military concepts. Last year highlighted deterrence and there was virtually no mention of strategic defense. This year it seems to me that you have sort of reversed that. You mentioned strategic defense, but not deterrence.

Is that an unfair conclusion? Is it an accurate conclusion? General POWELL. I think I talked to deterrence, Senator, in my opening presentation by describing two concepts of deterrence, strategic deterrence and conventional deterrence. And with respect to strategic deterrence, I think I made the point that we still require strategic nuclear offensive forces, defensive forces, and command and control systems appropriate to strategic offensive and defensive forces, in order to make sure that we are never second best to any other nuclear power, old nuclear power or newly emerging nuclear power.

So I continue to believe that we need a balance of offensive and defensive strategic nuclear forces. I think that the future direction is more emphasis on defenses, and I am an old SDI adherent from my old days in the Reagan administration, in the belief that it would be a better world if we could base our strategic deterrence posture on defensive systems and eventually get rid of offensive systems or purchase and have in our operating forces the minimum number of offensive systems.

But we are still researching defensive systems to see if truly we can rest the security of the Nation on that kind of a calculus.

Senator BUMPERS. That brings me to my very next question. I agree with you. I have always felt that especially a limited strategic defense makes sense, for all the reasons there is no point in beTaboring here.

Do you agree, incidentally, with what we did last year on the proposed ground-based intercept system in North Dakota?

General POWELL. I believe it was prudent to try to accelerate the construction of the first ground-based system in North Dakota. Whether or not we can actually do it by 1996 and whether we have the funds to do it by 1996 is less clear to me. I would really have to get that answer for the record after consulting with the SDIO office.

[The information follows:]

The Missile Defense Act of 1991 is an important and prudent step in addressing the proliferation of ballistic missile technology. It also is in consonance with the current thrust of the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) Program towards Global Protection Against Limited Strikes, a redirection which is supported by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Meeting a 1996 deployment date with a system that is cost and operationally effective is quite challenging and the SDI Organization (SDIO) is working aggressively to design an optimum program plan to meet the Congressional guidance. The "180 day report" directed by the Missile Defense Act will reflect the specifics of the plan. The report is being developed by the SDIO with the support of the Services, will be formally staffed through the Joint Staff and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and will reflect our official position regarding the proposed deployment plan.

Senator BUMPERS. General, I could not agree with you more, because I am not sure quite yet how I feel about that. And I certainly agree with your statement, that I do not sense that urgency. And based on Bob Gates' testimony here the other day about who could threaten us strategically with intercontinental ballistic missiles between now and the year 2000, it would indicate that we do not have to rush to judgment on that.

My concern is the amount of money we are I have got a feeling that we might make a mistake out there if we stick with the 1996 deadline. I mean, our research right now is not to the point in my opinion where we can set that deadline and say we are going to stick with it. And it would be the height of folly to begin something without knowing that the research is proven, been tested, and we are satisfied with it.

I am not sure if some kind of an improved Patriot might not make sense between now and then. But I am concerned about the amount of money we are allocating for SDI and the amount that is going for a ground-based interceptor.

And, of course, that brings me to my next point, and I will just ask your comment. This is my own specific question. Well, it is a question. Let me just conclude that by saying, I have never been very enthusiastic about Brilliant Pebbles and I am still not, nor are

you.

General POWELL. I am enthusiastic about it from the first time I heard it when I was National Security Advisor. I think we have to be cautious and I think we have to be absolutely persuaded that it will work as advertised and perform the mission we intend for it to perform.

But it would be a breakthrough to have such a system that I think it is worth making an investment in. I think it is worth the priority that the administration is giving to it, and I strongly support the research and development effort toward the Brilliant Pebbles system.

RUSSIAN MEMBERSHIP IN NATO

Senator BUMPERS. Incidentally, just an aside: Would you support-you know, Boris Yeltsin's applying for admission to NATO. Would you support that?

General POWELL. He has not yet applied for admission to NATO. Senator BUMPERS. He did it in the press. He has not made a formal application, but he said Russia ought to be a member of NATO.

