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CNN Talkback Live

Should the U.S. Build a Missile Defense System?

Aired May 01, 2001 - 15:06   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL O'HANLON, BROOKINGS INSTITUTE: We cannot stop a single ballistic missile coming at the U.S., and we're prevented from doing so by treaty.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOBBY BATTISTA, HOST: The Cold War is over, so are ballistic missile attacks something to worry about?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LAWRENCE KORB, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS: The concern, according to the Bush administration, is no longer the Russians but the so-called rogue states, states like North Korea, Iran and Iraq.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If they're going to attack us, they're going to look at what way is the most expedient and effective. If that's launching a ballistic missile, they'll do it that way. If it's bringing a suitcase bomb in, they'll do it that way. We should defend against both.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BATTISTA: President Bush proposes reducing the nuclear stockpile and taking a more defensive stand against nuclear aggression. But critics say a missile defense system costs too much, won't work and is politically motivated.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This has been a litmus test of loyalty to the Reagan legacy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BATTISTA: Does the U.S. need a missile defense system? Are you willing to pay for it? And would having it make you feel safe?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Three, two, one!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BATTISTA: Good afternoon and welcome to TALKBACK LIVE.

Does the United States really need a missile defense system? How important is it to national security? Now that the president and his critics have had their say, let's try to figure out how the rest of us feel about it.

Our guests today are Jack Spencer, national security and defense policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation. He is the author of the book "The Ballistic Missile Threat Handbook." Also with us, Gary Milhollin, director of the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control. Gary and Jack, thank you both very much for being here.

Before we get into whether or not we need a system like this, let me ask you first, Gary, whether or not the missile defense system that the president is proposing is feasible at this point?

GARY MILHOLLIN, THE WISCONSIN PROJECT: Well, the answer is, we really don't know. I guess you could -- you could say that it may be feasible technically at some point. That is, it may be that at some point, we'll be able actually to shoot down some percentage of incoming missiles arriving in the United States. The question is, whether we will be able to shoot down a high enough percentage to make this system worthwhile.

If you can just imagine a country with 100 missiles, and you get 95 percent of them, that means you are still losing five U.S. cities. Most people would say that that's not acceptable. And I haven't heard anyone say that the systems that we are thinking about would be able to produce a higher level of credibility, or reliability, or success than that.

So you get into the question, well, what can you really do with a system that's only, say, 90 or 95 percent effective? And it's not clear to me what you can do with it.

BATTISTA: Jack, can you ever get a system that is 100 percent effective?

JACK SPENCER, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: Well, if we hold everything at those sorts of standards, we would never have anything. And I'm here to tell you that if I lived in of the cities that was protected, I would be real happy that we had this system.

So, 100 percent reliability is not necessary. What is required is that we deploy something, and from that point on, we continue to make it better and better all the time. And then, we can hopefully deter anyone from ever doing that attack to begin with.

BATTISTA: So, you are talking about building on the technology as we go along? SPENCER: Sure. If we -- if we wait until something is 100 percent workable, that no missile can get through no matter what, we will never deploy anything, and that will give the incentive for other nations to continue to proliferate ballistic missiles.

The problem with the whole debate is that people have it backwards. People are assuming that building a missile defense will cause proliferation, when the facts are quite the opposite. In the absence of missile defense, we have seen proliferation take place. We've seen the United States' and Russian arsenals skyrocket since 1972, when we signed the ABM treaty. And since the end of the Cold War in 1991, we have seen the proliferation throughout the third world.

So, this is in the absence of missile defense, while under the constraints of the ABM treaty.

BATTISTA: But Gary, if we are successful in putting up that sort of missile defense shield, what would we expect China and Russia to do in response? I mean, wouldn't they immediately set about to try to find a way to pierce that shield, because their current nuclear weapons would be rendered useless, correct?

