Congressional Documents[Page S3667] Mr. Harkin EXECUTIVE AMENDMENT NO. 2312 Mr. HARKIN Mr. HARKIN Mr. HARKIN [Page S3669] Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. HARKIN Mr. HARKIN Mr. WARNER Mr. BIDEN Mr. WARNER Mr. BIDEN Mr. WARNER [Page S3670] Mr. BIDEN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. HARKIN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN [Page S3671] Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BYRD Mr. HARKIN Mr. BYRD Mr. HARKIN Mr. BYRD Mr. HARKIN Mr. BYRD Mr. HARKIN Mr. BYRD Mr. HARKIN Mr. BYRD Mr. HARKIN Mr. BYRD Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN [Page S3672] Mr. SMITH Mr. HARKIN Mr. SMITH Mr. HARKIN Mr. SMITH Mr. WARNER Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. WARNER Mr. BIDEN Mr. WARNER Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. HARKIN Mr. HARKIN [Page S3673] Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. HARKIN Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. HARKIN Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. HARKIN Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. HARKIN Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. BIDEN Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. BIDEN [Page S3674] Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. Butler Mr. Butler Mr. HARKIN Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. HARKIN Mr. LIEBERMAN [Page S3675] Mr. HARKIN Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. HARKIN Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. Sessions Mr. SMITH Mr. HARKIN Mr. SMITH Mr. HARKIN [Page S3676] Mr. SMITH Mr. HARKIN Mr. HARKIN [Page S3677] Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. GORTON Mr. LIEBERMAN Mr. GORTON Mr. GORTON [Page S3678] Mr. McCAIN Mr. McCAIN Mr. McCAIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. BIDEN Mr. McCAIN Mr. McCAIN Mr. BIDEN Mr. McCAIN
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The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the privilege order, the Senate will now go into executive session to resume consideration of Executive Calendar No. 16, which the clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
Treaty Document No. 105-36, Protocols to the North Atlantic Treaty of 1949 on Accession of Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic.
The Senate resumed consideration of the treaty.
Pending:
Kyl amendment No. 2310, to establish principles of policy of the United States toward the Strategic Concept of NATO.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the hour of 10:45 having arrived, the distinguished Senator from Iowa, Mr. Harkin, is recognized to offer an amendment on which there shall be 2 hours of debate equally divided.
The Senator from Iowa is recognized.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I send my amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Iowa [Mr. Harkin] proposes an executive amendment numbered 2312.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:
In section 3(2)(A), strike `and' at the end of clause (ii).
In section 3(2)(A), strike `(iii)' and insert `(iv)'.
In section 3(2)(A), insert after clause (ii) the following:
(iii) any future United States subsidy of the national expenses of Poland, Hungary, or the Czech Republic to meet its NATO commitments, including the assistance described in subparagraph (C), may not exceed 25 percent of all assistance provided to that country by all NATO members.
At the end of section 3(2), insert the following new subparagraph:
(C) Additional United States assistance described: The assistance referred to in subparagraph (A)(iii) includes--
(i) Foreign Military Financing under the Arms Export Control Act;
(ii) transfers of excess defense articles under section 516 of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961;
(iii) Emergency Drawdowns;
(iv) no-cost leases of United States equipment;
(v) the subsidy cost of loan guarantees and other contingent liabilities under subchapter VI of chapter 148 of title 10, United States Code; and
(vi) international military education and training under chapter 5 of part II of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I will yield myself such time as I may consume for opening comments and then reserve some time for others on the amendment.
Mr. President, we are, as the Senate and the country now know, debating the issue of whether or not the Senate will advise and consent to the President's signature on a proposal to bring three more nations into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
While I was not present yesterday in this Chamber, I did watch some of the debate that unfolded yesterday, and I think the debate is taking a good course of action. The debate yesterday was a good debate. I hope that the debate today will continue along those lines. In other words, what I mean by that is not just people giving a speech and then walking off the floor but where we can actually engage one another in asking and answering questions about the implications of the NATO treaty.
So I hope that will be the course of action during the Senate's responsibility to advise and consent here.
Mr. President, I want to make some extended remarks about the whole picture of NATO expansion, but I will just talk very briefly right now about the amendment I sent to the desk.
Basically, I think one of the most important issues facing us on NATO expansion is what it is going to cost, what it will cost the taxpayers of this country. So what I have sent to the desk is an amendment that will hopefully clear this up a little bit and provide for an accurate accounting of all of the expenses incident to the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. And I will have more to say about that a little bit later.
Concerns about the extension of our military obligations--and let's again be frank about this; NATO is a military alliance--have been voiced by Senators and interest groups, academics across the political spectrum, and when the voices expressing caution include Republicans and Democrats and progressives and conservatives, libertarians and others, such a diverse opposition may be a sign that we ought to really act very deliberately and deliberatively on this issue. So I am glad the debate has finally begun, and as I said, I am delighted with the course of action in the debate.
At the outset, I hope the Senate would not simply rubber stamp this bill that we have before us. We have a constitutional responsibility to both advise and consent on treaties. This is a responsibility that is taken seriously by every Senator and ought to because, as you know, under our Constitution a treaty overrides the Constitution. So anytime we advise and consent on a treaty, we are advising and consenting on a document that basically overrides much of our Constitution. So we have to be very careful about this.
There are important issues to consider in NATO expansion--burdensharing, command and coordination, responses to real and perceived threats, even the basic questions of mission and scope of the organization itself. They are not simple questions that lend themselves to a simple, sound bite debate. These questions and their answers will shape for better or worse our defense and foreign policy options for decades to come.
There is no doubt that NATO has been one of the greatest military alliance success stories in our Nation's history. And, again, at the outset we have to ask the question. Here is an organization founded in 1949 shortly after the end of the Second World War--the Second World War in this century--when 12 countries signed the North Atlantic treaty to establish the military alliance known as NATO.
Now, let's face it. The reason for NATO was the Soviet Union.
The reason for being in that alliance, and also to preserve the nations of Europe together, was to preclude any possibility of cross-border excursions by European countries. The treaty had as its goal `to unite their efforts for collective defense and the preservation of peace and security in Europe.'
Four nations have been added. Spain, the most recent, joined in 1982. So, again, it has been a success. It has kept the peace in Europe for nearly 50 years, both by deterring aggression by the Warsaw Pact and by encouraging cooperation between its members.
I must say, due to the commitment of its members and the leadership of the United States, NATO has largely fulfilled the reason for its very birth--the demise of the Soviet Union. So we have to, I think, at the outset, say, if something was born because of the Soviet Union and it has succeeded, what, then, are the reasons not only for continuing it but for expanding it? And, subsequently, are there better and other ways in which we can fulfill other goals, such as democracy, economic progress, market-based economies, and integration of the countries of Europe into one economic entity?
So, what role will NATO play in a new century? And what is the cost going to be in financial terms? And what is the cost going to be in other less tangible areas, like the potential for strained relations with nonmember nations? Or what will the cost be in a dangerous rollback, perhaps, of nuclear arms control and nonproliferation progress made since the end of the cold war?
By the administration's own admission, `Enlargement will take place in a European security environment in which there is no current threat of large-scale conventional aggression and where any such threat would take years to develop.' This is from the administration's own admission. There is no current threat and any threat would take years to develop. In response to questions from many Senators, the administration reiterated this point when they wrote, `Current members and prospective new members face no imminent threat of attack.'
This seems to be one of the few issues on NATO expansion where we can find wide consensus. There is no large-scale external threat, including Russia. They just don't exist. The administration's expectation for the role of an expanded NATO include:
No. 1, helping to deter future threats; No. 2, expanding our collective defense capabilities to respond to both traditional and nontraditional security challenges; and, No. 3, helping to support and stabilize emerging democracies. I agree that these are goals that the United States should pursue. They are worthwhile goals. But again I ask, is NATO the proper framework in which to accomplish these goals?
Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic have legitimate concerns about protecting their borders and their national sovereignty. After all, they persevered through a century of invasions and decades of outside control by a large and powerful neighbor. But, again, let me also say that I remember when I happened to be in Moscow shortly after the Berlin Wall came down and the Soviet Union was breaking up, I remember one of the Russian Members of the Duma telling me that, `You think you were the victims of the Soviet Union. You think Europe was the victim of the Soviet Union,' he said. `We Russians were the biggest victims of the Communist Soviet Union.'
So we have to think about it in that context also; of Russia, and of them coming out from underneath the yoke of a Soviet Communist empire. Think about Russia, also, in terms of its history, when it has gone, also, through a century of invasions and decades of control by a power not necessarily of Russian being.
I learned a lot about what countries in this region had endured. Last year I attended the dedication of the National Czech and Slovak Museum in Cedar Rapids, IA.
It is interesting. I was there with President Clinton and Ambassador Madeleine Albright, who was then-Ambassador to the United Nations, President Vaclav Havel of the Czech Republic, and President Kovac of the Republic of Slovakia.
Again, these people of these nations have shown a commitment and resilience to the democratic ideals during the economic and political transition. They are working in concert with the community of nations and peacekeeping operations in Bosnia, in Iraq also. I want to commend and recognize their efforts. That is all well and good. But is that a reason to expand NATO?
