[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 113 (Friday, July 24, 2009)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8086-S8090]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION

  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I rise today to discuss an amendment I 
submitted with 12 cosponsors that the Senate adopted yesterday by voice 
vote. My amendment, No. 1760, as modified by a second-degree amendment 
I offered, No. 1807, sets some important benchmarks for the President 
to meet as his administration negotiates and prepares for Senate 
ratification of a follow-on to the 1991 START agreement, which expires 
this December 5.
  As my colleagues know, the Constitution entrusts the Senate with the 
responsibility of advice and consent on treaties.

[[Page S8087]]

  It is entirely within the Senate's prerogative--in fact, it is the 
Senate's responsibility--to consult with the administration at the 
beginning of a treaty negotiation, during the process, and at the end. 
I have said before, if the administration wants to have the Senate on 
board at the end of the treaty process--at ratification--it must listen 
to Senators throughout that negotiation. That is why the National 
Security Working Group which I co-chair with my friend Senator Byrd is 
so important.
  It is also why this amendment is so important. The amendment is 
simple and straightforward so that there should not be any confusion 
about what the Senate expects in this treaty process.
  First, the amendment requires the President to submit a report on the 
plan to modernize the U.S. nuclear deterrent, including the nuclear 
weapons stockpile, the infrastructure and the delivery systems. This 
report must be put together in consultation with the experts: the 
directors of the national weapons labs, the Administrator of NNSA, the 
Secretary of Defense and the Commander of the United States Strategic 
Command. And it must be accompanied by a plan to pay for the 
modernization of the deterrent over the next decade.
  This report is due within 30 days of enactment of S. 1390 or at the 
same time the President sends the START follow-on treaty to the Senate, 
whichever occurs earlier.
  And to make sure there is no confusion about what the Senate expects, 
I joined my colleagues Senators Levin, McCain, Kerry, Lugar, and Byrd 
in sending a letter to the President to make clear that this plan must 
be in place, and funded in fiscal year 2011 and the outyears, at the 
same time the START follow-on treaty is sent to the Senate. I will ask 
to have this letter printed in the Record at the conclusion of my 
statement.
  Let there be no mistake about what we mean: if the administration 
does not submit to Congress a plan for the modernization of the U.S. 
nuclear deterrent, with funding to implement that plan, at the same 
time it submits a START follow on agreement, that treaty will not be 
ratified by the Senate until it does.
  I know modernization is a dirty word to some arms controllers who 
believe that our nuclear weapons will simply go away if we neglect them 
enough. It should now be clear that that plan of nuclear disarmament 
through neglect and atrophy is dead.
  Second, the amendment addresses the Russian Federation's demands that 
the U.S. place limitations upon its missile defenses, space 
capabilities, or advanced conventional modernization in order to reach 
an agreement on the treaty. Any such treaty would be dead on arrival in 
the Senate.
  To strengthen the President's position with the Russian Federation on 
these matters, the amendment makes clear the Senate expects the 
administration will not change its position by including any of these 
limitations in the follow-on treaty, no matter how hard the Russians 
huff and puff and stomp their feet.
  And the Senate has now joined the House of Representatives in 
unanimously backing my amendment and the similar House amendment 
offered by Congressman Turner so the Russians and the Obama 
administration should have no question about what both Houses of the 
Congress expect from this treaty process.
  I would like to say a few words about why I felt it was necessary to 
offer these measures.
  In recent months, it has become clear that our nuclear deterrent is 
in need of serious attention. As high an authority as Secretary of 
Defense Robert Gates warned:

       At a certain point, it will become impossible to keep 
     extending the life of our arsenal, especially in light of our 
     testing moratorium. It also makes it harder to reduce 
     existing stockpiles, because eventually we won't have as much 
     confidence in the efficacy of the weapons we do have.

  And:

       To be blunt, there is absolutely no way we can maintain a 
     credible deterrent and reduce the number of weapons in our 
     stockpile without either resorting to testing our stockpile 
     or pursuing a modernization program.

  The Perry-Schlesinger Commission, which recently issued its final 
report, also warned that:

       For the indefinite future, the United States must maintain 
     a viable nuclear deterrent. The other NPT-recognized nuclear-
     weapon states have put in place comprehensive programs to 
     modernize their forces to meet new international 
     circumstances.