General POWELL. Senator, stranger things have happened in the last year. I am not prepared to say today that I would support that. There are various ways of becoming aligned to the newly emerging security structure in Europe, whether it is as an adjunct member of NATO, associate member-as you know, there is something called the Coordinating Council, I guess is the right term, where the defense ministers of the Central European nations would sit down occasionally with the defense ministers of the NATO nations. But it is not yet clear in my mind whether NATO as we know it would still be the right kind of NATO if it includes not only all the central European nations, but Russia and all the former republics of the Soviet Union as well, or whether we really are talking about an entirely new organization no longer consistent with the original charter of NATO, where it just does not make sense as NATO any longer.

So I would withhold judgment on that to a little farther down the road.

With respect to how the land of 11 time zones is really going to shake out, it is a little unclear to me: Will the Commonwealth of

Independent States remain the Commonwealth of Independent States for any extended period of time? What is going to happen with larger republics, such as Ukraine and Kazakhstan and Belarus, as they divide up the Soviet armed forces, as they make their individual judgments on strategic weapons?

I think we are really just beginning the process, and it would be premature of us to make fundamental choices at this point as to what NATO should look like or not look like, or whether it is trying to come home from Europe or not come home from Europe.

That is why I am a strong advocate of, obviously, my own program, the President's program, the base force, to level off for a while, see how the world develops, as opposed to concluding that, because the Soviet Union ended last Christmas, we have now full insight into what is going to happen in Eurasia for the next 50 years.

Senator BUMPERS. I have this feeling also. And incidentally, if Russia makes it—and that is a really dicey conclusion, but if they make it and they proceed along the road to democratization and the free market and so on and such small threat as remains just evaporates, would you be willing at that point to say that we could remove ourselves from Europe?

General POWELL. I am going to be willing at every step along this process to make a hard-nosed calculation as to what we really need in Europe. To leave Europe is a more fundamental question.

Let me answer it this way, Senator: Russia right now is led by a gentleman who seems to be completely committed to correct principles of reform and democratization, and I wish him well. But I do not know how long he will be on the stage.

Let us say that a week from now, a year from now, 2 years from now, there is an eruption in Moscow and a new figure comes in, and he is not quite as committed as Mr. Yeltsin. He is a little bit more authoritarian. He is not a Stalin, but he is a little bit more authoritarian, and he has horrible economic problems, and he is looking around for some way to divert attention from these economic problems.

Suddenly he discovers ethnic Russians in Lithuania or Latvia or Estonia are being persecuted and he feels a need to respond to it. [Deleted.] Just suppose we had an authoritarian figure who decided that this could not be tolerated and that he had to respond in some way. There he is in the Kremlin debating in his own mind and with his associates as to whether he should respond, and he looks over the walls of the Kremlin toward the West to see what the reaction might be.

I think the world would be a much safer place if when he looked west he did not just see Germany quarreling with France and England, but the United States still engaged, still present in Europe, still part of a great trans-Atlantic alliance. I think that is a very stabilizing situation to be in.

So for as far as I can see, I see a role for the United States to be in Europe politically, there economically, but also with military presence. We will debate this year, next year, and the year after how large that military presence should be, and we ought to adjust it over time. Right now I think leveling off at an altitude of 150,000

troops over the next couple of years is the smartest thing we can do.

FUTURE U.S. ROLE IN NATO

Senator BUMPERS. Mr. Chairman, this is supposed to be a closed session and I do not know that this is all that important, but I will just make this comment. If you want to respond to it, be my guest. I do not think the decision is going to be ours. I think the Germans are going to invite us out some time. I think politically it is going to be impossible for Helmut Kohl or his successor to tolerate our presence there, and I think we are going to be asked to leave.

I am sure we will be permitted to leave in an orderly way, but that is just an opinion. I might also say-and I would not say this in a public speech to the local chamber of commerce-I think they will be busily engaged in making nuclear weapons not too far into the future after we leave there, and that is one of the reasons I am not suggesting and I have never suggested that we leave Europe. I disagree with you on the number, but that is what we are talking about. We are talking about the difference between 75,000 or 90,000 and 150,000. That is a dicey situation that we are going to be faced.