I am not convinced it is the most appropriate vehicle that we can use to get the goals of security, stability, political reform, and economic integration with the West sought by these newly free countries.
I am really worried we are buying into a mentality that has its roots in the cold war, and not the mentality that is looking ahead to the next century. Yes, it is true that Europe has sustained decades, almost a century, of warfare, invasions, domination and oppression by the people of Eastern Europe. This approach to foreign policy would be appropriate if the world climate was similar to what it was, say, before World War II. But the world has changed.
To those who say that, well, we can have another cross-border invasion by a country in Europe against another country, even the administration admits this is not going to happen. This would not happen for years. It would take years for anything like this to develop. You are not about to see any headlines exclaiming that Russian troops are marching toward Poland or Czechoslovakia.
The czars are gone. The Third Reich is gone. Germany is united as a democracy. Again, we need to reorient ourselves to the realities of the 21st century where the security threats are not czars and Hitlers and people like that, but are more likely to be rogue nations, international terrorists, and, as we have seen again in Europe, internal ethnic clashes.
For example, the security threat of most concern to Europe now is Bosnia and Kosovo. There is also the so-called nontraditional threat--terrorism, chemical, biological weapons. Again, we need to consider, is NATO the best way to deal with these challenges? But my primary concern now, and with this amendment, is the cost.
In February of 1997, the administration estimated the total cost of between $27 to $35 billion, of which the U.S. share would be $1.5 to $2 billion.
In December, NATO released their own study with the astonishingly low total cost estimate of $1.5 billion. Well, then the Clinton administration revised their initial projections down to reflect the NATO estimate of $1.5 billion.
Some would argue that comparing these numbers is like comparing apples and oranges--I heard that--because of the different assumptions and scenarios. But I would argue that is exactly the point. We do not have any consensus or concrete ideas on what posture NATO will take in the future and at what cost.
I have a chart here that shows basically the varying cost estimates so we get an idea of just how widely divergent they are. NATO, as I said, estimates $1.5 billion. The Clinton administration initially, as I said, came in last year--a year ago--at $27 to $35 billion. Now the administration says it is $1.5 billion. They just picked up the NATO estimate. CBO has given us a range of $21 to $125 billion. The Rand Corporation says it is $10 to $110 billion.
As I said, the first Clinton administration estimate was $27 billion to $35 billion--to $1.5 billion. So we go from $1.5 billion to $125 billion.
Where is it? How much of this will the U.S. taxpayers have to pick up? The GAO issued a report late last fall, the title of which explains my concerns and the reason for this amendment. It says, `NATO Enlargement Cost Implications for the United States Remain Unclear.'
Now, much of the uncertainty is because--a quote from the
GAO report--`It will not be until June of 1998 that NATO will make decisions about whether or how much to increase the common budgets which would then be shared among current and new members. Until this has been done, the implications for the U.S. contributions to NATO's common budgets will be unclear.'
Now, again, this is one reason why several other Senators and I asked for a delay in voting on NATO expansion. I felt and some others felt that we should have delayed this until this summer. We are not going to get this NATO estimate until at least June of this year. So why should we be voting on a blank check for the American taxpayer before we have the data? What is the rush? Why could we not wait until this summer until we get the NATO decisions on how much they want to increase their common budgets?
The same GAO report went on to discuss the financing for commonly funded items, such as the needed infrastructure to send reinforcements to new allies in times of crisis, communications systems, or interoperability with NATO's air defense system. None has been agreed to yet. None of it has been agreed upon yet.
Again, from the GAO report: `Whether they will be financed within existing budgets or by increasing the size of NATO's common budgets will not be determined until June of 1998.'
That is from the GAO report.
I am hopeful that the managers of the bill would engage with us in discussing why we would go ahead with this before we have this data that NATO will come up with in June of 1998. So that is a missing piece of the puzzle right there.
Another piece of the puzzle we are missing is how new members are to address their military shortfalls. The countries' force goals will not be set again until this spring. In other words, we are without a plan to address the force goals and the price tag associated with it.
Again, I and others are uncomfortable signing the American taxpayers' names to a potentially ballooning blank check, so that is a second part of this puzzle that I believe is missing.
The GAO concluded that while DOD's key assumptions were reasonable, their `cost estimates' are speculative. `NATO enlargement could entail costs in addition to those included in DOD's estimate, including costs for assistance to enhance the PFP or other bilateral assistance for countries not invited to join NATO in July 1997.'
So, in other words, it is not just those countries invited to join. What about the cost for assistance and other vital assistance for all of the other countries not invited to join in July 1997?
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Mr. BIDEN. Would the Senator yield?
Mr. HARKIN. I would be delighted to yield.
Mr. BIDEN. Wouldn't the Senator acknowledge the example he just gave has nothing to do with any commitment that is being undertaken by the expansion of NATO now? It is unrelated. We may or may not through the program which the opponents of expansion constantly point to--the Partnership for Peace, as what we should have stuck with--we may or may not do that. But passage of the expansion of NATO for these three countries in no way affects the point of whether or not we give assistance to Romania or we give assistance to any other country questioned. Is that not correct?
Mr. HARKIN. Well----
Mr. BIDEN. I respectfully suggest the answer is yes.
Mr. HARKIN. Well, wait a second. I do not think the answer is yes. What GAO said is NATO enlargement could entail costs in addition to those countries in the Partnership for Peace, for example,
others who may not be invited to NATO but because of the enlargement of NATO there may be other costs incidental and associated with it. That is what they are saying.
Does the Senator say absolutely there will be no other costs associated to PFP countries when NATO is enlarged?
Mr. BIDEN. If the Senator will yield, the answer is I am saying there is no obligation we undertake. The Senator sits on the Appropriations Committee. The Senator will have to make an individual judgment as each of the items come before him whether he wishes to do it.
For example, we are going to have, and right now the President has sent up within the last 3 months a request for additional equipment for Turkey, additional military equipment for Greece. Now, they have nothing to do with our common budget in NATO, zero.
Now, the Senator sits on the Appropriations Committee. He can come to the floor, and on foreign military sales of those countries, he can say no, we don't want to do that, and we can vote against it. It is irrelevant. It has nothing to do with whether or not Poland is a member of NATO or the Czech Republic is a member of NATO.
What the Defense Department means, I respectfully suggest, is the following; that with NATO, with the additional three countries in NATO, we may conclude that our defenses would be further enhanced, bilaterally enhanced, U.S. interests enhanced if we gave more money, more for military sales to Romania or to the Baltics or somewhere else. But it has nothing to do--nothing to do, zero--with whether or not we expand NATO. Zero, nothing.
The Senator from Virginia is on the floor, a strong opponent of expansion. He knows that the Armed Services Committee has no obligation to send foreign military sales which we subsidize to Greece or Turkey, yet he votes for it. But it has nothing to do with NATO, zero. Nothing to do with NATO, zero. It is not part of NATO's common budget, common budget.
The only thing, I respectfully suggest to my colleague, that we are committing ourselves to with the expansion of NATO is that we will continue to participate roughly 25 percent of the cost of the common budget of NATO. The things that the DOD referenced and what my friend from Iowa is talking about have zero to do with the common budget.
There is a chart here, `budget cost-sharing formula, in percentage of total NATO common budget.' I will later in the day go into great detail, because I think one of the great misnomers here is how the NATO is funded. I am not speaking to my friend from Iowa, who knows this area very well because he serves on the Appropriations Committee. But many of us who do not serve on the Appropriations Committee or Armed Services Committee don't necessarily understand the details of how the NATO budget is constructed. There are three common budgets. I will not go into it now. But they are the things that all 16 NATO nations reach into their pockets and pay for. They are not the national budgets.
The national budget, my friend on the authorizing committee--both my friends stand here on the Armed Services Committee--in the national budget we decide whether or not out of our military budget we are going to help Greece beyond the common budget, whether we are going to help Turkey beyond the common budget, whether we are going to help Chile beyond the common budget, whether we will spend money in Korea beyond, and it has nothing to do with the common budget of NATO.
So what happens here is we are taking great big apples and putting them in baskets of small oranges. We talk about mixing apples and oranges. The reason why the numbers, which I will go into in great detail later, range from $125 billion to $1.5 billion is that we are counting the wrong things.
So the issue here, and we will get a chance to talk about this in detail, what is NATO's--and I know my friend from Virginia knows this well--what is the common budget of NATO? And what are we committing ourselves to spend in addition to what we are now spending on the common budget of NATO because these three countries
are going to be added--if they are added, if we prevail?
So, that is the issue. With all due respect, my friend is mixing apples and oranges here when he refers to the DOD saying we might in the future decide to spend more money. It has nothing to do with any obligation we are taking on as a consequence of expanding NATO.
I thank my colleague. I yield the floor.
Mr. HARKIN. I would like to respond, but I yield to the Senator from Virginia.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa controls the time and the time has been running on his side.
Mr. HARKIN. I had 1 hour.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Correct; the Senator has 35 minutes remaining.
Mr. HARKIN. I yield to the Senator from Virginia.
Mr. WARNER. I thank my distinguished colleague.
