President Clinton wants the Senate to ratify the Chemicals Weapons Treaty, a document that that would ban some of the world's most dreaded killing agents. A group of conservative Senators, though, believe that U.S. participation in the treaty would be a threat to national security. After a discussion of the treaty with National Security Advisor Sandy Berger, Margaret Warner talks with Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK).

MARGARET WARNER: Now, the views of a leading Senate opponent. He's Republican Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma, a member of the Armed Services Committee, and he joins us from Tulsa. Welcome, Senator. Why do you think this treaty should not be ratified?

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE, (R) Oklahoma: Well, first of all, I listened very carefully as Sandy Berger talked about the reasons it should be ratified, and I don't agree with any of them. I mean, it's not verifiable; it's not--those countries that pose the greatest threat and have been most hostile to us, such as Iraq, North Korea, Syria, and Libya, they're not even a part--they're not even signatories. And then I'm also concerned because we have--99 percent of all the known chemicals are in the hands of three countries: China, Russia, and the United States. China and Russia have not--I mean, they're signatories to the treaty, like we are, but they have not ratified the treaty.

And besides that, if you stop and look, Margaret, in the past at the other treaties they've gone into with the former Soviet Union, or with the Soviet Union, that are still out there, things like the ABM Treaty--things like--there are five treaties right now, and they have not--they have been in non-compliance with all five treaties. So there's every reason in the world to oppose it. And those five conditions that we have that Jesse Helms has I think are very reasonable.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. Let me get to those in a minute, but let's just talk for one second about your reasons.

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: All right.

MARGARET WARNER: As you heard, and I asked Mr. Berger what about the point that the non-signing states can just acquire materials elsewhere. His answer, as I'm sure you heard, was, well, this isn't perfect, but it would make it harder for them to get the chemicals from say a company in our country, or a company elsewhere in a signing state.

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: I'd like to ask Mr. Berger the question: If that's the case, why have we found out recently that Russia has sold both technology and systems to countries like Iran and other rogue nations? And if they do this and if we are lulled into a sense of false security in this country, it's going to make it I think even more of an incentive for other countries to get involved in--in chemical weapons.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. Let me ask you about another argument he made, and the proponents make, which is the U.S. has already promised to destroy most of its own stockpiles by 2004, so it's all to the good to at least get some other countries to destroy theirs.

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: Well, first of all, he's talking about the 1990 treaty which, of course, was ratified by Russia.

MARGARET WARNER: With the Soviets, yes.

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: That's right.

MARGARET WARNER: Then Soviets.

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: And they had ratified that, but they're still not complying with it. And in such cases as the ABM Treaty they're saying we're not going to comply with them until you pay us to get rid of these particular weapons. So I don't think that there's any way in the world that anyone can say that it's going to reduce the chemical threat. In fact, if you take four of the most respected former secretaries of defense, Schlesinger, Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, and "Cap" Weinberger, all of them said that this could enhance the risk of facing chemical weapons. And as far as being able to inspect and stop them, look what happened after the Persian Gulf War. The U.N. was given much greater capability to inspect Iraq than is under this treaty, and now we find out, as we speak right now, Iraq is developing chemical weapons. And look at Russia, who came out just the other day last week, and they have developed a new type of chemical weapon that is made from precursor chemicals that are not even covered under this treaty. So they're already figuring out ways to get around it.

MARGARET WARNER: Let me turn the question around. Since the United States is destroying all its own chemical weapons anyway, what does the U.S. lose by signing this? In other words, even if it doesn't cover everybody, what is the U.S.--what harm is done?

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: Well, first of all, I'm not sure that that is true, and that will be the case because, as I say, other countries that signed on to the 1990 ban are not doing--not doing away with theirs, but what we're doing with this treaty goes far beyond that. In Article X, for example, and let me just read it to you because people can't believe that we'd consider something like this in this country. It says, "Each state party undertakes to facilitate and shall have the right to participate in the fullest possible exchange of equipment, material, and scientific, and technological information concerning means of protecting against chemical weapons." That's what we'd agree to. That's the reason we say one of the conditions would be that we want to be sure that we strike Article X. And when I read that to Schwarzkopf, General Schwarzkopf, when he was before my committee, even he agreed. He said, no, no, we can't do that.

MARGARET WARNER: Meaning that we don't want to share our chemical defenses with another country.

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: That's exactly right. We don't want to open up our doors to the other countries. One of the signatories to this is Iran. They'll probably ratify it. If they ratify, then we're going to have to open up our doors of our chemical companies, everything from cosmetic companies to fertilizer companies and other companies, saying, here's our technology.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. We have already moved into the amendments, that being one of them, but are you supporting all five of these amendments?

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: I do. As far as Russia having to ratify, first, I a disagree with Mr. Berger there too. They should have to ratify first because back when we had the START II--and I think I was the only one who voted against that for ratification until the very last of that roll call vote, and then three or four more did. During that, they used to sell that: Well, we'll go ahead and we'll ratify, good old United States, we'll ratify the START II Treaty, and then Russia will do it. You know what? Russia hasn't done it yet. And that was two years ago.

MARGARET WARNER: Do you have a prediction? Do you have the 34 votes you need to kill this?

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: I have the confidence in those who are wanting a good, strong national defense in the Republican aisle, that most of them will reverse their positions, or at least those who are undecided will come over and join us. I'm going to predict that the undecideds will go over to the right side.

MARGARET WARNER: Would you feel you had achieved victory if you--if these amendments passed, these amendments that the administration calls killer amendments?

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: Well, you know, I would say that, you know, as the President says, they're killer amendments anyway, and I think if we can leave these provisions that--or have these provisions in it would force Russia to go ahead and ratify first; that would preclude terrorist nations from getting information from our country and the other three, that it wouldn't be ratified.

MARGARET WARNER: So a Senator, in other words, could vote for these amendments and also vote for a treaty? Say he voted for the treaty, but, in effect, the treaty's killed.

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: I would think so, yes.

MARGARET WARNER: Okay. Well, thank you, Senator, very much.

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE: Thank you, Margaret.

Continue to Margaret Warner's discussion with National Security Advisor Sandy Berger regarding the Chemical weapon's treaty...