[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Pages 18220-18239]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




        NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2008

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the 
Senate will resume consideration of H.R. 1585, which the clerk will 
report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 1585) to authorize appropriations for fiscal 
     year 2008 for military activities of the Department of 
     Defense, for military construction, and for defense 
     activities of the Department of Energy, to prescribe military 
     personnel strengths for such fiscal year, and for other 
     purposes.

  Pending:

       Nelson of Nebraska (for Levin) amendment No. 2011, in the 
     nature of a substitute.
       Webb amendment No. 2012 (to amendment No. 2011), to specify 
     minimum periods between deployment of units and members of 
     the Armed Forces for Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation 
     Enduring Freedom.
       Nelson of Florida amendment No. 2013 (to amendment No. 
     2012), to change the enactment date.

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Arizona.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, again, I would like to thank my old friend 
from Hawaii for his patience so that, as the Republican ranking member 
of the committee, I may make a statement about the bill itself and 
about the situation in Iraq. I thank him for his courtesy, and I will 
try not to take too long a period of time. So I thank my old friend 
from Hawaii.
  Mr. President, we have reached another moment of importance this week 
in debating the fiscal year 2008 Defense authorization bill. We will 
help set the course of the Nation's security policy and influence our 
participation in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Much of the debate, 
as we all know, will be about Iraq, and before I discuss that and my 
recent visit, I would note that many provisions in this bill constitute 
a good defense policy and will strengthen the ability of our country to 
defend itself.
  Under the leadership of my good friend from Michigan, the chairman of 
the committee, Senator Levin, I think we have crafted an excellent 
piece of legislation. I think a testament to his leadership is that the 
committee voted unanimously to report the bill, and it fully funds the 
President's $648 billion defense budget request. It provides necessary 
measures to try to bring under control waste, fraud, and abuse in 
defense procurement, and, frankly, it makes Members more accountable 
for their spending in the earmark process.
  Again, I thank Senator Levin, the subcommittee chairs, and all the 
committee members for their work in bringing this issue to the floor.
  Very briefly, we have authorized a 3.5-percent, across-the-board pay 
raise for all military personnel. We have increased Army and Marine end 
strength to 525,400 and 189,000, respectively. The committee also 
approved $2.7 billion for items on the Army Chief of Staff's unfunded 
requirement list, including $775 million for reactive armor and other 
Stryker requirements, $207 million for aviation survivability 
equipment, $102 million for combat training centers and funding for 
explosive ordnance disposal equipment, night vision devices, and 
machine guns.
  The bill also authorizes $4.1 billion for Mine Resistant Ambush 
Protected vehicles, known as MRAP vehicles, for all of the Services' 
known requirements.
  The committee has come up with the money to support our troops, and I 
have no doubt the full Senate will follow step.
  Money and policy statements are not all that is required at this 
moment in our national history. Courage is required--courage, not the 
great courage exhibited by the brave men and women fighting today in 
Iraq and Afghanistan, but a smaller measure: the courage necessary to 
put our country's interests before every personal or political 
consideration.
  In this light, I would like to discuss America's involvement in Iraq, 
and finally I would like to make several points.
  Final reinforcements needed to implement General Petraeus's 
counterinsurgency tactics arrived just several weeks ago. Last week I 
had the opportunity to visit with troops in theater. From what I saw 
and heard while there, I believe our military, in cooperation with the 
Iraqi security forces, is making progress in a number of areas. There 
are other areas where they are not. I would like to outline some of 
their efforts, not to argue that these areas have suddenly become 
safe--they have not; I want to emphasize the areas have not become 
safe--but to illustrate the progress our military has achieved under 
General Petraeus's new strategy.
  Last year Anbar Province was believed to be lost to al-Qaida. On the 
map we see that U.S. and Iraqi troops cleaned out al-Qaida fighters 
from Ramadi and other areas of western Anbar. Tribal sheiks broke with 
the terrorists and joined the coalition side. It is a fact that some 16 
out of the 24 sheiks in the Sunni area of Anbar Province have now 
joined with U.S. forces in their commitment to destroy al-Qaida in 
Anbar Province.
  Ramadi, months ago, was Iraq's most dangerous city. It is now one of 
its safest. At considerable political risk, I point out that I visited, 
with Senator Graham, downtown Ramadi where the shopping areas were 
open. I did not visit without protection or without security forces 
with me. But the fact is, a short time ago it was one of the most 
dangerous cities in all of Iraq. Attacks are down from 30 to 35 a day 
in February to zero on most days now.
  In Fallujah, Iraqi police have established numerous stations and have 
divided the city into gated districts. The violence has declined and 
local intelligence tips have proliferated. Throughout Anbar Province, 
thousands of young men are signing up for the police and Army, and the 
locals are taking the fight to al-Qaida. All 18 major

[[Page 18221]]

tribes in the province are now onboard with the security plan. A year 
from now, the Iraqi Army and police could have total control of 
security in Ramadi, allowing American forces to safely draw down.
  South of Baghdad, operation Phantom Thunder is intended to stop 
insurgents present in the Baghdad belts from originating attacks in the 
capital itself. A brigade of the 10th Mountain Division, which I 
visited, is operating in Baghdad belts that have been havens for al-
Qaida. All soldiers in the brigade are living forward. That means they 
are in outposts away from the headquarters 24-7, living, working, and 
fighting alongside Iraqi military. Commanders report that the local 
sheiks are increasingly siding with the coalition against al-Qaida.
  Southeast of Baghdad, the military is targeting al-Qaida in safe 
havens they maintain along the Tigris River. In Baghdad itself, the 
military, in cooperation with Iraqi security forces, continues to 
establish joint security stations and deploy throughout the city. These 
efforts have produced some positive results. Sectarian violence has 
fallen. Since January, the total number of car bombings and suicide 
attacks declined. In May and June, the number of locals coming forward 
with intelligence tips has risen.
  Make no mistake, violence in Baghdad remains at unacceptably high 
levels, suicide bombers and other threats pose formidable challenges, 
and other difficulties abound. Nevertheless, there appears to be 
overall movement in the right direction.
  I have no doubt how difficult suicide bombers are to counter. Ask the 
Israelis. They literally had to seal their borders with Gaza and the 
West Bank because of the way people who are willing to sacrifice their 
own lives in order to take the lives of others are able to get through 
and do these horrendous acts that we are exposed to quite often on our 
television screens and in our newspapers in America.
  In Diyala Province, Iraqi and American troops have surged and are 
fighting to deny al-Qaida sanctuary in the city of Baqubah. For the 
first time since the war began, Americans showed up in force and did 
not quickly withdraw from the area. In response, locals have formed a 
new alliance with the coalition to counter al-Qaida.
  Why are some of these people now turning against al-Qaida? One reason 
is the extreme cruelty that is practiced by al-Qaida on a routine 
basis, which has caused many people to reject that kind of extreme 
violence and cruelty inflicted on the local people. Diyala, which was 
the center of Abu Mus' Ab al-Zarqawi's caliphate, finally has the 
chance to turn aside the forces of extremism.
  I offer these observations not to present a rosy scenario of the 
challenges we continue to face in Iraq. As last weekend's horrific 
bombing indicates so graphically, the threats to Iraqi stability have 
not gone away, nor are they likely to go away in the near future when 
our brave men and women in Iraq will continue to face great challenges.
  What I do believe is, while the mission to bring a degree of security 
to Iraq and to Baghdad and its environs in particular in order to 
establish the necessary preconditions for political and economic 
progress--while that mission is still in its early stages, the progress 
our military has made should encourage us. It is also clear the overall 
strategy that General Petraeus has put into place, a traditional 
counterinsurgency tactic that emphasizes protecting a population and 
which gets our troops off of the bases and into the areas they are 
trying to protect--that this strategy is the correct one.
  Some of my colleagues argue that we should return troops to the 
forward operating bases and confine their activities to training and 
targeted counterterrorism operations. That is precisely what we did for 
3\1/2\ years, and the situation in Iraq got worse. Over 3\1/2\ years we 
had our troops from operating bases going out--search and destroy as we 
used to call it during the Vietnam war--and going back to their bases. 
That was a failed strategy from the beginning. I am surprised that any 
of my colleagues would advocate a return to the failed Rumsfeld-Casey 
strategy.
  No one can be certain whether this new strategy, which remains in the 
early stages, can bring about greater stability. We can be sure, should 
the Senate seek to legislate an end to this strategy as it is just 
beginning, then we will fail for certain.
  Now that the military effort in Iraq is showing some signs of 
progress, the space is opening for political progress. Yet rather than 
seizing the opportunity, the government of Prime Minister Maliki is not 
functioning as it must. I repeat, the government of Prime Minister 
Maliki is not functioning as it must. We see little evidence of 
reconciliation and little progress toward meeting the benchmarks laid 
out by the President. The Iraqi Government can function. The question 
is whether it will.
  To encourage political progress, I believe we can find wisdom in 
several suggestions put forward recently by Henry Kissinger. 
Intensified negotiations by the Iraqi parties could limit violence, 
promote reconciliation, and put the political system on a more stable 
footing. We should promote dialog between the Iraqi Government and its 
Sunni Arab neighbors, specifically Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, in 
order to build broader international acceptance for the Iraqi central 
government in exchange for that government meeting specific obligations 
with respect to the protection and political participation of the Sunni 
minority. We should begin a broader effort to establish a basis for aid 
and even peacekeeping efforts by the international community, keyed to 
political progress in Iraq.
  Taking such steps, we must recognize that no lasting political 
settlement can grow out of the U.S. withdrawal. On the contrary, a 
withdrawal must grow out of a political solution, a solution made 
possible by the imposition of security by coalition and Iraqi forces.
  Secretary Kissinger is correct when he says ``precipitate withdrawal 
would produce a disaster,'' one that ``would not end the war but shift 
it to other areas, like Lebanon or Jordan or Saudi Arabia,'' produce 
greater violence among Iraqi factions, and embolden radical Islamists 
around the world.

       The war between Iraqi factions would intensify. The 
     demonstration of American impotence would embolden radical 
     Islamism and further radicalize its disciples from Indonesia 
     and India to the suburbs of European capitals . . .
       What America and the world need is not unilateral 
     withdrawal but a vision by the Bush administration of a 
     sustainable political end to the conflict.

  As I said before, withdrawals must grow out of a political solution, 
not the other way around.
  The Shias and the Sunnis and the Kurds:

       They need the buttress of a diplomatic process that could 
     provide international support for carrying out any internal 
     agreements reached or to contain conflict if the internal 
     parties cannot agree and Iraq breaks up . . .
       The American goal should be an international agreement 
     regarding the international status of Iraq. It would test 
     whether Iraq's neighbors as well as some more distant 
     countries are prepared to translate general concepts into 
     converging policies. It would provide a legal and political 
     framework to resist violations. These are the meaningful 
     benchmarks against which to test American withdrawals.

  He goes on to point out:

       Turkey has repeatedly emphasized it would resist a breakup 
     by force because of the radicalizing impact a Kurdish State 
     could have on Turkey's large Kurdish population. But this 
     would bring Turkey into unwanted conflict with the United 
     States and open a Pandora's box of other interventions.
       Saudi Arabia and Jordan dread Shiite domination of Iraq, 
     especially if the Baghdad regime threatens to become a 
     satellite of Iran. The various Gulf Sheikdoms, the largest of 
     which is Kuwait, find themselves in an even more threatened 
     position.
       Syria's attitudes are likely to be more ambivalent. Its 
     ties to Iran represent both a claim to status and a looming 
     vulnerability . . .
       Given a wise and determined American diplomacy, even Iran 
     may be brought to conclude that the risks of continued 
     turmoil outweigh the temptations before it.

  He goes on to talk about a multilateral framework.

       A forum for diplomacy already exists in the foreign 
     ministers' conference that met

[[Page 18222]]

     recently at Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. . . . It is in the United 
     States' interests to turn the conference into a working 
     enterprise under strong, if discrete, American leadership.

  He goes on to say:

       Neither the international system nor American public 
     opinion will accept as a permanent arrangement, an American 
     enclave maintained exclusively by American military power in 
     so volatile a region.

  I believe Secretary Kissinger is correct. I believe he is correct 
when he bases the premise that precipitate withdrawal would produce a 
disaster.
  Many of my colleagues would like to believe that should any of the 
various amendments forcing withdrawal become law, it would mark the end 
of this long effort. They are wrong.
  Should the Congress force a precipitous withdrawal from Iraq, it 
would mark a new beginning, the start of a new, more dangerous, more 
arduous effort to contain the forces unleashed by our disengagement. 
Our efforts in Iraq today are critical to the wider struggle against 
violent Islamic extremism. Already the terrorists are emboldened, 
excited that America is talking not about winning in Iraq but is rather 
debating when we should lose.
  Last week, Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaida's deputy chief, said the 
United States is merely delaying our ``inevitable'' defeat in Iraq and 
that: ``The Mujahideen of Islam in Iraq of the caliphate and jihad are 
advancing with steady steps toward victory.''
  If we leave Iraq prematurely, jihadists around the world will 
interpret the withdrawal as their great victory against our great 
power. The movement thrives in an atmosphere of perceived victory. We 
saw this in the surge of men and money flowing to al-Qaida following 
the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan.
  If they defeat the United States in Iraq, they will believe anything 
is possible, history is on their side, and they can bring their 
terrible rule to lands the world over.
  Recall the plan laid out in a letter from Zawahiri to Abu Mus'ab al-
Zarqawi before his death. That plan is to take shape in four stages: 
Establish a caliphate in Iraq, extend the jihad wave to the secular 
countries neighboring Iraq, clash with Israel; none of which shall 
commence until the completion of stage one: Expel the Americans from 
Iraq. The terrorists are in this war to win it. The question is, Are 
we?
  Withdrawing before there is a stable and legitimate Iraqi authority 
would turn Iraq into a failed state and a terrorist sanctuary in the 
heart of the Middle East. We have seen a failed state emerge after U.S. 
disengagement once before. It cost us terribly. In pre-9/11 
Afghanistan, terrorists found sanctuary to train and plan attacks with 
impunity. We know that today there are terrorists in Iraq who are 
planning attacks against Americans. I do not think we should make this 
mistake twice.
  Brent Scowcroft, whom we also know was opposed to the invasion of 
Iraq in the first place, has said:

       The costs of staying are visible. The costs of getting out 
     are almost never discussed . . . If we get out before Iraq is 
     stable, the entire Middle East region might start to resemble 
     Iraq today. Getting out is not a solution.

  One of my great heroes and role models and a person whom I have had 
the great honor of getting to know recently is Natan Sharansky, a man 
of inestimable courage and knowledge. He recently had a piece that ran 
Sunday in the Washington Post. The title of his piece is: ``Leave Iraq, 
Embrace for a Bigger Bloodbath.''
  In his statement, he talks about:

       The truth is that in totalitarian regimes, there are no 
     human rights. Period. The media do not criticize the 
     government. Parliaments do not check executive power. Courts 
     do not uphold due process. And human rights groups do not 
     file reports.

  He talks about the moral divide that separates societies in which 
people are slaves, from societies in which people are free.
  ``Some human rights groups undermine the very cause they claim to 
champion,'' he says.

       Consider one 2005 Amnesty International report on Iraq. It 
     notes that in the lawless climate of the first months after 
     Hussein's overthrow, reports of kidnappings, rapes and 
     killings of women and girls by criminal gangs rose. Iraqi 
     officers at a police station in Baghdad said in June 2003 
     that the number of reported rapes was ``substantially higher 
     than before the war.''
       The implication was that human rights may not really be 
     improving in post-Hussein Iraq. But the organization ignored 
     the possibility that reports of rape at police stations may 
     have increased for the simple reason that under Hussein it 
     was the regime--which includes the police--that was doing the 
     raping.

  He goes on to say:

       A precipitous withdrawal of U.S. forces could lead to a 
     bloodbath that would make the current carnage pale by 
     comparison.

  I am quoting from Natan Sharansky.

       Without U.S. troops in place to quell some of the violence, 
     Iranian-backed Shiite militias would dramatically increase 
     their attacks on Sunnis; Sunni militias, backed by the Saudis 
     or others, would retaliate in kind, drawing more and more of 
     Iraq into a vicious cycle of violence. If Iraq descended into 
     full-blown civil war, the chaos could trigger similar clashes 
     throughout the region as Sunni-Shiite tensions spill across 
     Iraq's borders. The death toll and the displacement civilians 
     would climb exponentially.

  He says:

       Perhaps the greatest irony of the political debate over 
     Iraq is that many of Bush's critics, who accused his 
     administration of going blindly to war without considering 
     what would happen once Hussein's regime was toppled, now 
     blindly support a policy of withdrawing from Iraq without 
     considering what might follow.
       In this respect, the debate over Iraq is beginning to look 
     a lot like the debate about the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 
     1970s. Then, too, the argument in the United States focused 
     primarily on whether U.S. forces should pull out. But many 
     who supported that withdrawal in the name of human rights did 
     not foresee the calamity that followed, which included 
     genocide in Cambodia, tens of thousands slaughtered in 
     Vietnam by the North Vietnamese and the tragedy of hundreds 
     of thousands of ``boat people.''

