[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 32 (Thursday, February 27, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2909-S2912]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
IRAQ
Mr. BENNETT. Mr. President, this morning's Washington Post has an
especially long editorial. Indeed, it takes up the entire length of the
editorial page. It is entitled ``Drumbeat on Iraq, a Response to
Readers.''
I have a dear friend in Utah who wrote me. She was distraught--is
distraught, I am sure--about the prospect of going to war and expressed
a great many concerns. I have been in the process of constructing what
I hope is a responsible and thoughtful response to her concerns. As I
read the editorial in this morning's Washington Post, I found that it
does a better job than I could do of summarizing many, if not most, of
the issues about which she is concerned. I want to read from sections
of the editorial and then ask unanimous consent that it be printed in
the Record at the end of my remarks.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(See exhibit 1.)
Mr. BENNETT. In the editorial they say:
The right question, though, is not, ``Is war risky?'' but
``Is inaction less so?'' No one can provide more than a
judgment in reply. But the world is already a dangerous
place. Anthrax has been wielded in Florida, New York and
Washington. Terrorists have struck repeatedly and with
increased strength over the past decade. Are the United
States and its allies ultimately safer if they back down
again and leave Saddam Hussein secure? Or does safety lie in
making clear that his kind of outlaw behavior will not be
tolerated and in helping Iraq become a peaceable nation that
offers no haven to terrorists? We would say the latter. . . .
As I say, I could not have put it better, which is why I have quoted
it. I have raised the question on the floor before: What are the
consequences if we do not follow through in Iraq? Some have said let's
just leave the troops in place. And that means Iraq remains contained.
Leaving the troops in place is not an option. We must understand that
the troops are where they are, poised to move into Iraq, because of the
agreement of the governments in Qatar, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia, among
others. Those governments will not allow our troops to remain on their
soil indefinitely. They will not allow those troops to remain there
while we contain Saddam Hussein for 6 months or 12 months or 12 years,
which has been the period of ``containment'' that we have seen up until
now. We must either withdraw those troops and say we are
[[Page S2910]]
not going to move ahead militarily or, if Saddam Hussein does not
disarm in accordance with the U.N. resolutions, those troops will move
forward into his territory. We have no other choice: Move forward or
withdraw.
For those who say the inspectors should be allowed to do their job,
we must understand that the only reason the inspectors are there is
because the troops are there. So we are coming down to the decision
point, that is very clear.
Again, back to the editorial:
Some argue now that, because Saddam Hussein has not in the
intervening half decade used his arsenal, Mr. Clinton was
wrong. . . .
I should say that the editorial quotes President Clinton as outlining
the case against Saddam Hussein in 1998.
Some would argue now that, because Saddam Hussein has not
in the intervening half decade used his arsenal, Mr. Clinton
was wrong and the world can rest assured that Iraq is
adequately ``contained.'' Given what we know about how
containment erodes over time; about Saddam Hussein's single-
mindedness compared with the inattention and divisions of
other nations; and about the ease with which deadly weapons
can move across borders, we do not trust such an assurance.
Mr. Clinton understood, as Mr. Bush understands, that no
president can bet his nation's safety on the hope that Iraq
is ``contained.'' We respect our readers who believe that war
is the worst option. But we believe that, in this case, long-
term peace will be better served by strength than by
concessions.
There is one other issue that was raised by my friend in Utah to
which the editorial does not speak. This is the issue of first strike.
My friend says we cannot cross the line of having the United States be
involved in a first strike against a nation that has not attacked us.
One of the arguments I have heard on this score is that if we do it,
we will set a precedent that will allow other nations to do it. Other
nations that we do not want to do it will say we can do it because the
United States did.
If I may, without being disrespectful to that argument, I would point
out that Adolph Hitler did not need a precedent from the United States
to attack Poland. He made up his own excuse. He pretended that Poland
had attacked him. He dressed prisoners in Polish military uniforms,
murdered them, and then had them found by German soldiers on German
soil who said they were shot as they tried to invade Germany.
The setting of a precedent by the United States or the not setting of
a precedent by the United States will have absolutely no effect on the
actions of a brutal dictator who decides to attack his neighbors in a
first strike fashion. Saddam Hussein didn't quote precedent when he
attacked Kuwait in the early 1990s. He went ahead and did it, and would
have done it again whether he had precedent or not.
Having said that, however, I want to review a little bit of American
history. It may not be history of which we are proud, for those who say
we have never committed a first strike, but it is history nonetheless
of which we must be aware. I have not taken the time to research all
examples of this because my memory provides me with enough to make the
point.
