"New Congress, Old Weapons"

PRODUCER: Pres., Center for Defense Information

HOST: Admiral John Shanahan (USN, Ret.) Director, Center for Defense Information

DIRECTOR OF RESEARCH: David T. Johnson

DIRECTOR OF TELEVISION: Mark Sugg

SENIOR PRODUCER & NARRATOR: Ira Shorr

PRODUCERS: Glenn Baker

Daniel Sagalyn

Stephen Sapienza

PRINCIPAL ANALYST & SCRIPTWRITER: Stephen Sapienza

SEGMENT PRODUCER: Stephen Sapienza

VIDEO GRAPHICS: Adam Luther

ORIGINATION: Washington, D.C.

PROGRAM NO.: 845

INITIAL BROADCAST: 23 July 1995

CONDITION OF USE: Credit "AMERICA'S DEFENSE MONITOR"

(Center for Defense Information).

(C) Copyright 1995, Center for Defense Information. All Rights

Reserved.

Videotapes also available.

"NEW CONGRESS, OLD WEAPONS" features comments from:

__________________________________________________

ADM EUGENE CARROLL, Jr. Deputy Director, Center for Defense

(USN, Ret.) Information

Rep. SAXBY CHAMBLISS

(R-GA)

SUZY KERR Legislative Director, Council for a Livable World

Senator JOHN McCAIN (R-AZ)

Rep. DAVID OBEY (D-WI)

BAKER SPRING Senior Policy Analyst for Defense

Policy, The Heritage Foundation

- - - - - - -

NARRATOR: January 1995 -- An energized Republican-led 104th Congress vows to change politics as usual, reduce the national debt, and put an end to wasteful government spending.

In the name of fiscal austerity, Republicans call for the elimination of whole departments of the federal government, including the Department of Energy and the Department of Education.

In order to balance the budget, the 104th Congress looks to slash funds for domestic programs, including medical care of the elderly, college loans, and school lunches for poor children.

But there are programs that Congress is willing to spend billions of taxpayer dollars on, even though the programs are of debatable value. The cost of any one of these programs will dwarf the savings achieved by cuts in public broadcasting or education funds. Today, on "AMERICA'S DEFENSE MONITOR," the New Congress and Old Weapons.

["AMERICA'S DEFENSE MONITOR" program introduction.]

ADM JOHN SHANAHAN (USN, Ret.): I'm Vice Admiral Jack Shanahan, director of the Center for Defense Information.

The American people want a strong military and they're prepared to pay for what's necessary. They don't get too uptight about $300 hammers; that sort of goes with the territory. But they are not prepared to accept billions upon billions of dollars of wasteful military spending on unneeded and unwanted weapons systems, most of them left over from the Cold War. It's a shame that most members of Congress can't see this issue in the same light as do a majority of the voters.

NARRATOR: Last November, when US voters made it clear that they would no longer tolerate politics as usual and the continued mismanagement of taxpayer dollars, Congress responded by putting domestic programs and federal agencies on the chopping block. Targeted programs included health care for the poor and elderly, food stamps, and environmental programs.

But while a majority in Congress were quick to find ways to cut domestic programs, when it came to military spending, it was business as usual. Weapons originally designed to fight the former Soviet Union were given the thumbs-up even though the combined cost of these weapons could end up at $900 billion.

We'll look at several of these Cold War weapons projects which, unlike the former Soviet Union, have yet to fade away.

In 1994, the 103rd Congress allowed the Pentagon to buy 20 B-2 Stealth bombers at a cost of $45 billion. The original mission of the B-2 was in an all out nuclear war to fly undetected through Warsaw Pact and Soviet Union airspace and drop more nuclear bombs on any remaining targets.

The B-2 bomber began in the military's secret, or black, budget in 1981. The Pentagon originally wanted 132 planes. However, as time wore on and the Soviet Union collapsed, many members of Congress grew skeptical of the need for costly

B-2 bombers.

Rep. LES ASPIN (D-WI) (at 1990 press conference):

"If the threats we face internationally were greater and the deficits we face at home were smaller, we might continue to hedge on the B-2. But they aren't and we can't."

NARRATOR: In 1994, Congress halted production of the B-2 program at 20 planes. The cost per B-2 bomber is a staggering $2.2 billion, making it the most expensive bomber ever built.

