[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 123 (Tuesday, September 9, 2003)]
[House]
[Pages H8071-H8076]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          IRAQ WATCH CONTINUES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. King of Iowa). Under the Speaker's 
announced policy of January 7, 2003, the gentleman from Pennsylvania 
(Mr. Hoeffel) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the 
minority leader.
  Mr. HOEFFEL. Mr. Speaker, we come to the floor again this evening as 
part of the Iraq Watch. For the last 2 months or so, four of us have 
been coming here the first evening that the House is in session each 
week to talk about Iraq, to talk about the policies that we think are 
flawed, to suggest new policies that the Nation might pursue, to ask 
questions about our policies and involvement in Iraq that we believe 
the American people need to know about and that Congress needs to know 
about.
  The four of us who have done this week after week include the 
gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Delahunt), the gentleman from Hawaii 
(Mr. Abercrombie), and the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Emanuel). We 
have been joined each week by several others, and we look forward to 
the discussion this evening and to continuing this each week until our 
involvement in Iraq has been clarified and stabilized and until we get 
answers to some of the questions that we think Congress is entitled to 
and the American people are entitled to.
  Mr. Speaker, this past week the President has announced his budget 
request for our occupation in Iraq for next year totaling $87 billion, 
a much higher figure than anticipated, on top of the $79 billion 
appropriated by Congress just this past April for the 2003 budget year. 
This requested $87 billion for 2004 would make our national investment 
over about a year-and-a-half period of time $166 billion, and every 
Member of Congress wants to make sure that we do right by the brave 
soldiers that are stationed in Iraq today. Every Member of Congress is 
determined to do right by the troops in the field, to make sure they 
get the support that they need, the resources they need, the equipment, 
the reinforcements, the supplies, everything they need to fulfill their 
mission as safely as possible.
  So the debate that Congress will have over the next 2 or 3 weeks 
regarding the President's request for $87 billion will not be about 
supporting the troops in the field, because we all want to do that; and 
we are all prepared to do that. What we will ask questions about is the 
President's vision for Iraq. He wants $87 billion. I believe Congress 
is entitled to the benefit of his thinking to know what he plans and 
what his administration plans to accomplish in Iraq and how he is going 
to do it.
  We owe those questions and deserve those answers, not just to 
Congress, but to the American people. It is their tax dollars being 
spent. It is their sons and daughters who are fighting in Iraq; and in 
a very tragic sense, their sons and daughters who are dying in Iraq, 
and this Congress needs to know some of the answers.
  Fundamentally, we need to know what the plan is. We need to know what 
the exit strategy is. How long will we be in Iraq? What are we trying 
to achieve? How will we know when we have achieved it? What standards 
can we set for ourselves? What are we trying to accomplish? What 
yardsticks can we use to determine whether or not we are succeeding, 
whether or not more troops will be needed, whether or not more money 
will be needed down the road?
  So I would suggest four areas before I turn to the gentleman from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Delahunt). Let me suggest four areas that I would 
like to see the President give information to the Congress.
  The first would be regarding the military operations and occupation 
in Iraq, how long does the President believe that our troops will be 
needed, how much money will be needed, not just next year but in the 
foreseeable future to support those troops and how many more troops 
will be needed to fulfill the mission. I should point out that the 
civilian leadership of the Pentagon last spring estimated by this time, 
by September of 2003, we would only need 40,000 American troops in 
Iraq. Right now we have 130,000 American troops in Iraq; and clearly, 
that is not enough. So we need a better plan. We need to know how many 
troops, how long will they be here, and how much will it cost to 
support them.
  Secondly, we need to ask the same questions and get the same answers 
about the reconstruction of Iraq. How long will it take to get the 
lights back on? How long will it take to get clean water to the 
villages and the cities of

[[Page H8072]]

Iraq? How much will it cost America to finance the reconstruction? When 
can we anticipate Iraqi oil revenues coming on line to pay for Iraq's 
reconstruction itself? How many more personnel from America will be 
needed, whether it is architects or engineers or teachers or government 
experts or lawyers? How many more personnel will be needed to move the 
reconstruction and the new governance forward?
  Thirdly, how quickly can we internationalize the operation? I think 
this is a key to our success in Iraq. We have got to bring forward our 
allies, United Nations, other international organizations to help pay 
for the reconstruction and to provide their resources and assets and 
expertise for the reconstruction, as well as for the military security 
challenges. Many of us have thought that the U.N. should have been 
brought in months ago to be put in charge of the reconstruction. Many 
of us felt that NATO should have been brought in months ago to be 
responsible for security, but we need to know what the President's plan 
is, how does he foresee the internationalizing of Iraq, if he foresees 
that at all. This is something that we need to know.
  Finally, the fourth point is, when will Iraqis be back in charge of 
Iraq? Clearly, America cannot run Iraq into the indefinite future. It 
has been said since we almost unilaterally won the military victory 
that we now own Iraq, Iraq is ours. I am not sure we want that to be 
our approach to this. We cannot own, run, dominate, occupy a foreign 
country for long. That is not what America is about. We will fight for 
freedom, we will fight to liberate, we will fight to disarm murderous 
tyrants. We will do many good things to help people around the world, 
both to help people around the world and to protect our own national 
interests; but occupying a foreign country for a long period of time is 
not what this country is all about.
  So how will we get Iraqis back in charge? What do we need to do to 
get them back in charge? What kind of training do they need? How can 
they support a democratic government when they do not have a history of 
democracy?

