21 June 1997
Source: http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/aces/aaces002.html

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[Congressional Record: June 19, 1997 (Senate)]
[Page S5978-S5998]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:cr19jn97-172]


        NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 1998

  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I am very pleased to be able to ask
unanimous consent that the Senate now turn to the consideration of
Calendar No. 88, S. 936, the Department of Defense authorization bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The clerk
will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 936) to authorize appropriations for fiscal year
     1998 for military activities of the Department of Defense,
     for military construction, and for defense activities of the
     Department of Energy, to prescribe personnel strengths for
     such fiscal year for the Armed Forces, and for other
     purposes.

*****
                           Amendment No. 420

   (Purpose: To require a license to export computers with composite
    theoretical performance equal to or greater than 2,000 million
                   theoretical operations per second)

  Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk for
myself and Mr. Durbin.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Mississippi [Mr. Cochran], for himself and
     Mr. Durbin, proposes an amendment numbered 420.

  Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further
reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:
       At the end of subtitle E of title X, add the following:

     SEC. . SUPERCOMPUTER EXPORT CONTROL.

       (a) Export Licensing Without Regard to End-Use and End-
     User.--
       (1) In general.--Notwithstanding any other provision of
     law, effective upon the date of enactment of this Act,
     computers described in paragraph (2) shall only be exported
     to a Computer Tier 3 country pursuant to an export license
     issued by the Secretary of Commerce.
       (2) Computers described.--A computer described in this
     paragraph is a computer with a composite theoretical
     performance equal to or greater than 2,000 million
     theoretical operations per second.
       (b) Limitation on Reexport.--It is the sense of the Senate
     that Congress should enact legislation to require that any
     computer described in subsection (a)(2) that is exported to a
     Computer Tier 1 or Computer Tier 2 country shall only be
     reexported to a Computer Tier 3 country (or, in the case of a
     computer exported to a Computer Tier 3 country pursuant to
     subsection (a), reexported to another Computer Tier 3
     country) pursuant to an export license approved by the
     Secretary of Commerce and that the preceding requirement be
     included as a provision in the contract of sale of any such
     computer to a Computer Tier 1, Computer Tier 2, or Computer
     Tier 3 country.
       (3) Computer Tiers Defined.--In this section, the terms
     ``Computer Tier 1'', ``Computer Tier 2'', and ``Computer Tier
     3'' have

[[Page S5992]]

     the meanings given such terms in section 740.7 of title 15,
     Code of Federal Regulations.

  Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, on the 11th of June, my Subcommittee on
International Security, Proliferation, and Federal Services of the
Committee on Governmental Affairs held a hearing on the subject of
proliferation and U.S. dual-use export controls. The hearing focused
almost entirely on the subject of U.S. exports of high-performance
computers, also known as supercomputers.
  In preparing for and conducting this hearing, we learned that the
administration's policy on supercomputers, which are an integral
component for developing, producing and maintaining nuclear weapons,
ballistic missiles, and practically all advanced weapon systems, could
put American lives and interests at risk.
  I am offering this amendment as a necessary first step to staunch the
flow of American-made supercomputers to countries and places they
should not be going.
  On October 6, 1995, President Clinton announced a new export control
policy for supercomputers which decontrolled supercomputer exports to a
great extent. He said that he had ``decided to eliminate controls on
the exports of all computers to countries in North America, most of
Europe, and parts of Asia.'' Continuing further, ``For the former
Soviet Union, China, and a number of other countries, we will focus our
controls on computers intended for military end uses or users, while
easing them on the export of computers to civilian customers.''
  There is, of course, a delicate balance that must be struck between
presenting U.S. national security by controlling dual-use exports and
promoting exports. We must be careful not to place American
manufacturers in a position where they cannot export goods that other
countries are exporting, though, of course, our national security
interests dictate that some goods cannot be sold to some countries no
matter how irresponsibly other countries behave. For example, the
willingness of some Western European countries to work with Libya to
construct a chemical weapons complex does not justify the involvement
of United States companies in similar ventures.
  President Clinton's October 6, 1995, announcement liberalizing U.S.
export controls on supercomputers established four country tiers to
guide American exporters, at the same time eliminating restrictions on
the export of computers capable of less than 2,000 million theoretical
operations per second-- this is referred to as an MTOPS--for all except
tier 4 countries, it is unrestricted if the computers are capable of
less than 2,000 MTOPS. Whether it makes sense to decontrol computers
capable of up to that level is one of the issues which should be
studied more extensively. I will ask the General Accounting Office to
do so.
  Country tier 1, consisting primarily of NATO allies, effectively
establishes a license-free zone for U.S. high-performance computer
exports. Computers of unlimited capacity under this policy can be
exported to any tier 1 country without regard to the identity of the
end user or the intended end use.
  The policy for country tier 2, which includes countries such as South
Korea, Hungary, Poland, and the Czech Republic, allows unlicensed
exports to any country within this tier of computers capable up to
10,000 million theoretical operations per second. And the policy
continues the virtual embargo against those nations--the terrorist
nations such as Iran, Iraq, Syria, and North Korea--that comprise
country tier 4. There are many deficiencies in this new policy, Mr.
President.
  Our amendment addresses what we consider to be the most significant
deficiency in need of immediate attention. It is a problem specific to
the part of the policy pertaining to country tier 3 which I want to
describe now. The policy announced by President Clinton for tier 3
countries, which include Russia, China, and some others, is based
entirely upon the questions of who the end user will be and for what
end use the supercomputer is intended. End use and end user are the
critical factors for tier 3 exports.
  The tier 3 policy requires an export license to be granted by the
Department of Commerce under only two circumstances: First, if the
computer to be exported is capable of 2,000 MTOPS and is going to a
military end use or end user; and second, if the computer to be
exported is capable of 7,000 MTOPS and is going to a civilian end use
and end user. This policy requires no export license for manufacturers
who want to sell supercomputers capable between 2,000 and 7,000 MTOPS
to buyers in tier 3 countries when there is to be a civilian end use
and end user. It is the exporter--not the Department of Commerce, not
the U.S. Government--who is given the latitude under the policy for
determining whether the purchaser's representations are accurate, that
it is not a military end user and will not use the supercomputer for a
military purpose.
  The Clinton administration policy further requires American exporters
to act on the honor system, policing themselves and deciding themselves
whether or not the end user is going to be a military entity or will be
putting the supercomputer to a military use.
  Unfortunately, some companies have already been tempted to take a
chance. Maybe they were not sure; maybe they were tempted by the
profits of the transaction. Whatever the motivations and the
understandings or lack of information, or for whatever the reason, we
have known that some transactions have involved the sale of
supercomputers, without objection from our Department of Commerce or
our Federal Government to those who may be putting computers to a
military use, or maybe military entities themselves.
  We know now, for example, based on statements from the Russian
Minister of Atomic Energy and from United States Government officials,
that there are at least five American supercomputers in two of Russia's
nuclear weapons labs: Chelyabinsk-70 and Arzamas-16. Minister Mikhailov
of the Russian Ministry of Atomic Energy has not been reluctant to
proclaim what these high-performance computers will be used for, and he
said in a speech in January they will be used to simulate nuclear
explosions, and that the computers are, in his words, ``10 times faster
than any previously available in Russia.''
  Four of the five supercomputers we are aware of publicly in Russia's
nuclear weapons labs came from Silicon Graphics, a company in
California, I think. According to the CEO, Edward McCracken, it was his
company's understanding that the computers were for environmental and
ecological purposes. It may be that Silicon Graphics was unable to
determine whether a Russian nuclear weapons lab was going to be the
military end user or if its supercomputers would be put to a military
end use. But it seems from the statements made by the Atomic Energy
Minister in Russia that they certainly are available to them for those
purposes.
  We also know at least 47 high-performance computers have been
exported without licenses to the People's Republic of China. One of the
computers sold also by Silicon Graphics is now operating in the Chinese
Academy of Sciences. The Chinese Academy of Sciences is a key
participant in military research and development, and works on
everything from the DF-5 ICBM--which, incidentally, is capable of
reaching the United States--to uranium enrichment for nuclear weapons.
There can be no question about the Chinese Academy of Science's status
as a military end- user.
  According to the Department, its new Silicon Graphic Power Challenge
XL supercomputer provides it with computational power previously
unknown, which is available to all the major scientific and
technological institutes across China. We can only hope that some of
these institutes in China are using the supercomputer's technology for
peaceful purposes, but we cannot help but suspect that some may be a
part of the weapons development program in China, which is on a fast
track to modernize their nuclear weapons system and capabilities and
their missile technologies and all the rest.
  At our recent hearing, we had the benefit of testimony from the Under
Secretary of Commerce for Export Administration, William Reinsch, who
said that the Clinton administration doesn't know if any of the
supercomputers in China or Russia are being used for weapons-related
activities, but the Commerce Department is in a difficult position. You
have to appreciate how difficult it must be to have the responsibility
for both promoting exports

[[Page S5993]]

