Floor Statements

Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 1623.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, although I am tempted to allow the reading to take place, it is a short amendment, and I am going to read the heart of it myself:

Nothing in this Act shall be construed to prohibit a civil

liability action from being brought or continued against a

person if the gross negligence or reckless conduct of that

person was a proximate cause of death or injury.

The bill itself provides in section 2, page 3, that the purpose of this bill--one of them--is that ``the possibility of imposing liability on an entire industry for harm that is solely caused by others is an abuse of the legal system. . . .''

And I agree with that.

On page 5 of the bill where it states its purpose:

Purpose.--

(1) To prohibit causes of action against manufacturers,

distributors, dealers, and importers of firearms or

ammunition products . . . for the harm solely caused by the

criminal or unlawful misuse of firearm products by others. .

. .

And I agree with that. Nobody should be held responsible or accountable for harm which is perpetrated by others.

What about their own reckless or negligent conduct? When we look at the language of this bill, it is not just that manufacturers and dealers are not held accountable for the misconduct of others, except for three or four very narrowly described categories, they are off the hook for their own misconduct, their own reckless conduct, their own negligent misconduct. And that is what my amendment seeks to correct or clarify.

The stated purpose of this bill is that if negligence or recklessness is caused by others, if the misconduct of a third party is the cause of damage, that the gun dealer or manufacturer should not be held accountable. We agree with that. But what if their own recklessness, their own gross negligence contributes to the damage or, to put it in legalistic terms, what happens if their own misconduct is a proximate cause of the damage, injury, or death to somebody else? Why should they be off the hook for their own misconduct?

I ask unanimous consent, by the way, that Senator Durbin be added as a cosponsor to this amendment.

Mr. President, what the amendment says is this act does not prohibit a civil liability action from being brought or continued against a person if his own gross negligence or reckless conduct was a proximate cause of the death or injury.

We have heard about a number of cases that have been brought to the attention of this body. These are cases where manufacturers or dealers have been held liable for their own misconduct, their own negligence, their own recklessness where the allegation against a dealer or manufacturers had to do with their own behavior.

We heard about the tragic DC area sniper shootings case where there was a settlement that was obtained from a gun supplier, called Bull's Eye Shooter Supply, for their own negligence. Mr. President, 238 guns had gone missing from Bull's Eye's inventory. Fifty had been traced to criminal actions since 1997. If this bill had been enacted prior to the DC area sniper shootings, the victims would have been unable to even

have their case against that supplier heard in court. And there are many other cases. There are so many cases that this is why police officers, police chiefs, and police departments around the country oppose this bill as it is written.

We should protect innocent manufacturers and gun dealers, just the way we should protect any innocent party in this country. But we should not protect anybody--I don't care if it is a manufacturer of guns or a manufacturer of automobiles or a manufacturer of refrigerators or a dealer in those products or any other products--we should not protect their folks from their own reckless conduct, their own negligence. And this bill does that. It does not say that it does that. It says it is protecting folks from the conduct of others. But the bill's analysis clearly indicates, when you go beyond the stated purpose, that it is the manufacturers' and gun dealers' own negligence and recklessness which is immunized, with very narrow exceptions.

If they committed a violation of law, if they have committed a crime, you can go after them; they are still on the hook. If they negligently entrust, knowing that the person to whom they have entrusted a weapon is going to go out and commit a crime or do something unlawful, they are still on the hook. But if they just left their guns sloppily around the store, or if they hired employees who they knew or should have known were going to illegally sell guns, steal guns, and then have those guns used in a criminal endeavor--and these are real cases--if that is the type of negligence or recklessness that is at issue, then they are off the hook.

They are only kept on the hook, under the language of this bill, if they designed something negligently, if they have negligently entrusted in a very narrow definition, or if they have committed a crime.

I want to read excerpts from a letter which has been signed by, I believe, 75 law professors:

Dear Senators and Representatives: S. 397 . . . described

as ``a bill to prohibit civil liability actions from being

brought or continued against manufacturers, distributors,

dealers, or importers of firearms or ammunition for damages

resulting from the misuse of their products by others,''

would largely immunize those in the firearms industry from

liability for negligence. This would represent a sharp break

with traditional principles of tort liability. No other

industry enjoys or has ever enjoyed such blanket freedom from

responsibility for the foreseeable and preventable

consequences of negligent conduct. . . .

American law has never embraced a rule freeing defendants

from liability for the foreseeable consequences of their

negligence merely because those consequences may include the

criminal conduct of third parties.

Under American tort law, they say:

. . . actors may be liable if their negligence enables or

facilitates foreseeable third party criminal conduct.

These professors remind us:

Thus, car dealers who negligently leave vehicles

unattended, railroads who negligently manage trains, hotel

operators who negligently fail to secure rooms, and

contractors who negligently leave dangerous

equipment unguarded are all potentially liable if their

conduct--

Their conduct--

creates an unreasonable and foreseeable risk of third party

misconduct, including illegal behavior, leading to harm.

In this amendment, we make it clear that if the conduct of gun manufacturers and gun dealers is grossly negligent or reckless, and if that is a proximate cause of the death or injury of someone else, they are not off the hook, and they should not be. No one in this country should be. No one in this country is, as far as I know.

Mr. President, how much time do I have remaining?

I appreciate that. My cosponsor, Senator Dayton, would like 5 minutes yielded to him. I yield 5 minutes to Senator Dayton.

I yield 5 minutes to the Senator from Virginia.

Mr. President, I yield myself 3 minutes. I wonder if Senator Graham might wait. I want to comment on his remarks, and I don't want to do this without him being aware of it.

The good Senator said that if you have done everything right, you should not be held accountable. Of course. That is a given. I accept that. But what if you have been reckless, what if you have been grossly negligent and that gross negligence--by the way, I am perfectly happy to accept the Black's Law Dictionary definition if my good friend from Arizona wants to substitute that for the definition in this bill. That is not the issue. But if the gross negligence and recklessness is a proximate cause of injury, why should the manufacturer or dealer be immunized then?

What the Senator from South Carolina says is a truism; of course you should not be held accountable for the wrongdoing of other people. The question is whether you should be held accountable for your own recklessness, your own gross negligence. We should not immunize people against their own negligence. That is the issue. That is the only issue of this amendment. We don't see but what this bill does is eliminate rights, rights of people to get compensation against others who have been a cause of their death or injury. That is what the bill does, and that is what is wrong. There is no other industry, no other industry has that immunity. But this industry would be given that immunity for the first time that I know of in American history or tort history. You can perform, perpetrate an act of gross negligence or reckless conduct and not be held accountable. Now, if you commit a crime you will be held accountable, or if you negligently entrust, you will be held accountable, but all the other acts of negligence, which are perpetratable, are going to be immunized. It is not a matter, by the way, of alleging gross negligence or recklessness. It is a matter of proving recklessness or gross negligence, because the amendment says, not that the allegation is enough; it is that if you show gross negligence or recklessness caused your death or injury, you must have, still, a cause of action.

I am happy to yield at this time to my dear friend from Illinois.

I don't know how much time I have remaining.

I am happy to yield 5 minutes. Does the Senator from Rhode Island want any time?

I yield 5 minutes.

I believe I have half a minute remaining, and I would like to use it.

Mr. President, we have been told people should not be held accountable for the wrongdoing of others; that is true. The question is whether they should be held accountable for their own wrongdoing.

This amendment would make sure that gun dealers and manufacturers-- such as any other dealer or manufacturer--could be held accountable for their own wrongdoing. That is the issue. It is very clear in the wording of the amendment.

I ask unanimous consent the letter from 75 law professors describing what this bill would do in terms of eliminating responsibility for manufacturers' and gun dealers' own conduct be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, in a moment or two, I am going to propound a unanimous-consent request while the manager is here. Before I do that, I congratulate the Senator from Montana for his analysis of health care costs in relationship to the manufacturing situation in which we find ourselves.

He has pointed out something which is critically important, which is that of all the competition faced by American manufacturers, one of the competitive disadvantages we put them in is the health care system we have compared to the health care systems their competitors have, leading to, for instance, in the automotive area, a disadvantage of something like $1,000 or $1,500 a car.

I congratulate him for his efforts in this particular area and many other areas as well.

I have one little minor note, and that is, the Senator from Montana is currently looking at the proud owner of a Ford hybrid. So America now is manufacturing hybrids.

May they produce many more. I thank the Senator from Montana.

Mr. President, I want to for a couple minutes comment on the bill and then make a unanimous-consent request that the amendment I will offer be in order and that other amendments be laid aside. But first a moment or two of commentary.

The bill before us, S. 397, says that its purpose is ``to prohibit civil liability actions from being brought or continued against manufacturers, distributors, dealers, or importers of firearms or ammunition for damages, injunctive or other relief resulting''--and here are the keywords--``from the misuse of their products by others.''

On page 3, in section 2, findings and purposes, finding No. 6 is:

The possibility of imposing liability on an entire industry

for harm that is solely--

And that is the keyword--

solely caused by others is an abuse of the legal system. . .

.

I happen to agree with that. If harm is solely caused by others, it would be an abuse of the legal system to impose liability on someone who did not contribute to somebody else's damage.

My amendment would make it clear, and I will just read one paragraph from my amendment:

That nothing in this act shall be construed to prohibit a

civil liability action from being brought or continued

against a person if the gross negligence or reckless conduct

of that person was a proximate cause of death or injury.

What my amendment would do is basically take the words that are in the stated purpose of this bill, which is that it is wrong that anyone have liability imposed on them for harm that is solely caused by others, and say that basically I accept that premise.

The problem with the bill is that it does not or could not or might not allow for damages to be imposed where someone's own reckless or gross misconduct is a cause, a proximate cause, or contributes to damages which others have.

