partisan or self-serving sense, there are political decisions that have to be made at a given point when nations are negotiating that sometimes outsiders are not privy to, and therefore, it is very difficult to determine the objective reality. THANKING WITNESSES FOR THEIR APPEARANCE Mr. GILMAN. I want to thank both panelists for taking their time to appear. We all are concerned and motivated to try to find a proper solution for reducing nuclear armaments. We are honest people disagreeing how to best achieve that goal, and I think our President is sincere in trying to find the ultimate solution. Chairman FASCELL. Cardinal, Archbishop, thank you very much. We appreciate your accepting the invitation to appear before this committee to discuss this important subject, and give us your views as expressed in the pastoral letter, and for being so generous in giving us your time and answering a lot of questions. Thank you very much. Cardinal BERNARDIN. We are very grateful to you for the opportunity to make this presentation. Archbishop O'CONNOR. We would note that the pastoral letter is not so long as any single issue of the Congressional Record. [Whereupon, at 11:30 a.m., the committee was adjourned.] THE ROLE OF ARMS CONTROL IN U.S. DEFENSE POLICY WEDNESDAY, JULY 25, 1984 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, Washington, DC. The committee met at 10:15 a.m., in room 2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Dante B. Fascell (chairman) presiding. Chairman FASCELL. The committee will please come to order. The committee meets today to conclude its hearings on the role of arms control in U.S. defense policy. We have heard from a wide variety of Government and private witnesses, coming from many different perspectives, in an effort to explore means of advancing progress in achieving mutual and verifiable arms control agreements that serve U.S. national security interests. Today we hear from our colleagues in the Congress. We have quite a number who have expressed an interest. Without objection, we will allow members who could not be present to put their statements in the record. Our first witness this morning is Hon. Albert Gore, Jr., a Representative in Congress from the State of Tennessee. Mr. Gore, we welcome you. STATEMENT OF HON. ALBERT GORE, JR., A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TENNESSEE Mr. GORE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and Mr. Winn. It is a pleasure to be here this morning. This is a very critical issue, and I want to thank and commend the committee for having this meeting. We are meeting at a time when our political system is at its most divisive; when the invitation "Come, let us reason together" is more likely to fuel impatience rather than to restore forbearance. And so it must be, since what is underway is a great contest in which competing prescriptions for policy struggle against each other for the prize of a mandate from the electorate. To make our democracy work, we politicians often toil to sharpen our differences. But to make our Government work, we shallregardless of the outcome of the elections-have to find ways to accommodate, within limits, each other's most deeply held values. Today's subject, the role of arms control in national defense policy, could hardly have been better chosen, as an example of the cross-cut between the need for political competition and the need for compromise on policy. The fundamental basis for our divisions about arms control has to do with the fact that in dealing with nuclear weapons, we confront a dilemma: Nuclear weapons are both central to our sovereignty and security on the one hand, and the central threat to our survival, on the other. The present administration came to office with its attention almost entirely fixed on the link it perceived between our lost nuclear superiority, and our lost ability to move freely, doing as we think best, in the world. From its perspective, arms control had achieved only the moral disarmament of the West-while allowing the Soviet Union to pursue a course of undiminished hostility to our security requirements and political values. The policies the administration adopted were focused to a high degree on achieving an accelerated military buildup across the board, but especially in nuclear weapons-and in evading, as one would evade a snare, serious negotiations. If it were true that the sheer accumulation of military power, and nuclear power in particular, could any longer be directly translated into greater physical security, and greater freedom of action, then the administration's policies might have been justified. But the fact is that after both superpowers crossed the threshold of being able to annihilate each other, military power, and again, especially nuclear power, has bred fear as it grew. This is not an unreasoning fear, but rather one based on an educated appraisal of the tragic history of the 20th century. Our times not only teach that weakness invites aggression, they also teach that the competitive accumulation of military power often leads to war. Thus did the present administration, in seeking to bolster national confidence, do much to build a national sense of dread. It falls to the opposition party to give voice to that apprehension, through a platform that emphasizes the search for negotiated solutions with the Soviet Union, including a number of dramatic initiatives designed to break the current deadlock. Some will argue that if the United States remains steadfast and pursues its military goals, the Soviets will in due course come around and negotiate seriously. Others respond that breaking the Soviet Union's will in this manner requires a buildup beyond our material resources, and brings us closer to war than to any hope of a negotiated solution. But whichever way the electorate decides, the next task before us, before all of us on either side of the political spectrum-is to realize that what the country most urgently needs is a new synthesis between these opposing schools of thought. If military might alone cannot make us safer, and if much greater emphasis is needed on efforts to negotiate a verifiable solution with the Soviet Union-so, too, is it necessary to be resolute in dealing with them. If vigorous negotiating proposals are offered and go nowhere, and if strong