MILHOLLIN: No, the Russians will be able to hit us reliably with any kind of a system that can now be imagined. Their arsenal is going to be able to overwhelm anything that we will be ever be able to field. So there will never be any protection against the Russian arsenal.

The Chinese arsenal is probably less than 20 ICBMs today that can reach the United States. If we build a system with 100 say, interceptors, we may be able to knock down half of those 20. But by the time we get this system into the field, the Chinese will probably have 50 or more missiles.

So, I can't see a time realistically when we'll be able to say that we don't have a threat from China. I think China will respond. China will make sure that it can overwhelm or get through any kind of missile defense system that we are likely to field. So, I don't think that we can say that it's going to protect us from China.

BATTISTA: Jack?

MILHOLLIN: The question then, is, will it protect us from other people? When the Iranians, for example, get their first long-range missile or the North Koreans continue their program on our able to hit some city in the United States. Can we reliably expect to knock down a launch from them?

Now, of course, we try to deter that kind of a launch with thousands of missiles that those countries know with 100 percent certainty will fall on their heads if they launch against us. The question I think we have to face is: how much money is it worth to do better than that?

BATTISTA: Jack, is that acceptable, then? Is that an acceptable cost of this? That China would likely proliferate its nuclear arms in response to us?

SPENCER: I would like to address a couple of points that were just made. First of all, the Russia question. Bobbie, you sound like a good old fashion Cold Warrior there. Russia's not an enemy anymore. We don't really have to worry about the Russian nuclear arsenal anymore. So, they have no incentive to invest their resources in building more missiles to strike the United States...

BATTISTA: I thought we were more worried about an accident in Russia. Not an intentional hit, but an accident.

SPENCER: Right. Exactly. Exactly. And the accidental launch scenario is very real. But the question is, as you posed it, was: will this cause an arms race with Russia, for example? And it won't.

The Chinese have been building ballistic missiles for a number of years now, long-range ones. They have two very high-tech missiles in the works. The DF-30 one which will be deployed very soon. So, they're building their missile arsenals independent of any missile defense system and they have been since before the missile defense came back onto the radar screen.

So, I think those are important issues that need to be addressed when we talk about whether or not this is going to cause an arms race, because it simply will not. It will stop the ongoing arms race that's taking place right now.

BATTISTA: How long would it take to get this system -- and I am assuming that we can only get it, as you say, to the 95 percent acceptable level of operation. How long would that take? How close are we to that?

MILHOLLIN: Who is that question for?

BATTISTA: Either one, Gary, go ahead.

SPENCER: We are closer today than what we were yesterday. Because President Bush made the political commitment today to defend the United States, our friends and allies overseas and that's the first step to deploying a real effective missile defense. He finally put this Cold War treaty behind us, hopefully, the ABM treaty, which has defined the Cold War adversarial relationship for 30 years.

The Cold War is over, the adversarial relationship is over. And now we can get about to the business of defending the United States and the rest of the world in this post-Cold War country -- this post- Cold War environment. That is the first step. So, we're closer today than we were yesterday. It was a big step.

MILHOLLIN: I am not so sure that that is true. Whether we are closer today is really a technological question. The more tests that is done on this new system, the more tests that fail. So far, there's no reason to think this technology will ever succeed. Although, it might. So the problem we're having is that we are dealing with a number of unknowns. First, will this technology ever work? Second, will it ever work well enough so that we can rely on it, assuming it does work? And third, the countries that we are worried about, continue to develop these missiles at the same rate that they seem to be doing now?

None of these things are really known. And so, what we are doing is investing a lot of money into a very complex system without really knowing very much about what will happen.

BATTISTA: You have raised a lot of questions. Gary, I have to take a quick break here. So we'll continue in just a moment.

As we do, now that you've heard the pros and cons: Do you think the United States should build a missile defense system? Take a vote on the TALKBACK LIVE online viewer vote. AOL key word: CNN.

