Demil Bill (S1438/Sec 1062)

From: Ryan M Gill (rmgill@mindspring.com)
Date: Mon Oct 08 2001 - 16:51:17 PDT


I did some poking around on the Thomas web server this evening, I
found a few specific mentions of section 1062. One member of the
Senate (Senator Craig) noted the problems with the section. See page
10050 of the congressional record.

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query Search for S10050 (a
Congressional Record Page) on the word search.

I also searched sub-committee reports and found the following...

Authority to ensure demilitarization of significant military
equipment formerly owned by the Department of Defense (sec. 1062)

The committee recommends a provision that would provide authority to
ensure demilitarization of significant military equipment formerly
owned by the Department of Defense (DOD).

The possession of improperly demilitarized DOD property by
individuals and business entities was the subject of a recent study
of the Defense Science Board and has raised considerable public
concern. Section 1051 of the Strom Thurmond National Defense
Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1999 required DOD to develop a plan
for improving the demilitarization of excess and surplus defense
property and propose appropriate legislation to clarify the authority
of the government to recover critical defense property that has not
been properly demilitarized. The Department complied with this
requirement and proposed legislation addressing this issue.

The provision recommended by the committee would make it unlawful for
any person to possess significant military equipment formerly owned
by DOD that has not been demilitarized, without proper authorization.
Under this provision, the Secretary of

Defense would be required to notify the Attorney General of potential
violations of this prohibition, and the Attorney General would be
authorized to take appropriate steps to ensure that the equipment is
demilitarized or returned.

The committee notes that military equipment would be covered by this
provision only if it is specifically designated as significant
military equipment. Public safety should be the foremost
consideration in making any such designation, but the Secretary may
also take into consideration the historic or cultural significance of
certain equipment. For example, the committee does not believe that
civil war cannon would or should be designated as significant
military equipment. Similarly, the committee does not expect that
World War II aircraft from which all weapons systems have been
removed would or should be designated as significant military
equipment.

 From what I've been able to determine, the section (1062) is
something that Senator Strom Thurmond proposed as part of the
original S1416 bill. If someone is in his district, you may want to
give him a call and ask him what he was thinking.

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