                              {time}  2245

  What do we need to do to build the institutions of liberty to help 
them support a democracy? What do we need to do to establish a free 
press in Iraq, the rights of free speech, the traditions of free 
speech? How do we make a corruption-free and open court system in Iraq? 
How do we help them write a constitution? How do we get all segments of 
Iraq to participate in a representative government, a pluralistic 
government, and a democratic government? How long will it take, how do 
we do it, what yardsticks can we use to measure our progress?
  Mr. Speaker, these are the questions I believe that Congress needs to 
ask of the President. These are the questions I hope he will be eager 
to answer. He wants $87 billion. It is a great deal of money. We want 
to do right by our American troops. We want to do right by our 
commitment to freedom and liberty around the world. But doing right 
requires us to know what we are doing and to do right by the American 
taxpayer as well. And so we will be putting these questions forward, 
and I hope that we will be getting prompt and full and complete answers 
from the administration.
  Mr. Speaker, at this point let me turn to my good friend, the 
gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Delahunt), who has been a leader in 
the Iraq Watch and a leader on the Committee on International Relations 
and welcome him to this discussion. We look forward to his comments.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend and colleague, the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Hoeffel), who has led this particular 
conversation for some many weeks now.
  My memory is that last week there were reports in many of the leading 
newspapers in this country that the President would come forward with a 
supplemental budget in the neighborhood of some $80 billion; and this 
past Sunday, the American people and Members of Congress learned for 
the first time that that budget request would be for some $87 billion. 
That is an astounding figure.
  Clearly, we are on the verge of adding to a deficit that was 
estimated for the fiscal year of 2004 to be some $480 billion. The way 
we are heading, it is now in excess, with this request, of some $540 
billion. That is disturbing, the long-term implications for what we 
have to look forward to in terms of an economic recovery. $87 billion, 
I think it is interesting to note, exceeds the following that were 
items in the President's budget.
  This $87 billion we have discussed here is a supplemental budget. 
This is in addition to the $79 billion that this Congress approved, it 
seems like just a short time ago, though it was several months ago. The 
entire request for the year for homeland security was $41 billion. This 
supplemental request is double that amount. More than double.
  Health and Human Services, $66.2 billion. And that $66.2 billion, we 
should note, includes $27 billion for the National Institutes of 
Health, which is so critical to advancing discoveries for such scourges 
as cancer, heart disease, et cetera, et cetera.
  This $87 billion supplemental request exceeds the total amount 
allocated or budgeted for the Department of Education. The Department 
of Education budget was some $53 billion.
  It is almost three times the amount that has been appropriated for 
the State Department in foreign aid. That figure is some $27 billion.
  For highway and road construction in the United States, $30 billion.
  The only aspect of the President's budget that this particular 
supplemental request does not surpass are the proposed tax cuts of some 
$107 billion.
  This says to me, and I know it says it to my friend as well, that the 
costs were vastly underestimated; and now we face a difficult moment in 
our economic life where this recovery, if we can call it a recovery, is 
certainly a jobless recovery. This past month, in August, it was 
reported that here in the United States an additional 93,000 jobs, 
American jobs, were lost. This supplemental request of $87 billion 
certainly will not add to the number of jobs and the number of 
Americans that are employed.
  Mr. HOEFFEL. If I may reclaim my time, Mr. Speaker, for just a 
moment, the President has recently said that he will be advocating to 
make the 2001 tax cuts permanent. If the gentleman will recall, that 
tax program was too big to fit into the 10-year budget program that the 
Republicans put forward, so they sunsetted most of those tax cuts. But 
now the President wants to make them permanent, which will lose another 
trillion or so of revenue over the next 10 years.
  I wonder if the gentleman has ever before noticed, in his study of 
history, a time when America was at war, where, when we asked for 
sacrifices from the American people, those sacrifices were limited to 
the middle-income and low-income people who are receiving frozen or 
reduced government services and, of course, are bearing most of the 
cost and burden of fighting our battles in Iraq, while the wealthier 
Americans are actually being asked to sacrifice by getting a tax cut?

