of democracy protested these arrests in an open
letter to the Communist Government, it was no surprise the Chinese
Government kindly responded by arresting yet another dissident, Xu
Wenli.
According to the Associated Press, on July 24, 1998, the Chinese
Government detained four more dissidents, bringing the known number of
detained dissidents since the President returned from China to 21.
Twenty-one dissidents have been detained since July 10, and three
remain in custody at this moment.
On July 29, the Associated Press reported that the Chinese Government
detained the democracy activist Wang Youcai for the second time this
month. I will simply say, this is not the ``breeze of freedom,'' but it
is rather the draft of repression.
Some would like to argue that President Clinton's televised comments
in China were a historic breakthrough in emboldening democracy
activists throughout China. Unfortunately, the President's remarks were
broadcast in the middle of the day when few Chinese were watching
television. His remarks were not repeated on the evening news and were
completely omitted from the next day's state-controlled newspapers. I
remind my colleagues also that Chinese activists already had their
momentum, and that momentum was of their own creation from the 1989
demonstrations at Tiananmen Square.
We see that President Clinton spoke directly to the Chinese people,
at least some of them. We see the symbolic point that he made, but what
we do not see is that there was any difference made in the policy of
the Chinese Government. In fact, their response was one of impudence,
one of, if you will, a reinforcement of their policy of repression, and
I believe the arrests that the Washington Post and all the major
[[Page S9336]]
media in our country spoke of within a week of the President's return
is testimony to the failure of our policy of appeasement.
As this chart is on the floor of the Senate with that headline,
``Chinese Resume Arrests,'' it stands as, I think, irrefutable evidence
that the current policies failed to bring about the desired changes,
the changes that we all desire in China.
They resumed arrests. A policy of appeasement has never worked, and
it is not working today. Today, we, as a body, have the opportunity to
move beyond rhetoric into real action with the amendment that I have
offered.
The amendment is composed of two parts: one dealing with forced
abortions and one dealing with religious persecution in China. This
will have brought most of the House-passed measures last year--the
Chinese freedom policy measures sponsored by my good friend and
colleague, Chris Cox--this will have brought most of those now to a
vote in the Senate. I am glad to say that my friend, Spence Abraham,
the Senator from Michigan, intends to offer the human rights monitors
amendment later on this bill.
I am also glad that an amendment that I had filed dealing with
satellite technology transfers and moving the authority for that waiver
process back to the State Department and away from the Commerce
Department is, as I speak, being worked out in the State Department
authorization conference committee, and I trust and hope that it will
be in that conference report when it is presented to the Senate later.
I want to provide my colleagues with some background on this
amendment. As many of my colleagues will recall, in November of last
year, a number of China-related bills were overwhelmingly passed by the
House of Representatives. This is that package of bills sponsored by
Congressman Cox, a ``policy for freedom,'' it was called. Since that
time, most of these measures have languished in Senate committees
without hearings, without movement and without consideration.
On the defense authorization bill, we adopted several of these House
provisions that I offered at that time. However, the remainder of those
were not passed because my efforts to offer them were thwarted by those
who did not desire to have that debate on these China provisions before
or during the President's trip to China. I simply say the President has
returned. This is our opportunity now.
My amendment, which I am glad to say is bipartisan and that Senator
Wellstone from Minnesota, who is on the floor--and I welcome his
remarks in support of this--is cosponsoring this amendment, mirrors the
language that passed overwhelmingly in the House of Representatives
last November.
The provision on forced abortions--by the way, the Nuremberg Tribunal
on War Crimes condemned forced abortions, rightfully, as being a crime
against humanity. This is not a pro-life, pro-choice issue. Pro-
choicers overwhelmingly in the House of Representatives voted for this
provision because this is, in fact, a crime against humanity.
To compel and to force--to use coercion--take a woman in the seventh,
eighth, ninth month of pregnancy and compel her, against her wishes, to
have an abortion, that is a crime against humanity. That is why that
provision in the House of Representatives passed by a vote of 415-1--
415-1.
The second provision, the ``free the clergy'' portion, of the
amendment passed the House of Representatives last November by a vote
of 366-54.
Now, what does the amendment do? It condemns religious persecution
and forced abortion in China. The amendment would prohibit the use of
American funds, appropriated to the Department of State, the USIA or
AID, to pay for the travel of Communist officials involved in
repressing worship or religious persecution.
So where there is credible evidence that these officials are engaged
in these horrendous practices, they would be denied visa approval, they
would be denied travel expenses, per diem by the American Government,
by the American taxpayer. It would deny visas to officials engaged in
religious persecution and forced abortion.
The amendment would force the Department of State to raise, in every
bilateral and multilateral forum, the issues of individuals in prison,
detained, confined, or otherwise harassed by the Chinese Government on
religious grounds. It simply means that we are going to require our
diplomats, when engaging in bilateral and multilateral discussions, to
raise these important issues of religious persecution and forced
abortions so that that discussion and our concern--the concern of the
American people--is reflected by our diplomatic corps.
This amendment would make freedom of religion one of the major
objectives of the United States foreign policy with respect to China.
And lastly, concerning religious persecution, this amendment would
demand that Chinese Government officials provide the United States
State Department with the specific names of individuals, the
individuals' whereabouts, the condition of those individuals, the
charges against them, and the sentence that it imposed against them.
So individuals who have been arrested and incarcerated because of
their faith, because of their religious practice, we would demand that
the Chinese Government provide information about the condition, the
whereabouts of those individuals and how long the sentence was. The
same would be applied to those engaged in forced abortions.
Mr. President, since the founding of the People's Republic of China
almost 50 years ago, the Government has savaged and persecuted
religious believers and subjected religious groups in China to
comprehensive control by the state and the Chinese Communist Party.
The head of the state's Religious Affairs Bureau said in 1996--and I
quote the head of the Religious Affairs Bureau in China--``Our aim is
not registration for its own sake, but control.'' Let me say that
again. He said, ``Our aim is not just registration, but control over
places for religious activities as well as over all religious
activities themselves.''
When people say there is religious freedom in China, that they only
require registration, please realize, the purpose of that registration
is to control religious activities in China, an effort that they have
been quite successful at. So religious organizations today in China are
required to promote socialism and ``patriotism'' while the massive
state party propaganda apparatus vigorously attempts to promote atheism
and combat what they call ``superstition.''
Mr. President, the Chinese Government, the Communist Party, have in
recent years intensified efforts to expel religious believers from the
Government, the military, and the party, ordering a nationwide purge of
believers in January of 1995.
