[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 2]
[House]
[Pages 2125-2126]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




      PRESIDENTS SHOULD GET AUTHORITY FROM CONGRESS TO SEND TROOPS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Paul) is recognized for 5 minutes.

[[Page 2126]]


  Mr. PAUL. Mr. Speaker, since World War II, our presidents have been 
sending troops overseas without Congressional approval. Prior to World 
War II, it was traditional and constitutional that all presidents came 
to the Congress for authority to send troops.
  Recently, the President has announced that he will most likely be 
sending thousands of American troops under NATO command to Kosovo. I 
think this is wrong. I have introduced legislation today that says that 
the President cannot send these troops without Congressional approval, 
merely restating what the Constitution says and how we followed the 
rules up until World War II.
  Three years ago, the President sent troops into Bosnia and said they 
would be there for 6 months. They have been there now 3 years. We have 
spent over $20 billion. Nobody even asks hardly at all anymore when 
these troops will be coming home.
  We have been bombing and interfering with the security of Iraq for 
now over 8 years, and that continues, and we do not give Congressional 
approval of these acts. My legislation is simple. It just denies 
funding for sending troops into Kosovo without Congressional approval.
  This is not complicated. It is very precise and very clear and very 
important that we as a Congress restate our constitutional obligation 
to supervise the sending of troops around the world.
  It would be much better for us to spend this money that is being 
wasted in Bosnia and Iraq on our national defense. We spend less and 
less money every year on national defense but we spend more and more 
money on policing the world. I think that policy ought to change and it 
is the responsibility of the Congress, the body that has control of the 
purse strings, to do something about this.
  If the President is permitted to do this, he does it not because he 
has constitutional authority but because the Congress has reneged on 
their responsibility to supervise the spending.
  It is a bit ironic now that we are sending or planning to send troops 
to Kosovo. We have all read about and heard the horrible stories about 
the Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic, and yet our troops going to 
Kosovo are going to be sent with the intention that Kosovo cannot be 
independent; that they will not be able to separate themselves from 
Serbia; that they cannot decide under what government they want to 
live.
  It is also interesting that one of the jobs of the troops in NATO, if 
they go into Kosovo, will be to disarm the Kosovo Liberation Army. That 
is hardly good sense. First, it is not good sense for us to give the 
permission or renege on our responsibility, but it does not make good 
sense to get involved in a war that has been going on for many years, 
but it certainly does not make good sense for us to go in for the sole 
purpose of supporting Milosevic. He is the one that has been bombing 
the Kosovars and here we are, we want to disarm the liberation forces 
and at the same time prevent Kosovo from becoming independent.
  The issue here is money, but there is also a bigger issue and that is 
the responsibility that we have to decide when troops should be sent. 
Once troops are sent into a foreign country, it is very difficult for 
us to bring our troops home.

                              {time}  1815

  Troops in Kosovo will not serve the interests of the United States. 
They will not help our national security. It will drain funds that 
should be spent on national defense. At the same time it will 
jeopardize our national security by endangering our troops and raising 
the possibility of us becoming involved in a war spreading through the 
Balkans. This should not occur.
  So, Mr. Speaker, I am asking my fellow colleagues to join me in 
cosponsoring this legislation just to say that it is not the 
prerogative of the President to send troops around the world whenever 
he pleases. That is the prerogative of the Congress.
  I do know that it has not been stated this clearly in the last 40 
years, but it is about time we did. And besides, one thing more, the 
President has admitted, at least it has been in print, that he is 
likely to place these troops under a foreign commander, under a British 
general.
  Mr. Speaker, we do not need this. We need to restrain the President's 
ability to send troops.

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