25 April 2000

Defense Department Report: CBO Estimate Calls for "More Robust" NMD System Than DOD'S

Pentagon spokesman Ken Bacon told reporters April 25 that a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report questioning Defense Department (DOD) estimates for financing a National Missile Defense (NMD) system actually is looking at "a much more robust system that we have costed out at this stage."

The CBO report projects costs running billions of dollars more that DOD estimates.

The DOD's estimate is for "about 100 interceptors at one site; the CBO is looking at a larger system -- 250 interceptors at two sites. All our estimates deal with a smaller system. We have not made estimates for a larger system," he said.

Both the DOD and CBO estimates cover a 20 year period, he said, adding "these estimates reflect not only the cost of building a system that hasn't even been completely developed and tested and proven yet, but (they also cover) two decades of inflation that we can't predict."

Everyone engaged in comparing the two estimates must be aware of "the risks involved and the judgment factors that enter into any sort of cost estimate over a long period of time for a highly complex system that no one has decided to deploy," Bacon said.

On the subject of Russian concern over the possible need to amend the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty to permit NMD were to go forward, Bacon referred reporters to Secretary of State Madeleine Albright's statement at the Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference April 24.

"The statement made it very clear that we are designing a National Missile Defense system against a small attack, not the type of attack that Russia would be capable of launching," he said.

The United States is in the process of discussing with the Russians the importance of adjustments to the ABM Treaty that would allow building an NMD system "that we do not believe threatens them in any way," Bacon added.

It would be a "purely defensive system" that can only handle a few tens of incoming missiles, he continued. "There is a threat that applies equally to Russia as it does to us. The same nations that concern us are actually much closer to Russia than they are to us. And those are principally Iraq, Iran, and North Korea.

"This is an important diplomatic initiative that will be pursued at the highest level of our two governments," Bacon said, adding that President Clinton will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in June to discuss this and other major issues.

(Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)