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<TITLE>Harold P. Smith, Jr.</TITLE>
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<CENTER><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000"><FONT SIZE="+3">Defense
by Other Means: Status of the</FONT></FONT></FONT></CENTER>
<CENTER><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000"><FONT SIZE="+3">Nunn-Lugar
Program</FONT></FONT></FONT></CENTER>
<CENTER><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000"><FONT SIZE="+2">United
States Assistant to the Secretary of Defense Harold P. Smith, Jr.</FONT></FONT></FONT>
</CENTER>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">To use General Joulwan's
artful phrase, despite the kind introduction by General Curtin, I am a
simple implementer of very key programs. And I will not attempt to surpass
the eloquence that I have heard in this gathering in this historic city.
This is the city to which Rudolph II brought de Brahe and Kepler to study
and work with the court in the early 17<SUP>th</SUP> century. As I hope
you all know, that set the stage for the scientific revolution. To a
scientist such as myself, this is a city where it started. When Isaac
Newton said the reason he could see so far was that he stood on the
shoulders of giants, the giants, in fact, were here. And it was Prague
that grew them. So I pay my obeisance to this wonderful capital city, and
I thank you for giving me the chance to come here.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">What I am going to talk
about is defense by other means. We have already noted that an expanding
NATO is a new form of defense, a new form of security, for Europe.
President Constantinescu said that security was equal to prosperity. There
is another dimension. Security is also equal to cooperation with one's
former adversaries. What I want to do is to present a new form of defense
for Europe, as Secretary Perry said, "defense by other means,"
in which Europe can, should, and indeed must play a greater role. I will
attempt to show why.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">What I will first do is
give you the status of the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction
Program. I will quickly tell you what the United States has done, is
doing, and, in fact, plans to do. And then I will try to show a few
examples where member-states' help is badly needed. Ambassador Robert
Hunter, last year at this gathering in Warsaw, said, "We must also
determine what countries must do to become real allies--producers, and not
just consumers, of security, when they join the Alliance." And of
course I will make some suggestions today. The point is, there is a cost
to being a member of NATO--a cost, when paid, that enhances the security
of us all.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">The Nunn-Lugar Bill was
first passed in 1991. It was an extremely complicated bill, and it remains
so today. To carry out the dictates of the bill demands lengthy
negotiations within the bureaucracy of the United States, and then it
demands lengthy negotiations within the bureaucracy of Russia, and then it
demands notification and agreement from the United States Congress. It is
the best example I have ever found of Churchill's observation of America:
"The Americans always get it right--after they have tried every
conceivable alternative."</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">Allegedly, the program got
off to a slow start in 1991, and, indeed, it did. The bill provided only
for authorizations of $800 million for the first two years, but with no
appropriations. That meant that Secretary Cheney, at the time, had the
dubious pleasure of convincing the various constituents at the Pentagon
that they should give up improvements to quality of life, peacekeeping,
improved infrastructure, better housing, research and development,
procurement, etc., in order to assist their former enemies, the Russians
and the 3 other nuclear states, Kazakstan, Belarus, and Ukraine. Needless
to say, Secretary Cheney moved cautiously. In fact, only $23 million of
the $800 million available during the Bush administration was even
obligated. It did, indeed, get off to a slow start.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">But this is a new
administration. This is the Clinton administration, and then-Deputy
Secretary Perry made it vividly clear to me when I was sworn into office
in June, 1993, that this program must move, and it must move quickly--and
indeed it has. Now, some four years later, we have notified and have the
agreement of the Congress to spend almost $2 billion. We have actually
obligated, that is, have under contract, well over $1 billion. Congress,
indeed, has been very generous. And as I start to show you what $1 or $2
billion buys, I think you will agree with me that Senator Dirksen was
wrong. He said, "A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon it
adds up to real money." Nonsense! We have done some wonderful things
with that billion dollars.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">For example, there are
three fewer nuclear states in the world today: Belarus, Ukraine, and
Kazakhstan. They have all agreed, independently and severally, to return
their nuclear warheads to Russia. There are many reasons for that, but a
significant reason was the willingness of the United States to provide the
funds for the safe transport of those weapons, and to destroy the
vehicles, the silos, that remained behind. Step one, then, to create three
fewer nuclear powers, is well worth a billion dollars.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">When those warheads were
being moved within Russia, under the 12th Main Directorate, we used
super-containers built by the British. We have also provided rail cars,
computers, emergency equipment and training because we wanted to make sure
that those weapons arrived and arrived safely. The cooperation with the
Russians was a joy to behold.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">But let us continue to
watch the flow of those weapons. Some are being dismantled, and will end
up at a place called Mayak. There the United States has contracts with
Bechtel to build a storage facility to hold approximately 12,500 warheads.
