[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 21]
[House]
[Pages 29215-29216]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




              UNITED STATES SHOULD NOT BE NATION BUILDING

  Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to claim the time of 
the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Price).
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Tennessee?
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Duncan) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Speaker, the Pentagon, 3 days ago, issued a directive 
which should be of great concern to any traditional conservative. The 
Washington Times on its front page reported it this way: ``The Pentagon 
yesterday announced a landmark change in the use of combat troops, 
elevating stability missions, commonly called nation-building, to an 
equal status with major combat operations.''
  Conservatives used to be opposed to world government. Conservatives 
used to believe in the United States of America rather than the United 
States of the New World Order. Conservatives used to oppose turning the 
Department of Defense into the Department of Foreign Aid.
  Probably well over half of what we have spent in Iraq is just pure 
foreign aid, building roads, power plants, water systems, new schools, 
railroads, ports, new prisons, training their police and military, and 
giving free medical care, among other things.

[[Page 29216]]

  President Bush, when he campaigned in 2000, in many speeches came out 
strongly against nation-building. We have so many needs in this 
country, especially with our aging clean water and wastewater systems. 
We also have a national debt that will soon reach $9 trillion. We 
simply cannot afford to build or rebuild nations all over this world.
  Georgie Ann Geyer, the nationally syndicated columnist, wrote a 
couple years ago: ``Critics of the war against Iraq have said since the 
beginning of the conflict that Americans, still strangely complacent 
about overseas wars being waged by a minority in their name, will 
eventually come to a point where they see they have to have a 
government that provides services at home or one that seeks empire 
across the globe.''
  But this is not primarily about Iraq. It is about whether we want a 
Department of Defense or a Department of Foreign Aid. We are not going 
to be able to pay all of our military pensions, civil service pensions, 
Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the new prescription drug benefit, 
the 44 million private pensions we have guaranteed through the PBGC, in 
just a few years with money that means anything if we do not stop all 
this nation-building around the world.
  I have nothing at all against anyone from any other country, but the 
first obligation of the U.S. Congress should be to the American people. 
The first thing that is said about anyone who opposes spending mega 
billions in other countries is that he must be an isolationist. But the 
isolationist charge means the person who says it is resorting to 
childish name-calling rather than a discussion on the merits.
  Our interventionist foreign policy has caused great resentment and 
animosity against us all over the world. There is another way, a better 
way than intervening in almost every major political, ethnic, religious 
or military dispute around the world. The middle way between isolation 
and intervention is to have trade and tourism, cultural and educational 
exchanges, help out during humanitarian crises, give technical advice 
by government agencies and try to be friends with all nations but 
maintain an enlightened neutrality on disputes that really are none of 
our business.
  This new directive is more about money than it is about security. 
Like any gigantic bureaucracy, the Pentagon and its Defense contractors 
always want more money. One of the most common ways any government 
agency uses to get more money is by expanding its mission. You can 
never satisfy any government's appetite for money or land. They always 
want more.
  President Eisenhower warned us many years ago of what he called the 
military-industrial complex. I have great respect for anyone who serves 
in the military. I believe in having a strong national defense. But I 
do not believe in the U.S. providing international defense, and it is 
certainly not a traditional conservative position to make those in our 
military the policemen of the world or take on the defense needs of the 
whole world.
  And it is certainly not conservative, nor is it constitutional, for 
the U.S. to do nation-building all over the world, whether it is done 
by the Defense Department or any other department.

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