[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 17 (Thursday, January 30, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1761-S1765]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                            STANDING UNITED

  Mr. KYL. Finally, I ask unanimous consent to print in the Record a 
letter from several international leaders called ``Europe and America 
Must Stand United,'' reprinted from the Wall Street Journal. It is 
signed by representatives from Spain, Portugal, Italy, the United 
Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Denmark. It makes the 
point that other countries in Europe stand with the United States in 
our determination to bring the country of Iraq into compliance with the 
norms of international behavior and U.N. resolutions that apply to its 
weapons of mass destruction program.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

             [From the Wall Street Journal, Jan. 30, 2003]

                  Europe and America Must Stand United

       The real bond between the United States and Europe is the 
     values we share: democracy, individual freedom, human rights 
     and the Rule of Law. These values crossed the Atlantic with 
     those who sailed from Europe to help create the USA. Today 
     they are under greater threat than ever.
       The attacks of 11 September showed just how far 
     terrorists--the enemies of our common values--are prepared to 
     go to destroy them. Those outrages were an attack on all of 
     us. In standing firm in defence of these principles, the 
     governments and people of the United States and Europe have 
     amply demonstrated the strength of their convictions. Today 
     more than ever, the transatlantic bond is a guarantee of our 
     freedom.
       We in Europe have a relationship with the United States 
     which has stood the test of time. Thanks in large part to 
     American bravery, generosity and far-sightedness, Europe was 
     set free from the two forms of tyranny that devastated our 
     continent in the 20th century: Nazism and Communism. Thanks, 
     too, to the continued cooperation between Europe and the 
     United States we have managed to guarantee peace and freedom 
     on our continent. The transatlantic relationship must not 
     become a casualty of the current Iraqi regime's persistent 
     attempts to threaten world security.
       In today's world, more than ever before, it is vital that 
     we preserve that unity and cohesion. We know that success in 
     the day-to-day battle against terrorism and the proliferation 
     of weapons of mass destruction demands unwavering 
     determination and firm international cohesion on the part of 
     all countries for whom freedom is precious.
       The Iraqi regime and its weapons of mass destruction 
     represent a clear threat to world security. This danger has 
     been explicitly recognised by the United Nations. All of us 
     are bound by Security Council Resolution 1441, which was 
     adopted unanimously. We Europeans have since reiterated our 
     backing for Resolution 1441, our wish to pursue the UN route 
     and our support for the Security Council, at the Prague Nato 
     Summit and the Copenhagen European Council.
       In doing so, we sent a clear, firm and unequivocal message 
     that we would rid the world of the danger posed by Saddam 
     Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. We must remain united 
     in insisting that his regime is disarmed. The solidarity, 
     cohesion and determination of the international community are 
     our best hope of achieving this peacefully. Our strength lies 
     in unity.
       The combination of weapons of mass destruction and 
     terrorism is a threat of incalculable consequences. It is one 
     at which all of us should feel concerned. Resolution 1441 is 
     Saddam Hussein's last chance to disarm using peaceful means. 
     The opportunity to avoid greater confrontation rests with 
     him. Sadly this week the UN weapons inspectors have confirmed 
     that his long-established pattern of deception, denial and 
     non-compliance with UN Security Council resolutions is 
     continuing.
       Europe has no quarrel with the Iraqi people. Indeed, they 
     are the first victims of Iraq's current brutal regime. Our 
     goal is to safeguard world peace and security by ensuring 
     that this regime gives up its weapons of mass destruction. 
     Our governments have a common responsibility to face this 
     threat. Failure to do so would be nothing less than negligent 
     to our own citizens and to the wider world.
       The United Nations Charter charges the Security Council 
     with the task of preserving international peace and security. 
     To do so, the Security Council must maintain its credibility 
     by ensuring full compliance with its resolutions. We cannot 
     allow a dictator to systematically violate those Resolutions. 
     If they are not complied with, the Security Council will lose 
     its credibility and world peace will suffer as a result.
       We are confident that the Security Council will face up to 
     its responsibilities.

