fidence that they are both united in a campaign against terrorism, and not let it degenerate into a campaign against each other.

Mr. Chairman, I think you are aware of what we have been doing in Afghanistan. I do not need to belabor the point. We should be so proud of our men and women in uniform who fought that campaign with such skill and efficiency. And now the task before us is to make sure that we help the people of Afghanistan and the new authority of Afghanistan get the financial wherewithal they need to start building hope for the people of Afghanistan, and to bring reality to that hope.

I was pleased that as one of the co-chairs of the Tokyo reconstruction conference, the conference was able to come up with $4.5 billion to be disbursed over a period of 5 years which will get the country started. The big challenge facing Mr. Karzai and his colleagues is the challenge of security, providing a secure environment throughout the country so that the reconstruction effort can begin. With respect to our continued campaign against terrorism, I think the President has spoken clearly. We will continue to pursue terrorism. We will pursue al-Qaeda around the world. We will go after other terrorist organizations and we will deal with those nations that provide a haven or a harbor for terrorists and we will not shrink from this. We have the patience for it, we have the persistence for it, and we have the leadership for it.

Mr. Chairman, in my prepared statement you have the various details of budget items and since I have gone on quite a bit, I do not want to belabor it any longer. But I just wanted to take the time that I did to show that there is a lot more going on than just what we read about in the daily papers on a particular crisis.

We have forged good relations with Russia and China and we have solid relations with the Europeans. We have solid relations with our allies in the Pacific-Asia region. We are working the problems with Africa and our own hemisphere.

There is no part of the world that we are not interested in. We are a country of countries. We are touched by every country and we touch every country and we have a values-based foreign policy that rests on principle, and it is principle that is founded in our value system of democracy, the free enterprise system, the individual rights of men and women.

We seek no enemies. We seek only friends. But we will confront our enemies and we will do it under what I believe is a solid, dedicated persistent leadership of the man who heads the foreign policy of the United States, President George W. Bush. Thank you, sir. [The prepared statement of Secretary Powell follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. COLIN L. POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE

Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, I am pleased to appear before you to testify in support of President Bush's budget request for FY 2003.

Before beginning, I want to thank you for confirming almost all of the nominees for the State Department. They are now hard at work.

Of those who remain to be confirmed, our ambassador-designate to the Philippines is of particular concern to me. We need Frank Ricciardone in Manila and we need him there as soon as possible. Not only have we not had an ambassador there in over eighteen months, it is now an even more crucial requirement as we scale up our assistance in helping President Arroyo combat the terrorists in her country. So, Mr. Chairman, I ask for your help in getting Frank confirmed, and in getting the remainder of our people to work as well.

I also ask that you help me get the FY 2002/2003 State Department Authorization bill passed as quickly as possible and that it include full authorization of our budget request for FY 2003, that it lift the cap on UN Peacekeeping dues, allow us to pay the third tranche of UN arrears with no additional strings attached, and include the management authorities we have requested. Moreover, I would also be grateful for your help in removing from the final bill the foreign policy restrictions, earmarks, and reporting requirements that tie the Department's hands.

And let me say here at the outset, Mr. Chairman, before I go into the details of the budget and our foreign policy, that President Bush has two overriding objectives that our foreign policy must serve before all else. These two objectives are to win the war on terrorism and to protect Americans at home and abroad. This Administration will not be deterred from accomplishing these objectives. I have no doubt that this committee and the Congress feel the same way.

As many of you will recall, at my first budget testimony last March I said I was going to break the mold and instead of talking exclusively about foreign affairs, I was going to focus on the financial condition of the Department-both in terms of State Department operations and in terms of foreign operations. I did that because the resources challenge for the Department of State had become a serious impediment to the conduct of the nation's foreign policy. And you heard my testimony and you responded, and we are grateful.

Because of your understanding and generosity, we have already made significant progress and in the remainder of FY 2002 we will make more. In new hires for the Foreign Service, we have made great strides. For example, we doubled the number of candidates for the Foreign Service Written Examination-and this year we will give the exam twice instead of just once. Moreover, our new recruits better reflect the diversity of our country with nearly 17% of those who passed last September's written exam being members of minority groups. We have also improved Civil Service recruitment by creating new web-based recruiting tools. And once we identify the best people we bring them on more quickly. For Foreign Service recruits, for instance, we have reduced the time from written exam to entry into service from 27 months to less than a year. We are also working with OMB to create extensive new performance measures to ensure that we are hiring the very best people.

