[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 138 (Wednesday, September 28, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: September 28, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                                 HAITI

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Weldon] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. WELDON. Mr. Speaker, I rise today, again, as a member of the 
Committee on Armed Services to express my grave concern with what is 
happening in Haiti as well as my outrage at some additional facts that 
I learned today in a briefing that was provided to myself and other 
members of the Committee on Armed Services.
  President Clinton has been telling the American people that this 
effort is a multinational effort and if you ask most Americans and, I 
think, most Members of Congress who is in Haiti right now, they would 
tell you, it a multinational force.
  At today's briefing we had the Deputy Secretary of Defense, John 
Deutch, and Lt. Gen. John Sheehan, who is the Director of Operations 
for the Joint Chiefs.
  I asked that specific question. Right now, today, 10 days after 
President Clinton committed our troops and has told the American people 
it is a multinational force, how many Americans are involved in that 
effort? The answer is that there are 19,000 young Americans who are 
involved in Haiti today.
  Then I said, ``Would you tell me how many other troops are involved 
in that effort today right now, 10 days after the President committed 
us, after he has told the American people it is a multinational 
force?''
  Secretary Deutch hemmed and hawed and talked about what is committed 
and what may be. I said, ``No, what is there right now, how many troops 
that are not American?''
  He said, ``Well, about two dozen.''
  I said, ``You mean like 24?''
  Three times I repeated the question and three times Secretary Deutch 
confirmed that there are 24 non-United States troops involved in Haiti 
right now; 19,000 Americans and 24 troops, not 24 countries, 24 troops. 
I said, ``Where are they?'' And he said, ``They are all in the command 
headquarters.''
  So we have 19,000 Americans in Haiti in harm's way and we have 24 
troops from other countries who are all in the headquarters building.
  Mr. Speaker, this is not what the Members of Congress and the 
American people have been led to believe. This is not what this 
President has told us in terms of the commitment and the involvement.
  Last week he said that within 2 to 3 days the multinational forces 
would be in Haiti. Here we are 10 days later.
  Some other things came out of the briefing. We learned today that the 
United States in fact will pay all of the costs, if and when other 
troops come in. So for the taxpayers of this country, we can now advise 
them that with our serious budget shortfall, if, in fact, we get other 
troops to come in, which is still doubtful, the taxpayers of this 
country will pay the full bill. We will pay their salaries. We will pay 
the cost of transporting them. We will pay all of their expenses.
  And in fact, today we had an announcement that the Russians will send 
troops. We will pay the Russians, not the United Nations, the United 
States.
  Mr. Speaker, this is outrageous. Not only are we going to pay the 
cost for the troops, but we even heard about big gun buy back program 
in Haiti. America is buying those guns. We, in fact, are the ones who 
are paying that bill. What is the cost going to be? Secretary Deutch 
could not give us an exact figure. Estimates range from $800 million to 
$1.5 billion.
  The Secretary tried to focus on the fact that we should not 
legislatively impose a date certain to bring the troops out. Well, that 
is outrageous. Because most of us in this body do not think they should 
have been inserted there in the first place.
  The Secretary and the President would tell us, they are going to be 
out within a few months, perhaps in the early part of 1995. If you read 
the Boston Globe today or yesterday, there is an article that says the 
U.S. military role may last until and through 1996.
  Mr. Speaker, we are not getting good information. The American people 
are not being told the truth about what is happening in Haiti, and we 
have our men and women in harm's way. Now we hear, if you read the news 
accounts today, that what we thought was a suicide of one of our troops 
in Haiti is now thought to not be a suicide and, in fact, there was one 
AP report today that said it is likely not to be a suicide. We do not 
know the facts of that young military personnel's death, but we will 
find that out.
  Mr. Speaker, what is happening in Haiti is outrageous because we are 
not given the facts and the chance to even ask the questions about what 
we are doing there.
  Mr. Speaker, I wanted Strobe Talbott to be at the briefing today. 
Strobe Talbott was scheduled to be one of the witnesses, representing 
Warren Christopher, our Secretary of State. Stobe Talbott did not show 
up. But if I would have had him there, I would have asked him to 
respond to the internal memo of the United Nations from the United 
States special envoy to Haiti, Dante Caputo. On May 23 of this year, 
this is what he wrote to Boutros-Ghali:

       To the minister's question about the existence of another 
     alternative, other than force, Dante Caputo replies that the 
     United States acted as a brake to a diplomatic solution, 
     creating a situation where military intervention became 
     nearly inevitable.

