[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 16]
[House]
[Page 21896]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        IRAQ AND PRISONER ABUSE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, 8 months ago standing outside this dome, 
the President of the United States spoke these words as he was sworn in 
for a second term: ``We will persistently clarify the choice before 
every ruler and every nation, the moral choice between oppression, 
which is always wrong, and freedom which is eternally right. All who 
live in tyranny and hopelessness can know the United States will not 
ignore your oppression or excuse your oppressors.''
  Beautiful words, honorable sentiments, if only the Bush 
administration were conducting this war in Iraq in a way that actually 
reflects those values.
  Last week, Human Rights Watch released a report that details once 
again how Iraqi war prisoners were subjected to acts of sadistic 
cruelty at the hands of their supposed liberators. This time it was at 
Forward Operating Base Mercury, where beatings and other forms of 
humiliation took place on a daily basis for several months. Often, this 
was not even about interrogation or securing some vital piece of 
national security. ``In a way, it was sport,'' said one sergeant in the 
82nd Airborne, a way to ``work out your frustration.''

                              {time}  1800

  What is perhaps most tragic is that our soldiers who have committed 
these acts are themselves victims as well, victimized by their 
incompetent and amoral superiors who give a wink and a nod to torture 
and then blame it on a few bad apples. One officer in the 82nd 
Airborne, Captain Ian Fishback, was appalled by the prisoner abuse and 
tried in vain for a year and a half to get some clarification from his 
superiors about how prisoners should be treated, given that the 
administration had essentially tossed the Geneva Conventions in the 
trash can. He got no answers because the Pentagon seemed to want the 
abuse to continue but did not want to take any responsibility for it.
  That is how it works with this crowd: The powerless take the fall 
while the high-level decisionmakers who make bad decisions are left in 
place to make more bad decisions. So it is that Lynndie England faces 
jail time for her conduct at Abu Ghraib while Tommy Franks gets the 
Presidential Medal of Freedom.
  The prisoner abuse episode is consistent with everything else about 
the way this war has been handled. It indicates both a moral blind spot 
and a staggering incompetence that has cost nearly 2,000 Americans 
their lives. The Bush administration had no plan for how to conduct 
this war, they had no plan for securing the country once Saddam was 
deposed, and now they have no plan for ending the war. We need a 
compassionate and we need a viable exit strategy, one that ends the 
occupation but still gives us a constructive role in the rebuilding of 
Iraqi society. If the President will not do it, we will. If the 
President will not lead, we will.
  Two weeks ago, I held an informal bipartisan hearing to discuss plans 
to withdraw our troops and end the war. We heard from a panel of Middle 
East experts and military strategists, just the kind of people George 
Bush should have listened to along his march to war, all of whom 
testified about the need for a change in U.S. policy in Iraq. The 
hearing was not about endorsing one particular approach. My goal was to 
put ideas on the table, to start a conversation that the Nation wants 
and the Nation deserves. Two-thirds of the American people disapprove 
of the President's handling of Iraq, and yet it has been some sort of 
taboo around this place to discuss troop withdrawal. The American 
people are way ahead of Congress on this. It is about time we caught 
up, it is about time we realized this war is not making America any 
safer. It is about time we brought our brave soldiers home.

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