Now some members of Congress and the B-2's manufacturer, Northrop-Grumman, want taxpayers to buy 20 more

B-2s. $553 million was recently added to the 1996 House Defense Authorization Act to begin production of two new B-2 bombers. The $553 million would be the down payment on 20 new

B-2 bombers which would cost taxpayers $14 billion. Operating and maintaining the added B-2s over their 20-year lifespan would bring the total cost of 20 extra B-2 bombers to a staggering $30 billion.

Many find the push in Congress for more stealth bombers ironic. The Pentagon has said publicly that it doesn't want 20 more B-2 bombers, especially at the expense of other weapons.

Two independent studies commissioned by the Defense Department at the urging of Congress found that current bombers in the US arsenal, such as upgraded B-52 bombers and B-1 bombers, will meet the need for US military planners for the foreseeable future.

According to both reports, cheaper alternatives to the stealth bomber are also available, namely cruise missiles, which can be fired at targets from a distance outside of enemy airspace.

Rep. JOHN KASICH (R-OH) (House debate, June 13, 1995):

"This is the heavy bomber study. Do you know what it says? Additional quantities of accurate guided munitions are more cost-effective than securing 20 additional B-2s. It says let us buy the standoff, precision-guided weapons. It would be better for us than buying B-2s. Frankly, it'll save us a ton of money. In fact, it will allow us to not have to put other systems at risk."

NARRATOR: Many in the new Congress are willing to fund a weapon that even the Pentagon doesn't want. Yet at the same time, they claim to be tough on government waste and abuse.

Rep. CHAKA FATTAH (D-PA) (House debate, June 13, 1995):

"So, it's interesting to see these people who want to cut the budget so much now come and want to spend more than even the Pentagon has requested and have us again throw additional dollars into the development of a B-2 bomber.

"I'm sure many are sincere in their objections, but it just seems to be unwise at this point in our country, given our fiscal circumstances and given the responsibility to do some things about threats both foreign and domestic that we should reconsider perhaps what our priorities as a House ought to be."

NARRATOR: Even though the original mission for the B-2 has disappeared and the Pentagon doesn't want the bomber, some members of Congress, like Representative Richard Armey, the majority leader of the House and a champion of cuts in non-military spending, see spending money on the B-2 as an investment in the future of America.

Rep. RICHARD ARMEY (R-TX) (House debate, June 13, 1995):

"The B-2 does for me, and for my children's future, and for my nation, and for my nation's treasury everything I can ask of a weapons system. This is truly, ladies and gentlemen, a flying miracle for the future and it's something we ought to be very, very serious about."

Rep. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC) (House debate. June 13, 1995):

"If we start today and plan today and spend some money, not only will we save lives in the future, we'll have a bomber that will deter war and will give our children a secure future. That's why I'm going to vote for the B-2. "Does it cost a lot? Yes, it does. Will it save a lot of lives? Yes, it will because we will be in a war. And what we do in the 21st Century in war is determined by what we do here in 1995."

NARRATOR: At $1.5 billion per plane, each additional B-2 bomber is literally worth its weight in gold. But the value of these bombers to the American taxpayer is being challenged by those who see it as the politics of pork.

Rep. RON DELLUMS (D-CA) (House debate, June 13, 1995):

"It's not about the realities of the post-Cold War. Who are you going to fly B-2 bombers against? Haiti? Against Somalia? Against Rwanda? Against Bosnia? This is ludicrous in the extreme. It is about money. It is about building it. It's about contractors saying let me build 20 more.

"It staggers the imagination, Mr. Chairman, what we could do in this room with $31.5 billion, and that's what it's going to cost to revitalize the education for our children, or address the health needs of our senior citizens."

NARRATOR: The Seawolf submarine is another lingering weapons program spawned by the Cold War. Currently, one Seawolf sub has been put in the water. Another is under construction and some members of Congress want to buy a third Seawolf at a cost of almost $3 billion. The price tag for three Seawolf submarines could reach $13 billion.

The Seawolf submarine was originally designed to seek out and destroy Soviet ballistic missile subs before they could launch their deadly nuclear payloads at US cities. Russia, with its weak economy, can no longer bear the enormous costs of maintaining and operating a huge Soviet Union-sized navy.

Rear Admiral Eugene Carroll is the deputy director of the Center for Defense Information. He has testified numerous times before Congress on military issues.

