[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 15820]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




              WE SHOULD STOP TRYING TO RUN THE MIDDLE EAST

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Tennessee (Mr. Duncan) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DUNCAN of Tennessee. Mr. Speaker, the same people that got us 
into a very unnecessary war in Iraq are now clamoring for military 
action in Syria. These same people that have opposed us getting out of 
Afghanistan, even though our troops have been there more than three 
times longer than World War II, now demand action in Syria. These same 
people seem to want us to be at war in almost every country in the 
Middle East, even though things are worse now than when we started 
fighting there many years ago.
  Surely we have learned a very costly lesson after spending trillions 
of U.S. taxpayer dollars and losing thousands of American lives, that 
we cannot run the Middle East. President Eisenhower certainly knew the 
horrors of war. He brought us home from Korea and kept us out of all 
the conflicts and little wars during his time in office.
  He did not have to prove that he was tough or that he was a great 
military leader. Too many of our leaders or would-be leaders seem to be 
falling all over themselves trying to show that they are tougher than 
anyone else.
  With our national debt now totaling more than $18 trillion, we simply 
cannot afford to intervene in every hotspot or conflict all around the 
world. This is not isolationism, this is common sense.
  We should have trade and tourism with other countries and cultural 
and educational exchanges, but we should not be eager to go to war or 
send troops or drones or bombs in mainly to prove that we are great 
world leaders.
  We have too many officials and candidates who want to be seen as new 
Winston Churchills. They try to turn every two-bit dictator into new 
Hitlers. President Eisenhower, in his most famous speech near the end 
of his Presidency, warned us against the military-industrial complex. 
Now some people say we have a security-industrial complex as well.
  Most of the threats against us have been greatly exaggerated by 
people and companies which make big money from all of our foreign 
interventions.
  If we would stop trying to run the Middle East, we could make our own 
country stronger from both a financial and security standpoint. While 
our intentions have been honorable, our foreign policies in the Middle 
East have created much hatred and resentment for us.
  It was not an American bomb that went astray killing 131 people at 
the wedding in Yemen a few days ago, but all the reports said it was a 
U.S.-led coalition. So we are getting the blame.
  The air attack on the Doctors Without Borders hospital in Afghanistan 
that killed 22 in what the Pentagon described as inadvertent was 
another public relations disaster for the U.S.
  We need to stop trying to run the whole world. We have enough 
problems of our own right here at home, yet many of our leaders seem to 
feel more important if they are concentrating on foreign issues.
  It is not the fault of the American people, but it is the fault of 
our liberal elitist foreign policy establishment that there is so much 
hatred for America in the Middle East.
  This liberal elitist establishment wanted us to go to war in Syria 2 
or 3 years ago, but the public outcry from ordinary American citizens 
was so strong against it that their plans had to be abandoned.
  Now these same interventionists have figured out a way to accomplish 
their goal by resurrecting a Russia that no longer exists. Even the 
disgraced General Petraeus said at a hearing last week that Putin's 
foreign reserves are less than $200 billion. With his economy at home 
in shambles, in part, due to low prices for oil and natural gas, he 
cannot afford to run Syria for long, even if it were possible to do so.
  If Putin wants to pursue this folly, we certainly should not try to 
do the same, as if it were a competitive advantage to take over a 
failed state. It would be especially foolish to try to take over a 
messed-up place like the Syria of today. Businessmen compete to take 
over very profitable businesses. They generally don't fight over 
businesses that are going under.
  While the neoconservatives hate to admit it, both Assad in Syria and 
the leadership in Iran are allies in the fight against ISIS. ISIS has 
strength for two main reasons: One, resentment for our interventions in 
the Middle East; and, two, billions of dollars' worth of U.S. equipment 
abandoned by security forces that we spent billions to train who cut 
and run at the first sign of danger. We should not send more young 
Americans to fight and die for people who are not willing to fight for 
themselves.
  Dr. Daniel Larison, a contributing editor of the American 
Conservative magazine, wrote a few days ago that ``the U.S. keeps 
stumbling ahead with a war in Syria that it doesn't need to be 
fighting. All of this comes ultimately from our political leaders' 
inability to recognize that there are many conflicts that the U.S. 
should avoid all together.'' Eisenhower recognized this. We desperately 
need a leader like him again.
  Finally, Mr. Speaker, columnist Pat Buchanan summed it up best: ``If 
America's elites continue to assert their right to intervene in the 
internal affairs of nations . . . then we are headed for endless 
conflict.''
  He said: ``There was a time, not so long ago . . . when Americans 
accepted a diversity of regimes abroad. Indeed, a belief in 
nonintervention abroad was once the very cornerstone of American 
foreign policy.''

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