NewsMax.com
Friday, March 30, 2001

It came in the form of a letter the powerful chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee sent to Secretary of State Colin Powell.

According to a story from the Washington bureau of the San Jose, Calif., Mercury News, one of the Knight-Ridder Newspapers, which obtained a copy of the letter:

The North Carolina Republican gave Powell what amounts to a wish list of international agreements he wants the new administration either to avoid or repudiate.

• An international treaty banning nuclear test blasts.

• Agreements with Russia that conservatives contend would limit the Pentagon's ability to develop the anti-ballistic missile system Bush proposes for the defense of cities in the United States.

• A treaty creating an international criminal court.

• A global ban on land mines.

All of those were mainstays of the previous Democratic administration of Bill Clinton and Al Gore.

Helms' letter comes at the very time the Bush-Cheney administration is well into a stem-to-stern review of U.S. nuclear-weapons and arms-control policies left over from the Clinton-Gore administration.

It is seen as strengthening the hands of Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, known to be opponents of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.

In one of the major foreign policy setbacks for Clinton, the Republican-led Senate refused in October 1999 to ratify that proposed treaty.

To date, the executive branches of 160 nations have signed it.

Of those countries, the legislatures of 75 have ratified it, including three nuclear powers – Britain, France and Russia.

As the treaty is drafted, it can go into effect only after ratification by all 44 countries with nuclear reactors. Among the nuclear-reactor powers that have not ratified the treaty, in addition to the United States, are Communist China, India, Israel, North Korea and Pakistan.

While Helms did not say so, his letter seemed to indicate he is ready to see the United States resume its nuclear tests, which were on hold for the entirety of the eight Clinton-Gore years in office.

But Helms left little doubt that he wants the Bush-Cheney administration to formulate an entirely new policy governing nuclear weapons tests.

That would please congressional conservatives, who want the United States to develop a new generation of warheads with explosive yields small enough that they would not produce large amounts of radioactive fallout.

Pending his internal review, Bush has not made it clear where he stands on repudiating the test-ban treaty.

Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
Bush Administration
Missile Defense

Related Products:
Get NewsMax.com`s new book "Bitter Legacy" FREE.