Council for a Livable World

By Executive Director John Isaacs

Color me surprised.

I recently wrote about votes in the House of Representatives signaling rising discontent with the use of military force abroad – but also pointed out that Members of Congress are not ready to take back the right to declare war.  

The House came close to a majority vote against the Afghanistan War for the first time when it narrowly rejected (by a vote of 204 – 215) an amendment by Reps. Jim McGovern (D-MA) and Walter Jones (R-NC).  While the bill called for a withdrawal plan, it did not call for cutting off funding for the war.

At the time, I expressed skepticism that a resolution offered by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) to force the removal of U.S. armed forces from Libya would to get into the triple digits of support.

Wrong!  Kucinich received 148 votes, including an incredibly high number of 87 Republicans. It used to be Kucinich was toxic to Republicans – and to many Democrats. No longer.

In fact, a vote on the Kucinich resolution was delayed in the House so that Speaker John Boehner could put forward an alternative resolution to draw Republican votes from Kucinich.

The Boehner resolution rebuked the President for his Libya policy, but did not require a troop withdrawal. His resolution was adopted by a stunning 268-145.

Cynics in Washington, D.C. – is there anyone but cynics here – naturally assume that many Republicans are willing to repudiate a Democratic President but would have slavishly followed a Republican.

I am not so sure about that facile assumption, at least in this case.

It is always hard to determine motives for a particular vote; it means seeing into a Member’s soul.

Only President George W. Bush could do that with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

Rather, I believe that many tea party Republicans are anti-government abroad as well as at home. They want small government keeping its hands off health care and regulation and Afghanistan and Libya.

Or, as I was quoted in the New York Times:

They [tea party Republicans] reflect a growing discontent within the Republican Party about the wars and a growing feeling that they don’t want to spend money on them anymore,” said John Isaacs, executive director of the Council for a Livable World, an advocacy group that promotes arms control. “They are military noninterventionists.

Okay, it is doubtful that the House will act within its powers to cut off funds for the Libyan operation in a few weeks when the Fiscal Year 2012 Defense Appropriations bill comes to the House floor.

And even if the House were to be so bold, the Senate is moving in the opposite direction to endorse the use of force in Libya.

But the bible of the neo-conservative Republican right, the Wall Street Journal, was disturbed enough by the votes on Libya to denounce “the emergence of the Kucinich Republicans.”

Naturally, the Journal prefers to see more aggressive American military action in Libya, weak-kneed Democrats or anti-war Republicans be damned.

Anytime the Wall Street Journal is unhappy, I am happy.

Strange doings in the Republican Party. Stay tuned to see where things go from here, particularly when the Defense Appropriations bill is considered by the House the week of June 20.

John Isaacs talk at
Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs Conference
Carnegie Council, U.S. Army War College
U.S. Global Engagement: Report of Two Years of Activities
The Pocantico Center
June 1-3, 2011

Prospects for nuclear arms control over the next 18 months

Thank you for inviting me to participate in the conference.

I am delighted only to have to comment on Stephen Blank’s paper rather than do any original thinking or writing myself.

And while he focused more on the broader U.S.-Russian reset question, I will focus more narrowly on nuclear weapons and treaty issues between the two questions.

When I first gave a talk for the Carnegie Council a year and a half ago, I was brimming with confidence about the ambitious Obama Administration agenda on nuclear issues, particularly after the President’s wide-ranging and terrific speech in Prague, the Czech Republic in April 2009.

While there has been important progress since that speech, that progress has not led to great momentum on other parts of that nuclear agenda, at least not in the immediate future.

But the immediate future is just that; I think we can look to make more progress beginning in 2013.

Our Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation has held a series of sessions to discuss next steps after New START. Attending have been some of the best and the brightest in the arms control community in Washington, DC as well as congressional staff.

While the discussions are still on-going, there is a surprisingly and unanimously pessimistic view about what might happen next.

That is, another bilateral arms control treaty with the Russians is likely to be very difficult, if not impossible, to achieve.

That consensus does not mean we should give up on the goal of another treaty, but that in the near-term, we should pursue less ambitious steps.

I would give several reasons for these cautious views.

First, the Senate vote in December for New START and the subsequent U.S.-Russian ratification became not an important stepping stone to greater reductions, or the road to a world without nuclear weapons, but rather the completion of a useful step.

And after the vote, the Senate appeared to be saying let’s move on to other topics.

