[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 3]
[House]
[Page 3738]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       END THE WAR IN AFGHANISTAN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
North Carolina (Mr. Jones) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. JONES. Mr. Speaker, yesterday, Dennis Kucinich, Ron Paul, and I, 
along with other colleagues, held a press conference to announce House 
Concurrent Resolution 28, which would require the President to withdraw 
all United States Armed Forces from Afghanistan by the end of 2011.
  Last month's USA Today/Gallup poll, 72 percent of Americans favor 
congressional action this year to bring our troops home from 
Afghanistan.
  This week the Rasmussen Report finds that 52 percent of voters want 
our troops home from Afghanistan this year. To quote this poll, ``A 
majority of voters, for the first time, support an immediate withdrawal 
of all U.S. troops from Afghanistan or the creation of a timetable to 
bring them all home within a year.''
  Fourteen months ago, I asked a retired military general to advise me 
on Afghanistan. I have asked him for his thoughts, and I will read some 
of them to you. Back in November, I emailed this general and I said, 
What do you think about the possibility of being in Afghanistan for 4 
more years?
  Mr. Speaker, he replied, ``I do not believe that 40 more years would 
guarantee `victory,' whatever that is; so 4 will do nothing. The war is 
costing money and lives, all in short supply.''
  Mr. Speaker, there is a retired lieutenant colonel in Jacksonville, 
North Carolina, which is in my district, who served in the United 
States Marine Corps for 31 years. His name is Dennis Adams. He wrote me 
a letter, and the last paragraph of the letter I would like to read to 
the House.
  ``I urge you to make contact with all the current and newly elected 
men and women to Congress and ask them to end this war and bring our 
young men and women home. If any of my comments will assist you in this 
effort, you are welcome to use them and my name.''
  Mr. Speaker, I want to show the faces. I want to show the faces of 
war and the faces of pain.
  This is a young man whose name is Phillip Jordan. At the time of his 
father's death--his father was a gunnery sergeant--he was 6 years of 
age. I wish the people could see the eyes of this young boy, 6 years of 
age, with a folded flag under his arm and the coffin that is following 
right behind him. This is war. Children feel war as adults feel war.
  Mr. Speaker, I also want to show a poster from the honor guard at 
Dover walking a transfer case, which most people know is a coffin. It's 
the remains of an American hero off the plane. This again is war and 
the pain of war.
  Mr. Speaker, this is a beautiful, handsome couple. It's a young 
marine, his wife, and his child. This young marine had been deployed so 
much that he developed PTSD. A year ago, on the main drag at Camp 
Lejeune known as McHugh Boulevard, he committed suicide. He stepped out 
of the car, he put a gun to his head, and he committed suicide.
  Mr. Speaker, I hope that the Congress would join Mr. Kucinich, Mr. 
Paul, and others in this House and let's have a debate, and let's vote. 
Let's meet our constitutional responsibility, and let's bring our 
troops home before we break the military. It is time to bring our 
troops home from Afghanistan.
  Mr. Speaker, as I always do, I ask God to please bless our men and 
women in uniform. I ask God to please bless the families of our men and 
women in uniform. I ask God to love the families who have given a child 
dying for freedom in Afghanistan and Iraq, and I ask God to please 
bless the House and Senate that we would do what is right in the eyes 
of God. I ask God to give wisdom, strength, and courage to President 
Obama that he will do what is right in the eyes of God.
  And three times I will ask, God please, God please, God please 
continue to bless America.

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