William M. ``Mac'' Thornberry: “thanks to the work of the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Weldon), the chairman of the committee, the gentleman from…”

“thanks to the work of the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Weldon), the chairman of the committee, the gentleman from California (Mr. Hunter), others and the Rumsfeld Commission, no one seriously questions whether we are threatened today by the spread of missiles, nor does anyone question whether that threat is going to grow in the future. No one seriously questions whether the American people want and in fact demand a defense against those missiles, which even the administration now seems to acknowledge. Mr. Speaker, if the national security is the first responsibility of the Federal Government and if protecting the homeland of the United States and the people of the United States is the first job of national security, then I do not know of any program that ought to be higher on the priority list than this one. The question is do we in Congress and does the administration really mean what we say in this resolution? Are these words merely a way to try to deal with a political problem and the polls, or do they mean something, and are they going to be backed up with action? Since 1983, we have heard a million excuses about how we could not do this or we should not do this. Even today we hear excuses. But we cannot give Russia or anyone else a veto over our right to defend ourselves, we cannot be afraid of test failures, and we certainly cannot be fooled by those few people who say that by weakening ourselves we are really making ourselves stronger.”