[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 13]
[House]
[Pages 18545-18551]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      REAL SECURITY SPECIAL ORDER

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 2005, the gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. SCHIFF. Madam Speaker, 229 years ago today, American forces under 
the command of General Horatio Gates defeated the British at Saratoga, 
New York. This battle and the subsequent engagement at Saratoga several 
weeks later turned the tide of the American Revolution and were crucial 
in securing the survival of our fledgling Nation.
  More than two centuries later, the United States is the most powerful 
Nation on Earth, but we face myriad challenges to our national security 
that our revolutionary forebearers could not have imagined.
  Throughout much of our history, the security of our Nation was an 
issue that was above politics. America's leaders put aside their 
differences and, working together, ensured that our country remained 
strong and free. Unfortunately, Madam Speaker, that bipartisan 
tradition has been cast aside by our GOP colleagues who have sought for 
the last three decades to portray the Democratic Party as weak on 
defense or insufficiently concerned with defending the United States. 
Never mind that this wholly distorts the historical record of Democrats 
who have always, always answered the Nation's call to lead in the 
defense of our country. It was Woodrow Wilson, a Democrat, who led 
America during the first World War and vowed to make the world safe for 
democracy.

                              {time}  2115

  It was Franklin Roosevelt, a Democrat, who guided this Nation and the 
entire free world through World War II.
  It was Harry Truman, a Democrat, who made the tough decisions to use 
the atomic bomb against Japan to contain Soviet expansionism after the 
war and to confront the North Korean attack against South Korea in 
1950.
  It was John Kennedy, a Democrat, who went eyeball to eyeball with 
Nikita Khrushchev during the Cuban missile crisis.
  These great leaders and their successors, including Lyndon Johnson 
and Bill Clinton, never shied away from the hard fights, and our 
friends on the other side of the aisle know it. Nevertheless, 
Republicans have continued to try to scare the American people into 
believing that only they can protect the country.
  This shameful use of national security as a political wedge issue has 
reached new lows since the September 11 attacks. In 2002 and 2004 and 
again in this election season, Republicans from President Bush on down 
have used terrorism as a political issue. In so doing, they have up-
ended America's long tradition of optimism, self-confidence and 
bipartisanship on national security.
  In 1933, President Roosevelt told a Nation shaken by 3 years of 
depression that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. 
President Bush has spent the last 5 years telling the American people 
the only thing we really have to fear is the loss of GOP rule.
  My colleagues, including the distinguished gentleman from Maryland 
(Mr. Hoyer), the other distinguished gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Van 
Hollen), the distinguished gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Scott), and the 
gentleman from my home State of California (Mr. Cardoza) will join 
tonight in a message to the American people that we must change course 
from the administration's policies which have endangered our country, 
and that Democrats will do a better job at protecting the American 
people.
  Our plan, Real Security, was developed with the assistance of a broad 
range of experts, former military officers, retired diplomats, law 
enforcement personnel, homeland security experts and others who helped 
identify key areas where current policies have failed and where new 
ones are needed.
  The Real Security Plan rests on five pillars. They involve the 
creation of a 21st century military, a smart strategy to win the war on 
terror, a plan to secure our homeland, a way forward in Iraq, and a 
proposal for achieving energy independence for America by 2020.
  Under Real Security, a Democratic Congress will rebuild the state-of-
the-art military by making needed investments in equipment and manpower 
so we can project to protect America wherever and whenever necessary.

[[Page 18546]]

