[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 56 (Wednesday, April 28, 2004)]
[House]
[Pages H2475-H2481]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                               IRAQ WATCH

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Carter). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 7, 2003, the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Inslee) 
is recognized for 60 minutes.
  Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, I have come tonight to discuss the challenge 
for America in the Iraq war. Some may know that a group of my 
colleagues and myself have been discussing this challenge now for 
several months on the floor of the House, once a week. We style this 
the Iraq Watch. The reason we come to the floor, sometimes as late as 
midnight, is that this really is a challenge and it demands that 
Congress be involved and not sit on the sidelines of this issue. This 
issue is too important, it is too deadly, it is too contentious for 
Members of Congress to simply take a pass and have responsibility only 
rest in the executive branch, the President's branch of the United 
States Government. So we have come once a week to talk about how to 
pursue a meaningful, commonsense, successful policy in Iraq. Hopefully 
I will be joined by some colleagues a little later in the evening.
  I would like to start by just giving a background about why this is 
so important and why it is so important for Members of Congress to 
address the Iraq issue and not walk away from it. The answer is simply 
an example many Members of Congress have had, that I have had, of 
visiting a few weeks ago with a family in Bremerton, Washington, who 
the father and the husband was serving in Iraq proudly as a sergeant in 
the United States Army a few months ago. He was involved in a sweep 
mission near the Tigris River. A boat overturned, he went to aid, to 
try to save an Iraqi who was serving in forces with the U.S. Army. 
Unfortunately, he drowned while doing his duty. Like so many others in 
Iraq, a hero.
  We now have lost since the war began 725 Americans, since the capture 
of Saddam Hussein 264 Americans, since May 31, 2003, and the President 
declared that the mission was accomplished, 585 Americans. We have had, 
total wounded, 4,151 Americans, many with very, very severe injuries, 
many which I have visited in Walter Reed and Bethesda.
  Our losses demand that the U.S. Government pursue a policy that is 
not based on half truths but all the truth, not on partial planning but 
full planning, not on a policy based just on wishes and dreams and 
hopes and even faith but based on meaningful plans, strategic decisions 
that are based on the hard realities in Iraq.
  Unfortunately, the truth is, and it is hard to say, that our policy 
in Iraq has not fit the extent of the heroism put

[[Page H2476]]

forth by our proud men and women in Iraq who have served with great 
valor and distinction in extremely trying circumstances.

