14 Concern Over Missile Defenses European allies have expressed increasing concerns about the Clinton administration's plans to negotiate with Russia to allow deployment of a missile shield.
Senator John McCain of Arizona had previously said he hoped to vote for the treaty as long as concerns over missile defense were addressed, and it was not clear whether he was signaling a shift or using the opportunity to vent his longstanding frustration with Russian behavior.
Mr. McCain, one of his party's leading voices on national security, said he thought that Republican concerns over missile defense and nuclear modernization could be resolved in time to vote on the so-called New Start treaty during the lame-duck session of Congress this month, as Mr. Obama has sought.
For China, which Mr. Bush and the Republican Party have identified as Washington's main security challenge in the future, there is concern over a missile-defense system and Taiwan.
Lawmakers have cited in particular their concern over the "Lexus level" defense of Brian Nichols, a rape suspect who escaped the Fulton County Courthouse in 2005 and killed four people before he was recaptured.
Meanwhile, in the Soviet Union, concern over the burden of high defense expenditures, combined with an awareness that the arms buildup of the 1970s had triggered a counterresponse from NATO, encouraged "new thinking" that actually picked up on the ideas of defensive defense.
Attacks from abroad this spring and summer on government systems and contractors have heightened concerns over security in defense and intelligence systems.
PAGE A13 Wariness on U.S. Arms Plan After a weeks of consultations with allies and former adversaries, the Bush administration has failed to allay deep concerns over its missile defense proposal.
Earlier on Tuesday in Cairo, with Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit of Egypt, Ms. Rice backed Israel's right to self-defense, but expressed concern over civilian casualties.
Criminal defense lawyers have expressed concern over the creation of yet another task force, as this latest one follows several others that the government has formed since the financial crisis.
