vote:

the presiding officer: are there any senators wishing to vote or to change a vote?

if want, on the amendment, there are 32 yeas, 63 noes, the amendment is not agreed to. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the question is on the risch amendment 4878. mr. kerry: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. mr. kerry: i move to table the risch amendment and i ask for the yeas and nays. and i ask unanimous consent that this be a ten-minute vote. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. is there a sufficient second? there appears to be a sufficient second. the question is on the motion to table. the clerk will call the roll. vote:

vote:

vote: the presiding officer: are there any senators wishing to vote or to change a vote?

if not, on the motion to table, the ayes are 61, the nays are 32. the motion to table is agreed to. mr. reid: mr. president? mr. president? the presiding officer: without objection, the majority leader is recognized. mr. reid: we're in a position now, we don't have the consent agreement completely fixed, but we know what we're going to do. we're going to have three votes, three different amendments. it will be a half-hour debate on each amendment. so we likely will have another series of votes at 8:15 or thereabouts tonight. we'll have -- senator kerry will offer a consent agreement to that effect very shortly. in the meantime, we can start debating one of the amendments. mr. kerry: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. mr. kerry: mr. president, i understand there will be three amendments that we'll proceed with. two will be by senator kyl and one by senator wicker. i believe senator wicker is

prepared to call up his amendment at this point. i think we're going to proceed -- i would ask unanimous consent that on each amendment there be a half-hour equally divided -- no, hold it. okay. mr. president, we'll hold off on the unanimous consent agreement, but senator wicker, i believe, will start the debate on his amendment. thank you. the presiding officer: the senator from mississippi is recognized. mr. wicker: i ask consent to call up amendment number 4895 by wicker and kyl. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. the clerk will report. the clerk: the senator from mississippi, mr. wicker, proposes amendment numbered 4895. at the end -- mr. wicker: i ask unanimous consent that the amendment be considered as read. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. wicker: and thank you, mr. president. i rise this evening to offer

another amendment to the resolution of ratification. this amendment rises out of concerns over the bilateral consultive commission known as the b.c.c. the b.c.c. has been referred to numerous times in debate today. article 12 of the treaty establishes the b.c.c. as a forum for the parties to resolve issues concerning implementation of the treaty. part six of the protocol says the b.c.c. has the authority to resolve questions relating to compliance, agree to additional measures to improve the viability and effectiveness of the treaty and discuss other issues raised by either party. this clearly is very broad authority given to the b.c.c. in effect, the subject matter jurisdiction of the b.c.c. seems

limitless, based on the clear language of article 12. now, former national security advisor under president george w. bush, stephen hadley, appeared before the senate foreign relations committee and expressed concerns over this treaty, and he stated with regard to the bilateral consultive commission -- quote -- "the bilateral consultive commission seems to have been given authority to adopt without senate review measures that -- measures to improve the viability and effectiveness of the treaty, which could include restrictions on missile defense." unquote. it is that element of senate review that this amendment will inject back into the process. mr. president, others have

voiced concern that the mandate of the b.c.c. is overly broad. this should trouble senators, and it's why i offer this amendment to place proper limits on the power of the b.c.c. now, i hold in my hand a fact sheet written by the department of state bureau of verification, compliance and implementation, dated august 11, 2010, and i ask that this fact sheet consisting of two pages be admitted into the record at this point. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. wicker: the fact sheet mentions on more than one occasion that change is -- that changes adopted by the b.c.c. cannot affect substantive rights or obligations. it says under background, the new start treaty authorizes the parties to use the bilateral consultive commission, b.c.c.,

to reach agreement on changes in the protocol of the treaty, including its annexes, that do not affect substantive rights or obligations. further down, under authority of the b.c.c., the state department fact sheet says in addition to making technical changes to the protocol, including its annexes, that do not affect substantive rights or obligations, the b. b.c.c. may -- and then it lists six bullets. first, resolve questions relating to compliance with the obligations assumed by the parties. secondly, agree upon constitutional measures as -- substitutional measures as may be necessary to approve the necessity of the treaty. next, discuss features of the mills and their launchers, other than icbms and icbm launchers or slbms and slbm launchers, referred to in paragraph 3 of article 5 of the treaty that distinguished such missiles and

their launchers from icbm and icbm launchers or slbms and slbm launchers. next, discuss on an annual basis the exchange of telemetric information under the treaty. fifth, resolve questions related to the applicability of provisions of the treaty to a new kind of strategic offensive arm. and finally, discuss other issues raised by either party. but the changes may not affect substantive rights or obligations of the parties. rules governing the work of the b.c.c. the b.c.c. is required to meet at least twice a year in geneva unless the parties agree otherwise. the work of the b.c.c. is confidential except that the parties agree in the b.c.c. to release details of the work and b.c.c. agreements reached as a result of its work recorded in writing are not confidential.

if the b.c.c. agrees to amends in the treaty -- to amendments in the treaty -- the b.c.c. can agree to amendments in the treaty, but they must be submitted back to the united states senate for advice and consent. a very powerful provision, no doubt, and it's reassuring to have this fact sheet saying that substantive changes cannot be made by the b.c.c. it would be more reassuring if we put this in writing, and that is what the wicker and kyl amendment 4895 does. it -- it is very simple and it

uses the state department language, mr. president, stating that provisions adopted by the b.c.c. that affect substantive rights -- and those are the very words used by the state department in the fact sheet -- are those that create new rights or obligations for the united states and must therefore be submitted to the senate for its advice and consent. the bottom line is this: if it is determined that a substantive change has been made by a decision of the b.c.c., then that change should be subject to the advice and consent of the senate. i urge a yes vote to this very simple but straightforward amendment. mr. kerry: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts.