This is an important part of this bill. We have a number of exceptions in the bill which are set forth. If somebody negligently entrusts a weapon to somebody else knowing that person will misuse it or if there is a violation of law or there are two other allowed lawsuits, but we surely should allow a lawsuit, particularly if State law allows it--and that is the key--but if State law allows the lawsuit, which most States do, against a person whose own gross negligence, whose own recklessness is a proximate cause of somebody else's damages, we should not prevent advertently or inadvertently that cause of action from being brought. State law would be displaced by this bill. This is a radical departure in terms of tort liability because it would displace State law.

The traditional role of the States in tort liability would be displaced in this instance, and I think it is important that we take the language that this bill says in its purpose is the purpose of the bill--that where harm is solely caused by others, that we should not allow liability to be imposed on some person who had no contributing cause or was not a contributing cause--it takes that stated purpose and puts into amendment form ``that nothing in this act would be construed to prohibit a civil liability action from being brought or continued against a person if that person's own gross negligence or own reckless conduct was a proximate cause of the death or injury.''

That is the explanation of my amendment. Now, with the manager's attention, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be laid aside so that my amendment No. 1623, which I believe has been at the desk for a number of hours, be in order.

I wonder if the Senator will withhold that objection for 30 more seconds so I can respond to one point the good Senator said.

The term ``gross negligence'' is defined in my amendment as the term is defined in 42 United States Code 1791(B), and the term ``reckless'' has the meaning given under section 2(A)1.4 of the Federal Sentencing Guidelines. So we do define both terms very precisely as they are already defined in two laws.

I appreciate the Senator withholding his objection at this time so I could make that statement. I yield the floor.

Will the Senator yield for a question?

Is it not also true that these amendments, plus many others, have been offered, and people would

have been perfectly happy to have votes on them if they were permitted, but votes were not permitted, so they had to be temporarily laid aside so others could be offered? But the idea that those people who offered those amendments would not have been happy to have votes on those amendments is not right.

And are pending; is that correct?

Over 40.

Mr. President, we support this amendment, as modified. It has been modified to address a problem it had which did not relate to the Boy Scouts but which had to do with the wording which made it overly broad. The language clearly depends upon an appropriate agency making either a grant or an appropriation. We support the amendment. We thank Senator Durbin, particularly, for his modification.

Parliamentary inquiry: Following up on that, is it not true that even though amendments are relevant in a postcloture situation, if they are not technically germane, they fall?

Mr. President, will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. President, I have a unanimous consent request. I ask unanimous consent that I be added as a cosponsor to amendment No. 1557, which is the field manual amendment to which they have been referring.

Mr. President, if I could be recognized just for 1 minute to comment on this amendment, and then I will yield the floor.

Mr. President, first of all, I congratulate Senator McCain. I do not think there is anybody in this body who speaks with greater authority on the subject matter he has spoken to in this amendment. I commend him for the distinction he is making. It is a critical distinction. In addition to the fact that the field manual is there for everybody to see and has historic meaning, the difference between the McCain amendment and the one which was offered by the Senator from Virginia--another difference--is that the field manual is a public document. You can read what is in the field manual. The Secretary of Defense memoranda too often have been classified ``unavailable.'' We have been spending sometimes months and years trying to just find out what is in those memoranda.

So there is a very important difference between these two amendments in a number of regards. I very much believe that the first amendment, amendment No. 1557, is the way which is most consistent with our values. It makes it very clear, in public, what the authorities are and what the standards and criteria are. The contrast between that and something amorphous, which gives the Secretary of Defense a power he already has anyway, which is to issue regulations but to do so in secret and in a classified way, leads to more vagueness, more uncertainty, more conflict, more inability of Congress to perform oversight.

So I commend the Senator from Arizona for this amendment. I believe the differences between these two amendments are significant.

Mr. President, if I could just comment briefly on that, at least with the unclassified portion, we have access to it, unlike the documents that are issued by the Secretary of Defense memoranda. They are classified, but they are also, too often, unavailable to Congress. They just use one excuse after another not to make those memoranda available to Congress. So there may be a classified version of the field manual, but at least Congress has access to that unclassified version.

Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I wonder if we can line up some time at this point. I will not object, but after he is recognized, I believe then the majority has additional time for another amendment going up to what time?

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that immediately following the completion of those three time periods on the Republican side, I be allocated 10 minutes on this side, which I will provide equally between the junior Senator from Michigan, the Senator from Washington, and myself, so that four amendments can be introduced and laid aside.

Reserving the right to object, we have not had any time prior to the ADA matter, and it was intended that we have some time. There is a prepared UC that would perhaps assist us, which has been handed to us. I wonder if the manager will read this.

Reserving the right to object, I ask that that be modified to allow 10 minutes between 5:15 and 5:30 to be granted to this side for the introduction of those amendments. They will be introduced, with a minute on each, and then set aside.

No.

The junior Senator from Michigan, 2 minutes; the Senator from Washington, 2 minutes; and me for 1 minute.

Reserving the right to object, does that include the UC which the Senator from Virginia read?

Reserving the right to object, the Democratic leader is going to want 2 minutes prior to the vote on leadership time, or prior to 5:15. You all figure it out.

I wonder if the Senator will yield. We need only 7\1/2\ minutes before 5:15. I wonder if the chairman will agree to this: After Senator Sessions, go to the Senator from South Carolina for 5 minutes, and then come to me.

Mr. President, I yield 3 minutes to my colleague from Michigan.

Mr. President, I yield 3 minutes to the Senator from Washington.

Amendment No. 1348

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending amendment.

I call up amendment 1494, cosponsored by Senators Kennedy, Rockefeller, and Reed of Rhode Island.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, this amendment would establish an independent commission on the treatment of detainees in Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo, and elsewhere. U.S. policies, and too often practices, in the treatment of detainees have veered off the course which was established by decades of U.S. leadership in international humanitarian law and has been a champion of the Geneva Conventions on the treatment of prisoners of war and other detainees.

Our troops serve honorably and courageously across the globe. Their honor is besmirched when some of those who are captured are abused. Our troops' future security is jeopardized when people we detain are not treated as we rightfully insist others treat our troops when they are captured.

The amendment we are proposing today would help reaffirm the values we cherish as Americans. It would protect our troops should they be captured. It is going to be argued that there have been dozens of inquiries and hundreds of interviews and thousands of pages provided to Congress, but the fact is that huge gaps and omissions remain.

First, we do not know the role of the CIA and other parts of the intelligence community in the mistreatment of detainees or what policies apply to these intelligence personnel.

Second, we do not know what the policies and practices of the United States are regarding the rendition of detainees to other countries where they may be interrogated using techniques that would not be permitted at U.S. detention facilities.

Third, we have insufficient information on the role of contractors in U.S. detention and intelligence operations.

Fourth, the detention and interrogation of detainees by special operations forces need close examination.

Fifth, we are still missing key documents, including legal documents, from the Office of Legal Counsel.

Sixth, there are just too many significant questions which have been left unanswered.

I hope we can appoint an independent commission on the treatment of these detainees, on policies involved, patterned after the 9/11 Commission. We owe it to our military personnel who might someday be in enemy custody to demonstrate our commitment to the humane treatment of detainees, to strengthen our standing, to object and to take appropriate action against anyone who would mistreat an American prisoner of war.

I yield the floor.

I would have to check with our leadership on that. In terms of continuing tonight, I surely would be happy to do that, but let me check with our leaders.

Mr. President, I mentioned to Senator Warner I would be saying this. He suggested the possibility of votes tonight. My response to him privately, and now publicly, is we would be happy to try to see if we could work out additional amendments that are pending where we could agree on rollcall votes tonight. I will work with Senator Warner to see if those amendments can be identified mutually during this rollcall vote.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

I thank my good friend from Virginia. I think Senator Graham was actually part of a UC.

Right. So he has the right to go next.

I would ask, if it is convenient for the Senator from Florida, that after Senator Graham, I will ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Florida be recognized to introduce his amendment at that time. I wonder if we could find out from Senator Graham about how long he expects to be.

Then I would make inquiry also from my friend from Virginia. I understand that the Republican TV monitor has already indicated no votes tonight. Is that correct?

If we could work out votes, we were willing to do that, but I think it is becoming clear that is not going to happen.

The Senator from Florida would need about how much time?

Whatever the Senator needs is fine. Then I would be offering two amendments, if that is agreeable with the Senator from Virginia.

I will be introducing them immediately following the Senator from Florida.

Will the Senator yield for an additional question? And I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to proceed for 3 minutes with the Senator from South Carolina, if the Senator from Florida will be so gracious.

I also commend the Senators who are involved in these proposals. These are extremely important proposals. I hope that they would not be nongermane if, indeed, cloture is invoked tomorrow.

By the way, I wonder if I could ask the Chair whether or not the pending amendment would be germane, if cloture is invoked?

I thank the Chair.

I have no objection.

If I can go back and make inquiry of my good friend from South Carolina, I think he has focused, along with the cosponsors, on something which is critically important, and that is reliance on the Army manual so everybody knows the roadmap, as he puts it.

Is it the Senator's understanding of the Army manual that abusive and degrading treatment would be prohibited?

The reason this comes up is those words have now been utilized by a witness, by somebody who has made investigation. So I want to be as precise as I can, in my question, about whether it would be the belief of the Senator from South Carolina that abusive and degrading treatment would be a violation of the manual?

Again, I commend my friend from South Carolina. I am glad we have the reassurance that he would consider at least abusive and degrading treatment to be inhumane treatment within the meaning of those words. I thank him, and I yield the floor.

Amendment No. 762

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending amendment.

Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 1496.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, on April 5, 1986, Libya directed its agents to execute a terrorist attack in West Berlin for the sole purpose of killing and maiming as many American military personnel as possible. So they selected a discotheque that military personnel frequented in Berlin. They placed a bomb in the discotheque when 260 people, including U.S. personnel, were present. When that bomb detonated, two U.S. soldiers were killed and over 90 soldiers were severely injured. They have not been compensated.

