republican reconciliation bill that is going to cut social spending for poor people and working people, elderly and children but shield defense spending. and now we're going to put some more wasteful spending on top of that. this is not good. now, i think we can talk about this without kind of punching each other around and hitting each other with low blows and that kind of thing. i think we can talk about these partisans. but it's ironic that we are trying to scare people into supporting a wasteful expenditure and then taking away food stamps, taking away medicaid benefits and taking

away other benefits from people who cannot do for themselves without that help in a period of great unemployment, trying to climb out of this economic downturn that we're in. you know, this is crazy. so i want us to get back on track doing the business that this committee normally does in a business-like manner and let's debate these issues without personal attack and let's think about holistically what we're doing here. i think the american people can understand what we're doing. they see it. and let's all try to be the kind of representative that our people want us to be. thank you. >> the gentleman yields back.

the chair now yields to the gentleman from new jersey for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i yield my time to mr. turner. >> thank you. i just want to re visit the issue of -- that those that have led us to the support for the east coast site. the commander u.s. northern command in 2007-2008 recommended such a site. this recommendation is not -- the recommendation of the current administration that sought instead to move to a european phased adaptive approach. the gao recently issued a report calling into question the president's plan as to whether or not the president's missile, the 2b that was expected to be -- by the president's timeline to be available by 2020 would even have the capabilities necessary to protect the united states. so it falls away as an alternative, leaving us with the additional vulnerability. the president is unphased

adaptive approach recognized that more was needed besides just van denberg air force base and alaska west coast sites in pursuing the approach. the east coast site, in addition to being supported by the u.s. northern commander in 2007-2008, was supported by the institute for defense analysis and the national academies. they have examined the potential contribution of an east coast missile defense site. and these studies have recommended that work begin on the development and deployment of such a site. that's what we're doing the beginning of the assessment and the plan. there's no site that's identified. it's moving forward so we can meet the futuristic, not today's risk, the futuristic that we all know is coming and all have acknowledged. even the president of the united states has knowledge acknowledged. as explained in answer 6, our recommended homeland defense system would include interceptor base in the northeastern part of

the united states. that site would receive the first installments of the new homeland defense interceptor. the subcommittee has been briefed by both these entities on their findings, which were the product of work they completed per congressional mandates. let me make that clear. we asked them to tell us what we should do and all we're doing is doing that. the national academy study also shows carried forward of concerns about the 2b missile which the other studies have also identified. i want to go back a moment to what the president said. i think it's clear ranking member smith raised the issue that he said after the issue i'll have more flexibility. that is a secret deal with the russians. medvedev said i will tell putin that the discussion was going to continue between them as if the messenger was going to carry back the description from the president. but what was so frightening to everybody in the american public is the president would say i'm

going to tell you, russian president, my real position on missile defense but i can't tell the american public but i will tell you and after the election i'll be able to tell everybody and i'll have more flexibility. well, we don't think we should be guided by the president's secret plan with the russians to diminish our missile defense. we believe we should follow the u.s. northern commander from 2007-2008 and the national academies and the institute for defense analysis and i believe all the intellectual experts have looked at this and said, the risk is real. i ran and north korea continued to gain the capability that's going to reach the united states. we have to act now to respond to that. as we look to 2015 for the prospects of having that capability available, we will be glad that we did. i cannot imagine sitting in this committee and being a member of the committee in 2015 looking at an icbm capable iran and north

korea and say i could have put something there to protect the united states but i decided not to because i thought they might not get there fast enough. we need to get there fast enough. we should oppose the president's secret deal with the russians and protect the national security of our homeland. >> the gentleman yields back. the chair now yields to mr. andrews, the gentleman from new jersey, five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. we have two things i think going on here simultaneously. we have a diversionary political discussion and we have an important substantive question. the diversionary political discussion is this alleged secret deal the president has with the russians. and everyone agrees what he said was, quote, i will have more flexibility after the election. i think what's gone on for the last 30 minutes shows how candid and correct the president was.