  We have all heard stories of parents throughout the country using 
their own money to purchase body armor for their children serving in 
Iraq. I have asked Secretary Rumsfeld about the shortage of body armor 
and the lack of properly armored vehicles, about holdups in the 
development of equipment to counter roadside bombs that have killed and 
maimed so many of our troops. Despite his assurances, the last few 
months have seen a spike in the number of IED attacks against American 
forces in Iraq, and they seem more lethal than ever.
  Under Real Security, Democrats will guarantee all of our troops have 
the protective gear, the equipment, the training they need and are 
never sent to war without accurate intelligence and a strategy for 
success.
  I have been to Iraq three times, Afghanistan twice. I visit our 
troops wounded here at home, there in Germany. I have spoken at the 
funerals of my constituents killed in Iraq. I have sat with their 
families as they have mourned. These experiences have reinforced my 
sense of commitment to ensuring the well-being of America's soldiers 
and their families and our veterans.
  Democrats will enact a GI Bill of Rights for the 21st Century that 
guarantees our troops, Active, Reserve, retired, our veterans and their 
families, receive the pay, health care, mental health services and 
other benefits they have earned and deserve.
  Our Active military are stretched to the breaking point, but our 
Guard and Reserves have also been ground down by multiple deployments, 
falling enlistment and reenlistment. This has, in turn, added to the 
stress.
  I remember meeting one young marine from California when I was in 
Iraq who had been there for 9 months and was on his way home. His wife, 
also in the service of this country, was on her way to Iraq. These are 
the kinds of deployments that are so taxing on our military families.
  As a part of Real Security, Democrats will strengthen our National 
Guard in partnership with our Nation's Governors to ensure it is fully 
manned, properly equipped and available to meet missions at home and 
abroad.
  The next pillar of Real Security is a broad strategy to win the war 
on terror. Four-and-a-half years, five years after 9/11, Osama bin 
Laden is still at large. Al Qaeda has morphed into a worldwide amalgam 
of discrete cells that are more difficult to track down. When Democrats 
are in charge, we will make the elimination of Osama bin Laden our 
first priority. We will destroy al Qaeda and other terrorist networks 
and finish the job in Afghanistan, ending the threat posed by the 
Taliban. We propose to double the size of our Special Forces, increase 
our human intelligence capabilities, and ensure that our intelligence 
is free from political pressure.
  Despite their vow to drain the swamp, the administration has done 
little to eliminate terrorist breeding grounds by combating the 
economic, social and political conditions that allow extremism to 
thrive. Democrats will fight terrorism with all the means at our 
disposal, using military force when necessary, but also leading 
international efforts to uphold and defend human rights and renew the 
long-standing alliances that have advanced our national security 
objectives.
  Under Real Security, we will confront the specter of nuclear 
terrorism by greatly accelerating the pace at which we are securing 
nuclear material that can be used to make a nuclear weapon or a dirty 
bomb. Our goal is to secure loose nukes by 2010. We will redouble our 
efforts to stop nuclear weapons development in Iran and North Korea. 
And while Democrats understand that no option can be taken off the 
table, we are committed to using a muscular diplomacy as the best 
option for curbing Pyongyang and Iran's nuclear ambitions.
  The third pillar of Real Security is homeland security. In the wake 
of 9/11, there have been numerous commissions and investigations at the 
Federal, State and local levels, as well as a multitude of private 
studies. All of them have pointed to broad, systemic and other flaws in 
our homeland security program. Almost 2 years ago the bipartisan 9/11 
Commission published its report, but most of its recommendations have 
not yet been implemented.
  As a part of Real Security, Democrats will immediately implement the 
recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, including securing national 
borders, ports, airports and mass transit systems. We will implement 
the screening of 100 percent of containers and cargo bound for the 
United States in ships or airplanes at their point of origin, and we 
will take steps to better safeguard America's nuclear and chemical 
plants and our food and water supplies.
  Democrats will prevent the outsourcing of critical components of our 
national security infrastructure such as ports, airports and mass 
transit to foreign interests that could put America at risk.
  Under Real Security, Democrats would provide firefighters, emergency 
medical workers, police officers, and other workers on the front lines 
with the training, the staffing, the equipment and the cutting-edge 
technology that they need.
  While the immediate threats to our national security come from 
terrorists, we face other dangers as well. Democrats are committed to a 
security strategy that will protect America from biological terrorism 
and pandemics, including the avian flu, by investing in the public 
health infrastructure and training public health workers.
  The fourth pillar, and the one that will have the most immediate 
effect on our security and the longest-term effect on our security, is 
to chart a new course in Iraq that will ensure that in the coming 
months we see a significant transition to full Iraqi sovereignty, with 
the Iraqis assuming primary responsibility for securing and governing 
their country with a responsible redeployment of U.S. forces.
  Democrats will insist that Iraqis make the political compromises that 
are necessary to unite their country, defeat the insurgency, and we 
will promote regional diplomacy and strongly encourage our allies in 
other nations to play a constructive role. Those nations now are 
largely on the sidelines.
  As a part of Real Security, Democrats intend to hold this 
administration accountable for its manipulated prewar intelligence, its 
poor planning, contracting abuses that have placed our troops at 
greater risk and have wasted billions of taxpayer dollars.
  Our security will remain threatened as long as we remain dependent on 
Middle East oil. The fifth pillar, and one with far-reaching 
ramifications for our country and for the world, is to achieve energy 
independence for America by 2020.
  Under Real Security, Democrats will increase the production of 
alternate fuels from America's heartland: biofuels, geothermal, clean 
coal, fuel cells, solar and wind. We will promote hybrid and flex-fuel 
technology in manufacturing, enhance energy efficiency and conservation 
measures. All of this we will do, and more, to meet the real national 
security needs of our country.
  We are joined tonight by the minority whip, the gentleman from 
Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), who has been a great leader on national security 
issues. I would invite the minority whip to address us this evening, 
along with our colleague from Maryland and our colleague from Georgia.
  Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding the time, and I am 
pleased to join him and certainly adopt his remarks, which I think are 
fundamental to this debate that will be going on for the next 6 weeks 
in our country about how we effect Real Security. That is our 
objective. That is our commitment as Democrats.
  We believe that terrorism is a real threat. We believe that we have a 
responsibility to confront and defeat that threat. That is our 
responsibility as citizens, and that is our responsibility as elected 
representatives.
  I am pleased to join Mr. Schiff, who has been such a leader on 
national security issues in the Congress; my dear friend from Maryland 
and colleague Mr. Van Hollen, who has a depth of

