[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 28 (Tuesday, March 2, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H1002-H1003]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  NO WINNERS IN THE NUCLEAR ARMS RACE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, there is no greater security threat in the 
world than the continued development and proliferation of nuclear 
weapons. A single nuclear strike has the power to destroy the planet 
and to obliterate the human race.
  The headline in Sunday's New York Times read, ``White House is 
rethinking nuclear policy.'' Boy, did it need some rethinking.
  After years of a grossly irresponsible nuclear strategy, we should 
all be grateful that the Obama administration seems poised on this 
issue to put us on a course toward peace and global security.
  It appears that the President is prepared to dramatically reduce the 
size of the U.S. nuclear stockpile. All accounts are that there will be 
no development of new nuclear weapons on his watch. That includes the 
unnecessarily dangerous, expensive, and wasteful ``bunker buster''--the 
pet nuke of the previous administration. While his predecessor thumbed 
his nose at the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and the Nuclear 
Nonproliferation Treaty, President Obama is sincere about honoring our 
multilateral obligations.
  Not all the news is that encouraging, however. The emerging White 
House strategy looks like it will include an increased reliance on 
missile defense systems, which have proven themselves to be a failure 
and a waste of taxpayer money for going on 30 years now. Most 
ominously, there appears to be some reluctance in the White House to 
adopt a ``no first use'' policy. In other words, we would not 
specifically rule out the possibility of a preemptive nuclear strike. 
This should terrify all of us, Mr. Speaker, because it takes only a 
single nuclear attack to unleash untold human suffering, the likes of 
which the world has never seen.
  What possible national security objective could be served by using 
weapons that could wipe out civilization?
  I encourage the White House to be bold in its pursuit of a world free 
of nuclear weapons. Specifically, I want to see the administration 
adopt the principles of the ``NO NUKES'' resolution that I have 
introduced in this Congress--``NO NUKES,'' which stands for 
Nonproliferation Options for Nuclear Understanding to Keep Everyone 
Safe.
  The resolution specifically declares that the United States would not 
use nuclear weapons first, regarding them as a deterrent against attack 
until their eventual complete elimination.
  The resolution also calls for more aggressive multilateral 
negotiations toward disarmament, greater cooperation with Russia toward 
dismantling Cold War nuclear warheads, a reaffirmation of the 
moratorium on nuclear testing, and a ban on weapons in outer space.
  Nuclear nonproliferation is one of the pillars of the Smart Security 
approach that I have been advocating from this Chamber for years, Mr. 
Speaker. ``Smart Security'' means using more brains and less brawn to 
keep America safe. It treats war only as a last resort. It demands that 
we stop equating security with aggression or belligerence. It advances 
our security goals through humanitarian rather than military means--
more development aid, more diplomacy, more conflict resolution, and a 
more vigorous commitment to stopping the spread of nuclear weapons.
  There can be no winners in the nuclear arms race. We cannot afford to 
get this one wrong. I hope our President treats this issue with the 
urgency and the sensitivity that it deserves. Nothing less than the 
life of every man, woman, and child on Earth is at stake.

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