ADM EUGENE CARROLL, Jr. (USN, Ret.): The threat against the United States posed by the Soviet Union is gone because the Soviet Union is gone. The Russian submarine fleet is disappearing. They've retired over 120 submarines in the last three years.

NARRATOR: Advertisements in national newspapers and magazines have sought to sell politicians and the public on the importance of the Seawolf program. These ads imply that Russian submarines are still a threat to the United States and that the Seawolf program is vital to America if we are to maintain our ability to build new submarines in the future.

Rep. JACK REED (D-RI) (at Seawolf christening, Groton, CT, June 24, 1995):

"This ship is a tribute to the thousands of men and women of Electric Boat and associated contractors who built this magnificent warship. Their skill is one of the most prized assets in the arsenal of democracy and we cannot lose that great asset.

"This ship is also a commitment to our submarine forces that they shall have the finest technology as they risk their lives to guard our freedom. This ship also recognizes that Russia continues to heavily invest its scarce resources in sophisticated submarine technology and more aggressive deployment of its submarine fleet."

ADM CARROLL: They have six modern attack submarines, six in their whole fleet. They may build as many as five more. And that's what the Navy is now pointing at and saying, oh, the Akula is the world's quietest submarine, we have to have the Seawolf to deal with that. That isn't true.

Three Seawolfs, if they get all three of them, are not going to take care of 11 Akulas, if they were ever used against us. And secondly, the Navy has said we need 10 to 12 super-quiet submarines about the year 2010. There's plenty of time to achieve super silence by new technology by the year 2010, if that's what we need, without building these $4 billion monsters.

NARRATOR: Baker Spring is the senior analyst for defense policy at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C. He argues that the third Seawolf is needed to preserve America's ability to build submarines in the future.

BAKER SPRING: The third Seawolf is really a question of what's going to happen with the industrial base as the United States moves to build a new family of attack submarines, a follow-on generation really to the Los Angeles class, because the Seawolfs will only have three. Even if they were to build this one, it would still be the last one. I think that there is a legitimate argument for maintaining two nuclear-capable shipyards in this country.

ADM CARROLL: The justification, rationalization that's advanced for the third Seawolf, besides the Akula submarine as the threat, is that we have to maintain an industrial base capability in two locations to build nuclear submarines. We have a shipyard, the Newport News shipbuilding corporation. They could build all the submarines and carriers that the United States is planning to build for the foreseeable future.

But they say, oh, well, we can't have it all in one place, we have to have two facilities where we can do this work. And so, that's just another rationalization for building ships we don't need in order to keep the jobs and the shipyards in business.

SUZY KERR: We didn't need Seawolf I or II, let alone III. It's a very expensive jobs program. So, to appease members who have jobs in their district, they put the money in a generic pot that they'll slowly farm out to those shipyards as they start running out of money.

NARRATOR: Suzy Kerr is the legislative director at the Council for a Livable World, an arms control advocacy organization.

Ms. KERR: They're doing things like giving $12 million to the shipyard in Virginia so that it can send 10 employees to the shipyard in Connecticut, so that they can watch the submarines being built, so they can compete better in the future. Well, if we don't need submarines in the first place, it makes a lot of sense to me that we should go ahead and close a shipyard and only have one and build submarines there, when we need them, and not build submarines just because it's a jobs program.

Senator JOHN McCAIN (R-AZ): We spend these monies on the unneeded weapons systems for one reason: Because they subcontract major weapons systems all over the country. For example, the Seawolf submarine which cost $2.7 billion, there's $62 million of those contracts, guess where? In Arizona. There is subcontracting all over America and the subcontractors, understandably, in the name of job preservation, come there.

The other argument, of course, is the so-called defense industrial base. So, we have to keep building these weapon systems in order to preserve the defense industrial base. There is validity to that argument, but it has been carried to ludicrous extremes.

ADM CARROLL: The Seawolf program is no shown in reports to Congress as estimated to cost more than $13 billion for three submarines. If we stop the third one, which has not yet been funded, fully funded, you probably could save a billion to a billion and a half dollars. So, the two would end up costing us $12 billion. Either way you slice it, we've spent an awful lot of money for very, very little military capability.

NARRATOR: A research project borne of the Cold War, the Strategic Defense Initiative, otherwise known as "Star Wars," was intended to shield the United States from Soviet missiles. The Star Wars program, which has cost $38 billion since it began in 1983, was supposed to use satellites, plus space and land-based lasers and missiles to shoot down incoming Soviet nuclear missiles.