We are also well underway in bringing state-of-the-art information technology to the Department. We have an aggressive deployment schedule for our OpenNet Plus system which will provide desktop Internet access to our unclassified system for over 30,000 State users worldwide. We are deploying our classified connectivity program over the next two years. Our goal is to put the Internet in the service of diplomacy and we are well on the way to accomplishing it.

In right-sizing our facilities and in shaping up and bringing smarter management practices to our overseas buildings program, we are moving forward briskly as well-as many of you are aware because General Chuck Williams has been keeping you informed about our progress. In fact, that is the first change we made, putting General Williams in charge and giving him assistant secretary equivalent rank. His Overseas Building Operations (OBO) has developed the Department's first longrange plan, which covers our major facility requirements through Fiscal Year 2007. The OBO has also developed a standard embassy design concept for small, medium, and large embassies. This concept will reduce cost while speeding up construction and enhancing quality, And in making all of our facilities, overseas and stateside, more secure, we are also making good headway. By the end of FY 2002, over two-thirds of our overseas posts should reach minimal security standards, meaning secure doors, windows, and perimeters. And we are making progress in efforts to provide new facilities that are fully secure, with 13 major capital projects in design or construction, another eight expected to begin this fiscal year, and nine more in FY 2003.

I am also pleased that we have been able to improve the morale of our State Department families. We are especially proud of our interim childcare center at the National Foreign Affairs Training Center. It opened on September 4 and can handle a full complement of 30 infants and toddlers.

The idea of family and the quality of life that must always nourish that idea even in the remotest station, is uppermost in our minds at the Department. While we concentrate on the nation's foreign affairs we must also focus on caring about those Americans who conduct it, as well as the many thousands of Foreign Service Nationals who help us across the globe. For example, our sixty Afghan employees in Kabul worked diligently to maintain and protect our facilities throughout the 13 years the Embassy was closed. They worked at considerable personal risk and often went months without getting paid. They even repaired the chancery roof when it was damaged by a rocket attack. This is the sort of diligence and loyalty that is typical of our outstanding Foreign Service Nationals.

With regard to our budget, last year I told you that the out years were a source of concern to me and they still are. In fact, given the costs of the war on terrorism, the downturn in the economy and accompanying shrinkage of revenues, I am even more concerned this year than last. But I was confident last year that I could make the case for State and I am confident this year that I can do so. We have a solid case to make, and it is the case of how we best pursue America's interests and there is no doubt in this old soldier's mind that foreign policy stands foremost among the answers to that "how." And Mr. Chairman, I am excited about the changes we've made and the momentum we've developed.

We need to keep that momentum going. That is why for FY 2003 you will get no break from me. I am going to focus on resources again this year in my testimony, because it is so critical that we continue to push the organization and conduct of America's foreign policy into the 21st Century.

Since that heart-rending day in September when the terrorists struck in New York, Virginia, and Pennsylvania, we have seen why our foreign policy is so impor

tant.

We have had great success over the past five months in the war on terrorism, especially in Afghanistan. And behind the courageous men and women of our armed forces has been the quiet, steady course of diplomacy, assisting our military's efforts to unseat the Taliban government and defeat the al-Qaida terrorists in Afghanistan. We've reshaped that whole region-a new U.S.-Pakistan relationship, a reinvigorated U.S.-India relationship, a new Interim Authority in Kabul, the Taliban gone, and the terrorists dead, in jail, or on the run. We are also forming important new relationships with the nations of Central Asia.

In his second visit to the Department last year, President Bush told us that despite the great tragedy of September 11, we could see opportunities through our tears and at his direction, the Department of State has been at flank speed ever since, making as much as possible of those opportunities.

And we need to continue to do so and for many years to come. We will need resources to do it, so first let me focus on my "CEŎ dollars", and then I will turn to foreign policy.

THE BUDGET PRIORITIES FOR FY 2003: DEPARTMENT OF STATE AND RELATED AGENCIES

The President's request for the Department of State and Related Agencies for FY 2003 is $8.1 billion. These dollars will allow us to:

• Continue initiatives to recruit, hire, train, and deploy the right work force. The budget request includes $100 million for the next step in the hiring process we began last year. With these dollars, we will be able to bring on board 399 more foreign affairs professionals and be well on our way to repairing the large gap created in our personnel structure and, thus, the strain put on our people by almost a decade of too few hires, an inability to train properly, and hundreds of unfilled positions. In FY 2004, if we are able to hire the final 399 personnel, we will have completed our three-year effort with respect to overseas staffingto include establishing the training pool I described to you last year that is so important if we are to allow our people to complete the training we feel is needed for them to do their jobs. Soon, I will be back up here briefing you on the results of our domestic staffing review.