mr. kerry: mr. president, the amendment from senator wicker is really an amendment that's looking for an issue. it's -- it's -- there is no -- there is no issue that's joined here with respect to the bilateral commission or what it might do with respect to the creation of rights, but if this amendment were to pass, there would be an issue, and not only an issue with respect to russian participation but actually an issue that could be harmful to the u.s. this is a little bit technical, and it's a tricky thing to follow in some ways, but let me just lay this out. under the start treaty -- that's the prior treaty under which we have lived since 1992 -- under the start treaty and now under the proposed new start treaty,

the consultative commission that we create in the treaty, this commission that will get together in order to work out the problems that may or may not arise, it's allowed to agree upon -- and i'm quoting -- any -- such additional measures as may be necessary to improve the viability and the effectiveness of the treaty. now, if those additional measures that they might approve at some point in time are changes to the protocol or to its annexes and if the changes don't affect substantive rights or obligations under the treaty, then it is entirely allowable for those changes to be adopted without referring them back to the senate for any advice or ratification. the senator's proposed amendment would make it u.s. policy all of a sudden that the phrase "do not affect substantive rights or obligations" means doesn't create new rights or

obligations, so there is a distinction between affecting substantive rights and then having the operative language that kicks it in to gear become the creation of rights or obligations. so this proposal is really unnecessary. why? we have operated without it for 15 years under the start treaty without a single problem. the new start treaty uses the exact same approach that has worked for 15 years, and we have a lot of experience in determining what constitutes substantive rights or obligations. more importantly, i mentioned a moment ago that this could be harmful to american interests. here's how. it would actually require that agreements that we want to move on and that act in our national security interests, that they would be delayed and referred to the senate. and we all know how long that

could take, even if the new rights or obligations that they created were absolutely technical in nature, no matter how technical or trivial, they have to come to the united states senate to become hostage to one senator or another senator's agenda in terms of our ability to move, at least as structured here. now, under start, the compliance commission adopted provisions on how inspectors would use radiation detection equipment to determine that the objects on a missile that russia declared not to be warheads were, in fact, nonnuclear and therefore not warheads. there was absolutely no need for the senate to hold hearings, write reports, have a floor debate on that provision, even though it created a new right for the inspecting site and a new obligation for the hosting side in an inspection. so we really don't want to take away our ability to do that, and this amendment would do that.

similarly, the commission under start reached agreement from time to time on changes in the types of inspection and equipment that a country could use. equipment changes over time, as we know, which, you know, the technology advances so the equipment changes. giving u.s. inspectors the new right to use that equipment or the new obligation to let russian inspectors use it hardly warrants referral to the united states senate for its advice and consent. so in summary, this amendment is unneeded, we have done well without it -- not well. we have done spectacularly without it for 15 years. no problems whatsoever. and on the other side, it's a dangerous amendment because it forces us to delay for months the implementation of technical agreements that our inspectors ought to be allowed to implement without delay. mr. president, i reserve the balance of our time.

i ask unanimous consent that upon the use or yielding back of time specified below, the senate proceed to votes in relation to the following amendments to the resolution of ratification -- wicker 4895, kyl 4860, and kyl 4893. further, that prior to the votes there be no second-degree amendments in order to any of the amendments and that there be 30 minutes of debate on each amendment, equally divided between the sponsors of the amendment and myself and/or my designee or the designee of the sponsors. further, i ask consent that the time already consumed by senator wicker and myself be counted towards this agreement. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. kerry: how much time do i have left, mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator has nine minutes left on

the wicker amendment. mr. kerry: i yield three minutes to the senator from maryland. mr. cardin: first let me thank senator wicker for bringing forward this amendment. i know that it is an amendment he feels very strongly about. i just really want to compliment him because i believe a good part of what he was concerned about is already in the resolution of the advice and consent on ratification. as the senator pointed out, there is a consultation process before the bilateral consultive commission could meet on any changes that would modify the treaty itself, and there has to be consultation with congress on those issues, as the senator pointed out in his comments. so i think we have already taken care of the -- of the major concern that you have that it would be a substantive decision made by the bilateral consultive commission. secondly, let me point out that whatever the bilateral consultive commission does, it's limited by the treaty itself which has been ratified --

hopefully will have been ratified by both the united states and russia, so there will be the limit on the ratification already on the process. and as senator kerry pointed out, we certainly don't want to hold up minor administrative issues for senate confirmation, knowing how long senate confirmation of anything related to a treaty could take effect. the last point i want to bring out, you mentioned the missile defense -- i know this has been brought up over and over and over again, but in our resolution of adoption, of advice and consent, we have already put in that that the new start treaty does not impose any limitations on the deployment of missile defense other than the requirements of paragraph 3, article 4 of the new start treaty which states each party shall not convert, shall not use icbm launchers or slbm launchers for placement of missile defense interceptors therein. so we already put in the resolution the concern that you have voiced as the major reason why you wanted to expand the consultive process, which is

also already included in the resolution. so for all those reasons, the point i think senator kerry has raised, this would present -- make it technically unworkable for the bilateral consultive commission to do its work if we required the senate consultation or ratification n every time the commission wanted to meet. for all those reasons, i would urge my colleagues to reject the amendment.. the presiding officer: who yeedz time? mr. wicker: -- who yields time? mr. wicker: if no one else seeks time on this amendment, i'll close. it -- it may -- it may be that my friend from maryland is satisfied that there are no restrictions on missle defense

