By Emelie Rutherford
A Democratic lawmaker planning to visit Polish, Czech, and Russian officials said she will explain Congress’ mandate for not deploying a European missile-defense site without adequate testing while also making clear that Russian objections will not quash the site.
“These are very sensitive things, so that’s part of the reason why I’m going there,” Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.), chair of the House Armed Services Strategic Forces subcommittee, said yesterday about the overseas trip she and a delegation of House Armed Services Committee (HASC) members will depart for on Friday. “A lot of this is about politics.”
Missile-defense observers are waiting to see if and how President-elect Barack Obama deviates from the Bush administration’s position of support for quickly deploying the so-called third site in the Czech Republic and Poland. Still, Tauscher said she will be speaking for Congress, not Obama, on the trip to the two nations and to Russia and Germany.
Congressional Democrats have ensured that the European site cannot be deployed until the system is tested twice, the defense secretary certifies it works, and the Czech and Polish governments agree to the host the setup–conditions not yet achieved.
Tauscher, in comments yesterday after a speech at the Center for National Policy think tank in Washington, said she also plans to make clear on the trip that, “We can’t allow the Russians to look like they’re vetoing what we’re going to do,” referring to the nation’s objections to siting interceptors in Poland and radars in the Czech Republic.
Tauscher said Congress’ plans are clear in current law.
“The Congress has said that we are not going to deploy systems that have not been tested sufficiently,” Tauscher said. “I don’t believe that that varies dramatically from where President-elect Obama’s administration will be. But it certainly is different from what the Bush administration has done….When we see what President-elect Obama and his administration decide to do, we hope that we’re congruent.”
Obama’s transition team Web site says his administration “will support missile defense, but ensure that it is developed in a way that is pragmatic and cost-effective; and, most importantly, does not divert resources from other national security priorities until we are positive the technology will protect the American public.”
Tauscher said she is “thrilled” Defense Secretary Robert Gates will continue in his job in the Obama administration, and that she doesn’t think his support during the Bush administration for quickly deploying the European site will generate friction.
“I don’t believe that the decisions on missile defense were his, I believe that they were ideological decisions made by the Bush administration, and happily that’s coming to an end,” she said, noting Gates has always worked “very fairly” with her.
Tauscher said she does not believe she and Gates have different points of view on missile defense.
“We need to have protections for forward-deployed troops, our allies, our assets; that is not in dispute,” she said. “I think that we have wide support for that. What is in dispute is the Bush administration’s decision to make the (Missile Defense Agency) MDA a fair-haired child with no adult supervision, not forcing it to have the rigorous testing that every other agency has, not flying before you buy, and not doing the things necessary to achieve credible deterrence on this kind of system.”
Concerns about having “science projects going on and on and on” are behind Congress’ move to shift missile-defense spending to shorter-range systems–Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, PAC-3, and Aegis Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) interceptors–that can help warfighters now, Tauscher said.
She called for continuing to work to “NATOize” the missile-defense system for countering Iran’s short-and-medium-range missiles. Meanwhile, she said, the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system, which is integral to the long-range setup, “is a system that needs more testing.”
Tauscher noted shortcomings in last week’s closely watched test of the GMD system, including that 40-year-old missiles were used as targets and it was only the third test in six years.
“In each of those tests, countermeasures have failed,” she said. “And it is a system that has not achieved the minimum of credible deterrence. If you spend $60 billion on a system, and your primary antagonists, Iran and North Korea, keep doing what they’re doing, then you haven’t convinced anybody that your system works. I can’t allow that.”