[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 2]
[House]
[Page 2232]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           OPERATIONS IN IRAQ

  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, one cannot doubt that the American 
objective in Iraq has failed. Those are not my words. They were written 
last week by William F. Buckley, the godfather of modern American 
conservatism.
  In a column entitled, It Did Not Work, Mr. Buckley urges an 
acknowledgment of defeat in Iraq. If President Bush has lost William F. 
Buckley, then his Iraq policy is in a heap of trouble.
  By the way, I am eager to see if Mr. Buckley is labeled a treasonous 
coward, as my friend and colleague Mr. Murtha was when he made similar 
points a few months ago.

                              {time}  2015

  Who could blame Mr. Buckley, or anyone else with a pulse, for that 
matter, at arriving at this conclusion?
  While we were away for our district work period, the bombing of a 
Shiite shrine ignited the most gruesome carnage that Iraq has ever seen 
since the war began nearly 3 years ago. The Washington Post reported on 
its front page this morning that a staggering 1,300 people died in last 
week's sectarian violence.
  ``Hundreds of unclaimed dead lay at the morgue at midday Monday,'' 
The Post reported, ``blood-caked men who had been shot, knifed, 
garroted or apparently suffocated by the plastic bags still over their 
heads. Many of the bodies were sprawled with their hands still bound.''
  Is this what ``freedom on the march'' looks like, Mr. Speaker?
  But we should not be surprised. It is not as if no one saw this 
coming. Those of us who opposed the Iraq war before it even started 
warned that an invasion would open up a Pandora's Box of ethnic strife 
that we would be unable to tame, that could lead to full-blown civil 
war.
  The administration's Iraq policy is a tragic blunder of historic 
proportions. I can hardly believe that we have sacrificed 2,300 
Americans and spent a quarter of a trillion dollars all so Iraq could 
slip into chaos and lawlessness, with the political process now hanging 
by the flimsiest of threads.
  My heart weeps for our soldiers who have been put in this impossible 
situation. Various news reports describe some of our troops as hanging 
back during last week's violence. Why? Because rather than being able 
to calm the uprisings, they know that their very presence is actually 
one of the main catalysts for the violence in the first place. No 
wonder a new poll shows that our servicemen and -women in Iraq believe 
we should leave and we should leave soon, with less than a quarter 
agreeing with President Bush that we should stay as long as it takes.
  Here you see a complete folly that is our policy. Our preemptive 
occupation lit the original match that grew into this uncontainable 
inferno. We do not have a hose to put it out. In fact, we pour gasoline 
on the fire every single day, a fire that is destroying Iraq, killing 
our soldiers, sending them home wounded almost beyond repair. And for 
what reason? If we are doing more harm than good, if we are a force for 
resentment and divisiveness, rather than peace and stability, what are 
we doing there?
  Mr. Speaker, it has never been clearer that it is time to bring our 
troops home.

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