Wayne Allard: “I rise today as a co-sponsor and supporter of S. 1873, The American Missile Protection Act of 1998. This important…”

“I rise today as a co-sponsor and supporter of S. 1873, The American Missile Protection Act of 1998. This important legislation will remove present barriers to the deployment of an effective, reliable missile defense system, so that our citizens will be free from the threat of an attack by missiles launched from across oceans. Prudence demands that we deploy a domestic missile defense system as soon as we possess the technology to do so. Missile technology developed during the Cold War has forever neutralized what was once our greatest domestic security asset-- distance. As a result, today many of our citizens have never known a world in which nuclear missiles were not pointed at their families. It is unconscionable that now, after years of being in the shadow of nuclear threat, the most powerful nation in the world still cannot defend its own soil against even one ballistic missile attack. In the post-Cold War era, a multiple array of new threats exist. Not only do we still face the possibility of accidental launch from a nuclear state--a possibility not without precedent--but now the proliferation of missile components and technology compounds the threat beyond even Cold War-levels. The capability of a rogue state to bypass years of development by clandestinely obtaining nuclear, chemical, and biological materials and long-range ballistic missile technology poses a new, more sinister threat.”