and controlling exports, and that is the dilemma that this Department
is in. But we have to realize that nuclear weapons labs are potential
end users and have been shown already by the evidence before our
committee that they have obtained American supercomputers and they may
be put to a military end use.
  In 1986, the Department of Energy published an unclassified report
entitled, ``The Need for Supercomputers in Nuclear Weapons Design.''
The report's conclusion included this statement: ``The use of high-
speed computers and mathematical models to simulate complex physical
processes has been and continues to be the cornerstone of the nuclear
weapons design program.'' These computers continue to be important to
the design and production of nuclear weapons and other types of weapons
of mass destruction and delivery systems.
  I do not see how we can tolerate the continuation of a policy that
makes it easier for Russia and China to modernize their nuclear weapons
and delivery systems. We ought not to be in the business of helping
them to improve the quality of our weapons, their technology, their
delivery systems, particularly when there is evidence of proliferation
from those countries to other countries.
  This amendment, I want to point out, does not include a comprehensive
revision of our export control policy. It is targeted to one specific
part of the policy. We hope that with the findings that are obtained
from the General Accounting Office study and our further studies in our
subcommittee, which is reviewing this entire issue and proliferation
problems generally, that we will be able to come up with and work with
the administration and hopefully develop a consensus agreement on a
modification of our export policy.
  We think the time is here, it is now, when we need to stop the
unrestricted flow of these supercomputers to potential users all around
the world that can threaten our Nation's security and put at risk
American citizens. It is not like some other country has these systems
available for sale on the market. They do not. We are the state-of-the-
art producer of the supercomputers. Japan has the capacity to produce
supercomputers as well, but their export policy is more restrictive now
than ours is. So we are the culprit, if we are putting in the hand of
military end users and military weapon system producers in other
countries technologies that are superior to what they have now and that
can be used to make more lethal their nuclear weapons and their missile
systems. We are putting in jeopardy the lives of our own citizens.
  I am hopeful that this amendment, in concert with other efforts that
we are making, will help improve our capacity to monitor these exports
and require license in those situations where we think this export
might present a proliferation problem, because we know from previous
experience in Russia and China, as well, private companies have
demonstrated that they do not have the adequate restraints to make
determinations about where and how their exports are distributed into
other country's hands. We know that transshipments are occurring. We
also know that it is difficult to verify in a country like China what
the private company that may be the purchaser of a supercomputer really
intends to do with it once they have it. It is difficult to get access,
to get information, and so a private company has a very difficult time
developing an information base on which it can really make a conclusion
about the end use or the end user. That is another reason to change
this policy. The Commerce Department is going to have to do a better
job of compiling information about those who are in the market
worldwide for these supercomputers and making this information
available to our exporters and the companies that have these
supercomputers for sale.
  Mr. President, I encourage the Senate to look very carefully at this
proposal. I hope that the amendment will be agreed to. Senator Durbin
and I were involved in questioning witnesses before our subcommittee
just recently on this subject, and we are convinced that this is a
policy that has to be changed, and the time to change it is right now.
  Our amendment does not in any way change the policy President Clinton
announced in October 1995, though it is my judgment that the entire
policy is in need of serious evaluation and revision, and I will also
be asking the General Accounting Office to assist me in this
evaluation. Our amendment requires the Department of Commerce, in
concert with other parts of the executive branch, to determine whether
an entity in a tier 3 country is a military or civilian end-user, and
whether the end-use will be for a military or civilian purpose. By
their exports to Russian and Chinese nuclear weapons labs, private
companies have demonstrated that they do not do an adequate job of
making this determination. Government has the resources and information
available to make the best determination possible, and should step in
to ensure that America's national security is not being compromised for
sake of a more profitable quarter.
  In a country like the People's Republic of China, how can any private
company have the resources to determine whether an end-user is military
or civilian?
  Some suggest that the process can be left unchanged, but that the
Commerce Department can do a better job of helping industry make the
proper end-use and end-user determination by publishing a list of end-
users to which high performance computer exports are prohibited. I
disagree with this suggestion. Any published list would necessarily be
incomplete, for a complete list would compromise U.S. intelligence
sources and methods. Any published list would also serve as a marketing
tool for the world's proliferators, making their job of finding
specific clients easier. And, any published list would be only too easy
to manipulate by both the purchaser and the exporter who may not be
willing to operate under the honor system. If, for example,
Chelyabinsk-70 is on the list of prohibited locations, does that mean
that a Chelyabinsk-71, not on the list, can receive U.S. exports of
high performance computers? What's to stop an exporter like Silicon
Graphics from accepting the convenient suggestion that, ``yes,
Chelyabinsk-70 does nuclear weapons work, but at Chelyabinsk-71 we
conduct only environmental research.''
  Publishing a list could reduce, but not eliminate, the problem we
face, though in so doing other serious problems would be created.
Congress needs to change the current process so the Government--with
the most access to information with which to make the most informed
determination of military end-use and end-user--makes the decision on
whether to ship these computers to countries who are modernizing their
weapons and delivery systems and engaged in proliferation of these
technologies. America should not be participating in the qualitative
upgrade of Russian and Chinese proliferant activities.
  The Commerce Department maintains that President Clinton's
supercomputer export control policy is working. Commerce continues to
make this claim despite the fact that the administration's policy has
allowed American supercomputers to be shipped to Russia's and China's
nuclear weapons complexes, and who knows where else. If this policy is
working, what would a policy that wasn't working look like? Would there
be more supercomputers in Russia and China, or would we know absolutely
that our supercomputers were in Iran, North Korea, or other terrorist
states?
  The cold war's end does not decrease the need for the continued
safeguarding of sensitive American dual-use technology. While there may
no longer be a single, overarching enemy of the United States, there is
little doubt that many rogue states, and perhaps others, have interests
clearly contrary to those of the United States. Helping these nations--
or helping other nations to help these nations--to acquire sensitive
dual-use technology capable of threatening American lives and interests
makes no sense.
  I thank Senator Durbin for his work with me on this issue, and look
forward to continuing to work with him to get to the bottom of this
problem. I encourage all of my colleagues to support this amendment.
  Mr. DURBIN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Bennett). The Senator from Illinois is
recognized.

[[Page S5994]]

                         Privilege of the Floor

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, first, I ask unanimous consent that the
privilege of the floor be granted to Lamelle Rawlins during the
pendency of this debate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I am pleased to join my colleague from
Mississippi, Senator Cochran, as a cosponsor of this important
amendment. I think anyone who had attended our hearing within the last
2 weeks on this issue would have been shocked at what they learned. We
have expanded opportunities for the purchase of some of the most
valuable technology in the world. It is technology developed in the
United States, which has no parallel anywhere else in the world, and we
are selling it. The fact that we are selling it is nothing new. The
United States has done that for years. But this technology is so
important and sensitive that the people who buy it automatically
acquire a capacity, a capability that they have never had in their
history. In other words, our expertise, our knowledge, our
technological skill is being sold.
  What makes this particularly important is that this very technology
has the capacity to give to the purchasing country the skills and
abilities that they have never had before to develop things that are
very positive, on one hand, but also potentially very negative. I was
reminded of a quotation that is attributed to Mr. Lenin in the early
days of his establishment of the Soviet republics. He said that it was
his belief that ``a capitalist would sell you the rope that you would
use to hang him.'' I thought about that over and over, as we discussed
this question of selling these computers to countries like China and
Russia, which have the capacity to allow them to develop extraordinary
military capability.
  Recent news accounts about sales of supercomputers to Russian nuclear
weapons labs and the Chinese Academy of Sciences--in apparent
circumvention of United States export control regulations--have raised
troubling questions about the control that the United States exercises
over supercomputer exports.
  China has purchased at least 46 United States supercomputers. Of
these, 32 are one particular model that is faster than two-thirds of
the classified computer systems available to our own Department of
Defense, including the United States Naval Underwater Weapons Center,
United States Army TACOM, and United States Air Force/National Test
Facility.
  The Commerce Department and the Justice Department are investigating
the unlicensed sale--unlicensed sale--of four over-2000 MTOPS computers
to the Russian nuclear weapons facility Chelyabinsk-70.
  The computers recently sold are 10 times more powerful than anything
Russia ever had before, and we sold it to them.
  There is ample room for mistakes and confusion in the current dual-
use export control system for supercomputers.
  According to a New York Times article on February 25 of this year, in
an effort to circumvent United States export controls, Russia's nuclear
weapons establishment obtained a powerful IBM supercomputer through a
European middleman and said they planned to use it to simulate nuclear
tests.
  I was on this floor 2 weeks ago giving a speech about a test ban,
recalling the speech given by President Kennedy before American
University in 1963. I came to the floor with Senator Harkin and said it
is time for us to have a comprehensive nuclear test ban, moving toward
the day when there are no nuclear weapons threatening this world. In
the world we live in today, you don't need to detonate a nuclear
weapon. If you have a supercomputer, which can simulate that
detonation, you can derive the same information--or a lot of it--
through this model and through this technology. These are the very same
computers and capabilities that we are selling.
  The Nation's export controls for supercomputers ``amount to a kind of
honor system,'' according to one U.S. official quoted in the Wall
Street Journal. Companies that have doubt about a customer's activities
are expected to call the U.S. Government for advice.