First, I want to say what a pleasure it is to sit and listen to a well-informed presentation on a very important amendment. Indeed, I will, in the course of the day, engage in another detailed colloquy with my friend on this.
I point out when you mention the Armed Services Committee, authorizing committee, I think the Senator should reconsider. It is your committee, the Foreign Relations Committee, that authorizes the level of assistance on matters like this, as opposed to the Armed Services Committee.
Mr. BIDEN. That is correct.
Mr. WARNER. A small matter, but I wanted to make----
Mr. BIDEN. We are so accustomed to other committees stealing our jurisdiction that it was a slip of the tongue.
Mr. WARNER. It is well-taken. At every opportunity the Armed Services Committee will do that.
Your question is correct, but I say to my good friend that while there is no fixed-in-law obligation for an increased contribution on behalf of the United States to these three potential new members, there is, indeed, a moral, and it seems to me that that moral obligation will come into play very strongly. If for any reason their economies cannot support their quotient of final costs allocated among the three, I am certain the United States would be a participant in picking it up.
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Mr. BIDEN. On my time, if I may respond, if I can take 3 minutes--and I guess it is not just my time but the time controlled by the majority here--if I can have 3 minutes to respond.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is recognized for 3 minutes.
Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, I say to my friend, one of the things the Armed Services Committee has been very jealous of, rightfully so, even though foreign military sales fall within the Foreign Relations Committee purview, when we argued in the Foreign Relations Committee, some of us, against some foreign military sales, the Armed Services Committee members and staff have often come to us and said, `Joe, do you know what you are doing?' If you don't let Lockheed or Marietta Martin sell that particular item subsidized to the Germans or to the Greeks or to the Spaniards or to whomever, do you know what you are doing? You are just subsidizing the French because they will sell them a Mirage; they will sell this, they will sell that.
When we make these judgments on foreign military sales, they are judgments that are not only made in terms of what we believe to be our security interest, but when we fail to participate in that, we find that we lose part of our infrastructure because we find that, as a lecture I received many times on the floor from Armed Services Committee members, we lose the competitive advantage to those foreign military sales merchants in France, in England, wherever else.
So what we are talking about is the independent judgment of whether or not we may, in the future conclude, as we have in the past, that in addition to our contribution to the common military budget, in order to keep peace in the Aegean, we have supplied in addition to that common NATO budget, we have supplied additional moneys or subsidies to Greece or to Turkey or Denmark. We have done it for almost all of the 15 members.
What the amendment of my friend here would do is something revolutionary. It would say that we will redefine what NATO's common budget is as it relates to the United States. We now would have to include as part of the economic budget any of the following: foreign military financing under the Arms Control Export Act, transfers of excess defense articles, emergency drawdowns or no-cost leases of U.S. equipment or subsidies or loan guarantees, which would in effect give veto power over our interests with the other 15 NATO nations. The reason we give a veto power is because if we draw down, if we have to draw down from a 25 percent foreign military sales, we can't then pay our common budget that is owed to NATO because we have agreed. If we don't do that, then NATO says `Woe, woe, you are not engaging in cost sharing.'
And that, in turn, means that they can veto whether or not as a practical matter we decide it is in our national interest to sell Cobra helicopters to the Greeks. My time is up.
Mr. HARKIN. Will the Senator yield?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
Mr. HARKIN addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I think the Senator is making my point. My friend from Delaware is making my point. We are limited to 25 percent of the common budgets. All of the cost estimates we keep hearing about only deal with the common budgets. We don't talk about the national budget. What my amendment says is what is good for one side ought to be good for the other. We are not mixing the two. We are applying a good, sound principle. If 25 percent is good for the common budgets, it ought to be good for the national budgets. That is what my amendment says. It says to the American people, look, you are right, we don't know what it is going to cost us in the future. The Senator just stated that. He said that we don't know what it may cost us in the future.
What this amendment says is that at no time will the portion of the national budgets of these countries or any other new members of NATO be more than 25 percent, so that if some cost comes in at $10 billion, our share, the share of the American people, will be no more than 25 percent. The other nations of NATO will have to kick in their proportionate share, also.
That is why I drafted this amendment. People don't understand the difference between the common budgets and the national budgets. We keep hearing from the Clinton administration that this is only going to cost us $400 million--as I pointed out, we already promised as much as $1.069 billion in loans and subsidies to Eastern and Central Europe--because they are talking about the common budgets, not about the national budgets of these countries. The Senator from Delaware is exactly right. My amendment seeks to say that no more than 25 percent of those would be paid for by the American taxpayers. I would think the Senator would support that.
Mr. BIDEN. If the Senator will yield. He wants written into law in the passage of the amendment to the Washington treaty a commitment that the United States national budget will now and forever not exceed 25 percent of all the money we decide to spend in the European theater. I can't imagine the Senator from Virginia supporting that.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, with all due respect, I don't think the Senator read my amendment.
Mr. BIDEN. I have read it in detail.
Mr. HARKIN. It is talking about the subsidy. It is not talking about what we spend ourselves in terms of our own military. It is talking about what subsidy we provide to these countries.
Mr. BIDEN. Is that not out of our national budget? Is that not out of our national defense budget?
Mr. HARKIN. Yes, out of our taxpayer dollars, subsidies to those countries. But it has nothing to do with our military expenditures for our nation's forces stationed in Europe.
Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, it clearly does. It says that if we want to `take a tank off the shelf,' as they say, which comes right now out of the Defense Department budget, and we want to give that tank to Turkey, or to Greece, or to Germany, it says that tank can't be given if in fact we have already met our obligation of 25 percent under the common budget because it would exceed 25 percent. So he is limiting--limiting in perpetuity--the amount of money we can spend out of our national budget.
Look, this is apples and oranges again. We say with NATO, here is the deal: We are going to pay 25 percent of all the moneys that directly relate to NATO. We do not say we are only going to keep 25 percent of the total amount of money we spent at 25 percent if, in addition, we decide we want to help, as we have over the last 30 years, Greece. If this had been the law in the last 20 years, the military aid that we have given to Greece and Turkey would have eaten up our share of what we agreed to do in the common
budget. So in Aviano, Italy, the national budget of the country of Italy pays for that Air Force base. But if we are going to build a runway to land NATO planes on, or Italy comes back and says, wait a minute, even though that is on an Italian air base for which we pay for all the infrastructure, if you want to lengthen the runway to accommodate NATO planes, the other 15 members of NATO have to kick in to pay for it. If it costs $10 to extend the runway, we take out $2.50 and pay the 25 percent. But if we have already given $2.50 off the shelf to Greece, we don't have any money, we are prohibited by law from being able to do this.
This is hamstringing our national defense budget, unrelated to NATO. It is a little like my saying that we are not going to spend anymore money on education than what we now spend on title VII. So if we want to pass, as I do, and did, the subsidy for IRAs for private schools, that would have to come out of the ceiling for all title VII, which was a billion dollars. We would have to find $300 million out of that billion dollars, which means you don't have enough money to meet the obligation you have agreed to, separate and apart for decisions independent of NATO considerations. You know, the rest of NATO has not wanted to support Greece. We stepped in and said, OK, notwithstanding that NATO doesn't want to support Greece beyond the NATO common budget, we are going to step in and give them the following subsidies, or the following military equipment off our shelf, out of our national budget, out of our pocket.
Now, if we deal with any NATO nation, and we conclude that we want to engage in foreign military sales with them, unrelated to NATO, if we want to convince the French--which we never could--to stop flying Mirage aircraft in their national air force and fly F-15s, we could not do that. And so this is a profound change in national defense policy that, with all due respect, has nothing to do with NATO. If you want to cap all U.S. spending as it relates from the Euros to the Atlantic at 25 percent, fine, do it; but understand that you are making a profound foreign policy judgment that has nothing to do with whether or not Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary are members of NATO.
I yield the floor.
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Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I will get back to this amendment. I respectfully suggest that the Senator from Delaware, again, is making my point in two ways. What the Senator from Delaware has said is that the costs of the taxpayers of this country are going to increase in the future. We don't know how much, but that is what he said. It is going to increase. Listen carefully--
Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, with all due respect, I did not say it is going to increase. It would be up to the Senate and the Appropriations Committee.
Mr. HARKIN. After a treaty is signed. And keep in mind, treaties override the Constitution of the United States. Once those decisions are made, we are going to have to meet, as the Senator from Virginia said, our moral obligations.
Mr. BIDEN. Moral obligations--
Mr. HARKIN. If the Senator will let me finish, I never interrupted him.
Mr. BIDEN. The Senator is correct. I apologize.
Mr. HARKIN. Again, I think the arguments, if I might respectfully say so, of the Senator from Delaware are arguments that we would have heard on the Senate floor in the 1950s and the 1960s and the 1970s. The Senator's arguments pertain to a world that no longer exists in Europe. The Senator talks about Greece, that if this amendment had been in effect 30 years ago, 40 years ago, we could not have done in Greece what we did. The Senator is right. But this is not 40 years ago.
Mr. BYRD. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. HARKIN. I yield to the Senator from West Virginia.
Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I thought I heard the distinguished Senator say that treaties override the Constitution of the United States.