While there, take a look at my daily notes, and drop us some e- mails. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BATTISTA: A couple of e-mails here. RJ in California says:

"The people who we think we don't need this are the same people who still don't understand why we gather intelligence from countries like China and Iraq. We still have a giant target on our collective backs and I for one think that we need protection."

Bill in Oregon says:

"Let me get this straight. We're going to spend 60 billion or more on an anti-missile system that irritates our allies, may frighten our potential enemies in renewing the arms race, and doesn't seem to work. Brilliant."

Maybe we need to go back, Gary, and Jack, just a little bit. The president spoke early in his speech about this, about why we need this type of system or why he feels that we need this kind of system. And who do we feel like the biggest threat of a nuclear attack is coming from?

SPENCER: It's the existence of these missiles, that's the threat. These countries would not be investing their scarce resources and developing an 11,000-kilometer range missile, for example, if they didn't plan to use it, either to blackmail the United States or to actually launch a missile against the United States.

That's exactly what poor countries like North Korea is doing. Why in the world would North Korea, who can't feed its own people, invest in this technology? I will tell you why, because the United States right now is completely vulnerable to even one ballistic missile. And it gives a country like North Korea the international standing to throw its weight around. And we can't have an irresponsible nation like that with that capability.

MILHOLLIN: Actually, that -- I would say is overstates the case with respect to North Korea. North Korea has developed missiles that have been completely paid for by client states elsewhere, Iran, Syria, primarily. They have contracted with North Korea to develop the missiles, develop the missile factories, and then transfer them to the buyer.

So when North Korea does a missile test, it's really doing what -- it's like a -- like the car dealer doing a new car demonstration. Their launches are sales promotion events. I don't think North Korea really expects to deploy a missile that will be able to hit a U.S. city with any degree of reliability. What North Korea's trying to do is build a series of missiles that it can sell to other countries.

BATTISTA: But why...

MILHOLLIN: And so far successfully. The point is...

BATTISTA: But let me ask you this: just logically speaking, why would North Korea, or any other country, even Iraq for that matter, launch a nuclear at the United States, knowing that we could around and obliterate them?

SPENCER: Would we, though? Would we necessarily turn around and obliterate millions and millions of innocent North Koreans or innocent Iraqis because of the irrational actions of one crazy dictator, tyrant? I don't know that we would, and I think that could be in the calculations of these sorts of leaders.

Let's say, for example, a war were to break out in the Middle East or on the peninsula or anywhere in the world, and that the United States, or whatever power, was about to obtain victory, and the leader who was about to lose and his regime was about to fall, never used his missile, but at the very the last moment, he thought, hey, I'm about -- my regime is going to fall anyway, why not launch this missile against the United States and make them pay for them taking away my country?

So, there are a number of scenarios where a missile could very well be launched. And again, I want to come back to -- these countries would not be investing their resources and to developing this technology if they didn't have some reason to use it.

BATTISTA: Gary, do you agree?

MILHOLLIN: I think that there is a justification for missile defense, when you don't -- when deterrence fails. And the question is: will it fail? It might. An accidental launch is an example of a case where you can't really deter an accidental launch with a threat of retaliation.

But I believe that the most likely scenario, if we can use that word over and over again, is that any country that wants to hurt the United States and has a nuclear missile, won't do so by launching it on a ballistic missile. They will -- especially if we have a defense system which could knock the missile down. They will go around it, and they will go around it by smuggling in a warhead in a container, in a van, in a ship coming up a river, or they will go to sea. They will launch the missile from a ship offshore, either a cruise missile, or even a medium-range or a short-range ballistic missile, to which this ballistic missile defense system will have no answer. So I think, unfortunately, that we are seeing a case where every president from Truman forward, except for the possibility of Ronald Reagan, believed that there was no defense against nuclear weapons.

