[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 1]
[House]
[Pages 603-604]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  2000
                    NO ESCALATION OF TROOPS IN IRAQ

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I come to the floor this evening to voice 
my strong opposition to President Bush's

[[Page 604]]

apparent decision to send up to 20,000 more troops to Iraq. Tomorrow 
evening the President will try to persuade a very skeptical public that 
more troops are needed in Iraq. But regardless of the number he 
suggests tomorrow night, I will oppose any efforts to escalate the war 
by sending additional American troops.
  Mr. Speaker, it appears President Bush has learned nothing from the 
results of the 2006 election, nor has he listened to the suggestions of 
the bipartisan Iraq Study Group or his own Joint Chiefs of Staff who 
said as late as last month that they saw no reason to send more troops 
to Iraq.
  Instead, President Bush has chosen to stick his head in the sand, not 
listen to anyone and continue on a course that is not going to make 
Iraq any safer for either our brave troops or for the Iraqis 
themselves.
  It is time to bring an end to the war in Iraq. President Bush has 
lost the support of the American people who have grown frustrated by 
the continuing loss of American troops. They are rightfully asking the 
question, why must our troops continue to serve as referees in a civil 
conflict between Sunnis and Shias?
  Mr. Speaker, there was a new Washington Post ABC news poll released 
this morning. And only 17 percent of Americans support sending more 
troops to Iraq; 17 percent is not a mandate for anything, in my 
opinion. And it is time for President Bush to finally listen to the 
American people.
  Many of us woke up on New Year's Day to the headline of ``3,000'' 
bannered across our newspapers. We have now lost more than 3,000 
soldiers in Iraq. Now, how many more are going to have to die before 
the President realizes that there is no possible U.S. military solution 
in Iraq?
  Some supporters of the President's plan are going to claim that if we 
bring our troops home now, the more than 3,000 U.S. soldiers that have 
died over the past 3 years will have done so in vain. But I could not 
disagree more. These men and women fought admirably for our country and 
will certainly be remembered as heroes. But the question now is whether 
or not we want to risk thousands more American lives for a war that we 
so obviously cannot win.
  Since the inception of this war, we have seen little evidence of 
progress in Iraq. In fact, the violence has only intensified to the 
point that a report released from the President's own Pentagon 
concluded that violence in Iraq was at an all time high just last 
month. And last month was the third deadliest month for American troops 
since the start of the war with insurgents claiming 111 soldiers lives.
  Now, our troops know that the situation in Iraq is getting worse 
every day. They are speaking about IEDs, the improvised explosive 
devices used by the insurgents, which are now bigger and more complex.
  The Bush Administration has tried troop escalation before, but it has 
never worked. Last summer, the President touted a plan that sent more 
troops into Baghdad, similar to what is expected to be proposed by him 
tomorrow. But while the violence subsided for a couple of weeks, by the 
end of August last year, violence was again on the rise, and it 
continued to escalate for the remainder of the year.
  Based on these facts on the ground, why would the President even 
consider sending more troops to Iraq? Why would you put more American 
lives in harm's way when we know that previous troop escalations have 
not been successful in reducing violence and decreasing the number of 
insurgents?
  Mr. Speaker, it is time for us to begin to bring our troops home. The 
President has said that increasing troops is a sacrifice we have to 
make to win this war. But I think truly it is time for him to admit 
that risking more American lives for this failed war is a monumental 
mistake.

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