  Mr. KYL. That is the subject I would like to devote the rest of my 
time to discussing. It is the issue the President addressed in the 
State of the Union speech, an issue we dealt with 3 months ago in the 
Senate when we approved a resolution authorizing the President to use 
force, if need be, to bring Iraq into compliance with both agreements 
it had signed at the end of the Persian Gulf war 12 years ago and also 
various United Nations resolutions.
  I rise to speak today because there are obviously a lot of legitimate 
concerns being expressed by various Members of the Congress, including 
a long-time Member of the Senate, Senator Kennedy, who recently 
introduced a resolution calling for the Senate to revisit this issue. I 
did not have the opportunity to tell Senator Kennedy I would be 
speaking about his resolution, but I did want to note this has been 
dealt with by the Congress. We have given the President the authority.
  One could argue with respect to any change in circumstances that 
conditions have only gotten worse, not better, since the President was 
granted that authority by the Congress and therefore we do not need to 
vote on that resolution again or a new resolution giving the President 
the authority to act. I make that point because of the submission of 
his resolution yesterday and because of the remarks he made. I will be 
referring to those remarks.
  The point of the President's comments in his State of the Union 
speech was not to lay out the case for proceeding against Saddam 
Hussein but, rather, to begin to create the predicate for action we 
will have to take. People have asked why President Bush has not been 
more vocal about the case to be made. I don't know because I have not 
talked to him, but I suspect that the last thing President Bush wanted 
to do was to be seen as beating the war drums. This is a grave decision 
he will have to make. It is a decision I know he does not make lightly. 
He makes it very reluctantly. But in the end, he will have to make a 
decision. I believe, from the tone and tenor of his remarks on Tuesday 
evening and the fact that he has not been speaking out a lot about this 
in the last several weeks, that is an illustration of the fact that he 
did not want to be seen as promoting the United States involvement in 
military action in Iraq but rather exactly the opposite: Asking 
Secretary Powell to visit with our allies at the United Nations and 
other nations, as well, and Secretary Rumsfeld and Dr. Rice to go out 
and speak to others to assert their views on the subject and express 
our views on the subject, to try to find some way to avoid having to 
use military action to enforce these U.N. resolutions.
  The President has made the point that time is running out, that 
Saddam Hussein has steadfastly, continuously, repeatedly refused to 
comply with those resolutions and that at some point the international 
community as a whole, the United Nations as a body, and the United 
States specifically, have to decide whether these international 
agreements are going to be enforced. If they are not, then one could 
easily say they are not worth the paper on which they are written. The 
United States would have less moral suasion in the world if it refused 
to act when it had a clear responsibility to do so, and the United 
Nations and its Security Council would be deemed increasingly 
irrelevant by virtue of the fact that it has passed no fewer than 16 
resolutions expressing the fact that Saddam Hussein has remained in 
violation of his promise to dismantle his weapons of mass destruction 
and has not done so.

[[Page S1762]]