[[Page 18547]]

knowledge and experience in foreign policy issues and national security 
issues; and my good friend from the State of Georgia, Mr. David Scott. 
The State of Georgia has historically had leaders in national defense. 
On our side of the aisle, most recently was Sam Nunn, one of the most 
extraordinarily able and thoughtful spokespersons for national 
security.
  Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleagues for taking this time. 
Our highest duty as Members of this Congress is to protect the American 
people, to protect our homeland and to strengthen our national 
security. We Democrats are proud of our party's strong tradition of 
leadership in world affairs from Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt 
to Harry Truman and John Kennedy, indeed to Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton, 
it will be recalled, most recently marshaled the NATO Alliance, 
received the imprimatur of the United Nations, confronted the genocide 
being led by Slobodan Milosevic, defeated and stopped the genocide, 
stopped the ethnic cleansing, and put Slobodan Milosevic in the dock in 
trial at the Hague, all without losing a single American life in 
combat.
  These leaders demonstrated that defending America requires our Nation 
to marshal the full range of its powers, economic and moral, diplomatic 
and military, to fight for freedom, to foster democracy, and to defeat 
tyranny and terrorism.
  I believe that Members on both sides of the aisle are committed to 
this Nation's security. Any suggestion to the contrary, in my opinion, 
is either mistaken or quite possibly malicious partisanship. 
Furthermore, I believe that members of the loyal opposition, in this 
case us congressional Democrats, have the responsibility to critique 
the wisdom and effectiveness of the policies pursued by the majority 
party. That is what our Founding Fathers conceived. That is what our 
Founding Fathers believed was absolutely essential for the success of 
our democracy: A Congress and an executive and indeed a judiciary that 
provided checks and balances, provided thoughtful alternatives to 
policies being pursued, and provided constructive criticism. The fact 
is our Nation and our people are not as safe today as they could and 
should be.

                              {time}  2130

  I accept the fact that we are safer, but I repeat, that we are not as 
safe as we could or should be. Osama bin Laden, the architect of the 
worst terrorist attack on America in our history, remains at large. We 
still have not fully implemented the recommendations of the bipartisan 
9/11 Commission, for which the commission itself has criticized us 
sharply. In fact, Tom Kean, the co-chair, the former Republican 
Governor of the State of New Jersey, the co-chair of the 9/11 
Commission and the former Republican Governor, as I said, of New 
Jersey, recently stated: ``We are not protecting our own people in this 
country. The government is not doing its job.'' What powerful words and 
what a call to attention are Governor Kean's words.
  Meanwhile, the nuclear threats from North Korea and Iran have 
increased dramatically in the last 6 years. The Taliban is resurgent in 
Afghanistan, where roadside bombs have increased 30 percent and suicide 
bombings have doubled. And anti-Americanism has unfortunately and 
dangerously risen by substantial proportions. Even former Secretary of 
State and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Colin Powell, who has 
served this country so honorably in uniform and as a diplomat, remarked 
last week: ``The world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our 
fight against terrorism.''
  That is an extraordinary dangerous condition. We cannot nor should we 
fight this war against terrorists alone. We must have allies. We must 
have allies who respect us, who believe that our word is credible, and 
believe that our leadership is based upon values, insight, good 
intelligence, and conviction. Without question, Madam Speaker, our 
continuing military action in Iraq has fomented much of this anti-
American sentiment.
  Let me add that I supported the effort to remove Saddam Hussein as 
the dictator in Iraq. Democrats, however, as the loyal opposition, 
believe that we have a duty to honestly appraise the gross 
miscalculations and, I suggest, even incompetence that have plagued 
Operation Iraqi Freedom from its very start and to offer alternatives.
  The administration ignored the advice of top military commanders and 
sent far too few troops to accomplish the task at hand. Recall, if you 
will, that we sent over a half million troops in the fall of 1990 to 
confront Saddam Hussein and his army in the late winter of 1991. We 
sent those troops to eject Hussein from Kuwait. We sent a force one-
third, however, the size in 2003 not only to confront Saddam Hussein's 
army but to take control and stabilize an entire nation of 22 million-
plus people and to ensure its stability.
  As Tom Friedman of the New York Times has stated: ``If we're in such 
a titanic struggle with radical Islam and if getting Iraq right is at 
the center of that struggle, why did the Bush administration fight the 
Iraq war with the Rumsfeld doctrine, just enough troops to lose, and 
not the Powell doctrine of overwhelming force to create the necessary 
foundation of any democracy-building project, which is,'' of course, 
``security?''
  The administration, with Mr. Bremer as its viceroy in Iraq, fired 
police and security forces and oil workers, which increased, not 
decreased, instability. It initiated the war before making alternative 
plans when the Turks told us that we could not come in through the 
north so we could shut the back door to Baghdad. And as a result, many 
of those in the Saddam Hussein armed forces escaped and were a basis 
for an insurgency.
  In fact, just this month Brigadier General Mark Scheid revealed that 
Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld said he would ``fire the next person'' 
who talked about the need for a post-war plan. There was no effective 
plan for post-Saddam Hussein regime nation-building. As a result, chaos 
occurred.
  The administration failed to properly equip our own troops, Mr. 
Schiff has pointed that out, nearly 2,700 of whom have given the 
ultimate measure of sacrifice in this war. All of us in our districts 
have lost people in this war.
  The administration grossly underestimated the cost of the war at 
about $60 billion. Today, the war costs stand at five times that 
amount, in excess of $300 billion. All of that has happened, I suggest 
to you, Madam Speaker, without significant oversight and appropriate 
hearings being conducted by this Congress, which is our responsibility 
to our constituents and to our country.
  The administration hired inexperienced and unqualified political 
appointees for the Coalition Provisional Authority, as The Washington 
Post reported on Sunday. And when confronted with concrete evidence of 
widespread mistreatment of detainees in American custody, the President 
failed to hold anyone in his administration accountable.
  All of this, Madam Speaker, has undermined the effectiveness of an 
effort that I supported. Some did not. But whether you supported it or 
you did not, you must lament the fact that the execution of the policy 
has been so unsuccessful.
  Madam Speaker, as Lieutenant General Gregory Newbold, the former 
commanding general of the 1st Marine Division, has stated: ``What we 
are living with now is the consequence of successive policy failures.'' 
That is not a Democrat or a Republican but a three-star general 
concerned about his troops, concerned about our country, concerned 
about the success of an effort given to our Armed Forces.
  The current strategy for our military, our security, and the Iraqi 
people is neither working nor making us more secure. Our colleague 
Congressman Skelton of Missouri has pointed out that there is not a 
single Army nondeployed combat brigade currently prepared to meet its 
wartime mission. That, Madam Speaker, is an extraordinary assertion and 
I suggest an accurate one as well.
  Meanwhile, the news in Iraq is equally dire. The chief of 
intelligence for the Marine Corps in Iraq has concluded that prospects 
for securing that country's Anbar Province are dim and there