                              {time}  2100

  Their valor, their professionalism, their integrity has not been 
matched by the Federal Government's decision-making. We are going to 
discuss tonight in several ways why that professionalism in Iraq has 
not been matched by professionalism and wisdom here in Washington, D.C.
  I want to talk about several of those mistakes which have cost us 
grievously. By the way, I want to say one thing up front: these people 
say, well, this is not the 50,000 people we lost in Vietnam. Try 
telling that to the family that I visited and the two kids whose dad 
will never come home. One American life lost due to incompetence, 
neglect, exaggeration, deceit, failure to plan is too many; and that is 
what has happened in Iraq.
  So, if I may, let me address some of the mistakes that our country 
has suffered in Iraq due to failures of this nature.
  Number one, this administration sent into combat, into mortal combat, 
into the lion's den our soldiers and sailors with inadequate security 
protection for themselves. Today as we speak, almost 1 year after the 
President of the United States declared that the mission was 
accomplished, we still do not have armored Humvees in an adequate 
number in Iraq to protect our sons and daughters and husbands and 
wives. That is inexcusable.
  It is inexcusable, because we obviously were going to be involved in 
urban combat going into Iraq. We obviously were going to take RPG, 
rocket-propelled grenades, AK-47s, which can penetrate this tiny little 
thin skin of sheet metal on a Humvee; and we did not, the people who 
were vested in the executive power of the United States Government, did 
not do adequate planning to protect our soldiers and sailors from an 
obvious threat in the dens and warrens of Baghdad, Fallujah, Basra. 
Today they are still not on.
  Why did that happen? You know of the travail and travesty, that we 
sent our soldiers over there without flak vests either. We are now told 
that finally after a year that has been remedied. By why would the 
executive branch of this government send our soldiers and Marines into 
dangerous urban combat without armor to protect them? Why would they do 
that?
  Well, it is because of mistake number two. Mistake number two was the 
one where the executive over and over and over again told us in the 
Congress, told Americans, and apparently believed, for reasons that 
stretch my powers of imagination, that we would be met with nothing but 
rose petals and champagne and the welcome mat from grateful Iraqis for 
occupying their country, and that this country, if you can call it 
that, which is a collection of tribes thrown together after the 
collapse of the Ottoman Empire, would come together in this joyous 
reunion of brotherhood and sisterhood and welcome us with nothing but 
open arms, an occupying army from a Western nation, the greatest 
Western nation and the greatest democracy that has ever lived, but one 
that is totally foreign to Iraq.
  This was wishful thinking at its highest. It was the arrogance at its 
highest of those that did not have a clue what was going on in the 
culture and sent our boys and daughters into this combat without this 
protection; and, as a result, we have lost now hundreds of our finest 
people in this country.
  Now, thankfully, finally, the executive has admitted its mistake and 
they are trying to remedy this issue, and they have now issued these 
contracts trying to put these retrofitted armor plates on our Humvees. 
But it is an example of what happens when an executive makes a war-
power decision based on arrogance. People die. And that is what has 
happened in Iraq, and it is what happens when you make a decision based 
on not understanding the nature of the threat.
  So let me go to mistake number three that still exists today. Now, 
today we had the pleasure of talking to Dr. Condoleezza Rice, who 
finally came and briefed the Democratic Caucus. We think the briefings 
should be bipartisan, because this is a bipartisan challenge and there 
are no Democrats or Republicans in Iraq. There are only Americans.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. If I can interrupt my friend, how many briefings has 
Dr. Rice volunteered up to this point in time to come in and to consult 
and to engage in a discourse and a dialogue with Members of Congress?
  Mr. INSLEE. I could be mistaken, but I do not recall any. The way 
this one happened is she agreed to brief the Republican colleagues, and 
only later as an afterthought, at our request, apparently, offered to 
brief the Democratic colleagues. We have suggested that we have 
bipartisan briefings, because we are in this pickle together, and we 
have suggested this.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. What you are saying is that the President's National 
Security Adviser, who is responsible for coordinating American foreign 
policy, particularly in times of crisis like obviously we find 
ourselves currently in, has not on a single occasion briefed Democratic 
Members of the House of Representatives, at least to your knowledge?
  Mr. INSLEE. That is correct. It is a failure, because we need to be a 
team in this regard.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. I think what is particularly interesting, when we talk 
about consultation, and those that are listening to us this evening, 
members of our group that we call the Iraq Watch, ought to be aware 
that this is a complaint that not only comes from the Democratic side 
of the aisle, but also from Republicans.
  I remember noting a particular quote by Senator Hagel who serves on 
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in describing his perception of 
the consultative process during the course of the debate leading up to 
the war as one which he felt that the White House considered Congress 
as a nuisance.
  Hopefully, hopefully, that attitude will not occur, and conceivably 
we could have some discourse and dialogue with key members of the 
administration such as Dr. Rice on a regular basis.
  I think in all fairness, however, I should note, and those who are 
listening to us this evening, that on a regular basis, the Secretary of 
Defense, Mr. Rumsfeld, has volunteered to come before Members of 
Congress and provide briefings. But I have been particularly 
disappointed with Dr. Rice, who, up until this point in time, has not 
in any way engaged in a conversation with Members of Congress.

  Mr. INSLEE. And we would hope in the future when we do have these 
consultations that we do this in a bipartisan manner, because we have 
to all have the information, Democrat and Republican alike, so we can 
try to fashion the proper response.
  Let me go to the third mistake, if I can, we were talking about. I 
must say after briefings today by Dr. Rice and listening to the 
administration and listening to the press information, this is an error 
that I will next address that still exists in this administration, and 
that is the error that they have a strategic initiative that is based 
on the wishful hopes that there is just a few finite number of 
individuals in Iraq, and that if they are eliminated, this problem is 
going to be solved.
  This administration still looks at Iraq as sort of this virginal, 
potential flower Garden of Eden of democracy that just happens to have 
the Corleone family in it, and if they can just get rid of the Corleone 
family, everything is going to be hunky-dory.
  Listening to Dr. Rice's briefing today, I was astounded to hear that 
things were going so swimmingly in Iraq, that if we just eliminate a 
few more people in Fallujah and maybe a couple in Basra and three in 
Baghdad, things were going to be okay.
  That is the most wildly out-of-touch viewpoint about the challenge 
that we have in Iraq and dooms our policy in Iraq to failure.
  If you think about the administration's theory, their plan, if you 
can call it that, their view is, well, when we get Uday, things are 
going to be okay. We got Uday, and things were not okay. If we get 
Saddam, things are going to be okay. Well, we got Saddam, and we have 
lost 264 Americans since then. Now, if we just get a few people in 
Fallujah, things are going to be okay.
  Well, unfortunately, that is not the situation, because one of the 
most prescient things said was stated by Mr.