  Mr. Sharansky lives in the neighborhood. Mr. Sharansky understands 
the meaning of the word ``freedom.'' Mr. Sharansky understands the 
meaning of the word ``sacrifice.''
  Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the 
Record the Kissinger and Sharansky articles.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

  [From the International Herald Tribune Media Services, July 2, 2007]

                    A Political Program To Exit Iraq

                        (By Henry A. Kissinger)

       The war in Iraq is approaching a kind of self-imposed 
     climax. Public disenchantment is palpable. Congress will 
     surely press for an accelerated, if not total, withdrawal of 
     American forces. Demands for a political solution are likely 
     to mount.
       But precipitate withdrawal would produce a disaster. It 
     would not end the war but shift it to other areas, like 
     Lebanon or Jordan or Saudi Arabia. The war between the Iraqi 
     factions would intensify. The demonstration of American 
     impotence would embolden radical Islamism and further 
     radicalize its disciples from Indonesia and India to the 
     suburbs of European capitals.
       We face a number of paradoxes. Military victory, in the 
     sense of establishing a government capable of enforcing its 
     writ throughout Iraq, is not possible in a time frame 
     tolerated by the American political process. Yet no political 
     solution is conceivable in isolation from the situation on 
     the ground.
       What America and the world need is not unilateral 
     withdrawal but a vision by the administration of a 
     sustainable political end to the conflict. Withdrawals must 
     grow out of a political solution, not the other way around.
       None of Iraq's neighbors, not even Iran, is in a position 
     to dominate the situation against the opposition of all the 
     other interested parties. Is it possible to build a 
     sustainable outcome on such considerations?
       The answer must be sought on three levels: the internal, 
     the regional and the international.
       The internal parties--the Shiites, the Sunnis and the 
     Kurds--have been subjected to insistent American appeals to 
     achieve national reconciliation. But groups that have been 
     conducting blood feuds with one another for centuries are, 
     not surprisingly, struggling in their efforts to compose 
     their differences by constitutional means. They need the 
     buttress of a diplomatic process that could provide 
     international support for carrying out any internal 
     agreements reached or to contain their conflict if the 
     internal parties cannot agree and Iraq breaks up.
       The American goal should be an international agreement 
     regarding the international status of Iraq. It would test 
     whether the neighbors of Iraq as well as some more

[[Page 18223]]

     distant countries are prepared to translate general concepts 
     into converging policies. It would provide a legal and 
     political framework to resist violations. These are the 
     meaningful benchmarks against which to test American 
     withdrawals.
       The reason why such a diplomacy may prove feasible is that 
     the continuation of Iraq's current crisis presents all of 
     Iraq's neighbors with mounting problems. The longer the war 
     in Iraq rages, the more likely will be the breakup of the 
     country into sectarian units.
       Turkey has repeatedly emphasized that it would resist such 
     a breakup by force because of the radicalizing impact that a 
     Kurdish state could have on Turkey's large Kurdish 
     population. But this would bring Turkey into unwanted 
     conflict with the United States and open a Pandora's box of 
     other interventions.
       Saudi Arabia and Jordan dread Shiite domination of Iraq, 
     especially if the Baghdad regime threatens to become a 
     satellite of Iran. The various Gulf sheikhdoms, the largest 
     of which is Kuwait, find themselves in an even more 
     threatened position. Syria's attitudes are likely to be more 
     ambivalent. Its ties to Iran represent both a claim to status 
     and a looming vulnerability.
       Given a wise and determined American diplomacy, even Iran 
     may be brought to conclude that the risks of continued 
     turmoil outweigh the temptations before it.
       To be sure, Iranian leaders may believe that the wind is at 
     their backs, that the moment is uniquely favorable to realize 
     millennial visions of a reincarnated Persian empire or a 
     reversal of the Shiite-Sunni split under Shiite domination. 
     On the other hand, if prudent leaders exist--which remains to 
     be determined--they might come to the conclusion that they 
     had better treat these advantages as a bargaining chip in a 
     negotiation rather than risk them in a contest over 
     domination of the region.
       No American president will, in the end, acquiesce once the 
     full consequences of Iranian domination of the region become 
     apparent. Russia will have its own reasons, principally the 
     fear of the radicalization of its own Islamic minority, to 
     begin resisting Iranian and radical Islamist domination of 
     the Gulf. Combined with the international controversy over 
     its nuclear weapons program, Iran's challenge could come to 
     be perceived by its leaders to pose excessive risks.
       Whether or whenever Iran reaches these conclusions, two 
     conditions will have to be met: First, no serious diplomacy 
     can be based on the premise that the United States is the 
     supplicant. America and its allies must demonstrate a 
     determination to vindicate their vital interests that Iran 
     will find credible. Second, the United States will need to 
     put forward a diplomatic position that acknowledges the 
     legitimate security interests of Iran.
       Such a negotiation must be initiated within a genuinely 
     multilateral forum. A dramatic bilateral Iranian-U.S. 
     negotiation would magnify all the region's insecurities. For 
     if Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait--which have 
     entrusted their security primarily to the United States--
     become convinced that an Iranian-U.S. condominium is looming, 
     a race for Tehran's favor may bring about the disintegration 
     of all resolve.
       Within a multilateral framework, the United States will be 
     able to conduct individual conversations with the key 
     participants, as has happened in the six-party forum on North 
     Korea.
       A forum for such an effort already exists in the foreign 
     ministers' conference that met recently at Sharm el-Sheikh. 
     It is in the United States' interest to turn the conference 
     into a working enterprise under strong, if discreet, American 
     leadership.
       The purpose of such a forum should be to define the 
     international status of the emerging Iraqi political 
     structure into a series of reciprocal obligations. Iraq would 
     continue to evolve as a sovereign state but agree to place 
     itself under some international restraint in return for 
     specific guarantees.
       In such a scheme, the United States-led multinational force 
     would be gradually transformed into an agent of that 
     arrangement, along the lines of the Bosnian settlement in the 
     Balkans.
       All this suggests a three-tiered international effort: an 
     intensified negotiation among the Iraqi parties; a regional 
     forum like the Sharm el-Sheikh conference to elaborate an 
     international transition status for Iraq; and a broader 
     conference to establish the peacekeeping and verification 
     dimensions. The rest of the world cannot indefinitely pretend 
     to be bystanders to a process that could engulf them through 
     their default.
       Neither the international system nor American public 
     opinion will accept as a permanent arrangement an American 
     enclave maintained exclusively by American military power in 
     so volatile a region. The concept outlined here seeks to 
     establish a new international framework for Iraq. It is an 
     outcome emerging from a political and military situation on 
     the ground and not from artificial deadlines.
                                  ____


                [From the Washington Post, July 8, 2007]

              Leave Iraq and Brace for a Bigger Bloodbath

                          (By Natan Sharansky)

       Iraqis call Ali Hassan al-Majeed ``Chemical Ali,'' and few 
     wept when the notorious former general received five death 
     sentences last month for ordering the use of nerve agents 
     against his government's Kurdish citizens in the late 1980s. 
     His trial came as a reckoning and a reminder--summoning up 
     the horrors of Saddam Hussein's rule even as it underscored 
     the way today's heated Iraq debates in Washington have left 
     the key issue of human rights on the sidelines. People of 
     goodwill can certainly disagree over how to handle Iraq, but 
     human rights should be part of any responsible calculus. 
     Unfortunately, some leaders continue to play down the gross 
     violations in Iraq under Hussein's republic of fear and 
     ignore the potential for a human rights catastrophe should 
     the United States withdraw.
       As the hideous violence in Iraq continues, it has become 
     increasingly common to hear people argue that the world was 
     better off with Hussein in power and (even more remarkably) 
     that Iraqis were better off under his fist. In his final 
     interview as U.N. secretary general, Kofi Annan acknowledged 
     that Iraq ``had a dictator who was brutal'' but said that 
     Iraqis under the Baathist dictatorship ``had their streets, 
     they could go out, their kids could go to school.''
       This line of argument began soon after the U.S.-led 
     invasion in 2003. By early 2004, some prominent political and 
     intellectual leaders were arguing that women's rights, gay 
     rights, health care and much else had suffered in post-
     Hussein Iraq.
       Following in the footsteps of George Bernard Shaw, Walter 
     Duranty and other Western liberals who served as willing 
     dupes for Joseph Stalin, some members of the human rights 
     community are whitewashing totalitarianism. A textbook 
     example came last year from John Pace, who recently left his 
     post as U.N. human rights chief in Iraq. ``Under Saddam,'' he 
     said, according to the Associated Press, ``if you agreed to 
     forgo your basic freedom of expression and thought, you were 
     physically more or less OK.''
       The truth is that in totalitarian regimes, there are no 
     human rights. Period. The media do not criticize the 
     government. Parliaments do not check executive power. Courts 
     do not uphold due process. And human rights groups don't file 
     reports.
       For most people, life under totalitarianism is slavery with 
     no possibility of escape. That is why despite the carnage in 
     Iraq, Iraqis are consistently less pessimistic about the 
     present and more optimistic about the future of their country 
     than Americans are. In a face-to-face national poll of 5,019 
     people conducted this spring by Opinion Research Business, a 
     British market-research firm, only 27 percent of Iraqis said 
     they believed ``that their country is actually in a state of 
     civil war,'' and by nearly 2 to 1 (49 percent to 26 percent), 
     the Iraqis surveyed said they preferred life under their new 
     government to life under the old tyranny. That is why, at a 
     time when many Americans are abandoning the vision of a 
     democratic Iraq, most Iraqis still cling to the hope of a 
     better future. They know that under Hussein, there was no 
     hope.
       By consistently ignoring the fundamental moral divide that 
     separates societies in which people are slaves from societies 
     in which people are free, some human rights groups undermine 
     the very cause they claim to champion. Consider one 2005 
     Amnesty International report on Iraq. It notes that in the 
     lawless climate of the first months after Hussein's 
     overthrow, reports of kidnappings, rapes and killings of 
     women and girls by criminal gangs rose. Iraqi officers at a 
     police station in Baghdad said in June 2003 that the number 
     of reported rapes ``was substantially higher than before the 
     war.''
       The implication was that human rights may not really be 
     improving in post-Hussein Iraq. But the organization ignored 
     the possibility that reports of rape at police stations may 
     have increased for the simple reason that under Hussein it 
     was the regime--which includes the police--that was doing the 
     raping. When Hussein's son Uday went on his legendary raping 
     sprees, victims were not about to report the crime.
       Of course, Hussein's removal has created a host of 
     difficult strategic challenges, and numerous human rights 
     atrocities have been committed since his ouster. But let us 
     be under no illusion of what life under Hussein was like. He 
     was a mass murderer who tortured children in front of their 
     parents, gassed Kurds, slaughtered Shiites, started two wars 
     with his neighbors and launched Scud missiles into downtown 
     Riyadh and Tel Aviv. The price for the stability that Hussein 
     supposedly brought to the region was mass graves, hundreds of 
     thousands of dead in Iraq, and terrorism and war outside it. 
     Difficult as the challenges are today--with Iran and Syria 
     trying to stymie democracy in Iraq, with al-Qaeda turning 
     Iraq into the central battleground in its holy war of 
     terrorism against the free world, and with sectarian militias 
     bent on murder and mayhem--there is still hope that tomorrow 
     may be better.
       No one can know for sure whether President Bush's ``surge'' 
     of U.S. troops in Iraq will succeed. But those who believe 
     that human rights should play a central role in international 
     affairs should be doing everything in their power to maximize 
     the

[[Page 18224]]

     chances that it will. For one of the consequences of failure 
     could well be catastrophe.
       A precipitous withdrawal of U.S. forces could lead to a 
     bloodbath that would make the current carnage pale by 
     comparison. Without U.S. troops in place to quell some of the 
     violence, Iranian-backed Shiite militias would dramatically 
     increase their attacks on Sunnis; Sunni militias, backed by 
     the Saudis or others, would retaliate in kind, drawing more 
     and more of Iraq into a vicious cycle of violence. If Iraq 
     descended into full-blown civil war, the chaos could trigger 
     similar clashes throughout the region as Sunni-Shiite 
     tensions spill across Iraq's borders. The death toll and the 
     displacement of civilians could climb exponentially.
       Perhaps the greatest irony of the political debate over 
     Iraq is that many of Bush's critics, who accused his 
     administration of going blindly to war without considering 
     what would happen once Hussein's regime was toppled, now 
     blindly support a policy of withdrawing from Iraq without 
     considering what might follow.
       In this respect, the debate over Iraq is beginning to look 
     a lot like the debate about the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 
     '70s. Then, too, the argument in the United States focused 
     primarily on whether U.S. forces should pull out. But many 
     who supported that withdrawal in the name of human rights did 
     not foresee the calamity that followed, which included 
     genocide in Cambodia, tens of thousands slaughtered in 
     Vietnam by the North Vietnamese and the tragedy of hundreds 
     of thousands of ``boat people.''
       In the final analysis, U.S. leaders will pursue a course in 
     Iraq that they believe best serves U.S. interests. My hope is 
     that as they do, they will make the human rights dimension a 
     central part of any decision. The consequences of not doing 
     so might prove catastrophic to Iraqis, to regional peace and, 
     ultimately, to U.S. security.

  Mr. McCAIN. Should we leave Iraq before there is a basic level of 
stability, we will invite further Iranian influence at a time when 
Iranian operatives are already moving weapons, training fighters, 
providing resources and helping plan operations to kill American 
soldiers and damage our efforts to bring stability to Iraq.
  Iran will comfortably step into the power vacuum left by a U.S. 
withdrawal, and such an aggrandizement of fundamentalist power has 
great potential to spark greater Sunni-Shia conflict across the region.
  Leaving prematurely would induce Iraq's neighbors, including Saudi 
Arabia and Jordan, Egypt and Israel, Turkey and others, to feel their 
own security eroding and may well induce them to act in ways that 
prompt wider instability. The potential for genocide, wider war, 
spiralling oil prices, and the perception of strategic American defeat 
is real.
  This fight is about Iraq but not about Iraq alone. It is greater than 
that and, more important still, about whether America still has the 
political courage to fight for victory or whether we will settle for 
defeat, with all the terrible things that accompany it. We cannot walk 
away gracefully from defeat in this war.
  General Petraeus and his commanders believe they have a strategy that 
can, over time, lead to success in Iraq. General Petraeus and 
Ambassador Ryan Crocker will come to Washington in September to report 
on the status of their efforts and those of the Iraqis. They ask two 
things of us: the time necessary to see whether their efforts can 
succeed and the political courage to support them in their work. I 
believe we should give them both.
  I know that Senators are tired of this war, tired of the mounting 
death toll, tired of the many mistakes we have made in this war and the 
great effort it requires to reverse them, tired of the war's 
politicization and the degree to which it has become embroiled in 
partisan struggles and election strategies. I understand this fatigue. 
Yet I maintain that we, as elected leaders with a duty to our people 
and the security of their Nation, cannot let fatigue dictate our 
policies.
  The soldiers I met last week have no illusions about the sacrifices 
necessary to achieve their mission. On July 4, I had the great 
privilege to be present as 588 troops reenlisted in the military and 
another 161 were naturalized as U.S. citizens. Tragically, two of those 
who were scheduled to be naturalized as U.S. citizens were killed very 
shortly before the ceremony.
  Those men and women taking the oaths of enlistment and citizenship in 
the center of Saddam's al Faw Palace, they understand the many 
hardships made in our name. They have completed tour after tour away 
from their families, risking everything, everything for the security of 
this country. They do so because they understand the circumstances 
that, however great the costs of this war, the costs are immeasurably 
greater still if we abandon it prematurely. All they ask is that we 
support them in their noble mission.
  I wish we had planned to fight this war correctly the first time. But 
we can no more turn back the clock to 2003 than we can wish away the 
consequences of defeat by imposing some artificial deadline for 
withdrawal. Last week in Iraq, I met the bravest men and women our 
country has to offer, and not one of them told me it was time to go or 
that the cause is lost.
  They are frustrated with the Iraqi Government's lack of progress. 
They are buffeted by the winds of partisanship in Washington, talking 
today of surges and tomorrow of withdrawal, voting to confirm General 
Petraeus and then voting for a course that guarantees defeat. But in 
the end, they know the war in Iraq is part of a larger struggle, a war 
of moderation and stability against the forces of violence and 
extremism.
  They recognize that if we simply pack up and leave, the war does not 
end--it merely gets harder.
  Finally, I would like to give a couple of quotes. General Lynch, who 
is the third ID commander of the U.S. forces, says:

       Pulling out before the mission was accomplished would be a 
     mess. We find the enemy regaining ground, reestablishing 
     sanctuaries, building more IEDs and the violence would 
     escalate.

  GEN Anthony Zinni, one of my particular heroes, who opposed the war 
in Iraq, said:

       . . . that we cannot simply pull out of Iraq, as much as we 
     may want to. The consequences of a destabilized and chaotic 
     Iraq, sitting in the center of a critical region of the 
     world, could have catastrophic implications. . . .There is no 
     short-term solution. It will take years to stabilize Iraq. 
     How many? I believe at least five to seven.

  In the Baker Hamilton report, there is a lot of selective quoting. 
But I would like to point out that they said:

       Because of the importance of Iraq, the potential for 
     catastrophe in the role and the commitments of the United 
     States in initiating events that have led to the current 
     situation, we believe it would be wrong for the United States 
     to abandon the country through a precipitous withdrawal of 
     troops and support. A premature American departure from Iraq 
     would almost certainly produce greater sectarian violence and 
     further deterioration of conditions, leading to a number of 
     adverse consequences outlined above. The near-term results 
     would be a significant power vacuum, greater human suffering, 
     regional destabilization, and a threat to the global economy. 
     Al-Qaeda would depict our withdrawal as a historic victory. 
     If we leave and Iraq descends into chaos, the long-range 
     consequences could eventually require the United States to 
     return.