  Think about that. You have a computer company and you have a sale
worth millions of dollars and you don't know whether it is going to be
used for a peaceful purpose or a military purpose. Well, the honor
system says it is time to call the Department of Commerce and check it
out and see if they have any records or classified information. They
may not share the information with you, but they may tell you there is
some concern. But it is an honor system. There is nothing built into
the law to guarantee this kind of surveillance, this kind of
supervision.
  Companies may fail to obtain licenses to sell supercomputers ordered
for civilian purposes, such as weather forecasting or air pollution
studies or natural resources prospecting and development, but these
computers end up in places which do design work for nuclear weapons
programs--not a civilian use. Companies may knowingly ignore licensing
requirements or, alternatively, companies may unwittingly fail to
recognize a suspect end-user.
  The first step toward better export controls is better communication.
Increased accountability and interaction between industry and the
Federal Government called for by this amendment will help facilitate
that interchange.
  Even William Reinsch, the Undersecretary for Export Administration
for the Commerce Department, quoted by Senator Cochran with whom I
share the sponsorship of this amendment, testified at the Governmental
Affairs subcommittee hearing last week, agreed that better
communication is essential. He invited and encouraged companies to
consult with the Commerce Department when faced with challenging sales
decisions.
  The current system for supercomputer exports involves controls on
high-power computer exports set forth in Federal regulations that
divide the countries of the world into various categories, or tiers.
  The licensing policies vary depending on which category the country
falls into. There are countries for which no export license is
required--tier 1--some countries for which licenses are required for
extraordinarily high performance machines--tier 2--some for which
licenses are required, depending on whether the end-use is military
rather than civilian--tier 3--and countries for which sales are totally
banned--tier 4.
  The tier 3 countries include India, Pakistan, all of the Middle East/
Maghreb, the former Soviet Union, China, Vietnam, and the rest of
Eastern Europe.
  Under current rules, export licenses are required to export or re-
export computers with a composite theoretical performance, known as
CTP, greater than 2000 MTOPS to military end-users and end-uses and to
nuclear, chemical, biological, or missile end-users and end-uses in
tier 3 countries.
  However, for civilian end-users or end-uses that don't fall into a
military or proliferation category, licenses are not required for
export or re-export of computers under 7000 MTOPS to these countries.
  What this means is that for many sales, no Government oversight or
decisionmaking takes place at the front end if the exporter determines
that he is selling to a company that portrays itself as a civilian user
because no license is required.
  Because of the differences in the licensing rules that apply to
exports for military and proliferation uses than those governing sales
for civilian use, the U.S. Government plays no upfront role in
determining whether the end-use of a supercomputer under 7000 MTOPS
sold to a buyer in a tier 3 country is indeed to be used for a civilian
purpose.
  I know this is involved, I know that it is complicated. Let me try to
cut to the bottom line. If a company in the United States seeks to sell
a supercomputer, one of great capacity, and the end-user, the company
that is buying in another country, says this is strictly for a civilian
purpose, it is not going to be used for anything of a military
capacity, there are virtually no controls on that sale; nor is there
much of anything done to track that sale, once it is made, as to where
that computer actually ends up.

  The responsibility is all on the shoulders of the manufacturer or
exporter to make the determination on whether or not a license is
needed, whether or not the computer might be used for military
purposes. Exporters run the risk

[[Page S5995]]