  Mr. DELAHUNT. Well, Mr. Speaker, if my friend would yield for a 
moment, of course that is absolutely aberrational in American history. 
In fact, during World War II, President Roosevelt asked the American 
people to accept a tax increase. We are not here even suggesting that 
this evening. But I think what we have learned is, unfortunately, the 
estimates that have been put forth by the administration were 
absolutely inaccurate, underestimated, and represented a scenario that 
was totally unrealistic.
  I would remind my friend that Under Secretary of Defense Wolfowitz, 
back in March, told Congress that, and I will quote him, ``We are 
dealing with a country that can really refinance its own 
reconstruction, and relatively soon.'' And relatively soon.
  What I find fascinating is that this Congress, on a bipartisan basis, 
is expressing its dismay. To quote from a story that appeared in the 
September 9 issue of The New York Times, and this is when 
representatives of the administration were appearing before a Senate 
committee, a prominent member of that committee, Senator McCain of 
Arizona, was dissatisfied with an answer from Mark Grossman, the Under 
Secretary of State for Political Affairs on how long it would take for 
more troops from other countries to arrive in Iraq

[[Page H8073]]

under United Nations auspices: `` `I am not asking for precisely what 
day,' Senator McCain said. `I am asking of a matter could you tell me 
years?' Mr. Grossman replied that should the Security Council 
resolution pass in the next few weeks, I can't imagine that it would be 
years. 'that precision is not really satisfying,' said Senator 
McCain.''
  The level of incompetence in terms of the postwar, postmajor come-
back phase, I should say, of what would be required of America, 
American taxpayers and American military personnel, the magnitude of 
that incompetence can only be described as colossal; and it has cost 
America its sons and badly needed revenue to meet our own domestic 
needs. As I indicated earlier, when I was reading through the monies 
available for Homeland Security, for Health and Human Services, for 
Education, for the functioning of the State Department in foreign 
assistance, this supplemental budget, by itself, exceeded all of the 
monies allocated for those needs.
  What we know now and what we should have known is that you simply 
cannot have tax cuts, guns, and butter too; yet here we are tonight 
faced with a proposal that is really a price tag. There is no plan. The 
questions that the gentleman posed earlier in terms of how long will 
our troops be required there, when will Iraqis assume control of their 
own destiny and devested with the power that is necessary have not been 
provided.
  I think that the White House and the administration and the 
Department of Defense have to be prepared to respond to those 
questions. Otherwise, I cannot imagine this body and the United States 
Senate approving a request that would provide the White House with a 
blank check. It just simply will not fly.
  Mr. HOEFFEL. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his comments. 
Eloquent as always.
  We have been joined by our colleague, the gentleman from Washington 
(Mr. Inslee), and we welcome him.
  Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, I am pleased to 
participate in this discussion.
  I think a preliminary question the U.S. Congress needs to ask itself 
is what role we have in acting as stewards for the taxpayers' money in 
this regard for $87 billion in expenditures.
  It seems to me that we ought to really scrupulously evaluate how 
effective this administration and their team has been to date in 
fulfilling its warrants to the American people in regard to the Iraqi 
situation. It is important to know whether this administration has been 
so accurate, so complete, so well-planned that, frankly, Congress ought 
to just give the administration a blank check and let it run. So I want 
to spend just 2 minutes evaluating the performance in that regard.