That is, it was a heavy lift in the Senate to win the required 71 votes. And the immediate post-vote reaction in Congress was okay, we have checked that box, and now let’s turn to deficit reduction, jobs and other issues the voters care more about.

While the New START campaign was useful to educate a lot of new Senators about nuclear issues, this education did not whet their appetites for the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, strengthening the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty or resurrecting the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty.

All these treaties were listed on the agenda for today’s meeting.

And if anything, President Obama’s stated goal of a world free of nuclear weapons, while popular worldwide and in the arms control community, was a net negative in the Senate. Let us just say the Senate was not inspired by the President’s Prague speech the way so many of the rest of us were.

Second, and I know it will shock this group to think that politics can intrude on national security issues, but there is the matter of presidential elections in both Russia and the United States.

Obviously there are those here that can speak to the political uncertainty in Russia that is leading to policy uncertainty.

But that one kind of uncertainty is leading to the other kind is certainly true in this country.

I do not expect any major policy changes on nuclear issues until and unless President Obama is re-elected in November 2012.

While other international issues will intrude on President Obama’s agenda, including revolution in the Middle East, withdrawal of American troops from Iraq and a pending decision on troop levels in Afghanistan, don’t expect any major international security departures of policy over the next 17 months.

Third, is the imbalance of conventional, non-nuclear weapons between the United States and Russia.

In one of the great ironies of history, where during the Cold War there was a perceived imbalance of conventional forces that favored the Soviet Union, which led the United States to be more reliant on nuclear weapons, now the nuclear shoe is on the other foot.

The estimation — again, there are greater experts than I in this room — is that Russia is in no hurry to go to much lower nuclear numbers because of that disparity.

Fourth, the next round of negotiations will be more complex because of the need to deal with tactical or non-strategic nuclear weapons and the likelihood that U.S. nuclear weapons in storage and the long-range conventional weapons planned by this country will have to be dealt with. These issues were not part of New START

And fifth and last, in order not to take too much time, is the controversy over United States missile defense plans.

Now in the last couple of weeks, I have attended briefings by two administration officials involved in missile defense. They both assured me that the U.S. plans for the phased adaptive system in Europe are no threat to Russian nuclear forces and will not be so even after all four phases of the U.S. system are deployed.

Now this may be true or may not be true.

But the important point is that Russian leaders do not accept these reassurances and continue to believe that U.S. missile defense deployments at some point in the future will threaten their nuclear deterrent.

As a result, Russia wants limits on missile defense that the United States Senate will never accept.

All this is not to say that things are hopeless.

There are possible confidence building measures in the near-term, such as greater transparency of non-strategic weapons or on plans for missile defense, or matching unilateral reductions are possible

If the Russian nuclear numbers decline below the New START limits because of obsolescence – and a State Department report on June 1 suggests that the Russians are already below those limits in their number of launchers and warheads, perhaps a way could be found for the U.S. to go down to those same levels.   

Or the two countries can accelerate their planned reductions ahead of the 2018 deadline.

And Russia and the United States can continue to cooperate on non-proliferation efforts, including on the four-year goal of securing all stocks of plutonium and highly enriched uranium worldwide.

Last point, the pessimism that I cite is true today and will be true in 2012.

But there is ample time beginning in 2013 after the elections to work out a new nuclear arms reduction deal well before New START expires.

There is ample time to consider ways to strengthen the Non-Proliferation Treaty and bring the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty before the Senate a second time.

And an extra bonus to look forward to 2013: Sen. Jon Kyl, the leading opponent of New START and the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, will no longer be in the United States Senate.

—————————————————

John Isaacs has served as executive director of Council for a Livable World since 1991, headed the Washington office since 1981 and lobbied for the Council since 1978.  He also serves as Executive Director of the Council’s sister organization, Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation.

