Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2007

Floor Speech

DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2007 -- (House of Representatives - August 04, 2007)

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. WICKER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of this legislation to fund our troops.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this legislation. I want to thank Chairman MURTHA and Ranking Member Bill YOUNG for their leadership and for working with the members on both sides of the aisle in crafting this important bill.

This measure provides the funds to enable our military to meet the challenges it faces in the global war on terror and to protect our homeland. It contains resources to address the needs of our military families and includes initiatives to produce the advanced weaponry, equipment, and training to ensure that our military remains the best in the world.

I am particularly pleased that the Committee did not include restrictions on funds that would prevent the President and our military commanders in the field from implementing the surge strategy in Iraq.

In the debate on funding for the troops and the surge earlier this year, some of my Democratic colleagues and many in the news media proclaimed this operation to be a failure even before it began. Many said the war was lost. Despite signs that the new strategy was taking hold, the Democratic majority sought to undermine this effort with attempts to cut off funding and set a date-certain for withdrawal. President Bush and Republicans in this Congress countered that we should support the troops fully and give the surge time to work.

There is solid evidence now that this strategy so ably put into place by GEN David Petraeus is working. Two military commanders on the ground there reported this week that they are denying freedom of movement to Al-Qaeda and that the citizenry have a new level of confidence in the Coalition and Iraqi Security Forces. More Iraqis are turning against Al Qaeda and working with Coalition forces to make their communities safer.

Further proof about progress in Iraq was provided in a July 30 op-ed in the New York Times. The column, entitled ``A War We Just Might Win,'' was written by Michael O'Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack, two fellows at the Brookings Institution who have been harsh critics of the war effort. They spent eight days in Iraq and spoke of the significant changes taking place there.

They wrote that troop morale is now high, that Coalition forces are confident in the strategy, and that they have the personnel on the ground to ``make a real difference.'' Army and Marine units are working well with Iraqi security units and the political and economic arrangements being forged at the local level are helping provide basic services to the Iraqi people.

They visited Anbar province and its capital of Ramadi, which has gone from being described as the worst part of Iraq to the best in just six months. To quote, ``A few months ago, American Marines were fighting for every yard of Ramadi; last week we strolled down its streets without body armor.''

Mr. Chairman, in a previous House debate on this issue, I noted that the American people are war-weary and impatient with the progress of our efforts there. I also said I believe the American people want us to win. I understand the frustration they feel about this engagement, but I still believe they want us to succeed in bringing about a free and stable government in Iraq and in defeating Al Qaeda. The reports I referenced earlier offer encouragement that our strategy may yet produce those results.

Our success there would stymie the plans outlined by Osama Bin Laden and his Al Qaeda Jihadists who consider Iraq a central battleground in the war on terror. They seek to establish a radical Islamic caliphate in the Middle East and use it as a beach-head to spread their terror and intolerance throughout the region and around the world.

We have taken the fight to terrorists in Iraq and Afghanistan to deny them the staging ground to plot more September 11-style attacks in the U.S. We have also been vigilant about protecting our homeland since 9-11, and we must continue to provide the support our military and our intelligence communities need to meet that challenge. That includes modernizing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to enable our intelligence agencies to remove outdated restrictions on the collection of information needed to stop terrorist plots before they can be carried out.

The funding in this bill and revising the FISA provisions will send a message about our commitment to providing the resources to protect our homeland, enable our military to defend American interests, and fight terrorism in Iraq, Afghanistan, and around the world.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source