I remember when Lyndon Johnson sent the Marines into the Dominican
Republic, for what purpose I cannot recall. But this was not a country
that had attacked us and we sent military forces in there on the
grounds that there was some American interest that had to be protected.
Ronald Reagan sent the Marines into Grenada. His reason was that the
legitimate Government of Grenada requested it.
In his book, ``The Rise and Fall of the Soviet Empire,'' Brian
Crozier referred to the American military action in Grenada as one of
the key turning points in the cold war. He said if the United States
had not moved into Grenada and removed the Communist government there,
the cold war would have lasted considerably longer and been more
devastating.
There was no international clamor against President Reagan when he
did this. He believed it was in America's best interests, and at least
one historian has said it was not only in America's best interests, it
was in the world's best interests for Ronald Reagan to have done what
he did in Grenada.
In the waning days of his Presidency, the first President Bush sent
American troops into Somalia. Somalia had not attacked us and did not
represent any threat. The troops were there presumably on a
humanitarian mission, but they were sent in to deal with a military
situation in that country that President Bush thought had to be dealt
with. Those troops were withdrawn by the Clinton administration. But,
once again, this was not a circumstance where America had been attacked
but one where an American President sent American troops and there was
no international outcry, no international complaint.
Shortly after I came to the Senate, President Clinton invaded Haiti.
Our former colleague, Sam Nunn, was in Haiti just prior to the time
when the American military entered that country, and he debriefed a
number of us after he came back. He pointed out that the only reason
there was not bloodshed when the American troops entered Haiti was
because the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Colin Powell,
went with Senator Nunn and former President Jimmy Carter to Haiti and
General Powell was able to convince the Haitian general in charge of
their military that it was not dishonorable for the Haitian general to
save the lives of his troops and allow the Americans to come in without
military opposition.
As I recall it from Senator Nunn, the Haitian general was determined
that it was his duty as a military man to resist any invasion of his
country, no matter how hopeless that resistance might be. And he
gathered his family around him, his wife and his children, hugged them
together and said: This is our last night on Earth because tomorrow the
Americans are invading and I will be killed.
As I say, General Powell sat down with the Haitian general, convinced
him that his first duty as a military officer was to protect the lives
of his troops, and that he was not doing a dishonorable thing if he did
not mount a hopeless resistance against the Americans.
Once again, there was no international outcry against the American
decision to send troops into Haiti. Looking back on it, it was not
necessarily a wise thing to have done. We replaced a brutal dictator
much beloved by American conservatives with a brutal dictator much
beloved by American liberals. But the average Haitian has not seen any
improvement in his or her lifestyle. Indeed, those who have been to
Haiti recently tell me things are worse now than they were before the
Americans invaded.
Then we have the former Yugoslavia, a country that represented no
threat to the United States and had not attacked the United States, but
the United States led a national coalition in war upon that nation.
Why did we do it? We did it because, under Milosevic, that nation had
produced enough casualties within its borders to begin to approach 20
percent of the size of the Holocaust. They killed that many of their
own people, and the Americans felt that was a serious enough challenge
to require us to go ahead.
Now we have just heard a speech by the Senator from Michigan with
respect to North Korea. We are being asked, Why are we not doing more
with respect to North Korea? I will not respond to the Senator from
Michigan or the Democratic leader in that vein. But I will point out
that the attitude around the world and, indeed, here in the Senate is
why the United States isn't taking care of this. If I might add one
word to that question, Why isn't the United States taking care of this
unilaterally? In other words, the United States should handle this all
by themselves, according to speeches that are made here and in the
world community.
I run through this history simply to make this point: It is not
accurate to say the proposed action in Iraq is either unprecedented in
American history or illegal under American or international law. The
action that is proposed with respect to Iraq is in the tradition of
these humanitarian missions that I have described.
Some of them have gone wrong. Some of them have turned out not to
produce a humanitarian result. But in every case there was no prior
complaint raised against the proposal that we do this on the ground
that this was an unacceptable first strike against a
[[Page S2911]]
defenseless neighbor. In every circumstance, it went forward with full
approval. I voted against the move into Haiti. But the President
appropriately came to the Congress and got approval before he did it.
President Bush has come to the Congress, and by a 77-23 vote in this
body and an equally lopsided vote in the other body, has approval
before he goes into Iraq. This is not a stealth attack like Pearl
Harbor under the cover of night. This is something that has been
debated and laid before the United Nations. The United Nations, by a
15-0 vote in the Security Council, announced to Iraq if she did not
disarm, she would face serious consequences, and serious consequences
in United Nations speak means war. This is not something that is done
hidden or in a corner or in the dark.