The walls are rising now, thanks to the leadership of Bechtel, and thanks
to their ability to hire Russian subcontractors, which means jobs in
Russia--hard currency, paid-every-two-weeks. When those warhead components
begin arriving, they will be safely stored, and they will be subject to
transparency measures. If indeed we proceed to a START III, which includes
stockpile transparency measures, what we are learning in Mayak will be of
considerable value.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">Let me return, though, to
those nuclear warhead storage sites that I mentioned, with over 10,000
nuclear weapons, both tactical and strategic. I posit that this is
possibly the greatest source of nuclear proliferation in the world today.
Those weapons are guarded by loyal soldiers who are, unfortunately,
underpaid, sometimes not paid, underfed, and not well housed. The morale
may or may not be good, but one can see that it is a fruitful field for
people who may have a million dollars, who might want one or two or three
of those weapons. There have been no mistakes so far, but we--we, NATO;
we, the United States; we, Russia--cannot afford to let anything but the
finest security be present at those sites. Therefore, the Nunn-Lugar
Program is providing this day to the Russians cameras, computer inventory,
personnel-reliability programs, physical security enhancements, anything
we can think of and the Russians can think of, to secure those weapons. We
will be planning all this at a place called Sergiev-Posad. Many of you
know it as Zagorsk, a wonderful city with 11 different monasteries and
cathedrals, but also, I am pleased to say, shortly with one site where the
Americans and Russians are training the troops who guard those weapons
with the various technologies that we can bring to the scene. Will the
Americans ever be able to go out to the site and assist in the actual
guarding? I doubt it. But we have found a way to convince ourselves and
the Congress that the equipment is being used for the purposes intended,
and that the Russians are truly appreciative of what we are bringing to
them.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">Let us turn to the
delivery vehicles we promised to destroy in the three now no-nuclear
states and in Russia as well. Secretary Perry and I have personally been
to the Engels Air Base, and we have seen American equipment chopping up
bombers, piles of jet engines and propellers. I was with Secretary Perry
at Pervomaysk in Ukraine, on a cold winter day, 30-knot winds, and we
successfully withdrew an SS-19 missile from its silo. I have a wonderful
photograph of that scene signed by Bill Perry. He describes it as "a
moment in history." And he is right. I have a better photo, which
shows that missile being transported across the winter waste of the
Ukrainian plains. And today, if you go to that silo, you will find that it
is not there, that in fact there are sunflowers growing there--sunflowers
being a cash crop in Ukraine. The Americans made good on our promise. We
have removed the warheads; we have removed the missile; we have destroyed
the silo, we have returned the land to the purposes for which it was
intended.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">Or take the case of
Surovatikha in the Ural Mountains, where one of the finest rocket engines
of all time, the SS-18 liquid-rocket engine, is being eliminated. I have
stood with the colonel who oversees the storage and maintenance of
engines, while we put it into a meat grinder that would have pleased James
Bond in the movie <I>Goldfinger</I>. And coming out the back end of that
meat grinder is an SS-18 engine--although it is really just a cubic foot
of pressed metal, thoroughly destroyed, never to be used again.</FONT></FONT>
</P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">Or consider the
solid-rocket motor contract that we have just awarded to Lockheed-Martin.
