Chat with Chic, April 3, 1987

Chat with Chic A Report from Washington FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: CONTACT: Mike Miller April 3, 1987 (202)224-6244 BY U.S. SENATOR CHIC HECHT Over the weekend of January 30th-February 1st, I served on a Congressional Delegation to a special NATO Alliance Conference in Munich, Germany. We flew to Munich Thursday night and came back Sunday afternoon. I've come to one highly scientific conclusion having nothing to do with NATO Alliance problems: The older one gets, the greater the physical impact of jet lag. The "Wehrkunde" Conference, whose deliberations carry a lot of weight among the NATO Governments, is sponsored annually by a prestigious, private, West German defense policy organization. I attended the conference primarily in connection with my work on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Numerous key international personalities in the NATO plans and strategy f i e l d ? b o t h private and governmental lectured or commented on current policy problems within the NATO Alliance. One speaker, U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle, speaking as a private individual, not as a spokesman for the U.S. Government, presented a forthright, no-holds barred critique of the "mealymouth" way allied government and NATO officials often deal with confrontation issues on strategic defense with the USSR and its allies. Many of you have probably seen the media coverage of Assistant Secretary Perle's remarks, and the defensive reaction they provoked from other conferees. I must note, that I agree with much that he said about western governments' shortness and ambiguity when speaking officially and publicly about Soviet military capabilities and intentions, and about their international political c o n d u c t o r more accurately, misconduct. I was also interested in possible long range implications for Nevada of any changes in western alliance strategies and political positions on development, testing, and deployment of nuclear weapons. Much of the discussion dealt with arms control matters. Any important future changes in U.S. policies and programs in the nuclear weapons and strategies field will have significant implications for the citizens of our State. During the conference, I reminded the participants of an important possibility I had noted after my recent trip to Communist China if the USSR and the PRC are able to improve their relationship, especially on border and military threat issues, the Russians will gain significant flexibility in use of their military resources to threaten NATO in the west. I was struck again by one of the constants in U.S. national security life for better or worse the people of the United States have vital national security interests at stake, in both the Atlantic (Europe) and Pacific regions. We can not afford to ignore either areas, and we have to recognize the way our interests in the two areas interact.