  That is page 30 of the Iraq Study Group report.
  Finally, I understand, I believe very well, how difficult this issue 
is for many of our Members. I know the sorrow and the frustration that 
they and their constituents feel. If I knew a great option as to how we 
could preserve our Nation's security and withdraw and stop the 
unfortunate casualties that are incurred by these brave young people, I 
would embrace it tomorrow.
  Part of this debate is going to be proposals that people have made 
about how we can best leave. I intend to engage in vigorous discussion 
and debate. I would like to again begin this debate by pointing out I 
respect the views of my colleagues on this issue.
  I understand their frustration. I intend to be respectful of their 
views, and I hope we can have a debate and discussion on this issue, as 
we consider various amendments, that will better inform the American 
people of both points of view. I hope over time somehow we can find a 
way to come together in this body and in this Nation because this war 
has divided this Nation in the most terrible way.
  I saw it once before. I saw it once before, a long time ago, and I 
saw a defeated military, and I saw how long it took a military that was 
defeated to recover. I saw a divided nation beset by

[[Page 18225]]

assassinations and riots and a breakdown in a civil society. That is 
why we need, in my view, to try to come together--and I do not know how 
we do that--beginning with respecting each other's views so we can come 
together and hopefully end the tragedy of Iraq and at the same time 
ensure America's security.
  I will be saying a lot more on this issue as we continue the debate. 
I say again, I respect the views of my colleagues. Then, finally, I 
again pay my compliments to the distinguished chairman of the 
committee, who put together, as is his wont, a bipartisan package that 
will ensure our Nation's security in the future, as exemplified again 
by a unanimous vote of the committee in reporting out the Defense 
authorization bill.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Klobuchar). The Senator from Michigan is 
recognized.
  Mr. LEVIN. Madam President, let me first thank Senator McCain for his 
great generosity in terms of his comments about the committee and the 
operations of our committee. As he well knows, our committee has had a 
great tradition of bipartisanship. He has made a major contribution, 
always, to that tradition. As ranking member, he has more than 
continued that tradition. He has made a major contribution to it and to 
the bill that is before us and to the bipartisan flavor of that bill.
  While there obviously are and will be differences--which are 
understandable and appropriate--as he well points out, this is a bill 
that had unanimous support in the committee. We, in the next week or 
so, will be hearing differences on issues, including Iraq, and that is 
totally what we are all about: to express our feelings in a civil way 
and in a strong way.
  But I add my thanks to him for his contribution for so many decades 
going back. When he speaks about the situation we are in in Iraq, he 
speaks with not only great feeling but also with great experience, and 
I think every Member of this body treasures our relationship with 
Senator McCain and the experience he brings to this debate. He has the 
commitment, I hope, of everybody in this body that the debate, as we 
proceed relative to Iraq or any other issues in this week and next, 
will proceed in a very civil way.
  This issue requires all of the wisdom we can muster, all of the 
experiences of the various Members, and he has my assurance, and I 
think he would have the assurance of every Member of this body, that 
the tone he sets and wants us to maintain will indeed be maintained by 
this Senate. I am confident of that, and thank him again for his 
remarks and for his great contribution to this bill.
  Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Congressional 
Budget Office cost estimate of the Senate version of the National 
Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008, which was not available 
when the report on that bill, S. 1547, was filed, be printed in the 
Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

    S. 1547--National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008

       Summary: S. 1547 would authorize appropriations totaling 
     $629 billion for fiscal year 2008 for the military functions 
     of the Department of Defense (DoD), for activities of the 
     Department of Energy (DOE), and for other purposes. That 
     total includes $128 billion for military operations in Iraq 
     and Afghanistan. In addition, S. 1547 would prescribe 
     personnel strengths for each active-duty and selected reserve 
     component of the U.S. armed forces. CBO estimates that 
     appropriation of the authorized amounts would result in 
     additional outlays of $621 billion over the 2008-2012 period.
       Including outlays from funds previously appropriated, 
     spending for defense programs authorized by the bill would 
     total about $599 billion in 2008, CBO estimates. The bill 
     also contains provisions that would both increase and 
     decrease costs of discretionary defense programs in future 
     years. Most of those provisions would affect force structure, 
     compensation, and benefits. In total, such provisions would 
     raise costs by $9 billion in 2008 (this amount is included in 
     the above total of $629 billion specifically authorized for 
     that year) and by $4 billion to $6 billion annually over the 
     2009-2012 period.
       The bill contains provisions that would both increase and 
     decrease direct spending from changes to TRICARE For Life, 
     the foreign currency fluctuation account, combat-related 
     special compensation, and other programs. We estimate that 
     those provisions combined would decrease direct spending by 
     $309 million in 2008, $714 million over the 2008-2012 period, 
     and $2.1 billion over the 2008-2017 period. Those totals 
     include estimated net receipts from asset sales of a little 
     under $0.6 billion over the 2008-2017 period. (Under current 
     scorekeeping rules and conventions, asset sale receipts are 
     recorded as a credit against direct spending as long as such 
     sales would not result in a net financial cost to the 
     government--as determined on a present value basis.) In 
     addition, enacting the bill would have a negligible effect on 
     revenues.
       Section 4 of the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act (UMRA) 
     excludes from the application of that act any legislative 
     provisions that enforce the constitutional rights of 
     individuals. CBO has determined that section 1022 would fall 
     within that exclusion because it would amend the authority of 
     the President to employ the armed services to protect 
     individuals' civil rights. Therefore, CBO has not reviewed 
     that section of the bill for mandates.
       Other provisions of S. 1547 contain both intergovernmental 
     and private-sector mandates as defined in UMRA but CBO 
     estimates that the annual cost of those mandates would not 
     exceed the thresholds established in UMRA ($66 million for 
     intergovernmental mandates in 2007 and $131 million for 
     private-sector mandates in 2007, adjusted annually for 
     inflation).
       The bill also contains several provisions that would 
     benefit state and local governments. Some of those provisions 
     would authorize aid for certain local schools with dependents 
     of defense personnel and convey certain parcels of land to 
     state and local governments. Any costs to those governments 
     would be incurred voluntarily as a condition of receiving 
     federal assistance.
       Estimated cost to the federal government: The estimated 
     budgetary impact of S. 1547 is summarized in Table 1. Most of 
     the costs of this legislation fall within budget function 050 
     (national defense).
       Basis of estimate: For this estimate, CBO assumes that S. 
     1547 will be enacted near the start of fiscal year 2008 and 
     that the authorized amount will be appropriated for that 
     year. The estimated outlays from authorizations of regular 
     appropriations are based on historical spending patterns.

       TABLE 1.--BUDGETARY IMPACT OF S. 1547, THE NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2008a
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                             By fiscal year, in millions of dollars
                                               -----------------------------------------------------------------
                                                   2007       2008       2009       2010       2011       2012
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                        SPENDING SUBJECT TO APPROPRIATION
 
Spending Under Current Law for Programs
 Authorized by S. 1547:
    Budget Authorityb.........................    617,085          0          0          0          0          0
    Estimated Outlays.........................    551,703    219,217     79,329     27,802     10,589      4,277
Proposed Changes:
    Authorization of Regular Appropriations
     for 2008:
        Authorization Level...................          0    501,033          0          0          0          0
        Estimated Outlays.....................          0    320,660    116,444     39,156     12,588      4,993
    Authorization of Appropriations for 2008
     for Military Operations in Iraq and
     Afghanistan:
        Authorization Level...................          0    128,226          0          0          0          0
        Estimated Outlays.....................          0     59,054     45,470     15,961      4,751      1,648
Spending Under S. 1547:
    Authorization Levelb......................    617,085    629,259          0          0          0          0
    Estimated Outlays.........................    551,703    598,931    241,243     82,919     27,928     10,918
 
                               CHANGES IN DIRECT SPENDING (INCLUDING ASSET SALES)c
 
Estimated Budget Authority....................          0       -112       -138         84         26         54
Estimated Outlays.............................          0       -309       -287        -72        -62        14
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
aEnactment of S. 1547 would have an insignificant effect on federal revenues.

[[Page 18226]]

 
bThe 2007 level is the amount appropriated for programs authorized by the bill. That figure includes $99.3
  billion that was recently provided in Public Law 110-28, the U.S. Troop Readiness, Veterans' Care, Katrina
  Recovery, and Iraq Accountability Appropriations Act, 2007. The 2007 level shown here is slightly lower than
  the comparable figure presented in CBO's cost estimate for H.R. 1585, the National Defense Authorization Act
  for Fiscal Year 2008, as passed by the House, because H.R. 1585 would authorize appropriations for some
  existing programs that would not be authorized by S. 1547.
cIn addition to the direct spending effects shown here, enacting S. 1547 would have additional effects on direct
  spending after 2012 (see Table 4). The estimated changes in direct spending (including asset sales) would
  reduce outlays by $2.1 billion over the 2008-2017 period.
Note--For 2008, the authorization levels under ``Proposed Changes'' include amounts specifically authorized by
  the bill. As discussed in footnote 1 of the ``Summary'' to this estimate, the $629 billion that would be
  authorized by the bill does not include $11 billion in TRICARE For Life accrual payments that will be made
  under current law. (For additional information on those payments, see the discussion under ``Previous CBO
  Estimates.'') The bill also implicitly authorizes some activities in 2009 through 2012; those authorizations
  are not included above (but are shown in Table 3) because funding for those activities would be covered by
  specific authorizations in future years.

       Spending subject to appropriation: The bill would 
     specifically authorize appropriations totaling $629 billion 
     in 2008 (see Table 2). Nearly all of that amount falls within 
     budget function 050 (national defense), while a small 
     portion--$62 million for the Armed Forces Retirement Home--
     falls within budget function 600 (income security).
       Of the $629 billion in funding for 2008 authorized by the 
     bill for the costs of defense programs, $128 billion of that 
     amount would be for DoD costs associated with continuing 
     operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
       The bill also contains provisions that would both increase 
     and decrease various costs, mostly for changes in end 
     strength, military compensation, and health benefits, that 
     would be covered by the fiscal year 2008 authorization and by 
     authorizations in future years. Table 3 contains estimates of 
     those amounts.
       Multiyear procurement. Multiyear procurement is a special 
     contracting method authorized in title 10, United States 
     Code, section 2306b that permits the government to enter into 
     contracts covering acquisitions for more than one year but 
     not more than five years, even though the total funds 
     required for every year are not appropriated at the time the 
     contracts are awarded. As part of such a contract, the 
     government commits to purchase all items specified at the 
     time the contract is signed, including those to be produced 
     and paid for in subsequent years. Because multiyear 
     procurement allows a contractor to plan for more efficient 
     production, such a contract can reduce the cost of an 
     acquisition compared with the cost of buying the items 
     through a series of annual procurement contracts.
       Such contracts frequently include provisions that require 
     DoD to pay for unrecovered fixed costs in the event that the 
     contract is canceled before completion. DoD does not budget 
     for, obtain, or obligate funds sufficient to pay for those 
     contractual commitments at the time they are incurred. 
     Authorizing DoD to initiate a multiyear procurement program 
     with such unfunded cancellation liabilities provides contract 
     authority--a form of budget authority--because it allows the 
     department to incur that liability in advance of 
     appropriations. CBO believes that the full cost of such 
     liabilities should be recorded in the budget at the time they 
     are incurred. The failure to request funding for cancellation 
     liabilities may distort the resource allocation process by 
     understating the cost of decisions made for the budget year 
     and may require future Congresses to find the resources to 
     pay for decisions made today.

                                  TABLE 2.--SPECIFIED AUTHORIZATIONS IN S. 1547
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                  By fiscal year, in millions of dollars--
                         Category                         ------------------------------------------------------
                                                              2008       2009       2010       2011       2012
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Authorization of Regular Appropriations:
    Department of Defense:
        Military Personnel:
            Authorization Levela.........................    109,352          0          0          0          0
            Estimated Outlays............................    103,409      5,411        175         25          0
        Operation and Maintenance:
            Authorization Level..........................    166,618          0          0          0          0
            Estimated Outlays............................    127,463     31,030      4,824      1,723        727
        Procurement:
            Authorization Level..........................    110,731          0          0          0          0
            Estimated Outlays............................     32,226     41,476     22,272      7,451      3,126
        Research and Development:
            Authorization Level..........................     74,208          0          0          0          0
            Estimated Outlays............................     41,037     26,828      4,553      1,051        297
        Military Construction and Family Housing:
            Authorization Level..........................     21,784          0          0          0          0
            Estimated Outlays............................      3,037      7,332      6,759      2,488        919
        Revolving Funds:
            Authorization Level..........................      2,395          0          0          0          0
            Estimated Outlays............................      1,760        476         86         50         24
        General Transfer Authority:
            Authorization Level..........................          0          0          0          0          0
            Estimated Outlays............................      1,000       -200       -400       -200       -100
            Subtotal, Department of Defense:
                Authorization Levela.....................    485,088          0          0          0          0
                Estimated Outlays........................    309,932    112,353     38,269     12,588      4,993
    Atomic Energy Defense Activitiesb:
        Authorization Level..............................     15,883          0          0          0          0
        Estimated Outlays................................     10,676      4,082        887          0          0
    Armed Forces Retirement Home:
        Authorization Level..............................         62          0          0          0          0
        Estimated Outlays................................         52          9          0          0          0
            Subtotal, Authorization of Regular
             Appropriations:
                Authorization Level......................    501,033          0          0          0          0
                Estimated Outlays........................    320,660    116,444     39,156     12,588      4,993
Authorization of Appropriations for Military Operations
 in Iraq and Afghanistan:
    Military Personnel:
        Authorization Level..............................     12,922          0          0          0          0
        Estimated Outlays................................     12,190        689         17          2          0
    Operation and Maintenance:
        Authorization Level..............................     78,117          0          0          0          0
        Estimated Outlays................................     36,478     30,588      7,581      1,940        904
    Procurement:
        Authorization Level..............................     32,803          0          0          0          0
        Estimated Outlays................................      8,069     12,685      7,908      2,714        725
    Research and Development:
        Authorization Level..............................      1,950          0          0          0          0
        Estimated Outlays................................      1,117        683        111         23          6
    Military Construction:
            Authorization Level..........................        753          0          0          0          0
            Estimated Outlays............................          8        309        286         98         38
    Revolving Funds:
            Authorization Level..........................      1,681          0          0          0          0
            Estimated Outlays............................        947        569        128         27         10
    Special Transfer Authority:
        Authorization Level..............................          0          0          0          0          0
        Estimated Outlays................................        245        -53        -70        -53        -35
            Subtotal, Iraq and Afghanistan:
                Authorization Level......................    128,226          0          0          0          0
                Estimated Outlays........................     59,054     45,470     15,961      4,751      1,648
Total Specified Authorizations:
    Authorization Levela.................................    629,259          0          0          0          0
    Estimated Outlays....................................    379,714    161,914     55,117     17,339      6,641
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
aAs discussed in footnote 1 of the ``Summary'' to this estimate, this figure does not include the effect of an
  estimated $11 billion in TRICARE For Life accrual payments that will be made under current law. For additional
  information, see the discussion under ``Previous CBO Estimates.''
bThese authorizations are primarily for atomic energy activities within the Department of Energy.


[[Page 18227]]


             TABLE 3.--ESTIMATED AUTHORIZATIONS OF APPROPRIATIONS FOR SELECTED PROVISIONS IN S. 1547
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                   By fiscal year, in millions of dollars
                         Category                         ------------------------------------------------------
                                                              2008       2009       2010       2011       2012
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                 FORCE STRUCTURE
 
Army and Marine Corps Active-Duty End Strengths..........      6,683      4,821      4,257      3,292      2,930
Navy and Air Force Active-Duty End Strengths.............       -583       -935       -966     -1,000     -1,033
Reserve Component End Strengths..........................        306         71         50         52         53
Reserve Technicians......................................         -7        -15        -15        -16        -16
Grade Structure..........................................         97        182        248        257        265
 
                                         COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS (DOD)
 
Pay Raise................................................        311        425        439        454        469
Expiring Bonuses and Allowances..........................      2,127        916        370        185        180
Hardship Duty Pay........................................         79         56         33         23         23
Leave Carryover..........................................          4         21         22         23         23
Accession Bonus for Health Professional Scholarship......         15         15         15         15         15
Special Pays for Medical Officers........................          8          9         10         10         10
Dental Officer Special Pay...............................          8          8          8          8          8
Loan Repayment for Reserves..............................          1          2          3          4          5
 
                                             DEFENSE HEALTH PROGRAM
 
Discount Drug Pricing....................................       -300       -330       -360       -390       -430
 
                                                      OTHER
 
Defense Acquisition Workforce Development Fund...........        300        725      1,150      1,600     1,625
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Notes.--For every item in this table, the 2008 levels are included in Table 2 as amounts specifically authorized
  to be appropriated by the bill. Amounts shown in this table for 2009 through 2012 are not included in Table 1,
  because authorizations for those amounts would be covered by specific authorizations in future years.
Figures shown here may not add to numbers in the text because of rounding.

