[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 44 (Wednesday, March 30, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1951-S1953]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                 LIBYA

  Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I rise to speak in reaction to President 
Obama's speech this week outlining what he believes to be in our 
Nation's interest in Libya. Last week, while working in Nevada, many of 
my constituents asked what my thoughts were on the military action we 
have taken in Libya. My answer to them was simply that I did not 
believe the President had outlined a vital U.S.-American interest in 
our engagement in Libya, and that the United States cannot afford to be 
the police force of the world.
  This week, with the President's address to the Nation, I had hoped I 
would hear something to change my mind or, better yet, something that 
would instill confidence about the President's decision, but, 
unfortunately, this address provided the American people with many more 
questions than answers. President Obama left me wondering why any vital 
U.S.-American interest in Libya would justify military action.
  He said refugees would stream into Tunisia and Egypt, but we often 
aid refugees without F-15s. He said we needed to preserve the writ of 
the United Nations Security Council, but he did not explain why the 
safety of our men and women in uniform should ever be put at the 
service of that body. He said we needed to show dictators across the 
region that they cannot use violence to cling to power, but if 
President Obama's policy fails to get rid of Qadhafi, that is exactly 
the lesson they will learn.
  The President left me wondering about the definition of ``military 
success.'' He said our military mission is limited, but how do we know 
when we have hit our limit? Is it when Qadhafi poses no threat to 
civilians? Is it when all of Qadhafi's thugs are gone, or is it when 
Qadhafi steps down?
  This week's address from President Obama makes it clear that we may 
be headed for another decade-long military operation in the Middle 
East. Our service men and women cannot afford to be engaged in another 
Middle East dispute; they are stretched thin enough as it is.
  This weekend, Secretary of Defense Gates said, when asked about 
whether Libya is in our vital interest:

       No, I don't think [Libya] is a vital interest for the 
     United States. . . .

  So what are we doing? I understand the President may sincerely want 
to

[[Page S1952]]

save lives in Libya, but our country cannot afford to be the police 
force for the rest of the world. We did not step in when there was 
genocide in Darfur. As a matter of fact, there is a story today which I 
ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                 [From www.reuters.com, Mar. 29, 2011]

              Darfuris Feel Betrayed by Libya No-Fly Zone

                          (By Opheera McDoom)

       Khartoum.--People in Darfur watching how quickly a no-fly 
     zone was imposed on Libya by the United States and its allies 
     said they felt betrayed because U.S. President Barack Obama 
     had broken his promise to protect them in the same way from 
     government attacks.
       The government in Khartoum is still defying a U.N. Security 
     Council resolution by bombing rebels in Darfur.
       While Darfur was a foreign policy priority for Obama during 
     his election campaign, the festering conflict has fallen into 
     oblivion since his election.
       Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir is wanted by the 
     International Criminal Court for genocide and war crimes in 
     Darfur, where the United Nations estimates at least 300,000 
     people have died in a humanitarian crisis sparked by a brutal 
     counter-insurgency campaign that began in 2003.
       A prominent Darfuri leader said a no-fly zone would protect 
     civilians in the isolated region.
       ``Right now--forget in the past--right now what is 
     happening in Darfur is worse than in Libya,'' said Barouda 
     Sandal of the opposition Popular Congress Party. ``The air 
     force is bombing civilians and thousands are fleeing.''
       Peacekeepers from the joint U.N.-African Union force this 
     week confirmed aerial bombardments in areas they visited and 
     said more than 70,000 people had fled fighting in the past 
     few months alone, swelling miserable camps already housing 
     more than two million people seeking refuge from the 
     fighting.


                              NO-FLY ZONE

       During his 2008 presidential campaign, Obama backed a no-
     fly zone in Sudan's west and tougher U.S. sanctions on 
     Khartoum. But once in the White House, his special envoy 
     eased the embargo and promised to remove Sudan from the list 
     of state sponsors of terror.
       Washington was the first capital to label Darfur's conflict 
     genocide, infuriating Khartoum, which blames Western media 
     for exaggerating a conflict it describes as tribal. It says 
     10,000 people have died in the violence.
       But quick U.S. intervention in Libya on humanitarian 
     grounds has provoked debate as to what is the standard for 
     intervention in foreign conflicts.
       ``The swiftness of the international community's response 
     to Colonel Gaddafi's bloody repression of the Libyan uprising 
     has surprised no one more than the diplomats involved,'' 
     journalist Rebecca Tinsley wrote in the Huffington Post.
       ``At the same time it has left survivors of state-sponsored 
     massacres in Darfur, Rwanda . . . bewildered by our double 
     standards.''
       The U.S. embassy in Sudan said Washington remained engaged 
     in Darfur, giving aid and supporting the peacekeeping 
     mission.
       ``It is not inconsistent for the United States to play 
     different roles in each vital international effort,'' it said 
     in a written statement.
       Many Darfuris believe the quick military intervention in 
     Libya was because of its oil, rather than for humanitarian 
     reasons.
       ``We are astonished that over a few weeks about 1,000 
     Libyans have been killed and they went in, but in Darfur they 
     killed hundreds of thousands yet no one comes. And Darfuris 
     are feeling very bad about this,'' said Ibrahim el-Helu, a 
     commander from the Sudan Liberation Movement, a Darfur rebel 
     group.
       ``Hundreds of Darfuris are calling me, saying let them come 
     and drill for oil here if it means they will come and protect 
     us too,'' he said.