Vote on McGovern (MA), Jones (NC), Loretta Sanchez (CA), Amash (MI), Lewis (GA), Paul (TX), Cicilline (RI), Welch VT) amendment requiring a plan and a timeframe for an accelerated transition of military operations from U.S. to Afghan authorities, and other provisions. Defeated 204-215 (26 Republicans voting aye, 8 Democrats voting no)

Democrats: 178 aye, 8 no
Republicans: 26 aye, 207 no
12 not voting

http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2011/roll373.xml

—- YES   204 —
Ackerman
Amash
Andrews
Baca
Baldwin
Bartlett
Bass (CA)
Bass (NH)
Becerra
Berkley
Berman
Bishop (GA)
Bishop (NY)
Blumenauer
Boswell
Brady (PA)
Braley (IA)
Brown (FL)
Butterfield
Campbell
Capps
Capuano

Cardoza
Carnahan
Carney
Carson (IN)
Castor (FL)
Chaffetz
Chandler
Chu
Cicilline
Clarke (MI)
Clarke (NY)
Clay
Cleaver
Clyburn
Coble
Cohen
Connolly (VA)
Conyers
Cooper
Costa
Costello
Courtney
Critz
Crowley
Cuellar
Cummings
Davis (CA)
Davis (IL)
DeFazio
DeGette
DeLauro
Deutch
Dicks
Dingell
Doggett
Doyle
Duncan (TN)
Edwards
Ellison
Emerson
Engel
Eshoo
Farr
Fattah
Frank (MA)
Fudge
Garamendi
Garrett
Gonzalez
Green, Al
Green, Gene
Grijalva
Gutierrez
Hanabusa
Hastings (FL)
Heinrich
Higgins
Himes
Hinchey
Hinojosa
Hirono
Holden
Holt
Honda
Hoyer
Inslee
Israel
Jackson Lee (TX)
Johnson (GA)
Johnson (IL)
Johnson, E. B.
Jones
Kaptur
Keating
Kildee
Kind
Kucinich
Labrador
Langevin
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lee (CA)
Levin
Lewis (GA)
Lipinski
Loebsack
Lofgren, Zoe
Lowey
Luján
Lynch
Maloney
Markey
Matsui
McCollum
McDermott
McGovern
McIntyre
McNerney
Meeks
Michaud
Miller (NC)
Miller, George
Moore
Moran
Mulvaney
Murphy (CT)
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Nugent
Owens
Pallone
Pascrell
Pastor (AZ)
Paul
Pelosi
Perlmutter
Peters
Peterson
Petri
Pingree (ME)
Polis
Posey
Price (NC)
Quigley
Rahall
Rangel
Reyes
Richardson
Richmond
Rigell
Rohrabacher
Rokita
Rothman (NJ)
Roybal-Allard
Royce
Rush
Ryan (OH)
Sánchez, Linda T.
Sanchez, Loretta
Sarbanes
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schrader
Schwartz
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Serrano
Sewell
Sherman
Shuler
Sires
Slaughter
Smith (NJ)
Smith (WA)
Speier
Stark
Stearns
Sutton
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Tierney
Tonko
Towns
Tsongas
Upton
Van Hollen
Velázquez
Visclosky
Walsh (IL)
Walz (MN)
Wasserman Schultz
Waters
Watt
Waxman
Weiner
Welch
Whitfield
Wilson (FL)
Woolsey
Wu
Yarmuth

