Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, if one believes in strategic stability and deterrence, and I think almost every Member of the Chamber believes that deterrence has worked for the last 40 years, oppose this amendment. We have three legs to our strategic triad. We have the land-based leg, that is, our missiles that are in silos in the United States. They are extremely vulnerable. They are very obvious. They are well targeted by our adversaries. We have bomber aircraft. Those bomber aircraft are also very visible. They can be targeted on the runways very quickly. We have one type of triad, the third type, which is not visible, which is survivable, which can survive to retaliate and therefore deter an adversary from making that first strike, throwing that first rock at the United States of America. That leg of the triad is the submarine leg. Now we have 18 boats in the water, or boomers or SSBNs, missile boats. We go down under START II, if the Senate ratifies START II with the changes, which is no sure thing because the Russians changed START II when the Duma made the ratification, so we now have to ratify START II as changed, but even if that happens, we go down to 14 boats and that requires more D-5 missiles. Even if we do a START III, we are going to have 14 missile submarines, and that still requires D-5. So these accurate, stabilizing systems that are now the key and the heart of our strategic triad must be preserved.”