I am very concerned about the mounting campaign of religious
persecution being waged by the rulers of China. I believe this
amendment is the least that we can do. Many of my colleagues have said
that using trade policy is the wrong instrument in dealing with the
repressive practices of the Chinese Government. I understand. In fact,
I am sympathetic to that argument.
I never thought that most-favored-nation status was the best tool
that we had, and yet when we come with a proposal like this, one that I
have visited with Senator Wellstone about, and many of my colleagues
about, when we come with one that denies visas and denies travel and
per diem for those involved in these terrible practices, then I hear
people saying that is the wrong tool to use, we should not use visas.
This is the very least that we can do. If we are not willing to deal
with the $60 billion trade deficit that we give China--trade imbalance
that we have with that country--then the least we can do is come back
on this issue of visas, travel expenses, and raising the issue in our
diplomacy and diplomatic efforts with the Chinese Government and make
this something more than mere rhetoric.
I believe that these amendments are modest, that they are temperate,
that they are well thought out. They have been repeatedly debated, not
only in the House of Representatives but on the floor of the Senate as
well.
I will ask my colleagues to support the amendments and to oppose any
effort to table these amendments. I believe that there is clear
evidence not only of religious persecution among Evangelical believers,
among Roman
[[Page S9337]]
Catholic believers, but most obviously among Buddhist believers and the
followers of the Dalai Lama. The repression ranges from ransacking
homes in Tibet in search of banned pictures of the Dalai Lama to the
closing and destroying of over 18,000 Buddhist shrines last spring. So
the repression is real. And religious faith of all persuasions is in
revival in China, but it is in revival in the face of intense
persecution by the Chinese Government.
I will only briefly speak of the practice of forced abortions that
are going on in China today. I believe that this is a practice that is
indefensible by any civilized human being. In their effort and attempt
to reach a 1 percent annual population growth, the Chinese authorities,
in 1979, issued regulations that provided monetary bonuses and other
benefits, as incentives, and economic penalties for those who would
have in excess of one child.
They subject families in China to rigorous pressure to end
pregnancies and to undergo sterilizations. And while the Communist
Chinese Government today says that coercion is not an approved policy,
they admit that it goes on. They have not provided our State Department
any evidence that they are punishing the perpetrators of that terrible
practice of coerced abortions and forced sterilizations in China today.
Even more tragic is their effort to eliminate those they regard as
``defective.'' China's eugenics policy, the so-called natal and health
care law, requires couples at risk of transmitting disabling congenital
defects to their children to undergo sterilization.
So the practices continue in China; the abuses continue in China.
This amendment is the very least that we can do in clear conscience. I
have faith that my colleagues are going to support this amendment. I
think it is something that is so essential that we do. This practice of
coerced abortions--and, may I add, the practice of persecuting
believers, religious believers --is morally reprehensible and
indefensible.
It is clear, as well, that the desired changes that the policy of so-
called constructive engagement has sought has failed.
I once again point to this headline in the Washington Post, which
was, in various forms, the front page story all across this country
this month: ``Chinese Resume Arrests''--that in the wake of our
President's visit to China.
So please look at the temperate tone of these amendments. Realize
that the substance is simply denying visas, travel expenses, if you
will, American-taxpayer-subsidized travel, in recognition of those who
the State Department, the Secretary of State, has credible evidence
indicating that they are involved in these inhumane practices.
I ask my colleagues to support this amendment when we vote this
afternoon.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
Mr. WELLSTONE addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, first of all, let me say that I am very
proud to join with my colleague, Senator Hutchinson from Arkansas, in
offering this amendment. Let me say, second of all, that while we do
not agree on all issues--that may be the understatement of the year--we
do have a common bond in our very strongly held views and, I think,
passion when it comes to human freedom in our country and other
countries and respect for human rights.
At the beginning, I would like to just start out by doing two other
things before speaking right to the amendment.
Privilege Of The Floor
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Linn Schulte-Sasse, who
is an intern with our office, be allowed to be on the floor during the
debate on this appropriations bill.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. WELLSTONE. I think my colleague from Arkansas will agree with me,
it would be important, given this topic, given this debate, given this
discussion, to mention Aung San Suu Kyi from Burma, a woman who just
wanted to go to a meeting. That repressive junta Government would not
let her do so. She spent 5 days in her car, refusing to leave, before
she could go to this meeting. She never could get to the meeting. Now
she is back safely at home. It reminds us, again, of the repression of
this regime.
I hope that these junta leaders understand that all of us in the
Senate, Democrats and Republicans alike, abhor their actions. From my
point of view, we can't do enough as a country to isolate that
repressive Government.
The core value that brings my colleague from Arkansas and the Senator
from Minnesota together here today is freedom in human rights. I think
that there is no better way to speak to this than to examine our
relationship with the Government and 1.2 billion people in China.
I am concerned that the administration's ``carrots only'' policy has
not worked well enough when it comes to accomplishing this goal of
promoting freedom in human rights. I believe that the limited steps
that the Chinese Government has taken to lessen political persecution
or religious persecution has been when there has been American
pressure. These included the prospect of a human rights resolution on
China at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in Geneva and the debate
over annual MFN renewal. All of this has been important in
communicating a strong statement to this Government that they are under
our watchful eye, and that we speak out against persecution against
people because of the practice of their religion or of their basic
political viewpoint.
I had reservations, I have reservations about the June summit between
the President and President Jiang Zemin. I had hoped that there would
be concrete results. I always believed it would have been better if the
President had laid out clear human rights preconditions before visiting
China. Having said that, I was still very hopeful that this visit would
make a difference. I applauded the President speaking out while in
China. But always the question was, what next? Will China now take
realistic but meaningful steps, such as opening up Tibet to human
rights monitors and foreign journalists? Will China release political
prisoners? Will they put safeguards in place for the right of free
association of workers, beginning a process of abolishing the arbitrary
system of reduction through labor? Will they lift their official
blacklist of prodemocracy activists now abroad who can't return to
China?
I fear that what we have seen so far by way of agreements announced
in Beijing are merely symbolic in nature. On Tuesday, Secretary
Albright reported that Chinese dissidents are continuing to be rounded
up. For example, last Wednesday the police arrested Zhang Shanguang, a
prominent dissident, who had already spent 7 years in jail. What did he
do? What was his crime? He tried to organize laid off workers. Also
last week, a Chinese court sentenced another dissident to 3 years in
prison for helping a fellow activist to escape from China.