So we come back now to the fundamental question: Is it safer to go
ahead with an operation in Iraq than it is to pull down the American
troops and bring them home? I agree with the editorial writers of the
Washington Post. This is an agonizing decision. This is not one to be
made lightly, and I am sure from conversations with him that the
President is not going to make it lightly. He is going to weigh all of
the consequences. But I believe in the end he will come to the same
conclusion that the Washington Post editorial writers have come to and
that I have come to. Whatever the unknowns on either side, the present
evidence suggests that the most dangerous thing we could do with
respect to the situation in Iraq is to back down if Iraq does not
comply with the United Nations resolution. To pull our troops out of
Iraq does not comply with the demands that the world has made upon it.
The safest thing to do if Iraq does not comply is to carry through with
the resolution that was adopted on this floor by an overwhelming
margin, adopted in the Security Council of the United Nations
unanimously, and not hold back.
I yield the floor.
[From the Washington Post, Feb. 27, 2003]
``Drumbeat'' on Iraq? A Response to Readers
``I have been a faithful reader of The Washington Post for
almost 10 years,'' a recent e-mail to this page begins.
``Recently, however, I have grown tired of your bias and
endless drumbeating for war in Iraq.'' He's not the only one.
The national and international debate over Saddam Hussein's
weapons of mass destruction, and our editorials in favor of
disarming the dictator, have prompted a torrent of letters,
many approving and many critical. They are for the most part
thoughtful and serious; the antiwar letters in particular are
often angry and anguished as well. ``It is truly depressing
to witness the depths Washington Post editors have reached in
their jingoistic rush to war,'' another reader writes. It's a
serious charge, and it deserves a serious response.
That answer, given the reference to ``Washington Post
editors,'' probably needs to begin with a restatement of the
separation at The Post between news and editorial opinion
functions. Those of us who write editorials have no influence
over editors and reporters who cover the news and who are
committed to offering the fairest and most complete
journalism possible about the standoff with Iraq. They in
turn have no influence over us.
For our part, we might begin with that phrase ``rush to
war.'' In fact there is nothing sudden or precipitous about
our view that Saddam Hussein poses a grave danger. In 1990
and 1991 we supported many months of diplomacy and pressure
to persuade the Iraqi dictator to withdraw his troops from
Kuwait, the neighboring country he had invaded. When he
failed to do so, we supported the use of force to restore
Kuwait's independence. While many of the same Democrats who
oppose force now opposed it then also, we believe war was the
correct option--though it was certainly not, at the time, the
only choice. When the war ended, we supported--in hindsight
too unquestioningly--a cease-fire agreement that left Saddam
Hussein in power. But it was an agreement, imposed by the
U.N. Security Council, that demanded that he give up his
dangerous weapons.
In 1997 and 1998, we strongly backed President Clinton when
he vowed that Iraq must finally honor its commitments to the
United Nations to give up its nuclear, biological and
chemical weapons--and we strongly criticized him when he
retreated from those vows. Mr. Clinton understood the stakes.
Iraq, he said, was a ``rogue state with weapons of mass
destruction, ready to use them or provide them to terrorists,
drug traffickers or organized criminals who travel the world
among us unnoticed.''
When we cite Mr. Clinton's perceptive but ultimately empty
comments, it is in part to chide him and other Democrats who
take a different view now that a Republican is in charge. But
it has a more serious purpose too. Mr. Clinton could not
muster the will, or the domestic or international support, to
force Saddam Hussein to live up to the promises he had
made in 1991, though even then the danger was well
understood. Republicans who now line up behind President
Bush were in many cases particularly irresponsible; when
Mr. Clinton did bomb Iraqi weapons sites in 1998, some GOP
leaders accused him of seeking only to distract the nation
from his impeachment worries. Through the end of Mr.
Clinton's tenure and the first year of Mr. Bush's
presidency, Saddam Hussein built up his power, beat back
sanctions and found new space to rearm--all with the
support of France and Russia and the acquiescence of the
United States.
After Sept. 11, 2001, many people of both parties said--and
we certainly hoped--that the country had moved beyond such
failures of will and politicization of deadly foreign
threats. An outlaw dictator, in open defiance of U.N.
resolutions, unquestionably possessing and pursuing
biological and chemical weapons, expressing support for the
Sept. 11 attacks: Surely the nation would no longer dither in
the face of such a menace. Now it seems again an open
question. To us, risks that were clear before seem even
clearer now.
