[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 51 (Friday, April 19, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3735-S3736]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          STATEMENT ON LIBERIA

 Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, as the United States military 
winds up its spectacularly successful evacuation of over 1,795 people 
from Liberia, I rise today to pay tribute both to our 214 soldiers who 
conducted this very difficult mission, and to the United States 
personnel, led by Charge D'Affaires Bill Mylam, who are working under 
dire circumstances to try to bring some stability to Liberia. These 
people have undertaken magnificent and courageous endeavors, endeavors 
of which the American people should be very proud.
  Today I also want to focus on the challenge that must be faced in 
dealing with this unfortunate turn of events in West Africa.
  After a few months of guarded optimism that there might be peace in 
Liberia, it appears that this woeful country is once again on the brink 
of collapse. Looting and fighting have overtaken the capital, halting 
implementation of the Abuja Accords, suspending humanitarian operations 
and limiting food and water supplies. In addition to the 1 million-odd 
refugees around Liberia, 60,000 people have been newly displaced in 
Monrovia, and 15 to 20,000 Liberians are crowded into the Barclay's 
Training Center [BTC], seeking protection from tribal warfare. After 
United States evacuation efforts, only 19 Americans remain in Liberia 
in an official capacity, and humanitarian efforts are endangered. The 
prospects look bleak, but our resolve to contain the fighting and 
disintegration must remain steadfast. We have so few alternatives.
  Since September 1995 when the Abuja Accords were signed by all the 
warring factions, the United States, along with other interested 
members of the international community, has tried to help implement 
them. The primary tasks were deploying West African peacekeeping forces 
through ECOMOG throughout the country, militarily disengaging and 
disarming the factions, and quickly investing in an economy that had 
virtually nothing to offer the citizens of Liberia.
  Mr. President, this has not been overly successful. While thee have 
been many false hopes in Liberia, Abuja represented a reasonable plan, 
but only if each phase of that plan was fully met. It has not been--not 
by the Liberian factions, not by the international community, and not 
by the United States.
  ECOMOG has never been strong enough to help create an atmosphere of 
stability needed for peace to survive. Nigerian elements have remained 
dominant in ECOMOG, while new forces--such as a Ghanaian battalion that 
had previously succeeded at peacekeeping missions--have not been 
funded. This is a failing of the international community, including the 
United States, that had pledged to support the Abuja Accords. At the 
pledging conference, the United States committed $10 million for 
ECOMOG--a small sum for peace in any case. We have only delivered $5.5 
million of that.
  Mr. President, strengthening ECOMOG to help it carry out its mission 
is a commitment the United States made, correctly, to help prevent an 
explosion like the current one in Monrovia from occurring. But the fact 
that we barely delivered on our commitment has been damaging to the 
peace process. Two months ago, Senator Kassebaum and I made a proposal 
to transfer $20 million from democracy programs at AID to help fund a 
new battalion for ECOMOG. An unusual source of funding, perhaps, but 
indicative of the high priority we placed on the funding of ECOMOG, and 
a statement that ECOMOG is part of our development efforts in West 
Africa. The administration opposed this particular transfer, but 
promised to work to come up with other sources of funding for ECOMOG. 
Not only did the administration not find the money, but it also did 
little in this time frame to solicit contributions from others. Crises 
like these demand creative responses, so I would propose we take a hard 
look at other programs for this purpose. Strong cases can be made that 
Liberia is relevant to both these accounts. I will work with the 
administration to continue to look for resources which we can redirect 
to this cause.

  In theory I support the proposals I have heard about on the table 
today to extend communications and other logistical support and 
training to new battalions for ECOMOG, but I can't resist asking why 
the administration didn't focus on this earlier? Why did it take 
massive looting and displacement in Monrovia to solicit this response? 
And if the fighting lulls, will the interest in Liberia be sustained 
long enough to actually realize a support package for the Abuja 
Accords? I will be anxious to see what plan the European Command 
submits to the United States at the end of this week, and, if 
appropriate, will do what I can to assist the administration in making 
these plans operational.
  While I understand and sympathize with the tight budgets under which 
the administration must live, this is symptomatic of a larger trend to 
resistance to reinvent U.S. activities in the realm of peacemaking that 
I see. For example, at the time of the Abuja Accords, the United States 
pledged $75 million to help implement the peace process; $10 million of 
that was for ECOMOG, and $65 million for humanitarian assistance. I 
fully support emergency aid, Mr. President, but I think it is short-
sighted--and perhaps even becomes as self-fulfilling prophecy--when we 
under-finance peace and development efforts, because we are invested in 
humanitarian funding. In Liberia, it is to some degree a chicken-and-
egg scenario, given the destruction and desperation in the country. 
However, this should not deter us from investing in creation of an 
infrastructure for peace and development. As we ignore development 
needs, we only increase the potential for violent outbreaks, which, in 
turn, as we saw in Bosnia and Rwanda, could lead to the use of United 
States troops. While I understand that the use of United States 
military in Liberia is quite unlikely, if we do not invest in the peace 
process and in Liberia's development, we could very well face calls for 
United States military engagement, which in my view would be tragic and 
unwise.
  Regional peacekeeping is a peace and development idea worth investing 
in, Mr. President. In a post-cold-war era, as we restructure U.S. and 
U.N. doctrines for the use of force, it will become inevitable that 
regional forces, in most cases, will be the best deterrent early on to 
contain the spread of violence and instability. If the international 
community ignores, or does not work to strengthen, these organizations 
then it will all too often lead to pressure for the deployment of 
foreign--and in some cases American--troops. Bosnia is a prime example: 
for several years we tried to work with the Europeans to address 
effectively the Balkan war. But when it was clear the Europeans had 
completely failed, for a variety of reasons, it was U.S. troops that 
stepped in to fill the vacuum and lead the way to a peace 
implementation force. I still disagree with the decision to deploy 
United States troops in Bosnia, and I see the potential for calls for a 
similar path in Liberia if we do not support ECOMOG at this important 
juncture.