and this aspect of -- of the treaty, but it didn't satisfy stephen hadley, the national security adviser to former president george w. bush, who cameef we have a very simple way to address those concerns. let me reiterate to my colleagues the quote of -- of mr. hadley, the bilateral consulting commission seems to have been given authority to adopt without senate review measures to improve the viability and effectiveness of the treaty which could include restrictions on missle defense. i would also agree with my colleague from maryland that, indeed, the b.c.c. has the authority to negotiate amendments to the treaty. that's acknowledged in the fact

sheet by the state department. what i'm trying to do, the simple step beyond that that i'm trying to do with my amendment is to make it clear, using the terms supplied to us by the state department, that say the b.c.c. cannot make changes that affect substantive rights or obligations of the united stat states. i'm trying to make that part of the resolution of ratification. and that's all it does. it says that -- that if the b.c.c. adopts changes, provisions that affect substantive rights or obligations urn the create -- under the treaty, that create new rights or obligations, that those changes must come back to the united states senate. it is an addition to the requirement that amendments to

the treaty come back to the senate for ratification and it is a protection of the rights of this body to -- to continue to have a -- a role in substantive modifications that might come out of the b.c.c. i urge the adoption of this amendment. the presiding officer: who yields time? mr. cardin: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. mr. cardin: mr. president, i would just say, i think we just have a disagreement on this. i think that where the senate confirmation would be at issue is where there's an amendment to the treaty, and that's exactly what is included in our -- in our resolution. i think it's unworkable to try to get the senate involved in all the changes in trying to say what is substantive and what is

not. you really are -- i think would be interfering with the administration of the verification systems, et cetera. so i would just urge our colleagues to reject the amendment. senator wicker, i think on our side we're prepared to yield back, so if i would like to -- mr. wicker: mr. president -- mr. cardin: we yield back the time on this amendment. it's our understanding the unanimous consent request is 30 minutes per amendment. i think then we are prepared to go to senator kyl for the introduction of his amendment. mr. kyl: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. kyl: a point of inquiry before i begin here.

is there a difference between -- is there a reason why i should speak to either amendment number 4860 or 4893 first? the presiding officer: the senator can speak in whatever order he wishes but neither amendment has been offered. mr. kyl: all right. thank you, mr. president. then with that, i would like to offer amendment number 4860, slcm site agreement, which i believe is pending at the desk. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. kyl: and would ask for its consideration. the presiding officer: without objection. the clerk will report the amendment. the clerk: the senator from arizona, mr. kyl, proposes an amount numbered 4860. mr. kyl: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent further reading be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. kyl: mr. president, this is actually a very straightforward amendment. it simply seeks to repeat in this new start treaty the same thing that the then-soviet union and united states did in the previous start i treaty with

respect to a particular kind of weapon, a russian weapon called the slcm, or sea-launched cruise missile. as part of start i, we reached a binding side agreement, a side agreement, because the senate had said that we needed to include these weapons in the treaty. and so a side agreement was reached that they would -- that would limit each -- excuse me, that they would limit deployment of sea-launched cruise missiles, or the slcm due to their impact on strategic stability. the point being here that whether these sea-launched cruise missiles are deemed stact cal or strategic -- tactical or strategic, they actually have a strategic component, especially if they're sitting right off your coast and they're launched and they can hit your country. so that agreement was put into a side agreement between the then-soviet union and the united

states. but when this new start treaty was negotiation -- was negotiated, there was no similar side agreement, so there were no restrictions on slcm deployments. the side agreement in the start treaty limited both nations to fewer than 800 slcms with a range greater than 600 kilometers. in the 2010 nuclear posture review, the administration committed to unilaterally eliminating our slcm capability -- quote -- "the united states will retire the nuclear-equipped sea-launched cruise missile, the tlam-n. undersecretary miller said the time line for its retirements would be over the next two or three years. now, russia is developing a new version of its slcm where w a range of up to approximately -- slcm with a range of up to approximately 5,000 kilometers, which is a longer range than some of the ballistic missiles that are covered by the new start treaty. so that's why we believe that

there should be a side agreement just like there was in start i that deals with these slcms. we're not going to have them. russia is. and yet there's nothing in the treaty that would count their slickems against -- the slc ms against the total number of warheads or delivery vehicles that are allowed under the treaty or in any other way deal with them. the administration assures us that we shouldn't be concerned about a lack of formal agreeme agreement. she noted that the start -- secretary clinton noted that the start i treaty did have a limitation on sea-launched cruise missiles, that said both parties voluntarily agreed to cease deploying any new yec slcm -- nuclear slc ms on surface ships or multipurpose submarines. but today it's obvious with the information about russian plans that there is going to be a great disparity between the

united states and russia. and as i said, it's not obvious that saying that one is tactical as opposed to the strategic weapons that are otherwise limited by this treaty is a very important distinction. i think it's really a distinction without a difference. steve hadley, the former head of the n.c.s., said if you're living in eastern or central europe, a so-called tactical nuclear weapon, if you're within range, looks pretty strategic to you, so what are you going to do about those? as i said, he's the national security advisor. and ambassador bob joseph, in testimony before the foreign relations committee, said every time i hear the term "nonstrategic nuclear weapons," i recall that no nuclear weapon is nonstrategic. and if you stop and think about it, that's certainly true. so thee weapons, which are very expowfl could have a range -- powerful and could have a range of up to 5,000 kilometers, clearly need to be dealt with. now, we didn't want to insist that they go back and renegotiate the treaty because we've heard that argument before. so what we're suggesting about