The German civilians who were in that discotheque were compensated, but the American military personnel and their families have not been, despite promises of the Libyan Government to do so.

So this amendment simply says that we will not normalize, in any further way, relations with Libya until the Attorney General, after consulting with the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Defense, certifies to Congress that Libya has made a good-faith effort and a good-faith offer in negotiating with U.S. service members who were injured in that discotheque bombing and with the family members of U.S. service members who were killed in that bombing.

It is a very straightforward amendment that is so essential if we are going to do justice for U.S. military personnel who were killed in a terrorist attack by Libya the way justice has been done for the German civilians who were killed in that attack at that discotheque that was perpetrated by Libya and its agents.

So we provide a very carefully worded assessment by the Secretary of State and the Attorney General. They will decide if the good-faith offer has been made the way it has been promised. We do not make that decision in this amendment. We leave that up to the Attorney General, after consulting with the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Defense.

Amendment No. 1497

Mr. President, I now ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be laid aside, and I call up amendment No. 1497.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, we read the other day in the Washington Post about a procedure that is used by a number of contractors that reimburses those contractors for services rendered by subcontractors and where the contractor is charging the Government significantly more for that service than the subcontractor is paid. We are talking about labor rates.

Here is what the Post told us and reminded us:

Security guards in Virgin Islands paid $15 and $20 an hour

were billed to the government at [twice that rate]. Office

workers provided by [a subcontractor] at $20 an hour were

billed to the government [by the prime contractor] at $48.07

an hour.

This is not just to have a profit put in there for the prime contractor. That

is legitimate. This is a theory that prime contractors are using known as ``mapping,'' where instead of basing their charge to the Government on the cost of labor, they are basing the charge to the Government on a theoretical cost of labor--not on the subcontractor's cost but on what the prime would have paid for the same service. So we are billed as a Government for labor performed, and the cost of that labor, although it is not the true cost of the labor, is a theoretical cost.

That kind of practice should end. This amendment would fix the problem by requiring that prime contractors charge the Government their actual subcontract costs, unless the subcontract rates are specifically set forth in the prime contract. The General Services Administration has been balking at this change, although the Department of Defense itself says they have recognized the problem and are working to fix it. So we are going to come down with the effort to correct this problem that the DOD recognizes and override the obstinacy of the GSA to correct a very obvious inequity in terms of the American taxpayer.

So that is the sum and substance of this amendment. We would ask that this amendment be considered in the usual course, assuming, again, that cloture is not invoked.

I yield the floor.

While Senators Dodd and Warner are on the floor, let me first thank Senator Dodd for the passion he brought to this issue. This sounds like a process issue. It is not a process issue. These are life- and-death issues we are debating. These are war issues and how do we support our troops and their families issues. These are issues of whether there will be benefits for families who have lost loved ones in war. These are issues of whether bases will be closed, issues of nuclear weapons, and issues of whether we are going to go down the road of new nuclear weapons use at the same time we are trying to persuade the world not to go down that road.

These are the most vital issues we can possibly face as a people. I commend the chairman. He is, in good faith, going to attempt to see if we cannot find a way we can have a reasonable few days of debate before this debate is closed off, so we can consider the important amendments that have been filed.

The chairman is very much aware of the tradition of this committee because he has been part of it and supportive of it for so long. The tradition the Senator from Connecticut talks about is tradition which is plenty deep, but it is also law. I think we are the only committee which, by law, must pass an authorization bill. So that tradition is embodied in the law itself.

There is one little statistic, and this is something the Senator from Connecticut feels in his bones is true. But I want to give a statistic to support that passion and feeling that has been so beautifully expressed by the Senator from Connecticut. Last year, the first cloture motion was filed on the 11th day of debate. This year, it was the beginning of the second day. The second cloture motion, because the first wasn't adopted last year, was filed after 15 days of debate and after 148 amendments were considered. That is how important this bill is. So look at a longer period of time--a 10-year average. The average length of time for the first filing of cloture on a Defense authorization bill during that 10-year period is the fifth day of debate, and the second filing is on the ninth day of debate. So we have always historically, and by law, taken a reasonable period of time--a week or 2 weeks--to debate this bill because of its importance to the country.

As I was saying a moment ago, the chairman is very much aware of this tradition. He embodies it. He has fought for it. The Defense authorization bill should have due consideration, and I know he will do what he can in the next 24 hours to see if we cannot work out something that would allow some critically important amendments to be considered.

I thank the chairman for that and I thank the Senator from Connecticut.

Mr. President, there is one more matter. I was handed this. On behalf of Senator Harkin, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be laid aside so an amendment of his relating to the Armed Forces network could be introduced at this time.

Mr. President, this amendment relates to the Armed Forces network. It is provided in this amendment that the Armed Forces network would provide members of the Armed Forces, civilian employees of the Defense Department, and their families stationed outside of the continental U.S. and at sea with the same type and quality of American radio and television news, information, sports, and entertainment that is available in the continental U.S. There are other provisions about fairness, balance, free flow of programming, et cetera. I am not familiar with the details.

I yield the floor.

I wonder if the Senator will yield. For about 1 minute, I will go back to the history, and I will not go through it all. Last year, we spent 7 days on this bill. The 1st filing of cloture was on the 11th day of debate, after considering 42 amendments. The 2nd filing of cloture was on the 15th day of debate. I think it is totally inappropriate to file cloture today.

I have no better friend in this body than the Senator from Virginia. I was glad to hear what he basically just said, which is that he is going to take a close look at where we are before this vote takes place. He has always been openminded. I hope he will reconsider this cloture motion. We are going to make progress today, even though there are no votes.

It is difficult for Senators. Senator Kennedy is going to be offering a very important amendment in a few moments, but the vote on that is not going to take place until probably after the cloture because we have so many amendments that are stacked up here. He deserves better and, more importantly, the subject matter of the amendment deserves better than to be debated on a Friday and then laid aside and not voted on until many days later. Traditionally, we try to vote on amendments after they are debated--shortly after, not days and days after they are debated.

We are going to accommodate the demands of the schedule by trying to offer a lot of amendments today and on Monday in order to see if we can show enough progress here so that the motion for cloture will be vitiated. That is our hope. I hope the Senator from Virginia will do what he always does so magnificently, which is maintain an open mind, keep options open, and see what kind of progress can be made to avoid a divisive vote. It is inappropriate to have a cloture vote this soon after the debate begins.

I yield the floor.

We will have to wait and see the precise nature of the amendment.

I commend my friend from Virginia for his temperament, his ability to withhold any suggestion of personal comment. He is to be commended. He is literally a role model for that. The Senator from Virginia is correct. He showed great care for the Members of this body yesterday, gave great consideration to the Members, and I commend him for that.

Will the Senator from Colorado yield for a unanimous consent request?

I have talked to the chairman about this. I ask unanimous consent, with the concurrence of the chairman, after Senator Allard has completed, that the Chair then recognize Senator Salazar, and following Senator Salazar, that then Senator Dorgan be recognized. It is a little bit out of order because we have been going back and forth, but in terms of time, I think it may be a fair apportionment.

I would ask Senator Sessions if he could give us an idea as to about how long he would be so Senator Dorgan could plan his time.

Could we then amend the unanimous consent request to include Senator Sessions immediately following Senator Salazar, then it would go to Senator Dorgan.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that following the Senator from North Dakota, if it is not already locked in, then the Senator from Colorado be recognized to introduce three amendments which will take a total of--about how long?

Approximately 15 minutes.

We, the defamed people from Michigan, are really from Ohio.

Mr. President, if the Senator will yield, let me thank the Senator from Colorado for his extremely thoughtful and sensitive statement about what this bill is all about. I thank him for his kind remarks.

No objection.

I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. President, we are ready to proceed on a number of amendments, but we are going to withhold those as an accommodation to, I gather, a lot of folks here who want to go out right now. We will then offer the amendment on the Berlin cafe which has not yet been cleared. We will hold that off until Monday. And remarks on RNEP I will withhold until Monday. The national missile defense we also will withhold until Monday, if that is the desire of the chairman.

I wonder if I could inquire, while we are waiting, I will also withhold an amendment which is ready to go which I don't know if it has been cleared or not on the time and material contract abuses. I will withhold that until Monday. If we have a moment, if we could ask a parliamentary inquiry, how many amendments now have been laid aside and are pending for either vote by rollcall or voice vote or acceptance?

I thank the Chair.

Mr. President, the ``Do the Write Thing Challenge'' is a national writing contest that gives middle school students the opportunity to express themselves about community problems including guns, gangs, drugs, and violence. The students are asked to identify actions they can take to help address such problems.

The Do the Write Thing Challenge, or DtWT, was created in 1994 and is sponsored by the National Campaign to Stop Violence. DtWT currently operates in 22 cities and counties, including Detroit, MI. In 2005, more than 32,000 students nationwide participated in DtWT by written submissions and by pledging not to engage in violence. Since its creation, more than 145,000 students have participated in the DtWT Challenge.

The national DtWT finalists from each participating jurisdiction recently came to Washington, DC to talk to lawmakers about youth violence and its impact on their lives. In addition, the finalists were honored by the National Campaign to Stop Violence at a national recognition ceremony. Among those honored were Samantha Medina and Michael Henderson of Detroit, MI.

Samantha and Michael both addressed the issue of gun violence in their writings. In her poem, Samantha wrote about the constant threat that guns pose to her family and friends. Michael wrote a personal essay about two friends and an uncle who were murdered by criminals using guns. Both students also chose to write about the importance of nonviolent solutions in resolving conflict and how the actions of individuals impact the safety of their entire community.