                              {time}  2300

  Mr. Speaker, the administration allowed the American people to 
believe Saddam Hussein was behind September 11. As far as we know, 
according to the commission established for that purpose, that was 
wrong. The Bush administration led the American people to believe that 
Iraq was in cahoots with al Qaeda. According to information we now 
have, that was wrong. The administration told the American people that 
Iraq had literally hundreds of tons of chemical and biological 
companies. That may or may not be wrong, but to date appears to be. The 
administration told the American people that Iraq had sought to get 
uranium from Africa. That was wrong; in fact, fraudulent on someone's 
behalf. The Bush administration told the American people that troops 
would be welcomed with rose petals and open arms when they got to 
Baghdad. That turned out to be wrong.
  The administration told the American people that this would be 
largely a self-financing operation, as the gentleman from Massachusetts 
(Mr. Delahunt) indicated. Mr. Wolfowitz said in a short period of time, 
the oil would flow, the dollars would grow, and the American taxpayers 
would not be on the hook.
  This administration's record on its warrants to the American people 
is sadly lacking. In that context, it seems to me the U.S. Congress 
ought to not only ask serious, probing questions of the administration, 
it ought to set conditions on the expenditure of money that it may 
appropriate in this regard. Questions are not enough. Conditions are 
needed because this is a significant sum of money, $87 billion. The 
entire Marshall Plan was $100 billion. This is not a Marshall Plan, it 
is a partial plan because it lacks two very crucial elements.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Speaker, I call it the no plan.
  Mr. INSLEE. I think it is important to be generous in the spirit of 
bipartisanship. I will say partial plan because it lacks two important 
elements.
  Number one, it lacks a sincere effort to bring the international 
community into this effort. This administration, for reasons that are 
passive understanding, has had a sincere desire to be as unilateral as 
possible all of the way through this effort, and they have burned 
bridges every possible way. And now what we see to date when they 
finally say maybe we have to do something to rationalize this, they 
offer a fig leaf.
  We need full international participation in this effort because Iraq 
is not a prize to be won, it is a burden to be shared, and both 
taxpayers and our military should be sharing that burden with the rest 
of the world rather than exclusively having the United States shoulder 
it. There ought to be a condition for any money that is appropriated, 
specifically allocated or authorized by Congress.
  Second, another way that it is partial, it does not pay respect to 
domestic needs. The President has said that his tax cuts are a higher 
priority than building schools that could be built with $87 billion. He 
needs to rethink that.
  Third, how it is partial, and this is perhaps long term for our 
children's benefit, the thing it lacks is it simply is not paying for 
this obligation. It seeks to borrow from our children money to pay for 
this operation. It borrows from the Social Security to pay for this 
operation. We have heard about the lockbox, and it is not a lockbox. It 
is pulling in Social Security to pay for this obligation.
  Why does the President not want to pay for this? We should pay for 
it. Winston Churchill said all I have to offer is blood, sweat, toil 
and tears. This administration says while we have a war overseas, it 
will be balloons and fruit and candy back home with tax cuts, and now 
they want to continue to pass tax cuts, largely going to wealthy 
members of our society.
  If this is so important to American security, the President ought to 
be bellying up to the bar and asking Americans to recognize this not go 
forward with the tax cuts. That is an obligation that he ought to take 
and he ought to ask Americans to share in that, and he ought to be 
sincere in it and not have this let us be happy and fight a war at the 
same time. It is not the way the greatest generation did it in World 
War II or after World War II, and we ought to rise to that same 
obligation, to the world, and to our prosperity.
  Mr. HOEFFEL. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments from the 
gentleman from Washington (Mr. Inslee). We have also been joined by the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland). I look forward to your comments.
  Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, it is good to be here this evening. I am 
here tonight to say something that for me is kind of difficult to say. 
I believe the President has deceived us, that he has distorted the 
truth, and that he has engaged in false claims which has taken us into 
a war which is daily claiming the lives of our soldiers. The President 
and his administration told us that there was a connection between what 
happened on September 11, 2001, and Iraq, and thus far we have found no 
substantive evidence that such a connection existed.

  The President told us that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and 
that it was necessary for us to engage in a preemptive attack because 
of an imminent attack from Iraq, and thus far no such weapons have been 
found.
  Vice President Cheney said we would be welcomed as liberators, the 
people would consider us their friends; and yet the truth is that on a 
daily basis, young Americans are losing their lives and many more are 
being horribly maimed and injured, disfigured in Iraq.
  The administration told us this would not cost us a lot of money 
because Iraq had lots of oil and as already been mentioned in March, 
Deputy Defense Secretary Wolfowitz told

[[Page H8074]]

the House subcommittee that Iraq could generate $50 billion to $100 
billion of oil revenue over the next to 2 to 3 years. He said we are 
dealing with a country that can finance its own reconstruction and 
relatively soon, and yet the President in total has requested over $150 
billion of our tax dollars to pay for our adventure in Iraq.
  The President said recently that we must provide every benefit to our 
soldiers and protect them in any way possible, and yet tonight as we 
stand here on this floor in the safety of this great hall, young 
Americans are in Iraq wearing vests that do not have the capacity to 
stop bullets. They are wearing cheap vests because we have not spent 
the money necessary to get the highest quality protective vests for our 
soldiers.
  Moms and dads are asking me questions. Wives and sweethearts are 
asking me questions, questions that I cannot answer because this 
administration is unwilling to come forth and tell us what the plan is, 
how long they are going to be there. The President recently asked for 
$87 billion, American tax dollars, and we have heard a lot about that 
over the past few days on radio and television, but the truth is it is 
more than $87 billion because he asked for billions earlier. It is over 
$150 billion. But this $87 billion is three times the amount we are 
spending on homeland security, three times more than we are spending to 
keep our country safe. It is more than we are spending on education and 
homeland security combined.
  In this Congress we are underfunding the No Child Left Behind bill by 
$8 billion. We are underfunding veterans health care by $1.8 billion. 
The President is trying to impose additional costs on our veterans. He 
is asking our veterans to pay $15 a prescription, up from $7 a 
prescription. He is wanting to impose a $250 annual enrollment fee so 
that many of our veterans can participate in the VA health care system.


                Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. King of Iowa). The Chair would remind 
all Members to refrain from improper references to the President, such 
as accusing him of deception.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, let me say 
that $1.8 billion underfunded does not include the fact that this 
administration, within the past year, has denied access to health care 
benefits that this Congress in 1996 mandated for all veterans.

                              {time}  2310

  Now we have a situation where the administration is encouraging no 
outreach, do not tell. They have a do-not-tell policy.
  Mr. STRICKLAND. They have a gag order. They have a gag order. They 
have instructed their doctors and social workers and nurses who work in 
our VA hospitals, they have told them they cannot participate in 
community health fairs.
  They cannot send out newsletters informing our veterans of the 
services they are entitled to receive. They cannot make public service 
announcements informing the veterans of what this Congress has provided 
them under the law.
  We are willing to spend money in Iraq but we are not willing to take 
care of our veterans. In my judgment it is shameful what we are doing 
to our veterans.
  Then they decided that they were going to create a new category of 
veteran. We call them Priority 8 veterans. You can make as little as 
$25,000 and this administration considers you high income. And they say 
you cannot enroll in VA health care. You can be a combat decorated 
veteran and be excluded.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. I think that is so important to repeat. And we should 
say it slowly so that those in the viewing audience hear it clearly. 
And I would challenge any member of this branch to come forward and 
rebut it. If you earn over $25,000 and are a combat veteran, and you 
are described as a Priority 8 veteran, and understand there are 
hundreds of thousands that fall within that classification, you cannot 
enroll in a veterans health care program in this country. That is more 
than shameful; it is unconscionable.
  We sent these young and women to war, and when they come back, we 
dishonor them, we disrespect them.
  Mr. STRICKLAND. And we are talking about if we had an additional $1.8 
billion, we could include those veterans. We are quibbling over $1.8 
billion when we are being asked to approve $87 billion for Iraq. It is 
beyond belief.
  Mr. INSLEE. Is it a fair statement that under the policies of this 
administration that they have advocated as far as their budget that the 
veterans system that was in existence when these soldiers and sailors 
went to Iraq, when they come back from their extended tours, which are 
now being extended to the surprise of many, will come back to a 
veterans system that is less beneficial and less protective than when 
they left?
  Mr. STRICKLAND. Absolutely.
  Mr. Speaker, I got a letter from a young West Point graduate. He 
graduated from West Point just literally a few months ago. He is in 
Baghdad tonight. He wrote me about 2 months ago. He said, Congressman, 
they are issuing two kinds of vests here, one is capable of stopping 
bullets, the other is only capable of stopping fragments. And my men 
are wondering why they have the cheap vests.
  We took months to build up to the engagement in this conflict. We had 
plenty of time to make sure that every need that our soldiers may face 
in terms of equipment was available for them. It disturbs me that there 
may be young Americans tonight whose lives are unnecessarily in danger 
because this government has not provided them with the best possible 
protection.
  That really disturbs me. It ought to disturb everyone who serves in 
this Chamber, everyone who serves in the Senate and certainly it ought 
to disturb the President.
  Mr. INSLEE. It would disturb anyone who has gone to Bethesda Naval 
Hospital, as I have, and have talked to the Marines who have lost limbs 
and who have had crushing injuries of lifetime disability, to think 
that they are going to have less effective and comprehensive medical 
care than existed before they started this battle. That is not what 
they ought to be fighting for. It also seems to me to be appropriate 
for this administration to throw overboard its predilection for 
unilateralism, this desire to go it alone, this kind of macho policy of 
not allowing anyone else to be an ally with you, to bring other people 
involved in this effort, not just American GIs and Marines. Because the 
success of this mission depends on winning the respect of the Iraqi 
people, and winning the respect of the Iraqi people for whatever new 
government is formed is going to be more enhanced if we get more people 
from around the community internationally to be involved in this effort 
additionally sharing this burden.
  I may add, too, the injuries are truly severe. We cry and we pray 
over those who have not come home, but we have got a very high 
proportion of very severe injuries from this, in part because of the 
magnificent trauma care that we have now developed, at least at the 
scene of the battle. These kids deserve a veterans plan that is going 
to treat them as well as their fathers and their grandfathers were 
treated and better.
  That is not happening right now and is a symptom of this 
administration's addiction to these tax cuts on an altar that is higher 
than any other human value, including veterans health care, and it is 
wrong. During this debate about this $87 billion, we should make sure 
that this issue is addressed, too, and not swept under the rug.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. I cannot agree more. There has to be, as a 
precondition, serious consideration of this supplemental budget request 
for $87 billion and an honest and sincere effort to restore the $1.8 
billion, $2 billion, whatever that number be, to provide those veterans 
the kind of services that they are entitled to and that they defended 
this country so bravely to secure for future veterans.
  While we are talking for a moment about the military, it was the 
Congressional Budget Office that identified a looming problem. In 
March, we will have to start withdrawing most of our troops in Iraq if 
we want to maintain an acceptable level of military readiness. That is 
on the horizon. As the gentleman from Washington indicates, I do not 
see other nations rushing to provide a coalition, a genuine coalition 
that will provide the kind of security and stability that is necessary 
for the reconstruction of Iraq. I am sure many in the audience and 
those of you here

