[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 24 (Tuesday, February 27, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H1253-H1254]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     MEANINGLESS PRESIDENTIAL RESPONSE TO SHOT DOWN AMERICAN PLANES

  Mr. McCOLLUM. Madam Speaker, today I rise in memory of the four 
American civilians murdered by Fidel Castro over the weekend, and to 
condemn the foreign policies of an administration that has placed U.S. 
national interests in jeopardy around the globe. I remember a day when 
killing American citizens had consequences. The murder of an American 
serviceman by Manuel Noriega's regime pulled the trigger on Operation 
Just Cause, which ousted him from power. The death of an off-duty 
soldier from a terrorist's bomb in West Germany in 1986 prompted 
President Reagan to attack Libya and effectively remove Mu'ammar 
Qadhafi as a threat to U.S. interests. Once, violent attacks deserved 
and provoked strong responses from the United States.
  But things are different now. Misguided foreign policy decisions by 
President Bill Clinton over the past 3 years have jeopardized America's 
image as a nation that protects its own. When 18 of America's best 
soldiers were killed in Somalia after they had been denied the hardware 
to protect themselves, President Clinton cut and ran. Now, four more 
Americans have been killed on the President's watch, and his response? 
Little more than the withdrawal of a few poorly chosen carrots he 
dangled endlessly and uselessly in front of Fidel Castro 6 months ago. 
And that is not all of it. When I look at all of the other foreign 
policy areas the President has been involved with in the past 3 years, 
I see problems. In Haiti, we sent our soldiers in there for a purpose 
that clearly was one that was very difficult to accomplish, if it could 
even be accomplished in the end. Yes, there is a democratically elected 
government there now, but in a few days we are going to remove those 
troops. My experience as chairman of the Subcommittee on Crime and 
talking to the FBI about their experience there for 7 months last year 
when they tried to help solve some political murders was that human 
rights violations are still rampant, and when they got to the highest 
level of the Haitian Government to interview the witnesses, they were 
not allowed to, and had to pull our FBI out and they still go unsolved. 
The problems in Haiti have not gone away.
  And yet we look next door in Cuba and we see we have not done 
anything really about the Castro regime that has been in power for over 
35 years where it really could make a difference. Looking around the 
world, we look at China today. China is on the verge of being able in 
the next few years to produce an atomic bomb and a delivery system 
capable of delivering that bomb to the West Coast of the United States. 
We look at Russia. In Russia today we have a situation where it is very 
unstable. This summer, we do not know what is going to happen to the 
Yeltsin regime, yet we do know that we have not one single nuclear 
missile that has been dismantled yet in Russia or in the former Soviet 
Union. Who knows what their capabilities are and who is going to be 
controlling the button on nuclear weapons in the future there. And the 
spread of these nuclear weapons by China and North Korea to Iran, 
Pakistan, and elsewhere make it highly probable in the next few years 
we are going to see, if not a delivery of one of those weapons to the 
United States, certainly the delivery of one of those weapons to a 
nation or to an interest area of great importance to the United States, 
and President Clinton does not have an answer to that. He refuses to 
support a ballistic missile defense system that is workable. He should 
have supported one a long time ago. It is a very serious consequence 
when we see all of these developments occurring and no plans to provide 
the Nation the kind of defense it needs.

  Then we look at Bosnia. I think that is the worst situation of all, 
not just because we have sent troops into Bosnia, where we have no real 
probability of ultimate success. When they are removed a year or so 
from now, the chances of civil war resuming are great. But we are doing 
the stupidest thing. We are in the process now of training, equipping 
the forces of the government of Izetbegovic, the Moslem leader of 
Bosnia. And who does he happen to have as his best friend? Why, my 
goodness, it is Rafsanjani and the crew in Iran. The Iranians are 
clearly the ones who want to produce the most terror in the world 
today. They are determined to spread their radical form of Moslem 
concern, not the traditional form but the radical form, all over 
southern Europe, over northern Africa, over the Middle East, the Near 
East, and anywhere else they can lay their imprint where there is a 
Moslem country.
  Izetbegovic is a close ally of Iran; he has been ever since the days 
of the 

[[Page H1254]]
Ayatolla Khomeini. We are now in the process of training, equipping his 
forces, so when we pull out of there in a few months they are going to 
be the strongest military presence in the former State of Yugoslavia.
  I think that is absolutely senseless. It is stupid. It is bad foreign 
policy, and this President has led us into that path. And then when we 
have four American civilians shot down in Cuba, as we did over the 
weekend, our response is simply the tepid business that we have seen 
the President announce in the last 24 hours. He has not yet taken a 
single step that would show the kind of deterrent message that we need 
to have if we are going to protect our interest abroad. What message 
does this pattern of behavior send to other nations considering a 
confrontation with the United States? When strained credibility finally 
collapses, deterrents for the protection of our interest has not a 
prayer. Right now China calculates military action against Taiwan. 
Rafsanjani and Iran are considering terrorist attacks, and look what we 
have got with Fidel Castro. I submit we have a failed foreign policy, 
and this weekend the President's response to it is an example of why 
that foreign policy has failed.

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