[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 142 (Tuesday, September 9, 2008)]
[Senate]
[Page S8156]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION

  Mr. WEBB. Mr. President, today I am going to offer an amendment to 
the Defense authorization bill that will do two things. The first is it 
will extend the mandate or, shall I say, direct the President to 
negotiate the extension of the mandate we now operate under inside Iraq 
under the rubric of the United Nations. The second would be to place a 
restriction on the implementation of the strategic framework agreement 
that is now being negotiated inside Iraq to bring it inside the 
Constitution of the United States and require that the Congress of the 
United States approve this strategic framework agreement before it is 
actually put into motion.
  The reality right now is, our justification for operating inside Iraq 
under international law will expire at the end of this year. For almost 
a year, this administration has been negotiating two separate 
agreements with the Government of Iraq. One is a strategic framework 
agreement; the other is a status of forces agreement that would take 
place under the umbrella of the strategic framework agreement.
  This period of negotiation has been done largely without the 
involvement of the Congress. It will, if implemented, shape and direct 
the policy of the United States in Iraq for a good period of time--our 
security framework, all these sorts of things that traditionally have 
taken place only inside a treaty. Under the Constitution, a treaty is 
required to be approved by a two-thirds vote in the Senate.
  So we have two realities that have come together, that by the end of 
this year we need to address in some form or another. The first is we 
have to be operating under some proper international legal structure in 
order to maintain our forces in Iraq after December 31. The other is we 
need to be negotiating the right kind of bilateral future relationship 
between our country and the country of Iraq.
  This amendment intends to resolve both of these situations in a way 
that is not disruptive, that is within the constraints of the 
Constitution, and it will allow us some time to get the right kind of 
strategic framework in place rather than our having to rush it, as we 
are seeing right now, to get something in place by the end of the year 
that is arguably not within the Constitution.
  The first portion of this amendment basically says the President will 
direct the U.S. Special Representative to the United Nations to seek an 
extension of the multinational agreement that already is in place under 
the rubric of the Security Council of the United Nations. It also 
states it is the sense of Congress that this extension should expire 
within a year or earlier. It should expire at the end of next year, 
unless we have a strategic framework agreement in place, at which time 
it will expire earlier.
  The second goes to the notion that this agreement must be approved 
with the consent of the Congress. I have not gone so far in this 
amendment as to say we should treat this agreement as we would treat a 
longer, more formal treaty, with the recognition that treaties 
sometimes get tied up for years, but that we should have a law by the 
Congress, a vote by a majority of the Congress, approving this major 
step forward in our relationship with the country of Iraq.
  As it stands right now, I am a member of the Armed Services 
Committee. I am also a member of the Committee on Foreign Relations. We 
have not been shown one word of the actual document that is being 
negotiated. There are members of the Iraqi Parliament that have been 
shown portions of this document, if not all of it.
  I think it is very important for us to give this agreement the time 
we can give it if we extend the mandate of the United Nations for a 
year but also to get the proper involvement of the Congress in this 
most important step into the future of our relationship with Iraq.
  I hope my colleagues will support this amendment. I hope we can have 
bipartisan support on it. This is an amendment that goes to the 
propriety of the constitutional process and also is intended to take 
the time constraints out of the negotiation of this agreement with 
Iraq.
  I yield the floor.

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