[[Page H8075]]

tonight have noted in the most recent edition of Time magazine on the 
cover, Are We Stretched Too Thin? I daresay if you listen to General 
Schwarzkopf, if you listen to our military leaders who will speak in 
private, they will say we are stretched very, very, very thin. And here 
we are, contemporaneously with addressing this issue, we are now in the 
process of discussions that we cannot predict how they will go relative 
to the threat of a nuclear North Korea.

                              {time}  2320

  Some statements have been made by members of this administration that 
the military option has not been removed from the table. What are we 
talking about?
  Mr. INSLEE. If the gentleman will yield, I think it is very important 
that the gentleman points out about the difficulty of perhaps having to 
bring folks home because we are stretched thin beginning in March, and 
the reason that is important is it points out a fundamental truth that 
the administration has refused to share with the American people. They 
have not leveled with the American people on one fundamental truth, and 
that is the first 60 or $65 billion that was allocated was just a down 
payment. This second $87 billion is a second of many installments. We 
have already heard talk about another $30 billion to $60 billion 
following this one. This could lead to a significant restructuring of 
the entire U.S. military by increasing the number of troops to deal 
with this rotational need of our military.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Let me ask the gentleman, does this mean that at some 
point in the future, if we continue to have a foreign policy that 
creates these significant needs for military personnel, that some day 
on the floor of this House we will be debating the necessity for a 
draft?
  Mr. STRICKLAND. I think so.
  Mr. INSLEE. That is the $64,000 question.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. It is time to ask these kinds of questions.
  Mr. INSLEE. The gentleman points out something that I think is 
important and that is that the President needs to level with the 
American people about the real cost of this.
  Now, right now we have volunteers suffering the real cost of this war 
with loss of life and limb; but our children have a real cost they are 
enduring too, a Federal deficit that has gone over $500 billion this 
year with this additional $87 billion, the highest deficit in American 
history; and that is a real cost that the President, if he wants to 
show real leadership, would level with the American people about and 
say that we need to pay for, rather than hiding the cost and playing a 
fiscal shell game and putting that on our children.
  The only way to level with the American people is for him to throw 
aside at least some of the tax cuts, at least the additional tax cuts 
that he wants to give to the wealthiest folks in this country. If he 
believes the security interests of the United States demands that, then 
honesty to our children demands that and honesty about the true cost of 
war.
  That is why I believe when this debate starts, it is going to be very 
important for the U.S. Congress to condition any funds that are 
appropriated on making sure that it is paid for by us and not shucked 
off on the backs of our children as further deficit spending, as this 
administration has been wont to do, as it is necessary to condition 
this money on something that is going to be a requirement for success, 
and that is to get the rest of the world involved in this effort. It is 
the only way to win the Iraqis' respect for our ultimate efforts.
  Mr. HOEFFEL. The gentleman has made several very good points, and he 
has been talking about the notion of whether or not the President is 
leveling with the American people.
  I would like to get back to an earlier discussion. A suggestion was 
made by one of us this evening that the President was deceitful and we 
were admonished by the Chair that was not appropriate language. None of 
us are here to challenge the Chair. We are here to ask for the truth 
and ask questions about our policies in Iraq.
  I would like to review the bidding a little, to set this question in 
some context, whether or not the President has been deceitful.
  The President and his top advisers in the fall of 2002 said with 
complete certainty that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, 
was developing more weapons of mass destruction, was developing a 
chemical weapons of mass destruction program, a biological weapons of 
mass destruction program, and was probably moving forward to try to 
restart a nuclear weapons of mass destruction program, long before the 
State of the Union address this past January. I am speaking now of 
September 2002.
  In private briefings many of us received at the White House the same 
representations were made: complete certainty that the weapons of mass 
destruction program in Iraq was in full bloom and full speed ahead 
with, as I think the gentleman said, hundreds of tons of these weapons 
in the possession of Saddam Hussein, more on the way.
  The briefing I attended with maybe 15 of our colleagues was led by 
George Tenet and Condoleezza Rice in the Roosevelt Room of the White 
House. In their presentations and in their answers to questions from 
Members of Congress, a bipartisan group of us, complete certainty was 
expressed. At one point, Mr. Tenet, being asked would you rate on a 
scale of zero to 10 your certainty about the presence of these weapons 
in Iraq, he said 10.