[[Page 18548]]

is almost nothing the U.S. military can do to improve the political and 
social situation there. Thirty-four people were killed in suicide 
attacks on Monday in Tal Afar and Ramadi. Fifty-two bound and tortured 
corpses were found across Baghdad on Friday. And just today General 
John Abizaid, the commander of the U.S. Central Command, said that the 
U.S. military will likely maintain or possibly increase current force 
levels through next spring due to rising sectarian violence and the 
slow progress of the Iraqi Government.
  Madam Speaker, I want the Iraqi Government to succeed. I want 
democracy to flourish. I want a robust economy creating jobs and hope 
for its people to be in place. However, Madam Speaker, the policies 
that we have pursued have not accomplished that objective.
  Clearly, Madam Speaker, we need a new direction. I believe, as former 
National Security Adviser Brzezinski has said, that American and Iraqi 
leaders should jointly consult on a plan to transition from active 
American leadership and policing and securing Iraq to increasing Iraqi 
responsibility.
  I do not believe that we should announce an arbitrary timeline, but I 
do believe that discussions on this transition should be agreed upon 
and jointly announced.
  In addition, the Iraqi Government, not the United States, should then 
call for a regional conference of Muslim states to ask them to help the 
new government establish and consolidate internal stability. I suggest, 
Madam Speaker, that is in the interest of every regional state in the 
Middle East.
  Additionally, the United States should convene a donors' conference 
of European states, Japan, China, and others to become more directly 
involved in financing the restoration of the Iraqi economy. A stable, 
secure, and free Iraq is in the best interest of the entire 
international community; and because it is in their interest, they bear 
a joint responsibility to effect that end.
  Madam Speaker, this is our last best chance, in my opinion, to 
salvage success in Iraq. Our commitment there has been unwavering, but 
it must not be unending. Our strategy, hampered by gross 
miscalculations by our civilian leadership, is not working; and we 
believe that we have a duty to advocate for policy changes that will 
better serve our security interest and this great Nation we love.
  In conclusion, Madam Speaker, I reiterate, Democrats are committed to 
defending America, making safe Americans, and defeating terrorists who 
would harm our Nation and undermine our values. Our policies that we 
are pursuing have not worked. They need to be changed.
  Again, I thank Mr. Schiff for his leadership on this hour.
  Mr. SCHIFF. I thank the gentleman from Maryland for his leadership.
  And I particularly appreciate your comments about the proposal that 
Zbigniew Brzezinski has put forward. It is, I think, exemplary of the 
new direction in Iraq that Democrats have been advocating.
  The administration's policy of stay the course, the sum and substance 
of it, is more of the same. Indeed, in a nonclassified briefing when I 
asked Secretaries Rumsfeld and Rice, Director Negroponte and General 
Pace how are we adapting our strategy given that the sectarian violence 
is now more prominent than the insurgent violence, how are we changing 
from a counterinsurgency strategy to one that attempts to stop the 
civil war, the long and short of it is we weren't. We are simply doing 
the same thing we have done all along. The same thing that has led us 
to a place, as you pointed out, where Marine intelligence is saying we 
lost Anbar Province probably for good. If you keep doing the same thing 
and you expect the result to be different, you are going to be bitterly 
disappointed.
  And I thank the gentleman for his comments and his leadership on 
this.
  Mr. HOYER. Thank you very much.
  Mr. SCHIFF. For a small State, I have to say Maryland produces more 
than its share of great leaders, particularly on the issue of national 
security.
  Mr. HOYER. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. SCHIFF. Yes.
  Mr. HOYER. Of course our small State has given your large State our 
leader.
  Mr. SCHIFF. That is true.
  I now yield to my friend and colleague from Maryland, Mr. Van Hollen.
  Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I thank my friend and colleague Mr. Schiff from 
California, thank him for organizing these very important national 
security discussions here on the floor in the House. I also want to 
thank my colleague from Maryland Steny Hoyer for his terrific 
leadership on national security and a whole range of issues, and it is 
great to be here again with David Scott, my colleague, from Georgia, 
who has also been a leader and a very important voice on these 
important issues to our country.
  Mr. Hoyer mentioned that we had the important passing about 8 days 
ago of the solemn occasion of 9/11. It was the 5th-year anniversary of 
9/11 and the terrible attacks that took place upon our country. And I 
do think it is important to go back to that time and remember where 
those attacks came from because they were launched from Afghanistan. 
You had a failed state in Afghanistan run by the Taliban; and in that 
failed state, al Qaeda was able to take hold and find a home, and Osama 
bin Laden was able to prosper and plot his attacks against the United 
States.
  And after the attacks took place on September 11, 2001, this 
Congress, this country, and the international community were united in 
pledging that we would work together to defeat terrorism, to defeat al 
Qaeda and bring them to justice. And despite that unity, we have not 
achieved the result. In fact, if you look upon the situation today, 
there is great division in the world and we have failed to capitalize 
on that unity to finish the job in Afghanistan and against al Qaeda.
  The President declared way back in 2003, May 2003, aboard the 
aircraft carrier USS Lincoln, he had a big banner behind him that said 
``Mission Accomplished.'' Well, we haven't come close to accomplishing 
that mission because as we gather here on the floor today, Osama bin 
Laden is alive and well somewhere along the Afghan/Pakistan border, al 
Qaeda continues to plot attacks against the United States. They have 
become a franchiser. You know how al Qaeda franchises around the world.