[[Page H2477]]

Paul Bremer when he said on January 1, and, I am sorry my quote does 
not have which year, but it holds for any year, he said, ``As long as 
we are here, we are the occupying power.'' It is a very ugly word, but 
it is true: ``As long as we are here.''
  Unfortunately, Mr. Bremer was correct, and that is why this 
administration is wrong not to equip our Army in a way that will make 
it prepared for that type of conflict as long as we are there and to 
develop a strategic effort to recognize that we will be seen as an 
occupying power by a significant portion of that population as long as 
we are there.
  This administration's theory is if we just eliminate a few more 
people, we will no longer be seen as an occupying power, but rather as 
the liberators that we wish to be. It is a policy based on a falsehood 
which is based on mistake number four.
  Mistake number four is that there is one principal rule of warfare, 
that you should not start a war based on falsehood. Unfortunately, that 
is what this executive branch of the United States Government did. If I 
can spend just a few minutes, and then I will yield to the gentleman 
from Massachusetts (Mr. Delahunt) in that regard. That is a significant 
thing to say, but it is, unfortunately, the sad truth.
  On March 17, 2003, the President of the United States, George Bush, 
said, ``Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no 
doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the 
most lethal weapons ever devised.''
  That statement was false, and that statement formed the entire 
foundation of the war that this President initiated, and it was false. 
But, unfortunately, it was not the only falsehood that we heard.
  On March 16, 2003, the day before, the Vice President of the United 
States, Dick Cheney said, ``And we believe he has in fact reconstituted 
nuclear weapons.'' That statement was false, and it was an underlying 
principle of this executive starting this war.
  On March 23, a week later, 2003, Kenneth Adelman, the Defense Policy 
Board member of the executive branch of the government said, ``I have 
no doubt we are going to find big stores of weapons of mass 
destruction.'' That statement was false.
  Now, this administration I think somewhere in the year 2050 will 
still be saying, ``It is out there in the turkey fields somewhere. We 
know it is there.''
  It is now over a year after we have had control of Iraq and have not 
found a single weapon system that this administration started a war 
that cost hundreds of Americans' lives over. Not one. Not an ounce. Not 
a gear. Not a paper. Nothing. This is while our soldiers and sailors 
have paid the ultimate tribute at the behest of the Federal Government.
  On March 30, 2003, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said, ``We 
know where they are,'' referring to weapons of mass destruction. ``They 
are in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad, and east, west, south and 
north somewhat.''
  That statement was false. Unfortunately, these statements were false 
even given the intelligence we had then. We have subsequent to the 
initiation of this war had access, and obviously we will not disclose 
any secure information tonight, but in the public realm, it is clear 
that our intelligence indicated there was lots of doubt, at a minimum, 
what the situation was in Iraq.
  These airplanes that the President told us had been built by Saddam 
to fly over the Atlantic and spray germ warfare over Baltimore and 
Washington, D.C., which is a terrifying prospect, and one if it was 
true we ought to be concerned about, there was only one problem: the 
United States Air Force before the war started, according to published 
accounts, stated that that is not the reason these balsa wood, duct 
tape affairs were put together.

                              {time}  2115

  They were put together, they tried to come up with something they 
could take Polaroid pictures of the enemy. They were not meant for 
spraying germ warfare, and our own intelligence indicated that. But 
that is not what the President told us. It was something else.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Speaker, what I find particularly disturbing, and I 
think that the American people have reached, by a vast majority, the 
conclusion that many of us reached during the course of the debate on 
whether Congress should authorize the executive to attack Iraq 
militarily, and that is the case was never made, never made in terms of 
the existence of weapons of mass destruction. Neither was the case ever 
made in terms of a relationship or linkage between al Qaeda and Saddam 
Hussein, particularly as focused on September 11. There was no 
involvement by the Iraqi regime on September 11, and there never had 
been a significant relationship between al Qaeda and the Saddam Hussein 
regime in Baghdad.
  But what I find even more disturbing is that reluctance of the 
administration to let go of this myth. It is as if they so intensely 
embrace this belief that they are incapable from detaching themselves 
from that belief and accept reality.
  What I thought was particularly striking is that after the so-called 
major combat phase of the Iraq war, as it was announced by the 
President, and the inability of the existing forces to discover weapons 
of mass destruction, he created the so-called Survey Group, the Iraq 
Survey Group headed by a former U.N. inspector who was described as 
hawkish in his views in terms of whether there should have been or 
whether the United States was correct in invading Iraq. His name was 
David Kay. I am sure many of us remember the name, many of those 
watching here tonight remember David Kay. He appeared on a number of 
television programs, wrote opinion pieces in major media outlets, and 
he was selected by the President to head the effort.
  Well, last October he returned to Washington, consulted with 
Congress, consulted with Secretary Rumsfeld and reported that he was 
wrong. In fact, he testified before a Senate committee and made that 
statement which ended up in Newsweek that I believed was refreshing, 
because it reflected a candor and an honesty that has been lacking. And 
he stated passionately that we were all wrong. We were all wrong. Yet, 
as the gentleman from Washington indicated, the President, and 
particularly the Vice President will not let go, wants to create a 
reality that is simply inaccurate, that is false.
  Recently, David Kay stated that the U.S. is in grave danger of 
destroying its credibility at home and abroad if we do not own up to 
the mistakes that we made. We are a proud people. We are a democracy, 
and in a democracy, to move forward we have an opportunity to speak the 
truth, to acknowledge mistakes, and to learn from those mistakes. As I 
said earlier, the Vice President on more than one occasion has been, I 
do not want to say overruled, that is not the right word, but after 
making a statement the President himself has indicated that the 
statement was not accurate.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. DELAHUNT. I yield to my friend, the gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. 
Abercrombie).
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Will the gentleman be interested to know that the 
Wall Street Journal on the 23rd of this month made a report, and I 
quote: ``Before the war, United States companies used French units or 
French go-betweens to sell goods to Iraq. Since the war, French firms 
are using U.S. operations to bid for contracts in Iraq, though it is 
unclear whether they will succeed.''
  The Journal added, ``Between 1998 and 2002, United Nations documents 
show $397 million in sales to Iraq by French units of U.S. companies. 
The sales coincided with the period when the Clinton and Bush 
administrations were increasing pressure on Mr. Hussein, and the 
practice extended well beyond early 2002, when Mr. Bush included Iraq 
in his so-called Axis of Evil.
  Halliburton did tens of millions of dollars of business with Iraq in 
the late 1990s when it was still led by Vice President Cheney. Much of 
that business was done through French units. Mr. Cheney said during the 
2000 election campaign that Halliburton had a policy against trading 
with Iraq. The Halliburton contracts mentioned in the United Nations 
documents involved units and joint ventures that came with the purchase 
of Dresser, Incorporated in 1998.