  Mr. STRICKLAND. Pretty certain.
  Mr. HOEFFEL. It is not just that we have not found those weapons. 
Maybe they are there and hidden away, but we sure have not found them 
yet. It is not just we have not found them. It has now come to light 
that the White House was being given classified information by the 
intelligence agencies last fall that was telling the White House that 
there was great uncertainty about the state of Iraq's weapons of mass 
destruction program.
  These then-classified documents, now available in part because the 
White House declassified one to try to prove its case, and the other 
because it is now available for us to read at the Permanent Select 
Committee on Intelligence office, the Defense Intelligence Agency 
report of September 2002 and the National Intelligence Estimate of 
October 2002 are replete with expressions of doubt, uncertainty. I 
remember the phrase ``no credible evidence'' that Hussein had an 
ongoing chemical weapons program.
  None of those doubts were reported to the American people or to 
Congress, none of that uncertainty was expressed; and it is my belief 
that the President exaggerated the threat of weapons of mass 
destruction in the fall of 2002, in the buildup to the war, in order to 
secure public support and congressional support for an authorization of 
war.
  I will yield when I have unloaded my frustrations, which will be in 
just a moment.
  It is my belief that the President misled Congress, and it is my 
understanding from the documents that I have since read that are now 
available to us that were not available to us in the fall of 2002 that 
the White House was well instructed about the doubts and the 
uncertainty from the CIA, the FBI, and the rest of the intelligence 
agencies.
  Now, if it is objectionable to say that on the floor of the House, if 
the Republican leadership does not want to hear that on the floor of 
the House, bring it on. Let us bring it on right here, because this is 
the nub of the argument. This is what we are here to ask about.
  I would be happy to yield to my friend.
  Mr. STRICKLAND. The American people really do not care what word we 
use, but they understand what has happened. They listened to the 
President go on TV and address the national audience. They heard his 
references to a connection between al Qaeda and Iraq and September 11. 
They heard everything that was said about weapons of mass destruction.
  We do not have to pick a particular word. The American people 
understand that the situation that was described for them was an unreal 
situation, and the result is this: we have got thousands of our troops 
in Iraq tonight. They are inadequately protected. We are not providing 
them the best protection possible. We are not. And I challenge anyone 
in this administration to challenge that statement, to tell me that 
they have got the best vests that

[[Page H8076]]

we can buy, to tell me that they are as protected as they possibly can 
be. I do not believe it, based on what I have been told and I think 
what the facts show.
  So I do not want to quibble about what words we may use, but my 
friend has been very accurate. The gentleman has laid out the case as 
it unfolded.
  Now we are being told, well, we are there, so we might as well just, 
oh, get on board and get this over with. I think it is appropriate for 
us to ask whether or not those who are providing leadership are worthy 
of our confidence. Are they competent people? Have they told the truth? 
Can we trust them to make further decisions about what is happening in 
Iraq? Those are the questions that must be answered.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. I think it is important that we stress that this is not 
just Democrats that are posing these questions. This past week on, I 
think it was the ``CBS Early Show,'' someone who understands combat, 
someone who was in war and who is a decorated veteran of the Vietnam 
conflict, Chuck Hagel, Republican from Nebraska, said this: ``The 
administration has done a miserable job of planning the post-Saddam 
Iraq.''