—- NOES    215 —
Adams
Aderholt
Akin
Alexander
Altmire
Austria
Bachmann
Bachus
Barletta
Barrow
Barton (TX)
Benishek
Berg
Biggert
Bilbray
Bilirakis
Bishop (UT)
Black
Blackburn
Bonner
Bono Mack
Boren
Brady (TX)
Brooks
Broun (GA)
Buchanan
Bucshon
Buerkle
Burgess
Burton (IN)
Calvert
Camp
Canseco
Cantor
Capito
Carter
Cassidy
Chabot
Coffman (CO)
Cole
Conaway
Cravaack
Crawford
Crenshaw
Culberson
Davis (KY)
Denham
Dent
DesJarlais
Diaz-Balart
Dold
Donnelly (IN)
Dreier
Duffy
Duncan (SC)
Ellmers
Farenthold
Fincher
Fitzpatrick
Fleischmann
Fleming
Flores
Forbes
Fortenberry
Foxx
Franks (AZ)
Frelinghuysen
Gallegly
Gardner
Gerlach
Gibbs
Gibson
Gingrey (GA)
Gohmert
Goodlatte
Gosar
Gowdy
Granger
Graves (GA)
Graves (MO)
Griffin (AR)
Griffith (VA)
Grimm
Guinta
Guthrie
Hall
Harper
Harris
Hartzler
Hayworth
Heck
Hensarling
Herger
Herrera Beutler
Huelskamp
Huizenga (MI)
Hultgren
Hunter
Hurt
Issa
Jenkins
Johnson (OH)
Johnson, Sam
Jordan
Kelly
King (IA)
King (NY)
Kingston
Kinzinger (IL)
Kissell
Kline
Lamborn
Lance
Landry
Lankford
Latham
LaTourette
Latta
Lewis (CA)
LoBiondo
Lucas
Luetkemeyer
Lummis
Lungren, Daniel E.
Mack
Manzullo
Marchant
Marino
Matheson
McCarthy (CA)
McCaul
McClintock
McCotter
McKeon
McKinley
McMorris Rodgers
Meehan
Mica
Miller (FL)
Miller (MI)
Miller, Gary
Murphy (PA)
Myrick
Neugebauer
Noem
Nunes
Nunnelee
Olson
Palazzo
Paulsen
Pearce
Pence
Pitts
Platts
Poe (TX)
Pompeo
Price (GA)
Quayle
Reed
Rehberg
Reichert
Renacci
Ribble
Rivera
Roby
Roe (TN)
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (KY)
Rogers (MI)
Rooney
Ros-Lehtinen
Roskam
Ross (AR)
Ross (FL)
Runyan
Ruppersberger
Ryan (WI)
Scalise
Schilling
Schmidt
Schock
Schweikert
Scott (SC)
Scott, Austin
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shimkus
Shuster
Simpson
Smith (NE)
Smith (TX)
Southerland
Stivers
Stutzman
Sullivan
Terry
Thompson (PA)
Thornberry
Tiberi
Tipton
Turner
Walberg
Walden
Webster
West
Westmoreland
Wilson (SC)
Wittman
Wolf
Womack
Woodall
Yoder
Young (AK)
Young (FL)
Young (IN)

—- NOT VOTING    12 —
Boustany
Filner
Flake
Giffords
Hanna
Hastings (WA)
Jackson (IL)
Long
McCarthy (NY)
McHenry
Olver
Payne

Last week, the House adopted amendments to the annual Defense Authorization Bill signaling rising discontent with the use of military force abroad – but also demonstrated the limits of its bravery.  

These votes came as a number of Members of Congress denounced the Obama Administration for ignoring the War Powers Act enacted in 1973 over President Richard Nixon’s veto.

Most significantly, the House came close to a majority vote against the Afghanistan War for the first time when it narrowly rejected 204 – 215 an amendment by Reps. Jim McGovern (D-MA) and Walter Jones (R-NC) to require a timetable to bring American troops home from that country.

Over 90% of the Democrats, who had previously been split on the war, voted for the withdrawal, including the modestly hawkish House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD). Only eight Democrats dissented. Twenty six Republicans joined with the Democratic majority, a significant pickup in a party that has tended to support the wars.

Last year, a similar McGovern-Jones won only 162 votes at a time when Democrats dominated the House.

An amendment offered by Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) and 17 of his colleagues barring funds to deploy U.S. troops or private security contractors on the ground in Libya swept through by the astonishing margin of 416 – 5.

A second amendment offered by Rep. Scott Garrett (R-NJ) stating that Congress has not authorized military action in Libya was adopted by voice vote.

While there is a rising tide of discontent with the American military engagement abroad, there are limits to how far Congress is willing to go.

As I have previously written on congressional complaints about Libya:

Presidents commit U.S. troops overseas; Members of Congress do a lot of speechifying; but Congress fails to utilize the power it has either to authorize force or cut off the use of funds to continue the war. To paraphrase Pogo, “We have met the enemy and he is Congress.”

Last week, during a hearing of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, several Member of both parties attacked Obama for refusing to abide by the 60 day limit of American troop involvement overseas without congressional approval.

Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA) opined: “It’s time for Congress to step forward. It’s time to stop shredding the U.S. Constitution.”

It may be time, but don’t expect Congress to go that far.

Congress has not declared war against another country since 1941 despite numerous conflicts since that time.

Congress can force the withdrawal of U.S. troops by cutting off funding for the war. It is simply not willing to.

The House wants to persuade the President to withdraw troops rather than take responsibility to force and end to military involvement.

Similarly, while the House wants to block further U.S. military escalation in Libya, it has not been willing to stop the U.S. bombing and logistical operations over and around Libya.

This week, Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) will offer a resolution under the War Powers Act to remove U.S. armed forces from Libya. If the House permits a vote on his resolution, don’t expect the vote total to get into the triple digits.