of relying on assurances of the purchasers or their own intelligence
information about end-use, rather than the resources of the Government.
Either intentionally or inadvertently, exporters have made sales to
destinations for which a license should have been obtained, because of
end-use, but was not.
  The Cochran-Durbin amendment would require that all U.S. exports of
supercomputers above 2,000 million theoretical operations per second--a
measure of the computer's speed--to a tier 3 country be licensed by the
Commerce Department.
  The presently more lenient requirements for civilian end-use sales in
this category would be made identical to stricter ones applicable to
sales for military proliferation purposes.
  The amendment would shift responsibility from industry to the
Government for deciding the propriety and conditions of the sales.
  By subjecting all such sales above 2,000 MTOPS to licensing
requirements, the United States may be able to prevent the uncontrolled
flow of technology for unauthorized use or diversion to purchasers in
countries who may have vastly different interests than those of the
United States.
  Civilian sales of supercomputers above 2,000 MTOPS to purchasers in
tier 3 countries would be reviewed and approved by the Commerce
Department, using the same standards used in licensing military and
proliferation sales to these countries.
  In addition, the amendment expresses the sense of the Senate that
Congress should enact legislation requiring that any computer exceeding
2,000 MTOPS exported to a tier 1 or tier 2 country shall only be
reexported to a tier 3 country, or reexported by a tier 3 country to
another tier 3 country, pursuant to an export license approved by the
Secretary of Commerce.
  We are trying to track these computers, once sold, and determine
where they are going to end up. We are saying to those countries, whom
we consider to be our allies and friends, that we are going to ask you
to bear responsibility for the end-use of the computer. We don't want
you to be a conduit for the sale of a computer to a country where the
United States suspects it may be used for military purposes.
  The sense of the Senate would call for legislation that would require
any reexport to a tier 3 country would have to be done under U.S.
export license. This amendment is clearly necessary. I urge my
colleagues to join Senator Cochran and myself. If you had listened to
the testimony, as we did, you would have discovered, as I did, that
there has been a dramatic increase in technology and expertise in this
field. It is estimated that every 9 months to a year most of the
computers that we are talking about become obsolete and move on to
higher standards.
  The United States is where these computers are made and the country
from which they are sold. As we are concerned about the proliferation
of those items that can be used for the construction of nuclear,
biological, and chemical weapons, we should also be concerned about the
potential that we are selling technology that can also be used for
proliferation of military weaponry. If we are truly seeking a peaceful
world--and we are--the United States should take care not to sell that
technology which allows another country to develop weapons of
destruction.
  I think the Cochran-Durbin amendment strikes an appropriate balance.
It brings our Government into the decision process. It protects those
exporters in the United States who truly are trying to do the right
thing and sell for civilian use. But it gives them a backup, and it
leaves some assurance that will be another party investigating when it
comes to sales of a suspect nature.
  This amendment is an important step toward addressing some of the
growing concerns about U.S. export control policies governing sales of
dual-use technology and whether those policies may be permitting access
to sophisticated American technology to aid in the buildup of nuclear
weapons capability of other countries.
  Recall the words of Mr. Lenin: ``A capitalist will sell you the rope
that you will use to hang him.''
  Let's not have that occur. Not in the name of free trade and good
commerce should we forget our responsibility to national and world
security. I believe the Cochran-Durbin amendment is a sensible and
responsible way to bring some order to what is becoming a very chaotic
situation.
  I urge my colleagues to join Senator Cochran and me in support of
this amendment.
  I yield the remainder of my time.
  Mr. COCHRAN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.
  Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I commend the distinguished Senator from
Illinois for the great force of his argument and for the clarity of his
statement in support of this proposal.
  I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Michigan [Mr. Abraham]
be added as a cosponsor to the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Enzi). Without objection, it is so
ordered.

   Senate will continue consideration of the bill on Friday, June 20, 
1997.

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[Congressional Record: June 20, 1997 (Digest)]
[Page D646-D647]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:cr20jn97-1]
 
                                              Friday, June 20, 1997

                                 Senate

*****

DOD Authorizations: Senate continued consideration of S. 936, to 
authorize appropriations for fiscal year 1998 for military activities 
of the Department of Defense, for military construction, and for 
defense activities of the Department of Energy, and to prescribe 
personnel strengths for such fiscal year for the Armed Forces, taking 
action on amendments proposed thereto, as follows:
  Pages S6019-24, S6026-27

Pending:

  Cochran/Durbin Amendment No. 420, to require a license to export 
computers with composite theoretical performance equal to or greater 
than 2,000 million theoretical operations per second.
Pages S6019-24, S6026

  Grams Amendment No. 422 (to Amendment No. 420), to require the 
Comptroller General of the United States to conduct a study on the 
availability and potential risks relating to the sale of certain 
computers.
Pages S6022-24, S6026


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[Congressional Record: June 20, 1997 (Senate)]
[Page S6021-S6024]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:cr20jn97-78]



 
        NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 1998

  The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill.
  Mr. GRAMS addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota is recognized.


                           Amendment No. 420

  Mr. GRAMS. Madam President, I inquire of the business now before the 
Senate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The pending question is on the Cochran 
amendment No. 420.
  Mr. GRAMS. Madam President, I rise this morning to strongly oppose 
the amendment by my colleague and friend from Mississippi, Mr. Cochran, 
first for jurisdictional reasons, and most importantly because it is a 
seriously, I believe, flawed policy.
  As chairman of the International Finance Subcommittee of the Senate 
Banking Committee, I object to the consideration of this matter, since 
it is within the jurisdiction of my subcommittee and the Committee on 
Banking. This is a very controversial issue and it should be heard and 
debated in the normal congressional process, by the proper committee of 
jurisdiction, not by a floor amendment with little opportunity for 
opponents to be heard. Many Members of this body may have already 
returned to their States and will not even have the opportunity to 
listen to the debate today.
  The Senate has not had an opportunity to have a full debate on export 
controls in the last few years. Members need the benefit of time to 
fully analyze changes in an area that can have such a negative impact 
on U.S. companies and on U.S. jobs.
  What really concerns me, Madam President, is that this amendment 
turns back the clock on technology. This amendment indicates it is 
directed at supercomputers, but computers at the 2,000-7,000 MTOPS 
level are not supercomputers, a point I will discuss later. The 
amendment reverses 2 years of effort to decontrol computers that are 
generally available. You will hear all sorts of talk today about how 
this amendment improves national security. But it does not. If the goal 
is to stop the sale of high performance computers to questionable end 
users in Russia, China, India, Pakistan, and Israel, it will stop the 
sale of United States computers to those end users--but it will not 
stop our allies from making those sales.
  It is true that there are two companies currently under investigation 
for alleged sale without license to a questionable end user. Those 
investigations are still pending and should be pursued, so it seems 
premature to, in effect, have the Congress find them guilty. Let us let 
the process work. If they are guilty, they will be penalized. The U.S. 
companies selling computers abroad at this level are few; they are 
reputable and they do care about selling to questionable end users. The 
investigations have also had a positive effect in that they have 
encouraged companies to seek more validated licenses for uncertain end 
users. I disagree with my colleagues who believe businesses care only 
about the almighty dollar, and not national security.
  This amendment will bring us back to the cold war days when export 
controls were required for computers sold in drug stores. A computer at 
2,000 MTOPS, which is the level we would control, is a low-end work 
station which is widely available all over the world. We would 
establish unilateral controls on any computer over this capability. Our 
companies would have to