  Mr. ENSIGN. The headline reads:

       Darfuries feel betrayed by Libya no-fly zone.

  We didn't step in in Darfur. We also didn't help the people of 
Rwanda. The last time we did try to police a situation such as this was 
in Somalia, and we all know how that ended.
  That is probably why we haven't intervened in the Ivory Coast, even 
though there are more than 1 million people who have fled their homes 
and hundreds of thousands have crossed into neighboring countries.
  Other nations such as France wanted to take the lead on addressing 
the Libyan situation. I believe we should have allowed them to do so. 
The President's address made it clear that our military action in Libya 
is less about humanitarianism and more about realizing a 
multilateralist fantasy.
  While Secretary Clinton has continued to refer to S. Res. 85 as the 
Senate's endorsement of the President's establishment of a no-fly zone, 
I would like to point out to the American people that this talking 
point is misleading. This is what she said:

       The U.S. Senate called for a no-fly zone in a resolution 
     that it passed, I think, on March the 1st, and that mission 
     is on the brink of having been accomplished. And there was a 
     lot of congressional support to do something.

  This Senate resolution received the same amount of consideration that 
a bill to name a post office has. This legislation was hotlined. There 
was no debate allowed, no legislative language provided to consider. 
There was no vote. S. Res. 85 described a no-fly zone as a possible 
course of action for the U.N. Security Council's consideration. It did 
not instruct the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations to take action, 
let alone authorize a military operation. Using the hotline process for 
this resolution as a congressional endorsement for the President's 
policy is simply not an adequate use of Congress's role in authorizing 
military action. The administration unilaterally developed, planned, 
and executed its no-fly zone policy. The President consulted with the 
United Nations, he consulted with NATO, he consulted with the Arab 
League, but he did not consult with the body that is mandated under the 
Constitution: the U.S. Congress. There was no congressional approval or 
oversight of this military commitment.
  The Senate resolution simply does not authorize or endorse the use of 
force. It urges a multilateral body to consider a no-fly zone as a 
possible course of action. This is not the legal equivalent of an 
authorization to use force. This is not the political equivalent of 
that authorization. So what is it?
  I believe it is a disrespectful checking of the box for congressional 
approval by the administration's unilateral action. As Secretary Gates 
has stated, there is not a vital interest for our Nation in Libya, 
which means now that we are engaged there, the United States is at risk 
of mission creep and the possibility of a ``take two'' of what happened 
in Somalia.
  Before our military intervention, U.S. interests in Libya were 
minimal. Our intervention has overinflated our interests in Libya's 
civil war. If Qadhafi stays in power--and many believe he will--and 
continues to fire on innocent civilians, demands for U.S. military 
capabilities will go up. This sounds strikingly similar to what 
happened in Somalia. Furthermore, this engagement has explicitly 
announced our support for the rebel cause. Yet we don't even know who 
or what these rebels are or what their ideology is. President Obama's 
military strategy risks damaging our already shaky credibility in this 
unstable region of the world. Even with complete military success, 
President Obama's policy may appear to fail because he has disconnected 
military means--a no-fly zone--from his strategic ends--Qadhafi's 
removal.
  The Obama administration has confused our priorities in the Middle 
East. Operations in Libya divert our focus from unstable situations in 
Syria, Yemen, and Iran, all of which are more important for U.S. 
interests. Operations in Libya muddle our interests and undermine our 
ability to lead across the region. If turmoil in Libya calls for a no-
fly zone, are we prepared to make the same commitments in Syria and 
Iran, where we have far greater strategic interests? If not, what kind 
of message does this send to reformers in those countries?
  Last year, when there was an uprising in Iran, the President 
basically said: Hands off. It is not in our interest. We can't do 
anything about it. What kind of a message does that send?
  Some have argued that oil is the underlying reason for our engagement 
in Libya. Whether this is the case or not, the perception is there. 
Instead of lessening our dependence on dangerous foreign oil, this 
administration has steadfastly refused to allow the United States to 
tap into its own oil reserves.
  In Alaska alone there are three places that would supply the United 
States with 65 years' worth of what we import from the Persian Gulf.
  Unfortunately, as strongly as I believe in renewable energy, it is 
going to take us 30 to 40 years for renewable energy infrastructure to 
be up and running enough to start contributing significantly to our 
Nation's energy supply, which is why we need to act to get

[[Page S1953]]

more oil, natural gas, and other types of American fossil fuels into 
our energy supply today.
  I would argue that there is a vital U.S.-American interest to harvest 
our own energy or we risk engaging in a military conflict every time 
those in an unstable Middle East cannot get along.
  This is absolutely a critical debate. There are legitimate 
differences on both sides of the debate, but this is a debate that 
Congress should be willing to have: whether the President should have 
consulted and whether this is in our vital U.S.-American interest to go 
forward.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Udall of New Mexico). Without objection, 
it is so ordered.

                          ____________________