  Yet, it is clear that the steps necessary to do that are not being 
taken. The administration's fiscal year 2010 budget for the nuclear 
deterrent has been described by its own officials as ``treading water'' 
and a ``placeholder.''
  The physics and chemistry that are causing our nuclear weapons to 
deteriorate will not wait for the next Nuclear Posture Review--NPR--
though.
  I make that point because I'm sure there are those who will make the 
argument that a comprehensive modernization plan should wait for that 
NPR.
  To that I have two points: one, modernization is interrelated with 
the size of our stockpile this is the point made by the Secretary of 
Defense.
  And, apparently, decisions about the size of our stockpile--which is 
a significant element of the NPR Congress ordered--are being made right 
now; in fact, it appears they were made in early July in Moscow. If the 
cart can be put before the horse, the Senate can and should require the 
horse be brought along.
  I say again, my amendment doesn't say that the treaty or agreement 
can't be signed until there is a modernization plan put forward. It 
merely says the DOD can't implement the reductions called for in the 
treaty until the modernization plan, at least the fiscal year 2011 
elements of it, are submitted by the President and funded by the 
Congress.
  My personal belief, consistent with the warnings of the Secretary of 
Defense, is that we should not ratify the treaty until the long-term 
modernization plan is submitted by the President and funded by the 
Congress. But that is not what this amendment would do.
  Additionally, it is clear from that Joint Understanding that issues 
totally unrelated to strategic arms reductions, like missile defense 
and conventional modernization programs, are at risk of being sewn into 
the START agreement anyway.
  As Dr. Keith Payne, a member of the Perry-Schlesinger Commission, 
recently noted in testimony before the House Foreign Affairs Committee:

       It would seem self-evidently a mistake to include any 
     limits on U.S. [Ballistic Missile Defense] BMD as a price to 
     be paid for an agreement that requires nothing of the 
     Russians beyond discarding the aged systems they plan to 
     eliminate in any event and will not touch the real problem of 
     Russian tactical nuclear weapons.

  Yet, despite the logic of Dr. Payne's statement, and disregarding the 
photo ops and positive press statements, President Medvedev made clear 
that little had changed from the especially pugnacious Russian 
statements before the July summit when he said at the G-8 summit just a 
few days later: ``If we don't manage to agree on the issues, you know 
the consequences,'' referring to the deployment of Russian tactical 
missiles to Kaliningrad.
  And his Foreign Minister, Mr. Lavrov, further elaborated that if the 
Third Site goes forward, ``then that will doubtless place a big 
question mark over the prospects for further reductions in strategic 
offensive weapons.''
  Congress has a long history of making its views known on arms control 
negotiations in this fashion, including on the SALT-I negotiations in 
1972 and the START II negotiations in 1996.
  Given the issues at stake in the follow-on treaty, it is clear that 
this amendment is necessary.
  Mr. President, I also ask unanimous consent to have printed in the 
Record a Dear colleague letter I circulated to Senators concerning my 
amendment No. 1760, in addition to the letter to President Obama which 
I referred to earlier.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                    July 23, 2009.
     President Barack Obama,
     The White House,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear President Obama: We believe that when the START treaty 
     is submitted, you should also submit a plan, including a 
     funding estimate for FY11 (and out years across the next 
     decade), to enhance the safety, security and reliability of 
     the nuclear weapons stockpile, to modernize the nuclear 
     weapons

[[Page S8088]]

     complex (i.e. improve the safety of facilities, modernize the 
     infrastructure, maintain the key capabilities and 
     competencies of the nuclear weapons workforce--the designers 
     and the technicians), and to maintain the delivery platforms.
           Sincerely,
     Jon Kyl,
       U.S. Senator.
     John McCain,
       U.S. Senator.
     Richard Lugar,
       U.S. Senator.
     Carl Levin,
       U.S. Senator.
     John Kerry,
       U.S. Senator.
     Robert C. Byrd,
       U.S. Senator.
                                  ____

