Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, this amendment would strike a legislative rider that was put in the bill to prevent the Department of Defense from decommissioning nuclear missile silos. As you know, the Defense Appropriations bill requires the administration to keep 50 soon-to-be-empty silos--silos with no missiles--on warm standby. The missiles in these silos will be eliminated under the New START arms control agreement, and the administration was hoping to be able to destroy the silos eventually and save some money, but this bill will keep them in warm standby forever. This is not without costs. Under New START, those extra empty silos will have to be counted against our launcher totals, meaning we will have fewer permissible bombers or submarine-based missiles because we have, instead, empty ICBM silos. These silos have been precisely targeted by the Russians for decades. While it is important that we have an appropriate, flexible, and survivable nuclear deterrent, these land-based missiles are the least survivable leg of our deterrent, and, of course, empty silos deter no one. What this rider says is that we should have 50 empty silos and 50 fewer submarine-launched ballistic missiles or bombers. While it is true that, as an offer of support to Senators whose States have missile bases, the administration proposed to keep these silos warm temporarily, there is absolutely no reason to do so forever. This provision is not about security but about pork and political favoritism.…”