Excerpts of Testimony by Dr. Peter Leitner before the Joint Economic Committee of the United States Congress

Washington,
D.C.
17 June 1997

Introduction

Mr. Chairman, members of the
Committee, I am the author of the book
entitled Decontrolling Strategic
Technology 1990-1992: Creating the
Strategic Threats of the 21st Century.
I need to state up front that the
opinions and analysis I express here are
my own….

* * *

My motivation in writing this
book stemmed from the dramatic politicization
of the export control process. I have
seen the blatant manipulation of honest
technical and engineering analyzes that
warned of the dangers to U.S. national
security posed by the proliferation of
advanced dual-use technologies.
Unfortunately, as I have documented, the
campaign to weaken or eliminate the
concept of “non-proliferation”
by undermining the export control system
— its chief operational vehicle — has
been remarkably successful and can
accurately be characterized as a
scorched-earth policy.

It has been so successful, in fact,
that the Coordinating Committee on
Multilateral Export Controls (COCOM) and
the national security export controls
that we came to know and rely upon no
longer exist. In their place are
a handful of weak, ineffectual regimes
which are little more than cardboard
cut-outs designed to maintain the facade
of an international technology security
system, but offer virtually no protection
from nations seeking to develop advanced
conventional weapons or weapons of mass
destruction.

These so-called follow-on regimes are limited
notification fora, similar in
function to a post office box, where
nations inform each other of
denials of technology transfers if they
so desire. The national discretion nature
of decision-making common to these
regimes…ensures that suppliers may do
what they wish so long as some post
facto notification is made to the
partners. This de minimis
approach is a far cry from COCOM’s
consensus-based regime where
pre-notification was the rule and a
negative vote cast by any of the 16
member states could actually prevent a
dangerous transfer from taking place.

The current Administration was
responsible for the elimination of COCOM before
any replacement regime was installed.
The result was loss of any possible
negotiating leverage in ensuring that a
follow-on regime would have any teeth. The
so-called Wassenaar Agreement which was
eventually formed is little more than a
kabuki-like construct intended to provide
the appearance of technology control
while affording none. The
unnecessary destruction of COCOM opened
the floodgates of technology to China as
it was subject to few restraints other
than in the narrow realms of ballistic
missile and nuclear technology. As the
Chinese are already a nuclear and
ballistic missile power, the restraints
serve only to place obstacles in front of
Chinese acquisition of technology they
already have — while allowing the
unrestricted flow of militarily important
power projection and command, control,
computers and communications information
technology that they need.

* * *

Possible Implications to
U.S. National and Economic Security

This dramatic weakening of the
international system of export controls
lies at the heart of a series of
independent developments that are gnawing
away at our defense industrial base and
are spilling over into our civil
industrial base as well. Several parallel
developments have long-term implications
for the economic health and
competitiveness of our economy as well as
the safety of our men and women in the
armed forces. They include:

• The open penetration of
  U.S. high-tech industries, and
  national and military labs by
  Chinese and other foreign
  nationals who carry home
  critical military or
  manufacturing technology.
• The massive unilateral
  U.S. decontrol of supercomputers
  and supercomputer manufacturing
  technology.
• The wholesale transfer of
  military factories to China,
  including a Columbus, Ohio B-1
  bomber, C-17 airlifter, and ICBM
  factory as documented most
  thoroughly in John Fialka’s book War
  by Other Means.
• The widespread auctions
  of defense manufacturing plant
  and equipment, often to
  foreign buyers, and the loss of
  skilled personnel, experience,
  and productive capacity of our
  industrial base.
• Permitting Chinese agents
  to purchase state-of-the-art
  military parts, components, and
  weapons systems directly from DoD
  surplus property auctions,
  as reported by U.S. News
  and “60 Minutes”….
• The flooding of the
  domestic and international market
  with state-of-the-art
  manufacturing equipment at
  cut-rate prices and the
  undermining of efforts to
  strengthen the American machine
  tool industry.
• The lease of the former
  Long beach Naval Station
  to a shady arm of the Chinese
  government and the construction
  of a Chinese “Wholesale
  Mall” next door to the
  recently closed George Air Force
  Base in San Bernardino County,
  CA. George AFB is strategically
  located 70 miles from the Navy’s
  China Lake Weapons Development
  Center, only 40 miles from the
  Palmdale stealth and “black
  program” aerospace test
  facility, and just 30 miles from
  Edwards AFB — the primary U.S.
  military aerospace test flight
  center. If a permanent PRC
  presence develops at such a
  strategic location it may offer
  China unparalleled eavesdropping
  and intelligence collection
  opportunities.

* * *

Instead of preparing prospective
remedies to serious potential threats, the
Administration diverts attention by
focusing exclusively on small, almost
irrelevant, pariah states such as Cuba,
Syria, Sudan, Iraq, Iran, and Libya to
deflect attention away from the fact that
big money was being made modernizing our
most likely future adversaries.
Chief among them is China.

* * *

Self-Inflicted Wounds

…The greatest single point of
failure in maintaining a credible export
control system was the neutering of the
Defense Department’s traditional role as
the conservative anchor of the process.
This action was carried out very quickly
by freezing DoD’s key staff out of the
chain of command and isolating them from
the decision-making process within DoD.
DoD abandoned its traditional role and
instructed DoD employees to side with the
Commerce Department and isolate the State
Department and ACDA on many issues. This
bizarre role change finds the State
Department at times in the farcical
position of being the lone agency making
the national security case and opposing
liberalization positions from DoD.

Beyond these actions our strategic
position is being further eroded from
other angles. The much-ballyhooed
“Dual-Use Initiative” was
advertised as the Defense Secretary’s
plan to cut DoD procurement costs by
using commercial technology in weapons
systems wherever possible. This
initiative is, unfortunately, a
double-edged sword, which, while
promising some potential cost-savings,
will also slash critical advantages in
U.S. technological superiority by forcing
weapons systems to use the same
decontrolled technology potential enemies
are now allowed to build their own
weapons around. It also forces
our military to rely upon critical
microelectronics and components that are
designed and manufactured abroad, thus
making them extremely vulnerable to
supply cut-offs, countermeasures,
spoofing or even sabotage….

Ignoring History’s Lessons

Former Secretary of Defense Dick
Cheney observed in 1992:

“We field the most
technologically advanced weapons
in the world. This factor
partially offsets the need to
match potential adversaries’
quantitative advantages. The
combination of the technological
superiority of U.S. military
systems and the result of 49
years of preparation to fight a
global war provided us with the
capability to effectively contain
and counter aggression.”

However, current polices, which emphasize
the funding of research and development
activities but put production and
implementation in abeyance, will further
compound the erosion of the technology
gap that the taxpayer worked so hard to
achieve….Unfortunately, the
technological gap between the U.S. and
many potential adversaries, in particular
China, is closing from both ends of the
strategic equation. Fold in the unabated
takeovers of U.S. defense companies by
foreign entities and the process
accelerates further and takes overtones
of irresponsibility.

* * *

I am afraid that we are witnessing
history repeat itself. Chamberlain called
Churchill a warmonger for his warnings of
the dangers posed by the German monster
looming in the East. Chamberlain even
came out and said, in 1934, that he could
only base his decisions upon his
predictions for the next two years.
Looking beyond that limited horizon could
not be done. Unfortunately, the United
States is conducting its foreign and
military policies in much the same
fashion. Preparing for future threats is
given credence and funding only when it
does not interfere with moneyed interests
or large adversaries.