Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 3 minutes. Having previously served as the chairman of the Strategic Forces Subcommittee for several years, I am intimately familiar with our intercontinental ballistic missile forces and the important role ICBM deterrence plays when it comes to our national defense. While I understand the intent of this amendment, it is fundamentally unnecessary, dramatically overreaching, and lacks meaningful policy reform. The budget request for FY 2017 contains no funding for reducing the alert level or reducing the number of deployed ICBMs below 400, and there are no plans to do so in the future. Furthermore, the statement of policy with regard to ICBMs, which is legally binding, significantly overreaches. It states that modernization of the ICBMs and retaining an alert ICBM force is necessary to ensure robust nuclear deterrence by preventing any adversary from believing it can carry out a small, surprise, first-strike attack which disarms the strategic forces of the United States. However, this disregards the crucial and fundamental role of submarines that provide assured, survivable second-strike capability, which would dissuade an adversary from even thinking they could launch a disarming attack against the United States. If we include any legislation on ICBMs, Mr. Chairman, it should be that we increase accountability and ensure that we are improving the morale and culture inside the Air Force with regard to nuclear weapons.…”