Clinton on Forces of Destruction and Illicit Arms

[John Young <jya@pipeline.com>]

Excerpt from the President's remarks to the Democratic National
Committee in Sacramento this afternoon:

...
             But the most likely problems -- there are a couple 
little babies in this audience, or there were today, and some 
children -- the most likely problems these children will face 
when they come of age will be problems that cross national 
borders -- terrorism, organized crime and drug running, the 
spread of weapons of mass destruction, chemical and biological 
weapons and maybe small-scale nuclear weapons.
             
             This much nuclear cake put in a bomb would do ten 
times as much damage as the Oklahoma City bomb did.  
             
             The spread of environmental problems or diseases 
across national lines -- we are going to have to, in other words, 
find ways to cooperate, to keep the organized forces of 
destruction that are taking advantage of the Internet, the 
technological revolution, the freedom of travel and the freedom 
of movement, access to computers and moving money around and all 
that -- there will always be organized forces of destruction.  
             
             That is fundamentally what is at stake in the stand 
off we're having in Iraq today.  I don't want you to look at this 
backward through the prism of the Gulf War and think it's a 
replay.  I want you to look at it forward and think about it in 
terms of the innocent Japanese people that died in the subway 
when the saran gas was released; and how important it is for 
every responsible government in the world to do everything that 
can possibly be done not to let big stores of chemical or 
biological weapons fall into the wrong hands, not to let 
irresponsible people develop the capacity to put them in warheads 
on missiles or put them in briefcases that could be exploded in 
small rooms.  
             
             And I say this not to frighten you.  The world will 
always have challenges.  I think the chances are quite good that 
we can organize ourselves for this challenge and deal with it 
very effectively.  I personally believe that the next 50 years 
will be far more peaceful and less dangerous for our children and 
our grandchildren than the last 50 years were.  I also believe 
they will be the most prosperous and interesting time in all of 
human history -- but only if we do the right things.

...

From: http://library.whitehouse.gov/ThisWeek-plain.cgi

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For more on the US ban of assault weapons and the US and Mexico's 
convention to fight illicit arms trafficking, signed yesterday:

   http://jya.com/piat111597.htm