General POWELL. If I may, I would like to comment.

Senator BUMPERS. Yes; please.

General POWELL. [Deleted.]

So I see the German political situation somewhat differently. They want us to stay. They want us not to make any noise and not to give them any difficulty by staying, but I do not sense that they will ask us to leave in our entirety.

Furthermore, I think it would be a very bad situation for us to leave, because with us probably goes any legitimate expectation that the American nuclear umbrella still covers Europe, [deleted].

I do not think that would be a favorable situation, and I hope that would be another reason for us to be engaged. And, of course, we can debate for some time whether it is 75 or 90 or 150.

NUCLEAR WARHEAD REDUCTIONS

Senator BUMPERS. Mr. Chairman, I do not want to monopolize. Just a couple quick questions.

General, if you could wave a wand right now on strategic weaponry, where would you like to see the United States wind up, based on the situation, again assuming that Russia-first of all, let us assume Kazakhstan, Belarus, all their weapons wound up in Russia and we are just negotiating with Yeltsin on where we ought to go. I mean, these other things are very important and we have to deal with those sort of on a unilateral basis, depending on the threat, Libya, whatever.

But between us and Russia, and assuming that all the nuclear weapons have been transported to Russia, what do you think would be a sensible stockpile of strategic weaponry for both us and, say, Russia?

General POWELL. We are reaching the level in terms of raw numbers of weapons that it is not the raw numbers of weapons that count as much any more as the force structure within which those

weapons are contained and the robustness and redundancy of the force structure. I think we are in a very stable posture if we retain a triad, a triad that has some land-based systems that can be seen as fast flyers, that can get away quickly under time of attack, with a bomber force that is survivable and recallable, a very stable force, and with the most stable force of all, our submarines, with some of them always being at sea, with reasonable accuracy, so no oneYeltsin, a madman who might follow Yeltsin-no one in the world will ever believe that it will be within their power to launch a decapitating strike either against our command and control system or any leg of the triad, thereby making the whole triad vulnerable.

So it is the number of platforms and the viability of the triad that has become in my judgment more important than whether it is 4,700 warheads or 3,000 or 2,500. And the number of platforms we are planning on keeping and the concept undergirding those platforms leads me to believe that the number we have suggested, around 4,700-you know, we could talk a few hundred either side of that is about right.

If you start to get down to 2,000, 2,500, then it is getting harder to do what I want to do with respect to the triad and maintaining that flexibility and maintaining our forces dispersed among the legs of the triad.

There is always a pressure to make it lower, lower, lower. If I could wish, if I could wave a wand, I would like to see it go to zero, with not a nuclear weapon left in the world. But you cannot disinvent them. They are still there.

It is going to take us 10 years just to get down to the levels we are talking about. So I am not all that anxious to race down below our number to get to some new lower number which we cannot get to until 2005 anyway if it disturbs the concept of the triad and the flexibility of having our weapons distributed among the three legs. of the triad.

Senator BUMPERS. It seems to me that you and I remember that Ronald Reagan went off to Iceland and proposed a zero option and the Chiefs went ballistic. I knew the President did not have any more idea than a goon what a zero option was, and he did not.

I did not favor it. The Chiefs did not like it. And I do not even think it is a good idea. I agree with you, it would be nice if we knew there were no nuclear weapons in the world. But a zero option in today's world is crazy.

General POWELL. Yes, sir.

Senator BUMPERS. But Brent Scowcroft-we used to have a group that met about once a month. Mr. Chairman, I believe you used to attend that, over in Senator Cranston's office, just to talk about strategic weaponry. And Brent Scowcroft was a guest one day and he said something that has always kind of stuck with me. He said 1,000 mobile, single-warhead missiles on each side would be, he thought, about as stabilizing as any goal we could reach.

Now, we might have disagreements on that, but in the next 10year period we ought to have some goal in mind as to where we are trying to get to and we ought to decide some time in the not too distant future precisely what. Brent might have been right or wrong, but we ought to achieve some kind of a goal that we think provides the kind of world stability we are looking for.