[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 80 (Tuesday, June 20, 2006)]
[House]
[Pages H4314-H4315]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 THREE BROTHERS OF THE BAND OF BROTHERS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, they were called the Screaming Eagles of World 
War II. They jumped into Normandy into the wet darkness of the night 
before sunrise on D-Day, June 6, 1944. They held off the Germans in the 
dead of winter in the Battle of the Bulge in a small Belgian town 
called Bastogne. Even though completely surrounded, they replied to the 
demands of the Germans to surrender with that famous statement of their 
commander, ``Nuts.''
  They are the 101st Airborne of the United States Army. They are the 
Band of Brothers. The 101st is still on duty, and their legacy now 
continues in the blistering heat of Iraq. They are once again fighting 
the forces of tyranny and terrorism.
  Recently, at an outpost near Baghdad, American volunteers of the 
101st found themselves surrounded and attacked by the enemy. One 
soldier, Specialist David Babineau, was killed in the skirmish. Private 
First Class Kristian Menchaca and Private First Class Thomas Tucker 
were kidnapped, captured, and later, apparently, murdered.
  Twenty-three-year-old Kristian Menchaca was from my hometown of

[[Page H4315]]

Houston, Texas. The Army turned Kristian Menchaca's life around. It 
gave him a greater purpose, a higher calling. He leaves behind a wife, 
a family, and lots of grateful Americans.
  The terrorists that America fights in Iraq and Afghanistan, they take 
no prisoners. They have no POW camps. While the media here is bemoaning 
some alleged improper events in Guantanamo Bay prison about some 
captured terrorist that got their feelings hurt while in custody, they 
would do better to point out terrorists execute their prisoners.
  Terrorists kill everybody because terrorists hate everybody that 
believes in freedom. They kill children, the elderly, the weak, the 
innocent, and they even murder captured American soldiers.
  This enemy we fight in the desert sands of Iraq and Afghanistan are 
evil villains who oppose our righteous and just cause to proclaim 
freedom throughout the world.
  News reports claim the attackers of the outpost all wore masks to 
cover their faces. Mr. Speaker, outlaws and bandits of the Old West 
wore masks to disguise who they were because they, like these 
terrorists, covered up their wicked intentions of destruction of 
everything that is good and right.
  But like the outlaws of yesteryear, each of these criminals will be 
hunted, tracked and brought to a speedy end, because the 101st Airborne 
is on patrol in the hot hills of Iraq.
  These terrorists have messed with the wrong people. These American 
soldiers fear no enemy. You see, they are brothers. They are the Band 
of Brothers, and while three of them have given their lives for 
liberty, it will be the wrath of the remaining brothers that these 
terrorists will experience. The terrorists will be introduced to 
judgment day.
  Shakespeare said of the brothers in Henry V how they will be 
regarded. He said, ``From this day to the ending of the world, but we 
in it shall be remembered; we few, we happy few, we band of brothers; 
for he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.''
  Tonight, we remember the strongest of those unyielding warriors 
against terror, three members of the 101st Airborne, these Band of 
Brothers.
  And that's just the way it is.

                          ____________________