[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 90 (Tuesday, June 3, 2008)]
[House]
[Pages H4859-H4860]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[[Page H4859]]
                 IN MEMORY OF LT. GEN. WILLIAM E. ODOM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise to pay tribute to Lieutenant General 
William E. Odom, a great American and a true patriot. General Odom 
passed away last Friday at the age of 75 after a lifetime of service to 
the Nation. General Odom was a soldier and a scholar. He was a teacher 
and the author of seven books on history and international relations. 
He served Presidents of both parties. He was one of our Nation's top 
experts on military intelligence. He was a great visionary. And he was 
among the first to correctly and courageously warn that invading Iraq 
would be folly.
  I am proud to say that he was a friend. He generously shared his 
insight and counsel with me, and I found what he told and shared to be 
invaluable.
  General Odom was born in Tennessee and graduated from West Point. He 
received a Ph.D. from Columbia University and became a leading author 
on the Soviet Union. After teaching at West Point and Columbia, he 
served in the Carter administration as assistant to the President for 
national security affairs. Neither a Democrat nor a Republican, he also 
served in the Reagan administration as director of the National 
Security Agency. After retiring from the military, he became a 
professor at Yale University and a senior fellow with the Hudson 
Institute.
  General Odom was a patriot in every sense of the word. He served in 
Vietnam, and his family has continued to serve. His son was wounded in 
Iraq. But General Odom also understood that true patriotism meant 
disagreeing with your government's actions when you think they are 
wrong.
  He opposed the invasion and occupation of Iraq long before it began 
when it was not the popular thing to do and long before most of the 
rest of the country opposed it. His boss in the Carter administration, 
Mr. Brzezinksi, had this to say of his early opposition to the 
invasion, ``Among senior military people, (Odom) was probably the first 
to consider the war in Iraq a misbegotten adventure. He believed that 
we're just stoking hostility to the United States in that region and 
developing an opposition that cannot be defeated by military means.''
  In September of 2006, I and several of my colleagues in the House 
invited General Odom to speak at one of a series of ad hoc 
Congressional hearings and forums hosted by the Progressive Caucus on 
Iraq. General Odom described how al Qaeda's recruitment efforts had 
been seriously weakened by our efforts in Afghanistan, but he said that 
al Qaeda's recruitments soared after the invasion of Iraq. General Odom 
said, to (Osama bin Laden), the invasion must have been manna from 
heaven, probably saving his organization.'' I can't think of any more 
powerful argument against the invasion and continued occupation of Iraq 
than what he said.
  General Odom did not just oppose the administration's policy. He 
offered a real alternative that could both end the conflict in Iraq and 
lay the foundation for regional peace. He said, ``No effective new 
strategy can be devised for the United States until it begins 
withdrawing its forces from Iraq. Withdrawal is the pre-condition for 
winning support from countries in Europe that have stood aside, and, 
other major powers including India, China, Japan, and Russia. It will 
also shock and change attitudes in Iran, Syria, and other countries on 
Iraq's borders making them more likely to take seriously new U.S. 
approaches to restoring regional stability.''
  Everyone who knew General Odom knew that he was a tireless worker and 
a straight shooter. He continued to oppose war virtually up until the 
day that he died. Just 3 days before he passed away, an op-ed article 
he co-authored on Iran appeared in the Washington Post. The article 
opposed the drumbeat of war against Iran and offered a policy of 
diplomacy that can stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. I hope 
every Member of this House will read that article.
  General William Odom was a military man who worked hard for peace. If 
we had listened to him about Iraq in 2002, we could have saved tens of 
thousands of lives. I hope we will listen to his words now, because 
they can save many more lives in the future. General Odom was a great 
inspiration while he was alive, and I know that he will continue to 
inspire us in the days ahead.

