[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 137 (Monday, October 5, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H9508-H9509]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     AMERICA SHOULD NOT RUSH TO WAR

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Duncan) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Speaker, The New Yorker Magazine has just reported 
that the White House planned bombing raids on Afghanistan and the Sudan 
without involving four Members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Even 
worse, since these were supposedly terrorist targets, FBI Director 
Louis Freeh was also left out.
  Worse than that, The New Yorker said that the White House told Joint 
Chiefs Chairman Hugh Shelton about the raids, but specifically told him 
not to brief the other four chiefs of the military and not to consult 
with the Defense Intelligence Agency.
  Perhaps worst of all, Attorney General Janet Reno was ignored when 
she questioned whether our intelligence was good enough to support 
these raids, according to this Associated Press report.
  I did hear a Paul Harvey newscast a couple of days after these raids 
saying that our intelligence was bad and that we had bombed, among 
other things, a medicine factory. I know if another nation bombed a 
medicine factory here, we would be extremely angry, and rightly so.
  I do not understand why our intelligence is continually so weak, when 
we spend so many billions of dollars more than any other nation each 
and every year on this.
  I am sad to say that I, along with almost every Member of Congress, 
supported these raids when they first occurred. I, along with almost 
all of my colleagues, said that we have to take the strongest possible 
reasonable action against terrorists who are killing innocent people. I 
did say at the time that I was assuming that our intelligence was good, 
because I just found it impossible to believe that we would rush to war 
without being very, very certain that we were targeting the actual 
terrorists.
  I know that there were many people who felt that these bombing raids 
were done to try to draw attention from the President's troubles. 
However, I did not believe then that anyone would do anything so 
horrible, and this article is still no proof that that occurred. But 
the article does indicate a rush to judgment, an eagerness to go to war 
that should never happen in this country, a Nation that has already 
prided itself on its efforts to promote peace and freedom around the 
world.
  We should involve ourselves in war and/or take warlike actions only 
as a very last resort, and only if there is simply no other reasonable 
choice. We should conduct bombing raids on others only with extreme 
reluctance and only when forced to do so.
  The article in the New Yorker Magazine raises the most serious 
questions possible about these raids, and if this article is false or 
inaccurate, then the administration should immediately refute it. We 
have involved ourselves in recent years in civil wars in Haiti, Rwanda, 
Somalia, Bosnia, and now I suppose Kosovo, and we have spent many, many 
millions of taxpayers dollars in the process.
  As I have mentioned before, according to The Washington Post, we had 
our troops in Haiti picking up garbage and settling domestic disputes. 
I heard another Member say on this floor that we had our troops in 
Bosnia, among other things, giving rabies shots to dogs.
  The great majority of Americans believe that the Haitians should pick 
up their own garbage and the Bosnians should give their own rabies 
shots.
  President Kennedy said in 1961 that we have to realize that with just 
6 percent of the world's population, we cannot right every wrong and 
there cannot be an American solution to every world problem. Today we 
are less than 5 percent of the world's population.
  We should be very careful about rushing to war in Kosovo. Jonathan 
Clarke, a former member of the British Diplomatic Service, now with the 
Cato Institute, wrote in last Friday's Los Angeles Times, ``Some of 
Milosevic's democratic opponents . . . visited Washington last month to 
warn that bombing would play into Milosevic's hands and undermine their 
efforts. They made little progress. The `CNN factor' is too strong, 
they were told on Capitol Hill.
  ``This gives the game away. NATO's plans are directed less at 
resolving the

[[Page H9509]]

Kosovo crisis than at making the about-to-be expanded alliance look 
relevant. As Defense Secretary William Cohen said . . . `NATO's 
credibility is on the line.' In effect,'' Mr. Clarke continued, ``we 
are witnessing a NATO job search and the results are entirely 
counterproductive. NATO's potential involvement has radicalized all 
sides in Kosovo . . . In Belgrade, bombing will strengthen the hard men 
around Milosevic and sound the death knell of the brave Serbs who dare 
to oppose him.''
  Mr. Speaker, we should never rush into war, nor should we turn our 
soldiers into international social workers. We need a strong military 
for national defense and only for national defense.
  Mr. Speaker, I submit the Los Angeles Times article for inclusion in 
the Record:

               [From the Los Angeles Times, Oct. 2, 1998]