  If we are to rely upon international bodies, multilateral agreements, 
and even treaties and agreements signed by Saddam Hussein, there has to 
be an ``or else'' if they are not complied with or there is no point in 
entering into them in the first instance. Second, if you do not enforce 
the agreements, you foster more rogue behavior by nations such as Iraq 
under Saddam Hussein's leadership because those nations know they can 
continue to violate international norms of behavior and get away with 
it because at the end of the day no one is willing to enforce those 
norms of behavior even when they have been codified in agreements or in 
United Nations resolutions.
  That is why President Bush is right; time is running out, and Saddam 
Hussein has a very critical decision to make. Will he finally see the 
handwriting on the wall that his days and his regime's days are very 
numbered and comply with the agreement he made, to save his own life, 
to dismantle his weapons of mass destruction under international 
supervision? That is the term that is used in Resolution 687 of the 
United Nations which has been incorporated into the most recent 
Resolution 1441.
  That is the basis for the ability of the United States and the other 
nations of the world to act in this case. Saddam Hussein promised to 
dismantle his weapons of mass destruction under international 
supervision. He never did that. There was an inventory in 1998 of his 
weapons of mass destruction by the United Nations. He has never fully 
explained what happened to that inventory. He had a last opportunity to 
do so in the declaration he was invited to file a couple of months ago. 
A declaration was filed. It contained the same old things he talked 
about before but no evidence that he had destroyed those weapons of 
mass destruction.
  Now, why did the United Nations say he had to dismantle these weapons 
under international supervision? Precisely because we did not want to 
be in the position of having to go find the needle in the haystack: We 
have to go find evidence somewhere to prove that he still maintains or 
possesses these weapons of mass destruction. After all of these years 
and the opportunities he has had to hide these weapons, the burden 
should not be on the United States or the United Nations to go find 
these weapons but, rather, right where it was when he signed the 
agreements at the end of the gulf war and when the United Nations 
adopted its original resolution saying he had to dismantle these 
weapons under international supervision. We knew that was the only way 
we would know for sure it had been done, because of his record of lying 
and cheating.
  Sure enough, over the past 11 years, that record has continued. He 
has never explained what happened to these weapons. He has never given 
us the evidence that they have been destroyed. We have evidence that 
they still exist, from the declarations of the United Nations in 1998 
as well as our own intelligence and some admissions from the Iraqi 
Government itself and eye witness accounts. You cannot get better 
evidence than that.
  Now, some of this evidence, of course, is collected by the 
intelligence agencies and not of the kind that can be released 
publicly. But Secretary Powell is going to visit with our allies and 
others at the United Nations, hopefully next week, to lay out some 
additional information we can disclose and, hopefully, persuade these 
nations it is now time to act.
  The basis of the resolution Senator Kennedy offered was that there 
should be more time for the inspections to work. I would like to 
confront that directly because I know that while the concept is well 
meaning, it is very misplaced. There is nothing in the evidence to 
suggest Saddam Hussein will change his behavior in the least if he has 
more time. In fact, quite the opposite is true. The only time Saddam 
Hussein has ever come forward and done anything that has even begun to 
suggest compliance has been when he has been pressured to do so, when 
he has known the time was short and people were going to enforce the 
agreements he made if he did not do something.

  Ironically, the best way to get him to comply is to make it clear 
that military action is a very distinct and proximate possibility. That 
is the only basis on which I think there is any hope to avert military 
action--if he understands it is inevitable unless he complies.
  So I think giving him more time would be seen not only by Saddam 
Hussein but other rogue terrorists and terrorist states in the world as 
a lack of willingness on the part of the international community to 
enforce these agreements it has gotten Saddam Hussein to sign and the 
resolutions the United Nations adopted.
  What are the implications of that? If international norms of behavior 
are not enforced and if the free nations of the world cannot muster the 
will and the ability to enforce them, it merely fosters similar action 
by terrorists and rogue states around the world. The eyes of the world 
are upon us. This is why President Bush has made the commitment to move 
forward if Saddam Hussein does not comply, because he understands that 
everyone is watching, and if the rogue terrorists of the world--rogue 
states and terrorists decide they can get the United States and the 
United Nations to blink, that at the end of the day they are not really 
willing to enforce these resolutions and agreements, you can see them 
act in ways that very soon will challenge us to military action and 
perhaps at a time when it is more disadvantageous for us to take that 
action.
  The lesson of Korea is a good lesson. It would have been better if we 
could have dealt with Korea permanently before it acquired nuclear 
weaponry. Because it has that kind of weaponry today, and longer-range 
missiles, we are very reluctant to engage North Korea militarily, and 
with good reason. We cannot afford to wait until countries such as Iraq 
or other rogue states acquire similar weapons, nor to decide it is time 
to deal with them, to get them to comply with these agreements and U.N. 
resolutions. That is why more time is not the answer. More time will 
not solve the problem. More time will do nothing but exacerbate the 
problem.

