Political Quotes

“Today, I call on my colleagues to join me in supporting the effort to rebuild America's nuclear deterrent. For most Americans, this may seem like a relic of the Cold War, but to those of us tasked with funding our national defense, nuclear threats are not a thing of the past; nuclear threats are a present-day issue. America successfully deterred nuclear attacks during the Cold War. Back then, we had one clear foe, but today's national security situation is the most complex we have faced since World War II. Russia, China, and North Korea are rapidly growing their nuclear stockpiles, and Iran stands on the brink of building its own arsenal. Facing multiple nuclear-armed enemies at the same time requires us to rethink how we plan to modernize our nuclear capabilities. Let me first briefly outline the nuclear threat posed by our primary adversaries and then list four steps Congress can take in response. In the past, the Soviet Union and the United States possessed nuclear weapons stockpiles that dwarfed China's. Beijing has set out to change that. China has so rapidly expanded its nuclear arsenal that it may be a match for our own by the end of this decade. With breathtaking speed, China completed a nuclear triad of intercontinental ballistic missiles, long-range bombers, and ballistic missile submarines. China's pace and sophistication took us by surprise, frankly. We were slow to respond as China built hundreds of new ballistic missile silos.…”