On the recordMay 17, 2012
Mr. Chairman, this amendment makes an enormous amount of sense. There is no question North Korea is a threat, but there are two very salient points. First of all, as Mr. Johnson stated, we have a number of troops in South Korea. We have a number of options, including nuclear submarines and bombers in the region. We have on the table what we need to deal with that threat militarily. Yes, Mr. Franks had an amendment in the committee that asked us to look at ways to expand that, including the possibility of deploying tactical nuclear weapons to the region, which I think is very dangerous to talk about. But specifically, it would be very dangerous to deploy those tactical nuclear weapons to South Korea. That's why this amendment is limited to saying that that would be a bad idea. We all remember the Cuban missile crisis, how people are likely to react to nuclear weapons being deployed close by them. And North Korea is hardly a predictable actor. I can say with quite a great deal of confidence that if we were to put tactical nuclear weapons in South Korea, it would be an incredibly dangerous thing to do in terms of predicting how North Korea would react. The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentleman has expired.
