[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 10]
[House]
[Pages 14825-14826]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                 BRING OUR TROOPS HOME FROM AFGHANISTAN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
California (Mr. George Miller) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. This Friday, October 7, marks the 
10th anniversary of the beginning of the war in Afghanistan. Our men 
and women in uniform have fought valiantly in this war over the last 
decade at great cost. More than 1,700 American soldiers have lost their 
lives as they fought to destroy al Qaeda and hunt down Osama bin Laden. 
Thousands more have come home with very serious life-long injuries.
  When I'm at home in California and talk with veterans and their 
families, I can see how much our soldiers have sacrificed. I want to 
offer my sincere thanks and appreciation to all of the men and women in 
uniform who have carried out their duty in Afghanistan.
  As the anniversary approaches, I am thinking particularly of Army 
Captain John Hallett III of Concord, California, in my congressional 
district, and his family. Captain Hallett was killed in action in 
southern Afghanistan on August 25, 2009. I was honored to have provided 
him a congressional nomination to the West Point Academy.
  This week, all of us should honor the tremendous sacrifices our men 
and women in uniform made for their country in Afghanistan. And our 
objective in Afghanistan has been achieved--Osama bin Laden has been 
killed, and few al Qaeda members remain in the country. Yet, 
unfortunately, our troops

[[Page 14826]]

 in Afghanistan are now bogged down in an unending and deadly war with 
the Taliban and defending the corrupt Afghan Government. To this day, 
the government in Kabul, led by President Karzai, has not been able to 
take charge of its country, even as it has been able to provide 
enormous favors for the President's cronies and family.
  In these difficult times, we cannot afford to spend tens of billions 
of dollars per month defending a corrupt regime. We cannot afford to 
continue to provide payments to contractors who turn around and use 
those payments to pay off the very same Taliban who are killing our 
troops in Afghanistan. But above all, our soldiers cannot be asked to 
continue to risk their lives for years and years to come. Instead, it 
is time to bring all of our troops home and to invest in America 
instead. By doing so, we can honor the enormous sacrifice that our 
troops have made, and at the same time ensure that they have a strong 
and prosperous country to come home to.

                          ____________________