[[Page H2478]]

  Will the gentleman recall that during the Watergate investigation, 
that Woodward and Bernstein, when they were following through on 
various contacts and leads, that they had reported that it was not 
always that people were lying to them, it was that they were not 
telling the truth. Unless you knew the exact question to ask ahead of 
time, that is to say unless you knew the information and the answers to 
your questions ahead of time, you might actually ask a question in 
which the other party could avoid telling you the truth while not 
absolutely lying to you.
  It may well have been, as Mr. Cheney said, that Halliburton had a 
policy against trading with Iraq, but apparently it did not mean that 
units or subunits of Halliburton located in other nations could do the 
trading for them, thus benefiting and profiting the Halliburton company 
while Mr. Cheney was in charge of it. This is the caliber of the Vice 
President's ability to have any kind of veracity when it comes to 
statements about weapons of mass destruction or anything else having to 
do with whether or not he or his company profited from trading with 
Iraq.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Well, we do know this: we do know that Halliburton, 
according to a CBS report, established a subsidiary with an office in 
the Cayman Islands, and when an investigative team from CBS went to the 
office in the Cayman Islands, do my colleagues know what they found? 
They found a small office without a single person in the office. That 
obviously caused more interest.
  Further investigation revealed that this particular subsidiary of 
Halliburton in fact had an office in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. 
That particular subsidiary was dealing with another member of the so-
called Axis of Evil club: Iran. They were supplying the services and 
the products necessary for Iran to upgrade its oil industry.
  So the conflict, if you will, at least as I see it, and some would 
suggest that it is illegal, that it is a subterfuge that there are on 
the books of the United States Criminal Code laws that would prohibit 
American corporations such as Halliburton from dealing with rogue 
nations. My memory is that the title of the particular legislative 
provisions is called Trading With the Enemy Act. We had sanctions, and 
yet we have Halliburton, a subsidiary of Halliburton trading with Iran; 
Iran who, clearly, if we examine the reports of our own Department of 
State, to a far greater magnitude than anything that Saddam Hussein had 
done in Iraq as far as encouraging terrorists, terrorist organizations, 
that if there was a nation on the planet that sponsored terrorism and 
terrorist organizations, it was in Iran and, at the same time, 
Halliburton was supporting them in terms of the key component of their 
economy.
  Mr. INSLEE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, the gentleman 
has brought up a point with Iran which, unlike Iraq, is developing a 
nuclear program and is a potential threat on a nuclear basis. When I 
was in Israel a couple of years ago talking to the Israeli defense 
force, they were concerned, and rightfully so, I think, about the 
nuclear capabilities of Iran, not Iraq. But the pickle we are now in, 
we are in a situation now where we have difficulty dealing with Iran 
because they have the potential to inflame the Shiite allies they have 
in Iraq to get them whipped up, if you will, and foment violence. Now 
we are in a more difficult position in Iran.
  But I would like to return if I can for just a minute to another 
economic issue, since the gentleman brought up economics.
  There is a fourth mistake this administration has made which has 
severely hampered our effort, and that is this administration has not 
leveled with the American people about what the Iraq war costs, and 
this costs us a giant deficit because the President will not come forth 
and tell the truth about what this is costing the American taxpayer. 
How do I know that? It is real simple.
  The President of the United States sent us a budget, and in the 
budget it is hundreds of pages thick, thousands of numbers, thousands 
of numbers, all kinds of numbers. But there is one number that he did 
not have the willingness to put in his budget so Americans could see 
what it was going to be. That was the cost of the Iraq war.
  Can my colleagues believe it? The President of the United States 
purports to have us adopt a budget, but he leaves out the cost of the 
Iraq war. How could one possibly, with a straight face, leave out 
something that this year is going to cost us at least $100 billion and 
next year probably half to three-quarters of that at least, if not 
more. How with a straight face could he do that, unless he really did 
not want the American people to know how costly this endeavor is?
  This President needs to shoot straight with the American people and 
tell them what it is going to cost, which is hundreds of millions of 
dollars coming out of their April 15 taxes. And if it is worth doing, 
he needs to say so. But this duplicitous thing of trying to fight a war 
on the cheap is wrong.
  Winston Churchill said, ``All I have to offer you is blood, sweat, 
toil, and tears.'' This President said, don't worry, be happy. That is 
not the situation we are in today, and the President needs to belly up 
to the bar and show us how he intends to pay for this instead of 
ballooning the deficit, which is what he is doing, and putting the cost 
of the Iraq war, which is going to go on for years and years on the 
backs of our children, with a $500 billion deficit that he thinks 
Americans are not smart enough to figure out. Well, I think he is 
wrong.