And I believe that that is true. There is no defense against a nuclear weapon. If another country has -- if Saddam Hussein had five bombs today, he could get them all here in vans. He could do it, and there's just no defense against that, if he wants to -- he wants to achieve that end. And the ballistic -- and unfortunately, as much as we would like to believe in it, the missile defense system that President Bush is talking about won't do it for us.

SPENCER: I need to answer that. It's unfair to make the comparison between a terrorist attack and a ballistic missile attack. They are totally different sorts of attacks. One is not meant -- a missile defense shield is not meant to protect against a terrorist attack.

We spend right now about $12 billion a year to protect ourselves from terrorism. The bottom line is that we live a free society, and probably a motivated terrorist could do that. But a missile attack is something completely different. Comparing the two is like comparing apples and oranges.

BATTISTA: Well, I want to come back to that, Jack. I have to go to the break here real quickly. So we will do that and go to the audience in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BATTISTA: A commission chaired by Donald Rumsfeld issued a report in 1998, saying a rogue state with a missile could, quote: "Inflict major damage on the U.S. within about five years of a decision to acquire such a capability."

More e-mails. Tom in New Mexico says: "Too many rogue nation are crazy and hateful enough to launch missiles. We must protect the American way of life without question."

Cosmo in Idaho says: "Instead of spending 100 billion on a missile defense system, why don't we spend 100 million on foreign aid so that we don't have to worry about them firing on us. Would it really be that hard to eliminate the risk of getting nuked through diplomatic means as opposed to war-like means?"

Philip from Texas has been hanging on the phone. Philip, go ahead.

PHILIP: Hi, Bobbie. I agree with Jack in a lot of what he has been saying today. I think we as the American people need to wake up and see that we are really aren't the most liked nation around the world. There are places over in Northern Africa and in the Middle East, and the rogue nations where Americans can't even -- let alone walk down the streets without fear in the back of their mind for them being killed.

I think we definitely need to develop some sort of defense system to protect our nation from future problems, because we have a lot of footholds in the world that we need to protect.

BATTISTA: All right. And the opposite viewpoint is from Erik in Maryland. Go ahead, Erik.

ERIK: Yes, I want to make the same point, but we're hated mostly because we support military dictators all over the world, and these are sort of the same people that CIA finances, and then we create Saddam Hussein by telling him he can invade Iran because we are opposed to Iran, and then we have these problems.

We have to deal with this on a political level, not on a technological level. Thank you.

BATTISTA: All right, thank you, Erik. And before we went to the break, Jack, I interrupted you, the music interrupted you. Basically, you were trying to explain the difference between a terrorist attack and a missile attack.

SPENCER: Well, I was simply making the point that these, both of these kinds of attacks are different, have different objectives. A missile attack could be used as a military -- in a military conflict, whereas a terrorist attack, as they have been in the past, are usually politically motivated, not militarily motivated.

BATTISTA: But I thought the biggest threat to our country is thought to be terrorist attacks or rogue nations.

SPENCER: Well, you -- a terrorist attack by a rogue nation...

BATTISTA: Well, I mean in other words...

SPENCER: .... or a ballistic missile attack by a rogue nation...

BATTISTA: Or in other words, we're not really...

SPENCER: ... I'm saying that one -- one cannot -- a missile defense was never meant and should not be meant to defend against a terrorist attack. We as a -- we as a nation, it's our policy to remain completely vulnerable to ballistic missiles.

Now during the Cold War, whenever it was the United States and Russia and this was created a mutual assure destruction capability, maybe it made some sense then. But the Cold War is over now and there are all of these other missile threats emerging, and they've all emerged under -- in the absence of the ABM Treaty.

So I think that we often get misled by equating the terrorist attack and the missile defense -- the ballistic missile attack. That's all. BATTISTA: All right, and, Gary, quickly if I could get a comment from you on the ABM Treaty that the president -- I think the priority is to pull the United States out of that treaty or overhaul it in some way. What do you think?