Mr. President, I am all for having good relations with the
Government. I am all for making sure that we have economic cooperation.
I understand the market that is there. But I join with my colleague,
Senator Hutchinson, in introducing this amendment, to say that whatever
we do by way of our relations with China, we ought not to sacrifice a
basic principle that we hold dear as a country, which is a respect for
human rights and for human freedom of peoples.
This amendment started out to do three things. One will be taken care
of in an amendment by my colleague, Senator Abraham, which will
increase the number of U.N. diplomats at the Bejing Embassy assigned to
monitor human rights and add at least one human rights monitor to each
U.S. consulate in this vast country. That is an important amendment. I
hope my colleagues will support it.
The second point I want to make is that our amendment is divided into
two parts. First, our amendment will demonstrate our commitment to
religious freedom by banning travel to the United States by any Chinese
official who has engaged in religious persecution. While membership in
religious groups is increasing explosively in China, the Government
continues to prosecute, continues to persecute, Muslim Uighurs, Tibetan
Buddhists and Christians.
While harsh prison sentences and violence against religious activists
still occur, state control increasingly takes the form of a
registration process. This
[[Page S9338]]
is the way the Government monitors the membership in religious
organizations.
According to the State Department's reports, Chinese officials have
conducted a special campaign against all unauthorized religious
activities by Christians. This included police detaining people,
beating, and fining members of the underground Catholic Church in
Jiangxi Province, and raiding the homes of bishops. That is what is
happening in this country.
The Government has also carried out a major purge of local officials
in certain heavily Muslim populated areas, and targeted again
``underground'' Muslim activities. The Government has banned the
construction or renovation of 130 mosques, and arrested scores of
Muslim dissidents.
In Tibet, human rights conditions remain grim, and have gotten worse
this past year. Tibetan religious activists face ``disappearance,'' or
incommunicado detention, long prison sentences, and brutal treatment in
custody.
Finally, this amendment, second part, demonstrates the abhorrence of
the United States over the practice of forced abortion and
sterilization. It targets officials involved in forcing Chinese women
to undergo abortions and sterilization and bans their travel to the
United States of America. Chinese population control officials, working
with employers and work unit officials, routinely monitor women's
menstrual cycles. They subject women who conceive without Government
authorization to extreme psychological pressure, to harsh economic
sanctions, including unpayable fines--in one province, twice a family's
gross annual income--to loss of employment, and in some cases to the
use of physical force.
Some people argue that we cannot influence China, that the country is
too large, too proud, and that change takes too long. I disagree.
Religious prosecution, religious persecution, forced sterilization,
forced abortion, people trying to speak out on behalf of their own
human rights, all of these citizens have thanked us for speaking out;
all of the human rights advocates have thanked us for helping to keep
them alive by focusing attention on their plight and for fighting for
reforms.
We cannot give up. We must continue to pressure China on these urgent
matters. I urge my colleagues to vote for this very reasonable
amendment, and I think Senator Hutchinson sends a very compelling and
very powerful message, not only to the Government that we will not in
any way, shape, or form stand by idly and be silent about this kind of
repression, but also to the people in China, the citizens, that we
support their efforts on behalf of human rights, on behalf of their
right to be able to practice their own religion, on behalf of their
right to be free from forced abortion and forced sterilization.
Colleagues, please give this amendment your overwhelming support.
I yield the floor.
Mr. INOUYE addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.
Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, I realize that standing and speaking in
opposition would be condemned by some of my colleagues and my
constituents. I also realize that my chairman will rise to table this
amendment at the appropriate time. But I believe that something has to
be said as to why some of us oppose this amendment.
Mr. President, we are blessed to be able to live in a great country.
We just celebrated the 222nd anniversary of our birth. We have had a
very illustrious and a glorious history. Yet, there are many chapters
in our history that we would prefer not to discuss; we would prefer to
just pass them over. The countries that we are speaking up against in
Southeast Asia and Asia do not have a 222-year history. Yes, they may
have been in existence for 4,000 or 5,000 years, but keep in mind that
most of these countries have been under the yoke of some European power
until just recently. Indonesia, until the end of World War II, was
under the control, and therefore a colony of, Holland. China has been
controlled by various countries. The Japanese have been there; the
British have been there; the French, the Russians--and Americans. North
Korea had been under the control of the Japanese up until World War II.
The Philippines was our colony until the end of the war.
Our country is blessed with resources--all of the minerals that we
need, all of the chemicals we need to make us the No. 1 high-tech
country in the world, the most powerful military country in the world.
These other countries are still struggling. I don't think we can expect
these nations who are going through the evolutionary stage of just 50
years, as compared to our 222 years--we cannot impose and demand that
our will be carried out.
We should remind ourselves that we, the people of the United States,
and the Supreme Court of the United States have said that slavery was
constitutional. That wasn't too long ago. And there are many fellow
Americans who are still showing the effects of slavery to this day.
Well, we pride ourselves on human rights, but hardly a day goes by when
we don't see statistics that may not be the happiest. For example, I am
vice chairman now of the Indian Affairs Committee. The things we are
confronted with on a daily basis in this committee are sickening. For
example, the unemployment rate in the Nation is less than 5 percent.
The unemployment rate in Indian reservations today is over 50 percent.
In some reservations, it is as high as 92 percent. Yes, there are
reservations that are doing well--doing very, very well. But most of
the 550 tribes are not doing well.
When you look at health statistics, they are worse than Third World
countries. They are worse in cancer, worse in respiratory diseases,
worse in diabetes. And this happens in these United States. And if some
other country should condemn us for this, we would stand up as one and
say: It is none of your damn business.
Well, Mr. President, the question before us is, Do we contain and do
we isolate China--a nation with a population of over one-fourth of the
world's population? They have problems, as much as we have problems.
The question is, Do we ignore them, realizing that they may someday
acquire all the technology that they need to become a terrible world
power? Or do we try to engage them and, hopefully, by practice and by
model, convince them that our system is the best?
We seem to have done pretty well in doing this with the Soviet Union.
We are told that the cold war is over now, that the power the Soviet
Union had once upon a time is no more. Why? Because we had a policy of
engagement. We continue to talk to them. We continue to exchange views.
Yes, we propagandize them and they propagandize us. But because of our
attitude, because of our resources, we have prevailed. I think the same
can happen elsewhere.
Yes, we are dealing with countries that have a short contemporary
history--Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos. These were European colonies. If one
looks at the history of these colonies, the treatment was just as bad
as the colonies in Africa. And now to suddenly say, ``Now that you have
freedom, we expect you to behave like Americans,'' I think is asking
too much, Mr. President.