                                                    July 22, 2009.
       Dear Colleague, I recommend the attached op-ed, ``Plumage--
     But at a Price'' by Charles Krauthammer, from the July 9th 
     Washington Post. Mr. Krauthammer makes a number of 
     observations worth understanding and repeating, including, 
     ``the very notion that Kim Jong Il or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad 
     will suddenly abjure nukes because of yet another U.S.-
     Russian treaty is comical.''
       The column also highlights another concern: the Russian 
     insistence that we compromise our missile defense. As Mr. 
     Krauthammer writes, ``since defensive weaponry will be the 
     decisive strategic factor of the 21st century, Russia has 
     striven mightily for a quarter-century to halt its 
     development.'' The July 6th Joint Understanding signed by 
     President Obama and President Medvedev raises concerns that 
     the Administration may be ceding key ground to the Russians 
     on several significant points, including missile defense.
       Recently, the House unanimously adopted a provision as a 
     part of its FY10 National Defense Authorization Act that 
     missile defense, space capabilities and advanced conventional 
     modernization (e.g. prompt global strike) should not be a 
     part of the START follow-on, and our nuclear weapons MUST be 
     modernized if further reductions are to be conducted with 
     minimal risk. The operative provisions of the amendment are 
     tied to the implementation of a follow-on treaty or 
     agreement; they DO NOT prevent the Administration from 
     concluding a new treaty or agreement with the Russians.
       We should adopt the same amendment to strengthen the 
     Administration's hand with the Russians by making clear that 
     Congress simply WILL NOT provide the funding to implement a 
     START follow-on that in any way limits missile defense, space 
     capabilities, or conventional strike modernization, nor will 
     it allow further strategic arms reductions if the President 
     does not provide a comprehensive modernization program for 
     the U.S. nuclear deterrent (including the weapons stockpile, 
     the infrastructure that supports it, and the weapons delivery 
     systems).
       I will, therefore, be offering such an amendment to S. 
     1390, the FY10 National Defense Authorization Act.
       I will also offer an amendment that expresses the Sense of 
     the Senate that the asymmetrical advantage Russia has over 
     U.S. and allied forces due to its 10-to-1 edge in tactical 
     nuclear weapons must be rectified. As the bipartisan Perry-
     Schlesinger Commission stated in its Final Report: ``The 
     United States should not cede to Russia a posture of 
     superiority in the name of deemphasizing nuclear weapons in 
     U.S. military strategy. There seems no near-term prospect of 
     such a result in the balance of operationally deployed 
     strategic nuclear weapons. But that balance does not exist in 
     non-strategic nuclear forces, where Russia enjoys a sizeable 
     numerical advantage. As noted above, it stores thousands of 
     these weapons in apparent support of possible military 
     operations west of the Urals. The United States deploys a 
     small fraction of that number in support of nuclear sharing 
     agreements in NATO. Precise numbers for the U.S. deployments 
     are classified but their total is only about five percent of 
     the total at the height of the Cold War. Strict U.S.-Russian 
     equivalence in NSNF numbers is unnecessary. But the current 
     imbalance is stark and worrisome to some U.S. allies in 
     Central Europe. If and as reductions continue in the number 
     of operationally deployed strategic nuclear weapons, this 
     imbalance will become more apparent and allies less 
     assured.''
       Congress has a long history of making its views known on 
     arms control negotiations in this fashion, including on the 
     SALT-I negotiations in 1972 and the START II negotiations in 
     1996.
       I urge you to support my amendments to the NDAA. It is 
     imperative that we ensure the follow-on treaty is negotiated 
     and implemented in a manner most consistent with the national 
     security of the U.S.
           Sincerely,
                                                          Jon Kyl,
     United States Senator.
                                  ____


                [From the Washington Post, July 9, 2009]

                        Plumage--But at a Price

                        (By Charles Krauthammer)