Continue to upgrade and enhance our worldwide security readiness-even more important in light of our success in disrupting and damaging the al-Qaida terrorist network. The budget_request includes $553 million that builds on the funding provided from the Emergency Response Fund for the increased hiring of security agents and for counterterrorism programs.

• Continue to upgrade the security of our overseas facilities. The budget request includes over $1.3 billion to improve physical security, correct serious deficiencies that still exist, and provide for security-driven construction of new facilities at high-risk posts around the world.

• Continue our program to provide state-of-the-art information technology to our people everywhere. Just as I promised you last year, the budget request will continue projects aimed at extending classified connectivity to every post that requires it and to expanding desktop access to the Internet for Department employees. We have included $177 million for this purpose. Over the past decade, we let the Department's essential connectivity ebb to very low levels and we need to correct that situation.

• Continue and enhance our educational and cultural exchange programs. The budget request includes $247 million for strategic activities that build mutual understanding and develop friendly relations between America and the peoples of the world. These activities help build the trust, confidence, and international

cooperation necessary to sustain and advance the full range of our interests. Such activities have gained a new sense of urgency and importance since the brutal attacks of September. We need to teach more about America to the world. We need to show people who we are and what we stand for, and these programs do just that.

• Continue to meet our obligations to international organizations-also important as we pursue the war on terrorism to its end. The budget request includes $891.4 million to fund U.S. assessments to 43 international organizations, active membership of which furthers U.S. economic, political, security, social, and cultural interests.

• Continue to try to meet our obligations to international peacekeeping activities. The budget request includes $726 million to pay our projected United Nations peacekeeping assessments-all the more important as we seek to avoid increasing even further our UN arrearages. UN peacekeeping activities allow us to leverage our political, military, and financial assets through the authority of the United Nations Security Council and the participation of other countries in providing funds and peacekeepers for conflicts worldwide. As we have seen in Afghanistan, it is often best to use American GIs for the heavy-lifting of combat and leave the peacekeeping to others.

• Continue and also enhance an aggressive public diplomacy effort to eliminate support for terrorists and thus deny them safe haven. The budget includes almost $518 million for International Broadcasting, of which $60 million is for the war on terrorism. This funding will enable the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty to continue increased media broadcasts to Afghanistan and the surrounding countries and throughout the Middle East. These international broadcasts help inform local public opinion about the true nature of alQaida and the purposes of the war on terrorism, building support for the coalition's global campaign.

Mr. Chairman, on this last subject let me expand my remarks.

The terrorist attacks of 9/11 underscore the urgency of implementing an effective public diplomacy campaign. Those who abet terror by spreading distortion and hate and inciting others, take full advantage of the global news cycle. We must do the same. Since 9/11, there have been over 2,000 media appearances by State Department individuals. Our continuous presence in Arabic and regional media by officials with language and media skills, has been unprecedented. Our international information website on terror is now online in seven languages. Internet search engines show it is the hottest page on the topic. Our 25-page color publication, "The Network of Terrorism", is now available in 30 languages with many different adaptations, including a full insert in the Arabic edition of Newsweek. “Right content, right format, right audience, right now" describes our strategic aim in seeing that U.S. policies are explained and placed in the proper context in the minds of foreign audi

ences.

I also serve, ex officio, as a member of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, the agency that oversees the efforts of Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty to broadcast our message into South Central Asia and the Middle East. With the support of the Congress, our broadcasting has increased dramatically since September 11. We have almost doubled the number of broadcast hours to areas that have been the breeding grounds of terrorists. The dollars we have requested for international broadcasting will help sustain these key efforts through the next fiscal year.

In addition, Under Secretary Charlotte Beers leads an aggressive effort to create and implement new programs to reach new audiences. She is working with private sector companies, government agencies, and with our embassies to create avenues to broader, younger audiences in critical regions. One of our new initiatives will focus on Muslim life in America. It will include television documentaries and radio programs co-produced with Muslim-Americans, speaker exchanges, and op-ed pieces. We know that this must be a long-term effort that will bear fruit only over time. But we must do it. Two of America's greatest strengths during the Cold War were our vigorous information and exchange programs. I believe that we can and must build a comparable capability today if we are to confront successfully the new threat to our security.