                              {time}  2145

  We have not made progress at totally dismantling that organization. 
In fact, what we are seeing in southern Afghanistan is a resurgence of 
the Taliban as reported by the NATO Commander there, and our own 
commanders on the ground.
  What have we done? We have actually reduced the number of U.S. forces 
in southern Afghanistan. We disbanded the one unit at the CIA that had 
the specific mission of going after al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden.
  You open the newspaper today and see that the opium crop in 
Afghanistan is at an all-time high, historic high. And we also know 
that the Pakistan Government that we had been really relying on to keep 
the Taliban and al Qaeda on the run in the northwest frontier part of 
Pakistan, that, in fact, they have now, the Pakistani Government has 
entered into a nonaggression pact essentially with the Taliban leaders 
and the leaders in the Waziristan area.
  So here we are more than 5 years after those terrible attacks, and we 
have not completed the job. We have not finished the mission against al 
Qaeda. And instead, in my view, we have actually reduced our commitment 
to doing that. And we must make sure that as Americans we are again 
united today, making sure we finish the mission in Afghanistan and 
bringing to justice and defeating the organization that, after all, was 
the organization and the leadership responsible for those attacks of 
September 11.
  Instead, we did take our eye off the ball. We decided, instead of 
finishing the job in Afghanistan, to go into Iraq. And today, 
unfortunately, if you look at the situation on the ground, it is a 
mess.

[[Page 18549]]