       This bill would authorize the Department of Defense to 
     enter into multiyear procurement contracts for three 
     programs: enhancements to the Abrams tank, upgrades to the 
     Bradley Fighting Vehicle, and new Virginia class submarines.
       Section 111 would authorize the Army to enter a multiyear 
     contract for up to five years to acquire a number of 
     improvements to M1A1 Abrams tanks over a five-year period. If 
     granted this authority, the Army plans to enter a contract 
     for the 2008-2012 period to modify 577 tanks at a total cost 
     of $1,595 million; it has requested $639 million in 2008 to 
     upgrade 241 tanks. The Army estimates that a multiyear 
     procurement contract for those tank modifications would cost 
     $178 million less than a series of annual procurement 
     contracts for those systems.
       Section 112 would authorize the Army to enter a multiyear 
     contract to acquire a number of improvements to the Bradley 
     Fighting Vehicle. According to budget documents provided by 
     the Army, the service would use this authority to enter a 
     contract for the 2008-2011 period to modify 965 vehicles at a 
     total cost of $2,310 million; it has requested $1,151 million 
     in 2008 to upgrade 525 vehicles. The Army estimates that a 
     multiyear procurement contract for those modifications would 
     cost $131 million less than a series of annual procurement 
     contracts for those systems.
       Section 131 would authorize the Navy to enter a multiyear 
     contract for Virginia-class submarines beginning in fiscal 
     year 2009. The Navy plans to enter a contract for the 2009-
     2013 period to purchase seven submarines at a total cost of 
     $19.1 billion; it has requested $703 million in 2008 to buy 
     certain components in economic quantities and to order items 
     that have lengthy production times. The Navy estimates that a 
     multiyear procurement contract would cost $2.9 billion less 
     than a series of annual procurement contracts for those 
     vessels.
       Force structure. The bill would affect force structure by 
     setting end-strength levels for the various military services 
     and by increasing the number of personnel in higher pay 
     grades.
       Military end strength. Title IV would authorize end-
     strength levels in 2008 for active-duty personnel and 
     personnel in the selected reserves of about 1,370,000 and 
     850,000, respectively. Of those selected reservists, about 
     76,000 would serve on active duty in support of the reserves. 
     In total, active-duty end strength would increase by about 
     4,000 and selected-reserve end strength would decrease by 
     about 5,000 when compared to levels authorized for 2007.
       Section 401 would authorize increases to the active-duty 
     end strengths of the Army and Marine Corps relative to the 
     personnel levels authorized for 2007. CBO estimates that 
     those increases--13,000 additional personnel for the Army and 
     9,000 for the Marine Corps--would increase costs to DoD by 
     about $7 billion in 2008 and about $22 billion over the 2008-
     2012 period. Those costs include the pay and benefits of the 
     additional personnel, as well as costs for operation and 
     maintenance, procurement, and construction.
       Section 401 also would decrease the Navy's active-duty end 
     strength by 12,300 and the Air Force's active-duty end 
     strength by 5,600. CBO estimates that, combined, those 
     decreases in end strength would cut costs for salaries and 
     other expenses by about $580 million in the first year and 
     about $1 billion annually in subsequent years.
       Sections 411 and 412 would authorize the end strengths for 
     the reserve components, including those full-time reservists 
     who serve on active duty in support of the reserves. Under 
     this bill, the selected reserve would experience a net 
     decrease in end strength of 4,900, with the Navy Reserve and 
     Air Force Reserve losing personnel while the Army Reserve and 
     National Guard would see an increase. However, the cost 
     savings from that net decrease would be more than offset by 
     the cost of an increase of 1,900 in the number of reservists 
     who serve on active duty in support of the reserves. CBO 
     estimates that the net result of implementing those 
     provisions would be an increase in costs for salaries and 
     other expenses for selected reservists of $306 million in 
     2008 and about $50 million a year thereafter as compared to 
     the authorized end-strength levels for 2007. Costs would be 
     higher in 2008 and 2009 than in later years as a result of 
     the need to procure new equipment for the additional Army 
     National Guard personnel.
       In addition, sections 413 and 414 would authorize the 
     minimum end-strength level for military technicians, who are 
     federal civilian personnel required to maintain membership in 
     a selected reserve component as a condition of their 
     employment. Under this bill, the required number of 
     technicians would decrease by 128 relative to the levels 
     currently authorized. CBO estimates the savings in civilian 
     salaries and expenses that would result from fewer military 
     technicians would be about $7 million in 2008 and about $15 
     million annually thereafter, as compared to the minimum end-
     strength levels for technicians in 2007.
       The bill also would authorize an end strength of 10,000 
     servicemembers in 2008 for the Coast Guard Reserve. Because 
     this authorization is the same as that under current law, CBO 
     does not estimate any additional costs for this provision.
       Grade structure. Sections 501, 502, and 521 would increase 
     the number of servicemembers in certain grades. Sections 501 
     and 502 would increase the number of officers authorized to 
     serve as majors in the Army and as lieutenant commanders, 
     commanders, and captains in the Navy. Section 521 would allow 
     the services to increase the percentage of personnel serving 
     in the pay-grade of E-9 from 1 percent of the enlisted force 
     to 1.25 percent. Those changes would not increase the overall 
     end strength, but would result in more promotions to those 
     ranks. CBO estimates that the additional pay and benefits 
     associated with promoting personnel to those higher grades 
     would be about $100 million in 2008 and $1 billion over the 
     2008-2012 period.
       Compensation and benefits. S. 1547 contains several 
     provisions that would affect military compensation and 
     benefits for uniformed personnel. The bill would specifically 
     authorize regular appropriations of $109 billion and 
     additional appropriations for operations in Iraq and 
     Afghanistan of $13 billion for costs of military pay and 
     allowances in 2008.
       Pay raise. Section 601 would raise basic pay for all 
     individuals in the uniformed services by 3.5 percent, 
     effective January 1, 2008. CBO estimates the total cost of a 
     3.5 percent raise in 2008 would be about $2.2 billion. 
     Because the pay raise would be above that projected under 
     current law (under current law a 3 percent across-the-board 
     increase would go into effect on January 1, 2008), CBO 
     estimates that the incremental cost associated with the 
     larger pay raise would be about $311 million in 2008 and $2.1 
     billion over the 2008-2012 period.
       Bonuses and allowances. Sections 611 through 614 would 
     extend DoD's authority to pay certain bonuses and allowances 
     to military personnel. Under current law, most of these 
     authorities are scheduled to expire in December 2007. The 
     bill would extend these authorities for another year. Based 
     on data

[[Page 18228]]

     provided by DoD, CBO estimates that: Authorities to make 
     special payments and give bonuses to certain health care 
     professionals would cost $26 million in 2008 and $15 million 
     in 2009; special payments for aviators and personnel 
     qualified to operate and maintain naval nuclear propulsion 
     plants would cost $104 million in 2008 and $72 million in 
     2009; retention and accession bonuses for officers and 
     enlisted members with critical skills would cost $95 million 
     in 2008 and $42 million in 2009; payment of reenlistment 
     bonuses for active-duty and reserve personnel would cost $1.2 
     billion in 2008 and $451 million in 2009; and enlistment 
     bonuses for active-duty and reserve personnel would cost $638 
     million in 2008 and $330 million in 2009.
       Most of these changes would result in additional, smaller 
     costs in subsequent years because many payments are made in 
     installments. In total, extending authority for the expiring 
     bonus and allowances would cost about $2.1 billion in 2008 
     and $3.8 billion over five years.
       Hardship duty pay. Section 617 would increase the maximum 
     allowable amount of hardship duty pay from $750 per month to 
     $1,500 per month. The Army reports that it would use this 
     additional authority as part of its ``Warrior Pay'' program, 
     which would provide extra incentives to military personnel 
     who make frequent deployments to combat zones. Based on 
     information from the Army, CBO estimates the total cost of 
     implementing this section would be $79 million in 2008 and 
     $214 million over the 2008-2012 period. Costs would be lower 
     in later years because CBO expects overseas deployments will 
     decrease.
       Leave carryover. Section 591 would allow servicemembers to 
     carry up to 90 days of leave from one year to the next and 
     also would allow members to sell accumulated leave in excess 
     of 120 days back to the government. Under current law, 
     members may carryover a maximum of 60 days of leave at the 
     end of each fiscal year, unless they have recently 
     participated in a contingency operation, in which case they 
     can carry over up to 120 days of leave. Section 591 would 
     increase the maximum carryover allowed to 90 days for members 
     who have not participated in a contingency operation.
       When members reenlist or separate, they are currently 
     allowed to sell up to 60 days of leave back to the 
     government. However, increasing the amount of leave carried 
     over from year to year would increase the average amount of 
     leave sold back to the government, even within the 60-day 
     buyback limit. According to data from DoD, in 2006, almost 
     150,000 personnel were each paid for an average of 19 days of 
     leave at a total cost of about $250 million. Based on an 
     analysis of current leave balances provided by the Defense 
     Finance and Accounting Service, CBO estimates that increasing 
     leave carryover to 90 days would increase the average amount 
     of leave sold back to the government by about 7 percent. This 
     would increase the annual cost of payments for unused leave 
     by about $17 million beginning in fiscal year 2009.
       In addition, section 591 would allow members to sell 
     accumulated leave in excess of 120 days back to the 
     government. Based on data from DoD, CBO estimates that, each 
     year, about 2,000 servicemembers will have leave in excess of 
     120 days--about 131 days of leave, on average, for that 
     group. The cost to DoD to buy back those extra days would be 
     about $155 per person per day, so that the cost would be 
     about $4 million in 2008 and $21 million over the 2008-2012 
     period. When combined with the increase in leave carryover, 
     CBO estimates the total cost of implementing section 591 
     would be $4 million in 2008 and $93 million over the 2008-
     2012 period.
       Accession bonus for health professions scholarship. Section 
     624 would allow DoD to award accession bonuses of up to 
     $20,000 to students who enroll in the Health Professions 
     Scholarship and Financial Assistance Programs. Those programs 
     pay the tuition and stipends of medical students who agree to 
     serve in the armed forces upon completion of their studies. 
     Because the armed forces are having difficulty recruiting 
     medical professionals, CBO believes that DoD would use the 
     maximum amount of this authority if funding were made 
     available. Based on data from DoD, CBO estimates about 750 
     students would enroll in the program and receive this bonus 
     each year, and that the total cost of implementing section 
     624 would be $15 million in 2008 and $74 million over the 
     2008-2012 period.
       Special pay for medical officers. Section 615 would 
     increase the maximum allowable amounts for both incentive 
     special pay and the multiyear retention bonus for medical 
     officers from $50,000 to $75,000 for each year the officer 
     agrees to remain in the armed forces. There are currently 
     only three medical specialties that are paid at, or near, the 
     current maximum amounts: neurologists, radiologists, and 
     anesthesiologists. The total number of personnel in those 
     specialties is currently about 630, although to qualify for 
     incentive special pay medical officers must first complete 
     their initial service agreements with DoD, and to qualify for 
     the retention bonus an officer must have at least eight years 
     of service. Based on DoD data, CBO estimates that about 50 
     percent of those 630 people would be eligible for the 
     increased incentive special pay and about 15 percent would 
     receive the higher retention bonus. CBO estimates the total 
     cost of implementing this section would be $8 million in 2008 
     and $48 million over the 2008-2012 period.
       Dental officer special pay. Section 616 would increase 
     additional special pay for dental officers with less than 10 
     years of service by $6,000 per year. Currently, those 
     personnel receive either $4,000 or $6,000 per year depending 
     on their seniority. This section would increase those amounts 
     to $10,000 and $12,000. Based on data from DoD, CBO estimates 
     about 1,350 dentists would receive the increase in additional 
     special pay if this section were enacted, for a cost of $8 
     million in 2008 and $41 million over the 2008-2012 period.
       Loan repayment for reserves. Section 672 would expand DoD's 
     education loan repayment program to include officers in the 
     selected reserve. Enlisted reservists are currently eligible 
     to receive benefits under this program. Assuming that officer 
     enrollment in this program would be proportionate to that of 
     enlisted members with college degrees, CBO estimates that DoD 
     would initiate loan repayment for about 620 reserve officers 
     each year if this authority were enacted. CBO estimates the 
     average amount of the loan repayments would total about 
     $7,000 per person and would be paid over six years in annual 
     increments of about $1,200, so that the total cost of this 
     section would be $1 million in 2008 and $14 million over the 
     2008-2012 period.
       Discount drug pricing. Under current law, DoD is one of 
     several federal agencies that receives from pharmaceutical 
     makers a significantly reduced price for drugs on the Federal 
     Supply Schedule (FSS). Through this program, DoD is able to 
     procure at a discount the drugs that it provides to 
     beneficiaries through its hospital pharmacies and mail-order 
     program. However, under DoD's TRICARE programs, beneficiaries 
     can also fill prescriptions at retail pharmacies. Many drug 
     manufacturers have refused to provide discounted prices to 
     DoD for medications provided to beneficiaries in that manner.
       Section 701 would require drug manufacturers to provide FSS 
     pricing on purchases covered by TRICARE at retail pharmacies. 
     Based on information from DoD about prescriptions filled at 
     retail pharmacies by active-duty dependents and retirees and 
     their dependents under age 65, CBO estimates that 
     implementing this section could result in savings of about 
     $300 million in 2008 and about $1.8 billion over the 2008-
     2012 period. This estimate is based on the difference between 
     what DoD currently pays drug manufacturers for prescriptions 
     filled at retail pharmacies and the FSS prices for those 
     drugs. The estimate takes into account price inflation, 
     projected increases in drug usage, and a growing active-duty 
     population, resulting in increased savings in future years. 
     (See the discussion in the ``Direct Spending'' section for 
     CBO's evaluation of this provision on the mandatory TRICARE 
     For Life program.)
       Defense acquisition workforce development fund. Section 844 
     would establish the Defense Acquisition Workforce Development 
     Fund to dedicate funding for recruiting, training, and 
     retaining acquisition personnel in excess of the levels DoD 
     is currently using for those purposes. Military services and 
     defense agencies would be required to deposit into the fund 
     in each fiscal year a percentage of the funds expended in 
     that year on contracts for services, other than services 
     related to research and development or construction. That 
     percentage would increase in even steps from 0.5 percent of 
     such expenditures in 2008 to 2 percent in 2011 and 
     thereafter.
       Based on information from the Federal Procurement Data 
     System, CBO estimates that DoD will expend approximately $75 
     billion to $80 billion each year on contracts for services 
     covered under this provision. The required deposit would be 
     in addition to the amounts necessary to pay for the 
     performance of the services contracts. CBO estimates that 
     implementing section 844 would increase personnel and 
     training costs by about $5.5 billion over the 2008-2012 
     period. Most of the deposits to the fund would be related to 
     expenditures of future appropriations. Those discretionary 
     costs would total $300 million in 2008 and $5.4 billion over 
     the 2008-2012 period. The remainder of the deposits, which 
     would be related to the expenditure of funds that were 
     appropriated in fiscal year 2007 and in prior years, would 
     constitute direct spending. Those costs are described later 
     in this estimate.
       Direct spending: The bill contains provisions that would 
     increase and decrease direct spending from changes to TRICARE 
     For Life, the foreign currency fluctuation account, combat-
     related special compensation, and other programs. S. 1547 
     also would increase receipts from asset sales, as discussed 
     in the following section. We estimate that those provisions 
     combined would decrease direct spending by $309 million in 
     2008, $714 million over the 2008-2012 period, and $2,088 
     million over the 2008-2017 period (see Table 4).

[[Page 18229]]



                                                                        TABLE 4.--DIRECT SPENDING, ASSET SALES, REVENUES
                                                                            [By fiscal year, in millions of dollars]
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                                                                                                       Total 2008-   Total 2008-
                                                           2008       2009       2010       2011       2012       2013       2014       2015       2016       2017        2012          2017
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                       CHANGES IN DIRECT SPENDING (EXCLUDING ASSET SALES)
 
Discount Drug Pricing:
    Estimated Budget Authority........................       -360       -390       -420       -460       -500       -540       -580       -630       -680       -740        -2,130        -5,300
    Estimated Outlays.................................       -360       -390       -420       -460       -500       -540       -580       -630       -680       -740        -2,130        -5,300
Transfers to Foreign Currency Account:
    Estimated Budget Authority........................        200        300        500        500        500          0          0          0          0          0         2,000         2,000
    Estimated Outlays.................................        100        200        400        450        500        250        100          0          0          0         1,650         2,000
Combat-Related Special Compensation:
    Estimated Budget Authority........................          7         70         98         65         67         69         72         74         76         79           308           678
    Estimated Outlays.................................          7         70         98         65         67         69         72         74         76         79           308           678
Aviation War Risk Insurance:
    Estimated Budget Authority........................        -80       -160       -120        -60        -10         30        200        240        210        150          -430           400
    Estimated Outlays.................................        -80       -160       -120        -60        -10         30        200        240        210        150          -430           400
Multiyear Contracts for Renewable Electricity:
    Estimated Budget Authority........................         80         80         80         80         80         80          0          0          0          0           400           480
    Estimated Outlays.................................          8         16         24         32         40         48         48         48         48         48           120           360
Early Reserve Retirement:
    Estimated Budget Authority........................          *          2          6         11         16         20         28         35         43         52            35           213
    Estimated Outlays.................................          *          2          6         11         16         20         28         35         43         52            35           213
Defense Acquisition Workforce Development Fund:
    Estimated Budget Authority........................         90         30         20          0          0          0          0          0          0          0           140           140
    Estimated Outlays.................................         65         45         20         10          0          0          0          0          0          0           140           140
Spending of Reimbursements from Palau:
    Estimated Budget Authority........................          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *             1             3
    Estimated Outlays.................................          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *             1             2
Extension of FEGLI for Reservists:
    Estimated Budget Authority........................          1          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *             1             1
    Estimated Outlays.................................          1          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *             1             1
    Subtotal:
        Estimated Budget Authority....................        -62        -68        164        136        153       -341       -280       -281       -351       -459           325        -1,385
        Estimated Outlays.............................       -259       -217          8         48        113       -123       -132       -233       -303       -411          -305        -1,506
 
                                                                                           ASSET SALES
 
National Defense Stockpile:
    Estimated Budget Authority........................        -50        -70        -80       -110        -99        -70        -60        -43         -0         -0          -409          -582
    Estimated Outlays.................................        -50        -70        -80       -110        -99        -70        -60        -43         -0         -0          -409          -582
    Total Changes:
        Estimated Budget Authority....................       -112       -138         84         26         54       -411       -340       -324       -351       -459           -84        -1,967
        Estimated Outlays.............................       -309       -287        -72        -62         14       -193       -192       -276       -303       -411          -714       -2,088
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Notes.--FEGLI = Federal Employees' Group Life Insurance.
* = less than $500,000.
Components may not sum to totals because of rounding.

