[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 105 (Tuesday, July 8, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4241-S4242]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                               LANDMINES

  Mr. LEAHY. Everyone knows the old adage that a picture is worth 1,000 
words. I have been an avid photographer since I was a child. I have a 
strong sense of that. So I thought I would provide a few examples 
today, because sometimes words are not enough.
  I have often spoken about the horrific toll on civilians from 
landmines. These tiny explosives, about the size of a hockey puck or a 
can of soup, can kill a child or blow the legs and arms off an adult. 
They are triggered by the victim. In other words, unlike a gun that a 
soldier aims and fires or a bomb that is dropped and explodes on a 
target, landmines sit there and wait for their victims.
  It could be hours or days or weeks, even years. But however long it 
is after they are scattered and hidden beneath a layer of sand or dirt, 
they explode when an unsuspecting person, whether a combatant or an 
innocent civilian, steps on it or triggers it with a plow or a 
wheelbarrow or a bicycle. That person's life is changed forever.
  In many countries where there are few doctors, landmine victims bleed 
to death. Those who survive with a leg or both legs gone are the lucky 
ones. This girl is an example of who I am talking about. We do not know 
her nationality, but the picture tells a lot. She is learning to walk 
on artificial legs. Her life has been made immeasurably harder because 
of a landmine that probably cost less than $2. I have a granddaughter 
not much older than her.
  Each of these photographs tell a similar story. None of these people 
were combatants. Each are facing lives of pain, and sometimes in their 
communities stigmatization because of weapons that are designed to be 
indiscriminate.
  The Leahy War Victims Fund has helped some of them, as this 
photograph taken in Vietnam shows. My wife Marcelle and I have seen the 
difference the Fund has made, but I wish there were no need for it 
because there would be no landmines.
  Over the years, as people around the world became aware of the 
landmine problem, they took action. The Senate was the first 
legislative body in the world to ban exports of antipersonnel 
landmines. I am proud of writing that amendment. Other countries soon 
followed our example.
  And there were others, especially Canada's former Foreign Minister 
Lloyd Axworthy and the International Campaign to Ban Landmines. Thanks 
to them an international treaty outlawing the weapons has been joined 
by 161 countries. I regret that the United States, of all the NATO 
countries, is the only one that has not joined, even though the U.S. 
military has not used antipersonnel mines for 22 years, despite two 
long wars.
  On June 27, though, the Obama administration finally took a step--it 
is an incremental step, but it is a significant one--to put the United 
States on a path to join the treaty. Although the United States has not 
produced or purchased antipersonnel mines since the 1990s, the White 
House announced that as a matter of official policy that it will no 
longer produce or otherwise acquire antipersonnel mines, nor will the 
Pentagon replenish its stockpile of mines as they become obsolete.
  Our closest allies and many others around the world welcomed this 
step, even though it falls far short of what supporters of the treaty 
have called for.
  But one senior Member of the House of Representatives immediately 
accused President Obama of ignoring U.S. military commanders, some of 
whom have defended the use of landmines, just as the military defended 
poison gas a century ago when nations acted to ban it.
  This Member of the House said: The President ``owes our military an 
explanation for ignoring their advice'', and he went on to say that 
this decision represents an ``expensive solution in search of a 
nonexistent problem.''
  A Member of our body, the Senate, called the announcement a ``brazen 
attempt by the President to circumvent the constitutional 
responsibility of the Senate to provide advice and consent to 
international treaties that bind the United States.''
  These are strong words. They make great sound bites for the press. 
But the truth lies elsewhere.
  Over the years, the White House has consulted closely with the 
Pentagon, including about this decision. The policy just announced 
simply makes official what has been an informal fact for at least 17 
years through three Presidential administrations.
  It also ignores the fact that the United States has neither joined 
the treaty nor has the President sent it to the Senate for 
ratification, so the President has obviously not circumvented the 
Senate's advice and consent role.
  And it ignores that every one of our NATO allies and most of our 
coalition partners have renounced antipersonnel mines, as have dozens 
of countries that could never dream of having a powerful, modern army 
as we do--countries that look to the United States, the most powerful 
Nation on Earth, but they got rid of their landmines.
  The naysayers' argument is simple. It goes like this: The United 
States is no longer causing the misery captured in these photographs, 
so why should we join the treaty? Does that mean they also oppose the 
Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, such as the 
crippled people in this photograph? Do they oppose the Chemical Weapons 
Treaty, and every other treaty dealing with international relations 
that the United States has joined since the time of George Washington?
  Does the fact that we are not causing a problem, that we do not use 
landmines or chemical weapons, absolve us from having a responsibility 
to be part of an international treaty to stop it? Of course not. The 
world looks to the United States for leadership.
  In 1992, if the Senate had accepted the argument now being made this 
body would never have voted 100 to 0 to ban the export of antipersonnel 
landmines.
  I suppose those in the House who criticize President Obama today 
would say the entire Senate was wrong 22 years ago. Those 100 Democrats 
and Republicans who voted back then to ban U.S. exports of 
antipersonnel mines understood that while the United States may not 
have been causing the problem, we needed to be part of the solution. 
The same holds true today.
  In 1996 President Clinton called on the Pentagon to develop 
alternatives to antipersonnel mines, whether they were technological or 
doctrinal alternatives. He was Commander in Chief, but the Pentagon 
largely ignored him. But now 18 years later it needs to be done. Not at 
some unspecified time in the future but by a reasonable deadline--
because it can be done.
  Now, I am not so naive to think that a treaty will prevent every last 
person on Earth from using landmines. But if people use them, they pay 
a price for using them. Bashar Assad used poison gas, but look at the 
political price he paid. Are those who oppose the landmine treaty so 
dismissive of the benefits of outlawing and stigmatizing a weapon like 
IEDs, which pose a danger to our own troops?
  Rather than opposing a treaty that will make it a war crime to use 
landmines against our troops, why not support the mine-breaching 
technology they need to protect themselves?
  I always come back to the photographs. I have met many people like 
these. They may not be Americans, but what happened to them happens to

[[Page S4242]]

thousands of others like them each year. The United States can help 
stop it. It is a moral issue.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Hirono). The assistant majority leader.

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