  You know, the Vice President, it was a little more a year ago, he 
went on national television and said, and I quote, that ``the 
insurgency in Iraq was in its last throes.''
  Well, just a few weeks ago we had a Pentagon report required by 
Congress that said that the insurgency, and I quote, ``remains potent 
and viable.'' And, in fact, the insurgency no longer is our number one 
problem in Iraq. The real problem is the cycling civil war, whether it 
is called a civil war, an incipient civil war, incipient of people are 
being killed in sectarian violence.
  So you have a situation where the administration was wrong on so many 
counts. They were wrong on weapons of mass destruction, they were wrong 
on the claim that there was a connection between Osama bin Laden and 
Saddam Hussein. In fact, we now have a bipartisan report out of the 
Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that said definitively there 
was never any relationship between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda. In 
fact, they were adversaries, they were ideological opposites. They were 
wrong on that.
  They were wrong on the cost of the war. They totally underestimated 
the cost of the war. They gave the American people one number that was 
low-balled. In turn it was a much bigger number.
  Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. Van Hollen, notwithstanding all of those mistakes in 
judgment and execution of the war, I am sure it gave you great 
confidence to hear from the Vice President on Meet the Press that if he 
had to do it all over again, he would do exactly the same thing. That 
must have encouraged you.
  Mr. VAN HOLLEN. It was stunning actually, because what you would hope 
for from our national leaders is some reflection, some understanding 
that the situation that we encountered in Iraq was not what we 
expected, that it was not what he said it would be. And, in fact, 
unfortunately this administration has never come to grips with the huge 
gap between what they said would happen in Iraq and with what is 
happening on the ground. That has exposed, I believe, a great 
credibility gap.
  So when the administration says, trust us, we know what we are doing 
in Iraq; all you people who raise questions, don't you worry about it, 
I have to say, that is what they told us many, many years ago. That is 
what Vice President Cheney said more than a year ago when he said the 
insurgency was in its last throes. So asking questions and trying to 
figure out a better way is, in fact, the patriotic thing to do.
  But I think one of the things that is most surprising is the fact 
that the administration did not really have a postwar plan. They 
thought things were going to just go so swimmingly in Iraq, that you 
did not have to plan for really the postinvasion period.
  In fact, just about a week ago, there was a general from the Defense 
Department who not only said that they did not have a postwar plan, but 
said specifically that Secretary Rumsfeld would punish anybody who came 
up with a plan, because it would send a signal to the outside world 
that this would not be as quick and easy as the Secretary of Defense 
wanted people to think it was.
  And let me just, I think it is important to read this excerpt: 
``Rumsfeld Forbade Planning for Postwar Iraq, General Says.'' This is 
out of the Saturday, September 9, Washington Post. ``Long before the 
United States invaded Iraq in 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld 
forbade military strategists to develop plans for securing a postwar 
Iraq, the retiring Commander of the Army Transportation Corps said.''
  Brigadier General Mark Scheid said in an interview, that Rumsfeld 
said ``he would fire the next person'' who talked about the need for a 
postwar plan. And we wonder why we are in trouble today in Iraq. We 
wonder when we open our newspapers or look at television sets why we 
see such a mess.
  You know, the terrible thing is that there were people in the 
administration who had worked on a postwar plan. Many people at the 
State Department had developed different scenarios for what would 
happen and how to respond. But instead of following that plan, the 
Defense Department essentially junked it, and Secretary Rumsfeld not 
only did not come up with a plan, but now we have a brigadier general 
who said that he threatened to fire people who came up with a plan.
  We need to do some more firing. We need to hold people accountable. 
We need to hold people accountable who made these big, big mistakes.
  Now, one of the other things that we have learned recently, and this 
may be partly due to the fact that they did not have a postwar plan, 
was the incompetence of many of the civilians that they sent in there 
to work on the reconstruction phase in Iraq. You know, we recently 
passed the 1-year anniversary of the terrible Hurricanes Katrina and 
Rita that struck our States in the Southern United States, struck New 
Orleans, struck Louisiana, struck Mississippi.
  And we know all too well that the people in those regions were hit 
twice really. First they were hit by a terrible hurricane, and then 
they were hit by the incompetence of a FEMA that was headed up by 
people who were not experts in emergency response, but happened to be 
political favorites in the administration. Michael Brown, we know that 
his primary credential was he had been the President of the Horse 
Breeders Association.
  Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. Van Hollen, I am sure if there had been an emergency 
of a national character involving thoroughbred horses, we would have 
been prepared.
  Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Well, the FEMA job, as we know, is one that we have 
to be prepared for all sorts of things, but you are absolutely right, 
my colleague. It goes to show, in my view, the kind of disdain that the 
administration has with respect to what kind of qualifications are 
required for people who are vested with such important national 
responsibilities.
  And we remember when the President said, ``Heck of a job, Brownie,'' 
in the midst of the real disaster not just from the hurricane, but in 
the response.
  But what I think we are learning now, unfortunately, is that same 
kind of cronyism, that same kind of cronyism infected many of the 
decisions with respect to who we sent to Iraq for that postwar period 
and reconstruction period.
  You would think that in deciding who we should send to Iraq, we would 
send the people who are highly qualified at reconstruction, people who 
knew something about Iraq, maybe people who spoke Arabic and the native 
language if we had them available. But if you look at a very recent 
article from the Washington Post, we learned that it was not those kind 
of expert qualifications that made the decision. It had to do with 
whether or not you were a big political supporter of the Bush 
administration.
  And I think this kind of political cronyism, when it comes to the 
biggest national security issues we have got, shows an incredible 
contempt for the American people and their security.
  I just think it is very important to read a little passage from this 
article from the Washington Post. This is an article, September, this 
past Sunday, September 17. Headline: Ties to GOP Trumped Know-How Among 
Staff Sent to Rebuild Iraq. After the fall of Saddam Hussein's 
government in April 2007, the opportunity to participate in the U.S.-
led effort to reconstruct Iraq attracted all manner of Americans, 
restless professionals, Arabic-speaking academics, development 
specialists, and war-zone adventurers. But before they could go to 
Baghdad, they had to just get past Jim O'Beirne's office in the 
Pentagon.
  To pass muster with O'Beirne, who is a political appointee who 
screens prospective political appointees for Defense Department posts, 
applicants did not need to be experts in the Middle East or in 
postconflict reconstruction. What seemed most important was loyalty to 
the Bush administration.
  Jumping down a bit: The decision to send the loyal and willing 
instead of the best and the brightest is now regarded by many people 
involved in the 3\1/2\-year effort to stabilize and rebuild Iraq as one 
of the Bush administration's gravest errors.

[[Page 18550]]

  And one of the people who was set up to be, he was the CPA person 
over there, said: We did not tap, and it should have started from the 
White House on down, we just did not tap the right people to do this 
job, said Frederick Smith, who served as the Deputy Director of the 
CPA, that is the Coalition Provisional Authority's Washington office. 
It was a tough, tough job. Instead, we got people who went out there 
because of their political leanings.
  He goes on to give a couple of examples of how people with absolutely 
no experience in contracts were given responsibilities for a $18 
billion construction budget.
  He goes on to talk about, you know, 24-year-old political appointees 
whose only qualifications were they had been part of the Bush campaign 
machine. Those are the people that were sent to Iraq to do a very 
important mission for the American people.
  And it is extremely disturbing to discover that the qualifications 
for those people had nothing to do with their ability to do the job, 
their expertise to do the job, their past background to do the job; 
that what it had to do with was whether they were a big political 
booster of the Bush administration. It points out that many of them 
were big political contributors to the Bush administration.
  Taking that kind of license with our national security, I think, is 
scandalous. It is important that we begin to hold people to account. 
Let's begin to have a real national conversation, not just a one-way 
discussion that the President wants to have.
  Let's have some real hearings on Capitol Hill. Let's begin to have 
some accountability, because we all know that when you have a system 
that rewards people who fail, that gives a pat on the back to the 
people who constantly got it wrong, and yet at the same time penalizes 
the people who got it right in this administration, the people who said 
we needed more troops on the ground, the people who questioned some of 
the decisions, it turns out that people who questioned the decisions 
were ignored or penalized. People like this general who wanted to do 
some postwar planning was ignored. In fact, they threatened to fire 
people who did that kind of thing.