  Another serious failure of Abuja has been the process of disarmament. 
Under Abuja, all parties were to disengage and disarm completely by 
February of this year. Of course, without any economic alternative 
other than soldiering, or any hope of protecting themselves without 
their weapons, most Liberians did not disarm. The lack of logistical 
support also made it difficult for ECOMOG to deploy to supervise the 
disarmament. Then, factions such as Charles Taylor's NPFL placed 
conditions on disarmament--in effect, reopening the delicate Abuja 
Accord. Another problem in the disarmament effort has been the last of 
effort by Liberia's neighbors--namely Burkina Faso, Cote D'Ivoire, and 
Guinea--in halting the arms--on both the black and gray markets--that 
cross their borders into Liberia.
  Mr. President, this is an issue we should take quite seriously. I 
have

[[Page S3736]]

raised the issue directly with parties involved in public and private, 
and am aware that high-ranking administration officials have done the 
same. Yet even as Abuja had its most reasonable chance to succeed, arms 
have flowed to the parties each country it favors. I will work to 
finally activate the U.N. Commission that was created after the U.N. 
arms embargo was imposed against Liberia, and establish sanctions for 
those flaunting the international embargo. I will also submit that if 
this practice continues, the United States consider sanctions of its 
own against those working to undermine the Abuja Accords. At a minimum, 
we should revive the sanctions against individuals working against 
democratization efforts that were lifted when Abuja was concluded.
  At this point, I request that an op-ed in yesterdays' New York Times 
by Jeffery Goldburg be printed in the Record. I do not agree with all 
the conclusions it draws, particularly the proposal that the preferable 
course of action is to have U.S. marines occupy Monrovia. However, I do 
recommend the article as a cogent analysis of what went wrong, and what 
the United States can try to do the repair the Abuja process.
  The article follows:

                [From the New York Times, Apr. 15, 1996]

                      Lifting Liberia Out of Chaos

                         (By Jeffrey Goldberg)

       George Boley stood in a clearing deep in a Liberian rain 
     forest and said that he was misunderstood. ``I am not a 
     warlord,'' he told me in late 1994. ``I don't know why they 
     use this term to describe me.''
       Behind the self-styled chairman of the wildly misnamed 
     Liberian Peace Council stood 80 soldiers. Most were teen-
     agers, some were as young as 9. All were armed, many were 
     drunk. ``These are professional fighting men,'' he said, 
     without irony.
       Mr. Boley, who holds a Ph.D. in educational administration 
     from the University of Akron, is most assuredly a warlord, as 
     are the other Liberian faction leaders who last week drove 
     their country back into chaos.
       Fighting in the capital, Monrovia, has killed untold 
     numbers. United States troops have evacuated more than 1,600 
     Americans and other foreigners. But the United States must 
     take stronger action to restore peace--and it can do so 
     without endangering American troops.
       The civil war began in 1989 when Charles Taylor, the 
     warlord of the National Patriotic Front of Liberia, invaded 
     from neighboring Ivory Coast. The next year, Liberia's 
     dictator, Master Sgt. Samuel Doe, was killed, setting off six 
     years of gang warfare among several factions.
       A peace accord struck in Abuja, Nigeria, last August was 
     supposed to end the war. It handed Monrovia over to the 
     warlords, who agreed to share power peacefully. But they 
     never came through on their pledge to disarm their 
     supporters.
       So it was inevitable that violence would erupt this month 
     after Mr. Taylor sent his men to arrest a rival, Roosevelt 
     Johnson, on murder charges. Mr. Johnson's faction has indeed 
     murdered civilians. But Mr. Taylor's fighters have also 
     indiscriminately killed civilians, including five American 
     nuns in 1992.
       The fault for this new spasm of violence rests mostly with 
     the warlords, of course. But the United States is also to 
     blame. Last year, it missed a chance to adequately finance a 
     disarmament effort by the United Nations and West African 
     Peacekeeping Force, which has been in Liberia since 1990.
       The peacekeeping force--with soldiers from nine countries--
     successfully defended Monrovia from a 1992 attack by Charles 
     Taylor's faction. But it is now demoralized, cashstrapped and 
     undermanned. Its ground forces, once at 12,000, are down to 
     5,000 or so poorly equipped men. Their commanders are for the 
     most part Nigerian Army generals and are widely considered 
     corrupt.
       For Liberia, the best scenario would have United States 
     Marines occupying Monrovia. But with Somalia still fresh on 
     Americans' minds, this is probably not politically feasible. 
     Still, a strong West African force of about 15,000 men could 
     disarm the ragtag factions and weaken the warlords. This 
     would take American cash and equipment--from ammunition and 
     food to armored vehicles and helicopters. The United States 
     would also have to send military trainers and communications 
     equipment to Ghana and other willing and capable West African 
     nations.
       All this would cost more than $20 million. But over the 
     past six years, Washington has poured almost half a billion 
     dollars of humanitarian aid into the country, not including 
     the cost of the current evacuation--the third such operation 
     since 1989.
       America has a special responsibility to Liberia, founded in 
     1847 by freed American slaves. Liberia was also an American 
     ally in the cold war, and $500 million in American aid 
     propped up the brutal Doe regime.
       The only way to end the terror of the warlords is to take 
     their guns away. If Washington helps West African troops do 
     so, not a single American soldier would be endangered. And it 
     would ultimately cost less than airlifting Americans out of 
     Monrovia every time the city explodes.