Mr. HARKIN. Portions.
Mr. BYRD. Did I hear him correctly?
Mr. HARKIN. Portions.
Mr. BYRD. No, treaties don't override the Constitution of the United States. Under the Constitution, treaties are a part of the law of the land, the supreme law of the land. They don't override the Constitution of the United States.
Mr. HARKIN. I will not argue constitutional principles with the Senator from West Virginia.
Mr. BYRD. I hope the Senator will take that out of his written speech.
Mr. HARKIN. I will not argue constitutional principles with the Senator from West Virginia, I know that. But treaties under--I forget the article--treaties become the law of the land.
Mr. BYRD. Yes; but they don't override the Constitution.
Mr. HARKIN. Under the Constitution, they become the law of the land.
Mr. BYRD. They become part of the supreme law of the land. I thank the Senator for yielding.
Mr. HARKIN. I appreciate the correction of the Senator from West Virginia.
Back to my point; the Senator from Delaware is right. If this amendment had been in effect 40 years ago, we couldn't have been in Greece. But that was during the cold war. That is when we were facing the Soviet Union. That is when we were facing, if I might say to the Senator from Delaware, facing a Europe that was on its knees, busted, broke, basically decapitated from World War II. There is no way that they could have done it on their own. That is why I say with this whole NATO argument that it just seems to me we are arguing about a world that existed 50 years ago. The Senator from Delaware in his impassioned pleas is arguing for a situation that no longer exists. Europe is powerful. Europe is wealthy, and the nations' GNPs are going up. There is no Soviet Union. There is no external threat like Greece was facing. Europe has been rebuilt. The cold war is over. Let's look ahead.
What I am saying is that I don't believe, in the context of a Europe that we see now and in the foreseeable future, that our taxpayers ought to be liable for the national costs anymore in excess of what they are liable right now for the common costs. That is what this amendment says. Very simply, it says very forthrightly, `Any future United States subsidy of the national expenses of Poland, Hungary, or the Czech Republic to meet its NATO commitments, including the assistance described in subparagraph (c), may not exceed 25 percent of all assistance provided to that country by all NATO members.'
When it comes to tanks, planes, or anything else, of course, we can still sell them. They can still buy from us. But our subsidy to this national effort cannot be more than 25 percent of the total amount of subsidies by all of the countries for that national effort----
Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, will the Senator yield on that point?
Mr. HARKIN. Yes. But I am losing a lot of time; if the Senator would help me by yielding back some time.
Mr. BIDEN. Where you don't go back 50 years--for example, if the Senator's amendment had been in place, we probably could not have amended the conventional forces in Europe. In 1991, it became clear--the wall came down in 1989--we had to amend the conventional forces amendment. We renegotiated that agreement. The flank agreement in the Senate was an amendment. It was passed in Russia in the Duma as well. What we said was that we had to give up a number of pieces of equipment, thousands of pieces of equipment, but because Greece and Turkey were on the southern flank of NATO and because we still were concerned about instability in the region, we still wanted force structure there, we had to call for a cascading down. We took all of the equipment that we were giving up, thousands of pieces, and we just gave them to the Greeks and the Turks. It was in our national interest to do so.
Had the Senator's amendment been in place, the cost of all of those pieces of equipment would have to have been computed and added up, and then reduced from the 25 percent ceiling that was allowed to be spent by the United States on the common budget of the NATO. That had nothing to do with the cold war; it had to do with reality. It had to do with the arms control agreement. That arms control agreement would have done one of two things. It would not be able to have been negotiated and signed by us because we would not have been able to have that force structure on the southern flank, or we would have had to go in arrears to our commitment of saying 25 percent of the common budget of NATO.
That is a contemporary example. That went on from 1991 to 1996. It is a further example of how well-intended but dangerous this amendment is.
I thank the Senator for yielding.
Mr. HARKIN. Again, I respond to the Senator from Delaware. Again, what he is basically arguing for is giving a blank check to the American people. I disagree with the Senator on the point that he just said about conventional structure. We are talking about three countries. My amendment only mentions three countries. It
mentions Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. It is just those three countries that we are talking about and about their national costs. There may be other arrangements in Europe. There may be other structures in which we are engaged that are not covered by this amendment.
Mr. BIDEN. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. HARKIN. I am talking only about subsidies to the national military budgets, the national expenses of those three countries to meet their national commitments.
Mr. BIDEN. Just those three?
Mr. HARKIN. That is all.
Mr. BIDEN. This in no way limits our ability to give aid or assistance to any other country in NATO. So we are going to say that you three guys can come in, but we are going to promise that we are never going to give you assistance, but we will maybe give assistance to Greece, Turkey, Germany, France and England.
Mr. HARKIN. That is right. Exactly. Why is that? Because England, France, and all of these countries' forces are modernized. They are fully integrated into NATO. Those are the three countries that are going to have a lot of money for interoperability, command, communications, force structures. That is where the money is going to go. I didn't want to say anything about the other countries. I don't think it is necessary for these other countries because we are not going to be involved in that kind of expenditure. That is why I limited it specifically to those three countries and why I respectfully demur from the Senator's comments that we could not be involved in other aspects of NATO beyond the 25 percent. We absolutely could. That is why I want to focus on those three countries only because that is where the money is going to be spent for force structure and modernization. I don't believe we ought to give a blank check.
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Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. HARKIN. Yes.
Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Wouldn't we, if we accept the amendment of the Senator from Iowa, then be relegating Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic second class citizenship in NATO?
Mr. HARKIN. I don't believe so. I think all we are saying is that the other members of NATO have to be as fully involved financially in upgrading and modernizing their force structure as the taxpayers of this country. I basically would submit that this amendment is more inclusive. It is saying to our partners in NATO that we are in this together; don't just stick the American taxpayer with the bill.
Mr. SMITH of Oregon. One other question.
It seems to me, as we look at the numbers that the Senator is presenting, $125 billion versus $1.5 billion, and changing circumstances, I would remind the Senate that the $125 billion was predicated on the Congressional Budget Office based upon an invasion by Russian forces of Hungary, Poland, and the Czech Republic, and that it would require the full advanced positioning of the U.S. military. If that were to occur, those numbers are probably right. The much reduced number of $1.5 billion is a reflection, according to the GAO, of the current political situation and, therefore, isn't an accurate estimate.
But I would say this: I don't think we should hamstring now our ability as the Senate and as the Congress to respond to whatever things might occur. But it seems to me, we would be doing just that if we were to accept the Harkin amendment.
Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, if I might, if I could restate what the Senator is trying to achieve with his amendment, is simply to say when NATO establishes the military requirements of three new nations, the costs associated with each of the nations and their ability to reach that requirement, the U.S. States taxpayer will pay no more than 25 percent of that cost, and 75 percent is then to be allocated among the remainder of the nations. It is as simple as that in clear English language.
Mr. HARKIN. I thank the Senator. That says it very clearly and very eloquently, and I think brings the point home again. I
say to the manager of the bill that when you talk about $1.5 billion, that is one of the common costs. That is why we are trying to reach out and find out what these other costs associated with it are. These NATO's costs, as I have pointed out, we have already allocated over $1 billion ourselves of taxpayer dollars for this.
I also say in response to the comments of the Senator from Delaware about what happens in the future that, if there is an emergency or something happens where you have changed circumstances, I would respond with the same enjoinder that he gave to this Senator; that is, I believe it is important now to limit our taxpayers' exposure rather than a blank check. If there is an emergency in the future, if something does happen, yes, the Appropriations Committee will respond. The Foreign Relations Committee and the authorizing committee will respond. The Armed Services Committee in their capacity as authorizing committee will respond. The appropriators will respond. It is better to address it at that point rather than giving a blank check now and just sort of letting it go. I think from a budgetary standpoint, from the standpoint of protecting our taxpayer dollars better, we limit it now, and then, if there is an emergency, fine, we can come up with the money and finance the emergency.
Mr. BIDEN. If the Senator will yield. If in fact this logic makes sense, I don't know why we would produce an amendment that says right now we spend--I don't know the exact national budget. My friend from Virginia may know how much we spend on defense right now in the United States of America on our total defense budget. I will make up a number. Let's say it is $300 billion. Why don't we attach an amendment right now and say that we will not spend more than $300 billion on defense, period? Why don't we do that? It is the same logic. Let's tell the American taxpayers now we are limiting what they are going to spend on defense. We will do it now. We will limit it to that number, not just in Europe but all over the world. Tell them that right now. If there is an emergency, we can come back.
This is the same man, whom I respect enormously, who argued strenuously, and he argued on the same issue of a constitutional amendment to balance the budget.
Why not set a number? Defense spending cannot increase at all. We can pass it now, unless we come along and by a two-thirds vote in this body agree to spend more money on defense. That is what we are doing here relative to these three countries. That is what we are doing for Europe. Why don't we do it for the all of the national defense budget?
If it doesn't make sense for the whole national defense budget, I respectfully suggest it makes zero sense to do it in Europe for these three countries.
Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, if I could clarify, the funds the Senator is talking about come out of the Department of State budget, not the defense budget.
Mr. BIDEN. Let's set the State Department budget.
