[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 7]
[House]
[Page 9721]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         BRING THE TROOPS HOME

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
North Carolina (Mr. Jones) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. JONES. Mr. Speaker, Monday I had the honor and the humbling 
experience of visiting Walter Reed Hospital. I met three young men that 
all three have lost both legs above the knees. And actually, one of 
them I engaged about Afghanistan, and he, with his wife there with him, 
believes that we have done just about all we can do, and certainly he 
has done more than that: he has given his legs for this country.
  That leads me to wanting to read just a paragraph of an editorial by 
Eugene Robinson that was in the North Carolina papers, and the title of 
his column is ``Afghan Strategy: Lets Go.'' And I will read the last 
paragraph of his column:
  ``We wanted to depose the Taliban regime, and we did. We wanted to 
install a new government that answers to its constituents at the polls, 
and we did. We wanted to smash al Qaeda's infrastructure of training 
camps and safe havens, and we did. We wanted to kill or capture Osama 
bin Laden, and we did. Even so, say the hawks, we have to stay in 
Afghanistan because of the dangerous instability across the border in 
nuclear-armed Pakistan. But does anyone believe the war in Afghanistan 
has made Pakistan more stable?''
  Mr. Robinson, you're right, it is not more stable because we are in 
Afghanistan. Perhaps it is useful to have a United States military 
presence in the region. This could be accomplished, however, with a lot 
fewer than 100,000 troops; and they would not be scattered across the 
Afghan countryside engaged in a dubious attempt at nation-building. The 
threat from Afghanistan is gone. Bring the troops home.
  Mr. Speaker, I don't know what the President will say tonight, and I 
wish the President well. But Mr. Gates has been saying all weekend--and 
he did testify before the Armed Services Committee in February and said 
it would be the latter part of 2014, maybe 2015, before we start 
bringing a substantial number of our troops home.
  Mr. Speaker, I say to the House of Representatives, both parties, 
let's come together and join in the McGovern-Jones bill, and let's 
start bringing our troops home and say to the President we don't need 
to be there until 2014-2015. As Eugene Robinson says, we're not going 
to change anything. History has proven you will never change 
Afghanistan. They don't want to change themselves. Quite frankly, the 
Taliban are Afghan people; it's a civil war.
  And, Mr. Speaker, as I have done before, I have the poster that has a 
flag-draped coffin being carried by the Air Force at Dover Air Force 
Base. Mr. President, you're a very smart man. You can call the shots on 
this war in Afghanistan. Say to the American people tonight that we 
will be home before 2014-2015.
  Mr. Speaker, I say in closing, may God bless our men and women in 
uniform. May God bless the families of our men and women in uniform. 
May God, in his loving arms, hold the families who have given a child 
dying for freedom in Afghanistan and Iraq. And I ask God to bless the 
House and the Senate, that we will do what is right in the eyes of God 
for his people here in America. And I ask God to give wisdom, strength, 
and courage to the President of the United States, that he will do what 
is right in the eyes of God for his people.
  And I close three times: God please, God please, God please continue 
to bless America.

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