SENATOR THAD COCHRAN

Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on International Security,

Proliferation, and Federal Services

"NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE AND PROSPECTS FOR U.S. - RUSSIA ABM TREATY ACCOMMODATION"

March 13, 1997

Opening Statement

I'd like to welcome everyone to today's hearing of the Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on International Security, Proliferation, and Federal Services. The topic of our hearing is "National Missile Defense and Prospects for U.S.-Russia ABM Treaty Accommodation."

At the subcommittee's first hearing on nuclear deterrence last month, there were questions about the relationship between U.S. deployment of a national missile defense and Russian ratification of the START II Treaty. During today's hearing we will have the opportunity to listen to and ask questions of the principal authors of a just-published U.S. Institute of Peace-sponsored study entitled, Cold Peace or Cooperation? The Potential for U.S.-Russian Accommodation on Missile Defense and the ABM Treaty. It is very important to note that the study, and its findings, have been endorsed by Vladimir Lukin, former ambassador to the United States and Chairman of the International Relations Committee of the Duma. The study, which has already been briefed to National Security Council officials, concludes that the deployment of a national missile defense by the United States and reductions to strategic offensive weapons in both the United States and Russia need not be mutually exclusive.

That being said, while the Senate provided advice and consent to ratification of START II more than one year ago, the treaty has not yet been ratified by Russia. While various Russians have included in their reluctance to ratify START II concern over U.S. plans for national missile defense, the fact of the matter is that there are many other more prominent reasons Russians -- in both the Yeltsin Administration and the Duma -

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have given for their failure to ratify START II. In October, Alexei Arbatov, deputy chairman of the Duma's defense committee, listed some of these reasons when he said, "First, there is no money for it. Secondly, the treaty is considered to be unfair on technical grounds. And thirdly, the general background -- the determination of NATO to expand to the east -- is very unfavorable to the treaty."

The United States must take Russian concerns into account before deploying a national missile defense system. And S.7, the National Missile Defense Act of 1997, seeks to take these concerns into account. S.7, in fact, specifically "urges the President to pursue, if necessary, high-level discussions with the Russian Federation to achieve agreement to amend the ABM Treaty to allow deployment of the national missile defense system...." Ultimately, though, we cannot make our security dependent upon Russian willingness to cooperate. The world has changed greatly in the quarter century since the ABM Treaty was negotiated. There now are many nations hostile to the United States working hard to acquire long-range missiles armed with weapons of mass destruction. My own bottom line on the ABM Treaty is very simple: We seek to cooperate with Russia, but ultimately the defense of our country is more important than the defense of a treaty that puts our country at risk. Indeed, this study proposes that, in the context of mutual accommodation, a new arms control agreement integrating strategic offensive and defensive forces could supersede the ABM Treaty.

Today's witnesses have addressed these issues in their fascinating study, and we are indebted to the U.S. Institute of Peace for funding their work. We will hear first from Ambassador Max Kampelman, a noted arms control negotiator in both Republican and Democratic administrations and the Vice Chairman of the U.S. Institute of Peace. Next, we will listen to Dr. Keith Payne, the principal American author of the study. Dr. Payne is the President of the National Institute for Public Policy and is also a member of the faculty of Georgetown University's National Security Studies Program in the School of Foreign Service. We will then hear from Dr. Andrei Kortunov, principal Russian author of the study and the President of the Moscow Public Science Foundation. Dr. Kortunov is the

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former Head of the Department of Foreign Policy at the Institute of USA and Canada Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and is a close advisor to the Russian Defense Ministry and senior members of the Duma.

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