  Mr. FEINGOLD. Situations like Liberia--and indeed other conflicts 
that have not been resolved by post-cold-war politics--demand creative 
responses by the international community. Liberia poses challenges that 
do not fall under the traditional definitions of United States national 
security, but they do include threats to our well-being and national 
interests. For instance, as Liberian refugees spill over into Guinea, 
the stresses on some of the last remaining tropical rainforest in West 
Africa become untenable, and the rainforest shrinks, causing shortages 
of resources, food, and medicine. Large concentrations on refugees and 
displaced persons also heighten potential for outbreaks of disease. One 
case of Ebola or typhoid in a refugee camp, and we have a humanitarian 
disaster that can spread anywhere in just a plane ride.
  Unfortunately, our option is not to pull out of Liberia and wash our 
hands of the problem: because of regional ramifications and threats of 
disease and environmental degradation, the issue is whether we meet the 
challenge of Liberia, or invest more after more destruction in the 
tragedies that would unravel in Sierra Leone, Guinea, Cote D'Ivoire, 
Burkina Faso, Ghana, and perhaps elsewhere in West Africa. So, 
Mr. President, we don't really have a choice: the problem is 
maintaining stability in West Africa, whether we call it Liberia or 
Burkina.

  For these reasons, yesterday I introduced a resolution, Senate 
Resolution 248 with Senators Kassebaum, Simon, Leahy, Jeffords, and 
Pell, declaring the breakdown of the Abuja process would have serious 
ramifications for United States interests in Liberia and throughout 
West Africa, and urging the administration to consider a number of 
steps. These include scrutinizing the budget to find funding for 
ECOMOG; this is key. We also suggest considering the provision of 
excess defense articles for communications and logistical support for 
troops willing to participate in ECOMOG. The resolution also urges the 
administration to use its influence with other governments to solicit 
interest in ECOMOG, and finally, it calls on the administration to lead 
U.N. efforts to establish finally a committee to enforce the U.N. arms 
embargo against Liberia. These are all suggestions that the 
administration should consider, and it is not an exhaustive list. The 
point is, we need decisive and creative action in Liberia--and part of 
that must be real support for the west African peacekeeping force.
  So, once again I applaud the work of our diplomatic and military 
forces in Liberia today, and compliment the administration on its 
efforts to help calm the situation. At the same time, I urge them to 
focus fully on Liberia--not just to quell the current tensions, but 
invest in trying to prevent them from erupting again.
  I also want to express our gratitude to Ghana's President Jerry 
Rawlings and his senior diplomatic team which has worked tirelessly and 
somewhat successfully to negotiate a ceasefire. Other ECOWAS states, 
particularly Cote D'Ivoire, have been very helpful in trying to reach 
the same goal. We also owe a debt of gratitude to Sierra Leone for 
making Freetown available as a transit point for those evacuated. While 
multilateral efforts may have failed to this point in Liberia, with 
each step--as painful as it is--the United States, ECOWAS, and the rest 
of the international community seem to be strengthening their 
abilities. We must learn from the past and look creatively to the 
future: we have no choice, unless we are willing to confront what could 
be even bigger disasters in the near future.

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