[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 69 (Thursday, May 13, 1999)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E953]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

[[Page E953]]



   NO BILLIONS IN APPROPRIATIONS CAN MAKE OUR PRESENT FOREIGN POLICY 
                               EFFECTIVE

                                 ______
                                 

                             HON. RON PAUL

                                of texas

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, May 13, 1999

  Mr. PAUL. Mr. Speaker, I have come forward in the past to suggest 
that the history of this century has shown us that the foreign policy 
of so-called ``pragmatic interventionists'' has created a disastrous 
situation. Specifically, I have pointed to the unintended consequences 
of our government's interventions. Namely, I have identified how World 
War One helped create the environment for the holocaust and how it thus 
helped create World War Two and thermonuclear war. And, I've mentioned 
how the Second World War resulted in the enslavement of much of Europe 
behind an iron curtain setting off the cold war, and spread the 
international communism and then our own disastrous foray into Vietnam. 
Yes, all of these wars and tragedies, wars hot and cold, were in part 
caused by the so-called ``war to end all wars.''
  Today I do not wish to investigate yet again the details of this 
history but rather to examine, at a deeper level, why this sort of 
policy is doomed to fail.
  The base reason is that pragmatism is illogical and interventionism 
does not work. The notion that we can have successes without regard to 
the ends to be sought is absurd.
  It should be obvious to practical people that you cannot have 
``progress,'' for example, without progressing toward some end. Equally 
as apparent ought to be the fact that human effectiveness cannot occur 
without considering the ends of human beings. Peace, freedom and virtue 
are ends toward which we ought to progress, but all reference to ends 
is rejected by the so-called pragmatists.
  Because of this lack of clarity of purpose we come to accept an 
equally unclear contortion of our language. Our military is ``too 
thin,'' it has been ``hollowed out'' and it is ``unprepared.'' But for 
what are we unprepared? And what policy is our army ``too hollow'' to 
carry out?
  If we remain unprepared to conduct total warfare across the globe, we 
should be thankful of this fact. If we are unprepared to police the 
world or to project power into every civil war, or ``to win two 
different regional conflicts,'' this is good.
  We are distracted by these dilemmas which result from unclear thought 
and unclear language. We convince ourselves that we need to be 
effective without having a goal in mind. Certainly we have no just end 
in mind because our pragmatic interventionists deny that ends exist.
  ``Preparedness'' is a word that has been thrown around a lot 
recently, but it begs the question ``prepared for what?'' No nation 
attacked ours, no nation has threatened ours, no sane leader would do 
so as it would be the death warrant of his own nation, his own people, 
and likely his own self. We are prepared to repel an attack and meet 
force with force but not necessarily to protect our nation and the 
populace. We are still vulnerable to a missile attack and have done 
little to protect against such a possibility.
  Thus or contortions and distortions that have led to dilemmas in our 
thoughts and dilemmas in our policy have led also to real paradoxes. 
Because our policy of globaloney is so bad, so unprincipled and so 
bound up with the notions of interventionism, we now face this strange 
truth: we ought to spend less on our military but we should spend more 
on defense. Our troops are underpaid, untertrained and poorly outfitted 
for the tasks we have given them. We are vulnerable to missile attack, 
and how do we spend our constituents money? What priorities have we set 
in this body? We vote to purchase a few more bombs to drop over Serbia 
or Iraq.
  Our policy is flawed. Our nation is at risk. Our defenses are 
weakened by those people who say they are ``hawks'' and those who claim 
they ``support the troops.'' Our policy is the end to which we must 
make ourselves effective, and currently our policy is all wrong. Our 
constitution grants us the obligation to defend this nation, and the 
right to defend only this nation. I should hope that we will never be 
prepared to police the world. We should not be militarily prepared nor 
philosophically prepared for such a policy. We need to refocus our 
military force policy and the way to do that is clear. It is to return 
it to the constitutionally authorized role of defending our country. 
Again, this is not simply a question of policy, and not merely a 
political question. No Mr. Speaker, the source of our quandary is the 
minds and hearts of human beings. Bad philosophy will always lead to 
bad policy precisely because ideas do have consequences.
  Here the bad idea to be found at the source of our malady is absurd 
pragmatism, a desire to be ``effective'' without having any idea what 
the end is that we trying to affect. It becomes evident in our policy 
and in our language.
  ``Now we are in it we must win it.'' But we know not what ``win'' 
means, other than ``be effective.'' But we are ``unprepared,'' but 
unprepared for what? Unprepared to be effective! But what is it, we are 
ineffective at achieving? ``Well, winning,'' is the reply. Without ends 
our policies become tautological. And with the wrong policy, our 
execution becomes disastrous. We must reject this absurd pragmatism and 
reestablish a military policy based on the defense of our nation. Only 
then we will be able to take the steps necessary for effectiveness, and 
preparedness. No billions in appropriations can make our present policy 
effective.

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