[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 6]
[Senate]
[Pages 8727-8730]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         EMERGENCY SUPPLEMENTAL

  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, last month I came to the Senate floor to 
express my doubts about the emergency supplemental spending bill put 
forth by the Democratic leadership in the House and Senate.
  The supplemental was, and still is, a flawed bill that will do little 
to advance the cause of either liberty or victory in Iraq. It is a 
poorly crafted bill that includes language directing the President to 
begin a phased withdrawal of American troops, essentially tying the 
hands of the Commander in Chief, and signaling to our enemies that this 
is the day on which we will wave the white flag and surrender.
  Mr. President, the Democrats believe the war in Iraq is a civil war 
between Sunni and Shia, and that America has no place in their war. I 
see the war in Iraq as a war between Islamic fascists and everyone 
else.
  Contrary to the belief of many of my Democratic colleagues, we are in 
the middle of that war, be it in Baghdad, New York, Pennsylvania, Bali, 
London, or Madrid. What my colleagues on the other side of the aisle 
fail to realize is that diplomacy and the exertion of military force 
are not mutually exclusive of one another. You can and must have both, 
and they must be effective.
  But it is naive to think that you can have diplomacy in a vacuum, 
especially when you are dealing with a country such as Iran, a country 
bent on developing nuclear weapons, increasing its ballistic missile 
capability, and providing weapons and training to our enemies in Iraq.
  However, this is all moot because the Democratic leadership on the 
war supplemental spending bill has been absent these last couple of 
weeks. Here we are, almost 3 weeks after the bill was passed in the 
Senate. There has been no conference of the bill. And the other body, 
the House of Representatives, has yet to appoint conferees. What are we 
waiting for? Why are we asking our men and women in uniform to wait?
  Well, unfortunately, waiting is what our military is going to do. The 
Democratic leadership has thus far decided to purposefully send a bill 
to the White House that they know will be vetoed in order to set up a 
confrontation with the President to score political points.
  I find it ironic that many of the Democrats who are so insistent on 
micromanaging the war and usurping the power of the President cannot 
even show up and show the requisite leadership to pass an emergency 
bill that funds our troops. Our troops deserve more from this Congress.
  I hope my colleagues across the aisle will do what is right and get a 
bill passed that the President can sign into law. If you look at what 
the consequences of us not acting are, it has been very clear. 
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said: This kind of disruption to key 
programs will have a genuinely adverse effect on the readiness of the 
Army and the quality of life for soldiers and their families.
  The supplemental is necessary to pay for training and equipping our 
soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. If the supplemental is not passed by 
April 15, the military will be forced to consider the following steps: 
Curtailing and suspending home station training for Reserve and Guard 
units; slowing the training of units slated to deploy next to Iraq and 
Afghanistan; cutting the funding for the upgrade or renovation of 
barracks and other facilities that support quality of life for troops 
and their families; stopping the repair of equipment necessary to 
support predeployment training; reducing the repair work being done at 
Army depots; delaying or curtailing the deployment of brigade combat 
teams to their training rotation; this, in turn, will cause additional 
units in theater to have their tours extended because other units are 
not ready to take their place; delaying formation of new brigade combat 
teams; implementation of a civilian hiring freeze; prohibiting the 
execution of new contracts and service orders, including service orders 
for training events and facilities; holding or canceling the order of 
repair parts to nondeployed units in the Army.
  These are all things that can result simply because this Congress has 
not acted in a way that is consistent with what is in the best interest 
of our men and women in uniform who are serving their country in Iraq 
and Afghanistan. It is about the politics of whether we ought to be 
withdrawing. Of course, as I said, the legislation that has passed both 
the House and Senate, including time lines for withdrawal, which ties 
the hands of our Commander in Chief, ties the hands of our generals in 
the field, sends a very clear message to our troops that we don't 
believe in their mission, that we don't believe it is possible for them 
to attain victory. It sends a very clear message to our enemies that on 
this date certain, we are going to pull out. What does that say to 
them, other than all they to have do is to wait us out?
