[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 130 (Thursday, September 11, 2014)]
[House]
[Pages H7450-H7452]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1530
                  EVENTS IN THE MIDDLE EAST WITH ISIS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2013, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from California 
(Mr. Sherman) for 30 minutes.
  Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to address the events in the 
Middle East and with ISIS, and I want to address three separate areas. 
The first is what should be the role of Congress in deciding American 
policy on these horrific events.
  Second is to respond to the unjustified attacks on the President of 
the United States by those who claim he doesn't have a plan, doesn't 
have a detailed enough plan, doesn't have a perfect plan, or whatever.
  And the third is to discuss what should be our policy in the Middle 
East and what dangers there are, no matter which policy we pursue.
  As we try to protect our Nation, we should also protect our 
Constitution. Article I of the Constitution vests in Congress the 
exclusive duty to decide when we declare war, when we go to war.
  Article II makes the President of the United States Commander in 
Chief of our Armed Forces.
  These two provisions need to be reconciled so that both the Congress 
and the President can make the decisions that the Constitution charges 
to them in our foreign and military policy.
  This is not a new issue. President Jefferson sent our Marines, in the 
words of the song, ``to the shores of Tripoli'' in 1801. This was our 
first foreign military deployment. This was our first fighting and 
involvement in the Middle East. And most relevant today, it was the 
first use of our military abroad in the absence of a formal declaration 
of war.
  Well, what did Thomas Jefferson think was the appropriate 
congressional role?
  Thomas Jefferson sought and obtained advance authorization to put our 
Marines ashore in North Africa.
  We still face the same constitutional provisions, but several decades 
ago, we passed the War Powers Act, a reasonable statute that harmonizes 
the two provisions of the Constitution that I have discussed.
  The War Powers Act makes it clear that the President can act for 60 
or 90 days without the authorization of Congress, but that is it. 
Beyond those time limits, deployments require congressional 
authorization.
  Now, we have heard from the President that he respects Congress, 
likes us, consults with us, and would welcome our support. But the 
President, I am sure, consults with many academics and think tanks and 
foreign officials, not as a constitutional duty, but just because it 
makes sense to consult with them. And the President would welcome the 
support of The Heritage Foundation or The New York Times editorial 
board for his policies.
  Saying that you welcome the support of Congress, or that you consult 
with Congress, has nothing to do with the legal rights of Congress and 
the American people.
  Now, the President has taken a very unusual legal stance. He asserted 
broadly last night that he has the authority to conduct the bombing 
campaign, but he needs Congress to approve training Syrians and 
providing arms. This stands the Constitution on its head.
  The main decision to be made here is whether we put our pilots and/or 
soldiers in harm's way, whether we wage war and cause casualties, and 
perhaps incur casualties. The far less important decision is whether we 
train a few hundred or a few thousand Syrians and provide them with 
weapons.
  Keep in mind, this training and arming of Syrians has occurred for 
well over a year without congressional authorization.
  What is happening here is the President wants us to vote in favor of 
his plan, or to take a vote of Congress and claim it is a vote in favor 
of his plan, when, in fact, we would only be voting on the smallest 
part of that plan, and that is, whether, without any risk of casualties 
to ourselves, without any risk that we would be directly causing 
casualties in the Middle East, to provide training to Syrian rebels. 
This is hardly what the Constitution requires.

[[Page H7451]]

  Today, in response to my questions, the President's Deputy National 
Security Adviser explained, for the first time from this 
administration, why they think they have authorization to bomb Iraq and 
Syria without any further action from Congress. He cited the 
authorization to use military force passed in this House 13 years ago, 
in response to the tragic events which occurred 13 years ago to this 
day.
  When Congress authorized going after al Qaeda, we never envisioned 
that that authority would be used in this manner.
  Just as important, the President's plan is to go after ISIS, which 
has been repudiated by al Qaeda, which broke from al Qaeda, and which 
wages war against the al-Nusra Front, which is part of al Qaeda.
  It is difficult to say that an authorization to use force against al 
Qaeda is an authorization to use force against those who are fighting 
al Qaeda, but it is a technical argument.
  On the President's side, you can say that al Qaeda splintered, and 
that all the splinters constitute part of the organization that 
attacked us 13 years ago to this day.
  That is why Congress needs to revise the authorization to use 
military force of 2001. We passed it for one purpose. Is it going to be 
there for 100 years?
  Is it going to authorize things we never imagined?
  Or shouldn't Congress define what it is we are authorizing under 
today's circumstance?
  The other argument raised by the President's Deputy National Security 
Adviser is that the authorization to go to war against Saddam Hussein 
somehow applies to this situation. A reading of that resolution clearly 
shows that it is confined to Iraq, and would not justify that portion 
of the President's plan, a necessary portion, that involves bombing 
Syria.
  So, again, Congress should vote on our authorization to use military 
force that is crafted to this situation at this time. But it is 
unlikely that we will do so because there is almost a silent conspiracy 
here in Washington.

