Secretary WOLFOWITZ. Well, the history of arms control agreements are mostly these protracted negotiations between two heavily armed, essentially hostile adversaries, the United States and the Soviet Union, and you are right, those negotiations took forever. I participated in a lot of them, and it was reminiscent of root canal work, and we are certainly not going to reach an agreement early if we approach it in that way. But the premise on which we are proceeding is that Russia is not the Soviet Union.

This is not a potential adversary. It is, in fact, a country that we would like to bring into closer partnership with us. It is a potential friend, maybe even a potential ally, and I think that is the way we want to move forward.

I must say that if someone envisions a negotiation like the old ones with the Soviet Union, and that we will not in any way encounter constraints to the ABM Treaty during the time of a protracted negotiation like that, I think, Senator, that really is giving the Russians a veto over our program, and that is the dilemma we are caught in here.

I think everyone agrees we need to move forward in missile defense. We do not want to give the Russians a veto. I think everyone agrees also we would like to achieve a cooperative outcome, and I think that forces a fairly rapid schedule.

I would emphasize, too, though I hope this is not where we end up, that even in the worst case if we say these are important things we have to proceed with them. If we do not yet have an agreement but we need to withdraw, that certainly should not be the end of negotiations. In fact, most of the negotiations that you refer to did not begin from a treaty. They began from an American program. In fact, the ABM Treaty itself grew out of a vote in this body to move forward with a Safeguard ABM system.

Senator DAYTON. I would agree with you, Mr. Secretary, that we certainly do not want to give Russia a veto. On the other hand, what seemed to be an agreement that the improvement, or at least the retention of global stability is the sine qua non in this arrangement, so as you say, you are in a delicate situation. It would seem that if the actions diplomatically of this administration are such that they cause Russia to respond adversarially, rather than cooperatively, that would seriously undermine even the military's intent of this undertaking.

Secretary WOLFOWITZ. That is a fair point, Senator, but we are doing more than trying to achieve an agreement with the Russians. We are doing a lot of things that they can observe, and I think ought to discourage them from any kind of precipitous or dangerous reaction. I come back to what I think is really very fundamental, and that is the reductions in our own offensive nuclear forces.

We are already taking some without any protracted negotiations. We did not even negotiate a week to remove 50 MIRV'd MX missiles from our force, nor to remove four Trident submarines, with nearly 800 nuclear warheads. We are taking more than 1,000 nuclear warheads out of our force with this budget alone, and it did not take a week of negotiations with the Russians.

I mean, you go back 10 years, when the previous President Bush, and I believe it was September-I think it was even September 27

General KADISH. There are no procurement or deployment activities in the current program, but there are decision points to offer it to the Secretary and others to decide whether we have enough information to proceed with a procurement and deployment program. Right now that is not part of the plan, and our intention at this point is to test as robustly and rapidly as we can all the systems that are under development so that we can be in a position to actually provide that information to the decisionmakers.

Senator AKAKA. General, I would like to mention and discuss countermeasures. In space, a warhead and simple decoy, such as a traffic cone, look the same. Is that correct?

General KADISH. They theoretically can be made to look the same, but you have to define look, and what visible or IR spectrum. There is a number of ways that you would want to look at them in the spectrums we deal with.

Senator AKAKA. It is my understanding that the flight test on Saturday used a single balloon decoy. How many decoys are you planning to use in future tests? If it is just a few decoys, is this a realistic test, when an enemy could use multiple cheap decoys, such as a simple traffic cone to deceive us?

General KADISH. The countermeasure and the decoy problems will be addressed as we build our test to be more complex in these areas, and ultimately I am hoping that we have I could not give you the exact number of decoys, but a lot of decoys, and see how the system performs.

In fact, in the world of development, we would like to actually test what we call the edge of the envelope, so that we can actually break the system and find out how many decoys you can have or not have, and that would be my intention, if we can afford to do that in the long run. But again, that is the issue of having a layered system, because countermeasures that work in the midcourse, like the tests that we did on Saturday, do not work in boost phase, and those that work potentially in boost phase do not work in midcourse, so having a layered system greatly complicates the countermeasure problem for our adversary, and it simplifies it for us to a large degree.