this amendment is just do the same thing we did in start i, just have it be a side agreement where the two parties would agree to limit the number, our administration would limit the russians so that they wouldn't have a significant number of these particular weapons. just a point, by the way, in the event that there are folks who don't believe that the russians intend to rely on their weapons, such as the slcms, under secretary of defense flournoy said the russians are actually increasing their nuclear weapons and the role of nuclear weapons in their strategy. secretary gates has made the same point. he said, "ironically, that is the case with russia today, which has neither the money nor the population to sustain its cold-war conventional force levels. instead, we have seen an increased reliance on its nuclear force with new icbm and sea-based missiles, as well as a fully functional infrastructure that can manufacture a significant number of warheads each year." and the strategic posture commission noted that this

imbalance in nonstrategic nuclear weapons, which greatly favors russia, is of rising concern. and an illustration of the new challenges of stranl i can stability as -- strategic stability as reductions in strategic weapons proceed, a point that's been made by many others as well. so, mr. president, i think this is fairly straightforward. it would simply allow -- or it would require the united states to negotiate a side agreement with russia just like or very similar to the side agreement that we had under start i to deal with a weapon that we are no longer going to have but the russians are apparently developing a new version of that's pretty -- has a pretty substantial range, 5,000 kilometers, and clearly very difficult to distinguish the difference between a weapon like that and the strategic offensive weapons that are otherwise dealt with in the treaty. i hope that my colleagues will recognize that this is not a treaty killer and it is something that needs to be addressed. thank you, mr. president.

the presiding officer: who yields time? mr. kerry: mr. president, i yield five minutes to the senator from maryland. mr. cardin: thank you. first, let me thank senator kyl for bringing this issue to our attention. i think it's a very important issue. we have a lot of security issues as it relates to russia, as it relates to europe, and as it relates to the sea-launched cruise missiles. i couldn't agree with the senator more. but this is -- falls under the same category of the discussion we had earlier about a side agreement on tactical weapons. and these are all beneficial issues, but it's not the key issue that's before us today. and if we were to adopt this amendment, i think we all would agree that it would cause a considerable delay in the implementation of the start

treaty. and let me just remind my colleagues, that the start treaty, according to our military experts is needed now. we've been a year without having inspection regimes in russia so that we can get the intelligence information we need by people on the ground. that expired december of last year. so we've already been delayed through this year. and the longer you delay, the less reliable the information we have for our ncurity.hougit had- it would be nice to have all these side agreements with russia on these other issues, we'd ask our negotiators to do this, it takes time. it takes time to it's not all one sided to negotiate. you know that. we know that as we negotiate issues. this is an important issue, but

it shouldn't delay the ratification an our inspectors on the ground getting the information that we need for our own national security as it relates to the stratigic capacity of russia. so for all those reasons, i would urge my colleagues to reject the amendment. mr. kerry: mr. president, -- mr.? nator from massachusetts. mr. kerry: mr. president, thank you. mr. president, the senator from maryland is absolutely correct. i appreciate him pointing that out. i think i've said many times in the course of this debate that it is imperative for us to deal with the issue of tactical nuclear weapons. in fact, the resolution of ratification has a section in it which specifically addresses

this and urges the president to move to that. i might add the senator from florida, senator lemieux, we are just finishing up an agreement on an amendment which will, in fact, add an additional component. it's an amendment we intend to accept and it will add an additional emphasis on this question of tactical weapons. but there is not -- not only is there no benefit to delaying this treaty from going into effect, i mean, that's what the amendment from the senator from arizona would do -- will do, until this limitation mechanism is put into effect. and, you know, the fact is that most of our experts from secretary gates through admiral mullen and others have all said to us, if we don't get this treaty, we're not going to get to the tactical nuclear

discussions with the russians. if you were the russians and the united states senate says we're not going to do this until this, you're looking at a long road where you've reopened all of the different relationships an you've dis -- and you've discarded this one component, which is the submarine-launched missles and the intercontinental ballistic missles and they want to know what we're doing and we want to know what they're doing and that's how you provide greatest stability. in addition to that, secretary gates and secretary clinton bot have reinforced that many times. here's the important thing to think about this as we think about what the impact on this treaty would be. nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missles or slick-ems,

these are tactical weapons. and although this amendment seems to suggest that russian slick-s they don't -- the they don't do -- we have considered these kinds of weapons to be nonstratigic weapons, tactical weapons. even they're long range, we consider them that. and -- and secretary gates and admiral mullen explained why in their answer to a specific question from the senate. they said, russian nuclear arms sea launched cruise missles could not threaten submarine-launched ballistic missles which will comprise a fraction of the stratigic force under new start and would pose a very limited threat to the hundreds siloed based icbm

that the united states would retain under new start. in other words, russian nuclear slick-ems can't take out our nuclear deterrent in a first strike. if russia were to use nuclear slickems against us, we could still use nuclear weapons and deliver a devastating blow in return. no logic in the sort of give and take of war planning as incomprehensible as it is with respect to nuclear wes, but it's all done appropriately, because they do exist and it is important to our security but ig to reduce our ability to not just defend ourselves but to annihilate anyone who would propose or think about doing that. ironically it was the soviets who once wanted to do what to categorize

slickems because we had a nuclear tomahawk on our submarines and the soviets worked hard to get the original start treaty to cover slickems. guess what? we didn't bite. we didn't do that. the first bush administration explicitly rejected the soviet efforts to add that. they considered slickems tactical weapons and they thought limits on nuclear sea-launched cruise missles are unverifiable. and, mr. president, that is, in part, because we didn't want to give the soviets thataccess to n return for access to theirs and we don't want to do it now with the russians. maybe people were wrong about that, but i just don't see the wisdom of putting the treaty the shelf while we go out and