[[Page S6022]]

obtain a validated license. Their competitors in other nations would 
not have that requirement. Therefore, European and Japanese companies 
would have a competitive edge in many, many computer sales in countries 
where it is important to establish a foothold as a reliable supplier to 
facilitate future sales. Licenses would be required for every sale 
above this limit, not just those to questionable end users. We want to 
expand markets in those countries, while protecting our national 
security interests, rather than handing them on a silver platter to our 
trading partners who will then be seen as reliable suppliers in the 
future.
  I know the argument will be that it is not hard to get an export 
license and that there are statutory deadlines on agency review of 
license applications. I can give you quite a list of companies--many of 
them smaller companies--which have come close to shutting down due to 
export license delays, even in recent years. We cannot return to this 
uncertainty and bureaucratic maze. Even the larger companies will see 
their expenses increase as they will have to hire more high-priced 
attorneys to facilitate many of the licenses through the process. 
Export licenses to these countries do not get approved in a couple of 
months. Many of them take many months and earn the U.S. the designation 
as an unreliable supplier. While we are pursuing regulatory reform in 
many areas, what we are doing here is reimposing regulations we 
eliminated 2 years ago.
  What is curious to me is an independent study commissioned in 1995 
for the Departments of Commerce and Defense which determined that 
computers could be decontrolled to the 7,000 MTOPS level without a 
negative impact on national security. The Departments of State, 
Defense, Commerce, the intelligence agencies, and ACDA all signed off 
on this report, and the decontrol was made at that time to 7,000 MTOPS. 
The determination was made because the 2,000-7,000 range, again, Madam 
President, was widely available throughout the world.
  But you have also heard that we are stopping the sale of 
supercomputers to tier 3 countries without a license. Again. Madam 
President, a 7,000 MTOPS computer is not a supercomputer. 
Supercomputers still need export licenses. I am told that the MTOPS for 
a supercomputer is in the 20,000 range and can go up to one million 
MTOPS--a far cry from 7,000.
  Let's look at the level the amendment seeks to control--2,000 MTOPS. 
This is a low-level work station computer. By 1998, personal computers 
will reach this level. Also, the alpha chip available next year will be 
1,000 MTOPS itself. So just two of those in a computer would qualify 
the computer for an export license. It is very difficult for me to 
justify that companies will have to jump through so many hoops just to 
sell fairly low-level computers. We are truly turning back the clock on 
technology.
  I have previously made the point that we are stabbing ourselves in 
the foot, since computer companies in other countries do not have these 
controls, and therefore our efforts are futile to say the least. There 
are four European companies which sell computers in the 2,000-7,000 
range as well as Japanese companies. We all know that they will be 
eager to make these sales.
  What is really ironic is that the Chinese themselves have now 
produced a computer at the 13,000 MTOPS level. They have surpassed the 
7,000 current limit the sponsor of this amendment is trying to roll 
back.
  One argument I have heard is that Japan also requires validated 
licenses for its sales. Yes, that is true, but Japan's validated 
license system has always been a rubber stamp operation. The entire 
process takes 24 hours, if that. Ours can take months. And I can show 
you some unhappy constituents who can verify that.
  Another question I have is whether it is good policy to codify export 
controls at certain levels rather than leaving them to regulation. Do 
we really want to be in a position to have to change the law each time 
we need to decontrol? Is the Congress really able to act as quickly and 
as often as needed to adjust to rapidly changing technology? I think 
not.
  Madam President, I plan to send a second degree amendment to the 
amendment by my colleague from Mississippi and in a moment will ask for 
its immediate consideration.
  But I again want to mention that this amendment would request the GAO 
to perform a study of the national security risks that would be 
involved with sales of computers in the 2,000-7,000 MTOPS range to 
military or nuclear end users in tier 3 countries. It would also 
analyze the foreign availability issue to determine whether controls at 
2,000 MTOPS and above would make any sense.
  Further, the amendment would require the Department of Commerce to 
publish in the Federal Register a list of end users which would require 
the filing of a validated license application, except when there is an 
administration finding that such publication would jeopardize sources 
and methods.
  Madam President, this is a sincere compromise in my position as 
subcommittee chairman of the committee of jurisdiction over this issue, 
which will help us decide whether there is a need to recontrol at the 
2,000 level. It is far too controversial to decide this question today, 
or by next Tuesday when we will vote.
  I believe Commerce should be asked to publish this list and to 
further seek ways to work with computer companies to determine whether 
other end users are questionable in order to alleviate some of the 
uncertainty that is out there.
  Madam President, let us not turn back the clock on technology. Let us 
make a rational national security decision that also take into account 
the best interests of our exporters--and the jobs that they represent.