We speak of human rights. We will conclude this year the final
payment of redress to Japanese Americans who were put in camps. Mr.
President, I certainly recall that soon after December 7--on February
19, 1942--an Executive order was issued declaring that Japanese
Americans were not to be trusted. Therefore, they had to be rounded up,
with 48 hours' notice, and placed in 10 camps throughout the United
States--no due process. No crimes were committed. Studies were made,
investigations done, and there was not a single case of sabotage, not a
single case of un-American activity. In fact, men volunteered from
these camps to form a regiment, which I was honored to serve in, and we
became the most decorated Army unit in the history of the Army. The
United States is finally going to close that chapter.
But these things have happened to us. As a personal matter, I
resented that when, on March 17, 1942, my Government said I was to be
declared 4C.
In case people are not aware of what 4C is about, 1A is the Draft
Board's declaration that you are physically fit, mentally alert.
Therefore, you are qualified to put on the uniform of the United
States; 4F, something is wrong with you, physically or mentally; 4C is
a special designation for enemy alien. That was my designation.
So when one speaks of the history of the United States, there are
chapters
[[Page S9339]]
that we don't wish to look at, because, if we start looking back to
these chapters, you will find that we have gone through this painful
evolution.
So I am telling my colleagues that this is not a simple amendment. It
is an amendment that requires deep thought on our part. I hope that we
leave it up to those who we rely upon in our State Department to do the
best. We can always watch what is going on. Yes, they have forced
abortion. I am against that. I am against religious persecution. We try
to convince ourselves that there is no religious persecution in the
United States. But I am certain we know that there is.
Mr. President, I will be voting to table this amendment.
Mr. HUTCHINSON addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Roberts). The distinguished Senator from
Arkansas is recognized.
Mr. HUTCHINSON. Mr. President, it is with some reluctance that I
respond to the comments, because I have such utmost respect for the
Senator from Hawaii and his distinguished career, and all that he
represents.
But I just want to clarify the perspective of the authors of this
amendment. The issue is not imposing American values. Frankly, we don't
and we can't impose anything on another nation. But what we can say is
that the values are important.
I think it is terribly wrong to try to make a moral equivalency
argument and say that examples of religious persecution that may exist
in the United States can in any stretch of the imagination be compared
to the wholesale religious oppression that exists in China today.
We simply don't have headlines in the Washington Post saying that
there were ``10 detained in Arkansas'' because of their religious
beliefs. We don't have that in this country, and we shouldn't. If we
did there would be an outrage, and if we did we should be condemned by
other nations in the world.
So the issue is not imposing American values. The issue is whether or
not we as a body and we as a nation want to reflect certain fundamental
beliefs and fundamental rights.
I add that these are not American values that we speak of. These are
not American values that this amendment is addressing. These are human
values. They are basic human rights.
It was not the U.S. Supreme Court that I quoted in condemnation of
forced abortion. It was the Nuremberg War Tribunal that said forced
abortion is a crime against humanity.
These are human values. We cannot excuse a nation by saying they are
new at this thing of freedom. No. In fact, it is not that the communist
rulers of China don't understand freedom. It is that they understand
freedom all too well, and they are determined to repress it.
The issue in China is control, and the Chinese Communist Government
is determined to use whatever means necessary and whatever means at
their disposal to insure that they maintain control, even to the point
of persecuting those who might say there is a power above and beyond
the power of the Chinese Government.
I say to my distinguished colleague from Hawaii that the issue is not
isolation. It is certainly not isolation. There is no way that we
could, even if we wished to, isolate the largest, most populist nation
in the world.
It is, though, whether we as a country and we as a people are going
to stand for something other than profits.
That is what this amendment is about. That is why I believe, I have
faith, that my colleagues in the Senate will support an amendment that
really reflects the best not only of American values but human values.
Mr. WELLSTONE addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The distinguished Senator from Minnesota.
Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I will take 2 minutes, because I know
my colleague wants to move forward.
Mr. President, the Senator from Hawaii is the best of the best
Senators. I don't like to be in disagreement with him. I am certainly
not in disagreement with his analysis about our own history. There is
nobody who can speak with more eloquence and more integrity about
injustices in our country toward minorities and violations of people's
human rights than the Senator from Hawaii. There is no question about
it.
But I also believe, as my colleague from Arkansas has ably pointed
out, that it is also important for other countries, and it would have
been an important relation for our country to speak out.
When I think about South Africa, I think about what President Mandela
said. One of the things he said over and over again, was when the
people in the United States took action, it was when we put the
pressure--not just symbolic politics--that things began to break open,
and finally we were able to end the awful system of subjugation of
people because of the color of their skin.
When I think even about our relations with the former Soviet Union,
we were tough on these human rights violations.
I really believe that this amendment is just a very modest beginning
which says, look, when you have people who are directly guilty of
religious persecution, and when you have people who are directly guilty
of forced sterilization, forced abortion--and we even had waivers for
the Presidents. But what we are saying is then let's take this into
account. They ought not to be given travel visas to our country.
This is moderate, I say to my colleagues. This is but a step forward.
But it sends such a powerful and important message about what our
values are all about, what we are about as a nation. And it supports
the people in China. This really is an important amendment. I hope that
our colleagues will vote for it and will give it overwhelming support.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, before I respond, I again would like to
request Senators to come forward, and let us see their amendments.
Earlier today I said of the 46--it is now 47 amendments that we know
of--that we had agreed to accept 23 of them.
My staff informs me that the difficulty is we can't accept them
because we haven't seen the final version of them. We hope that those
will be produced here so we can dispose of the amendments that we are
willing to accept expeditiously with very short comments from Members.
We are going to have over 50 amendments. We are going to finish this
bill by tomorrow. I advise Members and staff to start bringing in cots
for people to rest on tonight unless we get through them very quickly.
Mr. President, I have to confess to my friends, both of them who have
spoken in favor of this amendment, that this Senator is at a loss to
understand section 9012, which says that no funds can be used to pay
the travel expenses and per diem for the participation in conferences,
exchanges, programs, et cetera, of any national from the People's
Republic of China who is the head or political secretary of any Chinese
Government-created or approved organization. And it lists the Chinese
Buddhist Association, the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, the
National Congress of Catholic Representatives, the Chinese Catholic
Bishops' Conference, the Chinese Protestant Three-Self Patriotic
Movement, the China Christian Council, the Chinese Taoist Association,
the Chinese Islamic Association, and then a series of civilian and
military officials and employees of Government to carry out the
specific policies that are listed, such as promoting or participating
in policies or practices which hinder religious activities, or the free
expression of religious beliefs.
