By Tom Raum
Associated Press Writer
Friday, Oct. 1, 1999; 4:08 p.m. EDT

WASHINGTON –– Senate Democratic and Republican leaders agreed Friday to vote Oct. 12 on a long-stalled treaty to ban nuclear tests worldwide. Both sides suggested rejection was likely.

Agreement on the date came after Democrats reluctantly went along with a GOP move to force a vote on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty with little advance debate.

"We feel we have no choice," said Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D. "This may be the best that we can get. ... We'll take it."

Conservatives have blocked a vote on the treaty for two years.

But Republican leaders now want the vote to occur – both to silence increasing complaints from the Clinton administration and Senate Democrats and because they're sure they can defeat it. The treaty needs 67 votes – two-thirds of the Senate. All 45 Democratic senators are expected to support it, but only two Republicans – Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania and James Jeffords of Vermont – have endorsed it, and even optimistic supporters count only seven potential GOP votes.

"We don't think this is a good treaty. We think it would put us in a weakened position internationally," Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., said Friday. "But since there have been all these calls and demands for a vote, we have offered to vote."

"If they (Democrats) want to vote, let's vote," Lott added. "If there's not two-thirds to vote for it, it's over."

The treaty, which calls for an outright ban on all nuclear testing, has been signed by 152 nations, including the United States. But it has been ratified by only 18 of the 44 countries with nuclear capabilities that must ratify it for it to take effect.

Conservatives contend the pact – which also has not yet been ratified by Russia or China – could threaten the U.S. ability to modernize its arsenal if necessary.

Supporters say the United States already has a vast superiority in nuclear weapons, thanks to more than 1,000 nuclear tests during the Cold War, and the treaty would lock in that advantage.

Lott proposed Thursday that the Senate take up the treaty next Wednesday, debate it for 10 hours, and then vote. Daschle objected at first, claiming the timing was too short and that no hearings had been held on it.

But on Friday, Daschle said he could go along if Democrats got more time to organize. He proposed the treaty be taken up Oct. 8, with a final vote Oct. 12, with 18 hours of debate.

Lott agreed to the Democratic timetable.

Democrats were bleak about their hopes of mustering the needed votes by Oct. 12, with Daschle telling reporters he didn't know where the additional votes would come from.

Even if the treaty fails, the vote would at least force senators to go on the record, said Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware, senior Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee.

"The question is: If you are going to die, do you want to die with no one knowing who shot you or do you want to go at least with the world knowing who killed you?" Biden said.

At the State Department, spokesman James P. Rubin stressed the importance of ratification, saying, "The eyes of the world are on us."

"We will be in a far stronger position to insist that other countries do not go down the nuclear testing road if we ratify the treaty, " Rubin said.

Once the treaty's case is made in "a serious, sustained, and analytical way," there will be enough support to ratify it, he said, adding that three or four days would not be long enough to make that case.

Sen. John Warner, R-Va., said the Armed Services Committee, which he chairs, will hold hearings on it next week. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms, R-N.C., has refused to do so.