                              {time}  2130

  Mr. INSLEE. I think they know, especially with the deficit, the cost 
of this war; and he is not willing to talk about his tax cuts to pay 
for it because he doesn't want anybody to make a sacrifice in this war 
except the soldiers, sailors, Marines, and Air Force who put their 
lives on the line. They put their lives on the line, George Bush ought 
to put his tax cuts on the line. They know what sacrifice is. And, yet, 
this President won't shoot straight with the American people to show 
how to pay for this war.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield for a moment. 
I do not want the audience or whoever may be watching us have this 
conversation tonight to perceive this simply to be a one-sided partisan 
attack on the White House because that would be a distorted view of our 
purpose and our intent.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Would the gentleman yield on that point? I just read 
something from the Wall Street Journal, an investigative report of the 
Wall Street Journal. I hardly think that the Wall Street Journal can be 
called a tool of the Democratic Party.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. I concur with that, but let me read something from The 
Washington Post of last week.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Would the gentleman yield again? The Washington 
Post, which has editorially supported the war in Iraq.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. That is accurate.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Let us just keep right on with what we are doing 
here. We are analyzing the situation in which American troops are in 
harm's way and any accusation that this has anything to do with 
Republicans or Democrats is not only entirely beside the point, but 
undermines the dialogue and discussion that has to take place when we 
are in a situation of war.
  As the gentleman well knows, this Member has disagreed publicly and 
privately with the President of the United States when it was Bill 
Clinton and it was a Democrat. This gentleman, I can tell you, has 
never taken a position on the basis of who was President of the United 
States, but rather what the position of the United States should be in 
the consul of world powers in terms of the peace and welfare of the 
planet and the United States' role in it. Whether it is a Democratic 
President or a Republican President, we have to be accountable.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. I think we have to acknowledge that there are 
Republican Members of this House and the other body that say it like it 
is, that speak the truth, that are not hesitant to take on a President 
of their own party.
  Let me just read to you a statement that was attributed to the vice 
chair of the House Committee on Armed Services on which you serve, the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Weldon), a Republican, from 
Pennsylvania. He charged that ``the President is playing political 
games by postponing further funding requests until after the election 
to try to avoid reopening debate on the war's cost and future. Weldon

[[Page H2479]]

described the administration's current defense budget request as 
outrageous and immoral and said that at least $10 billion is needed for 
Iraqi operations over the next 5 months.'' There needs to be a 
supplemental whether it is a Presidential election year or not.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Would the gentleman yield? I serve as the ranking 
member on the subcommittee of the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. 
Weldon). And I can tell my colleague that back in the time of President 
Clinton's administration when the Kosovo and Bosnia issues were there, 
I was privileged to go with the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. 
Weldon) and other Members in a joint Democratic and Republican 
congressional delegation to the area because of disagreements we had in 
the way we were conducting both our foreign policy and military 
operations there.
  The gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Weldon), I believe, is also a 
supporter of the fact that we went to war with Iraq. So his admonitions 
here are based on his perceptions, I am certain, serving as his ranking 
member and counting myself as among his good and personal friends in 
this body. I have deep affection and respect for him both personally 
and as a colleague in this body.
  If he is making these statements, he is making them because he 
believes as a supporter of this war effort that this is, in fact, in 
the interest of the troops and the interest of the Nation.
  So this is something that is not partisan in nature. This is 
something that has to be addressed by all of us as our responsibility 
of one of 435 people in this body representing the interests of this 
Nation.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Let me note that the Senate chair of the foreign 
relations committee, who we all know and respect, Senator Lugar, along 
with the ranking member, Senator Biden, urged the administration to be 
more forthcoming about its strategy for returning Iraq to the control 
of its people. And, again, this is from an article last Wednesday from 
The Washington Post: ``The Bush administration has sometimes failed in 
the past to communicate its Iraq plans and cost estimates to Congress 
and the American people, Lugar said, and must recognize that its 
domestic credibility on Iraq will have a great impact on its efforts to 
succeed.''
  Mr. INSLEE. Would the gentleman yield? He said something that really 
triggered a thought, and it is disappointing. He said, ``The 
administration needs to be more forthright to tell us its plan.'' Well, 
I have some really bad news for the American people tonight: there was 
not a plan for the security of Iraq the week before the invasion, there 
was not a plan for the security of Iraq the week after the invasion, 
there was not a plan for the security of Iraq when the President 
declared the mission accomplished in May, 2003, and there is not a plan 
for the security of Iraq tonight that has a good chance of success.
  Now, why do I say that? And this is very, very frustrating to me. 
Because 7 days before the invasion of Iraq, we, on a bipartisan basis 
in several meetings, begged the administration to show us the plan for 
the security of Iraq after the Iraqi Army folded, which we knew was 
going to happen at some point. And the administration officials 
essentially said a week before the invasion, we are giving serious 
thought to that.