  Mr. Speaker, as we all know, Dante Caputo resigned from the United 
Nations last week because of his objections to what we have done in 
Haiti. I have inserted twice in the record of this institution the full 
text of Dante Caputo's memos where he outlines everything that is 
happening now back in May of this year.
  Mr. Speaker, this outrage has got to stop. We have got to have a full 
vote on this. We have to debate and we have got to bring our troops 
home, not next month, not 90 days but this week.
  Mr. Speaker, I include for the Record the article to which I 
referred.

                 U.S. Military Role May Last Until 1996

       United Nations.--U.S. officials have told the United 
     Nations that they plan to maintain a significant military 
     presence in Haiti until after a new president is inaugurated 
     in 1996.
       ``The US presence'' in the UN follow-up operation ``will be 
     fairly substantial,'' according to a senior UN official who 
     said US forces could make up as much as 50 percent of a 
     6,000-member UN military and police presence. That force will 
     take over the job of maintaining peace after the bulk of the 
     20,000 US combat forces withdraw. ``They want to be involved 
     until the UN withdraws from Haiti altogether.''
       In order to win public support for what is proving to be a 
     distinctly unpopular use of military force, President Clinton 
     last week played down the operation's potential for long-term 
     commitment, promising that the United Nations will be capable 
     of taking over the operation in as few as a ``couple of 
     months.''
       ``Politically, the administration has to present this as a 
     short-term intervention,'' said Matthew Vaccaro, an analyst 
     at Defense Forecasts Inc., who participated in Pentagon 
     policy discussions on Haiti until early this summer. ``Public 
     support is so tenuous, there's no way the administration 
     could sell a long drawnout and costly intervention.''
       At the same time, administration officials and military 
     planners recognize that the United States would have to keep 
     the coalition of peacekeepers from unraveling.
       US planners also are betting that they can gradually earn 
     the public's support to sustain a more long-term commitment 
     if the initial military operation proves successful.
       ``The Clinton administration has deemphasized the key role 
     that the US will play in the UN operation,'' Vaccaro said. 
     ``But they realize that in order for the follow-up UN mission 
     to function there must be a large US presence.''
       Although UN officials are concerned a large US military 
     presence in the UN follow-up mission may undermine its 
     international complexion, they nevertheless would welcome a 
     more robust US commitment. UN Secretary General Boutros 
     Boutros-Ghali, frustrated by the Clinton administration's 
     reluctance to stay the course in peace enforcement operations 
     in Somalia and Bosnia, is reportedly hopeful that greater US 
     involvement will improve the likelihood for success, 
     restoring credibility to both the United States and the 
     United Nations.
       With ``peace-keeping fatigue syndrome'' spreading 
     throughout the United Nations in the wake of Bosnia and 
     Somalia, diplomats said Boutros-Ghali believes that the only 
     cure is a dose of US arm-twisting. But senior UN officials 
     overseeing the Haiti operation said they fear that Clinton 
     may hand the ball off to them too soon.
       Before placing the Haiti mission under the UN flag, Clinton 
     has vowed that US forces will remove Haiti's military 
     dictators, install a team of international police monitors, 
     retrain a Haitian police force, restore Haiti's elected 
     President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to office and create a 
     secure and stable environment for the nation to begin 
     preparations for elections.
       UN officials said Washington has pretty much left them in 
     the dark as to how it intends to accomplish these tasks, 
     complicating UN efforts to recruit other countries to serve 
     in the international effort. And they doubt that US troops 
     will be able to create a secure environment for lightly armed 
     UN replacements for at least several months.
       These officials are also concerned that if public support 
     for the US operation erodes after the invasion, the Clinton 
     administration may choose prematurely to slough the operation 
     off on the United Nations as it did a year ago in Somalia.
       The Pentagon, they pointed out, long wary of the Haiti 
     operation, is said to be eager to get troops out of Haiti as 
     soon as possible, leaving the policing and nation-building 
     tasks to international agencies.
       ``The military is interested in turning over the 
     responsibilities for nation building and civil administration 
     to the UN as soon as they can,'' said Dr. Richard Downes, a 
     former staff military planner with the Joint Chiefs of Staff 
     and currently director of communications at the University of 
     Miami's North-South Center.
       ``They don't look at the postconflict period of Haiti with 
     relish.''

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