MILHOLLIN: Well, it sounds like the president has decided that the ABM Treaty is more trouble than it's worth. He may make that more explicit in the future. I think the question we have to ask, overall, is whether this kind of a big investment of money makes sense?

If -- even if you assume that all the money is going for defense, frankly, I would prefer to see more money put into our efforts to penetrate, understand, and anticipate the actions of terrorist groups and rogue nations -- the people who are likely to attack us.

I think that to put all of our -- all of our resources into a system that only is good against some missiles -- it won't defend against cruise missiles, it won't defend against short-range ballistic missiles -- I think that may be a misapplication of our resources.

We need better intelligence. We need to know what terrorist groups are going to do before they do it. We need to pick them up coming over the borders. We need to penetrate them at home. That's the kind of extended defense we need, and that's the only kind that will work.

SPENCER: And I agree with everything that was just said, except for the fact that we're still living in the United States, our troops and friends abroad, vulnerable to ballistic missiles. Look, $10 billion a year, probably what we need to spend, does seem like a lot of money. But it's less than 3 percent of our overall defense budget.

It's not really -- it's only a drop in the defense bucket and it's one that can provide a much-needed capability.

BATTISTA: All right, that will be the last -- let me go to the audience here quickly.

Bill?

Or Mike, I'm sorry.

BILL: I think that the world is a much more untidy place now than it was 10 or 20 years ago. I think that the greater threat comes from rogue nations and rogue leaders like Omar (sic) bin Laden than it does from the Chinese and the Russians, and yes, it would be expensive, and yes, it wouldn't be full-proof.

But if it worked just once, wouldn't it be worth the money? We are not going to change human nature by hiding under the sheets.

BATTISTA: All right, we have to take a quick break here. Jack Spencer and Gary Milhollin, thank you both very much for joining us. We will hear some other voices on this matter right after the break. We'll be back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BATTISTA: All right, we're back. Allen in Los Alamitos says: "I worked on SDI in the 1980s. It was the belief of myself and a lot of my co-workers that while we would probably not be able to get all the missiles that were launched toward us, we could get a great deal of them. That combined with the strategy of mutually assured destruction would make an effective deterrent from any assault on the United States."

John in Maryland says: "A missile defense system will break all the treaties we have signed on the subject, create a new Cold War climate with China and destabilize world politics. It will cost hundreds of billions of dollars before it is done and it won't work against anything but a single accidental missile launch. The only reasons to deploy a missile defense system are to make jobs for military scientists and create a new Cold War climate that will promote further military spending. Any false sense of security it offers will be more dangerous than comforting."

Joining us now, Richard Foster, editorial writer at "The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel," and Lynn Martin, former Illinois congresswoman and secretary of labor under President Bush from 1991 to 1993. She's on the board of TRW, an auto parts and aerospace defense company. Welcome to both of you.

RICHARD FOSTER, "MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL": Thank you.

LYNN MARTIN, FORMER SECRETARY OF LABOR: Thank you.

BATTISTA: Richard, even -- you know, you listen to the pros and cons of this, and even President Clinton was in favor of some sort of missile defense system. Can we really afford not to build one?

FOSTER: Yes, I think so. I think most of the arguments against it were introduced pretty well by Gary Milhollin on your previous segment. It just simply is unlikely to work. It's a huge amount of money. The estimate for the Clinton system was, I think, $60 billion through 2015. And that is apparently relatively -- that was just for one kind of a system.

Bush's plan, apparently, is going to multi-tiered system, which would be far more expensive, and as Gary pointed out, others have pointed out, the technology is at best unproven. So it's basically, I think, an enormous -- an enormous risk at best.

BATTISTA: Lynn, are perhaps we jumping the gun on the technology here? Is that what's making people uneasy?

MARTIN: Well, certainly it is. It's going to be a difficult sell. And I don't think we should try to promise things that aren't or can't be so.