  Well, I just do not think that is good enough. And that is one of the 
reasons Iraq exploded into looting because the President did not listen 
to General Shinseki when he told him, and this is the fifth mistake, 
that we need hundreds of thousands of boots on the ground to prevent 
Iraq from going up in flames after the Iraqi Army collapses.
  And our soldiers today, tonight in Fallujah are paying the price for 
that mistake, that we did not have enough boots on the ground the day 
after the Iraqi Army collapsed. And we continue to suffer as a result 
of that.
  Now, why did that happen? Again, the deadliest kind of plans in 
warfare are those based on wishful thinking. And this plan, if you 
could call it that, from day one has been based on fallacious, false, 
wishful thinking. It is wishful thinking about the amount of troops we 
are going to have to have, it was wishful thinking about what type of 
armor we are going to have to have, it was wishful thinking about how 
much it was going to cost, it was wishful thinking about whether we 
would find the weapons of mass destruction, it was wishful thinking 
that once we got rid of Saddam Hussein there would no longer be an ally 
of al Qaeda.
  Al Qaeda is in Iraq. They are in there now, al Qaeda is in Iraq big 
time now. They may not have been there before the war; but, by gum, we 
made it a great place for them to do business today, and they are 
there.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Can I use another word? My colleague said ``wishful 
thinking.'' Let me be very clear. What we are talking about here is 
competence or incompetence, and we are not talking about the military 
who, clearly, have performed professionally, heroically, and deserve 
our praise and deserve our support. But what we are talking about is 
the civilian leadership at the Pentagon and this administration and 
this Presidency.
  Let me just for one minute, if I can, here we are now talking about 
whether there should be a supplemental budget. And recently a colleague 
of ours, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards), visited Iraq and 
returned in the latter part of March and had private conversations with 
the generals in charge of the post-combat phase, if you will, according 
to the President. And they informed him that if there was not a 
supplemental, there would be serious problems confronting the American 
military.
  Again, in a recent story, a recent report, dated April 21, so that is 
last Wednesday, this is what is happening. Let us be very clear, we 
have heard again and again colleagues stand up and talk about the 
inadequate protection being provided to American troops, whether it be 
vests, whether it be unarmored Humvees. So to make it up, here is what 
is happening. According to this report, the military is scrambling to 
fill its needs. The Pentagon last week diverted 120 armored Humvees 
purchased by the Israeli defense forces to Iraq. Yesterday, the Army 
announced a $110 million contract for still more armored Humvees. This 
is incompetence. That is what this is about. It is not just about 
credibility; it is about incompetence.
  An unreal expectation that the numbers of troops that would be 
necessary in May of 2003 and 3 months thereafter would be 30,000. And, 
yet, the Under Secretary of Defense, Mr. Wolfowitz, in a very derisive 
way when asked about the estimate that was given to the Senate by 
General Shinseki of 200,000 troops, said it was wildly off the mark. 
Well, Mr. Wolfowitz, now you are scrambling, and now we have American 
military personnel at risk.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. If the gentleman would yield, both he and the 
gentleman from Washington (Mr. Inslee) have made the point over the 
last several minutes that a lack of planning, a lack of clear-sighted 
planning has brought us to the present path.
  I would like to cite an article in The Washington Post for summary 
purposes made just yesterday. At the confirmation hearing before the 
Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, where Mr. John Negroponte, Mr. 
Bush's nominee to be ambassador to Iraq, was being questioned, the 
summary in the story by Walter Pincus and Colum Lynch is as follows: 
``Panel members expressed confidence in Negroponte while voicing 
skepticism that the United States had a clear enough strategy in place 
for Iraq.''
  Let me be a little more specific, specific in the words of Mr. 
Negroponte with respect to his assuming the ambassadorship in Iraq and 
planning for what is going to happen to our troops and what is going to 
happen to Iraq in terms of its sovereignty: Under questioning by 
Senator Hagel, Republican of Nebraska, when asked what would happen if 
there was disagreement between Iraqi authorities and the United States 
military over how to handle a situation similar to the unrest in 
Fallujah, that would require, ``a real dialogue between our military 
commanders, the new Iraqi government, and, I think, the United States 
mission as well,'' Negroponte said. Think about that. Can you imagine a 
combat situation such as is faced right now in Fallujah. It has nothing 
to do with the competence or incompetence of the United States 
military; it has everything to do with the competence or incompetence 
of the political policies that put the military in that situation.

