[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 75 (Monday, May 24, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5792-S5793]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 COMPREHENSIVE NUCLEAR TEST BAN TREATY

  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I want to make a point about something 
which I think is critically important to the Senate and to this country 
and its future. It is something we are spending no time on and pay no 
attention to. It is the issue of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban 
Treaty.
  In the past two State of the Union Addresses, the President has asked 
Congress to report out and approve the nuclear test ban treaty.
  Going back to a time when President Eisenhower talked about this 
issue, I think most Americans understand the value of and the interest 
in a test ban treaty.
  Since 1945, six nations have conducted 2,046 nuclear test explosions. 
That is an average of one test every 9 days. There are a few countries 
that have the capability of producing a nuclear weapon and testing a 
nuclear weapon. There are many countries that want that capability. 
Stopping the spread of nuclear weapons, stopping the spread of missile 
technology, the means by which nuclear warheads can be delivered, is 
critically important.
  It seems to me one of the underpinnings of those efforts must be the 
passage of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. The United States 
has been under a moratorium of nuclear tests. We have not been testing 
since that moratorium began in 1992. We do not test nuclear weapons. We 
have been a leader. In this area, ratifying the Comprehensive Test Ban 
Treaty is not only important public policy for our country and the 
world, it is important in the context of our leadership in these areas.
  The difficulties we now have in the Balkans and the ruptures that 
have occurred with our relationship with the Russians, it seems to me, 
ought to emphasize to us how important it is to turn back to these 
issues of arms control.
  We know that the Iranians are testing medium-range missiles. We know 
that the North Koreans are testing medium-range missiles. We know that 
India and Pakistan exploded nuclear weapons under each other's nose, 
and they do not like each other.
  Ought that be of some concern to us? Of course it should. Yet, the 
Nuclear Test Ban Treaty--the CTBT it is called--the Comprehensive 
Nuclear

[[Page S5793]]

Test Ban Treaty is here in a committee without movement. There were no 
hearings on the treaty in the last session of the 105th Congress. We 
are now 5 months into the 106th Congress. I very much want our country 
to do the right thing: Ratify that treaty before September of 1999, 
when the committee will be formed of the countries that are signatories 
to that treaty and who have ratified that treaty, about how it will be 
brought into force and how it will be verified.
  I know some say: Well, if you have a treaty on banning nuclear 
weapons tests, only those who are willing to ban them will ban them, 
and you can't deal with the rogues or the outlaws.
  Look, if that is the attitude, no arms control of any type is worth 
pursuing. But, of course, that is absurd. Arms control has brought real 
rewards and real reductions in nuclear weapons.
  I have in my desk here in the Senate a piece of a backfire bomber. I 
am not at my desk to get it, but it is a piece of a wing of a backfire 
bomber. Normally you would get a piece of a potential adversary's 
bomber wing by shooting down a bomber. We did not do that. We cut the 
wing off the bomber as part of an arms control agreement in which they 
reduced the number of bombers, they reduced the number of missiles, and 
they reduced the number of warheads.
  Arms control reductions have worked. So too will the Comprehensive 
Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. I intend to work with a number of my 
colleagues to see if we are able, in the coming weeks, to speak with 
some aggressiveness on this issue here on the floor of the Senate and, 
on behalf of the American people, to make the case that we ought to 
have the opportunity to vote on the ratification of the Comprehensive 
Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. We ought to do it soon.

  I have seen the agenda that has been offered by the Majority Leader 
as to what he hopes to bring to the floor to the Senate before Memorial 
Day, before the Fourth of July. This is not on it. It must be. It 
should be. I hope it will be, because this is a critically important 
issue to our country and to the world.
  Efforts to stop the proliferation of nuclear weapons are critical to 
our future.
  Many countries want them. Only a few countries have access to them. 
We must, at every step of the way, try to forge arms control agreements 
that work. The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty is one step in 
that direction.
  Other steps include forging additional alliances with Russia who, as 
all of us know, is in some significant economic difficulty. We worry a 
lot about a range of issues with respect to their command and control 
of nuclear weapons.
  But the first step, I think, is for the Senate to be given the 
opportunity to vote on and ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban 
Treaty. I hope that is sooner rather than later.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative assistant proceeded to call the roll.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (The remarks of Ms. Landrieu pertaining to the submission of S. Con. 
Res. 33 are printed in today's Record under ``Submission of Concurrent 
and Senate Resolutions.'')
  Ms. LANDRIEU. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative assistant proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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