  Irrespective of where you are on this particular war--I know it is 
divisive in the United States--when it comes to the fundamental 
question of making sure our troops have the resources they need to do 
the job we have asked them to do, to make sure we are supporting the 
important work they are doing and giving them the impression we believe 
they can win and that we want them to win, there is nothing more 
important in the Senate for us to be dealing with. I know there are a 
lot of important issues the Senate has to deal with. We have an 
Intelligence authorization bill we are deliberating. We had stem cell 
research in the last couple of days. We ought to be dealing with issues 
such as immigration and health care and energy, all issues that are 
important to the people.
  I submit nothing is more important than making sure the men and women 
in uniform, serving our country in theaters of conflict, have the 
resources they need to do the job we have asked of them.
  Meanwhile, while the House is out of session and has yet to appoint 
conferees so even our staffs in the House and Senate could get together 
and begin discussing the differences between the House and Senate bills 
to get a bill to send to the President, which the President can 
subsequently veto and send back here so we can have an override vote, 
which will fail--then we will be right back where we started--the 
troops don't have any funding. Hopefully, at that point, perhaps, the 
Democrats in the House and Senate will come to the realization that all 
these theatrics and shenanigans being played on the floor of the House 
and Senate are not doing anything but sending a message to our enemies 
that we are weakening in our resolve and not doing what we need to be 
doing, and that is funding our troops to make sure they have the 
necessary training and equipment and ability to conduct and win this 
mission we have asked them to complete.
  The ironic thing about it is, while all this is not going on here, 
the absence of activity in the Congress where we ought to be 
conferencing the supplemental bill so we can get the process moving 
forward and hopefully get a bill back from the President that will have 
been vetoed so we can send him another bill that has funding in it for 
our troops, while all this is not going on in Washington, the Speaker 
of the House of Representatives, while the House is out of session this 
week in recess, is traveling around the world conducting foreign 
policy. Where and since when is it the job of the Speaker of the House 
of Representatives to conduct foreign policy, going to other countries 
in the world, particularly countries with which we don't have a 
relationship, countries that harbor and sponsor terrorist activities, 
meeting with them to deliver messages from other countries around the 
world?
  I know we have a President and Vice President, we have a State 
Department and a diplomatic corps, all of which are tasked with that 
important job. But the Speaker of the House of Representatives somehow 
decided she should be the courier of messages between Israel and Syria.
  It should come as no surprise that the Israeli Prime Minister took 
issue with the Speaker of the House of Representatives conducting 
Israeli foreign policy as well, not to mention the fact that she didn't 
have the authority to do it, nor was the message she delivered the 
correct message. It seems to

[[Page 8728]]

me what we ought to be focused on as a Congress is not running around 
the world meeting with leaders who are aiding and abetting the very 
people our men and women in uniform are fighting against in Iraq but, 
rather, being in Washington, dealing with the important issue of 
funding our men and women in uniform who are involved in a very 
important mission for the future of our country. I know this is an 
issue on which this country has great debate. I know people in my 
State, as in many States, are weary of the conflict in Iraq.
  We have in place a new strategy that includes additional troops, a 
change in rules of engagement, new conditions and benchmarks for the 
Iraqi Government, for the Iraqi military. I want to see it work. I want 
to see our troops succeed. I believe a majority of the people want to 
see our mission in Iraq succeed, knowing full well the consequences of 
failure will be detrimental and disastrous to the United States and to 
our security in the future. Yet here we are. The Senate is here. We 
can't conduct a conference because the House of Representatives is not 
in session, nor did they, before they departed for a 2-week recess, 
appoint conferees to the supplemental appropriations bill that would 
enable us to go about this important work.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Will the Senator yield for a question?
  Mr. THUNE. I am happy to yield to the Senator from Alabama.
  Mr. SESSIONS. About the conference process, when an emergency 
supplemental is passed, even though it had language in it that I know 
the Senator opposes, and so do I, it would normally have to go to a 
conference committee of Members of the House of Representatives and 
Members of the Senate. Sometimes it takes a good while, does it not, 
historically, for differences in the House and Senate bills to be 
worked out? It sometimes takes a good while; would the Senator agree?
