In connection with the Senate confirmation hearing for Ellen Tauscher on Tuesday morning, Senator Lugar, the Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, released a pre-hearing questionnaire completed by the proposed nominee. Representative Tauscher has been nominated by President Obama to become Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security. In that position, she will be responsible, among other things, for the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls (“DDTC”) which licenses arms exports from the United States.

Interestingly very few of Senator Lugar’s questions in the prehearing questionnaire were directed at export control. Most revolved around the proposed nuclear cooperation agreement between the United States and the proliferation concerns surrounding North Korea’s nuclear program.

However, the questions on export control revealed that the nominee appears to favor transferring jurisdiction over certain satellites and their components back to the Department of Commerce:

I support export control reform in general and would consider supporting the transfer of commercial communications satellites to the Department of Commerce provided that the transfer is consistent with our foreign policy and national security objectives. I would note that unless Congress determines otherwise, defense services related to integration and launch that might be required for exports of U.S. commercial communications satellites would continue to be licensed by the Department of State, as launch vehicles are controlled by the International Traffic in Arms Regulations.

She acknowledged that this would require Congressional authorization as jurisdiction over satellites was transferred from Commerce to State by legislation enacted by Congress in 1998 by section 1513 of the 1999 Defense Authorization Act.

Although Representative Tauscher is widely thought to be sensitive to the concerns of defense exporters, she dismissed a question relating whether U.S. export controls “unduly hampered” U.S. industry:

In the past, U.S. industry had some valid concerns regarding their competitiveness in a global market. In 2006, the average space-related export authorization took 76 days from submission to the Department of State to issuance of the authorization approval. In 2008, such approvals were averaging 23 days.

It’s not at all clear why she limited her answer to space-related export authorizations, because the question was broader than that industry. And while the export community is glad to see processing times for license applications diminish, licensing delays are not the only concerns that the export community has, particularly given the perception that many items that are licensed are widely available on the world market and shouldn’t be subjected to any delays for licensing, no matter how short.

Permalink


Copyright © 2009 Clif Burns. All Rights Reserved.
(No republication, syndication or use permitted without my consent.)