[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 7 (Monday, January 13, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S151-S152]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                                  Iran

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, it has been 10 days since the United 
States removed Iran's chief terrorist, Qasem Soleimani, from the 
battlefield. It has been 5 days since the brutal violence, 
recklessness, and failed governance that defines the Iranian's regime 
was put on full display with their shoot-down of a Ukrainian civilian 
airline and the death of all 167 souls on board.
  After a brief stab at a failed coverup, the Iranian Government had to 
come clean and explain that its own recklessness had killed more than 
80 Iranians, 63 Canadians, and the other victims. Despite the claims of 
supposed experts on Iran that Iranians would rally behind their 
oppressive regime, the truth is quite different. Instead, thousands of 
Iranians have taken to the streets to celebrate Soleimani's death, 
condemn the regime's domestic repression, call for regime change in 
Tehran, and denounce their government's feeble efforts to lay its own 
violence at the feet of the United States.
  According to journalists, here is one chant that has been ringing out 
on the streets of Iran: ``Soleimani is a murderer, his leader a 
traitor.'' Here is another: ``They are lying that our enemy is America, 
our enemy is right here.'' The irony is rich.
  As Iran's master terrorist, Soleimani himself led efforts to 
brutalize Iranian protesters who dared to challenge the regime. Just a 
few months ago, he boasted to Iraqi leaders: ``We in Iran know how to 
deal with protests.'' That violent approach is exactly why Iraqis and 
Iranians alike are now celebrating his death and denouncing the regime 
he helped lead. I am sure the mullahs regret that Soleimani himself is 
no longer around to help intimidate and murder their own citizens into 
silence.
  These protests aren't limited to Iran either. Protestors are back in 
Iraq as well--not phony, Iran-staged demonstrations but real citizen-
led protests across Iraq. Iraqis are demanding a government whose top 
priority is Iraqi's own interests rather than facilitating Iranian 
interference.
  Given the death and terror that Iran has wrought in the Middle East 
for decades, this kind of reaction shouldn't be a surprise, but 
strangely--strangely--it seems it has surprised many of our fellow 
Americans.
  Here at home, many on the left and in the media had rushed to 
reflexively blame President Trump, and not the Iranian regime, for the 
recent violence.
  After only the earliest initial reports, the Speaker of the House 
rushed

[[Page S152]]

to blame our administration for ``needless provocations,'' she said, 
and following Iran's shoot-down of the airliner, one prominent House 
Democrat characterized the regime's violence as ``collateral damage,'' 
resulting from America's actions--exactly how the Iranians themselves 
were trying to spin it.
  One Democrat running for President tried a similar, embarrassing 
equivocation. He said the civilians Iran had blown up were ``caught in 
the middle of an unnecessary and unwarranted military tit-for-tat.''
  For several days, you could not open a newspaper or turn on the 
television without prominent Democrats and so-called foreign policy 
experts setting aside decades of Iranian aggression to imply--or even 
say outright--that America, not Iran, was responsible for the cycle of 
violence and that President Donald Trump was the real villain.
  So we are faced with a remarkable spectacle. Even under threat of 
tear gas or even gunfire, the brave people of Iran are themselves 
displaying more willingness to criticize their own brutal rulers than 
we saw in the initial responses from some Democrats and so-called 
experts right here at home. It is a remarkable spectacle but a pretty 
sad one. I hope this can be a lesson to anyone who has let their 
domestic political grievances pollute their judgment of world affairs.
  It shouldn't take the brave Iranian people themselves to remind 
American leaders that Tehran has long been the force for bad in this 
situation, and the United States is a force for good.
  As I have said, the President's bold action has attracted significant 
criticism for Democrats here in Congress. It is the Senate's 
prerogative to weigh in on foreign policy, and I fully expect we will 
debate a War Powers Resolution from some of our colleagues very soon.
  I look forward to discussing the last administration's failed 
strategy that got us here. The Obama administration responded to Iran's 
violence and aggression with appeasement and retrenchment rather than 
pushback.
  I look forward to discussing the fact that senior military commanders 
did not just recommend the President take immediate action to disrupt 
Iranian plots against our personnel, they believed the United States 
would be ``culpably negligent'' if it didn't act to stop the plotting.
  I expect that some of the Democrats who have rhetorically embraced 
the intelligence community when it suited their political interests may 
now rush to criticize the career professionals. I look forward to 
hearing our colleagues who want to quibble over the word ``imminent'' 
explain just how close we should let the terrorists come to killing 
more Americans before we defend ourselves--just how close should we let 
terrorists come to killing more Americans before we defend ourselves.
  I assure you, if the President had not acted to disrupt a deadly 
attack, I am confident these same critics would have blasted him for 
failing--failing--to protect American lives.
  Just a few days before the strike, the junior Senator from 
Connecticut was blasting--blasting--the administration for 
``render[ing] America impotent in the Middle East.'' He complained that 
``no one fears us, no one listens to us.'' Naturally, after President 
Trump did take bold action, the same colleague has become a fierce 
critic of President Trump for supposedly being too harsh--too harsh. 
That is not exactly a model of consistency.
  Our Democratic colleagues were very happy to give President Obama 
wide latitude to engage in strikes where American lives and American 
interests were far less directly at stake than with Mr. Soleimani.
  Now the same Democrats who embraced the Obama intervention in Libya, 
for example, say it is a bridge too far for President Trump to respond 
with limited force to Iranian-directed strikes against American 
interests and personnel that have been escalating for months. OK in 
Libya, not OK here--the double standards are literally head-spinning.
  So I expect the Senate will soon debate Senator Kaine's War Powers 
Resolution. For a year now, I have wanted the Senate to go on record 
about our military presence and strategy in Syria and Iraq. I am glad 
my Democratic colleagues may finally be interested in having that 
discussion rather than ducking it.
  I don't believe the blunt instrument of the War Powers Resolution is 
an acceptable substitute for the studied oversight the Senate can 
exercise through hearings, resolutions, and more tailored legislation. 
So I will strongly oppose the resolution, and I would urge all our 
colleagues to consider what message the Senate should send to Iran and 
the world at the very moment that America's actions are challenging the 
calculus in Tehran for the better. We appear to have restored a measure 
of deterrence in the Middle East, so let's not screw it up.