in the environment of a u.s. political campaign lots of things are said that create impressions and misimpressions that the president will have difficulty operating in. this is proof past of the validity of his point. to return to the serious discussion, i think there are two points of agreement here. i don't think there's a member of this committee that wants to subject the people of this country, no matter where they live, to the serious threat of a nuclear weapon raining down on that area of the country. no one wants to see that happen. everyone is committed to doing what they want to do about that. the second thing i think people would agree with is testing tends to show the ground-based system that this east coast strategy implies has had at best a checkered record of test success.

in fact, i think it's had a rather dismal record. so what would we do? the prudent thing certainly is to assume that some day someone may have the capability and the intention to fire an icbm across the atlantic ocean and hit the united states of america. it would be imprudent to dismiss that discussion. but it would be equally imprudent to rush to fill this perceived void by spending billions of scarce dollars on something that doesn't work when you have something that does work that you could use in such an event. let's assume for a moment that tomorrow the intelligence committee walked into the oval office and said, you know, we forgot to tell you something but there's a foreign power that could hit us with an aicbm over the atlantic ocean. just over a year ago, april

15th, 2011, stationed just west of hawaii, was involved in a test mission. what happened was we launched an unarmed icbm from the marshall islands 2,300 miles away approximately where the ship was. within 11 minutes, with existing technology, the ship detected the trajectory of the icbm. shortly thereafter it activated and launched an sm3 block 1a miss skpeul hit the missile in the sky and knocked it down. we can do this today. with our existing technology. since 2002, 21 of the 25 tests have had a successful result. since 2001, 45 of the 58 tests have had a significant result. if we had an immediate crisis, the imprudent thing towed would be to spend billions of dollars

on something that doesn't work. the prudent and practical and available option would be to deploy this regional technology, based on the radar system and use it if we had to. if we should be talking about anything, it should be expanding that capability at the same time in an intelligent analytical way we further develop ground based systems. that's a rational response to a real problem. this is a political response to a campaign problem. mr. g's amendment to be approved for that reason. i yield back. >> the chair yields to the gentleman from washington, five minutes. >> i just want to take one minute to emphasize the things that mr. andrews said. we're not trying to talk about whether we should protect the country but the proposal in the bill by mr. turner is to fund a

system that currently isn't working in when fact there is a better alternative. this is up to $5 million to be spent on something that is not the best strategy. >> will the gentleman yield? >> let me just make the second point and then i will. second of all, i think it is worth efpl emphasizing you can see how politics enters into this when you translate a benign comment like we will have more flex account of some very detailed secret deal. it is precisely that political nonsense that the president was referring to and which we have seen on display again today when we ought to be working on the spwaps of the issue. and i'll be happy to yield to the gentleman from ohio. >> thank you, ranking member smith. there have been a lot of statements on the system not working. and i just want to call on our staff members for a moment to help us in this. there have been failed tests of certain portions of systems. i think the sm 1a and b tests,

sm3 tests that mr. andrews was referring weren't perhaps even icbm tests. they were missile tests. we're all dealing with information that is perhaps imprecise. there are portions that have been tested. we address that in the bill. >> i claim my time for one quick second. but the systems that mr. andrews is referring to work all the time at this point very, very well. >> that is actually not true either. 1a and 1b tests of icmbs failed. could you just drive through real quick 30 seconds on what works and what has some difficulties yet. >> mr. turner, it's correct that ftm-15, a test of the 1a missile failed and the ftm-16, a test of

the 1b also failed. the gmd visits of the ce 1 and 2 interceptors. ce 2 interceptors failed the last two tests. >> it's my time, if i may. how many of each the 1 and 2 on the cb and the last one you said do we have at this point. >> mr. smith, we have 20 of the ce 1 and we have 10 ce 2 interceptors. >> are we still being the ce 1s? >> no, sir, we are not. >> so ce 2 are long term what we're relying on and that's part of the problem? >> i'm not sure -- >> i'm sorry. that was inappropriate for staff. i apologize. i yield back my time.