       Discount drug pricing. Under current law, DoD is one of 
     several federal agencies that receives from pharmaceutical 
     makers a significantly reduced price for drugs on the Federal 
     Supply Schedule (FSS). Through this program, DoD is able to 
     procure at a discount the drugs that it provides to 
     beneficiaries through its hospital pharmacies and mail-order 
     program. However, under DoD's TRICARE programs, including the 
     TRICARE For Life program for retirees and their dependents 
     age 65 and over, beneficiaries can also fill prescriptions at 
     retail pharmacies. Many drug manufacturers have refused to 
     provide discounted prices to DoD for medications provided to 
     beneficiaries in that manner.
       Section 701 would require drug manufacturers to provide FSS 
     pricing on purchases covered by TRICARE at retail pharmacies. 
     Based on information from DoD about prescriptions filled at 
     retail pharmacies by retirees and their dependents age 65 and 
     over, CBO estimates that implementing this section could 
     reduce direct spending by about $360 million in 2008, $2.1 
     billion over the 2008-2012 period, and $5.3 billion over the 
     2008-2017 period. This estimate is based on the difference 
     between what DoD currently pays drug manufacturers for 
     prescriptions filled at retail pharmacies and the FSS prices 
     for those drugs. The estimate takes into account price 
     inflation and projected increases in drug usage, resulting in 
     increased savings in future years. (See the above discussion 
     under ``Spending Subject to Appropriation'' for CBO's 
     evaluation of this provision on the discretionary TRICARE 
     program for active-duty dependents and those retirees and 
     their dependents under age 65.)
       Transfers to the foreign currency account. Section 1007 
     would enhance DoD's ability to use expired appropriations to 
     cover the costs of certain contracts and projects which are 
     financed using foreign currencies. CBO estimates that section 
     1007 would increase direct spending outlays by $100 million 
     in 2008, $1.7 billion over the 2008-2012 period, and $2 
     billion over the 2008-2017 period.
       Under current law, most appropriations are available for 
     obligation for a specified number of years and, after that 
     time, they expire and cease to be available for new 
     obligations. Once expired, however, those balances can be 
     used during the following five years to record, adjust, or 
     liquidate existing obligations. At the end of that five-year 
     period, any remaining balances are cancelled. Appropriations 
     for military personnel and for operation and maintenance 
     generally are available for obligation for one year, except 
     as discussed below.
       Current law also contains another use for certain DoD funds 
     that have expired. Title 10 of the U.S. Code, section 2779, 
     allows DoD to transfer expired appropriations from its 
     military personnel and operation and maintenance accounts 
     into its Foreign Currency Fluctuations, Defense (FCF,D) 
     account, provided that the transfer occurs within two years 
     of when the applicable appropriation expired, and that the 
     account balance does not exceed $970 million at the time the 
     transfer is made. Funds in the account can then be 
     transferred back to the military personnel and operation and 
     maintenance accounts and be obligated to cover ``losses'' 
     that occur when actual exchange rates are less favorable than 
     the exchange rates that DoD used in formulating its budget. 
     If those transfers--to cover such losses--prove to exceed 
     DoD's requirements, the department can once again transfer 
     funds back to the FCF,D account within a corresponding two-
     year period. In addition, if actual exchange rates prove more 
     favorable than DoD's forecast, the department can transfer 
     those ``gains'' into the FCF,D account.
       Section 1007 would extend--from two years to five years--
     the time period that DoD could transfer expired balances from 
     the military personnel and operation and maintenance accounts 
     to the FCF,D account. This would result in a reappropriation 
     of funds by allowing existing appropriations that are 
     currently expired--or that will otherwise expire under 
     current law--to become newly available for obligation.
       Under section 1007, DoD would have access to a larger pool 
     of balances that could be transferred into the FCF,D account 
     because under the existing two-year limit, DoD's program 
     managers are reluctant to allow such transfers when those 
     balances may ultimately be needed to adjust or liquidate 
     obligations in later years. Under section 1007, once the life 
     of the balances approach the end of the applicable five-year 
     period, managers would likely allow almost all such balances 
     to be transferred because those funds would otherwise be 
     cancelled.
       During the 2002-2006 period, transfers of expired balances 
     ranged from $0.6 billion to $1.9 billion annually. Based on 
     DoD's past use of expired balances to cover currency losses, 
     on the expanded pool of balances that would be available to 
     cover currency losses, and considering the inherent 
     uncertainty in forecasting exchange rates, CBO estimates that 
     enacting this section would result in reappropriations of 
     about $200 million in 2008 and about $2 billion over the 
     2008-2012 period. Outlays would total about $100 million in 
     2008, $1.7 billion over the 2008-2012 period, and roughly $2 
     billion over the 2008-2017 period.
       Under current law almost all applicable balances from 
     appropriations provided in 2007 and prior years will be 
     cancelled after 2012. Therefore, CBO estimates that no 
     balances would be reappropriated in 2013 or in later years. 
     However, when the Congress provides DoD with appropriations 
     for 2008 and future years, DoD would ultimately spend a 
     higher percentage of those funds if section 1007 is enacted 
     into law. That added spending

[[Page 18230]]

     is not reflected in Table 4 because those outlays would be 
     subject to future appropriation actions.
       Combat-Related Special Compensation (CRSC). Currently, 
     disabled servicemembers who are allowed to retire with less 
     than 20 years of service see their retirement annuity offset 
     or reduced by any amount of disability compensation that they 
     receive from VA. Retirees who have served 20 or more years in 
     the service and whose VA-rated disability is related to 
     combat, hazardous duty, or military training are eligible to 
     receive CRSC. This compensation replaces part or all of the 
     portion of their retirement annuity that is offset by VA 
     disability compensation. Section 653 would allow disability 
     retirees with less than 20 years of service to receive CRSC. 
     Based on information from DoD, CBO estimates that enacting 
     this provision would increase direct spending by $7 million 
     in 2008, $308 million over the 2008-2012 period, and $678 
     million over the 2008-2017 period.
       Aviation war-risk insurance. Under current law, the Federal 
     Aviation Administration (FAA) offers a commercial aviation 
     insurance program that, for a premium, insures air carriers 
     and certain manufacturers against liabilities arising from 
     losses caused by terrorist events. The FAA also offers a non-
     premium insurance program to air carriers that participate in 
     the Civil Reserve Air Fleet (CRAF). The FAA's authority to 
     operate both of those programs is scheduled to expire on 
     March 30, 2008. Section 353 would extend those programs 
     through December 31, 2013. CBO estimates that extending the 
     CRAF program through 2013 would have no significant budgetary 
     impact; however, extending the FAA's authority to offer 
     commercial aviation insurance through 2013 would reduce net 
     direct spending by $80 million in 2008 and $430 million over 
     the 2008-2012 period, but would increase net direct spending 
     by $400 million over the 2008-2017 period.
       Those long-term net costs result because CBO assumes that 
     the FAA would continue to offer commercial aviation insurance 
     at rates that would not fully offset the government's cost of 
     providing that coverage. Based on information from the FAA 
     about current rates, CBO estimates that increased offsetting 
     receipts from premiums (which are credited against direct 
     spending) would total $1.1 billion over the 2008-2014 period. 
     CBO also estimates, however, that payments for expected 
     losses under section 353 would cost $1.5 billion over the 
     next 10 years, with residual spending after 2017.
       CBO cannot predict how much insured damage terrorists might 
     cause to air carriers and manufacturers in any specific year. 
     Instead, our estimate of the cost of commercial aviation 
     insurance under section 353 represents an expected value of 
     payments from the program--a weighted average that reflects 
     the probabilities of various outcomes, from zero damages up 
     to very large damages caused by possible future terrorist 
     attacks. The expected value can be thought of as the amount 
     of an insurance premium that would be necessary to just 
     offset the risk of providing this insurance; indeed, our 
     estimate of the expected cost of implementing section 353 is 
     based on actual premiums for terrorism insurance that have 
     been paid by non-U.S. air carriers that must purchase such 
     insurance from the private sector. Our estimate also 
     recognizes that some costs faced by private insurance firms 
     are not borne by the federal government. While this cost 
     estimate reflects CBO's best judgment on the basis of 
     available information, such future costs are a function of 
     inherently unpredictable future terrorist attacks. Actual 
     costs could fall anywhere within an extremely broad range.
       Multiyear contracts for renewable energy. Section 826 would 
     allow DoD to enter contracts for a term of up to 10 years to 
     purchase electricity from renewable sources such as wind or 
     solar power generators. Based on information from DoD, CBO 
     expects that the department would commit to purchasing a 
     guaranteed amount of electricity as part of those contracts, 
     to encourage producers to invest in renewable energy 
     generation equipment and to enable them to acquire financing 
     at favorable interest rates.
       When the government enters a contract with a guaranteed 
     purchase amount, it incurs a legal obligation for the full 
     cost of those purchases. However, when DoD has used other 
     multiyear contracting authorities in the past, it has 
     typically obtained budget authority and recorded obligations 
     only for the payments that were due in the first year of the 
     contract, even though its actual contractual obligation 
     exceeded that amount. That method of implementing multiyear 
     procurement authority provides DoD with contract authority--a 
     form of budget authority--because it allows the department to 
     incur an obligation in excess of available appropriations. 
     Budget authority for the full cost of such contracts should 
     be recorded at the time it is signed and outlays should be 
     recorded over the term of the contracts as payments are made 
     for the electricity consumed.
       Under current law, DoD is required to obtain 7.5 percent of 
     its electricity from renewable energy sources by 2013. It 
     currently gets about 4 percent of its electricity from such 
     sources. If section 826 were enacted, CBO estimates that DoD 
     would use multiyear contracts to purchase half the additional 
     renewable electricity it needs--nearly 500,000 megawatt hours 
     per year--to meet that requirement. The cost of renewable 
     energy would vary based on the mix of wind, solar, and 
     biomass power generators that were used; CBO estimates that 
     DoD would pay roughly $100 per megawatt hour of renewable 
     electricity. CBO assumes that over a six-year period, DoD 
     would initiate a series of 10-year contracts for even 
     increments of additional electricity at a cost of $80 million 
     per year until it was acquiring 500,000 megawatt hours of 
     electricity from renewable sources by 2013. Under such 
     contracts, direct spending would increase by $8 million in 
     2008, $120 million over the 2008-2012 period, and $360 
     million over the 2008-2017 period. The first group of 
     multiyear contracts that would be initiated in 2008 would 
     expire after 2017. At that time, the department would need to 
     enter new contracts for renewable electricity to continue to 
     satisfy the requirement in current law. CBO estimates that in 
     total, such contracts would increase direct spending by about 
     $50 million each year after 2017.
       Early reserve retirement. Under current law, members of the 
     reserve components may not receive retirement annuities for 
     their service until they reach 60 years of age. Section 655 
     would allow retired reservists to receive such annuities 
     earlier if they were called to active duty as a reservist and 
     served for at least 90 days. Under this proposal, for every 
     90 days a reservist is activated after passage of S. 1547, 
     they would be eligible to begin receiving their retirement 
     annuities 90 days earlier than they otherwise would. 
     Relatively few reservists would be able to take advantage of 
     this provision in the near future. As most reservists stop 
     active participation in the reserves well before their 60th 
     birthday, few reservists nearing retirement over the next 
     decade will have served on active duty during that decade. 
     Therefore, the full annual costs of this provision would 
     occur more than 10 years after enactment and are not 
     reflected in this estimate. Based upon information from DoD, 
     CBO estimates that enacting this provision would have an 
     insignificant effect on direct spending in 2008, and would 
     increase direct spending by about $35 million over the 2008-
     2012 period and $213 million over the 2008-2017 period.
       Defense Acquisition Workforce Development Fund. Section 844 
     would establish the Defense Acquisition Workforce Development 
     Fund to dedicate funding for recruiting, training, and 
     retaining acquisition personnel in excess of the levels DoD 
     is currently using for those purposes. Deposits to the fund 
     would be based on a percentage of expenditures on contracts 
     for services in a given year. CBO estimates that over the 
     2008-2010 period more than $23 billion will be expended on 
     such contracts from funds that have already been 
     appropriated.
       Most contracts for services are paid from appropriations 
     for operation and maintenance, which generally are available 
     for obligation for only one year. For the following five 
     years, those funds--now expired--are available only to 
     record, adjust, or liquidate existing obligations to the 
     account. At the end of that five-year period, any remaining 
     balances are cancelled. (Over $1 billion in unexpended 
     balances of operation and maintenance funds are cancelled 
     each year.) Expired, unobligated balances are available to 
     pay for an increase in the cost of contracts for which funds 
     were obligated during the period of availability. CBO expects 
     that the department would treat the requirement to make 
     deposits into the Fund as an increase in the cost of the 
     contracts on which such deposits are based, thus allowing it 
     to use expired, unobligated balances to make the required 
     deposits for expenditures of funds that were appropriated 
     prior to enactment of this bill. Thus, this section would 
     make those expired balances available for expenditure, 
     resulting in a reappropriation of those funds. CBO estimates 
     that those reappropriations would increase direct spending by 
     $65 million in 2008 and $140 million over the 2008-2011 
     period. (This section would also require DoD to make deposits 
     based on the expenditure of funds that have yet to be 
     appropriated. Those deposits are discretionary costs and are 
     discussed above in the section on ``Spending Subject to 
     Appropriation.'')
       Spending of reimbursements from Palau. Section 1213 would 
     allow DoD to spend reimbursements from the government of 
     Palau. Under current law, Palau reimburses the United States 
     for the cost of providing military civic action teams and 
     those receipts--about $250,000 annually--are deposited into 
     the U.S. Treasury. CBO estimates that enacting section 1213 
     would cost less than $500,000 in every year, and would cost a 
     total of $1 million over the 2008-2012 period and $2 million 
     over the 2008-2017 period.
       Extension of Federal Employees Group Life Insurance (FEGLI) 
     for reservists. Civilian employees of the federal government 
     are entitled to purchase life insurance under the FEGLI 
     program. Under current law, that insurance coverage may be 
     continued for up to 12 months for reservists who are called 
     to active military service. Section 1103 would extend FEGLI 
     coverage for up to 24 months of active military service. This 
     extension of coverage would initially increase net outlays

[[Page 18231]]

     from the Employees Life Insurance Fund because private 
     insurers would most likely increase the premiums they charge 
     the federal government. However, in later years, the 
     Employees Life Insurance Fund would offset those additional 
     costs by increasing the amount participating employees are 
     required to contribute to the fund. CBO estimates that the 
     net cost of implementing this section would be $1 million in 
     2008 and $1 million over the 2008-2017 period.
       Housing leases in Korea. DoD has authority under title 10 
     of the U.S. Code, section 2828, to lease 2,800 family housing 
     units in Korea, at a maximum cost of $35,000 per unit per 
     year. Under current law, that cost limit is adjusted for the 
     change in the consumer price index since 2003, and for the 
     change in the foreign currency exchange rate since 1988. 
     Section 2812 would increase the unadjusted cost limit to 
     $35,050 per unit.
       The department has requested that the cost limit on the 
     authority in current law be increased so that it can acquire 
     family housing through build-to-lease contracts. In a build-
     to-lease agreement, the government contracts with a developer 
     to build a specified number of housing units in a specified 
     location for use by military personnel. According to DoD, the 
     military services often agree to a fixed lease term--
     currently limited to a maximum of 15 years in Korea--with 
     renewal options for additional periods of time. Those renewal 
     options can extend the duration of the lease term to 30 years 
     or more. Based on the government's commitment to lease the 
     housing, the developer borrows money to pay for construction 
     of the units, using the promised payments from the government 
     to demonstrate to lenders a reliable source of income for 
     debt service.
       CBO believes that acquiring military housing through a 
     build-to-lease contract is a governmental activity that uses 
     a private-sector intermediary to serve as an instrument of 
     the federal government by borrowing funds to finance the 
     construction of housing on the government's behalf. Those 
     build-to-lease agreements should be considered acquisitions 
     rather than leases for several reasons. First, the housing 
     would be constructed at the request of the government to fill 
     an enduring need for housing for DoD personnel. Second, 
     because the government would agree to lease the housing for 
     up to 15 years, and may extend the lease term for additional 
     years under renewal options, the government would likely 
     consume most of the useful economic life of the housing. 
     Third, the need for at least 15 years of government 
     commitment to obtain financing indicates that there may not 
     be a private-sector market for the new housing. Finally, the 
     government would be the dominant or only source of income for 
     such projects. Lease payments are made directly by the 
     government to the housing developer. If the lease is 
     terminated before the end of the fixed term, or before the 
     end of any exercised lease options, the government is liable 
     for early termination costs, which, under DoD's current 
     practice, are not funded in the budget when the lease is 
     signed. The federal government also agrees to pay rent on all 
     the units it leases, regardless of whether they are occupied 
     by DoD personnel or are vacant.
       The acquisition cost of the housing that would be acquired 
     using the authority is determined by calculating the present 
     value of 15 years of lease payments less the portion of those 
     payments needed for operating and maintenance costs. That 
     amount should be recorded as budget authority in the year the 
     lease is signed, and outlays should be recorded over the 
     construction period. Instead, DoD treats such arrangements as 
     operating leases, by recording each year's lease payments on 
     an annual basis. (The department may not record any 
     obligations in the year it enters a contract for the housing 
     because such housing takes more than one year to build and 
     the first payment would not be due until construction was 
     completed.) By using the authority to incur an obligation in 
     advance of appropriations, current law provides contract 
     authority, which is a form of direct spending.
       According to DoD, the lease payment under the current cost 
     limit calculation do not provide enough income for housing 
     developers in Korea to recover their construction costs 
     during the initial 15-year term of the lease. Because it 
     increases the cost limit by only $50 per unit, CBO believes 
     that section 2812 is unlikely to facilitate additional build-
     to-lease contracts in Korea, and thus would have no effect. 
     If such contracts were feasible under the increased limit, 
     DoD could acquire housing worth $575 million, CBO estimates.
       Other provisions. The following provisions would have an 
     insignificant budgetary impact on direct spending:
       Section 504 would clarify the maximum age of service for 
     certain general and flag officers.
       Section 534 would set to 38 the maximum years of service 
     for reserve officers in the grade of lieutenant general or 
     vice admiral, aligning such limit with that for the active 
     duty force.
       Section 652 would allow guardians or caretakers of 
     dependent children to be designated beneficiaries under the 
     Survivor Benefit Plan.
       Section 682 would change the treatment of overseas 
     residence relating to certain immigration benefits for 
     military spouses and children.
       Section 825 would extend by five years the authority for 
     the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to 
     provide services to nongovernmental organizations and enter 
     into unconventional cooperative agreements with private 
     contractors for research relating to the development of 
     advanced weapons systems. This provision also would extend 
     the authority for DARPA to collect and spend reimbursements 
     for any services rendered.
       Section 934 would authorize DoD to operate a Western 
     Hemisphere Center for Excellence in Human Rights. This 
     provision would allow the center to accept and spend 
     donations to help defray operating costs.
       Section 1024 would make permanent the authority of the 
     Secretaries of the Army, Navy, and Air Force to accept gifts 
     on behalf of members of the Armed Forces and of civilian 
     employees of DoD who are injured in the line of duty.
       Section 1030 would prohibit DoD from selling parts for the 
     F-14 fighter aircraft, except to museums or to other 
     organizations in the United States that work to preserve F-14 
     fighter aircraft for historical purposes. (DoD can spend the 
     proceeds from any such sales without future appropriation 
     action.)
       Asset sales--National Defense Stockpile: Enacting the bill 
     would lead to increased receipts from the sale of material in 
     the National Defense Stockpile. Those additional sales would 
     reduce direct spending by $409 million over the 2008-2012 
     period and by $582 million over the 2008-2015 period.
       Section 1413 would increase by $129 million the target 
     contained in the National Defense Authorization Act for 
     Fiscal Year 2000 (Public Law 106-65; later revised by Public 
     Laws 108-136 and 109-163) for continual sales of chromium and 
     beryllium from the National Defense Stockpile. CBO estimates 
     that the additional sales would begin in 2010 and that there 
     would be sufficient quantities of those materials in the 
     stockpile to complete those additional sales by 2012. Thus, 
     CBO estimates that this section would increase receipts from 
     stockpile sales by $129 million over the 2010-2012 period.
       Section 1413 also would increase by $453 million the target 
     contained in the National Defense Authorization Act for 
     Fiscal Year 1999 (Public Law 105-261; later revised by Public 
     Laws 106-398, 107-107, 108-375, 109-163, and 109-364) for 
     continual sales of tungsten from the National Defense 
     Stockpile, and it would extend sales through fiscal year 
     2015. CBO estimates that there would be sufficient quantities 
     of tungsten in the stockpile to achieve additional receipts 
     of $50 million in 2008, $280 million over the 2008-2012 
     period, and $453 million over the 2008-2015 period.
       In addition to the increased targets, section 1413 
     initially would limit the sales of ferromanganese from the 
     National Defense Stockpile to no more than 50,000 tons in 
     2008. Additional sales of up to 50,000 tons of ferromangenese 
     would be allowed if the market demand was sufficient. Based 
     on recent sales, CBO estimates that the provision would not 
     reduce sales because market demand would be sufficient to 
     allow for the continued sales of ferromangenese at planned 
     levels.
       Section 1413 also would allow for additional sales of 500 
     tons of chrome metal (up from planned levels of 500 tons) if 
     the market demand was sufficient. CBO estimates that this 
     provision would have no significant budgetary effect because 
     recent sales suggest that those additional sales would not 
     occur.
       Revenues: Sections 934 and 1024 would allow DoD to accept 
     and spend gifts. Such donations are classified as revenues. 
     CBO expects, however, that enactment of those sections would 
     not have a significant effect on revenues.
       Intergovernmental and private-sector impact: Section 4 of 
     the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act excludes from the 
     application of that act any legislative provisions that 
     enforce the constitutional rights of individuals. CBO has 
     determined that section 1022 would fall within that exclusion 
     because it would amend the authority of the President to 
     employ the armed services to protect individuals' civil 
     rights. Therefore, CBO has not reviewed that section of the 
     bill for mandates.
       Other provisions of S. 1547 contain both intergovernmental 
     and private-sector mandates as defined in UMRA but CBO 
     estimates that the annual cost of those mandates would not 
     exceed the thresholds established in UMRA ($66 million for 
     intergovernmental mandates in 2007 and $131 million for 
     private-sector mandates in 2007, adjusted annually for 
     inflation).
       Increasing the end strength of the armed services: Sections 
     401 and 412 would increase the costs of complying with 
     existing intergovernmental and private-sector mandates as 
     defined in UMRA by increasing the number of servicemembers 
     and reservists on active duty. Those additional 
     servicemembers would be eligible for protection under the 
     Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (SCRA) including the right to 
     maintain a single state of residence for purposes of state 
     and local personal income taxes and the right to request a 
     deferral in the payment of certain state and local taxes and 
     fees. SCRA also requires creditors to reduce the interest 
     rate