                              {time}  2200

  If you reward failure, you are going to get more failure. What we are 
asking I think tonight and on other nights is that we just begin to 
hold people accountable and that this House of Representatives begin to 
do its job, and not be a rubber stamp, not just say yes, Mr. President, 
you know it all, when in fact we know from what is going on in Iraq 
that they have gotten so much wrong. Let's begin to get it right, and 
let's begin to ask the hard questions. I thank my colleague.
  Mr. SCHIFF. I thank my colleague for his statement tonight and all 
your tremendous leadership on this. I am confident with Democrats we 
will not only have a new direction, but we will have a functioning 
government of checks and balances where there is actual oversight by 
the Congress of the administration, which every administration needs, 
no matter how good, but particularly when the administration has made 
such serious mistakes that have placed this Nation so much in jeopardy. 
We need oversight.
  I would add only one thing, and this you may have watched, Mr. Van 
Hollen, the interview with the President from New Orleans when he went 
down for the Katrina anniversary, and Brian Williams asked him, ``Mr. 
President, some people have criticized that you have never really asked 
for a sacrifice of the American people in the war on terror. Is that a 
fair criticism?''
  His answer really struck me, because we have been talking about the 
American people being brought in and given a chance to contribute to 
our security and our success with an Apollo-like project for energy 
independence.
  Well, the President's idea of sacrifice, he said, ``Brian, that is 
not true. The American people have sacrificed. After 9/11, our economy 
was hurt, so American people sacrificed. And they pay taxes. They pay a 
lot of taxes, Brian.''
  That was it. That was the sacrifice he was asking. Now, if he had 
been a little more forthcoming, he might have said, ``Now, Brian, they 
pay taxes. They pay a lot of taxes, although actually they pay less 
taxes since 9/11, thanks to me, so the sacrifice really is they pay 
less taxes. That is their contribution.''
  And you have to ask, where are the Rosie the Riveters? Who is being 
called upon? These troops of ours that are doing these multiple 
rotations, they are sacrificing and their families are sacrificing. But 
what have the rest of us been asked to do? And in this body, I would 
think at a minimum we could move forward with far-reaching legislation 
to wean ourselves from reliance on fossil fuels. We could initiate real 
oversight with vigor. These are the kind of new directions we need to 
take this country in.
  I yield now to my good friend, the distinguished gentleman from 
Georgia, David Scott, a fellow Blue Dog member, who has been such a 
superb voice on these issues.
  Mr. SCOTT of Georgia. Thank you very much, Mr. Schiff. Of course, it 
is great to be here with you again, and my good friend Chris Van Hollen 
from Maryland. He is a tremendous advocate for national security. I 
have enjoyed his opening remarks and very thought-provoking remarks. 
And certainly it is always good to be on the floor with our leader, 
Steny Hoyer, who has long been a champion of national security. That is 
certainly the issue today.
  This is the issue that is on the minds of the American people. This 
is prime time, national security. We have got to make sure the American 
people not only feel safe, but we guarantee that they are safe. We have 
the capacity to do that.
  As I stand here, I was observing the remarks earlier about the 
contributions that the great State of Maryland and all of our great 
States have made to our strong defense and national security, and 
certainly I am proud to say that Georgia, my State, is certainly at the 
head of the list on that as well.
  I stand here on the shoulders of some great folks who have been 
strong on national security and helped to secure this country and make 
us the superior military power that we are, men like Senator Sam Nunn 
and Senator Richard Russell from my fine State of Georgia. I stand here 
on the shoulders of those great Democratic leaders who have led the 
way.
  Mr. SCHIFF. If I can interject, Mr. Scott, because I don't want to do 
any disservice to the great State of Georgia, a couple other superb 
Members who are contemporaries of ours, Jim Marshall and John Barrow, 
great, great advocates and leaders on national security. Jim Marshall 
is a decorated war veteran. So Georgia has got more than its share.
  Mr. SCOTT of Georgia. Absolutely. Jim and I have traveled overseas 
together. He was a decorated war veteran from Vietnam. So we stand tall 
as Democrats when it comes to national security, without any question.
  I want to start my remarks off, because I think today will go down in 
history as a very profound day, starting with the United Nations. Today 
presented some very interesting pictures as we watched television. Two 
speeches, of course, stand out on this day.
  I don't think I can remember in history when the President of the 
United States addressed the United Nations, but yet one of our chief 
adversaries, one of which he labeled one of the ``axis of evil,'' the 
President of Iran, Ahmadinejad, came in prime time, while the President 
spoke earlier, not in prime time.
  I am wondering how we got to this point? Where did this president of 
Iran come from? Five years ago we had never heard of him. Certainly I 
hadn't. But here he is at the United Nations, in fact upstaging our 
President. If I were working at the White House, I certainly would not 
have allowed the President of the United States to be over there on the 
same day. I felt that was very, very interesting.
  It might do us a little good to understand how we got to this point, 
and the way we do that, I think, is to start off this discussion by 
clearly pointing out to the American people something that