  Mr. THUNE. That is correct. The Senator is absolutely right. He well 
knows, anytime the House and Senate act on separate pieces of 
legislation, it has to go to a conference committee. Differences have 
to be worked out before the conference report can come back to the 
House and Senate and be passed and ultimately sent to the President.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Those conference committee appointments are decided by 
the leaders of the Senate for the Senate conferees and the leaders of 
the House, the Speaker of the House, Ms. Pelosi, would appoint those 
conferees. If it were something they wanted to have done badly, that 
was high on her agenda, would not they have appointed conferees before 
we recessed almost 2 weeks ago so the conferees could have begun work 
during this interim period, staffs could have been working on these 
issues and been ready to move rapidly when the House comes back in 
session? If they had wanted to, couldn't they have done that?
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I serve with my colleague from Alabama on 
the Armed Services Committee. This is an issue he cares deeply about, 
making sure our men and women are well cared for and that they are in a 
position to do the work we ask them to do. It would make sense--I think 
it is fair to say--that the House, knowing they were going to take a 2-
week recess, to appoint the conferees so the important work of the 
conference committee could get underway, so we wouldn't have to wait 
another several weeks to get this legislation through the conference 
committee, ultimately sent to the President, where it is certain to be 
vetoed, so that it has to come back here and start all over again. It 
seems that would be a fair expectation of our colleagues in the other 
body when it comes to appointing conferees for this important 
legislation.
  Having served three terms in the House of Representatives, I had the 
privilege during those terms to represent my class as a Member of the 
House leadership. On a weekly basis, I had the opportunity, under both 
Speakers Gingrich and Hastert, to be a part of the process. I know how 
many pressures and how much responsibility comes with the job of 
Speaker of the House. Our Senate leaders on both sides have a caucus of 
about 50 people, thereabouts, that they have to deal with. The Speaker 
of the House has a responsibility for making sure that 435 Members of 
the House of Representatives are moving forward with a legislative 
agenda. There is a lot of responsibility, a lot of pressure. I have 
experienced and seen firsthand much of that.
  What I don't understand, however, is where in the job description of 
the Speaker of the House comes this notion that somehow the Speaker of 
the House ought to be going out and meeting with Syrian leaders, 
countries and leadership that are aiding and abetting the people we are 
fighting against, our enemies in Iraq, and trying to conduct foreign 
policy, representing the interests of one of our allies, the Nation of 
Israel, and not only misrepresenting their views but, frankly, 
exercising authority that clearly they didn't give her to exercise. I 
am at a loss to explain why we would be here waiting to conference an 
important supplemental appropriations bill that will fund the troops 
while the leadership of the other body is traveling the world, 
conducting meetings that clearly ought to be in the purview of our 
representation at the State Department and the White House and 
diplomatic corps.
  If the Senator from Alabama would like to make some comments on this 
particular subject, I am happy to yield the floor.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, what time remains on this side?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 14\1/2\ minutes.
  Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Chair.
  I thank my colleague from South Dakota. I believe his National Guard 
per capita is one of the largest National Guards in the country. I know 
mine is, both on a per-capita and aggregate basis. We have soldiers in 
Iraq right now from our home States. I talked to the mother of a 
soldier who was recently killed, and this is a painful subject for us 
all. At this very moment throughout Baghdad, Al Anbar Province, 
American soldiers are walking those streets, working closely with Iraqi 
soldiers, Iraqi police officers, in an effort to create stability so 
that political agreements can be reached that could lead to a stable 
and successful Iraq. This is an extremely, deeply important matter. Now 
we are in a situation in which our leader in the Senate, Democratic 
leader, Senator Reid, has said they intend to fund our troops. They 
intend to provide the money the President needs to conduct this war, 
but at the same time they want to tell the generals how to conduct it. 
They want to say that on a given date we have to move troops in this 
direction or that direction, and we will begin to bring troops home 4 
months from today, regardless of the conditions in Iraq, regardless of 
what the military experts say, without any real thought, if you want to 
know the truth.