[[Page 18232]]

     on servicemembers' obligations to 6 percent when such 
     obligations predate active-duty service and allows courts to 
     temporarily stay certain civil proceedings, such as 
     evictions, foreclosures, and repossessions. Extending these 
     existing protections would constitute intergovernmental and 
     private-sector mandates and could result in additional lost 
     revenues to government and private-sector entities.
       The number of active-duty servicemembers covered by SCRA 
     would increase by less than 1 percent in fiscal year 2008. 
     CBO expects that relatively few of these servicemembers would 
     take advantage of the deferrals in certain state and local 
     tax payments; the lost revenues to those governments would be 
     insignificant.
       CBO does not have sufficient information to estimate 
     precisely the increase in costs of existing private-sector 
     mandates. Servicemembers' utilization of the various 
     provisions of the SCRA depends on a number of uncertain 
     factors, including how often and how long they are deployed. 
     Nonetheless, because the increase in the number of active-
     duty servicemembers covered by SCRA would be less than 1 
     percent, CBO expects that the increased costs to the private 
     sector caused by those new servicemembers utilizing SCRA 
     would be small.
       Prohibiting the sale by Department of Defense of parts for 
     F-14 fighter aircraft: Section 1030 contains a private-sector 
     mandate as defined by UMRA because it would prohibit the sale 
     of any parts of the F-14 aircraft by the Department of 
     Defense. It also would prohibit the United States government 
     from issuing an export license for sale of F-14 aircraft 
     parts. Those prohibitions would be a mandate upon U.S. 
     persons or entities that purchased F-14 parts legally from 
     the Department of Defense with the intention to resell the 
     aircraft parts.
       The cost of the mandate to the private sector, if any, 
     would be the amount certain United States persons and 
     entities have already paid to purchase the F-14 parts from 
     the Department of Defense added to the foregone profit 
     attributable to the prohibition of resale of the F-14 parts. 
     From April 2006 to December 2006, F-14 parts were sold for a 
     total of $38,000. As a result, CBO estimates that the cost, 
     if any, to comply with that mandate would be minimal.
       Providing benefits to state and local governments: This 
     bill contains several provisions that would benefit state and 
     local governments. Some of those provisions would authorize 
     aid for certain local schools with dependents of defense 
     personnel and convey certain parcels of land to state and 
     local governments. Any costs to those governments would be 
     incurred voluntarily as a condition of receiving federal 
     assistance.
       Previous CBO estimates: On April 12, 2007, CBO transmitted 
     a cost estimate for H.R. 1441, the Stop Arming Iran Act, as 
     ordered reported by the House Committee on Foreign Affairs on 
     March 27, 2007. Section 1030 of S. 1547 is similar to H.R. 
     1441 and the estimated costs are the same for both 
     provisions.
       On May 14, 2007, CBO transmitted a cost estimate for H.R. 
     1585, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 
     2008, as reported by the House Committee on Armed Services. 
     On June 12, CBO transmitted a cost estimate for H.R. 1585, 
     the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008, 
     as passed by the House. Differences in the estimated costs of 
     S. 1547 and the House-reported and House-passed versions of 
     H.R. 1585 reflect differences in the legislation, as well as 
     different treatments of TRICARE For Life accrual payments, as 
     discussed below.
       S. 1547 and H.R. 1585 as passed by the House, would 
     authorize different levels of appropriations but they 
     nevertheless envision a similar overall level of funding--
     roughly $640 billion--for 2008. Specifically, S. 1547 would 
     authorize appropriations totaling $629 billion, while the 
     House-passed version of H.R. 1585 would authorize about $12 
     billion more than that figure, or $641 billion. The $12 
     billion difference, however, does not reflect a vastly 
     different level of recommended funding. Rather, it primarily 
     reflects different treatments of $11 billion in TRICARE For 
     Life accrual payments that are part of DoD's budget; S. 1547 
     does not contain an authorization of appropriations for those 
     payments, while H.R. 1585 implicitly does.
       Those accrual payments, which are categorized as military 
     personnel spending, will be made under current law regardless 
     of whether or not they are authorized on an annual basis. 
     Furthermore, the payments will be charged to the House and 
     Senate Appropriations Committees and will count against their 
     discretionary allocations as set forth in the most recent 
     budget resolution.
       Despite envisioning similar levels of overall defense 
     funding, there is a notable difference in the authorizations 
     in S. 1547 and H.R. 1585 as passed by the House. S. 1547 
     would authorize $128 billion for DoD's costs of military 
     operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, or about $13 billion less 
     than the amount in the House-passed act (which is about equal 
     to the President's request.) In authorizing the lower amount, 
     the Senate Committee on Armed Services states that it 
     reallocated requested war-related authorizations--which the 
     committee believes are not directly related to operations in 
     Iraq and Afghanistan--into authorizations for DoD's ``base 
     budget accounts.'' As a result, the authorizations in S. 1547 
     for DoD's base budget are about $13 billion higher than in 
     the House-passed version of H.R. 1585 (after making 
     adjustments for the TRICARE For Life accrual payments 
     discussed above.)
       Estimate prepared by: Federal Costs: Defense Outlays: Kent 
     Christensen; Military and Civilian Personnel: Matthew Schmit; 
     Military Construction and Multiyear Procurement: David 
     Newman; Military Retirement and Education: Mike Waters; 
     Health Programs: Michelle S. Patterson; Aviation War-Risk 
     Insurance: Megan Carroll; Stockpile Sales: Raymond J. Hall; 
     Operation and Maintenance: Jason Wheelock; Foreign Affairs: 
     Sam Papenfuss; Impact on State, Local, and Tribal 
     Governments: Neil Hood; Impact on the Private Sector: 
     Victoria Liu.
       Estimate approved by: Peter H. Fontaine, Deputy Assistant 
     Director for Budget Analysis.

  Mr. LEVIN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that following 
the remarks of the Senator from Hawaii, on this side of the aisle, the 
order then be Senator Biden and Senator Boxer.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Hawaii is recognized.
  Mr. AKAKA. Madam President, I thank Chairman Levin and Ranking Member 
McCain for their leadership and working in a bipartisan fashion to 
unanimously pass the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 
2008 out of committee. I also thank my ranking member of the 
Subcommittee on Readiness, Senator Ensign, and the members of that 
committee for their work in bringing this about.
  This bill exemplifies what can be achieved through the spirit of 
bipartisan cooperation to address a number of important defense 
priorities. As our distinguished chairman has already highlighted, this 
bill includes a 3.5 percent across-the-board pay raise for all 
uniformed personnel, adds $4 billion to the President's budget for mine 
resistant vehicles to protect our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. It 
also authorizes fiscal year 2008 end strengths for the Army and Marine 
Corps, of 525,400 and 189,000 respectively, an increase of 13,000 for 
the Army and 9,000 for the Marine Corps, and it supports the 
transformation of our Armed Forces to meet the threats of the 21st 
century.
  As chairman of the Readiness Subcommittee, both Ranking Member Ensign 
and I worked with our colleagues to continue the subcommittee's strong 
commitment to increasing the readiness of the Armed Forces. In this 
legislation, we are providing support to projects and programs that are 
important to the readiness of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines, 
both active and reserve components. In this regard, $188.4 billion is 
authorized to meet the services' operation and maintenance requirements 
to support the combat operations, improve the readiness of deploying 
and nondeployed forces, and to support the Army and Marine Corps plans 
to increase their fiscal year 2008 end strengths.
  I believe all of us in the Senate are concerned that our military 
forces have what they need to be trained and ready, but I am 
particularly concerned about the readiness of our ground forces. This 
legislation before us today fully funds the Army and Marine Corps 
request for depot level maintenance. I am encouraged that neither the 
Army nor Marine Corps identified a shortage of funds for depot 
maintenance. While the Chief of Naval Operations did bring to this 
committee's attention a funding shortfall for Navy aircraft depot 
maintenance, we approved an increase of $77 million. In addition, we 
included $4.8 billion for the procurement of ammunition of all types to 
support the services' war fighting, training, and war reserve 
requirements.
  With regard to the Department of Defense's management and acquisition 
policy, I am particularly pleased this bill includes a provision 
requiring, for the first time, that the Department of Defense have a 
chief management officer. The Comptroller General has told the members 
of this committee on numerous occasions that the Department needs to do 
this to ensure that the Department's many high-risk areas get the top-
level management attention they deserve.
  Other important acquisition reform provisions included in this bill 
are as follows: a provision that would provide the resources that DOD 
needs to address the shortcomings in its acquisition workforce; a 
series of provisions

[[Page 18233]]

that would tighten DOD management of contract services; a provision 
that would ensure that our commanders on the battlefield have the 
authority they need to establish rules for armed contractors in an area 
of combat operations; a provision establishing guidelines for DOD to 
use in determining whether savings are ``substantial'' for the purpose 
of justifying multiyear contracts; and a provision that would require 
that each of the Assistant Secretaries for Acquisition in the military 
departments be assisted by a three-star military deputy who has 
significant acquisition experience. I believe these provisions, taken 
together, will lead to substantial improvements in the DOD acquisition 
process.
  I am particularly pleased this year's authorization bill includes a 
provision to establish a Director of Corrosion Control Policy and 
Oversight, and funding for corrosion prevention and control programs. 
Corrosion is a costly problem. In fact, it is one of the largest costs 
in the life cycle of weapons systems. In addition, corrosion reduces 
military readiness, as the need to repair or replace corrosion damage 
increases the downtime of critical military assets. Consequently, I 
firmly believe that cohesive corrosion control programs are integral to 
maintaining military readiness. This critical maintenance activity 
increases the life of multimillion dollar weapons systems and ensures 
their availability during times of crisis. Effective corrosion control 
should be made a key component of the Department of Defense's resetting 
strategy and funds should be allocated accordingly.
  This legislation also includes my legislation to establish a National 
Language Council to develop a long-term and comprehensive language 
strategy and oversee the implementation of that strategy. This will 
ensure that the administration's current efforts to promote foreign 
language competency will develop into an organized and concerted effort 
to improve the Nation's foreign language capabilities.
  We also make a valuable and important investment in our 
infrastructure by providing an additional $461 million above the budget 
request to repair, replace, and modernize our aging defense facilities 
and improve the quality of life and the productivity of our military. 
Furthermore, we make a true commitment to provide quality health care 
for all beneficiaries, including authorizing $24.6 billion for the 
Defense Health Program, authorizing the use of Federal pricing for 
drugs dispensed through the TRICARE retail program. In addition, we 
reject the administration's proposal to give DoD broad authority to 
increase TRICARE program cost-sharing amounts for military retirees and 
their dependents.
  As chairman of the Veterans' Affairs Committee and a member of the 
Armed Services Committee, I am able to look at the issue of seamless 
transition from military to civilian life from two different 
perspectives and, at the appropriate time, I will be offering an 
amendment to the underlying bill to improve care specifically for 
veterans. My friend and colleague Chairman Levin and I have worked 
together on these issues. We held a joint hearing on April 12 and have 
developed a thoughtful set of provisions to deal with the VA's response 
to traumatic brain injuries, also known as TBI and also known as 
invisible wounds. The amendment I will be offering includes provisions 
recently approved by the Committee on Veterans' Affairs at our markup 
on June 27. In fact, this amendment is a direct product of the 
committee's work to address seamless transition issues and is the 
corresponding piece to S. 1606, the Dignified Treatment for Wounded 
Warriors Act.
  At the heart of my amendment are the improvements to TBI care. 
Ranking Member Craig and I worked on these traumatic brain injury 
provisions and they have garnered the support of many organizations, 
including the American Academy of Neurology, the Brain Injury 
Association of America, and the Disabled American Veterans. The VA was 
caught flat-footed by the large number of devastating TBI cases 
resulting from the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. My amendment 
would go a long way toward resolving the difficulties faced by soldiers 
afflicted with TBI by providing comprehensive TBI legislation. It would 
require individual rehabilitation plans for veterans with traumatic 
brain injury and authorizes the use of non-VA facilities for the best 
TBI treatment available. The amendment also requires much more research 
and education for severe TBI. We have even developed a pilot program 
for assisted living services for veterans with TBI.
  My amendment would also extend the period of automatic eligibility 
for VA health care from 2 to 5 years for servicemembers returning from 
combat. It would ensure access to care for conditions that may not be 
apparent when a servicemember first leaves active duty and would 
contribute to a seamless transition from military to civilian life. In 
addition, this amendment requires a preliminary mental health 
evaluation be conducted within 30 days of a servicemember's request. VA 
must be prodded to ensure timely access to mental health care. I thank 
Senator Obama for working with me on this important provision.
  Finally, our ongoing global operations have utilized the reserve 
components on an unprecedented scale. When these citizen soldiers 
redeploy, it is essential that VA include them in their outreach 
efforts. To recognize the importance of the National Guard and Reserve 
and to acknowledge their contributions to the Nation's efforts, my 
amendment redefines the VA's definition by specifically including them 
in the outreach program.
  The Senate Armed Services Committee has taken bold and necessary 
steps in this legislation that will provide the necessary funds and 
management reforms required to support our service men and women while 
allowing the military to continue to meet our Nation's future defense 
needs.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Michigan is recognized.
  Mr. LEVIN. Madam President, Senator Biden was to be recognized next. 
I don't see him on the floor at this moment, so I will note the absence 
of a quorum for a few moments, and if he does not arrive, then I will 
give my remarks on the Webb amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. BOXER. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum 
call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. BOXER. Parliamentary inquiry: I understand I am supposed to 
speak after Senator Biden, but he told me before he left the floor that 
if he weren't here, I could reverse the order. I wonder if Senator 
Levin would give me permission to do that.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. LEVIN. Madam President, I thank my good friend from California, 
and I have no objection at all.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, this is a very important week for this 
country as we bring the issue of Iraq back to the Senate floor and 
listen to the American people, who are very clear. They want this war 
to end. They want the troops to come home. They know our service men 
and women have given everything there is to give, and more. They know 
the policies we have followed in Iraq since day one have backfired. 
They are looking to us.
  If I might say where we are in this debate in this Senate, in my 
opinion, is between talk and action. It is very easy to talk and say: 
Oh, we need a change. We must have a change. It is important that we 
have a change, and call press conferences and say we need a change. It 
is time for change. But let's see how people vote. Will they vote for a 
sense of the Senate that has absolutely no force of law, which says it 
is the sense of the Senate we should change course, or will they vote 
to start redeploying our troops out of the middle of a civil war, out 
of chaos?
  My colleagues know I represent the largest State in the Union, and we 
are taking a major hit. We have lost hundreds and hundreds of soldiers. 
We see