>> thank you, mr. chairman. i would like to yield to the gentleman from arizona, mr. franks. >> just a quick correction here. i believe i heard mr. andrews suggest that the sm 3 block 1a would be the answer to this problem. as i understand the sm3 block 1a would have to be stationed pretty perfectly in order to consistently approach speeds to be effective. and i also understand that we debated this when we were talking about the european site and the egis deployment that i believe mr. andrews is talking about indicated under the cost test to be much, much higher rather than stationing an entire ship and it having to be in that place that the silos with the gmd enter ten tors was

significantly less costly. i would like to clarify the issue on the block 1a. is this something to the sm3 block # 1a would be an effective defense on the east coast for icbms? >> mr. franks, the sm 31 a. >> sm 3 block 1a? >> it has been tested medium range. it has not been tested against icbms. >> would the gentleman yield, my friend from arizona? >> yes. >> yeah. my source for my comments is ary lease dated april 15th of 2011. and i would ask unanimous consent to be entered into the record the markup. is that appropriate at this point in time? i'm a layperson. i'll defer to you experts.

but it sounds to me they fired a missile from 2,400 miles away. and the missile defense system mount odd a ship knocked the -- >> re claiming my time, there's no one that has a higher opinion of the egis system than i do. but everything that i have learned about the egis sm3 block 1a is in order for it to be successful against icbm, there has to be a very ideal situation in order for it to be effective. the gmd, it's a much more robust, much faster miss skpeul able to catch as it were icbms. with the later sm3s we have added advantages. in this situation the overall point i'm trying to make sure is that not to have some redundancy or to make a critical mistakes has complications.

with that i yield back. >> the chair now yields to the gentleman from virginia, mr. forbes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i would like to yield to chairman turner from ohio. >> thank you. and i want to thank everybody forred yielding back and forth that has occurred for this discussion. everyone has been incredibly polite and ensuring that we can get to what is the substance of the systems that we have and what works and what doesn't work. i just want to make certain we didn't end the debate with leaving the impression that we had a system that didn't work. that's why i called on staff to give the detail of a system that has absolutely been tested and absolutely works. there are problems with the stretches of the system as we tried to implement new technologies. we'll get those right. when we do, we'll have even greater capability. and that's why we do it. what i would like to offer as we end this debate i would be glad to host a classified briefing that our subcommittee can invite every member to to go over what the capabilities are and are not

so we don't have to just deal with the information of what we believe. we can have the experts in front of us. you can learn as my subcommittee members have learned the threat is real. we will be glad to host that. we certainly will invite all of you to hear from the experts what works. i yield back. >> the gentleman yields back. the chair now yields to the gentlelady from california, ms. davis. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i would like to yield to the ranking member on the subject. >> thank you. i mean, it's very technical issue that we're talking about. and some of this is somewhat classified. but, you know, for somebody to think that a missile can be shot from north korea and reach the east coast or any portion of it, you know, you just have to look at the math of it to know that's

not what the east coast should worry about. should they worry about iran? there's just a small portion. you know, you were talking about trajectory and how to position a ship so we can shoot some of this down. well, the whole east coast is also not exposed on this. so, you know, if you're going to start throwing in technical pieces, let's get this right. the second thing is that this technology from ground based systems has had only 8 out of 17 tries have worked. that's not a good percentage. and to think somehow that when we shoot that missile in that

test that it is in the conditions what would be coming from north korea or from iran, if they had the technology, if they had a nuclear war head, is incorrect. we don't put the speed. we know exactly where it's coming from. we have little sensors that say here i am, come and get me. and we're still not shooting it down. these systems are not as robust, mr. chairman, as you suggest. >> will the gentlelady yield? >> i will in a minute. so to be putting in a system that is not as robust -- and that's the way i'm going to put it because i'm not going to go into spilling all the guts about everything we're doing, you have only one thing to look at. general o'reilly has said, i need to go back with my team and get this technology right.