  Presidents want more power to act as they decide in the national 
interest, without having to ask Congress for authority. Members of 
Congress sometimes just want to avoid a tough vote.
  So, the desire of the President to have all power, and the desire of 
some Members of this House to avoid responsibility, coincide with the 
idea of the President just boldly saying he has the authority to enter 
a new conflict and to enter it for far more than 60 or 90 days, and 
Congress never has to vote on the matter.
  The President, of course, would like to say that he has a vote of 
Congress in favor of his plan. So we are going to end up with the 
sneakiest of all maneuvers.
  What is likely to occur, and I hope it doesn't, is that we will vote 
next week on whether to continue government operations, whether to fund 
the government for the next several months, whether to prevent our 
national parks from closing, and buried in there will be a provision 
authorizing and funding the training of Syrian dissidents, and we will 
pass that package.
  The President will claim that since we funded and authorized the 
training of Syrian dissidents, we voted for his entire plan, including 
the bombing. And Members of Congress can say they had no choice but to 
vote for the Syrian provision, but didn't actually like it, never 
really voted for it. They just voted to keep the national parks open. A 
silent conspiracy of empowerment and shirking responsibility.
  What we should do next week is have three separate votes: one vote on 
whether to fund and authorize the arming of Syrians, because the 
President has asked for that vote; second, a vote on whether to 
authorize military force limited exclusively to air forces and not 
authorizing ground operations; and the third would be a vote to go 
further and authorize ground operations.
  The exact contours of these resolutions should be subject to 
amendment and open amendment in this House. We would have to deal with 
the duration and the exact limitations. But then we would be performing 
our constitutional duty. Then we would be protecting the American 
Constitution.
  I fear that, instead, we will cleverly avoid responsibility and the 
President will be able to say, ah, but you voted for my plan.
  Now, in defense of the President, I want to respond to the constant 
harping that the President doesn't have a plan, doesn't have a detailed 
enough plan, doesn't have a strategy.
  Well, first the President put forward a plan last evening. While 
Republicans have blasted it as insufficiently detailed, it is just as 
detailed as the plans put forward by the former President to invade 
Afghanistan and to invade Iraq.
  Now, keep in mind, as we learned from those wars, whatever plan is 
put forward is going to be dramatically changed because once you engage 
in hostilities, things change.
  Second, if the President were to provide as much detail as some 
hyperpartisan Republicans are demanding, he would then be attacked for 
revealing our strategy, our tactics, and classified information.
  The only thing that holds together, creates consistency among certain 
extremist partisan Republicans, is that whatever the President does, it 
is wrong.
  Then I have got to ask, where is the Republican plan?
  Have Republicans coalesced around any plan?
  Has any prominent Republican even put forward a plan?
  Where is your plan?
  Vice President Dick Cheney has not put forward a plan, just an 
expression of anger and partisanship. Speaker Boehner has not put 
forward a plan. The Republican-controlled House Armed Services 
Committee majority has not put forward a plan.
  There are a host of think tanks here in Washington that could aid 
Republicans in drafting a plan, yet, the Republicans have yet to even 
discuss their own plan, let alone coalesce around the Republican plan.
  It seems like the Republicans do have a plan. Their plan is to reap 
political advantage from this crisis in the Middle East, while avoiding 
any responsibility for making decisions.
  The Republicans are politically clever. And when I say Republicans in 
this speech, I am referring only to the hyperpartisan Republicans who 
have engaged in the activities that I described.
  These Republicans understand that no one can draft the plan the 
American people really want. Americans want a plan that guarantees the 
immediate and total destruction of ISIS, without significant American 
casualties.
  So hyperpartisan Republicans can constantly berate the President 
because he doesn't have a guarantee. He isn't offering immediate total 
destruction. He does have a plan designed to avoid American casualties.
  Instead, we get a suggestion that somehow this guaranteed, no-cost, 
immediate total victory would be achieved if only we had a different 
President.
  I think it is time for Congress to stop harping about whether the 
President has a plan. He has put forth a plan.
  Now Congress must exercise its constitutional role in defining what 
authorizations the President is going to be granted and what portions 
of his plan are going to be authorized.
  I look forward to--I hope, though doubt--a serious debate on the 
floor of this House, where we will discuss and vote on and amend and 
vote on the amendments of a resolution dealing with whether to arm 
Syrians and train them, with a resolution as to whether to have a long-
term, multiyear, perhaps, bombing campaign against ISIS, and whether 
the President is authorized to use ground forces.

