Charles Krauthammer Launches Surgical Strike on the Anti-Nuke Crowd’s ‘Back-Door’ Disarmament Scheme

Sen. Lott Rains on Byron Dorgan’s ‘C.T.B.T. Day of Action’

(Washington, D.C.): Today’s Washington Post features one of syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer’s finest dissections of the Left phenomenon he has called "a world imagined." His essay, entitled "A Test Ban That Disarms Us" (see the attached), should be required reading by every U.S. Senator, and by all those who wish to understand the unilateral disarmament agenda that is animating the current push by Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND), the Clinton Administration and their anti-nuclear activist allies aimed at securing Senate approval of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).

Importantly, Dr. Krauthammer methodically disposes of the ostensibly serious basis for supporting this accord. With a psychiatrist’s nose for neuroses, he points out that "History has not been kind to [the] argument" that unilateral U.S. restraint and "international norms" translate into universal behavior that mirrors our own. Dr. Krauthammer then applies the coup de grâce: "Whether the United States signs a ban on nuclear testing will not affect the course of proliferation. But it will affect the nuclear status of the United States." (Emphasis added.)

Sen. Lott Serves Notice

Dr. Krauthammer’s arguments — and those of the growing number of national security experts who have publicly declared their opposition to the CTBT ¹ — appear closely to parallel the views of the Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-MS). In an exchange with Sen. Dorgan on the Senate floor this morning, Sen. Lott cautioned his colleague that he better be careful what he wishes for.

In response to the North Dakotan’s insistence that the Senate open hearings and schedule action on this treaty (an insistence that may translate into an effort to block the chamber’s action on other matters), the Majority Leader made clear that hearings would prominently feature, among others, sharply critical testimony from Dr. James Schlesinger. Few people in the Nation have more authority and credibility on this topic than the only man in history to have held the positions of Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, Director of Central Intelligence, Secretary of Defense and Secretary of Energy — a career made even more influential in the Senate by virtue of his service in both Republican and Democratic cabinets. The prospects for favorable Senate action, already troubled, ² can only further decline as a result.

The Bottom Line

That forecast is further reinforced by the unfortunate testimony concerning the CTBT offered yesterday before the Senate Armed Services Committee by General Hugh Shelton. In connection with a hearing on his nomination for a second two-year term as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the General was asked by the Committee’s ranking member, Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) to repeat his previous endorsement of the Treaty. Their exchange was instructive:

I think from the standpoint of the holding back on the development of the testing which leads to wanting a better system, developing new capabilities, which then leads you into arms sales or into proliferation. Stopping that as early as we can, I think, is in the best interest of the international community in general, and specifically in the best interest of the United States.

It is to be hoped that, before a vote is taken on his confirmation (let alone on the CTBT) General Shelton will be given an opportunity to clarify his thinking about this defective agreement — and the consistency of his support for a treaty that will contribute to the unilateral nuclear disarmament of the United States with his oath to uphold and defend its constitutional requirement to provide for "the common defense."

¹ See the Center’s Decision Brief entitled Center Releases Open Letter to Senator Lott from Fifty-two Top Security Policy-Practitioners Opposing C.T.B.T. (No. 99-P 98, 9 September 1999).

² Last October, in action on what was described by its sponsors as a "test vote" on the CTBT, forty-four Senators — nine more than are needed to deny the two-thirds majority needed for ratification — cast ballots in the negative. See R.I.P. C.T.B.: Biden-Specter Amendment’s Phyrric Victory Shows Decisive Senate Opposition to Clinton’s Flawed Test Ban (No. 98-D 158, 2 September 1999).