Mr. Helms: Today's hearing is focused on the remarkable, unanimous conclusions reached by the Rumsfeld Commission regarding the threat of ballistic missile attack on the United States and the capacity of the U.S. intelligence community to keep abreast of those developments.

This morning's distinguished witness is the Honorable Donald Rumsfeld, former Secretary of Defense under President Ford and Chairman of the distinguished commission that was established pursuant to the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1997.

Secretary Rumsfeld, we appreciate your coming here this afternoon. At the outset, I will observe that there is no greater threat to America's national security than the proliferation of ballistic missiles tipped with nuclear, chemical, or biological warheads. At least ten countries have operational ballistic missiles with ranges greater than 300 miles today, and that number will grow by half again within the next decade. Many of these nations -- e.g., Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, and North Korea -- are clearly hostile to the United States. Given North Korea's recent flight test of a three-stage intercontinental ballistic missile, it is an absolute, irrefutable fact that a hostile tyrant will soon possess missiles capable of exterminating American cities.

I have watched in disbelief as the Clinton Administration, and the U.S. intelligence community, have willfully and repeatedly ignored the writing on the wall. Like many, I was appalled by the National Intelligence Estimate on Missile Threats (NIE 95-19), which simply made too many intellectual errors -all of which underestimated the looming threat -- to not have been politically skewed. NIE 95-19, as Senators will recall, made a number of ludicrous assumptions, such as:

- that concentrating on indigenous development of ICBMs adequately addresses the foreign missile threat to the United States;

- that foreign assistance will not enable countries to significantly accelerate ICBM development;

- that the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) will continue to significantly limit international transfers of missiles, components, and related technology;

- that no country with ICBMs will sell them;

- that no countries (other than the declared nuclear powers) capable of developing ICBMs from a space launch vehicle program will do so, nor will space launch vehicle programs enable third countries to significantly accelerate ICBM development;

- that a flight test program of five years is essential to the development of an ICBM;

- that development of short and medium-range missiles will not, in turn, speed ICBM development;

- that no country will pursue a biological warhead -- as opposed to a nuclear warhead -- for an ICBM; and

- that the possibility of unauthorized or accidental launch from existing nuclear arsenals has not changed significantly over the last decade.

I continue to shake my head in astonishment that, for the last three years, our national security policy has been driven by these assumptions. Not a single one of these claims stands up to close scrutiny.

We established your Commission, Secretary Rumsfeld, due to our frustration with the Intelligence Community's refusal to give us a straight answer (at least, on the record). And, true to all of our expectations, your bi-partisan Commission has served as a breath of fresh air. In the wake of your report, the intelligence community has begun a long-awaited, desperately needed revision of its estimates relating to the emerging ballistic missile threat.

Certainly much remains to be done, and the changes in the community's estimation process still leave much to be desired. For instance, rather than eating humble pie, the latest National Intelligence Estimate vainly clings to a variant of the formulation first used in NIE 95-19. The unclassified key judgment of the 1998 NIE is that:

" Beyond the North Korean TD-2, we judge it unlikely, despite the extensive transfer of theater missile technology, that other countries (except Russia and China as just mentioned) will develop, produce, and deploy an ICBM capable of reaching any part of the United States over the next decade."

Now, it is beyond me why the intelligence community cannot simply say: Within the next decade, North Korea is likely to join Russia and China as a country that has ICBM's capable of threatening the United States. This second statement is equally accurate, but heaven forbid that the Intelligence Community convey a sense of urgency regarding the emerging missile threat.

In closing Mr. Secretary, I think we all should be agreed that the missile threat is real and growing. I look forward to your presentation of the Commission's key judgments, and the chance to discuss the Intelligence Community's latest NIE with you and the other distinguished members of the Commission.