  Confidence is also misplaced to rely on the inspections to produce 
anything. President Bush has made the point, Secretary Powell has made 
the point--inspections only work if you have a willing, compliant party 
on the other side that has demonstrated a desire to dismantle weapons 
and wants the world to verify that has been done.
  We did this before in Ukraine and Kazakhstan, countries that were 
willing to dismantle their weapons. Where inspections are able to 
confirm that, demonstrate that, this is a technique that can work. But 
it can never work, as Secretary Powell said, with a nation such as Iraq 
which has as its intention hiding these weapons rather than 
cooperating.
  The inspectors are not in Iraq--and I repeat this, the inspectors are 
not in Iraq--to find evidence with which to prosecute Saddam Hussein. 
That would be an impossible task. They would have to get enormously 
lucky to find anything in that country. In fact, I guess we could say 
they were lucky, to the extent they found 16 shells which contained 
warheads suitable for chemical weaponry, warheads that were not 
declared by Saddam Hussein in his declaration and therefore were in 
clear violation of the U.N. requirement that he destroy these weapons. 
They were lucky to find them.
  People say you need a smoking gun. There is a smoking gun. Why is 
that not good enough? The bottom line is you cannot put the burden on 
the inspectors because there is no way in any reasonable period of time 
that you could expect them to find them all. I have forgotten the exact 
number now, but there are in the tens of thousands of these weapons 
that Saddam Hussein had. We knew he had them and he has never shown he 
has destroyed them. How are we going to find those? The fact is the 
inspectors are there to verify voluntary compliance. They are not there 
to try to find things that are being deliberately hidden.
  One of the reasons the document I had printed in the Record, the 
letter signed by European leaders, is so important is because it 
validates the notion that the free nations of the world need to be 
united in enforcing these norms of international behavior. Thus the 
headline: ``Europe and America Must Stand United.'' The last paragraph 
I will read:

       The United Nations Charter charges the Security Council 
     with the task of preserving

[[Page S1763]]

     international peace and security. To do so, the Security 
     Council must maintain its credibility by ensuring full 
     compliance with its resolutions. We cannot allow a dictator 
     to systematically violate those resolutions. If they are not 
     complied with, the Security Council will lose its credibility 
     and world peace will suffer as a result.
       We are confident the Security Council will face up to its 
     responsibilities.

