[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 97 (Wednesday, June 17, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4220-S4222]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT

  Mr. COATS. Mr. President, I wish to speak about several amendments I 
have submitted to the Defense authorization bill currently before the 
Senate.
  First, I wish to commend Chairman McCain in his first mission as 
chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

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The bill before us bears his imprint and that of the Senate Armed 
Services Committee, and it addresses the growing challenges facing our 
military.
  This legislation came out of committee in a bipartisan way and came 
to the floor with the opportunity for every Member of the Senate to 
offer amendments to this bill. It was an open amendment process, 
something we have been doing this year that hasn't been done previously 
under the leadership of the now minority. Unfortunately, that effort 
was blocked by the minority, and we now are where we are.
  I have introduced amendments that will hopefully be carried now in a 
manager's package with the support of Senator McCain and others here. I 
just want to describe what those were.
  First of all, let me say that despite the efforts of the minority to 
block our progress on this bill, perhaps one of the most essential 
things the Senate and the Congress does in any year is to provide for 
the common defense by passing authorization and appropriations for our 
military so that they have the policy and the authority and the 
resources to be able to conduct their efforts, both defending us here 
at home and dealing with issues overseas.
  The bill is a lifesaver and a nation defender, and it is not--to 
quote the minority leader--``a waste of time.'' How could anyone come 
to this floor and simply say that discussing, debating, and passing 
legislation that protects our country and provides support for our 
military is a waste of time? It just defies credulity and has us all 
scratching our heads.
  Nevertheless, we proceeded, and we go forward because, thankfully, 
under the majority leadership of Senator McConnell and the leadership 
of Senator McCain as chairman of the Armed Services Committee, we are 
moving forward with this bill.
  The personnel, platforms, and programs in this bill could very well 
save the lives of our military personnel deployed on the frontlines of 
freedom around the globe, and it is necessary that we go forward. That 
brings me to the rationale behind the first amendment that I have 
introduced.
  Last week, President Obama admitted to the Nation and to the world 
that he still does not have ``a complete strategy'' to deal with ISIS. 
A year ago this month, the terrorist organization Islamic State 
proclaimed itself as a worldwide caliphate, claiming control of 
territory in Syria and Iraq. ISIS quickly has become the largest, best 
organized, best financed, and most ambitious terrorist organization in 
history--not to mention the most brutal terrorist organization that we 
have ever seen.
  The previous Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of 
Staff described the threat arising from ISIS in apocalyptic terms--as 
well they should. The unspeakable depravities committed by ISIS are 
enough to evoke images of death's pale horse.
  ISIS has used sophisticated and successful Internet and media 
outreach tools to attract tens of thousands of radical Islamists to 
join its fight in Syria, Iraq, and beyond. They have captured and 
control major population centers in Iraq, including Mosul, Fallujah, 
and Ramadi. They have secured their bases of operations in Syria and 
expanded the territory ISIS controls throughout Syria, threatening to 
dominate any successor state emerging from the Syrian civil war. In the 
meantime, ISIS has also expanded its influence and secured allegiance 
from cooperating terrorist organizations in Yemen, Libya, Nigeria, 
Niger, Chad, and Cameroon.
  Yet early last year, the President compared ISIS to a junior varsity. 
Some junior varsity--it looks more like something that rises to the 
level of a major, major threat to the nations of the world--not just in 
the Middle East but to the nations of the world. But why call it a 
junior varsity?
  Then, following the terrorist group's dramatic expansion, later the 
President acknowledged the threat but admitted that ``we don't have a 
strategy yet'' to confront ISIS. Eventually, though, the President did 
come up with a plan that included two main elements: training moderate 
volunteers--not American volunteers but Iraqi volunteers--to fight ISIS 
in Syria and training and equipping the Iraqi Defense Forces to fight 
ISIS in Iraq.
  The first part of this plan has produced no fighters after a year of 
talk and has just begun to train the first cohort of 400 volunteers, 
whose training is to be complete in another year or so. Even then, they 
will be equipped to assume only defensive missions in Syria, according 
to the Pentagon. That is the U.S. portion. The Iraqi portion deals with 
training that I will be talking about here in just a moment.
  How could this severely limited strategy be even remotely responsive 
to ISIS, to the means and the threat ISIS poses? How is it that ISIS 
manages to recruit, transport, train, deploy, and effectively fight 
tens of thousands of radical men and women, while we are spending 2 
years finding and training just 400 in our program in Syria?
  In Iraq, 10 years and billions of dollars spent creating defense 
forces has produced nothing capable of standing up to the ISIS 
fanatics.
  The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said earlier this month 
that Iraqi forces ``did not have a will to fight'' when confronting a 
vastly inferior--vastly inferior--``Islamic State'' force in this 
particular battle. They just melted away in Mosul and Ramadi, said the 
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Those who had spent months, if 
not years, and spent very significant amounts of money on training 
simply melted away because they did not have the will to fight.

  The President's intention to train and equip the Iraqi forces to 
confront the Islamic State has failed to produce an effective fighting 
force that is adequately led and sufficiently equipped. That is the 
only conclusion we can come to after months and years and extraordinary 
expenditures of dollars to try to deal with the ISIS threat.
  The other major component of the President's strategy is airstrikes. 
Airpower, when used as part of an integrated grand strategy, can play 
an essential role. In this case, there is no integrated larger 
strategy, and therefore airpower is limited in terms of what it can do.
  The administration's airstrikes have been much less effective in 
dealing with the ISIS threat than anticipated. They have not halted 
ISIS's advances in the region.
  In the words of retired Air Force General David Deptula, a key 
architect of the air campaign in Operation Desert Storm:

       Air power has to be applied like a thunderstorm, not a 
     drizzle. In the campaign against the Islamic State, we are 
     averaging 12 strike sorties per day. During Operation Desert 
     Storm in Iraq and Kuwait, the average was 1,241.

