Jeff Bingaman: “again I will not take the full 7 minutes, but let me conclude by saying that I think there is clearly a failure to…”

“again I will not take the full 7 minutes, but let me conclude by saying that I think there is clearly a failure to communicate here on this issue. My colleague from New Hampshire says that the Army wants this program. Looking at the facts: The administration asked for a fairly healthy defense budget; the Armed Services Committee, in the bill that is before the Senate here, added about over $12 billion to that-- something in that range. In order to come up with that additional money, we went to each of the services and said, ``What is on your wish list? Are there things you would like to have funded that we were not able to fund, or that the President did not request, or that the Pentagon did not request, the Secretary of Defense did not request?'' The Army gave us over $2 billion worth of those, more like $3 billion. I am not sure of the exact amount. Again, there was nothing in there for this ASAT capability. The argument that the Army wants this, they just never want us to give them any money for it, is a hard one for me to understand. I think, clearly, this is not a program I am trying to kill. We are not touching the money. The money has been added here, and we are saying, ``Fine, let's go ahead and spend the money for whichever option the Pentagon wants to pursue.'' But let the Pentagon make the judgment. Do not try to prejudge the right technology in order to develop this ASAT capability. That is all we are saying.”