I congratulate Samantha and Michael, and the other DtWT national finalists as well as all of the participants across America for their achievements and efforts to eliminate violence from the areas where they live. I believe Congress can do more to support their efforts. Several pieces of legislation which would increase the number of police officers on our streets, increase resources for school and community violence prevention programs, and make it more difficult for criminals to obtain powerful weapons are currently awaiting further consideration in the Senate. I urge my colleagues to take up and pass these bills to make our families and communities more safe.

Mr. President, we have no objection that I know of to this amendment. It does not purport to limit the jurisdiction of a Federal court in determining what the Constitution means. So we do not have any objection to it.

Mr. President, we very strongly support the Warner amendment. I ask unanimous consent that I be listed as a cosponsor of the Warner amendment.

Mr. President, we understand there will be no second- degree amendments to the Warner amendment now.

I also ask unanimous consent that Senator Kennedy be listed as a cosponsor.

Mr. President, we are checking on Senator Bayh right now.

We appreciate that.

I wonder if we could lock in an additional speaker. I ask unanimous consent that immediately prior to the vote on the Warner amendment at 12:30, Senator Kennedy be recognized for 5 minutes at 12:25.

Mr. President, I am afraid I didn't hear that request. Are the speakers that have been identified speaking on the pending amendment?

I ask unanimous consent that we add to that request that Senator Lautenberg then be recognized to offer an amendment immediately after the speakers who have been identified.

He would just lay down an amendment prior to Senator Kennedy speaking and then he would pick up after the vote.

I wonder if the good Senator will also share the amendment with the chairman and the ranking member in the Banking Committee, both.

Mr. President, let me also commend the Senator from Massachusetts and the Senator from Indiana. They have been stalwarts in terms of urging we address this armor question.

Our service men and women continue to die and suffer grievous wounds in Iraq and Afghanistan, and by far the major casualty producer is the roadside bomb or mine--what the military calls an improvised explosive device or IED. The services are working to counter that threat through a variety of means--better intelligence, innovative tactics, techniques and procedures, the use of jamming devices, and of course, adding armor to Army and Marine Corps HMMWVs and other trucks. On my recent visit to Iraq, met with the Marines in Fallujah and viewed and discussed the various levels of armor protection on their HMMWVs and the new armor package for their heavy truck.

The armor issue is both a good news and a bad news story. The good news is that in just over 2 years, the Army and Marine Corps have gone from only a few hundred armored trucks to nearly 40,000 and 6,000 respectively. Many people have worked night and day to make that happen, and we commend and thank them for doing so. Congress has

consistently provided all the funding requested and, in several instances, has provided funding ahead of any request. In fact, the fiscal year 2005 Defense emergency supplemental added $1.2 billion for various force protection equipment, most notably for uparmored HMMWVs and add-on armor for HMMWVs and other trucks. As of last month, all known requirements for truck armor for Iraq and Afghanistan were funded, and the Army and Marine Corps were on track to complete those requirements for HMMWVs by July and September respectively, and for other trucks by December of next year.

The bad news is that military commanders have been slow to recognize the growing threat to thin-skinned HMMWVs and other trucks in Iraq and Afghanistan and determined requirements for armored trucks slowly and incrementally. For instance, in May of 2004, my staff sent me a memo which said:

The current Central Command requirement for [up-armored

HMMWVs in Iraq and Afghanistan is 4454. This appears to be an

ever-increasing number over the last year, having been

increased from 253 to 1233 to 1407 to 2957 to 3142 to 4149 to

4388, and finally to 4454. We have no confidence that it will

not be increased again in the future.''

That was a prescient statement because over the next year, the requirement for uparmored HMMWVs continued to increase--to 10,079 for the Army and 498 for the Marine Corps. The story was similar for the requirements to armor other Army and Marine Corps trucks. These incremental increases in requirements have led to inefficient acquisition and unnecessary delays in getting armored trucks for our troops.

It has also caused a lot of confusion and some fingerpointing, particularly between the Army and the Marine Corps on the one hand O'Gara Hess, the company which produces the uparmored HMMWV, On the other. A recent New York Times article reported that ``in January, when it [referring to the Army] asked O'Gara to name its price for the design rights for the armor, the company balked and suggested instead that the rights be placed in escrow for the Army to grab should the company ever fail to perform.'' With respect to the Marine Corps' uparmored HMMWV requirement, the same article further reported that, ``asked why the Marine Corps is still waiting for the 498 humvees it ordered last year, O'Gara acknowledged that it told the Marines it was backed up with Army orders, and has only begun filling the Marines' request this month. But the company says the Marine Corps never asked it to rush.''

I questioned the Army Chief of Staff and the Commandant of the Marine Corps on these issues in a hearing on June 30. I asked the Army Chief of Staff for an answer for the record as to whether or not it was true that the Army sought to purchase the design rights so that we could produce the uparmored HMMWVs a lot more quickly and that the company balked. I also asked the Commandant of the Marine Corps for an answer for the record as to whether the Marine Corps ever asked O'Gara to rush its order for uparmored HMMWVs. Just this morning, I received a formal response from the Army on the design rights. The Marine Corps has informally asserted that it did ask the company for accelerated production.

In its defense, Armor Holdings, the parent company of O'Gara Hess, has said that at the time of the Marine Corps' inquiry in September of 2004 relating to potential production of additional uparmored HMMWVs, the company indicated its interest in and its ability to produce those vehicles, and that as soon as the order was actually placed by the Marines in February 2005, it began to work on and has already begun to deliver those vehicles. What is still unclear is whether the Marine Corps ever coordinated a request for accelerated production through the Army's Tank Automotive and Armaments Command which handles all of the contract actions for upamored HMMWVs, and if it did, why the company was not issued a contract to increase the production rate over and above the increase from 450 to 550 a month that the Army requested in December of 2004.

With respect to the technical data package, TDP--the ``design rights'' discussed in the New York Times article--the Army says it requested, for informational purposes only, that O'Gara Hess submit a cost proposal for procurement of the technical data package in order to obtain a price for a TDP complete enough for any firm to manufacture the current uparmored HMMWV. The company has argued that the TDP was developed by Armor Holdings, with its own money, under its own initiative; that a formal request was never made by the Army to purchase that TDP as required under Federal Acquisition Regulations; that the company responded to an informal e-mail inquiry to that effect in January 2005 by offering to place the TDP in escrow and in so doing, allow the Army instant access to the design information if the company ever failed to meet the Army's request. In the company's view, it saw no logic to the inquiry because it had met or exceeded every production requirement and schedule, was ready and willing to produce more, and consequently there was no need for the Army to obtain alternative production sources.

What is not clear is why the Army would request the rights to the TDP for the uparmored HMMWV in January 2005, since already contracted for a the uparmored HMMWVs it planned to procure in fiscal year 2006--the last year that it intends to procure uparmored HMMWVs as it moves to implement its long-term armor strategy of procuring removable armor kits. I am expecting further information from the Army and the Marine Corps soon to clear up these matters.

This illustrates the continued confusion surrounding uparmored HMMWVs that has frustrated so many of us in Congress.

Given this background, and in light of the uncertainty as to whether requirements would continue to increase, the Senate Armed Services Committee, in the markup of the fiscal year 2006 authorization bill, added $120 million for the Army to continue to procure uparmored HMMWVs or add-on armor for HMMWVs and other trucks, even though the known requirements for Iraq and Afghanistan had been met with fiscal year 2005 emergency supplemental funding.

Now, however, it appears that the requirements have once again changed. Central Command is currently considering a request from the Southern European Task Force commander for additional uparmored HMMWVs for Afghanistan. And the Marine Corps has decided to upgrade and ``pure-fleet'' all 2,814 Marine Corps HMMWVs in the CENTCOM area of operations to the uparmored HMMWV configuration. Based on current, on- hand quantities, the Marine Corps could be short 1,826 uparmored HMMWVs.

To compound the potential problem, the Army plans to end all production of the uparmored HMMWV as it ramps up the production of a new HMMWV model with a heavier chassis that is ready to accept an integrated, bolt-on/off armor kit. However, the fiscal year 2006 President's budget only funds 90 of these vehicles with the armor kit. This would not appear to be a prudent approach, given the history to date of ever increasing requirements for truck armor.

The pending amendment would do two things: it would add $340 million to fund the 1,826 shortfall in the newest Marine Corps requirement for uparmored HMMWVs, and it would add $225 million to the Army for truck armor, an increase from the $120 million currently in the authorization bill. That is enough for the Army to procure the add-on armor kits for the 4,037 M1152 HMMWVs that will currently be fielded without armor in fiscal year 2006. With this funding and these additional armor kits, by the end fiscal year 2006 the Army will have fielded 16,768 HMMWVs with the highest--Level 1--armor protection.

I whole-heartedly support this amendment and urge my colleagues to do likewise. I also urge the Department of Defense to thoroughly review Army and Marine Corps long-term truck armor strategies and ensure that all requirements are identified in a timely manner, and that sufficient funding is requested in a timely manner so that we can ensure our troops get the equipment they need and deserve as quickly as possible.

Mr. President, to reiterate, lack of armor for our troops has been truly one of the most discouraging elements of the Iraq war. Partly it is because of what the Senator from Virginia said.

There has been a change in requirements along the way. Partly it has been administrative failures along the way inside the Department.

Listen to a New York Times article that has a conflict between the Army and Marines on the one hand and our producer, O'Gara Hess, on the other hand. The New York Times article says:

In January, when the Army asked O'Gara to name its price

for the design rights for the Army, the company balked and

suggested instead that the rights be placed in escrow for the

Army to grab should the company ever fail to perform.

So we have the Army asking the manufacturer how much would it cost to buy the design rights so we could have a second line, so we could have a second source, we are short of armor. And the Army says they never got the answer. The producer says it was never asked formally. In the meantime, men and women are dying in Iraq because of that kind of confusion.

