[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 32 (Tuesday, March 14, 2006)]
[Senate]
[Page S2124]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. SANTORUM:
  S. 2408. A bill to require the Director of National Intelligence to 
release documents captured in Afghanistan or Iraq during Operation 
Desert Storm, Operation Enduring Freedom, or Operation Iraqi Freedom; 
to the Select Committee on Intelligence.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I rise today to offer remarks on 
legislation that I am introducing today here in the Senate.
  This legislation concerns the need to release military documents and 
photographs recovered in Iraq and Afghanistan. Specifically, the bill 
requires the Director of National Intelligence to make publicly 
available on an Internet website documents captured in Afghanistan or 
Iraq during Operation Desert Storm, Operation Enduring Freedom, or 
Operation Iraqi Freedom.
  In my conversations with President Bush and Secretary of Defense 
Rumsfeld, I urged that efforts to examine these documents and 
photographs be accelerated. With U.S. and Coalition forces actively 
engaged in Iraq, the analysis and release of these documents should be 
made a top priority within the Department of Defense.
  Recently, I gave a speech at the Valley Forge Military Academy in 
Pennsylvania concerning ongoing military operations in Iraq and 
detailed why we must prevail. In my speech, I noted that U.S. and 
Coalition forces are fighting the forces of Islamic fascism and those 
who seek to overthrow the values and beliefs that civilized nations 
cherish. In short, this is a battle we cannot afford to lose.
  By way of background, The Weekly Standard published several articles 
detailing a number of these documents and the information contained 
within them which ``connect the dots'' between Saddam Hussein and the 
training of Islamic terrorists. Among the points highlighted in a 
recent The Weekly Standard article:

       The photographs and documents on Iraqi training camps come 
     from a collection of some 2 million ``exploitable items'' 
     captured in postwar Iraq and Afghanistan. They include 
     handwritten notes, typed documents, audiotapes, videotapes, 
     compact discs, floppy discs, and computer hard drives . . . 
     Nearly three years after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, only 
     50,000 of these 2 million ``exploitable items'' have been 
     thoroughly examined.

  Many of the translated and analyzed documents were entered into a 
government database known as ``HARMONY.'' It is now 4 years since these 
documents were captured. I understand that previous requests to release 
information from the HARMONY database have been rejected or delayed. It 
is reasonable to assume that over the course of the last 4 years any 
actionable intelligence contained within these documents has already 
been exploited.
  It is imperative that documents captured in Iraq which highlight the 
connections between Saddam Hussein's brutal regime and Islamic 
terrorists be released as soon as possible. These documents are 
increasingly necessary to help the American people understand both the 
reasons for our involvement in Iraq and the challenge of defending 
freedom and democracy.
  However, in the interest of national security, the bill permits the 
Director of National Intelligence to withhold making a document 
publicly available--provided he informs the relevant congressional 
committees of the justification for not disclosing the document.
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