try to experiment with a new approach that nobody has argued is imperative for security of our country. now, back then we did agree on politically binding declarations on 880 long-range nuclear slickems and declare at the beginning of the year how many slickems we intended to deploy. those stayed operative for many years. secretary gates stated for the record that as recently as december of 2008, russia has declared that it planned to zer. shortly after start was signed in 1991, the united states and russia each pledged as part of the presidential nuclear initiative to cease deploying any nuclear or nuclear ships or attack submarines. so while we have four former ballistic missle submarines

converted to cruise missle submarines, we are no longer deploying our nuclear tomorrowa hawk missles on any -- tomahawk missles on any u.s. submarines. and we think we're more -- so i see nothing to be gained from negotiating a new binding agreement in -- in the context of holding up this treaty, putting it on the shelf, and of going back in an effort to do that. this amendment would delay the new start for months or years. throw an entire curve back back -- ball back into what i talked about yesterday, which is the theory of negotiation which nothing is agreed upon until everything is agreed upon. in this case if we say, ain't agreed upon, sorry, we're coming back and you've got to come back and agree with us on tacticals before any of this becomes law, we've opened up the entire negotiation again. how reliable -- i mean, what

kind of partnership is that? i don't think that makes sense. i fail to see any point in going down that road. i urge my colleagues to defeat amendment and i reserve the balance of our time. the presiding officer: the senator from arizona has just eight minutes left. mr. kyl: mr. president, i'm a little bit numbe --we didn't wae preamble or treaty, but we could perhaps do some site agreements. we structured ts the presiding officer: without agreemenxa to. objection. mr. kerry: i'd be happy to urge, if he wants to change the amendment or he wants to submit -- it's a little late now, but we could accept perhaps a modification to urge the president to enter into the agreement, but not shelf the whole agreement until that happens. back on theiffere notion it would be great to get a side agreement, but don't hold this treaty up in the effort of

doing so. the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. kyl: mr. president, on start i, there was no delay in the imitation of the start -- implementation of the start i agreement because a site agreement be entered into between the then soviet union and the unitede same kind of mit were the subject of the site agreement unstart i. i suspect part of the reason was because it's pretty the difficult to distinguish as to whether or not if these weapons are being used for a stratigic or tactical purpose. senator kerry has said they cannot upset the stratigic balance. i totally disagree with that proposition. they absolutely can upset the stratigic balance depending upon where they're located or how they intend to be used. that's one of the reasons i suspect they were limited under the start i treaty. my colleague said they can't threaten our submarine fleet at sea and they pose only a limited threat to icbm sites.

that may be the opinion of our experts. they could sure threaten our submarine bases in washington state and kings bay. they could take out bases or other assets that we have. in fact, let me quote from a russian article, the r.i.novaty on april 82010, granny class submarines launch a variety of cruise missles up to 3,100 miles with nuclear warheads and effectively engage submarines, surface warships or land-based targets. end of quote. at 5,000-kilometers, that is a range longer than characterize them as tactical or ba stratigic. i think depends on how they're used. the point is if my colleague believes they can't threaten anything, what's the problem here? we're trying to estate limit on

them. well, obviously -- at least i assume obviously the russians don't want to do this. we raise this, but we don't have the negotiation records, i don't know whether it wasn't, why was? if it was because we didn't think there was any threat to the united states, then i think it would be very important to ask some of our military folks why they think that's the case given the kind of targets that could be held at risk here and given the fact that we apparently reached a different conclusion during the start i treaty implementation phase when the site agreement was negotiated with the then soviet union. so, mr. president, i don't think it would delay anything. we do this as a site agreement rather than an amendment. we say that the administration should negotiate so there wouldn't be a significant number of slbm deployments by the russians given the fact that we're not doing any. i do have to say i fundamentally

disagree with the assertion of my colleague, that this kind of weapon can't upset the stratigic balance. if you've a weapon that can fly over 3,000 miles with a nuclear warhead, which can be just as big as a bomb or intercontinental ballistic missle, with all of the continents that would be held at such a risk at 3,000 miles, you wouldn't have to be far off either of our two u.s. coasts to hit the targets within the continental united states. this is a weapon and it seems to me we should be concerned about it i urge my -- i urge my colleagues to deal with the site agreements under the slbm as we did under the start treaty. i reserve the balance of my time. the presiding officer: who yields time?

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. mr. cardin: mr. president, i just would say to my friend, senator kyl, these -- these missiles are not strategic. do they affect our strategic balance? i would say everything in our defense toolbox can affect our strategic balance. that was taken into consideration in the negotiations. so i thank him for bringing this issue to our attention, but for the reasons that we have already stated, we would urge our colleagues to reject the amendment. we're prepared to go to your next amendment if you're prepared to move forward. mr. kyl: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. kyl: i will respond in about 30 seconds here, and then i would be prepared to go to my next amendment. perhaps i can reserve whatever time i have left on this to make a closing argument if members are going to be here for the

votes. i -- i would suggest that -- and i really do sincerely appreciate the characterization of my -- of these issues that we have raised as serious and important issues, and i -- i do appreciate that. i do think, though, that it would be appropriate to have a better response than just this will upset the russians, they won't want to do it so we'll have to renegotiate the treaty, it will delay things, and that's going to create problems. the purpose is not to delay. as i said, i don't think that the start i treaty was delayed when we reached a side agreement, and i think in any event, the question is this: should the united states delay if that's what's called for in order to improve the treaty in important respects? if it's conceded that this is an important respect, then it seems to me that it's worth taking time to do it right. most of the arguments that have been made in response to the amendments we have raised boils

