[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 102 (Thursday, July 9, 2009)]
[House]
[Page H7923]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   AGREEMENT ON NUCLEAR ARMS CONTROL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Quigley) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. QUIGLEY. I rise today to congratulate President Obama on reaching 
an agreement on nuclear arms control with Russian President Medvedev. 
This agreement will cut American and Russian nuclear arsenals by at 
least one quarter. This represents a critical step towards more 
substantial arms control, as well as a milestone in confronting our 
nuclear legacy.
  I, like most Americans, was born in the nuclear age. The 1945 
bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki marked its beginning, establishing 
an uncertain peace in a war-weary world.

                              {time}  2030

  But with the global proliferation of nuclear weapons, the threat of 
catastrophe grew ever closer. Confrontations in Berlin, in Cuba and the 
Middle East were one miscalculation away from disaster. But rather than 
learning from these close calls and taking dramatic steps to reduce our 
stockpiles of nuclear arms, we built more, and so did the Soviet Union.
  Our arms control efforts were limited at best, and at worst they 
collapsed under the pressure of pursuing a global containment strategy 
against the Soviet Union. Today, the United States and Russia each 
deploy over 2,000 nuclear warheads. Although both countries exercise 
extreme care in managing these weapons, only one mistake in judgment 
could be fatal. That risk has grown as seven other countries have 
joined the so-called nuclear club over the past half century.
  Our nuclear warheads are also expensive to maintain and draw badly 
needed funding away from other priorities. As former President 
Eisenhower said, ``Every gun that is made, every warship launched, 
every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who 
hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.''
  For this reason I stand here today not only to congratulate President 
Obama on his progress in Moscow, but also to urge him to take further 
steps toward reducing the global stockpile of nuclear weapons. Like 
President Obama, I recognize that we live in a world in which threats 
to peace are no longer confined to the traditional great powers.
  I echo President Obama's sentiment that in this ``strange turn of 
history, the threat of global nuclear war has gone down, but the risk 
of nuclear attack has gone up.''
  Rogue states and terrorist organizations are dedicated to acquiring 
nuclear weapons. We must be vigilant in controlling these weapons and 
making sure that they do not fall into the wrong hands. A nuclear arms 
treaty with Russia to replace the expiring START treaty is a good place 
to start. We should also ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty which 
aims to limit the proliferation of nuclear weapons around the world.
  We must confront the terrible legacy of the Cold War. We must 
recognize that although this legacy belongs to another generation, it 
is now our responsibility to enact change. We must stop wasting money 
on the excesses of the Cold War and start thinking about improving the 
present. We must show the world that we are committed to reducing this 
nuclear threat. We must do everything we can to ensure that nuclear 
weapons are never used again.

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