CENTER INAUGURATES BRADLEY DEBATE SERIES WITH THE QUESTION: DOES THE UNITED STATES NEED BALLISTIC MISSILE DEFENSES?

(Chicago, Illinois): One of the most
serious national security problems facing
the Nation is the fact that the
American people are utterly undefended
against the growing danger of ballistic
missile attack. Fortunately,
this vulnerability, and the need promptly
to begin eliminating it, are issues that
have received a good bit of attention in
the course 1996 political campaign — and
that may feature prominently in the
presidential and vice presidential
debates beginnning this weekend.

After all, there are few topics on
which the differences between the
Republican and Democratic tickets are
more pronounced: Bob Dole has declared
his determination as one of his first
acts as President to begin defending
America; Bill Clinton maintains that
there is no need to take such a step for
at least three years, if not for
considerably longer.

As a non-partisan organization
dedicated to preserving and promoting
U.S. national security, the Center for
Security Policy welcomes all such
opportunities to educate the American
people about major challenges facing
America and its global interests. Indeed,
toward this end, the Center last night
sponsored the first of its Bradley
National Debate Series — a
forum made possible by a generous grant
from the Lynde and Harry Bradley
Foundation to facilitate rigorous
exchanges of ideas on critical foreign
and defense policy topics. Hosted by the
University of Chicago’s prestigious
Harris School of Public Policy and
featuring nationally renowned experts in
the field, this debate considered
the proposition that national missile
defenses should be promptly deployed, and
previewed the sorts of arguments that
should be heard in the course of this
Sunday’s debate and the two succeeding
sessions.

The first Bradley Debate was moderated
by Professor Charles Lipson
of the University of Chicago’s Department
of Political Science. Arguing that the
United States does need to
deploy effective missile defenses at the
earliest possible moment were the
Center’s Director, Frank J.
Gaffney, Jr. — who also serves
as the Coordinator of the Coalition to
Defend America — and Dr. William
R. Graham, former Science
Advisor to President Reagan. Arguing that
such a deployment could not or should not
be undertaken at this time were Dr.
John Mearsheimer, the R. Wendell
Harrison Distinguished Service Professor
of political Science at the University of
Chicago, and Dr. Gerald Marsh,
a physicist at the Argonne National
Laboratory and former consultant to the
Office of the Chief of Naval Operations
on strategic nuclear policy and
technology.

Among the important topics addressed
were: the reliability of traditional
means of deterrence in
the present and prospective strategic
environments; the nature and maturity of the
threat posed by ballistic
missile-borne weapons of mass
destruction; the past experience with
U.S. efforts to build effective
anti-missile systems and the
prospects for doing so today — both in
terms of technical performance to be
expected and the associated financial
outlays; and the effect that the
1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty
has had on such technological
developments previously and the costs
versus benefits of allowing it to do so
in the future.

An edited
transcript of the first Bradley
Debate may be obtained by contacting the
Center. For more information about this
exciting series, please contact the
Center’s Chief of Staff, Rinelda Bliss
Walters.

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