  I have been to Iraq four times and will be soon going my fifth. Very 
few people in the Senate have been there so often. I submit we don't 
know sufficiently how to direct the deployment of our troops. I don't 
know. Who knows the best? General Petraeus? This is his third full tour 
over there. He has studied insurgencies and written a Department of 
Defense manual on how to defeat an insurgency.
  Who is the best qualified to make these decisions? This is not a 
little matter. We voted, over three-fourths of this Senate, to 
authorize military force in Iraq. Our soldiers are doing what we asked 
them to do--not what they want to do, what their duty is.
  A father of a military Army officer told me right out here a few 
weeks ago--his son was about to go to Iraq--he said: Senator, they are 
watching you like a hawk. Our soldiers over there are watching what we 
in Congress do. They wonder what is going on.
  They are putting their necks on the line for the policies we asked 
them to do, and they hear this kind of talk, they hear of this delay. 
We can't get even the emergency supplemental passed. It is very 
discouraging to me. I don't believe this is an action worthy of a 
responsible Senate. We know this Senate has the power, this Congress 
has the power to shut off funding for

[[Page 8729]]

the war in Iraq and bring our troops home immediately.
  But if we are not going to do that--and the Democratic leader said we 
are not going to do that, we are going to give them the money they need 
under this supplemental--if we are not going to bring them home, and we 
are going to give them the money, for Heaven's sakes, let's don't 
micromanage what they do, and let's don't demand commitments from the 
Commander in Chief he cannot agree to.
  He cannot agree to 100 Senators telling him when and how to deploy 
the troops. What would General Petraeus think? What would his 
responsibility be to his general whom he asked to serve, who is 
serving, whom he told would be given responsibility to be successful in 
Iraq and bring stability there, with his whole effort focused on that?
  I wish to share with my colleagues a deep concern that we not get 
into some sort of game of chicken with the President and the Congress. 
I must say, I am glad the Democratic leaders apparently said last 
night, after earlier saying no, now they will meet with the President 
at his request to discuss their differences.
  But it is not just a political game of chicken between the Congress 
and the President; we have soldiers in the field whose lives are at 
risk this very moment. They need better support than that. Our allies 
need to know we are not going to be acting in a way this Senate 
resolution suggests. The enemy needs to know we are not going to be 
acting in that fashion, in my view.
  We have a tough challenge over there, there is no doubt about it. 
General Petraeus committed, at my request, that if he thought what we 
were doing would not be successful, he would not hesitate to tell the 
Congress and the American people exactly that. I believe he will. Right 
now, he believes he can be successful. If we allow him to do so, I 
believe he will be.
  Mr. President, I see others on the floor. I conclude by saying I 
believe we ought not to be in this posture of brinksmanship over this 
issue. I believe it is irresponsible. I believe it places those 
soldiers we have sent at greater risk for their lives, and their 
mission is placed in a situation where it would be more difficult to 
accomplish. That is something we should not do. I hope cooler heads 
will prevail.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask the Senator from Alabama if he will 
yield for a question.
  Mr. SESSIONS. I am pleased to yield.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I say to the Senator, I agree with 
everything he said. The thing I guess that has troubled me about this 
process since the inception of the debate we have had in the Senate, 
that has been swirling around in Washington for some time, has to do 
with the way this supplemental bill was constructed and the 
proscriptive language that was put in it relative to tying the hands of 
our Commander in Chief, tying the hands of our generals, essentially 
substituting the judgment of politics in Washington for the judgment of 
our generals in the field.
  I am extremely troubled by that language, as is the President, which 
is why he has indicated he is going to veto this bill when it comes 
before him. They knew that. They knew that when it was passed. They 
knew when it went down there, it was going to be an issue which the 
President, absolutely, in his constitutional role as Commander in 
Chief, could not allow--that type of language and that type of 
restriction--to be imposed on his ability to prosecute and win wars.
  But I guess my question to the Senator from Alabama has to do with: 
If the Senate or the House wanted to stop what is happening in Iraq, 
wanted to withdraw, get our troops home immediately--in spite of the 
fact that under this new strategy we now have more troops there, we 
have different rules of engagement, we have more buy-in from the 
Iraqis; the Iraqis are coming more into the fight; we have an 
opportunity, in my view, at least, hopefully, to have success there--
what is the step the Congress, if they wanted to basically end our 
involvement there, could do? Is it not to cut off funding? Would that 
not be?