We will destroy--we will help the Russians destroy--almost 17 kilotons of
solid propellant that formerly was in the SS-24 , SS-25, and naval
missile, the SS-N-20. Lockheed-Martin will do that as the integrating
contractor. I want you to note the steady progression here from an
order-book mentality, where we simply ask our Russian colleagues, "What
do you need? Rail cars? Geiger counters?" And we provided them. Now I
am talking about an integrating contractor--a contractor with the skills
of a Lockheed-Martin--that goes in, designs and organizes the plants,
hires the subcontractors, again, thereby providing honest, good-paying
jobs to the local community. So we have gone from the order-book to the
general contractor to the integrating contractor, and I think we are going
to now take another step.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">There are three yards
where the Russians built some of the finest submarines in the world:
Bolshoi Kamen, Murmansk, and a place called Severodvinsk. Severodvinsk is
a company town. Its population is constant, but it is not getting any
money. It is supposed to be dismantling the Russian submarines, and indeed
they are, at a rate of about one per year, using American equipment. I
have even met with the mayor of that town. We could in the future
negotiate a contract in which the Americans as a prime contractor will be
allowed to organize the yard, form subcontracting teams, and, we think,
improve the efficiency by a factor of four. At that time, the workers who
are currently underpaid or not paid will be fully paid, with hard
currency, on time, and will be removing strategic missile submarines at
four times the rate previously. So you can see we have now gone from
integrating contractor to turn-key to, in fact, plant manager.</FONT></FONT>
</P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">The nice thing about this
is that the Russians are clearly admiring and learning the kind of
technology that our prime contractors bring to the scene. More
importantly, trust has been building over these four years as we have gone
from the order-book mentality to that of the integrating contractor. That
trust is going to pay great dividends in the years ahead.</FONT></FONT>
</P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">So the question is, what
role can the NATO member states play? New members and old members--what
role? And the answer is, any role you please. Simple, bilateral
relationships will work just fine. The United States, for obvious reasons,
needs to be kept informed. As an example, the Germans have provided the
wherewithal to destroy eleven silos in Ukraine. Those eleven silos are
near populated areas where the local codes do not allow our explosive
technologies to be used to destroy them. Without our knowledge, the
Ukrainians accepted the German offer, and thereby created a problem. We
had a contract to destroy all, and the Germans had a contract to destroy
some. That is not a problem between Allies--we simply adapted our program
and rewrote the contract with our contractors. The German technology is
being used for a total of seventeen silos, and our technology will be used
elsewhere.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">The British have played a
role, the French, the Canadians, the Japanese, the Norwegians, the
European Union. These countries have provided everything from tools,
trucks, emergency equipment, destruction of mustard-gas weapons,
conversion of weapons plutonium metal to oxide fuel for reactors--but they
could do much more. It is a small percentage of what the Nunn-Lugar
Program has provided.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">Let me give you only one
example of where your assistance is greatly needed. I will turn to the
world of chemical weapons. The Russians have declared some 40,000 tons of
chemical weapons; we, the Americans, have some 30,000. And long before the
Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) appeared on the scene, the United States
committed itself to destroying those weapons. Because of the perceived and
real dangers of destroying lethal gas, it has been an extremely difficult
program but it proceeds, and it would have proceeded with or without the
CWC. Fortunately, as you all know, we ratified that treaty at the eleventh
hour. But the Russian Duma has not ratified. Their logic is quite simple:
if they do not have the funds to carry out the conditions of the treaty,
they will not ratify it.</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">The CTR program, from 1993
forward, waited neither for Russian funds nor the Chemical Weapons
Convention. We started immediately. And we have come a long way. We have
qualified a Russian technology for the destruction of nerve agents. We
have selected a site in the southern Urals, a place called Shchuch'ye. Two
contractors, Bechtel and Parsons, are on the ground, in the Urals,
designing the equipment to destroy the chemical weapons site present
there. We have agreed to build everything inside the industrial fence,
that is, the actual pilot plant itself, and we are beginning negotiations
to consider building the entire plant itself. But Congress has been very,
very clear: there will be no U.S. money to build anything outside the
fence. There are no roads; there is no power; there is no water for a
plant of this size. The money has to come from somewhere. We will continue
with our program of building the pilot plant inside that fence, up until
we come to an impediment caused by the lack of an industrial
infrastructure in a very rural town in the Urals. At that point, we stop.
At that point, massive stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction will
continue their slow deterioration and their mounting risk to the local
community and, in a sense, to the world. We invite all member-states, and
especially new member-states, to contribute in some form or other to this
very important project. As Minister Kosmo said, "There is a cost to
membership."</FONT></FONT> </P>
<P><FONT FACE="Palatino"><FONT COLOR="#000000">We have just marked the
50th anniversary of the Marshall Plan, and I do not mean to imply that the
Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, the Nunn-Lugar Program, is a
Marshall Plan. But it is the right plan, some 50 years later. A cold and
forbidding peace settled on Europe in 1947. Today there is vibrant hope.
But we must first dismantle those engines of mass destruction that held us
all in thrall for half a century. My Russian colleagues join me in
inviting your assistance in this defense of all of us--this defense by
other means--by generously and cooperatively removing the weapons of mass
destruction from this earth.</FONT></FONT> </P>
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