[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 42 (Wednesday, March 17, 1999)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E457]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        AN ARTICLE WORTH READING

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. BENJAMIN A. GILMAN

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                       Wednesday, March 17, 1999

  Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, last Thursday's Washington Post (3/11/99) 
contained an op-ed piece entitled ``Lies About China'' by Michael 
Kelly, the editor of the National Journal, in which he outlines the 
failure of the administration's China policy and the latest of a long 
series of dangerous Chinese action.
  The article appeared on the day that the House International 
Relations Committee was holding a hearing regarding the 40th 
anniversary of the Communist Chinese illegal occupation of Tibet and 
the full House was considering whether to send U.S. troops into Kosovo.
  The issue of Tibet represents what eventually happens when a nation 
is conquered and absorbed by a hostile neighbor and the world ignores 
the fact. The people, their culture, religion, and government are 
destroyed and the world eventually pays the price by having a new 
powerful belligerent actor on the world scene.
  Kosovo represents an opportunity for the world to deal with 
aggression appropriately at the beginning of the crises before a much 
more dangerous situation faces the world.
  Accordingly, I ask my colleagues to note Mr. Kelly's article and to 
consider the ramifications of how we should respond to powerful 
undemocratic regimes that threaten the stability of the world 
community. I ask that the article be included in the Congressional 
Record.

               [From the Washington Post, Mar. 11, 1999]

                            Lies About China

                           (By Michael Kelly)

       President Clinton's China policy, a mess of corruption and 
     carelessness and naivete, is collapsing under the weight of 
     its own fraudulence, exposing the nation Clinton calls 
     America's ``strategic partner'' as a threat to America's 
     security and a thief of America's nuclear secrets, and 
     exposing also the president and senior administration 
     officials for their efforts to minimize and hide this 
     unwelcome fact.
       For the past six years, the White House has lied about 
     China. It pretended, against all evidence, that the People's 
     Republic was sincere in its promises to curb its persecution 
     of democrats, Catholic priests, Tibetan monks, pregnant women 
     and other enemies of the people. It pretended that China was 
     sincere also in its promises to curb its spread of weapons of 
     mass destruction. It pretended not to understand that China 
     regarded the United States as enemy number one in its 
     campaign to achieve regional dominance, particularly over 
     Taiwan.
       The days of pretense are dwindling down to a precious few. 
     In February the PLA installed perhaps as many as 100 
     ballistic missiles on the Chinese coast opposite Taiwan. That 
     led to new calls in Congress that the United States proceed 
     with a plan to erect a theater missile defense system 
     protecting Japan, South Korea and Taiwan.
       In the first week of March, Secretary of State Madeleine 
     Albright went to Beijing and attempted to appease Chinese 
     fury over the threat that the United States would defend 
     Taiwan against missile attack. The Washington Post quoted a 
     senior Chinese official as saying Albright, in her private 
     meetings, had ``tried to `pacify' '' China, telling 
     officials, ``Please don't worry, don't overreact,'' and 
     assuring them that it would take the United States a decade 
     to put any missile defense system in place. For her troubles, 
     Albright won sneers and threats. ``If some people intend to 
     include Taiwan under theater-missile defense, that would 
     amount to an encroachment on China's sovereignty and 
     territorial integrity,'' said Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan.
       Meanwhile, the New York Times, elaborating on earlier 
     stories in the Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post, 
     gave front-page play to a bombshell.
       In April 1996, Energy Department officials informed Samuel 
     Berger, then Clinton's deputy national security adviser, that 
     Notra Trulock, the department's chief of intelligence, had 
     uncovered evidence that showed China had learned how to 
     miniaturize nuclear bombs, allowing for smaller, more lethal 
     missile warheads. And it appeared that the Chinese had gained 
     that knowledge through the efforts of a spy at the Los Alamos 
     National Laboratory. Berger was told the spy might be still 
     in place.
       The White House took no action. In April 1997 the FBI 
     recommended measures to tighten security at the laboratories. 
     No action. In July 1997 Trulock and other Energy Department 
     officials gave Berger a fuller briefing, and Berger in turn 
     briefed Clinton.
       But Trulock's warning came at an awkward time. The 
     administration was on the verge of the 1997 ``strategic 
     partnership'' summit with Beijing. It was also facing 
     congressional investigations into charges that the People's 
     Republic had illegally funneled money into the 1996 Clinton-
     Gore campaign. Very awkward, really.
       So Berger buried the embarrassment. He assigned National 
     Security staffer Gary Samore to look into things, and Samore 
     asked the CIA to come up with a theory of the case other than 
     Trulock's. The CIA dutifully reported that Trulock's analysis 
     was an unsupported ``worst-case'' scenario and Samore 
     dutifully told Berger that no one could really say where the 
     truth lay.
       Wen Ho Lee, the suspected spy, beavered on at Los Alamos. 
     Leisurely, the security council prepared a new plan to 
     tighten security at the labs. Leisurely, finally, in February 
     1998, Clinton formally ordered the reforms into effect. 
     Curiously, Energy Secretary Federico Pena never followed the 
     order. The reforms were not instituted until Bill Richardson, 
     Pena's successor, did so in October 1998--30 months after 
     Trulock's first warning, 18 months after the full alarm, 
     nine months after Clinton's directive.
       In the meantime, the administration did everything it could 
     to keep things buried. The Times reports that the House 
     Intelligence Committee asked Trulock for a briefing in July 
     1998. Trulock asked for permission from Elizabeth Moler, then 
     acting energy secretary. According to Trulock, Moler told him 
     not to brief the committee because the information might be 
     used against Clinton's China policy. Moler told the Times she 
     doesn't recall this.
       The White House's secret would have remained secret had it 
     not been for a select investigative committee headed by 
     Republican Rep. Christopher Cox. Cox's committee unearthed a 
     pattern of more than two decades of Chinese nuclear spying, 
     including the Los Alamos case. The secret leaked. On March 8, 
     Richardson fired Wen Ho Lee.
       Yet still the White House seeks to hide what truth it can. 
     A declassified version of the Cox committee's 800-page 
     bipartisan report is scheduled to be released late this 
     month--happily enough, just days before a Washington visit by 
     China's prime minister. The White House is waging a desperate 
     rearguard campaign to force the Republicans to redact 
     evidence about the administration's suspiciously deleterious 
     approach to the Los Alamos spy case and also evidence 
     suggesting linkage between Clinton's China policy reversal 
     and campaign contributions from parties desiring that 
     reversal.
       But these tactics will probably fail. An angered Republican 
     leadership is considering taking the matter to the full 
     House, where an unexpurgated report could be voted out over 
     Democratic objections. Good. Let a thousand flowers bloom.

     

                          ____________________