  Some of the signatories include Tony Blair, of the United Kingdom, 
Silvio Berlusconi, of Italy, Vaclav Havel, of the Czech Republic, one 
of the real democrats of our era, and others, who make the point that 
we have to stand united in this effort.
  The problem they are facing and that President Bush is facing is if 
we believe we have to get the approval of the Security Council, and any 
of the five permanent members, which could be Russia, China, or France, 
for example, were to veto another resolution, then our hands would be 
tied. That is why another resolution is not required. Resolution 1441 
is good enough. President Bush has made that point and Secretary Powell 
made the point, telling those nations, don't vote for the Resolution 
1441 if you are not going to be prepared to support action when the 
time comes.
  Now the time is upon us. What these distinguished leaders are saying 
in this letter is the Security Council needs to step to the plate and 
authorize the kind of action that is called for here. If not, it can be 
done unilaterally by the United States and the rest of the coalition of 
willing partners. We have that legal authority to do so. Obviously, it 
would be better if the world opinion, expressed through United Nations 
resolutions, backed that action. But that is not necessary.
  I would argue also in some respects it is not desirable to keep going 
back to the United Nations Security Council for approval. This is the 
reason why. You begin to create the precedent that action is 
illegitimate unless this group has approved it; that unless the 
Security Council has given its stamp of approval other nations may not 
act in their self-interest and in the interest of the international 
community of countries.
  That would be an extraordinarily bad precedent. It would cede the 
sovereignty of the United States to a United Nations body which is not 
some kind of angelic group of objective judges on high somewhere, 
deciding what is right, truth, and justice in the world. It is five 
countries with self-interests, one of which is the United States. All 
of these countries act in their self-interest and there is nothing 
wrong with that. France acts in its self-interest. A lot of French have 
business dealings with the Iraqis. There is nothing wrong with that 
except it may violate the sanctions of the United Nations. But they 
have reasons for perhaps not wanting to confront Iraq.
  Russia has a lot of money tied up in Iraq in debts that are owed to 
Russia. It wants to see those debts repaid. There is nothing wrong with 
that. So it is naturally a little bit careful here in the way it is 
dealing with Iraq in this resolution.
  China has its own issues, as have Great Britain and the United 
States. All of us approach these issues from the legitimate position of 
our own self-interest as nations. The combination of those five 
countries represents the permanent members of the Security Council, who 
have a veto. There are additionally 10 other nations that rotate on and 
off the Security Council.
  We got a unanimous decision of all 15 nations, including even Syria, 
with Resolution 1441. So we have the ability to proceed. What I am 
saying is it is a mistake to have to go to the Security Council again, 
first, because you are setting a very bad precedent that is the only 
way you can legitimately act, and, second, because there is some kind 
of suggestion that nations put their self-interests over here on a 
shelf when they deal with questions such as this. They do not. They 
make decisions based upon their perception of their own self-interest 
and there is nothing wrong with that. But what it can mean is that if 
our interests are divergent enough, we can get into situations where 
some countries decide to take an action and other countries decide to 
veto that action. If they have a legal veto, then they can preclude 
countries such as the United States and Great Britain, for example, 
from acting in their own self-interest.

  That is why, even though I welcome the debate and would be very 
willing to spend all of the time our good friend and colleague, Senator 
Kennedy, would like to take on the floor of the Senate, debating his 
resolution to have yet another expression of Congress in support of 
military action by the President, it is not necessary. We have already 
covered that ground. It has already been approved by the Senate. The 
President has taken a lot of action in reliance upon the action of the 
Senate back in November.
  It is kind of like pulling the rug out from under him. I know that is 
not Senator Kennedy's intent, but it could have that effect because the 
President relied on the approval the Senate gave to him to mobilize 
tens of thousands of American troops all over the world. These troops 
are now committed to the theater of Iraq. A great deal depends upon our 
ability to combine a military mission with the timing that is required 
to achieve success, and all the other factors that are involved in a 
successful outcome of the enforcement of these U.N. resolutions by the 
United States and its committed allies.
  We can't be getting to the point where there is a herky-jerky, we'll 
give you the authority, we'll take it back, OK, we'll give you some 
more, now you can't. The Commander in Chief cannot operate that way. 
That is why last December we said we will vote to give the authority. 
Don't vote for it if you don't think he should exercise that. Many of 
our colleagues did not, and they have good and sufficient reasons for 
voting that way. The vote overwhelmingly carried. The President was 
granted the authority by the Congress. Now, on the eve of his exercise 
of that authority, if he chooses to do so, is not the time to suggest 
that, well, we didn't really mean it; he has to come to us one more 
time. That would be an act, I suggest, that would not be worthy of the 
Senate, given our responsibilities to act in concert with the President 
in conducting his responsibilities as Commander in Chief.
  Even though we know there are sincere questions and concerns about 
taking military action--and every one of us shares those concerns--we 
also know leadership is about making decisions when the situation is 
not clear. All of us have heard about the fog of war. Henry Kissinger 
has written about the essence of leadership and making a decision when 
almost everything seems to be in doubt and there is no clear path to a 
decision. Making the right decision at that time and following through 
is what enables you to succeed, because waiting until everything is 
clear is usually to wait until it is too late. It is the situation I 
described before with North Korea, for example. If we wait until it is 
clear that Saddam Hussein has the nuclear weapon, it will be too late 
to confront him over the use of that weapon or over the fact he 
possesses that weapon.
  That is why the President has been so insistent that the original 
promise of Saddam Hussein to dismantle under international supervision 
and never having complied with that promise must now be enforced. That 
is the essence of the President's case. While I am sure he will speak 
to the American people and lay this out much more clearly than I have, 
and that he, Secretary Powell, and others will continue to speak with 
our allies so they know fully why we are prepared to act and will feel 
comfortable in joining us in this action--and even with those actions 
which I think we can contemplate in the next several days--I think it 
would be a big mistake, as I said, for the Senate to assume we need to 
revisit this issue in a legal way and that the President would not be 
authorized to act unless we pass some kind of legislation.
  I welcome the debate, as I said. If our colleagues wish to have that 
debate here on the Senate floor, I suggest it would be far better for 
us to acknowledge the President's authority and to stand behind him in 
the decisions he makes, knowing our support for his actions is support 
for the troops we are sending in harm's way. The best thing we can do 
for those sons and daughters is not to continue to question and wring 
our hands and express self-doubt about what we are doing but to 
solemnly weigh all of the factors, make a judgment to support the 
President in his judgment, and then support those troops when they are 
called upon to