Analogies aren't always a good form of discussion. But this is a little bit -- sometimes you go down with drug research and trying to help people, and the first year, two, three, four you may not know. We know some of the technology works, but the idea that we know every single part that may work -- it's true we don't. If we don't do the research, we will never know. And I'd go back to -- there's probably going to be a group of people that are for everything no matter what. And there was a group that opposed anything we did when the Cold War was going on, in terms of offensive weapons.

And we finally reached a really uncomfortable agreement on this dreadful term, mutually assured destruction: We'll kill 90 million people if you try to kill 90 million people. I can't imagine people really are today are talking about keeping that kind of thinking.

The biggest plus for this is this president is not doing it really for himself or even for us, but for 10, 12, 20 years down the line. We will get some of the benefits, but this is giving the next presidents much more flexibility on defense. And if there is anything we've learned, the temptation of the United States has been -- and I think here we're going to be remembered as very disciplined in this area. But do you really think that these groups and when the technology moves forward that somebody might not try something? Could we guarantee 100 percent? I don't know of anything that's 100 percent in this world.

But the idea that we would not do it and that somehow people would say we could spend it on education or spend it on foreign aid -- that's not the issue here. The issue is defense of our cities, of our people. And if this takes us a step closer, it makes war less a possibility. So I think at the end, if you believe in peace and believe in the idea you don't want to see destruction, this is the way you have to go.

BATTISTA: Richard, one of the things I found a little bit confusing in the president's speech was his talk of cooperating with Russia and China. How would that -- how would that come about? I mean, do we share this technology once we develop it with China?

FOSTER: Well, I don't know. The Russians and the Chinese, as you know, are very much against this, as in fact, the allies are. I suppose the idea is that once the United States -- once it had this technology, would willingly share it with the Russians and the Chinese and others. But I think that's a very iffy proposition.

The threshold question, of course, is whether the technology is going to work. I think you have to first establish that, pretty much beyond argument. And until you get to that point, I don't think it makes much sense to talk about sharing it. As of now, the technology hasn't been proved. They have tried it, worked on it, spent billions of dollars over 10, 20, 30 years. And it's just a very tough nut to crack. And it could be that this is just one thing that can't be done.

BATTISTA: Lynn, what do you read into that talk of cooperation?

MARTIN: Well, two things: One is, some of technology works and some doesn't. This is no surprise, the idea that everything in something this complex would work. But there have been incredible strategic moves forward here. And so I think there is a good chance, and I think we ought to say that.

But the other is, as soon as foreign policy sort of leaves our banks, I think we can all tend to be far more nonpartisan. I think what this president -- and I believe President Clinton could have done and would have done in the same situation -- is saying to the Russians and to the Chinese: Look, we're going to tell you what we're doing. That doesn't mean you'll necessarily share all secrets, after all, but we're going to try to keep you involved in this process.

Because some of their fears, though legitimate to them -- if they know what's happening, I hope, could be worked through. And I think with the difficulties we're having, understandably, with both nations, to keep that open line of communication is something we want from our president. And again, I even think members of Congress of both parties want those lines of communication open. I know I do.

BATTISTA: All right. Let me take a quick phone call from Stuart in Ontario before we go to break. Stuart, go ahead.

CALLER: Hi, I live in Canada, and I have a great concern over seeing the cause of more proliferation. I think that all these issues can be addressed through diplomacy. And being your northern neighbor, and basically seeing all the actions that are done in the States really affect me in Canada, I think that to cause proliferation is moving away from the direction that we've been going since the '70s, with the START Treaties and the nonproliferation treaties and everything. I think that there's's always a more peaceful way of solving the problem.

And as we've talked about, the fact that it's not guaranteed to work, and that it costs insurmountable amounts of money and that there's the other threats of terrorists bringing weapons in on a boat or something, I think that it doesn't justify the repercussions that it will cause. I think there are better reasons.