Mr. WARNER. It is important in this debate that we begin to establish a few fundamentals with some correctness. The defense budget will be around $260 billion to $270 billion, but it does not contain the funds to which my distinguished colleague is now referring.
Mr. BIDEN. If the Senator will yield, let's set the State Department budget then, freeze that.
Mr. HARKIN. I didn't hear the Senator from Delaware.
Mr. BIDEN. If the categories all come out of the State Department budget, then let's say let's freeze the State Department budget. Nothing can go up in the State Department budget, period. Freeze it, just like we are going to freeze it here. Why not do that? And if an emergency comes along, we can change our mind.
It is not a way to do business, I respectfully suggest.
Mr. HARKIN addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa has 13 minutes 30 seconds.
Mr. HARKIN. I am sure the Senator will yield me some more off his time, because I have been so yielding to him.
I think the analogy that the Senator from Delaware uses is totally wrong. Let me provide, I think, a more correct one. This amendment in no way limits how much total defense dollars we can provide to these three countries--not at all. It simply says, whatever their national budget, we will only pay 25 percent. So the Senator's analogy that we are somehow going to cap defense spending is not right.
A better analogy, if I might say to my friend from Delaware, is this. We do have a defense budget in the United States. It is $260 billion. Let's say that for national emergency reasons, or whatever threat might come up, we have to increase it to $300 billion a year. But what we are going to do is tax the citizens of Delaware for half of it, and then we will spread the other half among the other 49 States of the Union. That is the more correct analogy as to what my amendment seeks to do.
Now, certainly we would not say to the citizens of Delaware, `We are going to increase the defense budget. You have to pick up 50 percent of the total.' No. We would spread it out, make everybody pay a fair, proportionate share. That is what my amendment says. My amendment in no way limits the total amount of defense money spent on these three countries.
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Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I wonder if I might yield myself time from the Senator from Oregon.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I will yield the floor and let others use their own time.
Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I wonder if, having discussed with the Senator from Oregon, I might yield myself time from his time so as not to deprive the Senator----
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa yields the floor?
Mr. HARKIN. I am sorry. Mr. President, I yielded the floor and reserve the remainder of my time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair.
Mr. President, the Senator from Iowa has been very generous in yielding his own time. I wanted to make a brief statement and then pose two questions on what I take to be not just hypotheticals but real life probabilities.
I followed the discussion on a particular element of the budget, whether State Department or defense. I don't think that is right on point to what is being said here. I think the amendment of the Senator from Iowa is saying that American subsidy, as it were, of the national expenses of Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic to meet their NATO commitments should not be more than 25 percent of all assistance provided to each of those countries by all NATO members.
Let me lead into the questions that I want to ask the Senator from Iowa. The Senator from Iowa has said that his purpose in offering this amendment is to protect the taxpayers of America from incurring a liability greater than this 25 percent; that is, 25 percent of all assistance provided to each of these three countries by all NATO members. But I am concerned that there are some consequences in his amendment, perhaps unintended, which in fact not only do not protect the taxpayers of the United States but may hurt them, and certainly may hurt their security. And I want to describe two situations and then ask the Senator from Iowa if he would respond.
The 25 percent number is one that has some currency--no pun intended--in NATO circles about the American share. So it is not the 25 percent that I think troubles those of us who oppose this amendment. It is what the Senator from Iowa is including within the 25 percent in subsection (C) of his amendment, and I go particularly to this and I read from the amendment.
The assistance referred to in (A)(iii) above includes (1) Foreign Military Financing under the Arms Export Control Act.
So here is the circumstance I am concerned about being covered here. At sometime in the future--next year, 2 years, 3 years, 4 years--one of these three countries, the Czech Republic, Hungary, or Poland, decides that they, as part of their participation in NATO, their responsibility for their own defense, want to acquire certain modern military equipment systems.
My concern is that by squeezing foreign military financing under the Arms Export Control Act--which is to say the credits that our Government gives to facilitate the sale of weapons systems by American manufacturers to foreign purchasers--we are going to block our defense companies from having a chance to compete equally with other foreign defense manufacturers to try to sell to the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland.
Because the credits will be included within the 25 percent, and the effect of that will not be to protect American taxpayers, it will be to hurt American defense workers, whose products will not be able to be sold to these three countries.
So, I ask my friend from Iowa, is it not true, if the amendment he has submitted is agreed to, that we will limit credits for foreign military sales to these three countries and therefore limit the opportunity of American defense manufacturers to sell to these three countries, meaning that they will be pushed to buy from other producers elsewhere in the world?
Mr. HARKIN. I will respond to my friend, if he will yield.
Mr. LIEBERMAN. I do.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, again, this amendment does not preclude increased subsidies as long as we only pay our fair share. That is the point I was making prior to the Senator's comments.
But, again, is the Senator arguing that, again, this is going to cost a lot more than the $400 million that the administration has suggested--that this could really balloon in the years ahead? That is what I am concerned about. What is this going to cost? We are told it is only going to cost us $400 million. But now I hear the Senator saying maybe, if a country there decides to buy some expensive military hardware, we will want to jump in and subsidize our sales, so, therefore, we don't give it? I mean, nothing is given? It is not free; the taxpayers pay for it. And that bothers me. It doesn't preclude the sale of weapons; it just means it must be a fair share.
Again, I probably agree with the Senator that my amendment would preclude the kind of giveaway programs that cost our taxpayers a lot of money in order to maybe help one of these countries modernize to the point where they may not need it. But as long as it is free to them and costs our taxpayers, why not give it to them?
Mr. LIEBERMAN. I appreciate the response of the Senator from Iowa, because I do believe the response confirms my concern that one of the effects of passage of this amendment will be to apply what I consider to be an arbitrary cap--which is to say a 25 percent cap--on all American expenditures related to the assistance provided to these NATO countries.
Here is why I am concerned about that and why it does bother me. There are two different categories of expense. One is the direct amount we are contributing--common expenses, if you will--the $400 million that the Senator from Iowa refers to, to enlarge NATO to these countries. I do not consider the credits given to facilitate the sale of American military equipment to these countries in that same category. These are not giveaways. These are, in a long-established program, quite similar to what we do through the Export-Import Bank in other areas, or OPIC in other areas, to facilitate American companies' ability to sell their products abroad, creating or sustaining more jobs for American workers here at home.
So, my initial concerns are confirmed. I think the effect of this amendment, if adopted, would be to limit the ability of American companies to compete equally with foreign manufacturers of comparable weapons systems to sell them to these three countries, and the losers in that would be the workers in defense companies all around America. So these export credits are not giveaways. Yes, it may take the budget, the possible spending, somewhat above the $400 million, but that is a different category. The $400 million, if you will, is a grant. This is a little bit like giving a bit of a subsidy so you can sell a multiple of many times more and create jobs for American workers.
Mr. BIDEN. Will the Senator yield for a question?
Mr. LIEBERMAN. I will.
Mr. BIDEN. The Senator from Iowa forthrightly responded, as he always does, that if we wanted to sell Poland, like we sell Greece or Germany or anyone else, a piece of American-made military equipment, as long as we did not subsidize more than 25 percent of what that was, then we could sell it.
I wonder, why in God's name would the French Government agree to come up with money for Poland to allow them to buy an American jet instead of a French jet? Why would they possibly do that? And does this not give a veto, a veto on the part of other NATO nations, over American foreign military sales? Because unless they come up with 75 percent of what any subsidy would be, why would they possibly do that?
Is it not true--the Senator is on the Armed Services Committee--is it not true that one of the core debates in NATO beyond burdensharing has been who gets to sell NATO the equipment, whether they fly Mirages--whether NATO planes are Mirages or whether they are American made aircraft? Every other European country in NATO has been saying, `You Americans get too much of an advantage.' Every time we talk about burdensharing, don't they come back and say, `Yes, but you don't get it; you get to make all that money and get all those jobs because you are supplying the equipment that all the NATO uses'?
So why in the Lord's name would we give a veto power over the ability of American manufacturers and American employees to keep their jobs to the French and the Germans and the Brits?
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Mr. LIEBERMAN. The Senator raises a very good question. For me, at least, there is no good answer to that. That is why I say I believe that this may be an unintended consequence of the amendment that the Senator from Iowa has put forward. There is very spirited competition among the member countries of NATO in arms sales and arms purchases by NATO.
For instance, right now there is a great issue about the Joint Stars Program, a remarkable air surveillance of ground activity system in which we had an original requirement of 19 planes; assuming that NATO would buy 6, we would pay for 13. Our military says these are extraordinarily valuable. They are going to be critical in future warfare. We have already used them in Bosnia before we thought we would have to. Our allies in NATO decided last fall that they didn't want to buy the six from us, they wanted to try to make them themselves. So there is very spirited competition that goes on among the NATO members for NATO acquisitions, let alone to other countries.
I do want to say one word additionally on this point. The credits that are given for foreign military financing under the Arms Export Control Act are not literally spending; they are more in the form of a guarantee. I don't have the exact information before me, because I didn't realize we were going to get into this point this morning. I don't believe that the taxpayers have actually spent very much money on these credits. They are a form of a guarantee to facilitate these sales.
