[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 10]
[House]
[Pages 14618-14619]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        U.S. INVOLVEMENT IN IRAQ

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Washington (Mr. McDermott) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, there is hardly anyone asking the right 
question at this time, and it is whether the U.S. involvement in Iraq 
will end as it did in Vietnam or last forever as it has in Korea. Last 
week, the President declared his intention to keep America in Iraq 
forever. That's a sure sign the President's been talking to the Vice 
President again.
  Iraq looks nothing like Korea did in 1952. There is no DMZ and no 
38th parallel separating the opposing forces. In Iraq, the war is 
everywhere. In Korea, the DMZ is one of South Korea's most popular 
tourist destinations, with buses hauling people back and forth. It's so 
popular you have to book the trip weeks in advance. It costs $42, by 
the way, and that's without lunch.
  At the DMZ, you can visit the small building where an armistice was 
signed, and risk stepping across a painted line on the floor separating 
North and South Korea, which remain technically at war. Is this the 
President's vision of Iraq? Hardly, but that's what he would like the 
American people to believe.
  It sounds so simple and so safe and so utterly detached from Iraq, 
where every street corner in Baghdad is a war zone. The President wants 
an indefinite military presence in Iraq, but a majority of the Iraq 
parliament signed a petition demanding a timetable for the U.S. to 
leave, which the President ignores.
  The President wants permanent military bases in Iraq despite the 
thoughtful and bipartisan conclusion of the Iraq Study Group. That 
group said, ``The United States can begin to shape a positive climate 
for its diplomatic efforts internationally and within Iraq, through 
public statements by President Bush that reject the notion that the 
United States seeks to control Iraq's oil or seeks permanent bases 
within Iraq.''
  But the President rejected their common sense and ordered the base 
building to go forward. What exactly are we

[[Page 14619]]

protecting with the Iraqi people fleeing by the millions? South Korea 
never looked like this.
  In Iraq, students graduating from college used to dream about getting 
a good job and raising a family. Now they dream of getting out of Iraq 
alive and as quickly as possible.
  Just today, the United Nations issued a new report that says 4.2 
million Iraqis have been displaced, half driven out of their homes by 
rampant and unrelenting bloodshed, and the other fleeing the country. 
It's estimated by the U.N. that 30,000 Iraqis cross into Syria every 
month, and Syria says the actual number is much higher. Jordan, 
meanwhile, has already taken over 1 million Iraqis. What have we done? 
We have granted 701 Iraqi refugees asylum in the United States.
  The President recently announced we're willing to accept up to 7,000 
Iraqis. Over 2 million Iraqis have fled their homeland so far, and 
we're going to take in a few thousand.
  When we left Vietnam, we took hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese 
with us. Within a few months 130,000 Vietnamese had resettled here, and 
within a few years the number topped 320,000. These were our Vietnamese 
friends, people who had risked their lives to help us in Vietnam. We 
didn't desert them and they didn't desert us.
  In Iraq, the President says we're willing to take a few thousand in a 
Nation losing millions of its people. The Iraqi people are fleeing 
their homes and their homeland in increasing numbers, flooding into 
nearby countries unable to cope with the refugee crisis.
  Millions of peaceful, law-abiding Iraqis from its intellectual 
establishment, to its merchants, professionals, civil servants, and 
ordinary citizens are doing whatever they can to leave. And the 
President is doing everything he can to stay, building bases and 
demanding a so-called law to gain access to Iraqi's oil.
  The President's stay-the-course strategy has evolved into his stay 
forever strategy. It hasn't worked before and it won't work now.
  The President's military escalation is an absolute failure, and the 
sooner the President admits his mistake, the faster we can develop a 
national exit plan that protects our soldiers and gives Iraq back to 
the Iraq people, no strings or military bases attached.
  Mr. Speaker, please pass the message to our President. It's time to 
bring the troops home. A hundred a month are dying, more and more. Last 
month, the third highest month in the war. It's not getting better. 
We've got to bring the troops home.

{time}  2115

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