                 Amendment No. 422 To Amendment No. 420

 (Purpose: To require the Comptroller General of the United States to 
conduct a study on the availability and potential risks relating to the 
                       sale of certain computers)

  Mr. GRAMS. So, Madam President, I send my second-degree amendment to 
the desk, and ask for the yeas and nays on the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Minnesota [Mr. Grams] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 422 to amendment No. 420.

  Mr. GRAMS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that further 
reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       In lieu of the matter proposed to be inserted, insert the 
     following:

     SEC.   . GAO STUDY ON CERTAIN COMPUTERS.

       (a) In General.--The Comptroller General of the United 
     States shall conduct a study of the national security risks 
     relating to the sale of computers with composite theoretical 
     performance of between 2,000 and 7,000 million theoretical 
     operations per second to end-users in Tier 3 countries. The 
     study shall also analyze any foreign availability of 
     computers described in the preceding sentence and the impact 
     of such sales on United States exporters.
       (b) Publication of End-User List.--The Secretary of 
     Commerce shall publish in the Federal Register a list of 
     military and nuclear end-users of the computers described in 
     subsection (a), except any end-user with respect to whom 
     there is an administrative finding that such publication 
     would jeopardize the user's sources and methods.
       (c) End-User Assistance to Exporters.--The Secretary of 
     Commerce shall establish a procedure by which exporters may 
     seek information on questionable end-users.
       (d) Definition of Tier 3 Country.--For purposes of this 
     section, the term ``Tier 3 country'' has the meaning given 
     such term in section 740.7 of title 15, Code of Federal 
     Regulations.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second for the Senator's 
request for a rollcall vote?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  Mr. COCHRAN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Enzi). The Senator from Mississippi is 
recognized.
  Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I have listened carefully to the comments 
of my good friend from Minnesota in support of his second-degree 
amendment. I must say that the language of the amendment is appealing 
in some respects, particularly the suggestion that the General 
Accounting Office ought to be asked to conduct a review of this 
situation and the apparent risk to our national security caused by the 
export policies of this administration with respect to the sale of 
supercomputers and its technology to foreign purchasers.
  There is some question in my mind about the efficacy of the last part 
of

[[Page S6023]]

the amendment particularly, because in our hearings in the Governmental 
Affairs Committee the administration officials talked about the fact 
that the reason they did not publish and make available a list of end 
users or potential purchasers of these computers at this time was 
because of diplomatic considerations and the questions about whether it 
puts in jeopardy our intelligence-gathering capabilities and a number 
of other issues that concerned them enough so that they do not now make 
available this list even privately to exporters of supercomputers.
  So to require them to publish it in the Federal Register and to make 
it available to the general public is probably something that ought to 
be reconsidered and not approved by the Senate. They should not be 
compelled to do that. It seems to me that the reasons they gave in our 
hearing for not doing it even privately was enough and sufficient in my 
mind to raise questions about whether we should compel them to do it 
publicly.
  But looking back at the earlier complaints and the comments from my 
friend about the Cochran-Durbin amendment, let me say that this is not 
an effort on our part to roll back regulatory policy with respect to 
military end users. It is an effort to change the procedures and to put 
the onus and the responsibility for determining whether a sale is 
permissible or consistent with national security concerns on the 
administration rather than on the sellers of the computers.

  Computer companies do not have the capacity to make determinations on 
their own about the use to which the computers they are selling in the 
international market will be put, or the relationships between 
prospective purchasers and governments, particularly in the case of 
China or Russia. The U.S. Government, though, has the capacity, through 
its contacts worldwide, to do a much more reliable and accurate job of 
assessing whether or not someone would be a purchaser who would use 
these computers to enhance the lethalness of nuclear weapons or missile 
technology to put our own citizens at risk, the lives of Americans at 
risk, in a way that they would not otherwise be, but for the sale of 
our computer technology.
  So it is for that reason and that reason alone not to prevent the 
sale to legitimate purchasers who will use it for civilian or other 
appropriate purposes. It is in those situations where there is very 
real concern based on knowledge that we have about the potential 
harmful use--harmful to our own interests--that we ought to have the 
power, we ought to have the process reserved to the Federal Government 
to prohibit that sale in those selected situations.
  Right now the policy of our Government is to prohibit the sale of 
this category of computers if it is for the purpose of being used for a 
military use or sold to a military organization. It is prohibited under 
current law, under current regulations. So the suggestion that the 
Senator makes that we are imposing new restraint on trade in this 
amendment is not true insofar as it concerns the sales for military 
purposes.
  Current policy simply says to the exporters, if you know it is going 
to be used by a military organization, you cannot sell it--2,000 to 
7,000 MTOPS speed computers cannot be sold under current U.S. law and 
under current regulations. So this amendment that we are offering does 
not impose a new definition that restrains the sale of computers. It 
simply says that the Commerce Department is going to give you the OK. 
Once you tell us who you will sell it to, they will tell you whether it 
is permissible or not. That is all we are saying.
  The current policy is it is up to the exporter to decide whether this 
is a military end use or an end user. If they sell it to someone they 
knew was a military end user, they violate the law right now. The 
problem is a lot of exporters, the people in the business of 
manufacturing and marketing supercomputers, do not have the capacity to 
make this determination.
  Also, there are motivations that are different. They are in the 
business of making money. They are in the business of selling as many 
as they can. The stockholders of these companies want to see sales go 
up, and so when there is a close question--we are not questioning 
anybody's motives here today--but where there is a close question and 
you really do not know for sure, the temptation is to go on and make 
the sale, particularly if there is really no hard evidence there.
  Now, there have already been those cases where there is enough 
evidence that people have sold computers to end users who are military 
organizations or who are involved in nuclear weapons programs, that 
they are now under investigations by a Federal grand jury. This is 
serious business. That could have been prohibited, maybe, if you had 
the Commerce Department saying, ``OK, it is fine, go ahead and make 
this sale. Here is your license.'' Then the civilian marketer is off 
the hook. The Commerce Department makes the decision. That is the 
issue.
  Do we leave it up to the honor system that has been developed by the 
Clinton administration, which is not working--46, we thought it was 46, 
but it turned out to be 47 as a result of the hearing we held of new 
information of these computers that are in the hands of Chinese 
entities and we do not know what they are being used for. Or if our 
Government knows, they cannot tell us in a public hearing session. We 
have to go behind closed doors to find out what they really know.
  From what we can talk about right now, we know that this policy ought 
to be changed, and for the business of ``this is not the right place, 
this is not the right time,'' and the jurisdictional question--well, 
the Commerce Department has jurisdiction over commerce issues, the 
Banking Committee has some jurisdiction, our Governmental Affairs 
Committee has jurisdiction over compliance with nonproliferation treaty 
provisions. We are constantly monitoring the question of proliferation 
of weapons of mass destruction in our committee, and we came upon this 
information through the exercise of our oversight responsibilities.
  It is a matter of some urgency, in our view, that this matter be 
addressed, and we think the U.S. Senate will agree with that. I think 
we have suggested a very modest but a very necessary first step in the 
process of reform of our policies over exporting computers. This 
administration came into office having made a promise to the computer 
industry that they were going to make some dramatic changes in the 
rules so that they could sell more computers in the international 
marketplace. That is fine. That is fine. But they have adopted a policy 
that is not working. It is not working to protect our national security 
interests, which is important. It is working in that it has helped sell 
a lot more computers and a lot of people have gotten rich under this 
new policy. I do not have a problem with that. No complaints are being 
made about that. But it was supposed to be a policy that both enhanced 
our ability to compete in the international computer market but at the 
same time protected our national security interests. It worked on the 
one hand, but it has failed on the other.

