[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 177 (Thursday, October 7, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Page S6950]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             FOREIGN POLICY

  Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, now, on a related matter, while 
Americans contend with Democrats' self-created border crisis and 
inflation crisis, our foreign policy is in crisis as well.
  The Biden administration's disastrous retreat from Afghanistan may be 
over, but the danger to the American citizens and Afghan partners it 
left behind certainly is not over. Around the world, adversaries and 
allies alike are drawing new conclusions from President Biden's 
Afghanistan disaster about America's will to defend our allies and our 
interests.
  Pyongyang is putting on another master class in how despots disdain 
the so-called rules-based international order. Literally, while a North 
Korean official was haranguing the U.N. in a speech about the 
``consequences it will bring in the future in case it tries to encroach 
upon [its] sovereignty,'' the Kim regime punctuated the speech with yet 
another provocative round of U.N. sanctions-violating ballistic missile 
tests.
  Iranian disregard for international norms and the Biden 
administration's efforts to enforce them continues apace. Tehran is 
ramping up its nuclear activities, demanding bribes to even return to 
the negotiating table, as well as stepping up its use of terrorist 
proxies to threaten its adversaries all across the region.
  In light of our retreat from Afghanistan, we should not be surprised 
if Iranian-backed groups redouble their efforts to inflict U.S. 
casualties and otherwise pressure the Biden administration to turn tail 
and run from Syria and Iraq.
  When it comes to near-peer competitors like Russia, the Biden 
campaign's tough talk has been replaced by the Biden administration's 
desperate rhetoric of diplomacy. Putin is unfazed and undeterred.
  Repression at home, manipulation of energy markets abroad, military 
modernization, cyber mischief--this doesn't exactly scream ready for 
good-faith engagement.
  Most of all, the administration's hollow rhetoric has done nothing to 
deter the growing threat from communist China. Just this month, Beijing 
has sent a record number of military aircraft on provocative missions 
into Taiwan's airspace. As senior Pentagon officials have warned, ``we 
are witnessing a strategic breakout'' by China, Democrats still refuse 
to let us adequately fund our own military and defense.
  The Biden administration's budget falls woefully short of our 
requirements for greater competition with China and with Russia--all 
the more so given the inevitable growing terror threat. And here in 
Congress, Democrats are doubling down on this reckless misstep. 
Democrats want to spend trillions of dollars on a socialist wish list 
at home while leaving the servicemembers who keep us safe overseas in 
the lurch.
  Now, I don't expect Chairman Sanders or certain radicals in the House 
to be keen on using reconciliation to fund our military--hardly. But 
Senate Democrats have left Congress's most fundamental tool for 
influencing defense policy--the historically bipartisan NDAA--in 
procedural limbo literally for months.
  The Democratic leader's latest public statement on his caucus's 
spending priorities did not even mention the defense authorization 
bill. Apparently, he is content to let it languish behind their 
leftwing wish list.
  So, Madam President, America is staring down serious and historic 
threats. And somehow, with unified control of government, the only 
actions Democrats have managed to take on foreign policy have made them 
worse.
  The American people deserve a lot better than this. Our 
servicemembers deserve better. Our allies deserve better. But 
Washington Democrats are proving they cannot deliver.

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