[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 182 (Tuesday, December 15, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8663-S8665]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  PRESIDENT'S STRATEGY TO DEFEAT ISIS

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, just yesterday President Obama went to the 
Pentagon for a long overdue meeting with his national security 
advisers. During that meeting or shortly thereafter, he made this 
statement: ``We are hitting ISIL harder than ever.'' Unfortunately, the 
President failed to acknowledge the simple fact that his strategy 
against ISIL--or ISIS, as it is more frequently called--is simply not 
working.
  This is pretty hard to get right, but at least our leaders should 
have the humility to recognize reality, and when things aren't working 
out so well, reconsider and make some midcourse changes so they do 
work--not this President. I have said repeatedly that the President 
needs to tell Congress and the American people about his comprehensive 
strategy to defeat this terrorist enemy, and he has to do more to give 
our military the flexibility and resources they need to accomplish the 
mission. It is simply wrong to ask our military to accomplish something 
and not give them the freedom, flexibility, and resources they need in 
order to accomplish it.
  That is why when the President talks about airstrikes--I know of no 
military leader who believes that you can defeat this terrorist army in 
Syria and Iraq by airstrikes alone. Nobody. Yet that seems to be the 
only tactic this President is using. So the President needs to tell the 
American people the truth about the realities on the ground in Iraq and 
Syria. He needs to listen and take advice from the military leadership 
he has at the Pentagon and on his own staff. Above all, he needs to 
learn not to be ashamed of American leadership.
  It is absolutely true that America doesn't necessarily need to fight 
the wars for other countries in the region that ought to be engaged in 
the fight themselves, but the fact is there is no one else on the 
planet who can lead like the United States of America. We have to 
organize it, we have to lead it, and we have to support it if we expect 
other people to be the boots on the ground to fight those wars, but the 
action we are seeing currently from this administration does not match 
the very serious threat we face, and it is a threat that has gotten 
worse, not better, under the President.
  CIA Director John Brennan recently estimated that before President 
Obama prematurely pulled all U.S. troops out of Iraq, without any sort 
of transition at all, the predecessor of ISIS, known as Al Qaeda in 
Iraq, had ``maybe 700-or-so adherents left.'' This is the CIA Director, 
nominated by President Obama and confirmed by the Senate. He said, 
before the President pulled the plug in Iraq, there were about 700 or 
so adherents left in Al Qaeda in Iraq, the predecessor of ISIS. If we 
fast forward that to today, according to the New York Times, just a few 
months ago, he said: ``Nearly 30,000 foreign recruits have now poured 
in to Syria, many to join the Islamic State, a doubling of volunteers 
in the last 12 months. . . .''
  Nearly 30,000 foreign recruits, a doubling of volunteers in just the 
last 12 months, these are pretty amazing and concerning numbers but 
more often they demonstrate how out of touch the President's remarks 
are when he says ISIS has been contained or we are hitting them harder 
than we ever have before. It is simply not working. Clearly, we need 
the President to execute an effective military strategy that results in 
both the physical destruction of ISIS and the complete rejection of 
their bankrupt ideology--not just in the Middle East but around the 
world, including here at home.
  Frequently, when various pundits react when they hear people like me 
saying the President doesn't have an effective strategy, they say: OK. 
What is your strategy? First of all, I am not the Commander in Chief, 
but we did make some constructive suggestions to

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the President. Nine other Republican Senators joined me in a letter, 
where we recommended six specific military options that if brought to 
bear on ISIS, would go a long way toward achieving his stated goal of 
destroying this terrorist army. First, it would take the handcuffs off 
the U.S. military and let our troops do what they have trained to do 
and what they have volunteered to do. Increasingly, we need a strategy 
that doesn't just handle the fight over there. We need a strategy to 
handle the fight here at home because of the danger of foreign 
fighters, of fighters going from the United States to the fight in the 
Middle East and then returning or people going to Europe. In 
particular, one concern has been raised by many of our Democratic 
colleagues is the use of the visa waiver, where you don't actually 
need--the 38 countries where you can travel to the United States 
without actually getting a specific visa or having to be interviewed by 
a consular officer at one of our embassies. This is a potential 
vulnerability for the United States.
  The third area beyond the fight over there, beyond the danger of 
people exploiting the flaws in our screening system within immigration, 
whether it is fiance visas, whether it is a visa waiver or whether it 
is refugees--there is a third area the FBI Director talked about last 
week when he testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. He talked 
about homegrown terrorists--people like the ones in San Bernardino who 
did actually travel to the Middle East and come back--but he also 
included people in the United States, American citizens. I must admit I 
appreciated the FBI Director's understanding of the threat that ISIS 
poses, including their attempts to inspire people in this country to 
become terrorists and commit acts of violence.
