Profile In Courage: Peter Leitner Blows The Whistle On Clinton’s Dangerous Export Decontrol Policies

(Washington, D.C.): An experienced
career Pentagon professional, Dr. Peter
Leitner, said the unsayable Tuesday in
testimony before the Joint Economic
Committee: Mincing no words, he warned of
the “dramatic politicization of the
export control process” under
President Clinton. The result, he said,
has been the evisceration of “the
national security export controls that we
came to know and rely upon [during the
Cold War].”

“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.”

As a Senior Strategic Trade
Analyst for the U.S. Department of
Defense, Dr. Leitner is in a position to
know whereof he speaks. His critique is
informed by years of service in the
Defense Technology Security Agency, where
he has closely monitored trends in the
transfer of technologies which — in the
hands of adversaries of the United States
— could cause grave harm to American
armed forces and national security
interests more generally.

Dr. Leitner’s testimony illuminated the
particular danger associated with the
access the People’s Republic of China
has achieved to a host of U.S.
and Western military and dual-use
technologies. His remarks — and
prescriptions for corrective action —
are especially timely given that Congress
is preparing to debate President
Clinton’s proposal to renew China’s Most
Favored Nation status, a status that is
contributing to Beijing’s systematic
efforts to acquire and otherwise
compromise American strategic
technologies.

The Center for Security Policy
commends Peter Leitner for his courage in
authoring his important book entitled Decontrolling
Strategic Technology 1990-1992: Creating
the Strategic Threats of the 21st Century
(University Press of America, 1995)
and for reinforcing its warnings about
the recklessness of Clinton export
decontrol policies before the Congress on
Tuesday.

It is incumbent on Members of
Congress to come to grips with the
ominous implications of Dr. Leitner’s
critique — and to ensure that his candor
does not cause him to be subjected to
punitive actions by an
Administration that has gone to such
great lengths to eviscerate critical
export control arrangements governing
dual-use technologies and exhibited
contempt for those who oppose its
reckless policies in this area.

Three pages of excerpts
of Dr. Leitner’s extraordinary testimony
are attached. A copy of his complete
remarks submitted to the Joint Economic
Committee may be obtained by contacting
the Center.