Anyway, bottom line, I leave this part of the debate with a confirmed concern, which deepens my opposition to the amendment, that one of the unintended consequences--or consequences of this amendment, if it passes, would be to hamstring, to tie up, to put a cap on the ability of American companies and workers to compete with foreign companies and workers to sell these three systems that they may want to acquire in the future.
Mr. President, I would like to go on and pose a second question to my friend from Iowa. Let me describe a different kind of fact circumstance.
One of the reasons I am so strongly supporting the enlargement of NATO to these three countries is that it will help us--it will share our burden, to be as specific as I can. NATO, as we continue our historic mission of providing for the collective defense of the member states, will face threats, as it has both within their territories and outside. We have seen it in Bosnia. I suspect, as others do, that we will be threatened increasingly from the south of NATO, not from the east, because Russia is now our ally and our partner--Partner for Peace, as we say--in that specific program. And I am struck by what these three new members can add to NATO's military capacity.
First off, and most explicitly, they will add 200,000 troops. And not just the troops, but I think what we will find, because these new members will have the enthusiasm of new membership, perhaps even a greater willingness to be involved in sharing the burden that would otherwise fall exclusively on the United States of America in responding to threats to the security of NATO and its member states, including our own security.
Let me give a specific example. Hungary has been of great help to us already in Bosnia, giving us a base from which we can launch or source so much of our activity in Bosnia. But let me come to a much more specific and recent point. A short while ago, we were on the edge of military action against Iraq again, because the Iraqis wouldn't allow us, or the United Nations inspectors, access to their facilities, according to the post-gulf-war promises that they had made. And that conflict, for now--I am afraid not forever, but for now--has been avoided. But the record will show that during the period of time leading up to the possibility of military action against Iraq, these three countries--Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic--made unswervingly clear that they were prepared to stand by us.
Let me be very blunt about this, undiplomatically blunt.
They were much more supportive of military action against Iraq, much more willing to commit forces and materiel, much more convinced of the common threat that an uninspected Iraq posed to them, as well as to us, than some of our longest term and foremost allies in NATO. There is no secret here. The French were particularly reluctant about military activity against Iraq.
So what I want to pose now is another fact situation. Let us say in the next half year--we all hope this does not happen, but we can feel it building in Iraq again. Mr. Butler, of UNSCOM, of the U.N. group charged with inspecting in Iraq to guarantee that weapons of mass destruction have been eliminated, has said in the last week or two that, yes, the inspectors gained access to Saddam Hussein's palaces, but as far as I interpret his statements, the Iraqis cleared out the palaces, let the inspectors in, the inspectors naturally found nothing--there was a lot of time that passed--the inspectors went out, and now the Iraqis say, `That's it. Lift the sanctions.'
Mr. Butler, steadfast, honorable, independent, says, `Hey, we don't have affirmative proof as required under the post-gulf war agreements that the Iraqis are not developing chemical and biological weapons.'
So let us go forward a few months, and the conflict grows, the disagreement grows, the Iraqis refuse to allow U.N. inspectors in, and we are on the edge of military conflict again, and as we hope it will not happen, in fact there is a decision to launch a military action, and in this we ask and receive the support of our allies in Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic.
I know I am speeding up the schedule a little bit because they will not in that timeframe have acceded to NATO membership. So let us take it forward a year or two or three. They want to help us in an international conflict. And the one in the gulf is most likely. To facilitate their aid to us, we have to invoke exactly the sections of law that the Senator from Iowa includes in his amendment under the 25-percent cap--transfers of excess defense articles under section 516 of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, emergency drawdowns of our equipment to give to them no cost leases of U.S. equipment. All of this is not to throw it away but because they can share our burden. They can send troops to be with ours. But they may need some assistance, materiel assistance that we would normally draw down from.
So perhaps this has been a longer way than necessary to say that my concern is, these additional sections of this law would prevent the United States from, in a crisis such as the one I have described, or God forbid a larger one, where the soldiers, the military forces of these three countries were ready to share the burden of the United States in defense, in fact the 25-percent cap would say, you cannot do it, you cannot help them help us.
That is not only in the most limited and technical sense such a result in the interest of the taxpayers of the United States, it certainly is not in the interest of the security of the United States or in the interests of the well-being of the military of the United States, without assistance from countries like this, to have to shoulder more of the burden.
So I ask my friend from Iowa, is it not true that these sections of this amendment would limit the ability of the United States to draw down, to transfer articles, to enter into no-cost leases of U.S. equipment to these three countries in a time of crisis, in which we would very much want them to be helping us with our assistance?
Mr. HARKIN. If the Senator will yield.
Mr. LIEBERMAN. I will.
Mr. HARKIN. Is the Senator then saying that the cost of this is going to escalate greatly in the future, that it is not $400 million, it is going to be something much above that because we are going to subsidize a lot of sales? Is that what the Senator is saying?
Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Senator. What I am saying is that from the best estimates I have seen, the American contribution to
the common costs of NATO will be limited to the $400 million. But there will be other cases in our self-interest, such as the ones I have mentioned, where there is an international crisis and we will want to draw down, to give no-cost leases to Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic to help us so we incur less damage and less direct costs ourselves that I am afraid this amendment would limit. I consider that a very separate category than in the contribution we make to the common costs of NATO enlargement.
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Mr. HARKIN. If the Senator would yield further.
Mr. LIEBERMAN. I will.
Mr. HARKIN. The Senator talks about prices. Again, with all due respect, when a crisis happens, Congress responds. Again, just from a budgeting standpoint, from being perhaps a little tightfisted with taxpayer dollars, and not giving sort of a blank check and saying, `Fill it in,' I think by having a cap on these costs, a national cost that I propose equivalent to what we do in our common costs, that it precludes a kind of runaway giveaway.
It is like, OK, Hungary wants to upgrade their capabilities in a certain area, so we say, `Oh, wonderful. You need not the $1.98 version, you need the $100 version.' But Congress says, `We can't afford the $100 version.' We say, `Not to worry. We'll give it to you. That will be one of our grants. We will subsidize it, and you will get ours.'
Again, I must respectfully say to my friend from Connecticut, this is a whole new vineyard, this debate about jobs. I thought this was about democracy and markets and peacekeeping. Now we are talking about jobs. I find this debate now is veering off course a little bit.
To answer the question as forthrightly as I can, yes, I am saying that if one of these three countries want the $1.98 version, we could give up a 25-percent subsidy for that. We would not come in with a $100 version and say taxpayers are going to pay for the whole thing. Yes, that is exactly what I mean.
Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Senator from Iowa. I will say a brief word or two more and then yield to the Senator from Oregon.
What I fear from the amendment is that the effect of the amendment will be to limit our ability to sell cost-effective items to these three governments, not just the ones that the Senator may consider to be bloated in expense. And more to the point of the second example that I have asked him about, I think it will have the unintended consequence of shackling us in our attempt to benefit from the willingness of these three countries to assist us in a time of international crisis.
I want to make a final point about the comment that the Senator made in passing that this is about, the NATO enlargement debate is about principle, not about jobs in America. I respectfully, loosely paraphrase there.
In my opinion, as I tried to indicate yesterday, this debate really is about a principle, about the principle of freedom that was secured and won in the cold war and that we now, in my opinion, have a moral obligation to ratify that victory in the freedom won by countries like Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, countries that suffered during the cold war and the long years of Soviet Communist domination, to welcome them into this military alliance which is based on the principle of freedom, also on collective defense.
I know that there are some who have said that what drives this debate, what drives the move for NATO enlargement is the yearning by American military contractors for more sales in Central or Eastern Europe. I must say, I am on the Armed Services Committee and I have not had a single comment--I have contact on a regular basis with representatives of defense companies, and I have not had a single one of them say a single word to me about NATO enlargement.
But that having been said, and looking realistically, the potential sales here are quite modest as a proportion of overall military sales throughout the world, particularly within the United States with the Pentagon as the purchaser. But if these three countries want and need to purchase new military equipment, why would we want to limit the ability of American companies to sell American made products to them? So, no, the debate overall is not about American workers; it is about the principle of freedom and collective defense, and the promotion of peace and stability on the European Continent,
which is what NATO has done so greatly for almost 50 years and will do more broadly in the years ahead if we enlarge it.
Way down on the list of effects is the possibility that there might be a few sales of American-made equipment to these countries. I fear that the unintended consequence of this amendment would be to limit those sales and, in that sense, to give an unusual and surprising competitive advantage to military contractors abroad, particularly in Europe, perhaps even in Russia or China, as well.
I thank my friend from Iowa for what I hope has been an illuminating dialog and for the directness and eloquence of his own participation.
I thank my friend from Oregon for yielding me this time. I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sessions). The Senator from Oregon.
Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I was once asked by a mother in a town meeting I had in Oregon why her son or daughter should put his or her life at risk for a Hungarian or Pole or Czech through the expansion of NATO. I think it sometimes helps to think in human terms like that. My answer to her was that the surest way not to put her son's or daughter's life at risk was, in fact, to expand NATO.