[[Page S1764]]

act. That is the best way we can repay those who are willing to make 
that supreme sacrifice for that willingness on their part.
  I solemnly hope as we debate these issues, we can do so in that 
spirit, in the spirit of the sacrifice our troops are willing to make, 
and that the debate be as serious, as analytical, and as nonpartisan as 
much as we can make that kind of debate, but when the time comes that 
every one of us will support the President and our troops.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania is recognized.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I want to pick up where the Senator from 
Arizona left off.
  What has changed that would lead us to have another debate on a 
resolution authorizing force? Since the last time we debated this issue 
here on the Senate floor, I do not know if the Senator from Arizona has 
any thoughts as to what sort of things have changed. The only thing I 
can think of which has changed is we have had weapons inspectors in the 
country and those weapons inspectors have been deceived. We did not 
have weapons inspectors in the country at the time we were debating 
this resolution in September of last year. The only thing I can think 
of is the Senator from Massachusetts and others who wanted to debate 
this issue wanted to make the point that, Well, weapons inspectors 
haven't found anything, and maybe that has changed. Remember, they 
weren't in the country in the first place.
  We didn't find anything in the first place when the U.N. took as a 
given that he had these weapons of mass destruction. It was simply a 
matter of what he was going to declare and what he had done with them. 
He still hasn't.
  From my perspective, I haven't seen any change. We knew he had these 
weapons. The President detailed them the other night. He hasn't 
disclosed what he has done with these weapons, which is pretty status 
quo.
  When we were debating in September, we had had weapons inspectors who 
had been given the opportunity to determine where these weapons were, 
and Saddam Hussein had not cooperated.
  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, if I could respond to the Senator from 
Pennsylvania, I don't want to characterize Senator Kennedy's response 
to that. He made his statement. The essence of one of the things he 
said was things have changed since we debated this. From his 
perspective, he said things have changed. One of the things he said was 
inspectors had not been able to find anything.
  I would respond to that in two quick ways.
  First of all, the U.N. inspectors have determined Iraq is not 
voluntarily disarming as required by United Nations Resolution 1441. 
Quoting Hans Blix, head of the inspector team:

       Iraq appears not to have come into genuine acceptance--not 
     even today--of disarmament which was demanded of him and 
     which he needs to carry out to win the confidence of the 
     world and live in peace.

