#4
Dallas Morning News
October 10, 2002
Editorial
Destroying Stockpiles: There's work still to be done in Russia

Sometimes what seemed like a good idea at the time breeds unintended consequences and requires some nimble footwork to set things right.

One such instance is a funding impasse that threatens U.S. involvement in an international effort to destroy Soviet-era chemical weapons stockpiles. What was intended to make the Russians come clean on chemical weapons now is getting in the way of a program intended to eradicate these weapons.

Warehouses in the Russian town of Shchuch'ye house about 14 percent of the former Soviet Union's vast arsenal of chemical weapons. Sarin, VX gas and other particularly lethal chemicals are loaded into about 2 million artillery shells and missile warheads. The site is a veritable mother lode of silent, deadly, ghastly and portable chemical weapons that easily could be hidden and dispersed.

Under international agreements, the United States has spent about $230 million to prepare a site and design a plant to destroy the weapons at Shchuch'ye. The problem is that Congress imposed conditions that now prevent the Pentagon from spending more money on the project, which some estimate could cost $1 billion just at Shchuch'ye.

That is not a modest price until you consider that it would help eradicate a witch's brew of dangerous chemicals that Russia couldn't eliminate alone. And while U.S. assistance is hardly an ironclad guarantee that chemical weapons won't fall into the wrong hands, "it's absolutely a step in the right direction," says Amy Smithson, a chemical weapons expert at the Henry L. Stimson Center in Washington.

While it is imperative that lawmakers obtain a full accounting of chemical stockpiles and know that dollars are well spent, this program must not wither away from funding inaction. The known Russian chemical stockpile is 40,000 tons, a staggering amount that is at least 10,000 tons greater than the U.S. chemical weapons storehouse.

Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, who sits on the House Armed Services Committee, says he would favor congressional action giving the president the flexibility to waive funding restrictions. He says funding would continue and the president would retain leverage to press for a full accounting. We think this is a reasonable approach.

The United States must not minimize the danger these weapons pose and squander an opportunity to eradicate them.

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