       The signing ceremony in Moscow was a grand affair. For 
     Barack Obama, foreign policy neophyte and ``reset'' man, the 
     arms reduction agreement had a Kissingerian air. A fine 
     feather in his cap. And our president likes his plumage.
       Unfortunately for the United States, the country Obama 
     represents, the prospective treaty is useless at best, 
     detrimental at worst.
       Useless because the level of offensive nuclear weaponry, 
     the subject of the U.S.-Russia ``Joint Understanding,'' is an 
     irrelevance. We could today terminate all such negotiations, 
     invite the Russians to build as many warheads as they want 
     and profitably watch them spend themselves into penury, as 
     did their Soviet predecessors, stockpiling weapons that do 
     nothing more than, as Churchill put it, make the rubble 
     bounce.
       Obama says that his START will be a great boon, setting an 
     example to enable us to better pressure North Korea and Iran 
     to give up their nuclear programs. That a man of Obama's 
     intelligence can believe such nonsense is beyond 
     comprehension. There is not a shred of evidence that cuts by 
     the great powers--the INF treaty, START I, the Treaty of 
     Moscow (2002)--induced the curtailment of anyone's programs. 
     Moammar Gaddafi gave up his nukes the week we pulled Saddam 
     Hussein out of his spider hole. No treaty involved. The very 
     notion that Kim Jong Il or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will suddenly 
     abjure nukes because of yet another U.S.-Russian treaty is 
     comical.
       The pursuit of such an offensive weapons treaty could 
     nonetheless be detrimental to us. Why? Because Obama's hunger 
     for a diplomatic success, such as it is, allowed the Russians 
     to exact a price: linkage between offensive and defensive 
     nuclear weapons.
       This is important for Russia because of the huge American 
     technological advantage in defensive weaponry. We can 
     reliably shoot down an intercontinental ballistic missile. 
     They cannot. And since defensive weaponry will be the 
     decisive strategic factor of the 21st century, Russia has 
     striven mightily for a quarter-century to halt its 
     development. Gorbachev tried to swindle Reagan out of the 
     Strategic Defense Initiative at Reykjavik in 1986. Reagan 
     refused. As did his successors--Bush I, Clinton, Bush II.
       Obama, who seeks to banish nuclear weapons entirely, has 
     little use for such prosaic contrivances. First, the Obama 
     budget actually cuts spending on missile defense, at a time 
     when federal spending is a riot of extravagance and trillion-
     dollar deficits. Then comes the ``pause'' (as Russia's 
     president appreciatively noted) in the planned establishment 
     of a missile shield in Eastern Europe. And now the ``Joint 
     Understanding'' commits us to a new treaty that includes ``a 
     provision on the interrelationship of strategic offensive and 
     strategic defensive arms.'' Obama further said that the East 
     European missile shield ``will be the subject of extensive 
     negotiations'' between the United States and Russia.
       Obama doesn't even seem to understand the ramifications of 
     this concession. Poland and the Czech Republic thought they 
     were regaining their independence when they joined NATO under 
     the protection of the United States. They now see that the 
     shield negotiated with us and subsequently ratified by all of 
     NATO is in limbo. Russia and America will first have to 
     ``come to terms'' on the issue, explained President Dmitry 
     Medvedev. This is precisely the kind of compromised 
     sovereignty that Russia wants to impose on its ex-Soviet 
     colonies--and that U.S. presidents of both parties for the 
     past 20 years have resisted.
       Resistance, however, is not part of Obama's repertoire. 
     Hence his eagerness for arcane negotiations over MIRV'd 
     missiles, the perfect distraction from the major issue 
     between the two countries: Vladimir Putin's unapologetic and 
     relentless drive to restore Moscow's hegemony over the 
     sovereign states that used to be Soviet satrapies.
       That--not nukes--is the chief cause of the friction between 
     the United States and Russia. You wouldn't know it to hear 
     Obama in Moscow pledging to halt the ``drift'' in U.S.-
     Russian relations. Drift? The decline in relations came from 
     Putin's desire to undo what he considers ``the greatest 
     geopolitical catastrophe'' of the 20th century--the collapse 
     of the Soviet empire. Hence his squeezing Ukraine's energy 
     supplies. His overt threats against Poland and the Czech 
     Republic for daring to make sovereign agreements with the 
     United States. And finally, less than a year ago, his 
     invading a small neighbor, detaching and then effectively 
     annexing two of Georgia's provinces to Mother Russia.
       That's the cause of the collapse of our relations. Not 
     drift, but aggression. Or, as the reset master phrased it 
     with such delicacy in his Kremlin news conference: ``our 
     disagreements on Georgia's borders.''