That does not mean that we would not aggressively pursue overcoming midcourse countermeasures, but it certainly would help us to have a layered system.

Senator AKAKA. Thank you very much for your responses. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman LEVIN. Thank you, Senator Akaka.

Senator Carnahan.

Senator CARNAHAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for extending this hearing on this most important subject.

The committee is tasked with the responsibility of authorizing funds for our Nation's defense programs. As we address this year's defense budget, we will need to address some fundamental questions that I believe concern the American people. First, are we spending the available defense funds in a way that maximizes our national defense? We need to strike the right balance.

The President has requested a huge increase in missile defense, but his requests for readiness are modest. We are actually cutting funds for nonmissile defense science research. Even if one supports

the concept of missile defense, we all need to ask, at what cost, and what other defense priorities will be sacrificed, and second, we need to make sure our budget is geared toward addressing the most imminent and realistic threats to the United States.

I believe the average American is genuinely and appropriately concerned about the possibilities of a terrorist attack with a deadly virus, or some other devastating lethal attack. Of course, we must also address the serious threat of an accidental missile launch, or a missile attack by a rogue nation. Again, the difficulty is striking the right balance. I hope that this hearing will bring us closer to answering these questions. I am encouraged by the successful results of last weekend's flight test, but I believe that we must remain cautious in our enthusiasm.

As General Kadish commented on Saturday night, this success was only one step on the journey. We have a long road ahead in all of the missile defense activities that we have ahead of us. I hope that today, General Kadish and Secretary Wolfowitz will be able to help us as we proceed along that road.

My first question is to General Kadish. I understand your organization intends to accelerate its testing schedule with close to two dozen flight tests before the 2004 deployment date. Are you at all concerned that this schedule is so condensed that you may not have sufficient time between each of the tests to evaluate the performance of the system's components, and what primary factors will you be reviewing to measure the success of this program?

General KADISH. Well, Senator, that is a good question. Whenever we accelerate tests of this magnitude, the intercontinental ranges-I think you saw how complex it was on Saturday. When we decide to increase the number of tests, we will also at the same time put in the management practices to deal with that acceleration, and so to some degree having a lot of time between tests gives us the luxury of having a lot of time to do data reduction and data analysis. As we squeeze that time between tests, we have to make the management changes as well as invest in some equipment to do the data analysis quicker.

In addition to that, as we have more experience with our tests, doing high ops tempo testing, we will be looking at finer grain type elements of the system, and we should be able to reduce that data quicker. So I am confident that, as we increase the number, we will not lose any of our fidelity of analysis, but we will be able to accelerate that as well, and if we cannot, we are going to look very carefully at slowing the test program down, but I do not think we should slow down the test program based on our ability to analyze data.

Senator CARNAHAN. Secretary Wolfowitz, legal discussions on missile defense have recently focused on two important documents, the 1972 Antiballistic Missile Treaty, and the 1999 Cochran-Inouye National Missile Defense Act. At the last hearing, we learned that the President has requested funds for missile defense programs that may violate the ABM Treaty. Would you once again explain how missile defense development proposed in the President's defense budget might bump up against our commitment to the ABM Treaty?

Secretary WOLFOWITZ. I would point out that this is not the first budget that has done that. One budget actually includes money that the Clinton administration asked for to begin the construction of a radar in Shemya, Alaska which is, I think, the consensus of virtually all lawyers, and that is a hard consensus to find, that would have been, or would be a violation of the ABM Treaty.

In the 2002 budget, as best we can determine, there are three events that raise questions about the treaty. I discussed them in some detail in my last testimony, and they are addressed in the attachments to this testimony.

Each of the three, the test bed at Fort Greely, Alaska and the two test events of non-ABM radars, and some of our missile shots, raise issues under the treaty that we still do not have full review by the lawyers as to whether they are compliant or not compliant. They are in the gray zone on the boundaries of the treaty, and therefore one cannot say with clarity whether they violate the treaty or not.

