Ronald Dellums: “It would provide two opportunities to achieve what this gentleman believes to be a better balance of national security…”

“It would provide two opportunities to achieve what this gentleman believes to be a better balance of national security priorities. The motion would increase funding for two very important programs, would pay for these increases by reducing funding for star wars-type national missile defense programs contained in this bill. Specifically, the bill removes $109 million from star wars funding increases. It would increase funding, as the gentleman from Texas pointed out, impact aid assistance by $53 million. It would also plus- up the Corps SAM missile program by $56 million, taking it from the national missile defense program. The gentleman from Texas articulately discussed the matter of impact aid. I will not attempt to compete with those remarks. On the second matter, let me note that much has been made, and appropriately so, of the urgency of being able to deploy a theater missile defense. Corps SAM is a system that we need to deploy with our troops. It will travel with our forces and provide protection to them from tactical threats in the theater, the No. 1 priority threat that we have at this particular moment. Again, we should direct our scarce resources away from fanciful and extraordinary ideas, like star wars-type programs, and into programs of demonstrated requirements.”