representations about Soviet compliance with existing agreements do not get us satisfaction, we are going to need stern options in reserve, and the political courage to invoke them. It is a question of balance between building the means for war and searching for the means to remain at peace: a balance that has eluded our Government for almost 20 years, and which has as a result continuously emerged as a central issue in our national political contests. In the end, it is we legislators who must find and express that balance. We have the power to promote coherent policy when it presents itself, and to change or at least to prevent policies that are ill considered; especially those that are so narrow and extreme in their construction that they offend the Nation's instinct for proportion. In my opinion, despite our deep and continuing disagreements we have made progress in establishing a foundation for common agreement at some basic level, which the country will need whether the next Congress opens with Ronald Reagan or Walter Mondale as President. Precisely because we are all going to leave here in a few weeks to proclaim our political individuality, and to lean hard on the things that distinguish us, one from the other, it is well to spend a little time trying to identify what some of these points of agreement may be. I believe that what we have established or are close establishing are the following points. First, arms control and military planning must be welded together, or we shall be unable to pursue a sensible and consistent course in either. Second, because arms control only produces intermittent results at irregular intervals, defense policy cannot be held in a state of permanent uncertainty. Next, basic defense goals have to be serviced while we work on arms control. But it is vital to identify arms control options that need to be safeguarded against the advance of new technology and new weapons, and to understand how to safeguard these for as long as there is reasonable hope of realizing them. And that point refers particularly to the sea-launched cruise missile incident, where the administration decided to go right ahead and deploy nuclear-tip, sea-launched cruise missiles even as the conference committee between the House and the Senate was debating an amendment to the standing law preventing the deployment of those systems, because they do serious damage to arms control options that are valuable and need to be preserved. Fourth, the first priority goal for both arms control and military planning is to sustain a stable military relationship between both sides. In the area of nuclear weapons and nuclear arms control, this means that the issue of greatest concern is to avoid a relationship which nurtures the fear of a first strike on either side. Fifth, deep reductions in nuclear weapons need to be focused in the first instance on weapons most apt to feed concerns and fears about a first strike, specifically those systems quick on target and accurate enough to destroy the weapons on both sides-ballistic missiles. Six, we cannot negotiate such deep cuts, however, if other systems are deployed in great numbers, in ways that defy arms con trol accountability, or in ways that nullify the benefit of possible agreement on ballistic missiles. Seventh, the cheapest way to deploy nuclear weapons is not necessarily the best way, if the effect is destabilizing. There are, in fact, substantial costs associated with nuclear stability and with arms control. Eight, a succession of imperfect agreements, building on each other, is preferable to a single, perfect omnibus agreement, if only because the latter is probably unattainable. Ninth, perfect certainty about Soviet compliance is not in the cards, but should not be an impassable barrier to agreement on arms control, providing we deliberately maintain the means to quickly offset the effects of cheating, or Šoviet sharp practice. Above all, no administration can pursue its military or arms control policies without support in Congress, and that support must be bipartisan, based on continuous and close consultation. The middle ground in American politics cannot be taken for granted; it must be created and nurtured. The present administration erred in not doing this soon enough, and the next administration would be well advised not to repeat the same mistake. For the plain fact is that none of us have a monopoly on the truth about this subject. The search for middle ground is not an effort to escape choice, but in nuclear matters, is an effort to expand choice, by elaborating policies designed to work in less than ideal circumstances. Why? Because by any reasonable estimate, less than perfect circumstances are the ones we shall always experience, because our ability to find competent compromises among ourselves is a requirement for reaching agreement with the Soviets, and because that process is in the end indispensable for survival. These convictions led me to work with others in the House in an effort to search out areas of agreement on arms control and military security with the present administration, despite many deep differences of view; in particular, a fundamental distrust on the part of the administration where arms control is concerned, and a disposition to place almost exclusive reliance on weaponry. Should the Government change hands after November, we shall have an administration full of optimism that arms control can be made to work as a real brake on military competition. Many Members of this House will view that attitude as mistaken, based on what they will see as a fundamental misreading of Soviet purposes. But the verdict of the electorate will have been that we should make an all-out effort. The new administration will be in need of a grant of tolerance and support from the next Congress, if it is to explore its declared path. Until election day, we shall have plenty of opportunity to work for candidates whose ideas we find congenial. But afterward we have to pick up our unfinished and arduous business, which is to fashion compromises durable enough to allow the country to deal with its enemy, on matters of life and death. Nothing guarantees that we will be able to find this much wisdom. But there is no escape from the necessity for trying. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. |