A Welcome Debate: A Week of START Op-Eds
James Carafano /
In a week dominated by new START op-eds, Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN) penned another piece supporting treaty ratification while rejecting the arguments of former Governor Mitt Romney (R-MA) from earlier this week. This follows the article by Senator Kerry (D-MA) also in support of new START. For Sen. Kerry opposing the treaty is “political,” for Sen. Lugar the arguments of Romney were “hyperbolic. Getting down to the sheer facts of the matter, however, make it clear that opposing the treaty is simply in the best interest of United States security.
Quoting Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Sen. Lugar makes the point that the Russians have always hated missile defense and as much as they want to stop us from developing it, nothing in the treaty makes that possible. The first claim by the administration was that flat out, nothing in the treaty limited missile defense. Then the administration countered that the limit on converting ICBM launchers to missile defense launchers was overly expensive and not part of the Missile Defense Agency’s current or future plans. If so, then fine. (more…)