CP's & Friends: FYI
Date: Tue, 25 Jan 94 03:08:42 GMT Posted: Tue Jan 25 03:08:40 GMT 1994 Subject: Perry Nomination Brief
Subject: Remarks by President Bill Clinton and Deputy Secretary of Defense William J. Perry upon the announcement of Dr. Perry's Nomination as Secretary of Defense -- Conducted at the White House on Monday, January 24, 1994, at 3:00 p.m.
President Clinton: Thank you very much, and good afternoon. I want to welcome all of you here, especially the distinguished members of Congress who are here, and the members of Secretary Perry's family who he will introduced later.
One year ago I selected Dr. Bill Perry to serve as my Deputy Secretary of Defense. Today, based on his lifetime of accomplishment and his solid leadership at the Pentagon, I'm proud to announce my intention to nominate him as the next Secretary of Defense. He has the right skills and management experience for the job. He has the right vision for the job. He has served with real distinction as both Under Secretary and Deputy Secretary of Defense. For years, and throughout his service this past year, he has been at the cutting edge on defense issues.
Years ago he had a vision of the power of stealth technology -- technology that helped the United States win the Persian Gulf War, and helped save American lives. He's been a leader in reforming the Pentagon's procurement process and improving financial accountability. I expect he'll have more to say about that today and in the weeks and months ahead.
He's been instrumental in developing a defense budget for the coming fiscal year that protects the readiness of our forces and promotes our aggressive efforts at defense conversion, and the development of dual-use technologies, and the creation and the preservation of American jobs. He played an important role in the recent breakthrough to eliminate Ukraine's nuclear weapons.
He brings a broad and valuable background to this job. He has proven experienced in the private sector. He's the chairman, director, and founder of several successful defense-related corporations. He's served in the United States Army. His academic career as a professor of mathematics and engineering has also contributed to our nation's security.
In every aspect of his work, Bill Perry has earned high respect from members of both parties. In the Congress and the military, among those who study military strategy, and in the business community. He's demonstrated leadership, integrity, and a mastery of his field. Time and again we heard about him and what I have come to know personally -- Bill Perry is a real pro. You can depend on him. That's why Secretary Aspin and many others recommended that I select Dr. Perry for this post.
Let me note, with appreciation that Secretary Aspin has agreed to stay, as he said he would, until his successor is confirmed.
Now we have a lot of work ahead of us. We need to continue reshaping our forces for this new era so that they remain the best trained, the best equipped, the best prepared, and the most strongly motivated in the world. We must implement the recommendations through the Bottom-Up Review. We must continue to deal with the new threats of weapons proliferation and terrorism. We must continue our aggressive work at defense conversion to save and create American jobs, and to maintain our industrial base that is so critical for our national defense. And we must reform the procurement process.
Bill Perry comes extraordinarily well prepared to meet these challenges. I hope, and I trust that Congress will quickly confirm him, and I look forward to working closely with him as an integral part of the national security team. I think he will do a remarkable job.
Dr. Perry? (Applause)
Dr. Perry: Thank you very much. Thank you, President Clinton, for the confidence you've shown in me by this nomination. If I am confirmed, it will be a real privilege to serve as your Secretary of Defense.
I would like to take just a moment to introduce my family that is here. My wife Lee, my daughter Robin, and son David. (Applause) I have three other children not here today, and eight grandchildren not here. We have a large and happy family.
Over the past year, I have welcomed the attention of President Clinton to the challenge of reshaping our forces for this new era. We have worked to follow-up the vision that Les Aspin had in establishing the Bottom-Up Review. I appreciate, also, Mr. President, your commitment to maintaining the readiness and the morale of our fighting forces.
I also look forward to serve because this is a time of great change, great challenge, and great opportunity. The national security problems facing the United States today are complex and difficult. We are making a transition from the security posture evolved to deal with the Cold War, to a very different security posture. I look forward to carrying out your commitment. To make those changes in a way that addresses the need of our military and civilian personnel, our defense facilities, and the communities that depend on them.
This new security posture must deal both with the problems in the post-Soviet world, while we simultaneously seize the opportunities. We read about the problems every day -- in Mogadishu, Sarajevo, Pyongyang, but we must not lose sight of the opportunities in this new post-Soviet world.
For example, this year we have what I would call a window of opportunity to make a major reform to the defense acquisition system so that we combine modern equipment for our military forces at affordable prices. The President has already made a commitment to readiness, but the acquisition and new equipment deals with the forces five years hence, or ten years hence, so we must look to that problem as well.
I have the full commitment of the President to proceed on a vigorous program of acquisition reform, and I believe that we can work effectively with the Congress to establish real reform in the system, and it's long overdue.
