Pentagon Spokesman's Briefing

DEFENSE DEPARTMENT REGULAR BRIEFING
BRIEFER: REAR ADMIRAL CRAIG QUIGLEY, USN, SPOKESMAN
PENTAGON BRIEFING ROOM
ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA

1:30 P.M. EDT - THURSDAY, MAY 10, 2001

Q: Craig, on the nuclear policy review, isn't that just about
complete? The secretary was indicating he was well along in that. And
this is not going to depend on treaties or other countries; I mean,
this is going to be a unilateral thing involving the United States,
and it will save money, so it's not a budget issue so much, right?

Quigley: There are two efforts here. One is that he is indeed looking
at strategic forces as one of the studies that he's got going on right
now, but there is a separate requirement under the law that was a part
of the fiscal 2000, or 2001, authorization bill to do a nuclear
posture review, which is a separate formalized study effort which is
due in December of this year. I think the last time we did one of
these, Charlie, was '94, I believe, and that took a look at everything
-- the forces, the force structure, the command-and-control, the
strategic intelligence apparatus that goes into that process, and
resulted in some pretty substantial changes to our nuclear forces.

The Congress has set up a process to do another one of those, and that
is due in December. But again - and that's a process that is much
more detailed than the quick look, if you will, that the secretary has
put in place for the study here for the strategic forces.

Q: When will that come up, the strategic forces study? Whether to have
more long-range bombers, that kind of thing.

Quigley: Yeah. Well, the president alluded to that in his speech at
NDU last week, and I don't have a timetable as to when that's going to
be completely mature.

Dale.

Q: I just want to get something clarified. I think you started to say
there's a lot of uncertainty in this building and on the Hill about
how the secretary is going to complete his review, and the QDR will be
complete by the deadline, I believe, this fall. I take it from your
answer that it is still the secretary's intention to do that QDR on
time and not to ask for any kind of extension in the deadline on the
QDR?

Quigley: No. No.

Q: Okay.

Quigley: Some of the studies, now, will feed into the QDR, directly
into the QDR. But at this point at least, he believes the timetable
can be kept.

Q: Well, just to stay with that for a minute, you said a minute ago
that, if I understood it correctly, that the secretary was focusing on
decisions that have to be made for the '02 budget, and some of those
that could be deferred for '03 might well be deferred for some months
yet. How will you do that and still get the QDR done? Doesn't the QDR
basically have to answer all those questions?

Quigley: Well, the QDR feeds directly into the '03 budget. So if I get
a piece of analysis or a topic that I can feed into the QDR process,
by definition I'm feeding into the '03 budget process.

Alex.

Q: Perhaps this is the final one. Is the - an old story, but it's
come up again today. Is the Pentagon involved in suppressing evidence
of the existence of aliens and spacecraft?

Quigley: No.

Q: Thank you. (Laughter.)

Q: Glad we got that out of the way. (Laughter.) Thank you.

Quigley: Thank you.

Q: I thought he'd just say yes. (Laughter.)