[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 160 (Thursday, November 6, 2003)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E2266]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




        IRAQ RECONSTRUCTION IS A NOBLE CAUSE THAT MUST NOT FAIL

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. MICHAEL G. OXLEY

                                of ohio

                    in the house of representatives

                       Thursday, November 6, 2003

  Mr. OXLEY. Mr. Speaker, I recommend to my colleagues the following 
column by the distinguished commentator Morton M. Kondracke in the 
November 6 edition of Roll Call. Mr. Kondracke has eloquently stated 
the stakes facing all of us in Iraq. His incisive and knowledgeable 
commentary should be read by all.

                     [From Roll Call, Nov. 6, 2003]

         Iraq Reconstruction Is a Noble Cause That Mustn't Fail

                        (By Morton M. Kondracke)

       In January 1946, seven months after V-E Day, the eminent 
     novelist John DosPassos wrote after a trip to Europe that 
     U.S. servicemen were telling him, ``We've lost the peace. We 
     can't make it stick.''
       In an article in Life magazine, he wrote that ``A tour of 
     the beaten-up cities of Europe . . . is a mighty sobering 
     experience. Europeans, friend and foe alike, look you 
     accusingly in the face and tell how bitterly they are 
     disappointed in you as an American.
       ``They cite the evolution of the word `liberation.' Before 
     the Normandy landings, it meant to be freed from the tyranny 
     of the Nazis. Now it stands in the minds of the' civilians 
     for one thing: looting.''
       If this sounds familiar in the aftermath of the Iraq war, 
     it goes on: ``Instead of coming in with a bold plan of relief 
     and reconstruction, we came in full of evasions and 
     apologies. . . . We have swept away Hitlerism, but a great 
     many Europeans feel that the cure has been worse than the 
     disease.''
       It was another year after this article was written before 
     Secretary of State George Marshall delivered his celebrated 
     speech at Harvard University launching the Marshall Plan for 
     European relief.
       By contrast, Congress gave final approval this week, six 
     months after the Iraq war, to the contemporary version of the 
     Marshall Plan: the $20 billion downpayment on Iraqi 
     reconstruction. At that, reconstruction was already under 
     way.
       We succeeded grandly in Europe in one of the most generous 
     and idealistic--and also pragmatic--undertakings in American 
     history.
       Prior to America's making the effort, DosPassos noted, 
     Winston Churchill made a speech in which he warned Americans, 
     ``You must be prepared for further efforts of mind and body 
     and further sacrifices to great causes, if you are not to 
     fall back into the rut of inertia, the confusion of aim and 
     the craven fear of being great.''
       It's sad that we don't have a Churchill around to affirm 
     the morality of what America is doing in Iraq: We have 
     toppled a monstrous dictator and we are trying to rebuild his 
     shattered country, turn it into a democracy and make it an 
     example to a region that knows only authoritarianism and 
     despotism.
       It is a noble cause that President Bush has undertaken. His 
     adversaries at home and abroad say that he got us into it by 
     deception, but what could possibly have been his motive?
       The ``war for oil'' charge is simply laughable. The ``war 
     for politics'' charge--that it was done to help Republicans--
     is outrageous.
       The ``war for ideology'' analysis makes more sense--i.e., 
     that ``neo-conservatives'' in Bush's administration wanted to 
     topple Saddam Hussein from Day One. But why did they want to 
     do so, if they didn't think he represented a menace to U.S. 
     security?
       Bush's Democratic foes are charging that Bush trumped up 
     evidence of Hussein's possession of weapons of mass 
     destruction. But the fact is that every intelligence 
     service in the world believed he had them--how else could 
     Bush have won a unanimous vote at the U.N. Security 
     Council to give Hussein one final chance to account for 
     them?
       How and why the United States got into the war in the first 
     place will be hashed out for the rest of this presidential 
     campaign and beyond, but the important thing now is to win 
     the peace.
       Whatever their differences on whether the war should have 
     been fought or how the peace is being won, even Bush's 
     harshest foes ought to admit that what he's undertaking is an 
     idealistic enterprise.
       If Democrats are proud of America's intervention in Kosovo 
     and remorseful of our failure to intervene to prevent 
     genocide in Rwanda, how can they not support an effort to 
     establish democracy in Iraq?
       Moreover, what Bush is doing is not only Wilsonian, it's 
     also pragmatic. In 1946, the danger was that if America 
     failed in Europe, Russia would take over. In 2003, if the 
     United States fails, Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden 
     succeed.
       There's no question that the effort is going to be 
     difficult--or even that Bush miscalculated the difficulties 
     and didn't plan well enough for them.
       But contrary to the charge that he ``has no plan,'' he 
     plainly does now. As stated by U.S. Iraq Administrator Paul 
     Bremer, it is to (1) ``establish a secure environment by 
     taking direct action against terrorists . . . and restore 
     urgent and essential services to the country, (2) expand 
     international cooperation in the security and reconstruction 
     and (3) accelerate the orderly transition to self-government 
     by the Iraqis.''
       Can this be brought off? The jury is very much out. Our 
     forces and Iraqis who side with us are under constant attack, 
     at least in Sunni-dominated areas of the country. The 
     international community--ever so solicitous of Iraqi 
     citizens' welfare under economic sanctions--either wants us 
     to fail or has been scared off by bombings.
       The vast majority of Iraqis clearly want stability and 
     self-rule. For our sake and for theirs, it's imperative that 
     we stay the course and do this right--and not allow vicious 
     killers to force us out too early.
       It would be a catastrophe, both for the Iraqis who are 
     working with us and for our standing in the world, if this 
     effort were to fail. Fortunately, polls indicate that most 
     Americans want to stay the course. It's time for Bush's 
     critics to quit just carping and contribute constructive 
     ideas on how to make this effort succeed. If it does, all of 
     us will be very proud.

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