John Spratt: “These are the accumulated work orders for the Nunn-Lugar program ready to be executed if the gentleman does not stop the…”

“These are the accumulated work orders for the Nunn-Lugar program ready to be executed if the gentleman does not stop the funds with this ill-considered amendment. For somewhere between $300 and $400 million a year we can destroy nuclear missiles that were targeted to us and could have destroyed us throughout 50 years of the cold war. That in my book is money well spent. This amendment would have us cut off an investment in our own security if the Russians were to sell to the Chinese, listen to this, a cruise missile with a range of 60 nautical miles. This type of missile is already deployed by the Indian Navy. It cannot be ignored or dismissed. It is not state-of-the-art, however, by any means, and though it can be tipped with a small nuclear warhead, it more often carries a conventional warhead, and it does not constitute by any stretch of the imagination a strategic threat to the United States. Russian ICBM's, however, and Russian SLBM's and the fissile materials that must be secured from nations hostile to the United States are a strategic threat. This is not a good amendment, it is not a good idea. I urge all Members to vote against the Solomon amendment. It is not in our national security interests.”