So, yes, the requirements have changed, but there have also been administrative failures as well.

Then the Marines say they asked the company to rush the orders. The company denies it ever got the request to rush the orders.

Yes, the chairman is right, there have been changes in the requirements, the numbers needed, but I am afraid the Senator from Massachusetts is also right, that there have been some true failures and incompetence in the administration of the armor program. The differences in the conflicts that exist between the stories told by the Army and Marines on the one hand and the company that produces the humvees on the other, it seems to me, are evidence of those failures.

I will be happy to yield.

Mr. President, I think the vote is scheduled for 12:30. I ask unanimous consent to proceed for 1 additional minute.

Mr. President, I wholeheartedly support this amendment. I commend our chairman for it and urge our colleagues to support the amendment. In addition to that, I hope the Department of Defense will thoroughly review the Army and Marine Corps long-term truck armor strategies so we can identify requirements in a timely manner, sufficient funding be requested in a timely manner so we can assure our troops that they will get the equipment they need and deserve in time to meet the threat.

I know this Congress, under this chairman's leadership, has over and over again told the Defense Department: We will give you every dollar you need. There are no financial constraints when it comes to supporting our troops.

We have told them that over and over again. It should not be necessary to add this money, but it is. I wholeheartedly support it, and I thank the chairman for his leadership.

I ask unanimous consent that Senator Bayh of Indiana, who I know is trying to get to the floor to support this amendment because of his leadership in this area, be added as a cosponsor of the amendment.

I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. President, I commend our colleague from New Jersey for this amendment. It is ironic--the person who is presiding at this moment will understand this reference--that when it comes to Cuba, the sanctions not only apply to companies that would deal with Cuba under our law but also apply to their subsidiaries. And yet when it comes to the subsidiaries of companies that are dealing with terrorism, which have sanctions against them for different reasons, we don't cover the subsidiaries. So with Cuba, the subsidiaries are covered when it comes to sanctions, but when it comes to dealing with states that are on a terrorist list where the President of the United States decides to exercise his discretion to impose sanctions against a country and where companies are not thereby allowed to do business with that country, we don't cover the subsidiaries of the corporations, only the corporations themselves.

It is not only a loophole which has been pointed out by my friend from New Jersey, but it is a very inconsistent treatment. What the Senator from New Jersey is saying is let's do the same for the subsidiaries of corporations that deal with terrorist states and terrorist organizations and groups as we cover subsidiaries that deal with Cuba. I thank him for pointing out the loophole. If we are going to be serious about our war on terrorism, we have to be serious about providing sanctions against states that support terrorism. We have to be serious about telling American companies they cannot deal with those states or with those entities, and that we are truly serious. We have to also tell companies when we say you may not deal with terrorist states, you may not do business with terrorist states when the President so determines, that we are also applying this to your subsidiaries as well.

So it is an important amendment. We had a vote on a very similar amendment I believe a year ago or so. It almost passed this body. I think it came within one vote, and I hope that, given what we have seen in the last year, we can only reinforce the point which the Senator from New Jersey made in his amendment previously, that we can pick up the additional votes this time and pass this very important amendment. I commend him on it.

Reserving the right to object, and I will not object, I understand that is a delay being requested from 2:15 to 2:30, so that everybody can understand.

Will the Senator from Illinois yield for a question?

I read this the same as the Senator from Illinois. It is not just that there be no possibility ever of any agency reducing any funding that goes to the Boy Scouts, which is the purported purpose of this, but it is any youth organization because it says any form of support for a youth organization. That means any youth organization, including the Boy Scouts. As I read this, it would make it impossible for any youth organization, no matter how bad it was managing its books, no matter what there might be in terms of fraud and abuse--we are talking about every single youth organization that gets funding from the Federal Government, no matter what the reduction in the number of members of that youth organization is, you could not reduce, apparently, a grant from a Federal agency to any youth organization. I think that goes way beyond the stated purpose of this amendment, which is to protect the Boy Scouts, which I agree with and understand and support.

My reference was to any Federal agency, which means any grant agency, not just Appropriations, which the Senator from Illinois referred to, but any Federal agency, which means any agency that makes any grant to any youth organization cannot reduce that grant, no matter what the reason is, next year. That is the way I read this. It is so overly broad, it ought to be modified or stricken or something.

I think all of us want to support the Boy Scouts and their jamboree, using the facilities or the support of the Secretary of Defense and the armed services, as they have done before, but this is way broader than that.

Mr. President, I wonder if we could reach a time agreement on this amendment to give everybody an idea as to time. We are hoping it will be accepted. It is a terrific amendment. I am wondering if the chairman might consider a time limit.

Is Senator Leahy a supporter or opponent of the amendment?

I do not know of any opposition.

Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, the provisions in the fiscal year 2005 emergency supplemental appropriations bill increase the military death gratuity from $12,400 to $100,000. The bill before us continues that increase in the gratuity. The provisions, however, do not cover all people on active duty. It only covers people who are killed in combat. Our military leaders strongly, and I believe unanimously--our uniformed leaders--believe the death of a military person who is on active duty should be covered equally whether that person was killed in combat or on his way to a training exercise.

They have testified in front of our committee very forcefully that they believe the benefit which we have provided, the so-called military death gratuity of $100,000--now as we provide in the bill to be made permanent--should be applied equally to all persons on active duty.

The case of Marine LTC Richard Wersel, Jr., who had a fatal heart attack while exercising 1 week after returning from his second tour of duty in Iraq, perhaps says it all. This was an active-duty marine. He had just come back from an extremely difficult and stressful deployment. He had multiple deployments over 30 months. He had been training indigenous troops to fight drug traffickers. As well, he had two tours of duty in Iraq. But as his wife put it: Those multiple deployments were the silent bullet that took her husband's life.

Under current law, the death gratuity which would go to the wife and family would only be $12,400. Had the heart attack occurred while in Iraq, the death gratuity would have been $100,000. In either case, Colonel Wersel was serving his Nation, as he did very well throughout his life. He was on active duty. The fact that he died a week after returning from a second, stressful tour in Iraq should not cause his surviving spouse to receive such a significantly smaller death gratuity.

This is what the Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps told the Armed Services Committee at a hearing on military death benefits. He said:

I think we need to understand before we put any

distinctions on the great service of these wonderful young

men and women who wear this cloth forward into combat,

training to go to combat or in tsunami relief, they are all

performing magnificently. I think we have to be very cautious

in drawing distinctions.

At another hearing, I asked General Myers, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, for his views on whether the military death gratuity should be the same for all members who die on active duty. His answer was:

I think a death gratuity that applies to all servicemembers

is preferable to one that's targeted just to those that might

be in a combat zone.

He said:

When you join the military, you join the military. You go

where they send you. And it's happenstance that you're in a

combat zone or you're at home. And I think we have in the

past held to treating people universally, for the most part,

and consistently. And that's how I come down on that.

That is what General Myers said.

The Presiding Officer well knows this because he has to deal with these losses regularly back home in Minnesota. He pointed out earlier today how many Reserve folks he has in Minnesota whom he supports.

No benefit--no benefit--can replace the loss of life of a soldier, sailor, airman, or marine who gives his or her life in service to our country. Every survivor would choose to have the servicemember alive and healthy rather than any compensation our Government could provide. But that does not mean our benefits should not be full and generous and consistent; it is just a recognition that we cannot place a monetary value on a life given in service to our Nation.

There is much more to be said about this issue. But, again, the testimony of our senior uniformed military leaders, it seems to me, is the most compelling testimony, in addition to the actual, tragic situations we have, such as the one I read about a moment ago.

So I offer this amendment. Many of us have supported this amendment. There have been many members of our committee and many Members of the Senate who are not on the committee who I know very strongly support a $100,000 death gratuity for all active-duty military deaths, not just those who die in combat-related activity.

I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. President, to clarify that, regardless of what is pending, at 4:30, we will move to the Lugar amendment, and we will vote on that amendment at 6:30, and then return to whatever the pending matters are.

Right.

Reserving the right to object, we have a lot of amendments now that have been set aside. If the Senator from Texas is asking that she could introduce a sense-of-the-Senate amendment and put it in order and then it be set aside immediately and taken up at a later time, I will have no objection. Because other amendments are waiting to be disposed of, I could not agree that her amendment come ahead of other amendments.

Reserving the right to object, my understanding of the request is that immediately following Senator Durbin, the Senators from Texas and Florida will be recognized simply to introduce a sense-of- the-Senate amendment, which would then be set aside, and then we would move at 4:30 as previously authorized, and any time remaining between the time they offer and set aside that amendment would then go to the Senator from Maine and the Senator from New Jersey to continue their debate.

Mr. President, first let me say how delighted that I know I am--I know every Member who is on the floor now is, and every Member would be if they were on the floor--just taking a look at a dear friend and a former colleague of ours who just walked on the floor. When John Glenn

is in our presence, it lifts all of us. The way he lifted up this Nation, he still provides a great lift to each and every one of us. And his beloved wife and our beloved friend, Annie, does the same when she is at his side. So it is great to see former Senator Glenn again.

I also want to thank Senator Nelson for his remarks. I must say we are blessed--and I know Senator Warner feels the same way I do--that the members of our committee work so well together, but we are particularly blessed when we have members such as Bill Nelson of Florida who fight for so many issues not just for Florida but for the Nation.

He mentioned TRICARE. He has been on that issue as long as anybody I can remember. As it happened, we passed that perhaps when he was not even on the Senate floor today, but I know he has been a strong supporter and his advocacy has made all the difference.