Mr. Chairman, all of these State Department and Related Agencies programs and initiatives are critical to the conduct of America's foreign policy. Some of you know my feelings about the importance to the success of any enterprise of having the right people in the right places. If I had to put one of these priorities at the very pinnacle of our efforts, it would be our people. We must sustain the strong recruiting program we began last year. At the same time, we will continue measuring our

progress not simply on numbers hired but on how our new hire's enhance the Department's mission. We want to get to a point where our people can undergo training without seriously jeopardizing their missions or offices; where our men and women don't have to fill two or three positions at once; and where people have a chance to breathe occasionally. Morale at the Department has taken a definite swing upward and we want it to continue to rise and to stay as high as possible. As a soldier, I can tell you that such high morale, combined with superb training and adequate resources, is the key to a first-class offense-and that is what our men and women are, the first line of offense for America.

So, before I turn to foreign policy, let me say once again how strongly I feel as the CEO of the State Department about this part of our budget. It is essential that we have the funds necessary to pay for our operations worldwide.

FOREIGN POLICY: SUCCESSES, CHALLENGES, AND OPPORTUNITIES

In addition to the successes of the war on terrorism and the regional developments its skillful pursuit has made possible, we have been busy elsewhere as well. With regard to Russia, President Bush has defied some of our critics and structured a very strong relationship. The meetings that he had with President Putin and the dialogue that has taken place between Russian Foreign Minister Ivanov and me and between Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and his counterpart, and at a variety of other levels, have positioned the United States for a strengthened relationship with the land of eleven time zones.

The way that Russia responded to the events of September 11 was reflective of this positive relationship. Russia has been a key member of the antiterrorist coalition. It has played a crucial role in our success in Afghanistan, by providing intelligence, bolstering the Northern Alliance, and assisting our entry into Central Asia. As a result, we have seriously eroded the capabilities of a terrorist network that posed a direct threat to both of our countries.

Similarly, the way we agreed to disagree on the ABM Treaty reflects the intense dialogue we had over eleven months, a dialogue in which we told the Russians where we were headed and we made clear to them that we were serious and that nothing would deter us. And we asked them if there was a way that we could do what we had to do together, or a way that they could accept what we had to do in light of the threat to both of our countries from ballistic missiles.

At the end of the day, we agreed to disagree and we notified Russia that we were going to withdraw from the ABM Treaty. I notified FM Ivanov-we talked about our plans for two days. President Bush called President Putin. Then the two presidents arranged the way we would make our different announcements. And the world did not end. An arms race did not break out. There is no crisis in Russia-U.S. relations. In fact, our relations are very good. Both presidents pledged to reduce further the number of their nuclear weapons and we are hard at work on an agreement to record these mutual commitments. This is all part of the new strategic framework with Russia.

We even managed to come to an agreement on how we are going to work through NATO. We are now developing mechanisms for pursuing joint Russia-NATO consultations and actions "at 20" on a number of concrete issues. Our aim is to have these mechanisms in place for the Reykjavik ministerial in May. And as we head for the NATO Summit in Prague in November, I believe we will find the environment for the continued expansion of NATO a great deal calmer than we might have expected.

I believe the way we handled the war on terrorism, the ABM Treaty, nuclear reductions, and NATO is reflective of the way we will be working together with Russia in the future. Building on the progress we have already made will require energy, good will, and creativity on both sides as we seek to resolve some of the tough issues on our agenda. We have not forgotten about Russian abuse of human rights in Chechnya, Moscow's nuclear proliferation to Iran, or Russian intransigence with respect to revision of Iraq sanctions. Neither have we neglected to consider what the situation in Afghanistan has made plain for all to see: how do we achieve a more stable security situation in Central Asia? We know that this is something we cannot do without the Russians and something that increasingly they realize can't be done without us, and without the full participation of the countries in the region. We are working these issues as well.

In fact, the way we are approaching Central Asia is symbolic of the way we are approaching the relationship as a whole and of the growing trust between our two countries. We are taking issues that used to be problems between us and turning them into opportunities for more cooperation. Such an approach does not mean that differences have vanished or that tough negotiations are a thing of the past. What