Lawmakers Causing Export Delays ...

* Congressional oversight--while important--is causing some delays in the arms export process and some legislative relief could be useful, said Undersecretary of Defense for Policy John Rood.

"For right and good reasons, ... the [congressional] committees of oversight wish to be involved in looking at the arms export process," he said recently. "However, a number of informal processes have developed that have ended up imposing rather long delays and making us unpredictable to our allies."

These delays have ended...