If the chairman would yield, there is an issue on the floor today, in addition to the pending sense-of-the-Senate resolution about keeping men in space. We have a pending amendment that is going to be offered by Senator Lugar that has to do with nonproliferation, Nunn-Lugar, trying to make it possible for us to see if we cannot reduce the threat of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. I think the Member of the Senate who probably pioneered in the effort to prevent proliferation of weapons of mass destruction was John Glenn, who happens to be on the Senate floor at this particular moment. Senator Lugar is now here. Under our UC, he will be offering his amendment. But the effort of Senator Lugar to try to control weapons of mass destruction, to lock them up, to make sure that there are no loose nukes, that Senator Nunn and so many others joined in, was actually a subject which was very close to the heart and very much on the lips of John Glenn when he was here as a Senator.

Mr. President, first, I thank the Senator from Indiana for his intrepid, persistent, and determined, bulldogged leadership to try to address the greatest threat this country faces which is the presence of a weapon of mass destruction in the hands of a terrorist or terrorist state. We are told over and over again--one commission after another tells us--the greatest threat this Nation faces would be a chemical, biological, or nuclear weapon in the hands of a terrorist or terrorist state--``loose nukes,'' as they are sometimes called.

Yet, in the wonderful program we have called Nunn-Lugar, we have impediments to the prompt spending of our money in order to secure or destroy the weapons that threaten us. Why, in Heaven's name, we would put any impediment in the way of addressing the greatest threat that faces this country absolutely mystifies me.

We have six conditions that have to be certified to annually by the President before this money can be spent to protect our Nation. Let me take one of them. One of the conditions that has to be addressed and met in a report is the President certify annually that each country is meeting the following condition--one of the six--that the country is foregoing any military modernization program that exceeds the legitimate defense requirements of that country.

Now, why, in Heaven's name, we want to have some agency's employee spending time looking at whether Kazakhstan or Uzbekistan or, yes, Russia, in their entire military budget is spending any money on any weapons system that, in our judgment, they do not need--and if we cannot certify that, we cannot protect ourselves against destroying the weapon of mass destruction that exists in Kazakhstan or Uzbekistan--why would we want to tie our hands that way in order to address the greatest threat that faces us? It is absolutely mysterious to me.

The great Senator from Indiana--I do not know if he went through each one of these conditions. I know he went through some of them. And I am not even sure how we could certify that Russia has forgone every single military modernization program that exceeds their legitimate defense needs. How could anyone certify that? Go through the entire Russian defense budget and look at every single modernization program? I am not even sure it is public. I am not sure ours are. I know ours are not all public, by the way. We have classified programs. But the way the law reads, we have to get the Presidential certification that there is no Russian modernization program that exceeds their legitimate defense needs.

We have to do that with every country--Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Albania--before we can secure or destroy weapons, material, weapons of mass destruction, biological weapons, chemical weapons, nuclear material that threatens us? We have to write these endless reports, trying to certify that those conditions are met?

We are cutting off our nose to spite our face. What we are doing here is, instead of trying to secure material or destroy material, we end up securing reports, producing reports. How many of us have read those reports, by the way? I am not sure how many have been filed because they have to be waived every year if they are not written. But how many of us would look through a report on every modernization program--if we could figure it out--that Kazakhstan has before we destroy material that threatens us that might exist in that country?

Now, these impediments to protecting our people against the greatest threat we face actually make no sense anymore. We ought to get rid of them instead of requiring an annual certification, involving people writing these certifications, writing these reports rather than effectively spending our resources in order to protect the American people.

We say we have to be able to certify that Russia has accurately declared the size of its chemical weapons stockpile. We cannot certify that, verify it, because there is a great dispute over verification between ourselves and Russia. They want to come in to certain places we do not want them to come in, so they cannot verify certain things, because we are not giving them access. We are not perfectly transparent in terms of our own chemical production facility, for legitimate reasons. But there is a dispute on transparency between us and Russia.

So that dispute, which is a legitimate dispute, which has not been resolved yet--despite, let's assume, good-faith efforts on both sides-- the presence of that dispute means we cannot or the President cannot make a certification that Russia has accurately declared the size of a chemical weapons stockpile because we cannot get the verification agreed to, again, because we will not provide access to our own facility. That stops us from defending our people against chemical weapons.

What is the goal here? Reports or security? If we can get our hands on chemical weapons or biological weapons or nuclear material or missiles and destroy them, why wouldn't we want to grab that opportunity? Why would we want to put impediments in the way and require reports or certifications to be made?

By the way, I think it is great if the reports can be made. I have no problem with it, either. Senator Lugar mentioned, we raise these issues all the time. But we should not attach these as conditions to our taking action which is in our own interest. Churning away at reports when it is in our national security to eliminate weapons of mass destruction does not make sense to me. We have this process requiring hundreds of man-hours of work by the State Department, the intelligence community, the Pentagon, as well as other departments and agencies. That time could be better spent tackling the proliferation threats that face our country.

We should be spending all of our energies on interdicting WMD shipments, all of our energies at identifying the next A.Q. Khan, all of our energies on locating hidden stocks of chemical and biological weapons. Instead, we have nonproliferation experts spending time compiling reports and assembling certifications and waiver determinations.

By the way, the majority of those reports is repetitive. They have already filed reports in other formats. Yet we continue to require that.

The President does not have to spend any of this money. If the Executive decides they have questions and they are not going to spend money, for whatever legitimate reason, fine. But we should not add to their burdens. And we should not jeopardize the security of this Nation by putting barriers in the way of taking action to secure or destroy the most threatening material we face--chemical, biological, or nuclear material.

I very strongly support the efforts of our good friend from Indiana, who has been such a leader here. When Sam Nunn was here, it was Nunn- Lugar. No one could take Sam Nunn's place. Senator Lugar, with the support of many of us, including, may I say, our chairman, the Presiding Officer--who has supported the amount of money for Nunn- Lugar--without the support of the chairman of the committee, who is now presiding over the Senate, we would not be able to get that amount of money we have in this authorization. By the way, we are going to try to increase that somewhat during the debate on this bill.

But that amount of money, which is requested, I believe, by the administration, would not be there but for the Senator from Indiana, but for the chairman of our committee, and but for the support many of us on the Armed Services Committee have to address this absolutely most dangerous threat this Nation faces.

I commend the Senator from Indiana, and I am proud to be a cosponsor of his amendment.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I think Senator Lugar controls all of the time on his side. I wonder if he might yield 4 minutes to the Senator from Rhode Island. I don't know how long the Senator from Texas was going to speak.

This would be on Senator Lugar's time.

Would the chairman yield?

Now, I assume this amendment will be laid aside similar to other pending amendments.

I assume that in addition to the debate taking place tonight on this amendment, it could also take place tomorrow, along with a number of other amendments which at least will be debated tomorrow. I hope this might be one of those amendments that could be debated tomorrow, in addition to the comments that the chairman would make.

I join in those concerns, and I agree that there should be some response tonight.

We have no objection and support that.

I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. President, we are attempting to find a time for that amendment which fits not just the Senate schedule but a very important personal need, which I think the Senator from Virginia is aware of, of one of the cosponsors. We do have many amendments that we are going to be offered tomorrow. Apparently there is no plan for votes tomorrow; is that the Senator's understanding?

Although there will be no votes tomorrow, we nonetheless are making an effort on this side, and I hope the chairman will do the same on his side, to have people debate amendments, lay down amendments, set them aside so we can vote on them next week. We are doing that on this side.

The idea that a cloture motion is filed on this bill, to me, is inappropriate. There is no filibuster of this bill. Everybody wants to handle amendments as quickly as possible to this bill, and the idea that there is a cloture motion filed on a bill where we are making progress, where people are offering amendments, and we are disposing of them, to me is inconsistent with what we have done as a body and should be doing as a body.

Thirteen amendments pending.

Mr. President, there is nobody in this body I would rather work with than Senator Warner. We have had this relationship, which is a very warm one, for as long as we have both been here, and we have been here the same length of time.

I want to tell Senator Warner we are doing something unusual tomorrow and Monday in an effort to address the amendments which people want to offer. We are lining up people to speak on amendments, although they cannot get votes. Traditionally around here, there has been great resistance--and understandably--to offering amendments on one day if you cannot get a vote on that day because people want votes to come shortly after the debate so it will be fresh in people's mind.

We are making every effort to move this bill. We are having people lined up. We have them for tomorrow. We have them for Monday. We are willing, just in order to expedite consideration of this bill, to debate the bill on a Friday, although the votes cannot occur until a Tuesday. We are moving heaven and Earth. We are going out of our way to bring up amendments. But it is utterly unfair that a cloture motion be adopted which will cut off the opportunity of other Members to offer amendments under this circumstance. We are not delaying it. We are expediting this bill in every single way we know.

In terms of the question asked by a number of my colleagues, I cannot remember a Defense bill that just had 1 day for votes. Typically, we spend a good week on debate, maybe more--2 weeks, 3 weeks--on a Defense authorization bill. The idea that the cloture is filed on the second day to cut off debate on amendments seems to me unthinkable.

These are amendments aimed at improving this bill, strengthening this bill. That is the motive. We all have the same goal. We may differ when it comes to votes, but the motive is to strengthen this bill, to offer greater support for the men and women in the military. The idea that any one of those amendments might be cut off because technically they are not germane--although they are relevant--seems to me unthinkable.

I hope, No. 1, we will make progress; No. 2, that the majority would think about filing a cloture motion under these circumstances which would deny an opportunity to strengthen a bill which is so important to the men and women in the military.

Mr. President, I, too, oppose the amendment for the reasons which were set forth by the chairman. But, in addition, I have some other thoughts about this process. Each one of our States has gone through a tremendous period of anxiety. As it turns out, some of that anxiety was well based because they are on the list. For those States that did better than expected or better than their worst fears, it seems to me this amendment will throw them right back into that state of anxiety because by definition, this makes it more likely because of the uncertainty that is injected. And because of the delay in the final disposition, more States will be thrown right back into the position of being very nervous and anxious as to whether their bases and their facilities might be hit by a base-closing round. In other words, there is no finality. It is a totally uncertain finish, not just 2 years.