Senator CARNAHAN. Before leaving the treaty, the United States would have to announce its intention to do so at least 6 months in advance. Is the administration prepared to make this announcement if it is determined that the U.S. missile defense policies compete with the treaty's provisions?

Secretary WOLFOWITZ. I do not think the President has made that decision. It is certain we will comply with the treaty, and that if we were to do something in violation of the treaty, we would only do it after withdrawing, and withdrawal, as you correctly point out, requires 6 months notification.

But as I have said, and I have said it repeatedly, our goal is to get to a situation where we can move forward cooperatively with the Russians beyond the constraints of the treaty, and not to find ourselves in a situation where we are forced either to constrain our program and limit our ability to protect the American people or, ternatively, to withdraw from the treaty unilaterally.

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We would like to find a cooperative approach with the Russians, and Senator, I am optimistic we can do so.

Senator CARNAHAN. One final question. The 1999 CochranInouye National Missile Defense Act mandated a dual-track approach toward national missile defense. First, it authorizes as soon as technologically possible deployment of a national missile defense system capable of defending the territory of the United States. against limited ballistic missile attacks with funding subject to the annual authorization, and appropriations, and the annual appropriation of funds for national missile defense, and second, the law authorizes that the United States continue negotiating reductions in Russian nuclear forces.

Does your budget request seek funds for programs designed to address more than a limited ballistic missile attack? In other words, do you feel that you need additional statutory authority to plan and design and build the layered missile defense that you have proposed?

Secretary WOLFOWITZ. All we are seeking in the missile defense area this year is the money we are requesting under the authorization, but on the other side of that act, the Cochran-Inouye Act, the part you referred to about negotiated reductions, that is part of the

tem as it relates to our treaty with the former Soviet Union, which is in question, and finally, were we aware that this was going to this treaty, or that this agreement, if not a treaty, between Russia and China was imminent?

Secretary WOLFOWITZ. Senator, we were definitely aware they were likely to sign a treaty of friendship during this meeting. I have to confess I have not yet seen it, and I do not know that we have the exact text of what they have signed.

Senator BEN NELSON. But it is outside of the agreement that we have with the former Soviet Union which is in question.

Secretary WOLFOWITZ. Well, I think it has no direct bearing on the ABM Treaty. I think what it does indicate is, at least if one thinks about what the Russians are doing here, first of all, they have a 12,000 mile border with China, and they have good reason to try to have good relations with that country.

Second, we know that in relationships like this, countries try to use their relationship with another country to try to get some leverage in another negotiation, and this clearly is intended to get some leverage with us, and we know outside of that arrangement, and frankly much more disturbing, that the Russians are selling a number of military systems to China that some day I think they may come to regret.

There is no direct connection to the ABM Treaty, and I think we can reach the kind of understanding we are hoping to reach with the Russians consistent with their having a treaty of friendship with China.

Senator BEN NELSON. So you do not see this as a de facto veto of our efforts to move forward without regard to an agreement with Russia.

Secretary WOLFOWITZ. I do not think it is a veto. I think it probably is, among other things, intended by the Russians to give them more negotiating leverage, but it certainly does not give them a veto.

Senator BEN NELSON. At least it may be in part sending a message.

Secretary WOLFOWITZ. It may be, yes.

Senator BEN NELSON. I want to thank you for your patience, or at least your appearance of patience. When I keep trying to bore in on some definitional things so I know whether we are moving from development to deployment, I am really trying to figure out whether there is a difference, or if it is a matter of shades of gray.

I get a little concerned when we begin to lump all defense systems together-theater as well as intercontinental-as layered, because I am not sure where one shade of gray begins and the other ends. Maybe that is the fair way to do it, but it is a harder way for a person such as myself to analyze where we are, and I was taken by General Kadish's comment that there is a long road ahead.

At least on a road, if I am looking at a map, I know from point A to point B the points in between. I cannot determine for myself right now the points in between from development to deployment. Sometimes I think we are definitionally encumbered here, and it makes it more difficult for somebody such as myself. Is it a definitional difference, or is there a real difference?