I am at a loss to understand that section. Perhaps the Senator would
explain that to me.
Mr. HUTCHINSON. Mr. President, if the Senator will yield.
Mr. STEVENS. Yes.
Mr. HUTCHINSON. The officials that are listed of the various
religious organizations that the Senator listed in the amendment are,
in fact, Government employees, and Government agents.
They are those at the head of these associations. These are the
registered churches that are used as tools and the agents of the
Chinese Communist Government in the repression of those various groups.
It does not refer to the pastors, the ministers, the priests of local
congregations, but the heads of these associations which, in fact, work
for the Communist Chinese Government and are those that are
perpetrating the very persecution against those groups.
[[Page S9340]]
So while there are millions of Chinese today underground in
unregistered churches, mosques, synagogues and temples, there is also
the so-called Patriotic Church, the recognized church by the Government
which is strictly controlled, names, addresses of worshipers to be
turned into the Government. Messages that are proclaimed are closely
censored by the Government. That is why those officials would be
included if, in fact, the Secretary of State found credible evidence
that they were practicing perpetrating religious persecution.
Mr. STEVENS. I am sad to say to my friend I don't understand that
section to have that limitation, but, in any event, it is a very
controversial subject to be added to the Defense appropriations bill.
In conferring with Members yesterday, it was the position that we took
at the time that we were going to do our utmost to keep controversial
subjects that would lead to extended debate off of this bill. The only
way to do that is, once we have had a short explanation of it in
courtesy to the presenting Senator, it was going to be my intention to
move to table any such amendment, not just this one but any such
amendment.
Therefore, on the basis of the policy that we have announced, I move
to table the Senator's amendment and ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment is set aside and the vote will
occur after 2 p.m. today.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent at the request of
Senator Thomas that a letter signed by himself and Senator Murkowski,
Senator Biden, Senator Kerry, Senator Smith of Oregon, Senator Hagel,
Senator Grams, Senator Feinstein, Senator Robb, and Senator Lieberman,
and an excerpt from Newsweek be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
U.S. Senate,
Washington, DC, June 15, 1998.
Dear Colleague: When the Senate returns to consideration of
the DOD Authorization bill, S. 2057, we expect a series of
amendments to be offered concerning the People's Republic of
China. These amendments, if accepted, would do serious damage
to our bilateral relationship and halt a decade of U.S.
efforts to encourage greater Chinese adherence to
international norms in such areas as nonproliferation, human
rights, and trade.
In relative terms, in the last year China has shown
improvement in several areas which the U.S. has specifically
indicated are important to us. Relations with Taiwan have
stabilized, several prominent dissents have been released
from prison, enforcement of or agreements on intellectual
property rights have been stepped up, the revision of Hong
Kong has gone smoothly, and China's agreement not to devalue
its currency helped stabilize Asia's economic crisis.
Has this been enough change? Clearly not. But the question
is: how do we best encourage more change in China? Do we do
so by isolating one fourth of the world's population, by
denying visas to most members of its government, by denying
it access to any international concessional loans, and by
backing it into a corner and declaring it a pariah as these
amendments would do?
Or, rather, is the better course to engage China, to expand
dialogue, to invite China to live up to its aspirations as a
world power, to expose the country to the norms of democracy
and human rights and thereby draw it further into the family
of nations?
We are all for human rights; there's no dispute about that.
But the question is, how do be best achieve human rights? We
think it's through engagement.
We urge you to look beyond the artfully-crafted titles of
these amendments to their actual content and effect. One
would require that the United States to oppose the provision
of any international concessional loan to China, its
citizens, or businesses, even if the loan were to be used in
a manner which would promote democracy or human rights. This
same amendment would require every U.S. national involved in
conducting any significant business in China to register with
the Commerce Department and to agree to abide by a set of
government-imposed ``business principles'' mandated in the
amendment. On the eve of President Clinton's trip to China,
the raft of radical China-related amendments threatens to
undermine our relationship just when it is most crucial to
advance vital U.S. interests.
Several of the amendments contain provisions which are
sufficiently vague so as to effectively bar the grant of any
entrance visa to the United States to every member of the
Chinese government. Those provisions not only countervene
many of our international treaty commitments, but are
completely at odds with one of the amendments which would
prohibit the United States from funding the participation of
a great proportion of Chinese officials in any State
Department, USIA, or USAID conference, exchange program, or
activity; and with another amendment which urges agencies of
the U.S. Government to increase programs between the two
countries.
Finally, many of the amendments are drawn from bills which
have yet to be considered by the committee of jurisdiction,
the Foreign Relations Committee. That committee will review
the bills at a June 18 hearing, and they are scheduled to be
marked-up in committee on June 23. Legislation such as this
that would have such a profound effect on US-China relations
warrant careful committee consideration. They should not be
subject of an attempt to circumvent the committee process.
In the short twenty years since we first officially engaged
China, that country has opened up to the outside world,
rejected Maoism, initiated extensive market reforms,
witnessed a growing grass-roots movement towards increased
democratization, agreed to be bound by major international
nonproliferation and human rights agreements, and is on the
verge of dismantling its state-run enterprises. We can
continue to nurture that transformation through further
engagement, or we can capitualte to the voices of isolation
and containment that these amendments represent and negate
all the advances made so far.
We hope that you will agree with us and choose engagement.
We strongly urge you to vote against these amendments.
Sincerely,
Craig Thomas, Chairman, Subcommittee on East Asian and
Pacific Affairs, Committee on Foreign Relations; Frank
H. Murkowski, Chairman, Committee on Energy and Natural
Resources; Chuck Hagel, Chairman, Subcommittee on
International Economic Policy, Committee on Foreign
Relations; Joseph R. Biden, Jr., Ranking Member,
Committee on Foreign Relations; John F. Kerry, Ranking
Member, Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs,
Committee on Foreign Relations; Gordon Smith, Chairman,
Subcommittee on European Affairs, Committee on Foreign
Relations; Rod Grams, Chairman, Subcommittee on
International Operations, Committee on Foreign
Relations; Charles S. Robb, Ranking Member,
Subcommittee on Near East/South Asian Affairs,
Committee on Foreign Relations; Dianne Feinstein,
Ranking Member, Subcommittee on International
Operations, Committee on Foreign Relations; Joseph L.