down to the russians won't want to do what you say, and therefore we need to reject your amendment because it requires some renegotiation. i get back to the point i have made over and over again, then what is the senate doing here? why would the founders have suggested that we should have a role in relation to treaties if every time we tried to change something, the argument is, well, youthane is nothing that s about this treaty that has to go into effect tomorrow. as a matter of fact, "the washington post" had an editorial about a month ago, and they said no great calamity will befall the united states if this treaty is not concluded in the the -- before the end of the year. i think that's almost a direct quotation. and the administration itself has acknowledged that there is n immed inow the ain watnouh it, but there is nothing great -- nothing in the way of great harm that's going to befall us if we take a little extra time to do it right. again, if we're not willing to do that, then we're establishing we try to suggest any changes,

whatever the president sds up the other side will reject him, becaehe argument will be if and we couldn't possibly abide that. what i will do is reserve the balance of time on this amendment, and call up amendment number 4893, which i believe is pending at the desk and ask for its immediate consideration. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, the clerk will report. the clerk: the 4893. mr. kyl: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that a reading of the amendment be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. kyl: mr. president, i would have preferred to deal with each of the subjects in this amendment individually because each one of them is very important. to accommodate the other side's desire to try to have -- to get as much done as quickly as possible, we consolidated a lot of the amendments, and so there is a lot in this amendment, and i regret that we don't have time to get into more detail about each of them. what this amendment amounts to is an effort to try to improve the verification of the treaty to deal with a variety of issues that have been raised in the

past and which we believe are inadequately dealt with by the treaty. one of them involves covers, the kind of things that the then-soviet union and russians consistently put over the warhead bus so that it's impossible for our inspectors to really see what's under the cover, to see, for example, how many warheads are under that. that has been a big problem in the past. we intend to deal with that here in this treaty. on tell emery, the president should tell to the senate he has reached a legally binding agreement with the federation so each party is obliged to provide a full access to its telemetry of strategic missiles limited by the treaty. the reason why that's important is because while we're not developing a new generation of missiles, the russians are. under the treaty, we are denied the tell emery of those -- tell e.m.t.ry of those missile tests if the russians decide to deny it. what we would like to have is

unencrypted tell emery which our intelligence officials have told us is of great value to us in assessing the capabilities of russian missiles. under the treaty, they don't have to provide anything. they could provide tell emmettary on -- telemetry on old missiles and not provide any on the new missiles that they are testing. we believe that should be done. the same thing with respect to any ballistic missiles deployed during the time of the -- during the duration of the treaty. then we turn to the subject of inspections. there are different kinds of inspections, but we're talking here about type one inspections in which we say that the u.s. would consider a violation of the deployed warhead limit and a material breach of the treaty if the russians do one of two things: number one, any type one inspection that revealed that the russian federation had deployed a number of warheads on any one missile in excess of the number they declared for that missile.

and second, any action by the russian federation that impedes the ability of the united states to determine the warheads deployed on any one missile prior to or during a type one inspection, and that gets to the issue of covers again. why is this important? because we're supposedly counting weapons in this treaty, of 1,550 warheads. warheads. how can we possibly verify compliance if when we seek to count the number of warheads on top of missiles that we have designated and have a right to inspect, we can't count the warheads? you tell me how we're supposed to assume exactly how many warheads there are on the top of that particular missile. soar why we shouldn't deem it a material breach if they declare there is one number of warheads and it turns out that there are more than what they declared. i think these are commonsense changes and would help to strengthen the verifreaty. i regret that my colleague,

senator bond, is not here tonight. senator bond is the ranking republican member of the intelligence committee, and in the classified briefing that we -- the session that we had yesterday, talked a lot about the deficiencies and verification under this treaty. unfortunately, this is a subject that doesn't permit us to get into a lot of detail here in open session, but we heard a lot about past cheating by the soviet union or by russians. we heard a lot about the kinds of things that were done, and what we're trying to do with these three basic components of an amendment is to make it less likely that the russians would cheat and less likely that if they did, that it would have an impact on the key element of the treaty, which is the limitation on warheads of 1,550. i just note a couple of things here that put this in context, i think. there have been allegations that there is better verification under this treaty than ever before, and that's simply not true. the verification provisions of

this treaty are not as strong as under the start i treaty. well, there is an argument they don't need to be for various reasons or the russians weren'tr various reasons, but i don't think you can say that the verification is better in this treaty. secretary of state james baker who testified said the verification mechanism in the new start treaty does not appear as rigorous or as extensive as the one that verified the numerous and diverse treaty obligations and pro hicks under start i. this complex part of the treaty is more crucial when fewer deployed nuclear warheads are allowed than were allowed in the past. of course that's obvious. the more you get down to a smaller number, the more important cheating is, me dramatic its effect can be, and therefore the better verification you need. senator mccain, my colleague said, and i quote -- the new start treaty's permissive approach to new verification will result in less transparency and create additional challenges for our ability to monitor assnd futur rueia c e former c.i.a. director james

woolsey said -- "new start's verification provision also provide little or no help in detecting legal activity at ther otherwise hidden from our satellites." and senator bond made a comment that i have quoted before, which is that new start suffers from fundamental verification flaws that no amount of tampering around the edges can fix. the senate select committee on intelligence has been looking at this issue closely over the past several months. there is no doubt in my mind, he says, that the united states cannot reliably verify the treaty's 1,550 limit on deployed warheads. to conclude, would require the president to certify that he has reached an agreement with russia on the nonuse of covers that interfere with type one inspections and tal number f warheads, but it would reduce a method of deception that russia has used in the past. on telemetry, it would require