                [From the Washington Post, May 27, 2008]

                        A Sensible Path on Iran

               (By Zbigniew Brzezinski and William Odom)

       Current U.S. policy toward the regime in Tehran will almost 
     certainly result in an Iran with nuclear weapons. The 
     seemingly clever combination of the use of ``sticks'' and 
     ``carrots,'' including the frequent official hints of an 
     American military option ``remaining on the table,'' simply 
     intensifies Iran's desire to have its own nuclear arsenal. 
     Alas, such a heavy-handed ``sticks'' and ``carrots'' policy 
     may work with donkeys but not with serious countries. The 
     United States would have a better chance of success if the 
     White House abandoned its threats of military action and its 
     calls for regime change.
       Consider countries that could have quickly become nuclear 
     weapon states had they been treated similarly. Brazil, 
     Argentina and South Africa had nuclear weapons programs but 
     gave them up, each for different reasons. Had the United 
     States threatened to change their regimes if they would not, 
     probably none would have complied. But when ``sticks'' and 
     ``carrots'' failed to prevent India and Pakistan from 
     acquiring nuclear weapons, the United States rapidly 
     accommodated both, preferring good relations with them to 
     hostile ones. What does this suggest to leaders in Iran?
       To look at the issue another way, imagine if China, a 
     signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and a 
     country that has deliberately not engaged in a nuclear arms 
     race with Russia or the United States, threatened to change 
     the American regime if it did not begin a steady destruction 
     of its nuclear arsenal. The threat would have an arguable 
     legal basis, because all treaty signatories promised long ago 
     to reduce their arsenals, eventually to zero. The American 
     reaction, of course, would be explosive public opposition to 
     such a demand. U.S. leaders might even mimic the fantasy 
     rhetoric of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad regarding 
     the use of nuclear weapons.
       A successful approach to Iran has to accommodate its 
     security interests and ours. Neither a U.S. air attack on 
     Iranian nuclear facilities nor a less effective Israeli one 
     could do more than merely set back Iran's nuclear program. In 
     either case, the United States would be held accountable and 
     would have to pay the price resulting from likely Iranian 
     reactions. These would almost certainly involve destabilizing 
     the Middle East, as well as Afghanistan, and serious efforts 
     to disrupt the flow of oil, at the very least generating a 
     massive increase in its already high cost. The turmoil in the 
     Middle East resulting from a preemptive attack on Iran would 
     hurt America and eventually Israel, too.
       Given Iran's stated goals--a nuclear power capability but 
     not nuclear weapons, as well as an alleged desire to discuss 
     broader U.S.-Iranian security issues--a realistic policy 
     would exploit this opening to see what it might yield. The 
     United States could indicate that it is prepared to 
     negotiate, either on the basis of no preconditions by either 
     side (though retaining the right to terminate the 
     negotiations if Iran remains unyielding but begins to enrich 
     its uranium beyond levels allowed by the Non-Proliferation 
     Treaty); or to negotiate on the basis of an Iranian 
     willingness to suspend enrichment in return for simultaneous 
     U.S. suspension of major economic and financial sanctions.
       Such a broader and more flexible approach would increase 
     the prospects of an international arrangement being devised 
     to accommodate Iran's desire for an autonomous nuclear energy 
     program while minimizing the possibility that it could be 
     rapidly transformed into a nuclear weapons program. Moreover, 
     there is no credible reason to assume that the traditional 
     policy of strategic deterrence, which worked so well in U.S. 
     relations with the Soviet Union and with China and which has 
     helped to stabilize India-Pakistan hostility, would not work 
     in the case of Iran. The widely propagated notion of a 
     suicidal Iran detonating its very first nuclear weapon 
     against Israel is more the product of paranoia or demagogy 
     than of serious strategic calculus. It cannot be the basis 
     for U.S. policy, and it should not be for Israel's, either.
       An additional longer-range benefit of such a dramatically 
     different diplomatic approach is that it could help bring 
     Iran back into its traditional role of strategic cooperation 
     with the United States in stabilizing the Gulf region. 
     Eventually, Iran could even return to its long-standing and 
     geopolitically natural pre-1979 policy of cooperative 
     relations with Israel. One should note also in this 
     connection Iranian hostility toward al-Qaeda, lately 
     intensified by al-Qaeda's Web-based campaign urging a U.S.-
     Iranian war, which could both weaken what al-Qaeda views as 
     Iran's apostate Shiite regime and bog America down in a 
     prolonged regional conflict.
       Last but not least, consider that American sanctions have 
     been deliberately obstructing Iran's efforts to increase its 
     oil and natural gas outputs. That has contributed to the 
     rising cost of energy. An eventual American-Iranian 
     accommodation would significantly increase the flow of 
     Iranian energy to the world market. Americans doubtless would

[[Page H4860]]

     prefer to pay less for filling their gas tanks than having to 
     pay much more to finance a wider conflict in the Persian 
     Gulf.

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