Lieberman, Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Acquisition
and Technology, Committee on Armed Services.
____
[From Newsweek, July 6, 1998]
Help ``Independent Spirits''--A Gulag Veteran Appraises Clinton's
Mission
(By Wang Dan)
President Clinton is taking a lot of heat for his decision
to visit China in spite of the serious human-rights problems
there. I spent seven years in prison in China for my
activities on Tiananmen Square in 1989, so I certainly share
the view that the Chinese government must change its ways.
But I also think the American president can accomplish some
positive things with his trip.
It's critically important to have a broad range of contacts
with China. The West should not try to isolate the communist
regime or limit contact to political exchange. Washington
needs to maintain dialogue on many fronts at once: economic,
cultural, academic, anything that helps build civil society.
The key to democracy in China is independence. My country
needs independent intellectuals, independent economic actors,
independent spirits.
Economic change does influence political change. China's
economic development will be good for the West as well as for
the Chinese people. China needs Most Favored Nation trade
status with the United States, and it should fully enter the
world trading system. The terms of that entry must be
negotiated, of course, but in any case the rest of the world
must not break its contact with China.
President Clinton's visit to Tiananmen Square did not look
like a sacrilege to the Chinese people. He didn't stand in
the middle of the square, but along the side, outside the
Great Hall of the People. All foreign leaders go there.
Clinton was right later to mention the events of June 4,
1989. He must continue to stick up for such political
prisoners as Liu Nianchun, imprisoned in 1995 for three
years; Li Hai, a former student at Peking University
sentenced to nine years in 1995; and Hu Shigen, another
former Peking University student who was sentenced to 20
years in 1994. All were convicted on trumped-up criminal
charges. These people must never be forgotten. Nor should the
routine arrest and harassment of other dissidents, which
continued last week.
It's hard to say exactly what Chinese leaders think about
Clinton. The scandals in Washington allegedly implicating
Chinese officials only make the picture murkier. But one
thing is clear: China's leaders always view American
presidents as competitors. They believe that the United
States doesn't want China to grow, and they are suspicious of
its motives. That made Clinton's task in China more difficult
still. I wish him well.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
[[Page S9341]]
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I keep asking and requesting that Members
come forward with these amendments. I have asked now the leadership to
clear a unanimous consent request that all amendments have to be filed
by 4. I know it is not cleared yet, but I am again requesting that and
letting people know somehow or other we are going to get these
amendments. It may be that I will just have to move to go to third
reading, we will have a vote to go to third reading and cut them all
off.
For those people who want to go home, I will give them an avenue to
get home, and that is let's just vote on this bill. But if people won't
bring the amendments to us, we are going to have to take some drastic
steps here to limit the number of amendments we can consider. I know
that it is an extraordinary procedure, but these are extraordinary
times. I would like at least to have the amendments we have said we
would accept. Twenty-three Members out there with amendments I said we
would accept, and they have not brought them over. I plead with the
Senate to think about proceeding with this bill.
Mrs. HUTCHISON addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The distinguished Senator from Texas is
recognized.
Amendment No. 3409
(Purpose: To express the Sense of Congress that the readiness of the
United States Armed Forces to execute the National Security Strategy of
the United States is eroded from a combination of declining defense
budgets and expanded missions, including the ongoing, open-ended
commitment of U.S. forces to the peacekeeping mission in Bosnia)
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and
ask for its immediate consideration.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Texas [Mrs. Hutchison] proposes an
amendment numbered 3409.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading
of the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:
At the appropriate place in the bill, insert the following:
Sec. _. (a): Congress makes the following findings:
(1) Since 1989,
(A) The national defense budget has been cut in half as a
percentage of the gross domestic product;
(B) The national defense budget has been cut by over $120
billion in real terms;
(C) The U.S. military force structure has been reduced by
more than 30 percent;
(D) The Department of Defense's operations and maintenance
accounts have been reduced by 40 percent;
(E) The Department of Defense's procurement funding has
declined by more than 50 percent;
(F) U.S. military operational commitments have increased
fourfold;
(G) The Army has reduced its ranks by over 630,000 soldiers
and civilians, closed over 700 installations at home and
overseas, and cut 10 divisions from its force structure;
(H) The Army has reduced its presence in Europe from
215,000 to 65,000 personnel;
(I) The Army has averaged 14 deployments every four years,
increased significantly from the Cold War trend of one
deployment every four years;
(J) The Air Force has downsized by nearly 40 percent, while
experiencing a four-fold increase in operational commitments.
(2) In 1992, 37 percent of the Navy's fleet was deployed at
any given time. Today that number is 57 percent; at its
present rate, it will climb to 62 percent by 2005.
(3) The Navy Surface Warfare Officer community will fall
short of its needs a 40 percent increase in retention to meet
requirements;
(4) The Air Force is 18 percent short of its retention goal
for second-term airmen;
(5) The Air Force is more than 800 pilots short, and more
than 70 percent eligible for retention bonuses have turned
them down in favor of separation;
(6) The Army faces critical personnel shortages in combat
units, forcing unit commanders to borrow troops from other
units just to participate in training exercises.
(7) An Air Force F-16 squadron commander testified before
the House National Security Committee that his unit was
forced to borrow three aircraft and use cannibalized parts
from four other F-16s in order to deploy to Southwest Asia;
(8) In 1997, the Army averaged 31,000 soldiers deployed
away from their home station in support of military
operations in 70 countries with the average deployment
lasting 125 days;
(9) Critical shortfalls in meeting recruiting and retention
goals is seriously affecting the ability of the Army to train
and deploy. The Army reduced its recruiting goals for 1998 by
12,000 personnel;
(10) In fiscal year 1997, the Army fell short of its
recruiting goal for critical infantry soldiers by almost
5,000. As of February 15, 1998, Army-wide shortages existed
for 28 Army specialities. Many positions in squads and crews
are left unfilled or minimally filled because personnel are
diverted to work in key positions elsewhere;
(11) The Navy reports it will fall short of enlisted sailor
recruitment for 1998 by 10,000
(12) One in ten Air Force front-line units are not combat
ready;
(13) Ten Air Force technical specialties, representing
thousands of airmen, deployed away from their home station
for longer than the Air Force standard 120-day mark in 1997;
(14) The Air Force fell short of its reenlistment rate for
mid-career enlisted personnel by an average of six percent,
with key war fighting career fields experiencing even larger
drops in reenlistments;
(15) In 1997, U.S. Marines in the operating forces have
deployed on more than 200 exercises, rotational deployments,
or actual contingencies.