                              {time}  2330

  The administration has done a miserable job of planning the post-
Saddam Iraq. That is Senator Hagel. We all know Senator Hagel. 
Everybody in Congress respects and acknowledges his integrity, but he 
was right too. Maybe we failed in our responsibility collectively. I am 
talking about the House as well as the other branch. Because he pointed 
out that we allowed the administration to treat us like a nuisance. We 
did not ask the questions. Some of us did. But no, in the heat and in 
the vast amount of publicity that was attendant to the President and 
Vice President Cheney and Under Secretary Wolfowitz's natural access to 
the media, people did not ask the tough questions. Well, not this time.
  Mr. STRICKLAND. That is right.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Not this time. We want a plan, and we want all of the 
answers.
  I can remember Secretary Feith coming in front of the Committee on 
International Relations. I asked him, give me just an idea of the costs 
to rebuild Iraq. He said, I do not have any answers.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield on that 
point, precisely on that question, we need an answer as to whether or 
not reports today in the Los Angeles Times are correct that the $87 
billion figure is some $55 billion short of what the administration in 
anonymous leaks are indicating is actually needed, and that the $87 
billion is to take us up until the election; and then somehow, we are 
to magically find $55 billion from supposed allies. The exact quote, as 
a matter of fact, is that according to the Los Angeles Times, they said 
they would ``pressure other countries to come up with the additional 
funds needed to restore security in Iraq and repair its ravaged 
infrastructure.'' And I think everything that has been said tonight is 
indicative of the proposition that has just been made over these past 
few minutes that before we vote on this $87 billion, we have to ask the 
question: Is this actually the number that you are using, even 
internally?
  Mr. DELAHUNT. And does that include the $2 billion necessary for 
veterans health care benefits.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. And that is why we have to have this money 
authorized. That is why we have to have hearings in the Committee on 
Armed Services, the authorization committee. This is not just a 
supplemental bill to be taken to the Committee on Appropriations; this 
Congress needs to authorize the money that is involved in 
reconstruction and security in Iraq, or we are failing in our 
congressional duties.
  Mr. HOEFFEL. Mr. Speaker, would the gentleman explain that for the 
viewers? Would the gentleman explain the point he is making about the 
difference between authorization and appropriation?
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Very quickly, yes. Good point. Just as it is in our 
State legislatures, we have to authorize, that is to say, a committee 
must authorize the expenditure of money before it can be appropriated. 
The subject matter committee, in this instance the Committee on Armed 
Services, must take up the question: Will we authorize the expenditure 
of funds? The Committee on Appropriations may, if they have an 
authorization, appropriate up to or, in some instances, even exceed the 
amount of money that is there, if they can gain the approval of the 
legislature; but that is the object, to have a hearing as to what, in 
fact, should be done. That is to say what is the policy, and then 
attach a money figure to it.
  What we are doing is saying we are going to put money out there and 
then figure out a policy afterwards. What I am saying and I think all 
of us are saying tonight is, let us get the policy down first, and then 
figure out what it costs and then determine whether there is a cost-
benefit ratio to that policy.
  Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, I think there 
is an additional thing we need in addition to the sage comments of the 
gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Abercrombie); we need to stop the 
administration from stealing from the Social Security trust fund to pay 
for this war, and that is what they are telling us they want to do. 
They want to take $87 billion out of the Social Security trust fund to 
pay for this war. And the reason they want to do it is that they refuse 
to let go of their goal of continuing further tax cuts for the 
wealthiest folks in this country, and that is morally, ethically wrong 
to our children. And this Congress has an obligation to our kids to 
stop it right here during this supplemental, and I trust that we are 
making an effort to do that.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Speaker, if I could make a final concluding remark, 
and then I will then defer to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. 
Hoeffel). There was a report today, or rather Monday, in The Washington 
Post that the Secretary of Defense, Mr. Rumsfeld, when he was 
concluding his 4-day trip to Iraq and Afghanistan, complained that 
critics of the Bush administration's Iraq policy are encouraging 
terrorists and complicating the war on terrorism. Give me a break.

  Mr. STRICKLAND. Can I respond to that, please?
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Yes. Give me a break. We are going to ask the question.
  Mr. STRICKLAND. I hope the Secretary never says that in my presence, 
because if he does, I am going to have to challenge him. None of us, 
none of us condone terrorism. In fact, we are here because we are 
concerned that this administration is not adequately waging the war on 
terrorism. ``Osama bin Forgotten'' is out there somewhere planning the 
next attack on this country. The President said he can run, but he 
cannot hide. Well, he ran and he has hidden, and he is planning the 
next attack. And for the Secretary to say such a thing outside the 
country, outside the country I think is grossly unfair and I think the 
Secretary owes this Congress and each of us who have a responsibility 
under the Constitution to represent our constituents and to speak our 
mind as we believe the truth to be, he has no right to make such an 
accusation against any of us.
  Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, if I may dovetail on your disenchantment 
with the total irresponsible comments of the Secretary. He said there 
was al Qaeda in Iraq before our attack on Iraq, and the evidence would 
suggest that was not the case. But as a result, following his efforts 
and his strategy, they are in Iraq and Iraq indeed has been turned into 
a potential breeding ground for terrorism. That is the kind of policy 
we do not want to see continued. This is the kind of mistake we do not 
want to see this administration make again.

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