the president to certify he has reached a binding agreement with russia t end unimpstic missile systems deployed by the russians. as i said, they are now free to encrypt those missile tests. that makes it much harder for them to get information tha and then finally with regard to material breach, it contains an understanding that the united states would consider violation of the deployed warhead limits to be a material breach of the treaty, and that would include a type one inspection that revealed that they had deployed a number of warheads on any one missile in eof t number that they declared or that they continue to use covers that deny us the ability to see exactly how many warheads they have on gnize that verification is a problem under the treaty. this is a modest way to try to deal with three specific aspects of that verification, and i would hope that my colleagues would be willing to support the amendment and reserve the balance of my time. mr. kerry: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. mr. kerry: mr. president, i would first ask consent that when the senate votes on the three amendments that's provided

under the previous order, that those votes occur in the order listed in that agreement. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. kyl: mr. president, also request that the votes be 10-minute votes? mr. kerry: that's a very suggestion. i would ask unanimous consent that the second two votes be ten minutes in length. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. kerry: mr. president, let me first -- i want to compliment my colleague from arizona else, in his advocacy with respect to his point of view regarding this treaty, and while i and other senators may he proposes, and because of its impact as well as in some cases because of its scope or something else, that doesn't mean that the senator isn't raising valid questions and future discussions and things that we ought to be focused on. and i know he spends a lot of time at this, and i think all of

us have a lot of respect for the ways in which he has already impacted this treaty, and i give him credit for that. but this particular amendment is a combination of about four different amendments that have come together into one, and i understand exactly why that's happened, and i'm not complaining about that at all. it's just that there is a lot in it and there are therefore frankly different reasons that one ought to oppose this amendment. let me -- let me just say that that -- first of all, the new start -- in i think most people's judgment addresses the concerns that have been raised by the senator from arizona. the purpose of warhead inspections is the other actually seeing the neither side is comfortable with warhead, looking into it and seeing it. we're not comfortable with them doing that to because of the counting of the warhead as it is often the issue

of fail-safe devices or counter shootdown devices, other kinds of things that might be in there that we don't necessarily have a right to see and that they don't want us to see. so neither side is s, you know, looking at the actual warhead. the start treaty, the original start treaty therefore to deal with that issue lets the inspected party cover the warheads on the front of the -- of the any cover know what it can and can't before it's used, so that we conceal. we know what that cover is permitting us to see. what's more, paragraph 11 of section 2 in the treaty's annex on explicitly -- this is in new start -- the covers shall not hamper inspectors. now, we didn't have that previously. that's new to this treaty, and we have worked as a result of

what we have learned in start, we have learned how to look and how to ask things more appropriately, and our negotiators worked that into s are notty so as to protect our allowed to hamper the inspectors in ascertaining that the front section contains a number of re-entry vehicles equal to the number of re-entry vehicles that were declared for that deployed icbm or deployed slbm. now, the virtue of the new start treaty is that these declarations and the specific alphahese warheads in -- in the randomness of our allow us enormous certainty choices of where we go. if the russians are cheating or somebody is over for one reason or another,ort of decide where that might be, where we think the best target of opportunity is, and to lock that place down and go in and check

it. so there are enormous risks of being discovered as a consequence of the way we've set that up. the treaty already forbids russia from using covers that interfere with warhead counting and it would really create a very dangerous precedent, in my judgment, to require that we negotiate now before we put the treaty into effect a side agreement on the very same thi thing. now, that might suggest that other new start provisions, you know, don't need to be obeyed because there's no side deal reinforcing them. e agreement,mpact of the side incidentally, have to come back and be ratified by the senate before it all goes into effect? i mean, thr a lot of impond -- i mean, there are a lot of imponderables. now, with respect to the agreement on telemetry, the requirement for a legall legally to provideeement with russia

flight telemetry on all icbms and slbms, which is what the senator is seeking, would also delay the start treaty into force by the same months or years that we've been talking about. that argument has been hanlerred around here over -- he last seven days adequately. this delays the treaty. it does not act to increase the security of our country, and it already is in the resolution of ratification, in the treatye trading in telemetry. i find it hard to believe, therefore, that if we make this treaty precent russians hate to do, that's a way of buying into gridlock, deadlock, nothi - we've already been through this a little bit, incidentally. i and others strongly urged the president and his negotiators to seek significant in telemetry as was possible. but for a lot of reasons it didn't turn out that was achievable from their side, but also it didn't turn out it was desirable on our side

altogether. now, rush what is russia is tesw systems like the ballabah icbm and we mayest new in the next decade and that's why the russians reject this very significantly. now, a lot of people have suggested that our military doesn't want to share the telemetry on all of our tests on icbms and slbms. they're pretty happy with the way this agreement is structured now, including the provisions for telemetry, which allow us something i think like five telemetry exchanges we have to agree on them, but they're allowed under the treaty. and, you know, if that weren't true, there's no way that the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, admiral mullen, would have sent the letter that he sent to the entire senate where he stated t hetreaty ratified now and he was it implemented now and he believes that consistent with everything that people have said

within our national security network, that this treaty is both verifiable and enhances our capacity to be able to count and know what the russians are doi doing. now, the requirement for russian agreement not to deny telemetry on the new ballistic missile systems it develops during the duration of the treaty, is really redundant with the previous part that we just talked about and so you know i think again the amendment the russians. it is the absolute equivalent of amending the treaty itself and, therefore, i would oppose that. now, new start's telemetry exchange regime involves negotiating at the beginning of next year, of the year -- assuming this goes into effect -- which missile tests from the past year we're willing to share. could i ask how much time i have left? the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts has six minutes left. mr. kerry: i want to reserve some time for the senator from new hampshire. but let me just say that -- that the new start regime requires

to negotiate at the beginning of next year what we're going to share. now, if we don't offer anything interesting, russia isn't going to offer anything. i mean, that's the nature of a negotiation. you have to give to get. and this ament negotiated exchange to a literally give me something for next to nothing. it doesn't work. the russians would have to give us the good stuff while -- while we would give them telemetry from launches that were no different from 30 or tests -- 30 other tests over the last 20 years. i've got to tell you, mr. president, that -- that sort of a jusgreeme not going to happen. it's in a fantasy land. and the president would never get that side deal with russia and so the new start treaty would never come into force. i would yield -- i yield the balance of my time to the senator from new hampshire.