[[Page H2480]]

  We are now faced with circumstances in which military action becomes 
the political policy, that in order to support the political policy, 
you have to support military action, whatever it might be.
  Going on, in the end, however, Negroponte said, ``The U.S. military 
is going to have the freedom to act in their self-defense, and they are 
going to be free to operate in Iraq as they best see fit.'' Operate in 
their self-defense.
  Mr. Negroponte, perhaps unconsciously, recognizes we are not on the 
offense.

                              {time}  2145

  We are not accomplishing any mission. What we are saying is, what I 
have said on this floor, that on June 30, the United States military is 
going to set adrift in a desert sea of political anarchy where our 
military action will be self-defense. Is that what we are sentencing 
the United States military to? A daily round of defending itself? For 
what? Under what circumstances can we justify the continued presence of 
the United States military if their sole military purpose according to 
the ambassador nominee to Iraq is to defend themselves?
  Continuing, what is more, he said, Iraqi military forces ``will come 
under the unified command of a U.S.-led multinational force. Negroponte 
emphasized the interim government will not need law-making authority 
because it will just have two prime functions: running 25 government 
ministries and preparing for next year's election of a transitional 
national assembly. Among the most sensitive aspect of the U.S. 
transition plan has been what has been called the transitional 
administration law devised by the United States and its appointed Iraq 
governing council.''
  At the White House yesterday, Mr. Scott McClellan, the press 
secretary, told reporters, and I am quoting from the article ``that an 
annex to the transitional law is being written that will limit the 
interim government's power.''
  Mr. DELAHUNT. I am sure the Iraqi people will welcome that.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. ``Iraqis have made it clear they want limits on the 
authority of the interim government,'' Mr. McClellan said.
  We are in a situation where presumably authority is being transferred 
the 30th of June to an interim Iraqi government when we are writing an 
annex, which is a fancy word for saying we are writing an addendum, we 
are adding another codicil, another provision of this transitional law.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. A secret agreement.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. They are still writing it. Because, as Mr. 
Negroponte said in responding to a question about the annex by Senator 
Dodd, a Democrat of Connecticut, Mr. Negroponte said he had not been 
briefed on it. ``I am just not at the moment clued in as to the 
discussion about the annex.''
  This is the gentleman who by June 30 is supposed to take over in 
Iraq. It cannot be more clear the stumbling and the bumbling that has 
taken place to this point.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. And the incompetence.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. And the incompetence that has taken place up to this 
point is to continue.
  How is it possible that the ambassador designee says, I am not clued 
in, even on the most fundamental addition to the transitional authority 
law that will set the circumstances and boundaries for how the United 
States military, let alone its diplomatic function, is to take place in 
a presumably sovereign Iraq?
  Mr. INSLEE. I do not think the Iraqi new ``sovereign,'' whatever they 
are, should feel badly because our Secretary of State did not find out 
about the war until the ambassador of Saudi Arabia did first.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Prince Bandar.
  Mr. INSLEE. Prince Bandar, who learned about it before our Secretary 
of State. So the fact that we told the Saudis, the President of the 
United States shared with the Saudi Government, a foreign government, 
our war plan, that the war was going to start before he told the 
Secretary of State, the Iraqis should not feel too bad if we do not 
clue them to who the next government will be that we choose.
  Let us be honest about this. This is what we are asking and 
suggesting to the President in a very, very difficult situation. And I 
do not envy that position of dealing with Iraq as President of the 
United States. But the first order of business ought to be truth. And 
this operation from day one has been built on the shifting sands of 
deception, exaggeration, failure, and simply not shooting straight.
  Now he needs to be straight with the world and the Iraqis. What 
happens on June 30 is not going to be a sovereign government. And the 
reason it is not going to be a sovereign government is because the only 
force capable of doing anything in Iraq is the United States military. 
And he is fooling himself if he thinks that is going to fool the 
American people or the Iraqi people or the world. And we need to be 
straight about this that this is a multi-year situation the mess we are 
about.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. We have already had the evidence of that. It has been 
demonstrated very, very clearly.
  I remember the Secretary of Defense speaking to the fact that there 
was some 70,000 Iraqi security forces. Well, the truth is that there 
were about 3,000 of them that had actually received some 2 weeks of 
training. That is not being honest and forthcoming with the Congress of 
the United States and the American people. And then we learn during 
their first encounter about one in every 10 of Iraq security forces 
actually work against U.S. troops during the recent militia violence in 
Iraq, and an additional 40 percent walked off the job because of 
intimidation, the commander of the first armored division said 
Wednesday, and that is Major General Martin Dempsey.