  (At the request of Mr. Reid, the following statement was ordered to 
be printed in the Record.)
 Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I commend the Senate for including 
the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act as part of the National 
Defense Authorization Act, and I am optimistic that at long last, our 
12-year effort to enact this legislation into law is finally reaching 
fruition.
  Hate crimes are acts of domestic terrorism. Like all terrorist acts, 
hate crimes are intended to strike fear into whole communities by 
crimes against a few. We have committed ourselves to protecting our 
country from terrorists who strike from abroad, and now we have 
committed ourselves to protecting Americans from hate-motivated crimes 
in our own backyards.
  That is why 63 Senators from both sides of the aisle voted to include 
the

[[Page S8089]]

Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act as part of the National 
Defense Authorization Act. The House of Representatives already 
approved a very similar measure with strong bipartisan support earlier 
this year. The Matthew Shepard Act strengthens the ability of the 
Federal Government to investigate and prosecute hate crimes. It removes 
excessive restrictions in current Federal law that prevent effective 
hate crimes prosecutions. And it offers Federal assistance to State and 
local authorities in preventing, investigating, and prosecuting 
despicable crimes.
  I am proud that President Obama is a strong supporter of this 
bipartisan legislation along with Attorney General Eric Holder. The 
Attorney General has been with us from the beginning of our efforts to 
get this done, and it is significant that swift enactment of this 
legislation would ensure that the measure is implemented under his 
impressive guidance.
  The Attorney General's leadership at the Justice Department is 
launching a new era of civil rights enforcement. In recent months, we 
have worked with the Justice Department to improve the Senate-approved 
hate crimes bill so that it addresses hate crimes in the most effective 
and meaningful way, and I appreciate the time and expertise of so many 
at the Department on this matter, especially Mark Kappelhoff, Ron 
Weich, and Judy Appelbaum. In addition, I must thank the Justice 
Department for diligently working to provide its recent views letter 
which concludes that the Matthew Shepard Act would be ``wholly 
constitutional.''
  Passage of the amendment would not have been possible without the 
skill and dedication of many in the Senate. I commend Majority Leader 
Reid for his leadership and commitment to seeing that the amendment was 
passed before the August recess. In addition, I commend Serena Hoy of 
the majority leader's staff for her constant attention to the issue.
  I also especially commend Senator Levin for working so hard with me 
on this measure for so many years, and Rick Debobes and Kaye Meier of 
his staff for their tireless work on the Senate floor. I am also very 
grateful for the support and leadership of Senator Leahy and his 
excellent staff, including Ed Pagano, Bruce Cohen, Kristine Lucius, 
Noah Bookbinder, and Roscoe Jones.
  I appreciate as well the hard work of Senator Durbin and his staffer 
Mike Zubrensky, as well as Senator Collins and her staff, including Rob 
Epplin, Amanda Wood, and Nikki McKinney. I also thank Judiciary 
Committee staffers Lara Flint and Danyelle Solomon, as well as Mike 
Jones on the Budget Committee, for their contributions as well. I also 
appreciate the expert and patient assistance of John Henderson and Bill 
Jensen in the Office of the Legislative Counsel of the Senate.
  As is the case with many challenging issues before the Senate, 
passage of the Matthew Shepard Act would have not been possible without 
the effective support of the Democratic cloakroom, especially Lula 
Davis.
  Finally, I commend the outstanding work of so many in my own office, 
including Carey Parker, Christine Leonard, Ty Cobb, and Sara Kingsley--
as well as Bethany Bassett, Jorie Feldman, Joe Barresi, Colin Taylor, 
and Jamie Susskind, who helped us get through the final stretch. For 
over a decade, we have been working to see this measure become law, and 
we certainly wouldn't be where we are today without the contributions 
of so many dedicated and determined staffers along the way.
  Inclusion of the Matthew Shepard Act as part of the National Defense 
Authorization Act sends a strong signal that just as our Nation is 
concerned about terroristic acts abroad, it is also dedicated to 
eliminating homegrown terrorism against our Nation's own communities. 