  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I would say to my colleague that when we 
voted on this resolution in September there were no weapons inspectors 
in the country. There was not even the prospect of weapons inspectors 
in the country. I keep coming back to what has changed substantively. 
The fact that weapons inspectors haven't found anything is a fact, but 
it is not relevant to what the debate was back in September when we 
passed this resolution because there was not even the prospect of 
weapons inspectors at that time. The debate was clearly about the fact 
that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction and he had not come forward 
to date and disclosed them. All we have seen over the past few months 
is more of the same.
  Mr. KYL. If I could respond to the Senator from Pennsylvania, some of 
the best evidence of what has changed or what hasn't changed comes from 
Secretary Powell's comments on the United Nations report. Here is what 
he said:

       Iraq has been and continues to be in material breach of all 
     its earlier obligations. We are giving the resolution one 
     more chance to Iraq. We put a firm list of conditions for 
     Iraq to meet and what they should allow the inspectors to do 
     to assist them in disarmament. Iraq's time for disarmament is 
     fast coming to an end.

  Mr. SANTORUM. It seems to me what Senator Kennedy put forward is what 
many in the press have put forward, which is really a change of 
expectations and putting up, I would argue, the straw man; that is, it 
is our obligation to show Saddam is not in compliance by finding a 
weapon of mass destruction; the fact we haven't found one is somehow a 
breach on our part, or a problem; and a level of evidence we haven't 
been able to meet. Of course, just the opposite is true. As the Senator 
from Arizona just read, it is his obligation to prove he is in 
compliance, not our obligation to prove he is not in compliance.
  Mr. KYL. If I may further respond to the Senator from Pennsylvania, 
this is not just our view, Secretary Powell's view, or President Bush's 
view. The letter we saw in today's Wall Street Journal by prestigious 
leaders in countries such as Great Britain, Portugal, Italy, and the 
Czech Republic said this:

       Resolution 1441 is Saddam Hussein's last chance to disarm 
     using peaceful means. The opportunity to avoid greater 
     confrontation rests with him. Sadly, this week, the U.N. 
     weapons inspectors have confirmed that his long established 
     pattern of deception, denial, and noncompliance with U.N. 
     Security Council resolution is continuing. We cannot allow a 
     dictator to systematically violate those resolutions.

  Mr. SANTORUM. Another point that is being made is these inspectors 
are not finding anything, and that there is this undercurrent of 
expectation that it is their role to be detected or investigated; that 
they are over there to find the proverbial needle in the haystack; that 
they are there to be Sherlock Holmes when, of course, that is not their 
mission. Their mission there is not as detectives. They are inspectors. 
I use the example of someone who runs a gas station. Someone from the 
Bureau of Weights and Measures comes in and determines whether your 
scales are operating correctly. Are you running a legitimate business? 
You show them the record of what your pump is pumping out in gas, and 
they check it to make sure it is valid. That is what these inspectors 
are doing. If you are conducting illegal activities and siphoning off 
gas somewhere, they are not going to find that by checking whether your 
pump is working right.

  So that really is the case with these inspectors, is it not, that 
they are there to check as to what Saddam is telling us where his 
weapons of mass destruction went, if they actually went there, or were 
destroyed. Since he has not provided us any of that information, it is 
very hard for them to be able to find any smoking gun or deposit of 
weapons, when their job really isn't to do that; it is just to validate 
what he is telling them.
  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I say to the Senator from Pennsylvania, that 
is exactly right. The analogy is a good one. It is somewhat similar to 
what Secretary Powell has said. If I can find that, I will put it in 
the Record right here.
  But it is also interesting that not only is their job not to be a 
detective but, rather, to verify voluntary compliance. But since the 
resolution, passed by the Senate, authorizing the President to use 
force if necessary, here is what has happened: The inspectors have not 
have been able to interview any Iraqis in private. The inspectors have 
still not received from Iraq a full list of Iraqi personnel involved 
with the WMD programs. The inspectors have not been able to employ 
aerial surveillance. They will not guarantee the safety of the U-2 
planes. In fact, they shoot at our pilots every day as we try to 
surveil their country. Inspectors have caught Iraqis concealing top 
secret information. Inspectors have evidence that Iraq has moved or 
hidden items at sites just prior to inspection visits. And, of course, 
Iraq did not provide a complete declaration of the WMD program as it is 
required to do.
  So as to the question of what has changed with respect to 
inspections, it is all bad news, not good news.
  Mr. SANTORUM. The fact of the matter is, nothing has changed from the 
inspections that occurred prior to the debate here in the Senate back 
in September. So I really question what the motivation is of having 
this debate again when, on a substantive basis, nothing has changed, 
other than continued and maybe even more explicit deception on the part 
of Saddam Hussein in hiding these weapons of mass destruction.
  What has changed, I would argue, is the United States and our 
coalition