  We now see the Atomic Energy Minister in Russia, whose name is 
Mikhailov, bragging in a public forum about the new supercomputer 
technology they have bought from the United States that is 10 times 
more powerful and sophisticated than anything they have had before. 
This agency is in the business of modernizing the nuclear weapons that 
the Russians have.
  We have this Nunn-Lugar builddown program supposedly trying to 
dismantle these weapons of mass destruction, and we are very actively 
involved with the Russians in that regard. But at the same time, to be 
selling them the technology to make the weapons, they are more 
accurate, more lethal, capable of destroying potential adversaries like 
the United States, it seems we are working at cross-purposes with 
ourselves. We are trying to work to keep down the proliferation of 
weapons of mass destruction, and here we are, in this instance, 
contributing to the proliferation of more lethal nuclear weapon 
systems. Certainly that is true in the case of Russia and China. We 
know that. We know that.
  So what do we do about it? Nothing? Have some hearings? Have the GAO 
spend another year looking at things? We agree GAO ought to look at 
this. We are asking them to do that, too. They have already begun some 
work at our request. I agree with the Senator

[[Page S6024]]

that we need to do more, but to just say the Senate should not act on 
this suggestion, this is a modest first step. It is not a suggestion 
for comprehensive reform at this time. We need more information. We 
need to do more work to decide on the details of a comprehensive, 
workable policy than is on the books now and administered by our 
Commerce Department.
  So, but for the provisions of the amendment offered by the Senator 
that I have suggested caused me some concern, I would like to be able 
to support the amendment so that we could then go on and vote to 
approve the amendment as amended, but I cannot do that at this point. I 
hope the Senate will not agree to the amendment.
  I know under the announcement that was made earlier today on behalf 
of the majority leader, there will be no votes on amendments today. 
They will be set aside and we will come to them later. So there will 
not be a vote today. Knowing that there will not be, I will not push 
the issue any further, except to suggest to the Senate that this is an 
issue that ought to be debated, considered carefully, and we ought to 
vote for this amendment that I have offered with the cosponsorship of 
Senator Durbin.
  Incidentally, I asked the other day, after we had described the 
amendment, that Senator Abraham be added as a cosponsor. I have now 
been asked to seek unanimous consent that Senator Lugar be added as a 
cosponsor. I make that request at this time, Mr. President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                         Privilege of the Floor

  Mr. THURMOND. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Janice 
Nielsen, a legislative fellow with Senator Craig's office, be granted 
floor privileges during debate on S. 936, the Defense Authorization 
Act.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. GRAMS. Mr. President, I want to say I appreciate the remarks of 
my colleague from Mississippi, Senator Cochran. We hope to be able to 
work with him over the weekend and hope to come to an agreement and 
compromise with him by next week. Like he said, hopefully we can vote 
on this at that time.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. THURMOND. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call.
  Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that we may move 
from this quorum call into morning business for 20 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to calling off the quorum?
  Mr. LEVIN. I object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  The clerk will continue to call the roll.
  The bill clerk continued the call of the roll.
  Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, making two separate requests, I ask 
unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Frist). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I can proceed 
for 20 minutes as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. INHOFE. Will the Senator yield for a unanimous-consent request?
  Mr. LEVIN. Reserving the right to object, would the Senator add to 
that, that following morning business that we go back into an automatic 
quorum call?
  Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that following my 
speech, if it ever begins, that we go back into the quorum call, and I 
also ask unanimous consent that, without losing the floor, I might 
yield to Senator Inhofe so that he might get a staff member on the 
floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________

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  Senate will continue consideration of the bill on Tuesday, June 24, 
1997.

