[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 56 (Friday, March 30, 2007)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E707]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




INTRODUCTION OF NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT AND ECONOMIC CONVERSION ACT OF 2007

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                       HON. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON

                      of the district of columbia

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, March 29, 2007

  Ms. NORTON. Madam Speaker, today, I am again introducing the Nuclear 
Disarmament and Economic Conversion Act (NDECA), as I have done since 
1994, after working with the residents who were responsible for a 
ballot initiative passed by D.C. voters in 1993. NDECA will require the 
United States to disable and dismantle its nuclear weapons when all 
other nations possessing nuclear weapons enact laws to do the same. 
NDECA further provides that when U.S. nuclear weapons are dismantled, 
the resources for supporting nuclear weapon programs would be used for 
our growing human and infrastructure needs, such as housing, health 
care, Social Security and the environment.
  Tragically, instead of nuclear disarmament, nations around the world 
have increased in efforts to seek or acquire nuclear capability. Last 
week, the Security Council unanimously adopted resolution 1737 (2006) 
under Article 41 of the Charter's Chapter VIII, imposing sanctions on 
Iran for failure to halt uranium enrichment and mandating that Iran 
cease all sensitive nuclear activities. China's acquisition of nuclear 
weapons particularly underscores the dangerous spread of these weapons 
as a potent destabilizing force in world affairs. North Korea, at least 
in part in response to early aggressive talk by this administration 
responded in a dangerously paranoid fashion by announcing that it is 
expanding its nuclear capabilities, and today few doubt that North 
Korea has acquired a nuclear device. The North Korean threat has become 
so serious that the Administration recently reversed course and agreed 
to freeze North Korea's nuclear program in exchange for 50,000 tons of 
heavy fuel oil. India and Pakistan have moved back from the precipice 
of several years ago but each remains poised with nuclear weapons.
  The invasion of Iraq and the resistance of the Administration to end 
the war have cost the United States much of its leadership on the 
nuclear proliferation and other urgent international issues. This 
country would be non-credible in dissuading other nations who aspire to 
become or remain nuclear powers if we ourselves took greater initiative 
in dismantling our own nuclear weapons program. We moved in the right 
direction when the Senate ratified the Moscow Treaty in 2003, which 
provides that by 2012 both the U.S. and Russia will reduce their long-
range warheads two-thirds from approximately 6,000 warheads each to 
2,200. However, the Administration has failed to build on this effort. 
According to a recent study, Securing The Bomb: An Agenda for Action 
(May, 2004; prepared by the Belfer Center, Harvard University Kennedy 
School of Government): Total nuclear-threat-reduction spending remains 
less than one quarter of one percent of the U.S. military budget. 
Indeed, on average, the Bush administration requests for nuclear-
threat-reduction spending over FY 2002--2005 have been less, in real 
terms, than the last Clinton administration request, made long before 
the 9/11 attacks ever occurred. Instead, the Administration has moved 
to increase the country's nuclear capacity.

  However, the problem today even more complicated than nuclear 
disarmament by nation states. The greatest threat today is from 
inadequately defended and guarded sites in many countries where there 
is enough material to make nuclear weapons and many opportunities for 
terrorists or nations without weapons to secure nuclear materials. 
Astonishingly, because of the absence of presidential leadership, less 
nuclear material was seized in the two years following the 9/11 attacks 
than in the 2 years immediately preceding the attacks (Securing The 
Bomb: An Agenda for Action, May 2004).
  In my work on the Homeland Security Committee, I know that threats 
from nuclear proliferation and available nuclear material are more 
dangerous in the post 9/11 era than in 1994, when I first introduced 
the Nuclear Disarmament and Economic Conversion Act. It is more urgent 
than ever to begin closing down nuclear capability here and around the 
world.
  Today our country has 45 million people still without health 
insurance, a long list of other urgent domestic needs put on the back 
burner following the invasion of Iraq and large tax cuts to wealthy 
people and corporations, an economy burdened with a dangerous deficit, 
and millions of Americans pushed back into poverty during the last four 
years. As the only nation that has used nuclear weapons in war and 
still possesses the largest arsenal, the U.S. has an obligation to 
begin the arduous process of leading the world in the transfer of 
nuclear weapons funds to urgent domestic needs.

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