(16) U.S. Marine Corps maintenance forces are only able to
maintain 92 percent ground equipment and 77 percent aviation
equipment readiness rates due to excessive deployments of
troops and equipment;
(17) The National Security Strategy of the United States
assumes the ability of the U.S. Armed Forces to prevail in
two major regional conflicts nearly simultaneously.
(18) To execute the National Security of the United States,
the U.S. Army's five later-deploying divisions, which
constitute almost half of the Army's active combat forces,
are critical to the success of specific war plans;
(19) According to commanders in these divisions, the
practice of under staffing squads and crews that are
responsible for training, and assigning personnel to other
units as fillers for exercises and operations, has become
common and is degrading unit capability and readiness.
(20) In the aggregate, the Army's later-deploying divisions
were assigned 93 percent of their authorized personnel at the
beginning of fiscal year 1998. In one specific case, the 1st
Armored Division was staffed at 94 percent in the aggregate;
however, its combat support and service support specialties
were filled at below 85 percent, and captains and majors were
filled at 73 percent.
(21) At the 10th Infantry Division, only 138 of 162
infantry squads were fully or minimally filled, and 36 of the
filled squads were unqualified. At the 1st Brigade of the 1st
Infantry Division, only 56 percent of the authorized infantry
soldiers for its Bradley Fighting Vehicles were assigned, and
in the 2nd Brigade, 21 of 48 infantry squads had no personnel
assigned. At the 3rd Brigade of the 1st Armored Division,
only 16 of 116 M1A1 tanks had full crews and were qualified,
and in one of the Brigade's two armor battalions, 14 of 58
tanks had no crewmembers assigned because the personnel were
deployed to Bosnia.
(23) At the beginning of fiscal year 1998, the five later-
deploying divisions critical to the execution of the U.S.
National Security Strategy were short nearly 1,900 of the
total 25,357 Non-Commissioned Officers authorized, and as of
February 15, 1998, this shortage had grown to almost 2,200.
(24) Rotation of units to Bosnia is having a direct and
negative impact on the ability of later-deploying divisions
to maintain the training and readiness levels needed to
execute their mission in a major regional conflict.
Indications of this include:
(A) The reassignment by the Commander of the 3rd Brigade
Combat Team of 63 soldiers within the brigade to serve in
infantry squads of a deploying unit of 800 troops, stripping
non-deploying infantry and armor units of maintenance
personel, and reassigning Non-Commissioned Officers and
support personnel to the task force from throughout the
brigade;
(B) Cancellation of gunnery exercises for at least two
armor battalions in later-deploying divisions, causing 43 of
116 tank crews to lose their qualifications on the weapon
system;
(C) Hiring of outside contract personnel by 1st Armored and
1st Infantry later-deploying divisions to perform routine
maintenance.
(25) National Guard budget shortfalls compromise the
Guard's readiness levels, capabilities, force structure, and
end strength, putting the Guard's personel, schools,
training, full-time support, retention and recruitment, and
morale at risk.
(26) The President's budget requests for the National Guard
have been insufficient, notwithstanding the frequent calls on
the Guard to handle wide-ranging tasks, including deployments
in Bosnia, Iraq, Haiti, and Somalia.
(b) Sense of Congress:
(1) It is the sense of Congress that--
(A) The readiness of U.S. military forces to execute the
National Security Strategy of the United States is being
eroded from a
[[Page S9342]]
combination of declining defense budgets and expanded
missions;
(B) The ongoing, open-ended commitment of U.S. forces to
the peacekeeping mission in Bosnia is causing assigned and
supporting units to compromise their principle wartime
assignments;
(C) Defense appropriations are not keeping pace with the
expanding needs of the armed forces.
(c) Report Requirement.
(1) Not later than June 1, 1999, the President shall submit
to the Committee on Armed Services of the Senate and the
Committee on National Security of the House of
Representatives, and to the Committees on Appropriations in
both Houses, a report on the military readiness of the Armed
Forces of the United States. The President shall include in
the report a detailed discussion of the competition for
resources service-by-service caused by the ongoing commitment
to the peacekeeping operation in Bosnia, including in those
units that are supporting but not directly deployed to
Bosnia. The President shall specifically include in the
report the following:
(A) an assessment of current force structure and its
sufficiency to execute the National Security Strategy of the
United States;
(B) an outline of the service-by-service force structure
expected to be committed to a major regional contingency as
envisioned in the National Security Strategy of the United
States;
(C) a comparison of the force structures outlined in sub-
paragraph (c)(1)(B) above with the service-by-service order
of battle in Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm, as a
representative and recent major regional conflict;
(D) the force structure and defense appropriation increases
that are necessary to execute the National Security Strategy
of the United States assuming current projected ground force
levels assigned to the peacekeeping mission in Bosnia are
unchanged;
(E) a discussion of the U.S. ground force level in Bosnia
that can be sustained without impacting the ability of the
Armed Forces to execute the National Security Strategy of the
United States, assuming no increases in force structure and
defense appropriations during the period in which ground
forces are assigned to Bosnia.
Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, this amendment is a sense of Congress
regarding the readiness of the U.S. Armed Forces to execute the
national security strategy of the United States. So many people are now
talking about the hollow military that we seem to be going into, and I
think it is time that Congress address the concern that all of us have
that we may be driving our military down to the point that we will not
be able to respond if something happens where we are needed anywhere in
the world.
So, I make the following findings:
That since 1989:
The national defense budget has been cut in half as a percentage of
the gross domestic product;
The national defense budget has been cut by over $120 billion in real
terms;
The U.S. military force structure has been reduced by more than 30
percent;
The Department of Defense's operations and maintenance accounts have
been reduced by 40 percent;
The Department of Defense's procurement funding has declined by more
than 50 percent;
U.S. military operational commitments have increased fourfold.
It is clear the Army has reduced its ranks by over 630,000 soldiers
and civilians, closed over 700 installations at home and overseas and
cut 10 divisions from its force structure.
The Army has reduced its presence in Europe from 215,000 to 65,000
personnel.
The Army has averaged 14 deployments every four years, increased
significantly from the Cold War trend of one deployment every four
years.
The Air Force has downsized by nearly 40 percent,while experiencing a
four-fold increase in operation commitments.
In 1992, 37 percent of the Navy's fleet was deployed at any given
time. Today that number is 57 percent; at its present rate, it will
climb to 62 percent by 2005.