It is a very troubled area in world history. In a tough neighborhood, good fences make for better neighbors. I have fought to expand NATO because I think to leave the vacuum, to leave muddled `international speak' out there at the border was a mistake.
I think the answer I gave to that mother can also be given to my friend from Iowa. The Senator is concerned about the bill going up. I am concerned about that, too, but I think the surest way that the bill not go up is to expand NATO. I think if we did not expand NATO, and the worst kinds of scenarios you could construct actually occurred, we would be spending far more than $1.5 billion--whether Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic were in NATO or not because I don't think this time we would stand idly by. I certainly hope we would not.
So the surest way, I think, we can assure the American taxpayer that Senator Harkin is rightly concerned that we won't spend $125 billion to expand NATO, is to define the terms of the future, not just react to them, make them, expand NATO, make this commitment, and I believe it means we will not be spending the kind of excesses that I also fear with the Senator from Iowa.
Mr. HARKIN. How much time remains?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 11 minutes.
Mr. SMITH of Oregon. I yield the floor.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I will respond with a couple of things.
First of all, I have to ask again the question: Can these three members, these three nations, can they afford membership in NATO or can they not? Can they afford to bear the burden or can they not? We have been told they can. One of the requirements for membership is they can pay the tab. These three nations have stated over and over they could afford it.
Now I am hearing, wait a minute, no, maybe they can't, because now we will have to give them a lot of subsidies to buy weapons systems. Well, if that is the case, then do they have the economic strength to join NATO? It seems like we cannot have it both ways. If they have the economic strength, why do they need all the subsidies? If they don't, are they really capable of joining NATO?
Secondly, yes, I am concerned about these types of giveaway programs and loans and grants. I say to my friend from Connecticut, we have--I have been on the Defense Appropriations Committee for several years now, and I have been in some aviation things going back almost 20 years, both in the House and the Senate. I say to my friend from Connecticut, we have always been faced with other countries subsidizing, in many cases more than we ever subsidized our arms manufacturers.
So how do we beat them? We beat them because we make the best
products. We have the best quality. No one can match our aircraft. No one can match our weapons systems. No one can match not only the quality but the kind of support infrastructure that we can provide for those weapons systems. So other countries might have to subsidize theirs a little bit more, but only because they cannot match us in those areas. So we have been quite capable of competing and winning in the world market our share of defense items in the past. I do not think that will change in the future.
So in the last decade we have written off or forgiven over $10 billion in default of loans on military-related items on this. I think, again, we have to be very careful about this. We are told it will only cost us $400 million, but now what I hear is no, that is only for the common costs. This could go up and up and up and up, subsidy after subsidy after subsidy.
Then we hear that is only if there is a crisis. Fine. If there is a crisis we will address it then. But even the administration has said any threat to Europe to these nations is not imminent and would take years to develop. So we are not facing something that might happen in the next few months or even in the next couple of years or so, even according to the administration's own admission.
Therefore, I submit once more, Mr. President, that to keep the costs down, to be honest with the taxpayers of this country, what my amendment says is what is good for the common costs--that is, we limit our involvement to 25 percent--that we should limit the 25 percent, for subsidies for all of those national costs, also. That is all this amendment does. My friend from Oregon, my amendment does not stop NATO expansion. It simply says no longer will our taxpayers simply pick up the tab.
I yield the floor and reserve the remainder of my time.
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Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, with all respect for my friend from Iowa, I believe the Harkin amendment attempts to strangle NATO's expansion because it cannot prevent NATO expansion. This amendment places unreasonable restrictions on expenditures by limiting our assistance to new NATO members to 25 percent of all assistance provided to these countries by current NATO members.
I urge my colleagues to read carefully the resolution of ratification that we have before us. Condition two requires the President to certify that the United States is under no obligation to subsidize the national expenses necessary for Poland, Hungary, or the Czech Republic, to meet those countries' NATO commitments.
Let me be clear on this point. In signing the Protocols of Accession with these three countries, the United States has not signed up to foot the bill for their membership in NATO, and Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic understand that it is ultimately their responsibility to make the necessary improvements to their military structures.
Now, my friend from Iowa knows that in the past, the U.S. Congress has authorized and appropriated funds for countries in Central and Eastern Europe to assist in their efforts to meet the criteria for NATO membership.
Approving this resolution, however, in no way restricts the congressional prerogative to make this decision on an annual basis. In other words, why draw an arbitrary line now? We are going to do this on a regular basis anyway as circumstances change.
If in the future years we determine that Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic do not warrant or do not need the U.S. assistance, we will not authorize and appropriate it. I trust that future Congresses will be able to make this decision based on the circumstances in their time and will not need artificial percentages to dictate how our assistance should be appropriated.
I also confess concern about the signal that would be sent if the Senate adopted the Harkin amendment. Does approval of this amendment mean that the United States would only need NATO 25 percent of the time no matter what our security interests may be? Does it mean that the United States is interested in only 25 percent of NATO's activities, exercises, and planning processes? Does it mean that the United States would participate in just 25 percent of NATO operations despite any potential threat posed to the alliance? I think these questions demonstrate why arbitrary ceilings simply do not belong.
Mr. President, I suggest that we allow the Congress to make funding decisions based on our foreign policy interests and that we reject any effort to tie our assistance to countries in Central and Eastern Europe to that provided by our NATO allies. I, therefore, urge my colleagues to oppose the Harkin amendment, which I do today.
I yield the floor, Mr. President.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, how much time do I have remaining?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Seven minutes.
Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I want to briefly touch on an issue the Senator from Connecticut mentioned, and that is lobbying by defense contractors.
At the outset, I want to say that I have not been contacted by any either. I don't know that my staff has; at least they haven't told me that. I respond by reading from an article that appeared in the New York Times on March 30, which I obviously got off the Internet, in which the writer of the article went on to say that `The chief vehicle of support for NATO expansion is a group called `The U.S. Committee to Expand NATO'.' The president of that innocent-sounding group is Bruce Jackson, director of strategic planning for Lockheed, a vice president for Lockheed for strategic planning.
Mr. President, again, a lot of these people have been championing NATO membership for these countries. He quoted me as saying that `This may amount to `a Marshall Plan' for defense contractors who are chomping at the bit to sell weapons and make profits.' Well, I am a Democrat, and it says, `A top Republican aide joked that the arms makers were so eager for NATO expansion, we will probably be giving landlocked Hungary a new navy.' Those are just musings and comments by various and sundry people.
Again, this gets back to the question of whether or not we are going to ask the taxpayers of this country to provide subsidies over, above, and beyond what they kind of have been told in terms of NATO expansion as to what the costs would be. Yes, if these countries are going to upgrade their weapons system, sure. Do I want our defense contractors to be in there to provide them the necessary resources they need for defense? Absolutely. But do I want them there when the taxpayers say--as I pointed out to my friend from Connecticut, which we have seen so often in the past, for one of those countries may say that we need a certain system and it cost $1.98. Since there is no limit on the subsidies, one of our contractors could come in and say: You don't need the $1.98 one, you need the $100 version. Hungry, Poland, or the Czech Republic may say: We can't afford that. The contractor may say: Not to worry. You see, under the situation we have now, the U.S. taxpayers will provide the subsidy for it and you can go ahead and have it.
Once again, our taxpayers are stuck with it. I think that is
the normal course. If there is a crisis, as has been stated many times, well, this would hamstring us in terms of a crisis. Again, I point out that no one is saying there is any imminent threat of any crisis at all. The administration says that for years ahead Russia is no threat. So if, in fact, a crisis comes up in the future--in the distant future--we have time to react, we have time on both the authorizing committee and on the appropriating committee to make changes, to make sure these countries have the adequate and necessary defense capabilities to defend themselves. But to just give a blank check now, I think, is wrong. I think it will cost the taxpayers of this country untold billions of dollars, unless we put the same cap on our subsidies for national expenses that we have on the common costs.
We have agreed with our fellow member nations in NATO that on the common costs we would provide about 25 percent. I see no reason why that same logic cannot prevail and be used to cap our exposure on the national costs. In fact, I have gotten an idea this morning that I may offer another amendment to this bill, and that is to get other member countries of NATO to also agree that their subsidies, their proportion of the national costs, would not exceed what their proportion is under the common costs. Now, we cannot force them to do that, but it seems to me that should be one of the negotiating principles that we would use with other countries when they want to expand and enlarge NATO. In fact, it kind of comes as a surprise to me that we did not do that in the beginning. If we really want honest accounting, and we want the European countries that are quite wealthy now to bear their fair share of the costs, it seems to me that we should have insisted in the beginning that the same proportionality that pertains to the common costs should pertain to the national costs. To me, this is a gaping hole, and the first place to close it is here with this bill, by saying that the United States will provide no more than its 25-percent share of those national costs.
Mr. President, I yield the floor and reserve my time.
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Mr. LIEBERMAN addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
Mr. LIEBERMAN. I wonder if the Senator from Washington will yield up to 5 minutes.
