U.K.-U.S. Trade Treaty Facing Uncertain Future

[struggle4progress]

Posted 07/09/07 11:16
By WILLIAM MATTHEWS

For more than a decade, defense companies and two presidents have tried time and again to persuade Congress to ease the export licensing requirements for U.S. firms selling military equipment and technology to the United States’ closest allies. And each time the efforts have been blocked by the House of Representatives.

Now President George W. Bush is bypassing the House and attempting to ease defense trade restrictions with Britain by treaty, which needs approval only from the Senate.

Trade experts give the president credit for a “clever idea,” but warn that defense trade reforms in the form of a treaty before the Senate are likely to be controversial, and ratification might be a long time coming.

Diplomats in Washington and London announced June 21 that Bush and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair had secretly signed the Defense Trade Cooperation Treaty. So far, though, neither government has released the text of the treaty or many details about it. ~snip~

http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?F=2880920&C=europe