[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 1]
[House]
[Page 370]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                             SMART SECURITY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, our Nation is now in its 10th straight year 
of war. The military occupation of Afghanistan is longer than any war 
in our Nation's history. An entire generation of young people--
including my three grandchildren who came with me to visit Washington 
for the swearing in--is growing up knowing nothing but a Nation at war.
  This war is not just a moral abomination with devastating human 
costs, and it is not just fiscally irresponsible and unsustainable with 
a price tag of about $370 billion, though it most certainly is all of 
that. Perhaps the most tragic irony of this war is, for all of the 
sacrifice, it is not even doing what it was supposed to do: keeping us 
safe and defeating a terrorist threat.
  If Iraq and Afghanistan have proven anything to us, Mr. Speaker, it 
is that we need an entirely new national security model; one that 
emphasizes brain over brawn; one that uses soft power instead of hard; 
one that protects America by relying on the most honorable American 
values--love of freedom, desire for peace, moral leadership, and 
compassion for the people of the world. With these values in mind, this 
week I once again introduced a resolution calling for the adoption of a 
SMART Security platform. SMART Security would redirect our energy and 
resources away from warfare and it would focus instead on 
nonproliferation, conflict prevention, international diplomacy, and 
multilateralism. That means renewing our commitment to cooperation with 
other nations through the United Nations and other international 
institutions.
  SMART Security would build on the new START treaty ratified last 
month and move us more aggressively toward a goal of eliminating all 
nuclear weapons. It would rearrange our budget priorities so we are no 
longer throwing billions of dollars at weapons systems designed for a 
different era and instead invest in human capital around the world. 
That means addressing root causes of instability and violent conflict 
by increasing development aid and debt relief to poor countries.
  We would be supporting programs that promote sustainable development, 
that promote democracy building, human rights education, a strong civil 
society, gender equality, education for women and girls, and much, much 
more.
  The Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review recently completed 
at the State Department reaffirms the principles underlying SMART 
Security, calling for civilian power to lead the way in resolving 
conflicts and reducing threats around the world, with diplomacy and 
development mutually reinforcing one other; also strongly recommending 
a renewed focus on the rights of women and girls.
  The bottom line, Mr. Speaker, is that might doesn't make right. The 
conventional wisdom of peace through strength does not work, especially 
in an era with the greatest threats we face being from nonstate actors.
  A national security based on occupation and conquest has been given a 
chance to work over the last decade, and it has failed miserably. What 
we need in Afghanistan is a civilian surge, not a military surge. For 
the security of the American and the Afghan people, we need to be 
humanitarian partners, not military occupiers. It is time, Mr. Speaker, 
to bring our troops home and implement SMART Security principles. It is 
time that we do it now.

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