BATTISTA: All right, Stuart, thanks very much. We'll take a break and continue in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BATTISTA: The North American Aerospace Defense Command monitors the skies for man-made objects, including incoming missiles. Based at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado, American and Canadian military and civilians watch the space above North America, evaluating and dealing with possible threats to security.

Welcome back. Richard, the first step in taking the United States towards this system, or the globe, for that matter, is the 1972 ABM Treaty that, actually, we're violating if we keep this up. But is there a reason for the United States to pull out of this at this point? Has it outlived its usefulness? Or at the very least, does it at least need be to overhauled? Perhaps the tone and the spirit of it are still there, but times have changed.

FOSTER: Well, it's true that times have changed. It's pretty obvious that that's the case. Times have changed in a revolutionary way, but the fact that the treaty is 30 years old does not mean it's obsolete. If we threw away the laws that were 30 years old or more, we'd be throwing away the Ten Commandments. I think the law has stood the test of time for 30 years. It has preserved the peace. It's worked well, and it is supported by not only the Russians and the Chinese, but our European allies -- most of the rest of the world.

I think, really, the only people who think that it ought to be revised or renegotiated is a fraction of the Republican Party. Even -- and even some Republicans, I think, probably contest the president's view that it's obsolete. So my short answer of that is, no, I don't think it's obsolete. I think it's 30 years old but it's worked pretty well and still has a lot of useful life left in it.

BATTISTA: Lynn?

MARTIN: It's worked reasonably well, not very well. Because of course, we all know that regrettably there still has been an extraordinary proliferation, and some of that is very difficult to get governments to admit. But that does not mean the base forum of the treaty hasn't had and continues to have some base value.

But even the Constitution has a way to amend it, and we could -- we don't want to destroy the Constitution. I was never always for every defense budget, and I certainly supported the treaties that we had.

But 30 years and technology, if this is the only treaty we have, we will not be doing the right thing and I come back that something. All through the ages, there's groups of people that don't want to pay for defense. You know, it doesn't matter what it was. It doesn't matter if it's for floods or for whatever may happen. But you know, if you are leader, you have to do that. That's regardless of party.

And frankly the idea that our only defense was our ability to kill 100 million people, that for, I think, most Americans that's a horrible feeling in the pit of our stomach, that the last thing left is our submarine going somewhere to destroy it. The idea that we might be able to have the kind of defense -- not 100 percent guaranteed -- but with technology, a strong guarantee that would mean we could have defense, not offense, and frankly as a mother, as someone that believes that peace has to be the better route, this can giver us chance.

There's still a lot of room left to negotiate, a lot of room left to go, but it was time for a new president to do the beginnings of that conversation. I glad we are having it because we've got to have it. It's very serious. It's about 50 years from today, not just tomorrow.

BATTISTA: The tougher sell might to be our European allies, as opposed to the American people, but this is short segment. I've got to take another break, so we'll talk about that when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BATTISTA: In the short time we have left, Lynn, when the president's men travel overseas here in the weeks to come, what kind of reception do you think they're going to get?

MARTIN: Well, I try to remember that we fought with our allies in Europe though two World Wars, and I think he's tried to calm, and certainly our allies are extraordinarily important, but I suspect if we're going -- former history teachers tend to look back a little, and if we remember history, the best thing we can do with our allies is be more prepared than we were, all of them, all of us, for World War I and World War II.

If we'd had incredible strong defenses, maybe we could have saved a lot more lives. So, I hope that's the area. It doesn't mean they're going to get agreement. You know, being allies doesn't mean they have to be in lockstep with us or we with them, but I think it'll be an open, frank discussion and at the end, the leader of the free world must do what he and this nation think best.

BATTISTA: All right, Richard Foster, thank you for joining us today. Lynn Martin, thank you. Good to see you. We are out of time completely. A quick look at the poll here: Should the U.S. build missile defense system? It is running about 47 percent yes, 53 percent no.

And we will see you again tomorrow for more TALKBACK LIVE. Join us then.

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