               Military Intervention Would Make It Worse

                          (By Jonathan Clarke)

       In July 1913, the chancellor of the Austro-Hungarian Empire 
     received a written warning from his foreign minister not to 
     try to solve the Serbian question by ``force of arms.'' He 
     ignored the advice. A year later, Austria declared war 
     against Serbia. Four years after that, its empire went out of 
     business.
       Today, NATO, another multiethnic, multilanguage 
     organization with an identity crisis, is riding a wave of 
     popular revulsion over new atrocities toward military 
     intervention in Kosovo. ``Preparations are in full swing,'' 
     announced a NATO spokesman, making the proposed hostilities 
     sound like a homecoming dance, blissfully oblivious to 
     history's warnings. This is typical of the modern style of 
     diplomacy. Former Sen. Bob Dole, a tireless advocate of 
     American military involvement in the region, dismisses 
     history because it makes things ``complicated.''
       This approach--willful ignorance of local conditions 
     abetted by a canonical belief in the victory-delivering 
     capability of military might--was favored by the top brass in 
     Vietnam. It produced disaster there. Whether NATO can make it 
     work better in Kosovo remains to be seen.
       Kosovo is fearsomely complicated. This is not merely an 
     excuse offered by opponents of military intervention, but a 
     statement of the obvious fact that rational analysis should 
     precede major decisions. Unless Western policy can resolve 
     the Balkans' inherent complications, intervention risks 
     making matters much worse, especially for the Kosovo Albanian 
     refugees.
       Some of the contradictions seem almost technical. For 
     example, bombing is likely to fuel the fires of Kosovo's 
     independence, a goal that the U.S. does not support. Further, 
     NATO intervention in Kosovo directly contradicts the premise 
     of multiethnic principles of the Dayton accords, which veto 
     special treatment on ethnic grounds.
       A much more serious objection, however, is that bombing 
     directly serves Slobodan Milosevic, whom Congress earlier 
     this year called ``Europe's longest serving communist 
     dictator.'' What country, when under attack from outside, 
     does not rally to its leader? Look at Saddam Hussein. For 
     Milosevic, the bombs cannot fall too soon. Likewise, he hopes 
     Western sanctions will continue indefinitely. By turning 
     daily life into a struggle for survival, they sap the 
     energies of decent-minded people who might oppose him.
       Some of Milosevic's democratic opponents, Bishop Artemije 
     Radosavijevic of Kosovo and former Belgrade Mayor Nebojsa 
     Covic, visited Washington last month to warn that bombing 
     would mine their efforts. They made little progress. The 
     ``CNN factor'' is too strong, they were told on Capitol Hill.
       This gives the game away. NATO's plans are directed less at 
     resolving the Kosovo crisis than at making the about-to-be-
     expanded alliance look relevant. As Defense Secretary William 
     Cohen said at the Sept. 25 NATO conclave, ``NATO's 
     credibility is on the line.'' In effect, we are witnessing a 
     NATO job search. And the results are entirely 
     counterproductive. NATO's potential involvement has 
     radicalized all sides in Kosovo, as was vividly illustrated 
     by last week's attempted assassination of Sabri Hamiti, a 
     pro-negotiation moderate close to the Kosovo Albanian 
     leadership. In Belgrade, bombing will strengthen the hard men 
     around Milosevic and sound the death knell of the brave Serbs 
     who dare to oppose him.
       Earlier this month, NATO leaders counseled Iran against 
     armed intervention in Afghanistan. NATO is administering 
     similarly cautious advice in other conflicts such as Nagorno-
     Karabakh and Congo. What is so different about the Balkans? 
     Is it to do with the relative value placed on European as 
     opposed to Asian and African lives?
       This is not a prescription for inaction. Following the NATO 
     meeting, Cohen went onto the inaugural session of the 
     Southeast European Defense Ministerial. Taking place in the 
     less glamorous but arguably more purposeful surroundings of 
     Skopje, this grouping includes key countries with a real 
     stake in the Balkans, including Italy, Greece, Albania and 
     Turkey. They should be given the lead in delivering immediate 
     humanitarian aid and undertaking the painstaking, low-profile 
     mediation that might achieve a lasting settlement. This would 
     also free NATO to concentrate on its prime mission of 
     strategic defense. This is where NATO's credibility resides, 
     not in TV-driven adventurism.

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