Mr. GORTON. Certainly.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I want to respond briefly to two points. One is on the question of the involvement of the American defense industry in this debate. The Senator from Iowa cited a news article indicating that a group called the U.S. Committee to Expand NATO, headed by a gentleman involved in the defense industry--honestly, I don't know the facts about that committee at all, but I have seen some advertisements they have placed. But what I want to do is suggest--and I know the Senator from Iowa didn't mean to say this in quoting the article--that the support for NATO enlargement is quite broad. It is enormous. It goes well beyond this one organization headed by this one man. There are a host of military and veterans' organizations that I think support this because they have learned the lessons. They feel enlarging NATO is one of the rewards, if you will, for their service over the long years of the cold war. It was one of the goals they aspired to--to free the captive nations and let them become part of the community of freedom-loving nations. AMVETS supports NATO enlargement, as do the American Legion Association, U.S. Army Jewish War Veterans, Marine Corps League, National Guard Association, Reserve Officers Association, Veterans of Foreign Wars Association,
and, in addition, a host of civic policy and political organizations, including, interestingly, the Council of State Governments, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, a host of State legislative bodies, including my own State senate in Connecticut that spoke on behalf of enlargement;
A true rainbow coalition of ethnic organizations, American ethnic organizations, many of whom have members who have family ties to the people who have suffered for almost five decades, four decades anyway, under Soviet Communist domination, are now thrilled that their family and friends can enjoy the blessings of liberty and want to affirm that opportunity by membership in NATO;
Many business and labor organizations, including the AFL-CIO, support the enlargement of NATO. So this is a very broad-based organizational effort, much beyond one group;
A remarkable number of high-level officials have signed a statement of support of NATO enlargement; former Vice Presidents Quayle and Mondale; former Secretaries of State Baker, Christopher, Eagleburger, Haig, Rodgers, Shultz, Kissinger, and Vance. I believe that is every living former Secretary of State;
Former National Security Advisers Allen, Brzezinski, Lake, McFarland, and Powell;
Former Secretaries of Defense Carlucci, Cheney, Clifford, Perry, and Rumsfeld.
It is a remarkable, broad coalition, much beyond one person whose affiliation may be the defense industry and an organization that I presume is much larger than that.
The second and final point that I want to make is I want to draw on something that the Senator from Oregon said, and it helps me to make a point about what I believe to be one of the unintended, certainly undesirable, consequences if we should adopt the Harkin amendment, which I hope we will not. The Senator from Oregon has occasionally held town meetings in Oregon. He has asked about NATO enlargement. Do we want to send your sons? How will you respond to the question of why would you send your sons to defend Budapest or Warsaw or Prague?
One of the effects of enlarging NATO is in effect quite the opposite, which is to bring the military forces, 200,000 strong, into the common effort to defend NATO and its member states from security threats to it and them. That involves a scenario that I suggested earlier that may occur in the Middle East around Iraq and other trouble spots around the world. What I am confident of is there will be an enthusiasm and a steadfastness to participate among these three new members that we don't always find, frankly, among the other members who have been with us from the beginning.
The question could almost be turned. That is, expanding NATO holds the prospect that Hungarian soldiers, Czech soldiers, and Polish soldiers will be sent to trouble spots in the world and not require American soldiers to be sent, certainly not in the same numbers. I believe that one of the consequences of this amendment putting an arbitrary 25 percent cap on American involvement here will be to make it impossible for us to draw down supplies and equipment to offer assistance to those soldiers of these three countries when they share our burden and place less of a burden on our military and on those who wear the American uniform.
I thank the Chair.
I yield the floor.
Mr. GORTON addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, 10 days ago in a column appearing in the Washington Post, Charles Krauthammer wrote:
By ruling Central Europe out of bounds to Russia, NATO expansion takes one of this century's fatal temptations off the table. It is the easiest U.S. foreign policy call of the decade.
Why is it the easiest foreign policy call of the decade? Because the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for 50 years has preserved the peace of Europe and the peace of the United States. As a result of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the Soviet Union literally ceased to exist. All of this was accomplished by a military alliance that never was required to fight or to sacrifice its young men and women in a military conflict within the bounds of that organization.
Why did the North Atlantic Treaty Organization come into existence in the first place? Because the first half of this century showed that both world wars began in Central Europe because of the weakness, the instability, the unsettled nature of the former empires and the then national states in that part of Europe, occupied almost wholly by the Soviet Union at the end of World War II. The West could only be defended by a military organization of which the United States was a part. Behind the magnificent defensive line, the parapets, built by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Western Europe became free, democratic, and prosperous.
During that 50 years, we and the Western Europeans invested not an inconsiderable amount of money in communicating those ideas of freedom to the people of Central and Eastern Europe through the Voice of America and other such organizations. It is clear now that nothing was desired by the people of the Czech Republic, Poland, and Hungary more than to join the free and prosperous countries of Western Europe. Partly because of our efforts through NATO, partly because of our economic success, and partly from their growing dedication to freedom, they freed themselves--they freed themselves--from the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union disappeared and became Russia, a country still unstable, a country with candidates for President in the year 2000 who would desire nothing more than the restoration of the old Soviet Union.
So the rationale of the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is to say, no; these countries freed by their own efforts and our own efforts will stay freer. They will be to us as Germany and France and Normandy have been for the last half century. What history teaches us is that a political vacuum filled with weakness and irresolution is a temptation to an aggressor. Countries a part of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization were not such a temptation, even at the height of the power of the Soviet Union.
Accession to NATO is as close to a guarantee as we can possibly come of the fact that our sons and daughters will not die in Warsaw or in Prague or in Budapest any more than they were required to do so in Oslo or in Paris in the course of the last half century.
Mr. President, this is the easiest foreign policy call of the decade. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization will lend strength to us, a contribution to our own defense, but most importantly the security of countries that have not been secure that want to join us in prosperity and in safety as they have in freedom.
The amendment of the Senator from Iowa is simply another attempt to make these members second-class members. We have already stated that we made no commitment at all, a zero commitment, to subsidize the national expenses for these countries. How much, if any, we subsidize them in the future is a decision that can and should be made in the future and not in the course of this debate.
Even more mischievous, in my view, Mr. President, are amendments to say that there will be no further expansion, that we will leave a vacuum unless certain preconditions are made. For more than 50 years the United States of America refused to recognize the annexation of the Baltic republics by the Soviet Union. When their cause was deemed to be a hopeless cause by almost everyone, they, too, have freed themselves. They, too, want at some future date to be a part of NATO. They, too, create a vacuum at the present time in the power structure of Central and of Eastern Europe.
To pass an amendment that is likely to be proposed by another of my colleagues that singles them out as being countries we will not want to defend or be a part of without special circumstances, in my view, is simply an engraved invitation to some future Russian Government to say: We're coming back in; we don't care about your desire for freedom. You're a part of us whether you like it or not. And, look, the Americans have in effect in the Senate said that's OK.
That is the essence of instability and of uncertainty, not only for the nations immediately involved but for all of us.
Certainty created through 50 years by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is the best guarantor of peace. I am convinced we should reject all limiting amendments, admit these three nations, and judge in the future what additional nations should be admitted to NATO--nations, in my opinion, consisting of all of those that become real democracies, real free market countries, with a real desire not only to be a part of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization but to contribute their own strength to it.
We should reject the Harkin amendment. We should grant the accession of the three countries before us at the present time without further conditions, and in the good faith that their accession will strengthen peace, strengthen their democracy, and strengthen our own security.
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Mr. McCAIN addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to address the Senate as if in morning business past the agreed upon time of 12:45.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, for the moment I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, I realize we only have a minute or two before the unanimous consent order kicks in which ends discussion at 12:45, but let me say for the record that one of the aspects of the amendment that we are considering and will be voting on when we come back from our caucus luncheons, the Harkin amendment, deals with requiring excess military materiel transferred to any NATO country--in this case, the three new members--to be counted against our common budget.
I did not have these numbers before, but I want to put them in the Record now. The Senator from Iowa has contended that we provide aid only to the less well off countries in NATO, and he implied they are the only ones we have given this excess military equipment to. Most people don't know what we are talking about here, so let me make it clear. Here are the facts.
In fiscal year 1996, we provided excess defense articles to the following countries: Denmark, Germany, Greece, Portugal, and Turkey, for a total value of $55 million. In fiscal year 1997, these excess articles went to the United Kingdom, Norway, Spain, and Turkey; value: $113 million. And my friend from Iowa, if his amendment passes, would say we can continue to spend taxpayers' money for what we believe is in our national interest to give excess items to other NATO countries, not part of our NATO requirement but our individual judgment, but we could not do the same for Poland, the Czech Republic, or Hungary. I think that would a serious mistake. If he wishes to do that and `save the taxpayers' money,' why not have his amendment say no excess military arms could go to any NATO country? Why single out for this second-class treatment the three new countries?
I yield the floor.
Mr. McCAIN addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
Mr. McCAIN. I thank my friend from Delaware. His statement is a very important contribution to this debate on NATO, and I appreciate the fact that not only is he giving the Senate information but the great job the Senator is doing on this issue here for these many days. I am very appreciative.
Mr. BIDEN. I thank the Senator.
Mr. McCAIN. There is no one more qualified, in my view, in the Senate than the Senator from Delaware, on this issue especially, but other foreign policy issues.
END