We will be a stronger and better nation in the years ahead, once our 
laws recognize that bias-motivated violence has no place in the United 
States.
  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, while there are a number of provisions 
in the Fiscal Year 2010 National Defense Authorization Act that I 
support, I have some serious concerns about the bill that prevent me 
from supporting it. In particular, this bill does not contain a binding 
deadline to end the war in Iraq. While I am pleased that the President 
has committed to withdrawing our troops by the end of 2011, this 
redeployment schedule is too long and therefore may undermine our 
ability to combat al-Qaida and further strain our Armed Forces 
unnecessarily. In addition, while the President clearly understands 
that the greatest threat to our Nation resides in Pakistan, I remain 
concerned that his strategy regarding Afghanistan and Pakistan does not 
adequately address, and may even exacerbate, the problems we face in 
Pakistan. This bill authorizes funding that is being used to increase 
our military presence in Afghanistan, without ensuring that this 
strategy does not end up pushing militants into neighboring Pakistan 
and further destabilizing that nuclear-armed nation.
  Among the provisions in the bill that I strongly support are a pay 
raise for those serving in uniform, a task force to review care for 
wounded warriors, and $20 million in additional funding for the 
Cooperative Threat Reduction Program.
  In addition, my amendment to ensure that wounded members of the 
Reserve component are not discharged until their disabilities have been 
evaluated will help ensure a smooth transition back into civilian life 
for these service members. I am pleased that this amendment was 
accepted and thank Senator Levin and Senator McCain for their 
cooperation.
  I am also pleased that the Senate accepted my amendment to require a 
report on the adequacy of funding for forces needed to respond to the 
consequences of a chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear 
explosive incident in the United States. Historically, the Defense 
Department has delayed efforts to stand up these forces and underfunded 
similar capabilities. This amendment will help ensure that these key 
civil support forces receive necessary funds.
  Unfortunately, the Senate Armed Services Committee rejected my 
amendment to ensure our troops are not exposed to toxic fumes in Iraq 
and Afghanistan. This commonsense amendment would have prohibited the 
burning, in open pits, of waste that produces toxic fumes, including 
that which produces known carcinogens. I have urged the chairman to 
accede to the language in the House bill, which I helped to draft, that 
would prohibit this practice.
  I continue to be concerned that foreign military assistance funds 
authorized by this bill are being awarded in violation of the Foreign 
Assistance Act. I will continue to work to ensure that the Pentagon 
complies with Federal law in its administration of these programs. The 
Foreign Assistance Act ensures that our foreign military assistance is 
administered in a manner that will promote legitimate governments and 
the rule of law. Failure to comply with these statutory requirements 
runs the risk of provoking instability, militancy and anti-Americanism 
in key regions throughout the world.
  The bill contains a provision prohibiting the outsourcing of 
interrogations ``during or in the aftermath of hostilities.'' I have 
previously cosponsored similar amendments covering the intelligence 
community.
  I am pleased that the legislation includes changes to the Military 
Commissions Act to improve the procedures that would be used in 
military commission trials. The Military Commissions Act violated the 
basic principles and values of our constitutional system of government, 
and any improvement to it is welcome. However, I remain concerned that 
the military commission process is so discredited that it may not be 
possible to fix it. And I have yet to hear a convincing argument that 
other options for bringing detainees to justice--the civilian Federal 
criminal justice system and the military courts martial system--are 
insufficient or unworkable.
  The bill requires a report on the Department's efforts to reduce 
spending on unneeded spare parts. I have long had concerns about 
wasteful spending on unnecessary spare parts. I was pleased that early 
this year, at my urging, the Air Force committed to reducing its on 
order excess inventory by half, thus saving American taxpayers roughly 
$50 million.
  This bill largely supports the President's efforts to restore fiscal 
responsibility to the defense budget. I was