[[Page 18551]]

they are gradually beginning to see, and that is this, that we are 
fighting two distinct wars; one war is on terror, the other war is in 
Iraq.
  One war is of necessity. It was necessary. That is the war on terror, 
which is where we went into Afghanistan to go after the terrorist 
organization that attacked us on 9/11. That was a war of necessity, and 
we went there because that is where the enemy was that attacked us. 
That is where al Qaeda was. That is where bin Laden was, on that border 
between Afghanistan and Pakistan. We got the support of NATO and we got 
the support of the government of Afghanistan, with their help, and we 
went in there.
  But then we went into Iraq, and we went into Iraq on a lot of 
manufactured, now we know the truth, incomplete information, maybe 
false information, perhaps even manipulated information. Those are the 
facts. That is what is out there. But, nonetheless, we went into Iraq 
in a war of choice.
  Now we need to do a cost-benefit analysis, which brings me to the 
point I wanted to get to earlier, to segue back in, to show these two 
connecting points of what happened today, where the President of the 
United States is upstaged by the President of Iran, a president we did 
not even know about 5 years ago.
  But when you do the cost-benefit analysis on the war of choice, which 
is the war in Iraq, not the war on terror, which is the war of 
necessity in Afghanistan, and do a cost-benefit analysis, in other 
words, look at our cost: 2,600 soldiers, men and women who gave their 
lives, who were killed; nearly 20,000 wounded; over $600 billion 
expended at a rate of $3 billion every week. That is the cost.
  Who benefited? Who benefited? Who benefited? Iraq. When we went into 
Afghanistan, although we went in on the war on terror, we went after 
the Taliban, doing, again, Iraq's bidding. That was their enemy.
  When we went into Iraq, without question the chief beneficiary of 
that was Iran. They were the beneficiaries, because Saddam Hussein was 
their worst blood enemy. We did the dirty work for Iran. On the other 
account, we established a Shia regime there, a Shia government in Iraq. 
That, again, was a benefit to Iran.

                              {time}  2210

  They were able to control that.
  The other thing, all the while we are doing this, they are busy 
developing their nuclear capacity so that now that they have the 
nuclear capacity, again, a checkmate and a benefit for Iraq.
  So that now my point is simply that because of some of our policies, 
most definitely going into Iraq, the major beneficiary of our going 
into Iraq is Iran, which now is boosted on the stage and is here this 
day, in this country, at the United Nations, giving a speech. And here 
is a man who is the sponsor of the very terrorist organization that 
controlled the Lebanon situation, as well as the Hamas, which controls 
the Palestinian.
  All I am simply saying is our national security policies, our foreign 
policies have had a devastating impact, and that when we do the cost/
benefit analysis, it certainly benefits Iraq. It has taken us away from 
pursuing the goal of finding and decapitating the head of the 
mastermind of the terrorist organization that came to destroy us.
  That is why the American people are beginning to see this 
differentiation, and we are not going to be able to find our way out of 
this unless we finally do so we can understand exactly what this 
situation in Iraq is doing, and like you, we are not standing here just 
talking. We are standing here explaining how we earnestly feel as 
Americans, strong, patriotic Americans, who care about this country, 
and who resent the President of the United States saying that anytime 
we question that, we are not patriotic. We are doing our duty that the 
American people sent us up here to do to raise these important issues.
  We cannot stay the course, not this course. Sixty-three percent of 
the American people say they want a new direction. It is up to 
Democrats to provide that direction.
  The other issue which concerns me is the state of our military. Not 
only must we explain to the American people and help to dramatize and 
explain clearly and show how we are dealing with two distinct wars, one 
of necessity, one of choice, but the drain on the military, we have got 
to correct that. Our military is in a draining state. We are not 
meeting our recruiting goals. We are on two and three tours of duty 
there.
  We are in a terrible hole in Iraq, and we have got to extricate 
ourselves out of it. The challenge is to do so with yet the dignity and 
the respect that we must do so to honor the sacrifice of our men and 
women who have given their lives there, while at the same time putting 
the responsibility on the Iraqis themselves to manifest their destiny. 
They want democracy. We cannot shove it at them with a gun. They have 
to feel it in their soul. They have to go forward and grab it. That is 
not happening, and that is what we have to do to get this moving 
forward in a way that gives the respect to our military who have given 
their lives there.
  Mr. SCHIFF. I thank the gentleman very much for your comments, for 
your leadership on this issue. It has been a great pleasure and honor 
to share a few thoughts with you and our colleague Mr. Van Hollen and 
our whip Mr. Hoyer. Once again, I want to thank the great State of 
Georgia for sending you to Congress.

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