We don't know when substantially all major combat units from Iraq will be withdrawn. I would be very concerned that in addition to the arguments which the Senator from Virginia made, we have many States that hired consultants, that made major presentations, that now are going to be put back into a state of limbo because they will then say: Well, we are not going to know whether we are basically off the hook for years, potentially many years. So those that breathe a sigh of relief by this list or did better than their worst fears or better than expected are now going to be put in a position where they are going to have to say: This could go on for years. We better keep these consultants on board. We better continue to be nervous about this for some indefinite period of time.

There are many uncertainties that are created and a great degree of pain that will be inflicted if we continue this process for some unlimited period.

As I understand the Senator's amendment, he would complete the process through the Presidential decision.

That means that while the Senator sets forth arguments for why all this information is essential before a congressional decision, the Presidential decision would be made before all of this information is available?

I think there is a deep illogic in that. To the extent you would want to delay something so that Congress could have information, which I think would be a mistake for the reasons given, to the extent there is logic in that, the President should have the same information before making his decision as the Congress arguably should have.

Again, for reasons given by Senator Warner and myself, I think it would be a mistake to create the state of limbo which would result from the adoption of this amendment. It also has that degree of illogic in it as well.

Finally, I ask the chairman, so that we can get the precise position of the administration on this, whether we could reasonably expect that at least by Monday we could have a letter from the administration relating to the specifics of this amendment. I know we have a general position of the administration.

Mr. President, I think it is important that in addition to getting the general views of the administration about the importance of this BRAC process proceeding for the reasons they have set forth, the language of this amendment be forwarded to them. I will give an example of why.

As I understand it, one of the impacts of the amendment would be that it would be difficult, if not impossible, for the Army to bring back to the United States about 49,000 personnel and their families because those relocations back to the United States are dependent upon certain steps being taken as proposed in the BRAC process. We are leaving a lot of people in limbo overseas, I believe--that is our conclusion--but I would like to hear from the Defense Department as to the specific ramifications of this kind of delay, in addition to the reasons they have already given for opposing any delay or cancellation of the BRAC process. So I agree with our chairman that they are very clear that they would veto this bill if this kind of amendment passes.

But in terms of the argument on the amendment, there are practical problems, in addition to the ones already raised by the Defense Department, that they may want to raise if we get them the language. I hope that over the weekend the chairman will forward the language to the Defense Department.

I hope the Senator from South Dakota, if available tomorrow or Monday, if there is further debate on this amendment, might be present or be able to listen to the debate so he could respond to it.

And an even more distinguished list of opponents. Just kidding. The hour is late.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent, on behalf of Senator Reid, that Richard Ferguson, a Defense fellow, be granted the privilege of the floor during debate on the Defense authorization bill.

No objection.

I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

The glory days.

Mr. President, I join with the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Senator Warner, in bringing S. 1042, the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2006, to the Senate floor. I do so proudly. I am always proud to stand next to Senator Warner and with Senator Warner and our staffs in bringing this bill forward. It has been many years that we have done this together, and we always look forward to it because it is a time we, together with our staffs, can spend time trying to strengthen the security of this country in a bipartisan way.

This bill, to my memory, has always been a bipartisan bill. Our staffs work together on a bipartisan basis. The way they have worked together should be a role model for how we in the Senate should be working. I congratulate Senator Warner for his leadership of our committee. He sets the right pattern for all of us. Again, it is an honor to be standing here with him.

The bill we bring before the Senate is the product of 3 days of markup. I do not believe we needed a single recorded vote. There may have been some voice votes where there were some differences, but I don't even remember that. I think we worked out all of our differences. Where there were differences that remained, I think we actually were able to address them, if not resolve them, but without actually a recorded vote, if my memory is correct. That is quite a tribute to the leadership of Senator Warner as well.

We have a common interest in providing the support the men and women in uniform need and deserve. We are unanimous on that, regardless of our positions--which differ. As Members of the Senate we don't all have the same position on events in Iraq--how we got there and how we proceed from here. There is no unanimity on that issue. And on a number of other issues there is not unanimity. But where there is unanimity is that once that decision is made democratically to send our men and women to war, in harm's way, we stand behind them. And on that there is no dissent regardless of the positions of different Senators on the underlying issues. The men and women in uniform deserve our support. They are entitled to the support. During the Vietnam era, we had times when men and women in uniform did not receive the support they deserved. That has not been true since Vietnam. And finally, I think our people recognize that the men and women we put in harm's way, who are in the uniform of the United States, when the Commander in Chief, the Congress make a decision that they go to war, they are entitled to the full support of the people and of the Congress of the United States.

We are proud of these troops. Senator Warner and I have done many things together in the Senate, and one of them has been to travel to visit our troops. We have seen some of the most amazing men and women this country can produce who are in uniform, some of the most professional, dedicated, committed, patriotic people you will ever find representing the United States in uniform. We have been to far-flung places of the world. We have traveled long distances, but whenever we arrived where we were going, we have had that kind of feeling that whatever the thousands of miles were that we traveled to get there, it was worth it just to be inspired literally by the men and women who represent this country and take the risks for all of us.

The bill that is reported by the Armed Services Committee will improve the quality of life of the men and women in uniform, provide funding needed to continue ongoing military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, make needed improvements to the management of the Department of Defense, and authorize critical investments that are needed to reduce the risks the United States will face in the 21st century.

First and foremost, the bill before us continues the increases in compensation, in the quality of life our service men and women and their families deserve as they face the hardships that are imposed by continuing military operations around the world. Those demands have increased significantly over the years, and we have tried to respond to those demands and to those increased hazards which the men and women face.

In particular, the bill would authorize a 3.1-percent across-the- board pay raise for military personnel, authorize a $70 million increase in childcare and family assistance, services for military families, and authorize additional funds for supplemental education aid to local school districts affected by the assignment or location of military families.

We have increased the death gratuity to $100,000 for survivors and military members who die in a combat zone, and we are going to have an amendment which will broaden that further. We have increased from $250,000 to $400,000 the maximum amount of coverage available under the Service Members Group Life Insurance Program.

Second, the bill would provide funding needed to continue ongoing military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and help address the challenges our military faces around the world. For instance, the bill would authorize a $50 billion supplemental to cover part of the cost of ongoing military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan over the coming years. We know that supplemental is going to be needed. We on the Armed Services Committee asked the Budget Committee to add this money for our authorization bill because we have to plan on this expenditure. We know it is going to take place, and we should authorize it as part of a regular budget process and not just simply leave it to supplemental funding.

So we are authorizing a $50 billion supplemental for 2006 to cover ongoing military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is far more realistic budgeting than we have too frequently not done in the past.

Our bill authorizes an increase in the Army's active-duty end strength by 20,000 people to a total of 52,400 soldiers for fiscal year 2006. It is going to be a challenge to meet that new end strength just in terms of recruitment, but we are determined that we are going to try to respond to the demand of our members of the military by increasing the size of the Army's active-duty end strength. We have added 20,000 to that and added $1.4 billion over the President's request for force protection gear for our soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. We authorize almost $350 million for up-armored vehicles to provide additional force protection for our troops in the field. That represents an increase of $120 million over the President's budget request.

We direct that $500 million be dedicated to the joint improvised explosive device, IED, task force to facilitate the rapid development of technology to counter the top threat to our men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan. The chairman of our committee described the threat in terms of those IEDs and what we are doing to respond to that threat, which is everything we possibly can do given its nature and the fact that threat is really, if not the top threat, one of the top threats to our service personnel.

Our bill authorizes up to $500 million for the continuation of the Commanders Emergency Response Program. This program enables our military commanders in the field to respond quickly and flexibly to urgent requirements in fiscal years 2006 and 2007. They have told us that this authorization and appropriation which follows is one of the most effective actions we can take to increase their capability in the field, and that Commanders Emergency Response Program continued at $500 million for these 2 years is provided.

Third, the bill contains a number of important provisions to improve the efficiency and the transparency of the Department's operations. For instance, the bill contains provisions that would prohibit the inappropriate use of contracting techniques that result in the heightened risk of fraud and abuse by

limiting the Government's insight into contractor cost and performance in the acquisition of major weapons systems.

It addresses continuing awareness of interagency contracts by requiring the inspector general to review major interagency contracts which have been used by the Department of Defense. There have been real abuses in these interagency contracts, and we have, indeed, had a number of hearings over the years into some of these abuses where one agency uses the contract of another agency in order to carry out some function, but there is no transparency. Nobody knows it is done. You can do it noncompetitively. There is too much opaqueness in that process, and we are trying to make sure the abuses in the interagency contract area are addressed, and so we require the inspector general to review the major interagency contracts the Department of Defense is using or has used.

Our bill strengthens the defense ethics oversight by requiring major defense contractors to identify former Department of Defense officials on their payrolls and by requiring a review of ethics rules that are raised by the increased use of contractors to perform Government acquisition functions, and we establish a contract fraud risk assessment team to assess the vulnerability of Department of Defense contract fraud, waste, and abuse and require the Secretary of Defense to develop an action plan to address these areas of vulnerability.

Finally, the bill contains a number of critical provisions that should help reduce some of the risks our country will face in the coming century. We are particularly pleased that the bill authorizes the budget request for the Department of Defense Cooperative Threat Reduction Program and related Department of Energy nonproliferation programs. The greatest probable threat we face as a nation would be if a terrorist or terrorist group could get their hands on a nuclear weapon or weapon of mass destruction.

There are too many loose nukes in this world. We have to do more to address the proliferation threat. I don't believe the funding in this bill is adequate. I hope we can find a way to increase the amount of funding that goes into this threat reduction program and the other nonproliferation programs that are funded in this bill. Other than giving all the support we possibly can to our troops, there is probably nothing in this bill that directly addresses the greatest threat we face, which is the threat of a nuclear weapon in the hands of a terrorist, than this threat reduction program and the nonproliferation programs which are aimed at securing nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction.