[[Page 18234]]

thousands injured from our State. We see a National Guard that doesn't 
have the equipment it has to have. Some reports are the equipment is 
down 50 percent. What does that mean? It means if, God forbid, there is 
an earthquake, a fire, all the things we have to deal with in my 
beautiful State, who is going to protect the people? How much longer 
can we afford the bloodshed? The dollars--we are now told $12 billion a 
month is being spent in Iraq and Afghanistan.
  The Presiding Officer and I share a lot of common interests. One of 
them is, for example, to make sure our kids can go to afterschool care, 
because that is the time they get in trouble. That is a high-risk time. 
Do my colleagues know what it would cost to fund afterschool care to 
the level that it is supposed to be, according to No Child Left Behind? 
It would cost $3 billion a year. We are funding it at $1 billion. 
Millions of kids are on the street. We spend $12 billion in Iraq and 
Afghanistan in 1 month, but we cannot find a couple of billion in a 
year for our children. We can't find the money to insure our children, 
to protect their health. Oh, no. We don't have the money for that. The 
President is going to veto this bill and veto that bill. He can't help 
the farmers. We can't do this, we can't do that, but $12 billion in 
Iraq and Afghanistan--no problem. No problem to save his reputation, to 
save him from having to prove to the world he was wrong. Well, it is 
one thing to have an argument with someone and have pride and say: You 
know, I am not going to admit I made a mistake. It is another thing 
when people are dying because of your mistake--every day.
  Now, in November of 2006, the American people voted against the Iraq 
war. They elected Democrats. They want this war to end. They want this 
mission to end. They don't want our troops in the middle of a civil 
war, getting killed and getting maimed, getting post-traumatic stress, 
getting brain injuries that are the signature injury of this war.
  We will be dealing with the problems of this war for decades to come. 
Anyone who lived through Vietnam knows that if you go on the streets 
today and look at who the homeless are, you know who they are. A third 
of them are veterans, most of them from Vietnam who never got over the 
experience. That is why Senator Lieberman and I have worked together to 
try and get the people who are coming back the mental health care they 
need. Senator Lieberman and I do not agree on this war. We are polar 
opposites on this war. But let me tell my colleagues, we are working 
together to get these troops the mental health care they need. Their 
marriages are breaking up. They can't sleep at night. They are having 
trouble with their employers. We have so many problems, and the 
American people expect us to fix it.
  I see my friend Senator Biden is on the floor, and I will tell him I 
will speak for about another 10 minutes.
  Now that my friend is on the floor, Senator Biden is the Senator who 
has looked ahead, who has said there is a light at the end of the 
tunnel. He has put forward a plan, and he put it forward a long time 
ago, for a diplomatic solution here, because there is no military 
solution. How many more explosive devices are going to blow up in the 
faces of our troops before we start bringing them home? How many more 
Iraqis are going to die--women, children? How many more faces are we 
going to look at on the front page before we get the guts to do the 
right thing?
  The President doesn't listen. He didn't listen after the election. 
Oh, he said he did. He said he had a new strategy. What was it? The 
surge. The surge is not a new strategy. It is a military tactic, and it 
isn't working. Here is what the President said after he sent in more 
than 20,000 additional troops. He said:

       Over time, we can expect to see . . . fewer brazen acts of 
     terror, and growing trust and cooperation from Baghdad's 
     residents. When this happens, daily life will improve, Iraqis 
     will gain confidence in their leaders, and the Government 
     will have the breathing space it needs to make progress in 
     other critical areas.

  Wrong. The President was wrong again. The Washington Post reported on 
Sunday:

       The Iraqi government is unlikely to meet any of the 
     political and security goals or time lines President bush set 
     for it in January. . . .

  And today the AP, Associated Press, reports:

       Iraq fails to meet all reform goals.

  Not even one goal was met, and our people are dying. They cannot meet 
one goal. The violence continues unabated.
  Since the President made his speech on January 10, after the 
election, when he said there was going to be a new strategy, 590 U.S. 
service men and women have been killed, 107 of whom did not live to see 
their 21st birthday. What kind of change is that this President 
brought?
  The average number of daily attacks by insurgents and militias has 
not dropped below 150 per day. In Baghdad alone, there has been an 
average of 50 insurgent attacks a day. Over the weekend, more than 150 
Iraqis were killed in one single bombing. These bombings are not 
isolated events. In June alone, there were 39 bombings in Iraq that 
resulted in multiple fatalities. The number of suicide attacks more 
than doubled in Iraq since the surge began--from 26 in January to 58 in 
April. What kind of new strategy is that? If that is a new strategy, it 
is worse than the other one. The average number of Iraqi civilians 
killed has risen to more than 100 per day.
  The administration is failing on the security front; they are failing 
on the political front. They don't listen to Senator Biden, chairman of 
the Foreign Relations Committee. They don't listen to Senator Lugar, 
the ranking member. They are all saying you have to have a political 
solution.
  The administration is failing on the reconstruction front. Iraqis 
living in Baghdad still receive an average of 5.6 hours of electricity 
a day. The President can't even keep the lights on, let alone succeed 
in this surge.
  Yesterday, Tony Snow said:

       The President wants to withdraw troops based on the facts 
     on the ground, not on the matter of politics.

  Well, I say to Tony Snow, elections have consequences, and you lost 
in 2006. The issue was Iraq and the policies on the ground are not 
working; they are failing. So whether you listen to politics or what is 
happening on the ground, the answer is the same.
  On February 1, Tony Snow described the surge in this way:

       We are talking about significant economic development 
     efforts; we're talking about significant political 
     reconciliation. These are the kinds of things we expect to 
     see.

  Well, they have not seen them. We know the President is going to 
address the American people. I say to the President, tell the truth to 
the American people. Lay out what you expected, and then lay out the 
reality, and start getting the troops home. We have not seen 
improvements. Now our military is at the breaking point. Listen to 
retired generals. They don't have to toe the line. They tell the truth. 
Nearly 90 percent of Army National Guard units in the U.S. are rated 
``not ready''--largely as a result of shortfalls in equipment that 
jeopardize their capability to respond to crises at home and abroad. In 
my State, our equipment is down 50 percent. So who will be responsible 
when we have a disaster, I say to the President? Who is going to be 
responsible? The same people who have brought us Iraq are going to 
bring us a crisis in our States. We already saw what happened in 
Katrina from incompetence. Let's match incompetence and lack of 
equipment and see what happens then.
  What about Iraqi forces? On January 11, Secretary Gates said:

       We are going to know pretty early on whether the Iraqis are 
     meeting their military commitments. . . .

  He said we would know early on. The answer is they are not meeting 
their military commitments. After this weekend's violence, senior Iraqi 
officials called on Iraqi civilians to arm themselves and fight 
insurgents. That is from their Government. They are not telling the 
people this Government will protect you; that the Americans have 
trained 300,000 of us and we are ready to protect you. No. The answer 
is to arm yourselves so that when insurgents break down your door, you 
can

[[Page 18235]]

kill them before they kill you. What a situation.
  The Iraqi Vice President said:

       The people have no choice but to take up their own defense.

  We need to chart a new course on Iraq today. As Senator Lugar said:

       Persisting indefinitely with the surge strategy will delay 
     policy adjustments that have a better chance of protecting 
     our vital interests over the long term.

  But the administration doesn't seem willing to chart a new course. As 
stated on the front page of today's Washington Post, ``GOP Dissent 
Spurs Change in Message But Not Course.'' That is another way of, I 
think, confusing the subject. Get up and give a great speech and then 
you vote against anything that has any teeth in it. You vote for 
something that says it is the sense of the Senate that things are not 
going well, rather than it is time to change this mission and get our 
troops out of the middle of a civil war, and make sure what we are 
doing is training the Iraqi soldiers, and that is fine, and going after 
al-Qaida, which is fine, protecting our forces, and that is fine, but 
get most of them out of there.
  A change in message will not prevent the deaths of more Americans and 
will not salvage the President's failed policy. Over the next 2 weeks, 
we will have the opportunity to debate several amendments that will 
mandate a change of course on Iraq. I urge my colleagues, as strongly 
as I can, as someone who has stood up here time and time again and said 
we are making mistakes, to finally admit it--but not just admit it, do 
something about it. That is what we have to do. We have to change the 
reality of what is happening.
  As the experts have told us over and over again, what are we doing 
here? We are in the middle of a civil war; we are neglecting the war on 
terror. We say we are fighting the terrorists there and we will stop 
them from coming here. That is what Tony Blair said, but it didn't stop 
anything. This is a recruitment tool for al-Qaida. Iraq is a 
recruitment tool for al-Qaida. Peter Bergman said that a long time ago 
when we went into Iraq. He is an expert on the Middle East. I don't 
want to recruit al-Qaida; I want to go after them. I voted to go after 
them after 9/11. I didn't vote to change course and go in another 
direction for regime change based on faulty information, faulty 
intelligence.
  This week and next week, we will find out who talks in the Senate and 
who is willing to take action in the Senate. I hope the American people 
will look at the amendments we are voting on and, at the bottom line, 
understand which ones are just talk and which ones will actually result 
in redeployment of the troops out of a civil war--who walks the walk 
versus who talks the talk. Action means a deadline. Action means you 
change the mission. Action means you start bringing the troops home. 
Action doesn't mean a change in message, but a change of course. 
Reshuffling the chairs on the deck of the Titanic is not what we should 
be doing. We need to change course.
  I have spoken with mothers and fathers who have lost sons and 
daughters. They have begged me in the most tearful way to spare other 
families what they are going through. If this war was working, that 
would be one thing. But there is no military solution here. We need to 
listen to what our chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee is 
saying about a political solution, about separating the warring 
parties, about bringing in the nations of the region, and doing it 
now--before another soldier is blown up or breaks up with his wife 
because of the stress, or before another child has no dad or mom. The 
time is now.
  I am so glad we are going to be doing the Defense authorization bill 
and have our opportunity to actually put our ideas into action. I will 
be supporting every single amendment that will result in a change of 
course, accountability, starting to bring the troops home.
  I thank the Chair and I thank the Senator from Delaware for allowing 
me to go before he goes.
  I yield the floor at this time.
  [Applause in the Gallery.]
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Sergeant-at-Arms will restore order in the 
gallery. The expression of approval or disapproval is not permitted.
  The Senator from Arizona is recognized.
  Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, I certainly appreciate the passion of 
the Senator from California and her concern for the men and women 
serving in the military and those who have sacrificed a great deal 
already. The fact is, according to Lee Hamilton and Henry Kissinger, 
General Zinni, and according to literally almost every--not all--
respected national security expert in this country, it is acknowledged 
that we will have a lot more casualties.
  The Senator's concern is emotional and well-founded and very moving. 
I am also moved by the fact that Henry Kissinger and Lee Hamilton say 
Congress should drop fixed deadlines for the withdrawal of U.S. forces. 
As Commander in Chief, the President needs flexibility on troop 
withdrawals. He will accept no bill that has a timeline or a fixed date 
for withdrawal. Lee Hamilton says:

       The American people have the war in Iraq figured out. They 
     know American troops cannot settle Iraq's sectarian conflict, 
     and they want to withdraw responsibly. They do not want a 
     messy or sudden withdrawal to prompt wider sectarian strife 
     and an escalating humanitarian disaster.

  To some degree, I have seen this movie before. I remember when the 
debate was going on on the floor of the Senate on our withdrawal from 
Cambodia on December 15, 1970. Mr. Gravel, now one of the candidates 
for President of the United States, said:

       We come back to the argument of protecting American forces. 
     It is simple. Take the forces out and we do not have any 
     problem. It is simple. Do not get into Cambodia. Do not get 
     involved. Then we do not get into anything.

  Yes, there was an argument on the floor of the Senate about 
withdrawal. There was an argument that prohibited the United States 
from being involved in Cambodia. Three million people were 
slaughtered--one of the great acts of genocide in modern history. Yes, 
we cared about American casualties after Vietnam and we withdrew. The 
North Vietnamese attacked and millions of people got on boats, 
thousands were killed in reeducation camps, and thousands were 
executed. I have seen this movie before. I have seen this movie before 
from the liberal left in America, who share no responsibility for what 
happened in Cambodia when we said, no, as I quote Senator Gravel:

       We come back to the argument of protecting American forces. 
     It is simple. Take the forces out and we do not have any 
     problem. It is simple. Do not get into Cambodia. Do not get 
     involved. Then we do not get into anything.

  Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, will the Senator yield for a question?
  Mr. McCAIN. I would like to finish my comments, and then I will be 
glad to yield to the Senator from California.
  Continuing to quote Senator Gravel:

       What would happen if Cambodia fell tomorrow? It may well 
     fall. . . . Obviously, it would become communistic. We would 
     have some gnashing of teeth, but life would go on. We would 
     have our traffic jams and everything else.

  There were no traffic jams in Phnom Penh, Madam President, not a one. 
In fact, all of the people were killed or told to walk out of the city.

       Life would go on. Basically, that would increase the 
     casualties of Americans in South Vietnam. That would be the 
     difference, except the American people are going to get up 
     and say, ``We do not want Americans getting killed at that 
     rate.''
        . . . it means we are going to put more money in, and if 
     there is a danger that Cambodia will be overrun 6 months from 
     now, we would have to escalate to the next higher step, and 
     they will devise some way of getting American troops in 
     there. Or they would go the mercenary route until they 
     butcher enough of those people.

  Interesting.

       This, to my mind, is wrong, and adds nothing to our 
     security. Supposing South Vietnam fell, and became totally 
     Communist tomorrow, and then Cambodia fell and became totally 
     Communist; would that appreciably change the life of my 
     colleague from Kansas? Would that change his life?

  The debate goes on and on. It is very worthwhile reviewing the debate 
that went on about Cambodia and Vietnam, not to mention, as I mentioned 
earlier,

[[Page 18236]]

the impact of losing a war on America, our military, and others.
  The Senator from California and I am sure the Senator from Delaware 
will speak very movingly about the strain on the families of the men 
and women and the strain on our troops.
  By the way, we do in this authorization bill before us increase the 
size of the Marine Corps and the Army, and we need to increase it even 
more because of the challenges around the world--something that some of 
us have sought to achieve for a long period of time.
  But the fact is, when you lose a war, the consequences of failure are 
far, far more severe on the military than the strain that is put on the 
military when they are fighting. It is a fact. It is a fact of military 
history. It is a fact of the war that we lost in Vietnam, which took us 
well over a decade to restore any kind of efficiency in our military.
  I will be glad to yield to the Senator from California.
  Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, I thank the Senator for yielding. The 
Senator made the point that the liberal left wants us out of Iraq. I 
want to make sure the Senator is aware that the latest polls show 70 
percent of the American people want us to have a strategy to leave. And 
my question is, A, is the Senator aware of that? And, B, the followup 
to that question is, has the Senator read the various proposals, the 
Levin-Reed proposal, which I strongly support? There is no precipitous 
withdrawal.
  I think the Senator is setting up a straw man, if you will, here. The 
fact is, those of us who want to leave want to do it in the right way--
--
  Mr. McCAIN. I ask for the regular order.
  Mrs. BOXER. And we also change the mission to continue training the 
troops, and so on. I want to make sure the Senator is aware of that 
point.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
  Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, I thank the Senator from California for 
that thoughtful question. The fact is, I do read the polls, and if the 
Senator from California had paid attention to my opening statement, she 
would have known that I made it very clear that I understand the 
frustration and sorrow of the American people. I also know a lot of us 
are not driven by polls. A lot of us are driven by principle, and a lot 
of us do what we think is right no matter what the polls say.
  So I appreciate the concern of the Senator from California about 
whether I read the polls. I appreciate that greatly. But I do know also 
that when you send a signal, and I appreciate the Senator's concern--I 
was talking about the liberal left addressing the war in Cambodia, is 
what I was speaking of. The record is clear, and I will be glad to 
provide other quotes of a similar nature. But I do also know that those 
of us who study history, those of us who spend time in Iraq, those of 
us who spend time with various leaders, such as General Zinni, such as 
General Scowcroft, such as Secretary of State Baker, such as many 
others, we all know what the consequences of a date for withdrawal will 
be. And it isn't my opinion alone. It is shared by a broad variety of 
national security experts in this field.
  I also point out that it does have an effect on the troops in the 
field when they see effort after effort after effort to withdraw, to 
force them to be withdrawn and, obviously, a failure of their mission.
  I welcome this debate, as I said earlier. I think it is important to 
inform the American people. I think it is important to have a 
respectful exchange of views. And I will continue to respect the views 
of the Senator from California, but I will tell her that I have seen 
this movie before, and I have seen what happens when we have a defeated 
military and we have people who assure us that a withdrawal is without 
consequences.
  I believe, as Henry Kissinger as recently as a few days ago said:

        . . . precipitate withdrawal [from Iraq] would produce a 
     disaster. It would not end the war but shift it to other 
     areas, like Lebanon or Jordan or Saudi Arabia. The war 
     between the Iraqi functions would intensify. The 
     demonstration of American impotence would embolden radical 
     Islamism and further radicalize its disciples from Indonesia 
     and India to the suburbs of European capitals.

  Natan Sharansky says the same thing. A person who knows about 
oppression, who knows about freedom, who served as a beacon to me and a 
hero in my entire life says:

       A precipitous withdrawal of U.S. forces could lead to a 
     bloodbath that would make the current carnage pale by 
     comparison.

