Tillie K. Fowler: “I rise today to voice my strong opposition to the Frank amendment. In my view, the President's defense budget for fiscal…”

“I rise today to voice my strong opposition to the Frank amendment. In my view, the President's defense budget for fiscal year 1995 was totally inadequate as originally proposed. The Secretary of Defense is clearly on record as stating that the administration's budget submission already underfunds the force structure specified by the Bottom-Up Review by some $20 billion. This is the force structure that we have repeatedly been told is the absolute minimum acceptable force necessary to fight and win two major regional contingencies. The amendment that is now pending before the House would impose a cut of a further $2.5 billion this year and $11.7 billion over 5 years on the Defense Department budget. In my view, that is totally irresponsible. The President's budget already represents a reduction in real defense funding of nearly 34 percent from the peak we reached in 1985, and 43 percent by 1999. For me, the question is simple: Are we going to ask our soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines to put their lives on the line behind an inadequate force structure? Are we going to rob them of the training and the systems that they need to help secure our national security goals? I urge this body to defeat the Frank amendment.”