Our bill provides the President permanent authority to waive on an annual basis the condition that must be met before the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program money can be provided to countries of the former Soviet Union. This is an authority which the administration has requested. Instead of having to come to us each year for this authority, we believe it should be made permanent. Our bill enhances the authority of the Secretary of Defense to use cooperative threat reduction funds to address risks of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction outside the countries of the former Soviet Union. We not only have nuclear weapons and weapons of mass destruction inside those countries, we have those risks outside, and we ought to use this program to address again what is surely the most, or one of the most, serious risks any nation can face.

We in our bill earmark $100 million of missile defense money specifically for enhanced ground and flight testing to require objective testing and evaluation of the operational suitability of each block of missile defense that is produced.

There hasn't been enough testing in this program. There has been too much buying before we fly, and we are trying to see if we can't take some of the risk out of this program, to see, if we are going to proceed, whether we can't proceed in a way which would guarantee a system which is effective and workable and useful rather than just plowing billions of dollars into a system procuring missiles that may never be usable. So we take some of this money, specifically $100 million of that program, and we address it specifically to ground and flight testing in addition to what was previously planned.

We add $20 million to the President's budget to accelerate chemical demilitarization activity and to enable the United States to meet obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention.

While this bill takes many important steps to fund the national defense and support our men and women in uniform, there is more that we can and should do. I would like to just mention a few areas that I hope we can revisit as our bill is considered in the Chamber.

First, the bill contains a provision that would increase the military death gratuity from $12,000 to $100,000, but it is restricted to combat-related deaths. That means that the families of soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines who die in the line of duty outside of the combat area will still receive only $12,000. Our top military officers have uniformly testified that the amount of the death gratuity should not be dependent on the circumstances of somebody who is on active duty. The death of a family member in an accident, for instance, while on active duty can be every bit as hard on a family as a death in Iraq or Afghanistan. Somebody who is killed while being trained for duty in Iraq or Afghanistan should surely have his or her family provided with the same kind of benefit as somebody who is killed in combat. From the family perspective and I think morally, there is no significant difference. They are on active duty, they are taking risks, and they are killed while taking those risks on active duty.

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff testified before our committee the following:

When you join the military, you join the military. You go

where they send you. It's happenstance that you are in a

combat zone or at home. And I think we in the past held

treating people universally foremost and consistently and

that's how I come down on that.

So our top uniform folks support the uniform application of that benefit to $100,000 for people who are on active duty.

Earlier this year, the Senate adopted that position. We adopted an amendment to the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act which would have made the families of all soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines who die in the line of duty eligible for the full death benefit. The appropriations amendment was dropped in conference, but we should try again. I hope the Senate will stand strong on this issue and adopt a similar amendment to our bill.

Second, while the bill takes many positive steps to improve compensation and benefits for our men and women in uniform and their families, we have to do more for Guard and Reserve forces who are bearing so much of the burden in our current military operations.

Never before have we relied so heavily on the Guard and Reserve to serve on active duty over such an extended period of time. All members, representing different States, understand that. The families of the men and women who are in our Guard and Reserve forces have reminded us about how overly stretched those forces are. We do not get many complaints from the men and women themselves. They are too professional to do the complaining. We hear from families. We hear from employers.

Again, we have never before relied as heavily on our Guard and Reserve forces to serve on active duty for extended periods of times as we do now. Studies have shown that 40 percent of our junior enlisted members in the Reserve components nonetheless have no health insurance except when they are on active duty. I hope we can develop an approach to this problem that uses the military's TRICARE health care program to ensure that members of the Reserve component have adequate health insurance and are medically ready when called upon to serve.

Third, the bill earmarks $100 million of missile defense money specifically for enhanced ground and flight testing and requires objective testing and evaluation of the operational capability of each block of missile defense which is produced. Those are positive steps, as I have said, which will move us in the direction of the ``fly before you buy'' approach that we insist on with other major acquisitions.

However, the bill also authorizes more than $60 million in long-lead

funding for more interceptors on top of the 30 we already are buying, even though those interceptors are not subject to operational testing and evaluation. If we want a missile defense that works, rather than one that sits on the ground and soaks up money, we should insist on testing the missiles that we already have before we go out and buy more.

Finally, the administration requested $8.5 million for research and development of the robust nuclear earth penetrator, even though Congress canceled this program last year. Although the bill does cut $4.5 million of the Air Force money from this program, it authorizes the Department of Energy to spend $4 million to resume the feasibility study. Instead of being a leader in the effort to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons, we, ourselves, pursue the development of a new nuclear weapon. It is exactly the wrong message to send to the rest of the world.

We are trying to persuade the rest of the world, don't go nuclear. We are telling some of those countries, if you do go nuclear, we may take very serious action to prevent you from crossing certain red lines. Yet we, ourselves, again are on the verge of putting in money to resume a feasibility study for a new nuclear weapon to be developed. I know it is only a study, but it is a message. It is a loud message. It is a dramatic message. It is a compelling message. It is a persuasive message, and it is used against us when we go to other countries and say: Don't go down that nuclear road.

They say: Wait a minute. You are considering the possibility of going further and you already have thousands of nuclears and you are trying to persuade us that we should not be using nuclear weapons to defend ourselves when you are studying an additional use or additional weapon yourself? It weakens our argument and it weakens the argument that we must make against the most serious threat we face, which is the proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Finally, as our chairman has said, as we begin consideration of this bill, the men and women of our Armed Forces, both Active and Reserve, are deployed in harm's way in many areas of the globe that are subjected to daily armed attack in Iraq and Afghanistan. We joined together in standing behind our troops in expressing pride the extraordinary accomplishments on the battlefield. This bill will do much to provide them with the equipment they need and the compensation and benefits they deserve. If we can do more, we ought to do more. They deserve it, and their families deserve it.

We have important issues to debate. Again, I conclude by thanking Chairman Warner for his leadership, bringing this bill to the floor and having this bill in the fairly complete shape it is in coming to the Senate. I thank him for his leadership of our staffs. We have wonderful staff, as he mentioned, and we have a wonderful committee.

We are blessed to have members on our committee who all contribute in such important ways to the production of the bill. One of those members just walked off the floor. I, as Senator Warner did, want to recognize Senator Byrd although he is not here. He is stalwart in his commitment to this Senate and to this Nation. There are times when his plate is so overly full and his heart is so heavy, but nonetheless he performs his duty, and he is an inspiration to all members. All members of our committee deserve praise for the contribution they made to the bill.

Mr. President, first, this amendment addresses a very significant issue, which took up a lot of time of the committee. We have, in the bill itself, added some additional money to what the administration requested because their request was so inadequate to the threat. We have found over the period of time we have been in Iraq and Afghanistan a totally inadequate response to our armor needs.

We have had I don't know how many hearings in the Armed Services Committee--the chairman says about five; and that would be about my recollection, too--where we have pressed our military leaders, the Secretary of Defense, as to why there has been such a slow response to such an obvious need. So we have been pressing very hard to provide all of the adequate resources. We get different answers from the people who run the Defense Department than we get from the people who are providing the vehicles.

We were told, for instance, by the manufacturer that they never got a request for an increased amount. On the other hand, our military leaders said: Well, sure, we pressed for an increase in the amount.

We have a total conflict on the subject of whether there was ever a time when funding was short, because the committee was determined that we provide all of the resources--all of the resources--that are necessary to provide the armor. It is inexcusable we have men and women who are subject to these devices on the side of the road who do not have the best armor.

Hearing after hearing, we put pressure on our civilian and uniformed leaders to provide the equipment our men and women deserve, and the armor our men and women deserve.

There has been a number of Members of our committee, particularly Senator Kennedy, Senator Bayh, and others, who have had not only a major interest in and made a major effort to press for additional funding and for additional armor but who I know are interested in this subject on this bill.

So I suggest to my friend from Virginia that we give them an opportunity to read what he has now offered because I think it would be very possible they may want to either go in a slightly more increased direction or in a different direction. And I am not sure, they may want to offer a second-degree amendment to this amendment or they may be perfectly happy to cosponsor it. But I would like to give them an opportunity, since this does come at this hour, to read to see exactly what is being proposed since they have such an interest in this issue and I know they were planning on offering language on this bill.

I would join in the suggestion that this language be available promptly to the members of the committee or any Member of the body because I think every Member of this body has had an interest in trying to press the Defense Department to provide greater armor at greater speed.

I have been very dissatisfied, publicly, as to an issue having to do with the fact that our military leaders tried to get the manufacturer, as we understand it, to have a second source. That would have required the manufacturer to share some technology with the second producer. According to one story, they refused to share the technology with a second producer. If that is true, as I said publicly before, it would be pretty shocking we would have a contractor who produces material for the Defense Department, who knows we desperately need more, who would not share the technology with a second source so we could produce the armor a lot faster.

There is a lot of significant background. I think we ought to give every member of our committee and every Member of the Senate an opportunity to take a look at the approach the chairman is proposing to see whether this meets the various needs and thoughts of Members of the Senate. I welcome the chairman's willingness to lay this amendment aside to give those Members an opportunity.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, the amendment which was just offered has now been cleared on this side relative to the degree at the university. We support it. Senator Nelson is our ranking member. We wanted to doublecheck with him.

I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

We have no objection on this side.

Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

It has been.

I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. President, on behalf of myself and Senator Collins, I offer an amendment that would require the Department of Defense to develop a strategic plan for the civilian workforce of the Department of Defense, and I believe the amendment has been cleared.

Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senator Kennedy's Navy Fellow, Doug Thompson, be given floor privileges during consideration of this bill.