[[Page S8090]]

pleased to support Senator Levin and Senator McCain's amendment 
stripping funds for the F-22 from the bill. The Defense Department has 
stated that it does not need any more of these aircraft, and that these 
funds are urgently needed to meet the real-world threats that we face 
today. I am also pleased that the President has reduced spending on 
redundant and unproven missile defense technologies. I am disappointed, 
however, that this bill contains billions of dollars of earmarks not 
requested by the Pentagon. This wasteful spending takes money away from 
our troops and endangers our national security.
  Mr. KAUFMAN. Mr. President, today, I wish to speak on the Victims of 
Iranian Censorship, or VOICE, Act which passed last night as an 
amendment to the Defense authorization bill.
  I was pleased to introduce this bill with Senators McCain, Lieberman, 
Casey, and Graham, and I thank the cosponsors for their shared 
commitment to this issue. I also thank Chairman Levin and Ranking 
Member McCain for helping to secure its passage.
  The VOICE Act supports freedom of the press, freedom of speech, and 
freedom of expression in Iran, and authorizes funding for the 
Broadcasting Board of Governors to expand transmission capability and 
programming on Radio Farda and the Persian News Network.
  It supports the development of technology to counter ongoing Internet 
censorship, and promotes online U.S.-Iranian educational and cultural 
exchanges.
  Passage of the VOICE Act is especially timely given the suppression 
of free flowing information in and out of Iran since the June 12 
presidential election.
  While the people of Iran enthusiastically participated in these 
elections, it is painfully clear that the long road to democracy does 
not end there. A true democracy values fundamental freedoms, such as 
freedom of expression, which is protected under the International 
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
  In fact, in 1976, Iran was one of the first countries to ratify--and 
it is still a party to--this U.N. treaty, which also protects the right 
to hold opinions without interference, and affirms the right to receive 
and impart information in writing, print, or through any other media.
  Unfortunately, these international obligations have not been upheld 
in Iran, where the Internet and text-messaging services are monitored 
and blocked, and U.S.-funded television and radio broadcasting is 
increasingly jammed. News reporting has been censored, access for 
journalists has been restricted, and specific media outlets have been 
targeted and shutdown. Foreign journalists have had their press 
credentials cancelled and equipment confiscated.
  They have been confined to their hotels and told their visas would 
not be renewed. Foreign press bureaus in Tehran have been closed, and 
others have been instructed to suspend all their Farsi-language news.
  For Iranian journalists, the stakes have been even higher. Numerous 
Iranian journalists have been detained, imprisoned, assaulted, and 
intimidated since the elections. And journalists have been instructed 
to file stories solely from their offices, which has limited their 
ability to provide timely and accurate news.
  Regarding interference of international broadcasting, shortwave and 
medium wave transmissions of the Farsi-language Radio Free Europe/Radio 
Liberty's Radio Farda have been partially blocked. And satellite 
broadcasts, including those of the Voice of America's Persian News 
Network and the British Broadcasting Corporation, have been 
intermittently jammed.
  These are popular services in Iran, which serve as a vital source of 
news and entertainment for the Iranian people, especially for those 
seeking access to credible information and news.
  Since the election, efforts to suppress the free flow of information 
have not focused on the media alone. Blogs and social networking sites 
have been targeted as well, including popular websites such Facebook 
and Twitter. Short message service in Iran has been blocked--preventing 
text messaging and jamming internet sites that utilize such services--
and cell phone service has been partially shut-down. These restrictions 
have prevented the free flow of information, and precluded Iranian 
citizens from accessing unimpeded means of communication.
  Iran did not develop this sophisticated Internet-censorship 
technology on its own. In fact, reports indicate that numerous 
companies including some with U.S. subsidiaries--have provided Iran 
with the software and technological expertise to block the Internet, 
and monitor online use to gather information about individuals.
  Unfortunately, little is known about the specifics surrounding these 
sales, which likely including ``deep packet inspection'' technology, 
which, among other things, allows the government to read, block, and 
censor the Internet. In addition to giving it the capability to spread 
disinformation by modifying, tampering with, and diverting emails.
  This behavior is unconscionable, and unfortunately not enough is 
known about the sale of Internet-restricting technology to countries 
including, but not limited to, Iran. That is why the VOICE Act requires 
a report to Congress examining the sale of technology that has 
furthered Iran's ability to filter and monitor the Internet, as well as 
disrupt cell phone and Internet use.
  Our bill supports the Iranian people as they take steps to peacefully 
express their opinions and aspirations, and seek access to means of 
communication and news. It expresses respect for the sovereignty, proud 
history, and rich culture of the Iranian people, and recognizes the 
universal values of freedom of speech and freedom of the press.
  Most importantly, it supports the Iranian people as they seek access 
to unimpeded Internet access, cellular phone communications, and 
credible news.
  I am pleased the Senate has adopted a bipartisan bill that supports 
the Iranian people as they seek unfettered access to news and other 
information.
  It is critical that we continue to support for free speech, free 
press, and free expression in Iran and in every country throughout the 
world.

                          ____________________