[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 97 (Friday, July 22, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: July 22, 1994]



          INTELLIGENCE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 1995

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                               speech of

                        HON. DONALD A. MANZULLO

                              of illinois

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, July 20, 1994

       The House in Committee of the Whole House on the State of 
     the Union had under consideration the bill (H.R. 4299) to 
     authorize appropriations for fiscal year 1995 for 
     intelligence and intelligence-related activities of the U.S. 
     Government, the Community Management Account, and the Central 
     Intelligence Agency Retirement and Disability System, and for 
     other purposes:

  Mr. MANZULLO. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from Massachusetts is 100-
percent wrong in his effort to strip $100 million from the interdiction 
budget of our intelligence agencies.
  I represent the 16th Congressional District of Illinois, which 
includes the city of Rockford. Last year, Rockford gained the 
unfortunate distinction of leading the State of Illinois in per capita 
crime rate. This can be directly laid at the feet of the growth of 
gangs from larger urban areas expanding their territory to smaller and 
medium-size cities such as Rockford in the American heartland. These 
gangs are the tentacles of drug distribution networks that originate to 
a large degree from Latin America. These drugs are killing our 
children. Congress should vehemently oppose any attempt to diminish 
efforts to keep these murderers with their bags full of drugs away from 
our children.
  Last month, the Foreign Affairs Committee held a hearing on the 
suspension of counternarcotics intelligence sharing with our friends in 
South America because of a dispute of what these countries might do 
with the information. Some in the Clinton administration believe that a 
U.S. Air Force airman could be sued by someone because he shared 
information with the Colombian or Peruvian military that stopped a 
shipment of drugs leaving their country by air. If that is our biggest 
problem, then we are in good shape.
  Our counternarcotics policy must be an integrated, comprehensive 
strategy. We need drug eradication and interdiction outside our 
borders; tough law enforcement and swift prosecution inside the United 
States; and drug rehabilitation and education. Subtract resources from 
any one of these components and that is like sounding retreat on the 
drug war.
  For all the talk by this administration about fighting crime, the 
President sends mixed signals to Congress. One minute we loudly hear of 
the immediate need for 100,000 cops on the beat. However, the next day 
I read buried in huge budget documents a request to cut the Drug 
Enforcement Agency by nearly $2 million. No new agents have been hired 
since 1992. One of those agents could have been assigned to help 
Rockford with its growing drug problem.
  Fortunately, the Appropriations Committee last month added $22 
million to the President's meager request, including $5 million for 132 
new DEA agents.
  Totaled together, the President's 1995 budget request for 
international antidrug programs is $428 million, which is $96 million 
cut from last year. That is not good. And, now the gentleman from 
Massachusetts wants to cut another $100 million. I urge my colleagues 
to oppose this counterproductive amendment.
  Mr. Chairman, the drug war has not failed. We have not really even 
begun to fight. Now is not the time to withdraw from the battle. It is 
time to give the DEA, the intelligence agencies, and our friends in 
counternarcotics operations in Latin America the support they need to 
complete the job. You cannot fight a war without good intelligence. Let 
us fight the war on all fronts both here and abroad. Oppose the Frank 
amendment.

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