  If the Senate and the House were serious about this, why is it they 
are going about all these shenanigans, trying to provoke this 
confrontation with the President over this particular language that 
ties his hands relative to time lines, when in fact the real 
constitutional role the Congress has is funding? Is funding not the 
way, if the Senate and the House wanted to be heard on this, they would 
go about doing that?
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I could not agree with the Senator more. 
Having been in the Department of Justice a number of years as U.S. 
attorney and having had a few occasions to deal with this specific 
issue, money not appropriated by Congress cannot be spent by the 
Government. In fact, there is an Antideficiency Act that makes it a 
criminal offense for a governmental official to spend money that 
Congress has not appropriated.
  So that is our responsibility: to fund or not fund. The Democratic 
leader said they are going to fund. It is not our responsibility to 
micromanage the war, however. So I would say we absolutely as a 
Congress--if we reach that decision--can shut off funding, and tomorrow 
the troops would have to be brought home, or shortly thereafter.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I would say to the Senator from Alabama 
because I think it is an important point to make--I have heard the 
debate here a lot, and, again, as it continues in this city and across 
the country, that there has to be a political or diplomatic solution 
that somehow we have to reach; the sides have to come together, which I 
do not disagree with. However, I would also argue, in order for that to 
happen, you have to have security. You cannot have a functioning 
democracy or government absent security; in the last several hours, a 
couple of lawmakers in Iraq were killed in the Green Zone.
  How is a government to function, how is a political process to work, 
if there is not adequate security, which is the point I believe many of 
us have made all along. I say to my colleague from Alabama, there has 
to be not only a political solution, but there has to be security 
established. That is what this new strategy is designed to accomplish, 
to allow that process to work. We ought to allow this strategy an 
opportunity to work, rather than pass bills out of here that tie the 
hands of the President, tie the hands of our generals, substitute the 
judgment of politicians in Washington for the judgment of our generals 
in the field. Furthermore, we need to get funding to our troops.
  So I think the Senator from Alabama has put it very eloquently, and I 
join him in urging the rest of our colleagues in the Senate--and, 
obviously, hopefully, very soon in the House--to get this process 
wrapped up, to get a bill to the President that he will ultimately 
veto, send it back here, start over again, and let's at least get the 
funding to our troops so we can get this situation in Iraq secure so 
this political process can function and work and, hopefully, create a 
stable democracy.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I say to Senator Thune, I agree, and 
will recall for our colleagues that--I believe it was postelection--
General Schoomaker, the Chief of Staff of the Army, pleaded with us not 
to allow what happened last year to happen this year. He was referring 
to delaying passing the supplemental because it causes all kinds of 
problems.
  A few weeks ago, he testified again, and he was passionate about 
this. It is his soldiers, predominantly, Army soldiers in Iraq. He 
pleaded with us not to delay this supplemental. He said you have to 
take money from all kinds of accounts, and time and effort the 
leadership in the Department of Defense needs to be spending helping 
the soldiers being successful has to be redirected to bringing money 
together in ways that are not easy to fund the effort. He described it 
as trying to walk through a marsh waste deep in water--those were his 
words--in the muck.
  We are creating a political muck that makes it very difficult and 
adds additional burdens to our Defense Department when they have so 
many important things to do. We should not do that.

[[Page 8730]]

  I thank the Senator for his eloquent remarks and his leadership on 
the Armed Services Committee and for his commitment to our soldiers and 
commitment to the United States of America and the good foreign policy 
we have had, we seek to accomplish.
  Our foreign policy is a foreign policy designed to improve the Middle 
East. It is designed to improve the lives of the people in Iraq. It is 
not an imperialistic attempt to gain wealth or power at their expense. 
We want them to be successful. In the end, it will be successful for 
us. It will make us more safe. It will make the world more safe and can 
begin the end of some of the radicalism we are seeing.
  I thank the Presiding Officer and yield the floor.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
order for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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