  All of these are statements by people for whom I have the greatest 
respect. I hope we will heed some of their admonitions.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Boxer). The Senator from Delaware is 
recognized.
  Mr. BIDEN. Madam President, I was interested in the last exchange. 
Let me just say that one of my heroes is the Senator from Arizona. I 
mean this sincerely. We use the phrase around here ``my friend.'' I 
consider him my friend. I believe if neither he nor I were Senators and 
I picked up a phone and called him and said: I need you to show up at 
such-and-such a place, I can't tell you why, he would be there. I do 
not pretend to be his best friend in the world, but I admire him.
  But I think I should point out a couple of things. No. 1, the Senator 
from California is not poll-driven. As I remember it, when the whole of 
the country was clamoring to go to war, the Senator from California 
stood up and voted against going to war. If I am not mistaken, it was 
viewed as political suicide at that time. I know the Senator from 
California, and I know she needs no defense, but I know her. If I know 
anybody who is not poll-driven, it is the Senator from California, No. 
1.
  No. 2, Henry Kissinger, Lee Hamilton, and Baker--all these people 
mentioned--they all say get out. None of them think the policy of this 
President makes any sense. So let's start off where they are. Henry 
Kissinger has endorsed the Biden plan and the Boxer plan and all the 
rest who have done it. They need a political solution.
  I remind everybody that the Baker-Hamilton report set a date of March 
2008 as a goal to get the majority of our troops out, if not all of 
them out. They talked about drawing down our troops. The President 
rejected that policy.
  I don't know a serious person--there probably are--I don't know of 
any in the international community, I don't know of anybody in the 
foreign policy establishment in the United States of America, from 
Colin Powell, a former Secretary of State, to former Secretaries of 
State and Secretaries of Defense in Republican administrations, who 
thinks this policy makes any sense.
  Madam President, I say to my colleagues, to quote Gravel--I was here 
in 1972 while my friend John McCain, God love him, was in a prisoner-
of-war camp. I was a 29-year-old Senator. Nobody agreed with Gravel. 
Give me a break. Quoting Gravel as the voice of the left--he was the 
voice of his voice. God love him, as my mother would say, and he still 
is the voice of his voice. Who agrees with Gravel? Maybe somebody does. 
But to quote him as if it was the Democratic position on Cambodia--go 
count the votes, how many votes Gravel got. That is not representative 
of even the left. This is a man who, God love him, nominated himself 
for Vice President. Come on. Come on.
  And who is calling for a precipitous withdrawal? If I am not 
mistaken, the distinguished chairman of the Armed Services Committee is 
not voting for a precipitous withdrawal. This is what we call, in the 
law business, which I have been practicing 34 years, a red herring.
  The question is, Do we continue to send our kids into the middle of a 
meat grinder based on a policy that is fundamentally flawed? I don't 
think there are a dozen Republicans on that side of the aisle who agree 
with the President's strategy, nor do I believe, if the President had 
followed the recommendation of the Senator from Delaware and then the 
Senator from Arizona back before there was a civil war to put enough 
troops in to solidify the situation on the ground, we might not be 
here. The rationale he offered and I offered, if I am not mistaken,

[[Page 18237]]

was: Mr. President, you don't have a strategy. Secretary of Defense, 
these are not a bunch of dead-enders, they are not a bunch of thugs. 
They are thugs, but you have a big problem, Mr. President.
  If I am not mistaken, I heard the Senator from Arizona make those 
speeches 4 years ago. I heard him, along with me, call for more troops 
back then in order to get out sooner. We predicted there would be a 
civil war if we didn't gain control. Surprise, surprise, surprise. We 
have a civil war.
  Look, I understand the political dilemmas in which we find ourselves: 
We have a President of our own party we have a problem with. I have 
been there. It never kept me from speaking up. If my colleagues recall, 
my friend from California, who is presiding, remembers, to use the 
trite expression, I beat President Clinton up and about the head, as 
they say in the neighborhood where I come from, to use force in Bosnia, 
to end a genocide. The President didn't agree with me. I was told: Calm 
down, don't put him in that spot. I am accustomed to taking on 
Presidents in my own party, and I know it is hard. It is hard. But I 
tell you what, name me any one of the people who were quoted here who 
thinks the policy we are pursuing now makes any sense.
  Ever since the Democrats took control of the Congress back in 
January, we have been working to build pressure on the administration 
and, quite bluntly, on our Republican colleagues to change course in 
Iraq because I have reached a point where I think the President is 
impervious to information. There is a great expression, I believe it 
was Oliver Wendell Holmes referring to prejudice--and the President is 
not prejudiced, but I make the point. He said prejudice is like the 
pupil of the eye: the more light you shine upon it, the more tightly it 
closes. This administration is like the pupil of the eye: the more hard 
facts you give them to prove their policy is a failure, the tighter it 
closes and the less inclined to change they are. More and more 
Republicans--more and more Republicans--have stopped backing the 
President and started looking for ways to work with us to bring our 
soldiers home in a responsible way so we don't merely trade a dictator 
for chaos.
  Let me say something I am going to be reminded of, I am sure, again 
and again and again. Having been here for 34 years, I know you should 
not make statements I am about to make lightly, but I am reminded of it 
by the comments made about Cambodia. On this, we have a sell-by date. 
You know when you buy milk, it says sell by a certain date or it turns 
sour? There is a sell-by date here, folks, for us to change policy. 
Because if we do not change policy in a radical way in this calendar 
year, I believe we will be left with one of two alternatives.
  We have a chance now to change policy and maybe salvage--maybe 
salvage--a circumstance in Iraq, whereas we gradually leave, and we 
will not have traded a dictator for chaos and the possibility of a 
regional war. That is alternative one. I think that alternative two is 
Saigon revisited. We will be lifting American personnel off the roofs 
of buildings in the green zone if we do not change policy and pretty 
drastically.
  There is not a single person in here that knows anything about the 
military who can tell me they think there is any possibility of us 
sustaining 160,000 forces in Iraq this time next year. What my friend 
from Arizona did not say--and he knows a great deal about this--is that 
leading generals in the military say straightforward that we are 
breaking--let me emphasize that--breaking the U.S. military--breaking 
the U.S. military. Let me put it another way. We have more 
professionally trained academy graduates, such as my friend from 
Arizona, leaving the military after 5 years than we have had any time 
in the last 30-plus years. The cream of the crop are being broken by 
this failed--this failed policy in Iraq.
  What is worse is not that it is a failed policy, but it is impervious 
to recommendations made by the most informed people in both political 
parties inside and outside Government. What did the President do with 
the Baker-Hamilton Commission? Picked it up, gave it real lip service, 
and flipped it on the shelf. Who was on that commission? Two former 
Secretaries of State, who were Republicans; the present Secretary of 
Defense; some of the leading conservative voices in America on military 
matters; along with mainstream Democratic leaders. What did they do? 
What did they do? They blew it off. Now they are revisiting it. Now 
press reports are that maybe we have to have a plan B.
  Look, it matters profoundly how we end this war. It matters to our 
soldiers, it matters to the Iraqis, and it matters to America's future 
security. As I said before, I don't want my son, a captain in the Army, 
going to Iraq, but he will go, if called. But I also don't want my 
grandson going. How we leave will determine whether my grandson goes. 
So far this President has offered absolutely no political solution to 
Iraq. None.
  What does he say? He says surge troops. Why? To give the Iraqis 
breathing room. Why? So the Iraqis will get together and form a unity 
government that can be trusted by all the Iraqi people to govern the 
nation, allowing us to leave.
  Not in the lifetime of anyone on this floor, including these talented 
young pages, will there be a unity government in Baghdad that has the 
confidence of all the Iraqi people, able to maintain security, provide 
opportunity, and have a stable unity government. It will not happen.
  I had a proposal over a year ago--and I have been roundly criticized 
for it, except for the Presiding Officer and a few others--wherein I 
laid out--and not because I am so smart; I happen to be chairman of the 
Foreign Relations Committee because I have lasted longer than others--
but I laid out a comprehensive proposal. What does everybody say in 
this body? Everybody says, in and out of Government, that there is no 
military solution to Iraq, only a political solution. Name me a single 
person who has offered a political solution, except the Senator from 
California, myself, and the Senator from Kansas, Mr. Brownback. Name me 
anyone. What is the political solution? What is the political solution 
my friend is offering? What is it?
  The political solution is that somehow the Iraqis will have an 
epiphany--and I know Muslims don't have epiphanies; that is a Christian 
thing--they will have an epiphany and all of a sudden they are going to 
get together, realizing what is at stake, and form this unity 
government that can deliver.
  I met with al-Maliki last year. I have been to Iraq and Afghanistan 
eight times. I am heading over there again shortly. I sat with al-
Maliki, and when I came back, the President asked my views. He was kind 
enough to ask what I thought. I said, I don't think al-Maliki has it in 
his bone marrow, in his heart or his brain to desire to reconcile with 
the Sunnis. Even if he did, he doesn't have the capacity.
  What have we rested everything on here? We are about to have a report 
that was going to be filed this June 15, pointing out the Iraqis 
haven't met a single benchmark. Isn't that strange? What did we do? 
Every opportunity we had to help them along, we walked away from. I 
remember after they voted on their Constitution. I was there for the 
official vote, I stuck my finger in the ink that does not come off your 
finger. I went to the polling places. The Iraqis voted overwhelmingly 
for a constitution. Know what it says? I wish somebody would read it 
once in a while. It says, I believe it is article 1, we are a 
decentralized federal system. Then in articles 15, 16, 17, and 18, if I 
am not mistaken--this is from memory--it lays out how any 1 of the 18 
governates, political subdivisions, basically, in Iraq can become a 
region, vote for their own constitution, and have their own local 
security. It also implies there will be an allocation of the oil 
resources through a constitutional amendment.
  I remember immediately after that vote, coming back from my third or 
fourth trip, then meeting with the administration and saying: What are 
you going to do? And being told: Oh, it is too premature to push any of 
that. I

[[Page 18238]]

said: Whoa, let me get this straight. How are you going to bring these 
folks together unless you help them implement the Constitution? No, no, 
too tough now--too tough.
  This administration has not made, when given a choice, a single 
correct decision on Iraq. Hear me. That is a bold statement. I cannot 
think of a single decision when they have been faced with a choice that 
they have made the right choice. I cannot think of one. Way back, when 
the President asked me why I was calling for Rumsfeld's resignation, 
and the Vice President was in the room, in the Oval Office, I said: 
With all due respect, Mr. President, Mr. Vice President, if, Mr. Vice 
President, you were not a constitutional officer, I would call for your 
resignation too. He looked at me and said: Why? I said: Because, Mr. 
President, name me one piece of advice either Rumsfeld or Cheney have 
given you in Iraq that has turned out to be right. Name me one. One. 
One. It is not about retribution, Mr. President, it is about 
competence. If all the advice you have been given is bad, don't you 
think it is a good idea to look for new advice--new advisers?
  Look, I believe there is a comprehensive strategy to end this war 
responsibly and it has three parts. First, is a roadmap to bring most 
of our troops out and home by early next year. Two, is a detailed plan 
for what we leave behind, a political solution. Three, is the 
commitment that so long as there is a single American--a single 
American soldier--in Iraq, we should do everything in our power to 
protect them.
  Let me go through this very briefly. First, bringing our troops home. 
Instead of escalating the war with no end in sight, we have to start to 
bring our troops home now and withdraw most by next year. This was the 
Baker-Hamilton recommendation.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. I wish to remind the Senator that we had an 
order to recess after him speaking for 10 minutes. What is the pleasure 
of the Senator?
  Mr. BIDEN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to proceed for 10 
more minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered, and then 
we will recess for the lunch hour.
  Mr. BIDEN. If we don't start bringing home combat forces within the 
next few months, get them out of the midst of a civil war, we will have 
so soured the American people on the ability to do even the things that 
need be done that this President and the next President will be left 
with absolutely no option--absolutely no option--but to withdraw 
totally from that area and let the chips fall where they may.
  You know, that is exactly what we started to propose, the Senator 
from California and others, Senator Levin, in the Biden-Hagel-Snowe-
Levin resolution opposing the surge back in January and of the Biden-
Levin provision in the Iraqi supplemental bill, the very thing the 
President vetoed. The common denominator in all these efforts has been 
to transition our troops to a more limited mission so we can start to 
bring them home and set the groundwork for being able to leave behind a 
political solution.
  That is exactly what Senator Levin is doing today. He is taking the 
Biden-Levin amendment, now called the Levin-Reed amendment, and he is 
going back at it. I compliment him for it because we have to keep 
pushing in order to change the minds of our Republican friends by 
keeping pressure on them to start to vote for the troops and not the 
President.
  The second thing is getting our troops out of Iraq is necessary, but 
it is not sufficient. We also need a plan for what we are going to 
leave behind so we don't trade a dictator for chaos. What happens 
matters and how it happens. About everyone agrees there is no purely 
military solution. A political solution. Our plan is getting more 
bipartisan support--the so-called Biden-Brownback-Boxer-Hutchison-
Nelson-Smith amendment--and that is we recognize the fundamental 
problem in Iraq is the self-sustaining cycle of sectarian violence.
  I would respectfully suggest that history shows these cycles of 
sectarian violence end in only one of four ways. One, a bloodletting 
that leaves one side victorious and both sides exhausted. In the case 
of Iraq, that would take years, and I believe it would generate a 
Sunni-Shia revival of hatred from the Mediterranean to the Himalayas.
  Second, is an open-ended foreign occupation for a generation or more. 
That is not in America's DNA. It is not what we do. We are not the 
Ottoman Empire.
  Third, a return to a strong man, one who is not on the horizon. Even 
if there were, wouldn't it be the ultimate tragic irony that the United 
States replaced Saddam Hussein with another dictator?
  The fourth way they have ended is a political agreement to form a 
decentralized federal government that separates the warring factions, 
gives them breathing room in their own regions. That is what we did a 
decade ago in Bosnia. We have had over 24,000 NATO troops there for 10 
years and not one has been killed. The sectarian violence has stopped, 
the genocide is over, and they are trying to become part of Europe. The 
plan we put forward has five pieces. I will not take the time to go 
into it now, but one is in order to maintain a unified Iraq we have to 
decentralize it, with a limited central government that has common 
concerns of guarding the border and distributing oil revenues.
  Second, we have to secure support from the Sunnis by giving them a 
guaranteed piece of the oil revenues because they have nothing in that 
triangle.
  Third, we have to increase, not diminish, aid to rebuild that 
country, and we should look to the gulf states who have an overwhelming 
interest and overflow of dollars to do that.
  Fourth, since we have lost all credibility in the region, this has to 
be a consequence, this idea--it has to have an international imprimatur 
on it. It must come out of the Security Council. They must call an 
international conference. It must involve the stamp of the United 
Nations and a regional conference, where the international community 
pursues this--and they are ready to do it. I will not take the time to 
go into why.
  Last, we have to begin to draw down. We have to have military plans 
to draw down our combat forces by 2008, leaving behind a small force to 
take on terrorists and train Iraqis, assuming there is a political 
settlement. If there is no political settlement, mark my words, the 
public will insist they all come home. If they come home it means 
everything comes home. The idea that we are going to be able to leave 
an embassy there with thousands of people without 10,000 or more 
American soldiers to guard it is a joke. If we fail to make federalism 
work, if there is no political accommodation at the center, violent 
resistance will increase, the sectarian cycle of revenge will continue 
to spiral out of control, and we will not have this country break into 
three neat pieces. You will watch it fragment into multiple pieces, 
creating incredible difficulties for the entire region.
  The Bush administration, though, has another vision. Their vision for 
Iraq, their entire premise, as I said, is based on a fundamentally 
flawed premise that they can build a competent, popular, supported 
government based upon a consensus among the three parties, and it 
reside in Baghdad. That is the central flaw in their strategy. It 
cannot be sustained. The hard truth is that absent a foreign occupation 
or a dictator, Iraq cannot be run from the center. The sooner we 
understand that, as Secretary Kissinger does and all the people quoted 
today--the sooner we understand that, the faster we will get this thing 
resolved and the fewer American casualties there will be.
  The last part of this strategy is, so long as we have a single 
soldier in Iraq, it is our most sacred responsibility to give him or 
her the best protection this country can provide. Two months ago I 
called upon the President and Secretary Gates to make building of Mine 
Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles, so-called MRAPs, the Nation's top 
priority. Roadside bombs are responsible for 70 percent of the 25,000-
plus injuries and 70 percent of the roughly 3,600

[[Page 18239]]

deaths. It is hard to keep count, unfortunately; 70 percent. Yet if we 
transition our troops from those flat-bottomed, up-armored HMMWVs to 
these V-shaped-bottom MRAPs, the facts show that somewhere between 66 
percent and 80 percent of the casualties will be avoided.
  An article on the front page of USA Today last Friday pointed out a 
military person saying if we built these when we were supposed to, 
there would be, I think, 731 fewer deaths.
  These are our sons, our daughters, not somebody else's--all of ours. 
These are the people. These are the kite strings upon which our whole 
national ambition is lifted aloft. What are we doing? What are we 
doing? We are spending $10 billion a month in Iraq, and I get push-back 
for wanting to spend $20 billion to build these vehicles? I find it 
obscene.
  I fought to front load money in the emergency spending bill for these 
vehicles. As a result we will get 2,500 more of these vehicles to Iraq 
by the end of the year than we otherwise would have. That is why I 
voted for the bill.
  But I also insisted that the administration tell us by June 15 
whether it would need even more of these vehicles so that we make sure 
the money is there to get them built.
  Last week the Army concluded that it would need seven times the 
number of mine-resistant vehicles it had originally requested--some 
17,700, up from 2,500. When you factor in all the service requests, the 
total need for mine-resistant vehicles jumps from the 7,774 vehicles 
now planned to nearly 23,000 vehicles.
  But the Joint Chiefs have not yet made the Army request a ``clear and 
urgent'' requirement.
  And there is no plan to budget for and build these vehicles over the 
next 6 months, as well as proven technology that protects against so-
called explosively formed projectiles--EFP--that strike from the side.
  We need a commitment from the administration--now--to build every 
last one of these vehicles as soon as possible.
  We can't wait till next year or the year after. Our men and women on 
the front lines need them now.
  I will offer an amendment to the Defense bill to make it clear--with 
absolutely no ambiguity--that Congress will provide every dollar needed 
and every authority necessary to build these vehicles as quickly as 
possible.
  Every day we delay is another life lost.
  The war in Iraq must end. That is what the American people want. And 
that is where America's interests lie.
  I conclude by saying that in Congress we have a tremendous 
responsibility to turn the will of the American people into a practical 
reality. It is long past time we meet this responsibility head on, and 
it is long past time our Republican colleagues join us in what I 
believe they know to be right--forcing this President to radically 
change course in Iraq.
  I yield the floor.

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