  This Senator was astonished that the Department of Homeland Security 
would have a policy preventing the United States from screening the 
social media use by foreign nationals who are attempting to use our 
immigration system to come to the United States. In the instance of the 
female shooter in San Bernardino, it was revealed that using social 
media, she had posted things that should have been an alert--if our 
immigration officers were doing their job--to the fact that she was 
likely to be a jihadist and be a threat here at home.
  Another threat we are going to have to deal with that Director Comey 
and the Deputy Attorney General raised is the use of encryption as a 
challenge that hinders the FBI's counterintelligence efforts against 
these ISIS-inspired extremists. Encryption applications are available 
on your cell phone, and some of the companies--Apple, for example--
market them because people want to keep their communications private. 
We all understand that, but an encrypted message--one that is incapable 
of being unlocked--is one that can't be used to respond to a court 
order when somebody in law enforcement goes to court and says: We have 
probable cause to believe a crime was committed, so we want to execute 
this search warrant. As Director Comey confirmed, increasingly using 
encryption is part of terrorist trade craft.
  I was shocked--because I hadn't heard it before--to hear Director 
Comey talk about how encryption impacted an investigation in my home 
State of Texas. He said many will remember that back in May, two men 
attempted to attack people at an event northeast of Dallas in Garland, 
TX. He said that fortunately the quick and effective response of law 
enforcement officials in the area stopped the men from making their way 
into the conference center, keeping them from inflicting more harm. We 
now know the attack was at least inspired by ISIS. In fact, according 
to media reports, ISIS quickly claimed responsibility for the attack.
  Shockingly, Director Comey said last week before the Senate Judiciary 
Committee that the FBI had 109 encrypted messages with a terrorist 
overseas as part of this investigation of the Garland incident. 
According to the FBI Director, that is 109 messages the FBI still 
doesn't have access to because they are encrypted and they can't even 
crack it given a court order showing probable cause that it might lead 
to further evidence in this investigation. He pointed out that these 
sorts of encrypted communications are part of terrorist trade craft. In 
fact, there is reason to believe that within terror circles, they 
understand which of these devices and which of these apps are encrypted 
and thus make it less likely that they will be discovered when they are 
conspiring against Americans either here or abroad.
  It troubles me that the men and women charged with keeping us safe 
don't have all the information they need. I think that is a subject on 
which we need to have a more serious conversation. I think that is why 
Director Comey mentioned that last week, and that is why the Deputy 
Attorney General came to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee 
to raise the concern, so we can have the kind of debate we always have 
in America when it is a balancing of privacy and security.
  I commend the Director for engaging Congress on this critical issue, 
but what it points out is that the President and this administration 
need to have a three-pronged strategy when dealing against a terrorist 
threat: As I mentioned, over in Syria and Iraq, unhandcuff our military 
and make sure they have a strategy that will actually work over and 
above just airstrikes; second, try to make sure we enhance our 
screening system for immigration for people who come into the United 
States so we don't inadvertently allow someone into our country who has 
the intention of doing us harm; and third, do more to come up with a 
plan to deal with people being radicalized right here in the United 
States, not the least of which, I would hope the Department of Homeland 
Security voluntarily reverses their policy of not screening social 
media communications which are in the public domain. I mean, there is 
no expectation of privacy on the part of people posting things in a 
public domain such as Twitter or Facebook, particularly things like 
Twitter. I know you can restrict access, but most people communicate 
with their friends, family, and anybody else who happens to want to 
have a conversation with them on social media.
  We can all agree that the threat of ISIS to the United States is 
broad and real. Sadly, we were reminded in San Bernardino and in 
Garland last May of this fact.
  Last week, both in a letter I sent to the President and here on the 
floor, we sought to make some constructive suggestions to begin to have 
that conversation, which was long overdue, about what an effective 
strategy to carry out the President's stated goal of degrading and 
destroying ISIS would actually look like. I hope the President listens. 
Unfortunately, so far experience has taught us he is not necessarily 
primed that way. But I hope he will reconsider in light of the 
increased public concern about terrorist activity in the United States. 
Certainly, public opinion polls have shown that is the No. 1 issue of 
concern to the American people, and as the leader of the U.S. 
Government and as Commander in Chief, I hope he will have the humility 
and the common sense to say that what we are doing now is not working 
the way it should. We can do better. We can do more.
  Certainly, if the President would work with us in a bipartisan and 
bicameral fashion, I know we would support a strategy that I think 
Members of Congress felt had a reasonably decent chance of working. But 
right now the President seems stuck on this same inadequate strategy of 
just bombing missions. These airstrikes are necessary but not 
sufficient to get the job done over there. It certainly is incomplete 
when you look at the threat in terms of exploiting our immigration 
system and in terms of homegrown radicalism. We haven't heard the kind 
of plan that we need to hear from the President of the United States 
that we are willing to work with him on. We need to hear from him what 
he is willing to do to help keep the American people safe and to fight 
and win this war against Islamic radicalism.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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