Political Quotes

“just a couple of additional brief points. First, there is one thing we do agree on, I hope unanimously, in this body, which is that our highest priority is to defend the security interests of the United States. I do not know of anybody in this body who would disagree with that premise. The question is, Is our security advanced or is it harmed by making a statement that we are going to deploy a system that violates a treaty with Russia, without first trying to at least negotiate a modification in that treaty so that we can do so jointly without a unilateral breach? The stakes here are huge. We should make no mistake about it. The stakes are that Russia has been reducing the number of nuclear weapons on its soil. Indeed, we have been helping to dismantle those weapons so that we are safer. And what they have told us is that the reason they have done that is because they have a treaty with us which has permitted them to do that called the ABM Treaty, and that without that treaty in place--indeed, without that treaty enhanced--those reductions are going to end.”