Responsible Redeployment From Iraq Act
Floor Speech
RESPONSIBLE REDEPLOYMENT FROM IRAQ ACT -- (House of Representatives - July 12, 2007)
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Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Arizona.
And while I have the utmost respect for the chairman, I disagree with him on this resolution and I do rise to oppose the resolution today.
I guess I don't like the rhetoric of defeat. And I think that if we look at the situation in Iraq and if we look at the global war on terror, we have to ask ourselves: If we accept defeat at the hands of the terrorists, then what type message are we going to send? And I don't think that we would like that. Because if we pull out now, it is going to say that the U.S. is weak in the war on terror. It is going to say that we accept roving death squads in the streets of Baghdad, that we accept ethnic cleansing and a region engulfed in all-out chaos. That is the message we send. Just as when we were children, our actions carry a message with them.
Our soldiers deserve the confidence of their leaders, and not second-guessing by politicians that are a half world away. I think that they need to know that we are with them.
I had a message from a Marine parent. And they said, You know, we have our men out there fighting every day. They are using all the tools available to them. They are in combat. They are in patrols. They are using technology to stabilize, to train Iraqi troops. Then at night they come home, they come back to that post, that forward operating base, and they hammer out e-mails and blogs to those of us here to help combat the rhetoric coming out of Washington, DC.
General Petraeus, Ambassador Crocker have a plan, the Baghdad Security Plan. We find out now much of Baghdad is more secure than it was. Most of the troops to carry out this plan just landed, just got there 2 weeks ago to start implementing the plan. I think that for us to second-guess is inappropriate. I think that it may be the fashionable thing to want to pull out.
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