NEW IRAQ STRATEGY -- (Senate - July 11, 2007)
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Mr. PRYOR. Mr. President, I want to be on the record as thanking you for your leadership on this legislation. You shared it with me more than a couple of months ago now. I know you worked on it for a number of months before that. The Senate and the American people owe Senator KEN SALAZAR of Colorado a real debt of gratitude for drafting this legislation and pushing it to the point it has gotten to today.
I open by reading the first two paragraphs of the executive summary of the Iraq Study Group. This was written 6 months ago. It says:
The situation in Iraq is grave and deteriorating. There is no path that can guarantee success, but the prospects can be improved.
In this report, we make a number of recommendations for actions to be taken in Iraq, the United States, and the region. Our most important recommendations call for new and enhanced diplomatic and political efforts in Iraq and the region, and a change in the primary mission of U.S. forces in Iraq that will enable the United States to begin to move its combat forces out of Iraq responsibly. We believe that these two recommendations are equally important and reinforce one another. If they are effectively implemented, and if the Iraqi government moves forward with national reconciliation, Iraqis will have an opportunity for a better future, terrorism will be dealt a blow, stability will be enhanced in an important part of the world, and America's credibility, interests, and values will be protected.
That was true when it was written 6 months ago, and it is still very relevant today.
Today, I want to talk about amendment No. 2063 and encourage my colleagues to consider voting for it and even cosponsoring it. One of the things Senator Salazar did when he drafted this amendment is he worked very hard to try to honor the integrity of the findings and the recommendations of the Baker-Hamilton group, and he has done that. You can look at each paragraph of amendment No. 2063 and see that it reflects the essence of what the Iraq Study Group was trying to communicate to us.
In fact, we have had a couple of colleagues come to us in the last several days and say: Well, if you will just change this paragraph or this sentence or this one word, or if we can just work a little bit on this text, then I might be a cosponsor. Well, the problem there is, if we change that, then we would be trying to change what the Iraq Study Group recommended, and we are not going to do that. The purpose of this amendment is to take this bipartisan commission's work and put it into legislation.
Some people ask: Who made up this group? What is so magic about the Iraq Study Group? Well, let me tell you, it has two former Secretaries of State, it has the former chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, it has a former Supreme Court Associate Justice, it has a former White House Chief of Staff, it has a former Secretary of Defense, and two former United States Senators. This is a group that comes together with a lot of intelligence, with a lot of experience, and with a lot of knowledge about the region and international affairs and history.
I think the Iraq Study Group is the best effort that America has yet put forward on a thoughtful, responsible approach to Iraq. One of the things I like about the Iraq study group's recommendations and their conclusions is it is not just setting an artificial timetable. I am a little bit out of sync with some of my Democratic colleagues on wanting to set a timetable on Iraq. I don't think we ought to have a public timetable in the law. I know many of my Democratic colleagues disagree with me, and a few of my Republican colleagues do as well. But the thing I like about the Iraq Study Group legislation, the Salazar-Alexander amendment, is, it is much more comprehensive than simply a timetable. In fact, it is more comprehensive than just military.
It tries to take a different approach. It really tries to change American policy in Iraq. And it is a multifaceted approach on trying to deal with the issues in Iraq and the region. So what you are looking at with the Iraq Study Group is you are not just looking at a military solution. General Petraeus has said if we just have a military solution we are going to lose. So the Iraq Study Group anticipates that, and it says we need a diplomatic solution, an economic solution, a political solution, and a military solution. I think it is the most comprehensive approach that anyone has put forward yet on Iraq.
Again, this is a bipartisan group that has come together, and this amendment is bipartisan. We have seven Democrats and six Republicans. By this time tomorrow we may have seven and seven, or eight and eight, or some combination thereof. We don't know exactly the number of cosponsors we will end up with, but certainly we hope we will have a solid majority of Senators who will support this amendment when it has a chance to come up.
As Senator Salazar said, and Senator Alexander echoed, part of what this bill does is it gets U.S. forces out of the business of combat and into the business of training and equipping others. And, really, what we are trying to do is stabilize Iraq.
One thing I think the Iraq Study Group does over and over, for several pages in its findings, in its report, on several pages, is it talks about diplomacy and regional diplomacy and how important it is to have the neighborhood, so to speak, around Iraq--people inside Iraq and around the region--to have a part in stabilizing Iraq and making the region more stable and stronger.
I have heard a couple of criticisms, such as my colleagues mentioned tonight, and one is that it is too prescriptive, that our legislation is too prescriptive. Another is that it doesn't do anything. And those are kind of polar opposite criticisms. In fact, there is an old saying that when you are settling a lawsuit, if both sides are unhappy, maybe you have a good settlement. So I would say in this situation, at least one way to look at it is both sides are unhappy.
We are trying to thread the needle. We are trying to find a bipartisan solution on Iraq, a bipartisan consensus in this body. In fact, I would say this: With all due respect to my colleagues, and my House colleagues, and the President, the last thing in the world we should ever have a party-line vote on is Iraq. We have 150,000 troops in Iraq. They are getting shot at every day. They are putting their lives on the line for this country and for Iraq every single day. There are people out there trying to kill them, trying to maim them, trying to blow them up--you name it--every day. We should never have a party-line vote on Iraq. We just shouldn't do it. And this amendment right here, this is an effort to try to bring the consensus that we need on Iraq.
Senator Alexander told me a couple of months ago, he said: You know, we talk about needing a political consensus in Baghdad. He said: What we really need is a political consensus in Washington, DC, on Iraq. And I think he is right. The Salazar-Alexander amendment tries to get to that consensus.
I will say this: For the Senators who believe this amendment doesn't do anything, I disagree. I think this is a significant step in a new direction, in a positive direction for Iraq. In fact, you can look at the amendment itself, and it has 13 sections. It is true that 3 of the 13 are sense-of-Congress sections--3 out of 13. But that means 10 of 13 are binding, 10 of 13 actually change U.S. policy and have requirements that have teeth. I would encourage my colleagues who mistakenly believe this amendment doesn't do anything to actually look at the language of the amendment and they will see it is a very significant improvement over our current policy in Iraq.
Some people say it is too prescriptive. In other words, it binds the President's hands too much. I disagree. When you look at the language that Senator Salazar and members of the Iraq Study Group came up with when they drafted this, really what you are talking about is laying out some very specific things but also giving the President quite a bit of flexibility. And I think that is important. He is the Chief Executive. He is the Commander in Chief, and I think Senator Salazar and Senator Alexander have found the right balance in drafting this amendment.
The last thing I will say in closing, going back to the Iraq Study Group Report that came out this past December, and back to the executive summary--I started with reading the first two paragraphs of the executive summary, so let me conclude by reading the last two paragraphs of the executive summary in the Iraq Study Group Report:
It is the unanimous view of the Iraq study group that these recommendations offer a new way forward for the United States in Iraq and the region. They are comprehensive and need to be implemented in a coordinated fashion. They should not be separated or carried out in isolation. The dynamics of the region are as important to Iraq as events within Iraq.
The challenges are daunting. There will be difficult days ahead. But by pursuing this new way forward, Iraq, the region, and the United States of America can emerge stronger.
Again, I think those words were true 6 months ago, I think they are relevant today, and I think we need to give the Iraq Study Group recommendations a chance to succeed.
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