Last week, Mr. President, at the NATO Summit meeting, we provided leadership for the new Partnership for Peace in NATO. This partnership opens the door to a security partnership with our former enemies in the now extinct Warsaw Pact, but it does not draw a line dividing Europe at the very time we are trying to bring Europe together.
We also provided the leadership for the historic agreement on nuclear weapons reached at the Moscow Summit. When fully implemented, this agreement will see the country with the third largest number of nuclear weapons in the world voluntarily become a non-nuclear state with all of its nuclear weapons dismantled. This summit agreement takes a major step back from the nuclear abyss, and takes a major step forward for peace and stability in the world.
The British novelist Graham Greene once wrote, "There always comes a moment in time when a door opens and lets the future in." The ending of the Cold War opens such a door. The summit agreements will help us guide the future as it comes in.
Mr. President, I have great respect for the way you have been guiding our national security, and I am enthusiastic about the opportunity to help you guide it. I understand very well the demands of this job and the strains that it puts on one's family. My family and I have discussed this at considerable length this weekend, and they fully support my decision.
Mr. President, I am looking forward to working with you, the Vice President, General Shalikashvili, Tony Lake, Warren Christopher, and the rest of our national security team, and I look forward to serving the American people.
I thank you.
(Applause)
Q: Did you have to be persuaded to take this job? And what do you think will be the toughest part of it? Dr. Perry: No, I did not have to be persuaded to take the job. I met with the President to discuss this job Friday morning, and I left that meeting fully prepared to take on the job. I had a meeting with my family that evening, because it's not just me that's getting into this job. I put them under considerable strain when I do it, too. We had a follow-up meeting on Saturday morning with the White House where I told them that if I had to accept the job at that time, my answer would have to be no. I met, then, with the Vice President, and he told me I could take my time, take some time on the decision, meet with my family further. I took advantage of that. On Sunday afternoon I called the Vice President back and said if you still want me for your Secretary of Defense, I'm eager to serve.
Q: Why did you have second thoughts? Q: Why didn't you say yes immediately? What did you have to think about? Dr. Perry: I tried to explain that. It was because I did not want to drive my family into a decision, into my decision without their support, so I wanted to wait until I had their full support for it.
Q: Mr. President, why was this job so hard to fill? President Clinton: It wasn't easy to fill. It wasn't hard to fill, I mean. We had an abundance of talented people to consider, but I asked Secretary Perry and he said yes. It wasn't difficult at all. I can't say any more than you already know about what happened in the previous example, but we didn't go on a big search here. We had a very short list, and I quickly narrowed it to one. I had an interview with one person, I asked him if he'd take the job, and he did. I don't think that qualifies it as difficult.
Now I have had some difficult positions to fill. This one wasn't.
Q: What do you think he brings to the job that your current Defense Secretary did not? President Clinton: I don't think the two things are related. Secretary Aspin made his statement last month. We had our press conference on that. We answered your questions. It's got nothing to do with what we've said here today.
Q: Are you going to go along with Secretary Aspin's views on military women in planes and ships? Dr. Perry: Yes.
Q: That's good. (Laughter) Dr. Perry: Secretary Aspin created many important legacies this year. I mentioned the Bottom-Up Review, his work on all of the social aspects in the military. In particular, his advancement of women in combat is one which I enthusiastically support.
Q: Is there anything at all in your background that's come out over the past weekend that could conceivably cause you or the Administration any problems during the Senate confirmation process? In that regard, I'm specifically also referring to the so-called "nanny problem"? Dr. Perry: Nothing has come out that I believe would cause me any problems in the confirmation process.
Q: Dr. Perry, do you think that in terms of conservative government in Moscow that there's a possibility there may be a new Cold War starting? Dr. Perry: I would observe that we cannot control the events in other countries, including Russia. But we can influence them. I believe the President has adopted a program to assist, not just the Russians, but many of the former nations in the former Soviet Union, to help stabilize their economy. This is the most constructive thing we can do to minimize the chance of that unfortunate disaster occurring.
Q: Was your answer categorical about the nanny questions, Dr. Perry? Q: (inaudible)...the budgetary crisis that the Pentagon faces and the possible difficulty you may have in actually carrying out the blueprint the President has laid out? Dr. Perry: In order to carry out the Bottom-Up Review with the funds that are posed for it, we will have to manage the Pentagon very well. We will have to have real acquisition reform. We will have to have careful planning and management of our programs. We have to do all of this while we're maintaining a very high level of readiness and a level of morale and cohesion in the military forces. It is a difficult management job. I believe it's doable, and that's what I'm undertaking to do.
President Clinton: Thank you very much.
(END)