Despite the end of the Cold War, some members of Congress has discovered a renewed enthusiasm for funding a national ballistic missile defense system.

Rep. DANA ROHRABACHER (R-CA) (House speech, June 14, 1995):

"When we had one enemy or two enemies, yes, mutually assured destruction worked. Today, missile proliferation and nuclear proliferation means that in a few years we could face a scenario where a missile would be launched by an Iran, or a Libya, or some other -- maybe Afghanistan, some people in Afghanistan will get their hands on a surplus Soviet missile."

Mr. SPRING: The reason that Congress wants more money for ballistic missile defense is precisely related to the threat.

NARRATOR: The argument for a national ballistic missile defense was dramatized in a recent TV commercial.

TV AD from the COALITION to DEFEND AMERICA:

"Oh, my God! Mr. President, we have a national emergency! We've detected a ballistic missile launched at the US from the Middle East. Sir, I think it's a nuclear missile. We're not sure of the target yet, but it looks like a major American city. Mr. President, I can't shoot it down! We have no defense against missile attack! There's nothing I can do to stop it."

ADM CARROLL: The commercial is purely scare tactics. There's nobody in the Middle East capable of firing a missile at the United States. Why in the world would they dramatize it and act like it's going to happen tomorrow and we'd better get on with this missile defense?

I believe the least likely way the United States would be attacked with nuclear weapons is by an intercontinental ballistic missile system. Rogue nations don't have the money, they don't have the technology. And, furthermore, they know that if they attack the United States with one or two or five missiles, they would end up being absolutely annihilated.

No, they're much apt to smuggle a warhead into the United States welded into the hull of a trans-streamer, sailed into the Great Lakes as a commercial ship. Tie it up in Chicago and there goes Chicago, or New York, or Los Angeles.

NARRATOR: The House of Representatives recently proposed to fund ballistic missile defense at $763 million more than the Pentagon had requested.

Mr. SPRING: Congress is looking at the issue from the viewpoint of what happens if systems, entire systems of missiles or missile components are sold to rogue regimes around the world by countries like North Korea or China and that that serves as a short cut, certainly in times of timelines, for the development of both intermediate and long range missiles.

ADM CARROLL: The only nation capable of attacking the United States with ballistic missiles is the Russian nation. But we're helping them, loaning them money, cooperating with them, buying their nuclear materials. Why in the world would they want to attack us?

Key point: If they do attack us, they have enough missiles, enough warheads that no defense we're contemplating would make any difference. It wouldn't even blunt the attack, much less defeat it.

The other nations, there isn't a single one of them that's capable of attacking the United States, and there's been testimony to Congress by the Department of Defense and the CIA that they won't have any capability for ten years or more. This is just a contrived, imaginary threat that's being put forward to justify spending money on something they want to fund.

NARRATOR: The F-22 fighter plane, which is still under development, would be a radar-evading fighter bomber. Nearly $10 billion has been spent on the F-22, so far, and a few prototypes have been built for research purposes. The F-22 was once seen as a fighter plane that would do battle with Soviet fighters of the 21st Century. Those Soviet fighters haven't been built and likely never will.

And yet advocates of the F-22 are pushing Congress to fund the full scale production of the F-22 to the tune of $57 billion. Supporters of the F-22 tout the high tech capabilities that the plane possesses.

Rep. SAXBY CHAMBLISS (R-GA): We currently don't have an airplane that can do what the F-22 can do, because we don't have a stealth fighter. We don't have a fighter that has the advanced avionics, nor do we have a fighter that has super cruise. Those three things are crucial to the future of the air dominance by the United States.

NARRATOR: But opponents of the F-22 believe that the United States already has fighter planes, like the F-22, that will provide us with technological superiority well into the 21st Century.

Rep. DAVID OBEY (D-WI): The F-22 is meant to replace the

F-15 and we have hundreds and hundreds of F-15s right now and that F-15 is going last us till at least the year 2014. That's what we were told when we bought it anyway. And so, it seems to me that to replace the F-15 with the F-22 is a $72 billion waste of taxpayer's money.

NARRATOR: But F-22 supporters worry that other nations might soon have a fighter plane that will challenge American fighters.

Rep. CHAMBLISS: We have airplanes that are being produced overseas right now that are being upgraded, modified in order to catch up with the air dominance that we have right now. We have airplanes being modified that will be equal to or greater than what our F-15 capability is.