But what of our ``jingoism,'' our ``drumbeating''? Probably
no editorial page sin could be more grievous than whipping up
war fever for some political or trivial purpose. And we do
not take lightly the risks of war--to American and Iraqi
soldiers and civilians first of all. We believe that the Bush
administration has only begun to prepare the public for the
sacrifices that the nation and many young Americans might
bear during and after a war. And there is a long list of
terrible things that could go wrong: anthrax dispersed,
moderate regimes imperiled, Islamist recruiting spurred, oil
wells set afire.
The first question, though, is not ``Is war risky?'' but
``Is inaction less so?'' No one can provide more than a
judgment in reply. But the world is already a dangerous
place, Anthrax has been wielded in Florida, New York and
Washington. Terrorists have struck repeatedly and with
increasing strength over the past decade. Are the United
States and its allies ultimately safer if they back down
again and leave Saddam Hussein secure? Or does safety lie in
making clear that his kind of outlaw behavior will not be
tolerated and in helping Iraq become a peaceable nation that
offers no haven to terrorists? We would say the latter while
acknowledging the magnitude of the challenge, both during and
especially after any war that may have to be fought. And we
would say also that not only terrible things are possible: To
free the Iraqi people from the sadistic repression of Saddam
Hussein, while not the primary goal of a war, would surely be
a blessing.
Nor is it useful merely to repeat that war ``should only be
a last resort,'' as the latest French-German-Russian
resolution states, or that, as French President Jacques
Chirac said Monday, Iraq must disarm ``because it represents
a danger for the region and maybe the world . . . But we
believe this disarmament must happen peacefully.'' Like
everyone else, we hope it does happen peacefully. But if it
does not--if Saddam Hussein refuses as he has for a dozen
years--should that refusal be accommodated?
War in fact has rarely been the last resort for the United
States. In very recent times, the nation could have allowed
Saddam Huss- sein to swallow Kuwait. It could have allowed
Slobodan Milosevic to expel 1 million refugees from
Kosovo. In each case, the nation and its allies fought
wars of choice. Even the 2001 campaign against Afghanistan
was not a ``last resort,'' though it is now remembered as
an inevitable war of self-defense. Many Americans argued
that the Taliban had not attacked the United States and
should not be attached; that what was needed was a police
action against Osama bin Laden. We believed they were
wrong and Mr. Bush was right, though he will be vindicated
in history only if the United States and its allies stay
focused on Afghanistan and its reconstruction.
So the real questions are whether every meaningful
alternative has been exhausted, and if so whether war is wise
as well as justified. The risks should be minimized. Everyone
agrees, for example, that the United States would be stronger
before and during a war if jointed by many allies, and even
better positioned if backed by the United Nations. If waiting
a month, or three months, would ensure such backing, the wait
would be worthwhile.
But the history is not encouraging. The Security Council
agreed unanimously in early November that Iraq was a danger;
that inspectors could do no more than verify a voluntary
disarmament; and that a failure to disarm would be considered
a ``material breach.'' Now all agree that Saddam Hussein has
not cooperated, and yet some countries balk at the
consequences--as they have, time and again, since 1991. We
have seen no evidence that an additional three months would
be helpful. Nor does it strike us as serious to argue that
the war should be fought if Mr. Chirac and German Chancellor
Gerhard Schroeder agree, but not if they do not. If the war
is that optional, it should not be fought, even if those
leaders do agree; if it is essential to U.S. national
security, their objections ultimately cannot be dispositive.
In 1998, Mr. Clinton explained to the nation why U.S.
national security was, in fact, in danger. ``What if he fails
to comply and we fail to act, or we take some ambiguous third
route, which gives him yet more opportunities to develop this
program of weapons of
[[Page S2912]]
mass destruction? . . . Well, he will conclude that the
international community has lost its will. He will then
conclude that he can go right on and do more to rebuild an
arsenal of devastating destruction. And some day, some way, I
guarantee you he'll use the arsenal.''
Some argue now that, because Saddam Hussein has not in the
intervening half-decade use his arsenal, Mr. Clinton was
wrong and the world can rest assured that Iraq is adequately
``contained.'' Given what we know about how containment
erodes over time; about Saddam Hussein's single-mindedness
compared with the inattention and divisions of other nations;
and about the ease with which deadly weapons can move across
borders, we do not trust such an assurance. Mr. Clinton
understood, as Mr. Bush understands, that no president can
bet his nation's safety on the hope that Iraq is
``contained.'' We respect our readers who believe that war is
the worst option. But we believe that, in this case, long-
term peace will be better served by strength than by
concessions.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I send a resolution to the desk and ask
unanimous consent that it be held at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is
so ordered.
Mr. SANTORUM. Thank you, Mr. President.
____________________