                              {time}  1545

  Finally, I want to focus on the Middle East, itself, and how 
complicated the situation is, and I want to praise the President not 
only for his decisive action but also for his wise caution, because the 
situation we face in the Middle East is far more complicated than the 
President's detractors would let on.
  The natural reaction upon seeing those horrific videos is to say ISIS 
is the embodiment of all evil, and its total and immediate destruction 
is all that we need to do, that it should be our entire focus, but 
let's look at the situation. We look not only on the entity we want to 
destroy but also at who will be empowered by its destruction. Who is on 
the ground in Syria and in the Sunni areas of Iraq that is fighting 
ISIS and stands to gain if ISIS is destroyed? If we make the list, we 
see entities that are nearly as evil as ISIS

[[Page H7452]]

and are, if anything, more capable of hitting our homeland, of hitting 
Europe, of hitting targets outside the Middle East, than is ISIS 
itself.
  First, we see that ISIS is engaged in war with the al-Nusra Front. 
Al-Nusra is a dedicated branch of al Qaeda, one of its more capable 
branches. So the destruction of ISIS will, to some degree, empower al 
Qaeda and al-Nusra, since they are both rivals in fighting for support 
among extremist Sunnis.
  Second, on the list of ISIS' foes is the Assad regime. Now, the very 
people who are attacking the President for not acting precipitously 
today were attacking the President last year for not bombing the Assad 
regime. So they attacked him last year for not bombing Assad and this 
year for not bombing Assad's number one enemy. The only consistency 
here is you are attacking the President for not bombing somebody. The 
fact is that Assad has the blood of many tens of thousands of people on 
his hands, and his empowerment, his success in removing the ISIS 
problem that he has, will be one of the disadvantages of destroying 
ISIS.
  Third is Iran and Hezbollah. Iran and Hezbollah are waging war 
against ISIS today, and embody a greater long-term threat to the United 
States than ISIS. Keep in mind that Hezbollah killed hundreds of 
marines during the Reagan administration in Lebanon. Hezbollah and 
Iran, in working together, have conducted operations on a variety of 
different continents. There is all this talk about how there are 
numbers of people fighting with ISIS who have American passports, and 
they might come back and conduct an operation. There are those who are 
fighting with ISIS who have European passports who could go to Europe 
and conduct an operation. That is ``might.'' Iran and Hezbollah have 
been conducting operations in South America, Europe, Asia for decades, 
and Iran came close to effectuating an assassination right here in 
Washington, D.C., just within the last decade.
  So, yes, it would be good to destroy ISIS, but let's not kid 
ourselves. Those who would be empowered by that destruction include 
entities nearly as evil and probably more dangerous than ISIS itself.
  I bring up this complexity to argue against those who wonder why we 
didn't just lash out immediately. Why do we need caution? We need 
caution because the situation is not as simple as an old Western movie 
where you have the good guy in a white hat and the bad guy in a black 
hat, and if the bad guy gets killed, there is peace and unity, and life 
is wonderful and restored, and the good cowboy in the white hat rides 
off into the sunset with the schoolmarm. Al-Nusra is not a schoolmarm. 
Hezbollah is not a schoolmarm. Iran is developing nuclear weapons. The 
Middle East is not nearly as simple as the President's detractors 
pretend.
  I look forward to doing something that Members of Congress don't 
necessarily look forward to doing, and that is taking responsibility 
and casting tough votes, but if we are going to be true to the 
Constitution, we will not allow to stay on the books in its present 
form a 2001 resolution that was adopted in the immediate aftermath of 
the terrible events that occurred 13 years ago today. We will not allow 
that statement to be twisted and stretched and applied to situations 
well beyond its description. We will, instead, do what the Constitution 
requires of us, and that is to define:
  What is the President authorized to do, under these circumstances, 
for the goals that we have this decade and at this time?
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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