and he has asked and laid out the fastest plan that he can which will take two years at best to see if we should go down that road and we can get a system that is as robust as somehow you are suggesting to people on the east coast that we could shoot these things down. and i'll yield to the young lady and i think mr. g might want a little bit of time. >> thank you. >> thank you for yielding. just very quickly, my amendment does not say don't do it. it says do it in a rational and staged way. the amendment is very, very clear. and i'm just going to take a couple of seconds to cover it. it eliminates the 2015 -- >> will the gentleman yield? can you show us where the word "rationale" is in your amendment? it just says the word" strike" section 223. >> mr. turner, you and i have

had the opportunity to work many, many days together, and i would like to continue to do that in a way that doesn't get personal. >> i'm not getting personal. it says strike 223. >> there's a second amendment that does it differently. we'll take that up in a few minutes. my apologies. >> the gentleman yields back. >> i yield back, mr. chairman. >> the chair now yields to the gentleman from florida, mr. miller. >> thank you very much yield, mr. chairman. i yield my time to mr. turner. >> thank you, mr. miller. thank you, mr. chairman. i am very concerned when there are statements made that there is no threat and that the systems do not work. because even though we have the benefit of classified briefings,

that of course contradict all that that we don't bring forward in the hearings, there are luckily nonclassified statements of information that we can bring forward to contradict these statements of it doesn't work and there is no threat, one of which is secretary gates himself who said north korea's capabilities that they are seeking absolutely threaten the continental united states. so the statements of the people on the east coast don't need to worry. they can't get there is really an absolute overstatement. we're talking about the future. we're talking about a threat that's real. secretary gates himself articulated it to the american people. when the secretary of defense tells the public -- you know the continental united states they are at risk, they're at risk. skpaoeut shouldn't be a debate here as fiction. it's not fiction. secondly, again, i will underline subsequent to this

markup we will host the classified briefing. i invite all of you to attend. you will find this works. there are many missiles that we have that are under development. and there are missiles that are deployed. when you lump them all together and say when they are tested, developed, and you put it against a missile that works, it's in the ground, well, i shot one off that i'm developing that didn't work and they are only 50% reliable, they're not the same missile. we should not be combining all that information together and cop fusing people. we have ground-based missiles that work. and we need to proceed. now, i, again, i'm going to call on people to oppose mr. g's amendment. those who have suggest amount of knowledge in this area believe we need an east coast site to protect the united states. i believe we need an east coast site. and i would ask you to vote down

mr. g's amendment. >> the gentleman yields back. any further discussion at this moment? if not, the question is on the adoption of the amendment offered by mr. g. all those in favor will say aye. those opposed will say no. >> no. >> the nos have it. the amendment is not agreed to. roll call. sufficient support for roll call vote is indicated. we will call this roll call vote at the end of the subcommittee mark. are there any other amendments? >> mr. chairman, i have an amendment at the desk. >> will the clerk pass out the amendment? >> 147r1, please. >> without objection, the amendment will be dispensed.

thank you, mr. chairman. this issue, again, is the grouped based defense system. it would reduce the amount for the missile defense strategy by $357 million. ground based mid course defense has a record of testing failures and it has had those two back-to-back figures we just discussed. the u.s. has deployed 26

ground-based interceptors in alaska and four in california. and yet when we have tested there have been only eight hits out of 17 tries of this system since 1997. the last two intercept flight tests in january 2010 and december 2010 failed. there has not been a successful ground-based mid course defense flight intercept test since december 2008. in march of 2012, the pentagon announced that it was delaying another intercept flight test until late 2012 so that it could continue to evaluate the system and determine the cause of the recent test fail chers. general o'reilly has conducted a rigorous analysis and is proceeding deliberately.

mda has identified the cause of the failure and is implementing fixes before the ground testing this summer and another flight test in december. more funding will not speed up -- let me reiterate. more funding will not speed up the test investigations and preparations. in addition, the gao found in the most recent budget scrub that there should actually be another $100 million that could be cut from gmd. the system has yet to prove effective against operationally realistic threats employing decoys and countermeasures. in his 2011 report on u.s. missile defense systems, dr. gilmore stated, to date, gmd has

demonstrated a limited capability against a simple threat, referring to the decoys and the countermeasures. a 2011 defense science board report added, that while the ability to dependably discriminate re-entry vehicles from penetration, aids and other objects is essential, is essential, to an effective missile defense system, discrimination in the xo atmosphere is still not a completely solved problem. recent studies concluded that improvements and discrimination and reliability of gbis are needed. a 1999 national intelligence estimate stated we assess that countries developing ballistic missiles, north korea north korea and iran would also develop various responses to the u.s. theater and national defenses by the time that they would flight test their missiles.