Rep. OBEY: They will also make the argument that, well, a number of third countries are getting the F-16s, and so where we should be building the F-22 to stay ahead of them. The way you solve that is to have us quit selling F-16s to Third World countries, at least as many as we're selling. We're our own worst enemy when it comes to that.

ADM CARROLL: We have over 800 F-15s that are the finest air superiority fighters in the world and they're good way up into the 21st Century. I don't think the first one of those runs out of service life until 2010, 2012. If we go on with the F-22 program to deal with a nonexistent enemy, for every one we build we're going to have to retire the finest fighter planes in the world. We're in an arms race with ourself with the F-22.

NARRATOR: The B-2 bomber, Seawolf submarine, ballistic missile defense, the F-22 fighter.

ADM CARROLL: The tremendous scope, family of Cold War relics that are still in production or even planned for the future, such as the F-22, are so expensive that if we carried out all of the approved plans, the plans that are in the Pentagon's programs, they would cost something like $900 billion to build all of these weapons.

NARRATOR: Congressional supporters of these weapons feel that Americans are willing to bear the costs.

Rep. CHAMBLISS: You know, there is really no price tag that you can put on freedom. And if we're going to ensure not only the freedom of the citizens of the United States, but also the freedom of other democracies around the world, it's important that we have the F-22. The American people demand that we provide those assurances of freedom of the citizens of the United States. And in order to do that, we've got to have the F-22.

NARRATOR: Others maintain that those who want to fund these Cold War programs are out of touch with the American public.

Ms. KERR: It's interesting. They want the American people to think that we're going to protect you from an enemy that really doesn't exist, and yet -- I mean, look at what's happening on the domestic side of the budget, you know, that help you have a job, educate your kids, build your roads, pay for your Medicare, on and on. I don't know. The juxtaposition to me you have to keep noting again and again, where they want to put their money and where they want to cut it.

NARRATOR: Some observers argue that if we buy these weapons designed to fight yesterday's enemy, we may worsen today's domestic problems.

ADM CARROLL: The greatest threats to the security and wellbeing of Americans today is not from external sources, it's right here at home in our cities, in our economy, in our dependence on foreign energy sources. I mean, I can give you examples of all sorts of places that we should be spending money that we're wasting on relics of the Cold War.

NARRATOR: Suzy Kerr points to recent polling data that shows more Americans favor spending their money on domestic programs instead of weapons.

Ms. KERR: When you give them a choice between a B-2 bomber and better education for their kids, nine out of ten times they will always choose something on the domestic side. And as the domestic budget cuts really start hitting home, people are going to start turning around and saying, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Why are all these weapons -- They're finally going to start paying attention to Cold War weapons systems.

NARRATOR: Congress proposes trimming $894 billion from the federal budget over the next seven years, affecting virtually every major federal program except defense. Much of these cuts will be visited on domestic programs Congress says are unneeded and wasteful. But when the costs of domestic programs are compared to the expensive Cold War weapons, the value of the Cold War weapons becomes even more dubious.

[On screen]

...$13 billion for the Seawolf program or 37 years of funding for public broadcasting...

...$57 billion for the F-22 fighter or 12 years of funding for school lunch programs...

...$31 billion for 20 B-2 stealth bombers or 15 years of full funding for National Cancer Institute.

Rep. NEIL ABERCROMBIE (D-WI) (House debate, June 13, 1995):

"We have been told over and over again we have to make tough choices, tough choices within every category. We're telling kids they got to make tough choices, elderly people they got to make tough choices. We have to make tough choices in defense, as well."

ADM SHANAHAN: There is little chance that we will see any reduction in defense spending for the next year. The unique agreement between this Congress and the administration that defense has been cut enough already prevails. But wait until the budget cuts in domestic programs hit the home front.

As I said at the beginning, the American people want a strong military, but they also want good schools, good highways, good health care, and a balanced budget. All of this can be achieved, but the Defense Department must pay its fair share of the financial burden.

For "AMERICA'S DEFENSE MONITOR," I'm Jack Shanahan.

[End of broadcast.]

CONDITION OF USE: Credit "AMERICA'S DEFENSE MONITOR"

(Center for Defense Information).

(C) Copyright 1995. Center for Defense Information. All Rights

Reserved.

| Home | ADM's Home | Complete Program List |