  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. I want to point out that that story is in the 
Washington Times. Again, if someone wants to think that this is a 
partisan situation, everyone knows the Washington Times is in favor of 
this war, that the Washington Times represents itself to be a 
conservative voice. This is a report from the Washington Times.
  Mr. DELAHUNT. Well, speaking about where conservatives are, and again 
I think it is extremely important for us because we acknowledge that we 
are Democrats, but there is a growing opinion on the part of all 
Americans from whatever political perspective that they hold that the 
credibility that we see is dissipating now, as well as the competence 
in the planning has been a failure.
  Let me read something from a highly regarded national conservative 
leader by the name of Clyde Prestowitz. This was a column that appeared 
in my hometown paper, the Boston Globe. And more and more traditional 
conservative voices in this country are echoing these sentiments. And 
this White House and this administration should listen very carefully 
to the traditional Republican conservatives in this country who will 
voice similar concerns and doubts as we do here on a once-a-week basis.
  ``For a moment during the spring, neoconservatives associated with 
the Bush administration thought they had died and gone to heaven. The 
quicker than expected fall of Saddam Hussein seemed to justify their 
vision of a new America that would reshape world politics. The United 
States would use its overwhelming military power to crush tyrannical 
regimes, they declared, and establish American-style capitalist 
democracies in their place. Domestically, the neocons only question was 
whether the tax cuts aimed at reshaping American society would be 
merely big or gigantic. As time passes, however, it has become 
increasingly clear that this course is neither neo nor conservative and 
that it may lead more quickly to hell than to heaven.
  ``This is not the foreign policy agenda traditional conservatives 
like myself voted for in 2000. Concerned about growing anti-American 
feeling around the world, we were pleased when candidate Bush spoke of 
adopting a humbler attitude in foreign policy and of reducing U.S. 
overstretch abroad. We also anticipated that a new Bush administration 
would embrace long-standing conservative values such as smaller 
government, fiscal responsibility, tax cuts carved with a goal of 
balancing budgets, strong protection of individual rights, and support 
of healthy State and local governments.''
  I dare say that that is an opinion that is being echoed among 
conservatives of both parties. Recently, there was a similar piece, I 
will not take the

[[Page H2481]]

time because I know we are getting towards the end, that appeared in 
the New York Times. But I would commend those that are watching us this 
evening to go to the April 9 edition of the New York Times and read a 
piece by David Kirkpatrick entitled ``Lack of Resolutions in Iraq Find 
Conservatives Divided.''
  Mr. INSLEE. We have only got a minute or two and if the gentleman 
from Hawaii (Mr. Abercrombie) would like to finish just briefly? Let me 
wrap up if I can.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. I am delighted to have the gentleman wrap up.
  Mr. INSLEE. I am sure the country will appreciate that.
  First off, I want to make sure people understand what we have been 
talking about tonight has been very well documented. The Web site that 
is indicated before the podium here indicates where you can check out, 
anybody that is listening this evening can check out the factual 
statements that we have talked about. You will find 247 misstatements 
of fact by this administration about Iraq that are documented in this 
government Web site by the House Committee on Government Reform due to 
the good efforts of the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman). Anyone 
can check that out.
  In conclusion, let me wrap up. What we were saying tonight is a 
theme. We believe this is an extremely challenging situation for 
America in Iraq. We believe our soldiers and sailors, Air Force 
personnel, men and women, are doing an exemplary job in Iraq under 
extremely trying circumstances; and anyone who has talked to them will 
agree with that. But we believe it is high time for the administration, 
for the President of the United States, for the Vice President of the 
United States, for the Secretary of Defense to stop basing an Iraq 
policy on wishful thinking and exaggeration.
  They need to adopt the policy to the number of troops based on 
realism rather than rose-tinted glasses. They need to adopt a policy on 
how much it will cost based on hard-headed fiscal reality, rather than 
hiding the ball from the American people. They need to adopt a policy 
on the armor that recognizes how severe this problem is with security 
in Iraq, and starting to tell the truth to the American people is a 
good way to start to figure out a way out of Iraq.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Mr. Speaker, it remains for us to thank you for your 
patience and forbearance tonight. I believe at this opportunity we can 
indicate to our colleagues and to those watching us and participating 
with us tonight on C-SPAN broadcasts, these very valuable Special 
Orders that the House prepares to enable Members to speak to the 
broader American audience and elsewhere across the country. Thank you 
and thank them.
  At this time, pending our next session of Iraq Watch, we would move 
to adjourn the House.

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