  Airpower, when properly utilized in concert with troops to support 
the effort, can bring battlefield success. However, the Obama 
administration has failed to provide the proper number of well-trained 
American spotters on the ground in Iraq designating targets. If you do 
not have forces in position to target the exact target, airpower 
becomes random and not nearly as effective as it should be. And that 
has not been authorized by the President as a means of dealing with 
this issue; therefore, the limits that have been placed on the use of 
airpower have left us in a situation where it is much less effective 
than it could be.
  It has now been over a year since ISIS was widely acknowledged as a 
major threat to our national security. When asked just last week what 
is and is not working in the fight against ISIS, the President stated 
once again that we still do not have ``a complete strategy'' to 
confront ISIS. Instead, he blamed the Pentagon and the Iraqis for not 
finalizing a plan. Yet the President says we still do not have a 
complete strategy to address this threat. How is that possible?
  As the Wall Street Journal put it in its June 11 editorial, ``The 
fundamental problem with Mr. Obama's strategy is that he is so 
determined to show that the U.S. isn't returning to war in Iraq that he 
isn't doing enough to win the war we are fighting.''
  In the meantime, the White House announced that we would be sending 
another 450 troops to Iraq to train Sunni tribal fighters. I understand 
that this really means little more than 50 actual trainers, the rest of 
this small cohort to provide security for themselves. So we are down to 
about 50 trainers, and that is the next step in dealing with a threat 
that far expands the need to do much more.

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  We must insist that President Obama immediately produce a complete, 
detailed, and realistic plan to confront, degrade, and defeat the 
Islamic State. This plan must include realistic, well-substantiated 
estimates of timeframes, resources required, expected allies, and 
anticipated obstacles. Also, it must include clear definitions of 
milestones and metrics of success. Most importantly, the plan must 
include clear accountability. I have introduced an amendment to the 
Defense authorization bill that will require just that--a serious, 
credible, complete strategy for addressing the threat posed by ISIS.
  President Obama has shown a tendency to blame others--the Pentagon or 
allies or Sunnis or the Iraqi Government or Congress--for his own 
failures of leadership in this effort; therefore, we must demand a 
coherent, realistic plan so the American people can properly apportion 
the credit for success or the blame for failure where it belongs.
  Let me briefly talk about a couple of other amendments I have 
introduced, and I am hopeful we can include these two amendments in the 
managers' package.
  Amendment No. 1705 addresses the Department of Defense's present 
policy of not allowing Active-Duty flag and general officers to visit 
our friends in Taiwan. Instead, the DOD relies on retired flag and 
general officers--retired officers to visit Taiwan in what can only be 
seen as appeasing Communist China.
  It is difficult for military officials in both Taiwan and the United 
States to discuss contingency responses when Active-Duty U.S. generals 
and flag officers are not able to meet regularly with their Taiwanese 
counterparts. Without visiting Taiwan, they are not able to familiarize 
themselves with Taiwan's command centers, terrain, and operational 
capabilities.
  Active-Duty U.S. generals and flag officers have to be able to visit 
Taiwan and see its military in action in order to gain a better 
understanding of Taiwan's armed forces and the weapons they require for 
self-defense.
  In the event of an emergency, such as humanitarian assistance or a 
disaster relief mission, senior officers from Taiwan and the United 
States will have little, if any, experience working together to save 
the lives of thousands of Taiwanese citizens and Americans living 
abroad in Taiwan.
  My amendment would simply state that the Department of Defense should 
undertake a program of senior military officer exchanges with Taiwan. 
Note that this amendment does not require such exchanges. I do not 
believe in tying the military's hands in this sort of matter, but I do 
believe it is important that the Senate go on record as concerned about 
the current policy of refusing to allow such exchanges. The armed 
forces of Taiwan are a very valuable partner of the U.S. military. 
These visits by our generals and admirals will encourage Taiwan to make 
increased investments in their national defense, especially in light of 
the belligerent behavior demonstrated by the Chinese.
  I understand that there is bipartisan agreement on this amendment, 
and I hope and trust that we can include this measure in any upcoming 
managers' package.
  Finally, I have offered amendment No. 1877, which would require the 
Secretary of the Navy to submit to both the House and Senate Armed 
Services Committees a report detailing the potential impacts to the 
industrial base if the July 2017 start date for the refueling and 
complex overhaul of the USS George Washington is delayed by 6 months, 1 
year, or 2 years.
  As we learned last year when the administration briefly considered 
postponing the scheduled overhaul of the USS George Washington, such 
delays only drive up costs because of the uncertainty they create among 
the industrial base. I hope to avoid a repeat of that mistake by 
requiring the Navy to report on the true costs of any delay.
  I hope the Senate will agree to this amendment.
  Once again, I thank Senator McCain for his leadership on the Defense 
authorization bill, and I hope the Senate will act to pass this 
critically important bill without delay. This is one of the most 
essential bills this Congress takes up each year, and to deter this for 
any political reason simply is not acceptable when our troops' lives 
and safety are at risk. They are there to defend us. They need our 
support, and they need it now.
  I yield floor.

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