[[Page S1765]]

partners have moved forward in a plan of deployment to convince Saddam 
we are serious, that if he does not comply, and comply quickly and 
completely, there will be action taken.
  As we had this debate on the floor--and one of the reasons many 
Members here supported this resolution--it was to make sure Saddam knew 
we were serious, we were going to follow through with what we said we 
would do, and the President had the support of the American public, 
thereby making it a credible threat, giving--I heard this over and 
over--giving peace the best chance by letting Saddam know the certainty 
of his noncompliance.
  Mr. KYL. Might I just make one final comment to the Senator from 
Pennsylvania?
  Mr. SANTORUM. Please.
  Mr. KYL. I did find what I was looking for. The Senator has made 
exactly the right point. Inspectors can verify someone who wants to be 
in voluntary compliance, but inspectors cannot find something you are 
trying to hide. Two comments. Secretary Wolfowitz said, on January 23:

       It is not the job of inspectors to disarm Iraq. It is 
     Iraq's job to disarm itself. What inspectors can do is 
     confirm that a country has willingly disarmed and provide 
     verifiable evidence that it has done so.

  Then Secretary Powell had said this in the Washington Post a week 
ago:

       The question isn't how much longer do you need for 
     inspectors to work. Inspections will not work.

  Mr. SANTORUM. Yes. The term I use over and over again is that these 
are inspectors, not investigators. These are not detectives. This 
concept that inspectors will find a smoking gun is absurd. It is 
absurd. They will not because they are not looking for a smoking gun. 
It is not their mission to find a smoking gun. They are there, as the 
Senator from Arizona quoted our people at the Defense Department--Paul 
Wolfowitz--they are there to determine whether Saddam is telling us the 
truth in the information he has given us. Since he has not given us any 
information as to what he has done with his weapons of mass 
destruction, it is very difficult for them to determine whether he is 
telling the truth.
  So this whole concept, No. 1, that the burden of proof is on the 
United States of America or on the United Nations or on these weapons 
inspectors to find what Saddam has is false. And the expectation that 
there is some smoking gun we must show Members of the Senate, people in 
America, or people around the world, as some countries have indicated, 
is absurd on its face. Certainly, the countries that are involved in 
this action and have been involved in these negotiations at the United 
Nations know it. They know these inspectors are not there to find a 
smoking gun, are not there to find weapons of mass destruction. That is 
not what they are there to do.
  They happened to stumble onto 16 warheads that could use chemicals, 
that could contain chemical and biological weapons. They stumbled onto 
them. It just tells you how many of these things are probably lying 
around where even inspectors who are not looking for them can stumble 
onto them.
  So the basic point I am trying to make is nothing has fundamentally 
changed, except two things: No. 1, more of the same; more of the same; 
Saddam Hussein is not disarming and he is not cooperating, which he is 
required to do under the United Nations resolution. That has not 
changed. And the threat to the United States as a result has not 
changed. That was a threat when we debated this in September. It is a 
threat today. So those things have not changed.
  One thing has changed: We have begun, along with our coalition 
partners, to begin to deploy force in the region with the express 
purpose of giving Saddam every opportunity to understand the 
seriousness of our commitment. We should not at this time back down 
from that commitment.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
  Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be recognized 
for 15 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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