The Navy Surface Warfare Officer community will fall short of its
needs a 40 percent increase in retention to meet requirements;
The Air Force is 18 percent short of its retention goal for second-
term airmen.
We know the Air Force is more than 800 pilots short, and we know that
our experienced pilots have not re-upped, even in the face of a $60,000
bonus.
The Army faces critical personnel shortages in combat units, forcing
unit commanders to borrow troops from other units just to participate
in training exercises.
In 1997, the Army averaged 31,000 soldiers deployed away from their
home station in support of military operations in 70 countries with the
average deployment lasting 125 days.
Critical shortfalls in meeting recruiting and retention goals is
seriously affecting the ability of the Army to train and deploy. The
Army reduced its recruiting goal for 1998 by 12,000 personnel.
The Navy reports it will fall short of enlisted sailor recruitment
for 1998 by 10,000.
One in ten Air Force front-line units are not combat ready.
Ten Air Force technical specialties, representing thousands of
airmen, deployed away from their home station for longer than the Air
Force standard 120-day mark in 1997.
In 1997, U.S. Marines in the operating forces have deployed on more
than 200 exercises, rotational deployments, or actual contingencies.
U.S. Marine Corps maintenance forces are only able to maintain 92
percent ground equipment and 77 percent aviation equipment readiness
rates due to excessive deployments of troops and equipment;
The National Security Strategy of the United States assumes the
ability of the U.S. Armed Forces to prevail in two major regional
conflicts nearly simultaneously.
Mr. President, all of us, including the distinguished Senator from
Kansas who is a former marine, know that ``nearly'' has been inserted
into our national security strategy. Our strategy used to be that we
would have the ability to prevail in two major regional conflicts
simultaneously. Today, we are saying ``nearly simultaneously,'' yet
none of us who have studied these issues believe that we are ready,
today, even for this ramped down mission.
To execute the National Security of the United States, the U.S.
Army's five later-deploying divisions, which constitute almost half of
the Army's active combat forces, are critical if the success of
specific war plans can be achieved.
According to commanders in these divisions, the practice of under
staffing squads and crews that are responsible for training, and
assigning personnel to other units as fillers for exercises and
operations, has become common and is degrading unit capability and
readiness.
In the aggregate, the Army's later-deploying divisions were assigned
93 percent of their authorized personnel at the beginning of fiscal
year 1998. In one specific case, the 1st Armored Division was staffed
at 94 percent in the aggregate; however, its combat support and service
support specialties were filled at below 85 percent, and captains and
majors were filled at 73 percent.
At the 10th Infantry Division, only 138 of 162 infantry squads were
fully or minimally filled, and 36 of the filled squads were
unqualified.
At the beginning of fiscal year 1998, the five later-deploying
divisions critical to the execution of the U.S. National Security
Strategy were short nearly 1,900 of the total 25,357 Non-Commissioned
Officers authorized, and as of February 15, 1998, this shortage had
grown to almost 2,200.
Rotation of units to Bosnia is having a direct and negative impact on
the ability of later-deploying divisions to maintain the training and
readiness levels needed to executive their mission in a major regional
conflict. Indications of this include;
The reassignment by the Commander of the 3rd Brigade Combat Team of
63 soldiers within the brigade to serve in infantry squads of a
deploying unit of 800 troops, stripping non-deploying infantry and
armor units of maintenance personnel, and reassigning Non-Commissioned
Officers and support personnel to the task force from throughout the
brigade;
Cancellation of gunnery exercises for at least two armor battalions
in later-deploying divisions, causing 43 of 116 tank crews to lose
their qualifications on the weapon system;
Hiring of outside contract personnel by 1st Armored and 1st Infantry
later-deploying divisions to perform routine maintenance.
Mr. President, these are the facts. Every one of the facts that I
have read is absolutely in print, in the report of the Quadrennial
Defense Review, in the DOD budget for fiscal year 1999, and a
compilation of statements from the Department of Defense vice chiefs in
a
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hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee, and every other
part of what I have just read has been documented. These are from the
Defense Department's own statistics.
So I am asking for the sense of Congress, that we declare that:
The readiness of U.S. military forces to execute the National
Security Strategy of the United States is being eroded from a
combination of declining defense budgets and expanded missions;
The ongoing, open-ended commitment of U.S. forces to the peacekeeping
mission in Bosnia is causing assigned and supporting units to
compromise their principle wartime assignments.
Defense appropriations are not keeping pace with the expanding needs
of the Armed Forces.
So I am asking for a report by June 1, 1999 from: the President of
the United States to the Committee on Armed Services of the Senate and
the Committee on National Security of the House of Representatives, and
to the Committees on Appropriations in both Houses, a report on the
military readiness of the Armed Forces of the United States.
The President shall include in the report a detailed discussion of
the competition for resources service-by-service caused by the ongoing
commitment to the peacekeeping operation in Bosnia, including in those
units that are supporting but not directly deployed to Bosnia.
What we are asking, Mr. President, is for an assessment of where we
are. We have all talked about the problems we have seen in small
instances and different pieces of testimony. What I have done in this
sense of the Senate is put it all together. I have taken from the
Department of Defense its own authorization, its own budget, its
Quadrennial Defense Review, from statements made before one of our two
committees that talked about the problems in specific detail.
I think it is time that we in Congress now say we have put it all
together and we want a report on the state of our readiness. Let's look
at all of the factors and let's determine that we have a problem, that
we have to determine what to do about it, and let's go forward and try
to work with the administration, with the President, with the Secretary
of Defense, and look at the big picture, and the big picture and the
goal for all of us is that we would be able to meet the national
security strategy of the United States, that we would be able to
prevail in two major regional conflicts nearly simultaneously.
I prefer simultaneously, but, nevertheless, we are not even up to the
goal that we have stated, and we want to do what is our responsibility
in the U.S. Congress, and that is, ask for the report, let's study the
problem and let's come up with a solution together with the Armed
Services Committee and the Appropriations Committee of the U.S. Senate
and the U.S. House.
Mr. President, I hope that my colleagues will support me in this
sense of Congress. It is just the beginning of our responsibility to
address what we see as the problems in our military and that we would
then be able to take the report and take the necessary steps to correct
the backward motion that we are making with regard to the military
readiness and the security of our country.
Mr. STEVENS addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The distinguished chairman of the
Appropriations Committee, the Senator from Alaska.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I commend the Senator from Texas for her
presentation. It is my hope we will be able to accept that amendment. I
have referred it to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, and
we are hopeful that we can reach that conclusion later.
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