mrs. shaheen: senator kerry, i -- the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire. mrs. shaheen: i will speak only for about one minute and then give the rest of my time to senator feinsteo s wak to the qf the covers, as you d. i don't want to -- as you did. i don't want to speak to the technicalities that have been raised but i do want to make two points in response to senator kyl's concern about verification. you know, i think we should all be concerned about the fact that right now we have no inspectors on the ground, we have no way to verify what's going on in russia. and anything that delays that, delays our ability to get that intelligence back on the ground in russia as to the urgency of the situation. so i think that's a very important point. the other issue that he raised was relative to why do we need to do this now. the fact is, as you pointed out, we got a letter from admiral mike mull learning the chairman of the joint -- mike mullen, the chairman of the joint chiefs yesterday, that

said the sooner we ratify this treaty, the better. james clap, the director of national intelligence, said on new start, the earlier, the sooner, the better we get this done. so i think there is a lot of reason to believe that we need to act on this and we need to do it now. and i'd like to yield to the senator from california. the presiding officer: the senator from california. mrs. feinstein: i thank the president and i thank the senator from new hampshire. senator kyl is a very smart man. this is a major amendment. in my view, it is a deal breaker. it is a poison pill for the entire treaty. it essentially providesnt, prioo the treaty going into effect, must certify that he has achieved certain side agreements and those side agreements strike directly at some of the heart of the treaty therefore, it will effectively, in my view, be unacceptable to the russians and will destroy the treaty.

the treaty now says that you cannot block an inspector's ability to ascertain warheads on a reentry vehicle. that covers the cover issue. this again says that tell elm industry by eye prior agreement must -- must -- well, that there be a side agreement on full access to telemetry for allilesw missiles, it is one-sided. clearly, this is not going to be acceptable. and then it goes into the type i inspections. and i think if you're for the treaty, there's only one vote and it's to vote "no." and i very much regret this because i respect the senator. but as i see it, and there are things i can't go into here that i tried to go into

the presiding officer: who yields time? mr. kyl: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. kyl: might i inquire how much time remains on this side? the presiding officer: you have seven minutese about three or four or five of those minutes, mr. president. i appreciate my colleague's compliments about important issues being brought up and i also appreciate their concern that amendments of this significance would cause heartburn for the russians and might well require them to want to renegotiate aspects of the treaty. i am trying to address that through the mechanism of the side agreement rather than an amendment to the treaty or some kind of other, more restrictive method. i thought that would be the preferable way to do it. it's not my intention, as with the previous amendment, to delay things. i don't think it necessarily would. but i do appreciate that on a couple of these items, the russians would not likely want to renegotiate. i'm not so sure that would be the case with regard to the

covers, this question of the kind of shroud or cover that you put over the missile bust, the top of the missile that has the warheads there, since the treaty does deal with, it as my colleagues have pointed out. but i don't think does so in a conclusive way. the 2005 compliance report issued by the state department to discuss compliance of the russian government with respect to the start i treaty, had a couple of long-standing issues, and the issue of shrouds was one that they characterized as of long-standing. they had a very hard time getting that resolved with the russians. and in the end, there was a particular accommodation reached but it took forever, and during that time we didn't really have the kind of satisfaction that we wanted. when we've asked how disputes here would be dealt with, we get the same basic answer, well, that would go to the bilateral

counciltative commission, the group of russian and u.s. negotiators that are supposed to try to work these things out. and what i could see is kind of a repeat of what we had before. they like to cover these things up and it just doesn't seem to me that that is a way to enter into a treaty where we're supposed to be in agreement with our counterparts and yet we're going to have unresolved issues that we have to leave to another day to be resolved through a long and probably difficult negotiation process. i -- i would just also say that my colleague from massachusetts used -- these were his words, he wasn't quoting anyone -- that he thought we had enormous certainty about this. and i just would significant, i don't think that the intelligence community would use a phrase like enormous certainty. we can't get into here the degree of percentage that they attach to being able to know certain things under this trea treaty. suffice it to say that we're not

absolutely sure that we can do what needs to be done here and i don't think that characterizing it as enormous certainty would be an accurate way to do it. let me just mention with regard to telemetry, i think my colleagues are absolutely -- well, first of all, let me correct one thing that is a -- it's a little bit of misdirection and then agree with my colleagues on something else. there's a suggestion that we can get telemetry on five missiles and that's true if the russians agree. in other words, they have to volunteer to do it. and the five missile tests that they tell us about can be of old missiles. they don't have to be new missiles. so it is a fact that there's nothing in this treaty that requires the russians or the united states to exchange telemetry on new missile tests. that is to say, tests of missiles currently being developed. there are at least two that the russians are developing right now and that leads to the second point. i think it's probably true that the reason that they didn't to want agree to this is it would require them to give us very, very valuable information.

and right now, they wouldn't be getting any information from the united states because we're not testing missiles. but i just ask, is that an or that justifies a provision that says if you're not modernizing your forces and we are modernizing our forces, it's not fair to have us tell you what our missiles are like. under the previous treaty, both sides had to do that and it gave both sides more confidence. now, the russians are developing new missiles. shouldn't we have some understanding of the capabilities of those missiles?