Kelly Ayotte

I certainly appreciate, General Odierno, Secretary McHugh, your service during challenging times.

I think it's very important that people understand that if we don't do that, we will have a hollow Army.

Obviously, we want to do everything we can to prevent suicides and to give people the support that they need in difficult circumstances.

I have asked him about this on many instances. But what I really want to ask you is will you meet the law and produce the budgetary statement of audit-ready budget statements by the end of 2014 because it is the law?

It is my hope that given that the Navy has said that they are able to do this, that we will follow through.

The Navy, in looking at their resources and budget, have come up with a proposal that could end all the furloughs.

I am sure you will come up with a more polite way to say, can you tell them to, 'knock it off,' but that is what we need.

In my view, China could end some of the deeply troubling and bellicose behavior that we are seeing from the leader of North Korea.

Once we get behind on a maintenance schedule, then the entire maintenance of our naval fleet and our submarine fleet gets behind.

I had an opportunity to meet with Admiral Ferguson yesterday.

A delay in the Ohio-class replacement program would complicate the Navy's ability to meet its nuclear deterrence patrol and presence requirements.

So obviously, not having gone forward, this administration, with what the prior administration had planned, in 2009 has delayed some capacity that we now believe we need; is that right?

At some point we're going to have to go forward with our regular testing, though, because this isn't something that we just planned for this.

I think that's particularly important, given that North Korea relies on China essentially for its economic existence almost.

It seems to me that we need to be, I would think, clearer with China as to what our expectations are because this is a danger to them.

Wouldn't it be--as I understand it, in fact, China is North Korea's biggest trading partner, their main source of food, arms to some extent, and fuel.

The SPP provides approximately 10 percent of the total annual theater engagement in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility.

So one thing that--when you look at what's happened in the last couple of weeks with the new leader of North Korea and his bellicose actions, which seem to go beyond their typical cycle of provocation that we've seen in the past with his…

I am proud of the work all the National Guard does in support of SOUTHCOM through the SPP.

I think that preserving our nuclear deterrent is very important.

I think that Congress should have an ability to weigh in on these issues.

I would actually like a follow-up for the record, just with the question of whether they are in full compliance with all existing arms control agreements with the United States.

Should they not be bilateral and verifiable? Is verifiable important if we were going to take arms reductions based on what we were going to count on a bilateral understanding with the Russians?

But just so we're clear, as of today am I not correct in saying that west coast, North Korea, we get shoot-look-shoot?

Can you tell me right now--in the article it said that the Joint Chiefs had agreed that we could trim the number of active nuclear weapons in America's arsenal by nearly a third and make big cuts in the stockpile of backup weapons.