Afghanistan and Ukraine Security

Floor Speech

Mr. President, I just returned from a trip to Afghanistan and Ukraine where I reviewed the security situation in each country as chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

In each country, I met with military leaders and with civilian leaders and representatives of civilian society. The overwhelming impression I came away with is that American leadership remains critical, that others who are struggling for democracy and freedom see us as an essential friend and ally, and support for those who share those values must remain a cornerstone of our foreign policy and as essential to our own security.

In Afghanistan, I met with senior leaders of both our military and the Afghan military, including General Dunford, the commander of U.S. and coalition forces, and Afghan Minister of Defense Mohammedi. They reported that the transition of security responsibility to the Afghanistan National Security Forces--ANSF--has gone even better than we had hoped, with no significant loss of security in the country despite the withdrawal of tens of thousands of American and coalition troops. U.S. and Afghan leaders alike expressed satisfaction with the ability of the newly built and much larger ANSF to successfully protect the Afghan people, to defeat Taliban forces in combat, and to secure a series of major public events, culminating in the April 5 Afghan presidential election.

Our military commanders emphasized that while these gains reflect the growing confidence of the Afghan security forces in their ability to provide security to the Afghan people, the challenge ahead is to put in place the final pieces needed to make the progress of the last decade sustainable. This includes logistics, maintenance, airlift, and building the institutions of the Afghan Army and police. Fundamental to any long-term effort on our part in Afghanistan will be the signing of the Bilateral Security Agreement as soon as possible with a new Afghan president. While President Karzai remains unreliable and his rhetoric offensive, all the major Afghan presidential candidates, including the two winners of the first round, support what we have done so far and look forward to signing the BSA promptly if elected.

In addition to meeting with the three leading presidential candidates, I met with Afghan government officials and with several groups of representatives of Afghan civil society. The Afghans I met with came from different backgrounds and spoke with different voices, but they shared a common message of pride in the achievement of their country as it has rebuilt and recovered from the devastation of decades of civil war and Taliban rule. They pointed to the revival of Afghanistan's education and health systems, the dramatic improvement in the role of women in the country, and the new life that the last 10 years have brought to the country's economy.

They also spoke of their frustration with the exceedingly negative picture of events in Afghanistan depicted in the U.S. press. A leading national paper writes about a "deepening resentment'' of the American presence and a ``growing alienation'' between Afghanistan and the United States. But the Afghans I met and large majorities of Afghans, according to public opinion polls, are grateful for the sacrifices we have made on their behalf and are convinced they can continue to transform their country with our continued support. Their polls show that 64 percent of the Afgan people believe there has been significant progress in security. U.S. polls show the opposite, the product of an unbalanced, negative view in our media.

The Afghans I met spoke with pride of the election they held on April 5, in which 7 million Afghans braved threats and violence to get to the polls, voting at a higher rate than we achieve in our own elections. According to preliminary counts, more than 35 percent of the voters were women. This record vote was the culmination of a campaign in which the leading candidates held huge rallies, attended by tens of thousands of Afghans all over the country--including in areas that much of our press reports are controlled by the Taliban. All of the security for these events, and for the vote itself, was provided by Afghan forces. And every Afghan I spoke with said that he--or she--feels more secure today than a few years ago, in part because Afghan forces are providing security in Afghan cities and towns.

Although the vote was divided among a number of candidates and a run-off between Dr. Abdullah and Dr. Ghani will occur, Afghans say the act of voting itself sent a message that Afghans reject the Taliban and what it stands for. Our intelligence sources indicate that the Taliban leadership is concerned by its inability to disrupt the election and prevent Afghans from getting to the polls.

So, far from what we may read in much of our press, the Afghan people conveyed to me their optimism regarding their country's significant progress, their desire for democracy, and their gratitude for the assistance of the United States over the past decade.

In Ukraine, I met with Acting President Turchinov, Prime Minister Yatsenyuk, Defense Minister Koval, National Security and Defense Council Head Parubiy, and numerous other government officials, activists, and participants in the political process. Ukrainians faced down the heavily-armed security forces of a corrupt, repressive regime on the Maidan--their Independence Square--while they themselves armed with little more than rocks, tires, and sandbags. Now they face an even greater challenge in the form of tens of thousands of Russian troops massed on their borders. Already, the Russians have annexed Crimea and Russian Special Operations forces have organized sympathizers to occupy buildings in a number of Eastern Ukrainian cities and towns in an effort to disrupt and destabilize the government, make an election on May 25 difficult to organize, and establish a basis for Russian occupation or a Russian-oriented breakaway State.

In the face of these challenges, the Ukrainians I met expressed gratitude for the solidarity and support our country has shown through the dark days of the Yanukovich regime and into the challenges they face today. They expressed their support for our values and their strong desire to be a part of the democratic West, rather than the authoritarian sphere of Putin's Russia and its allies. And they asked for our support in their effort to stabilize their country, fend off the Russian challenge, and hold free and fair elections as scheduled.

The Ukrainian people earned our support when they put their lives on the line at the Maidan and turned to face the Russian threat with both toughness and restraint. We should stand with the Ukrainian government and the Ukrainian people because they share our democratic values, and because Russia's effort to dismember their country through the threat of force, if allowed to succeed, could undermine decades of stability and a peaceful, democratic, and united Europe.

Ukrainians understand there will not be American "boots on the ground'' in their country. But there are a number of important steps we can take to support the Ukrainians in their struggle.

First, we must expedite the aid we have already promised them--including both financial assistance and nonlethal military equipment--to make sure it arrives as quickly as possible.

Second, we should provide additional support, including body armor and fuel, that the Ukrainians need to protect themselves. We should provide the Ukrainians with firearms and ammunition if they need them--but it appears that at this point they do not.

Third, we should make more robust use of the powers established in Executive order 13661, which authorizes sanctions against the Russian financial, energy, metals, mining, engineering, and defense sectors, to ensure that the Putin regime pays a heavy price for its illegal actions. President Obama's action to sanction more wealthy individuals in Putin's circle, as well as businesses they own, is a wise one, but we can do more.

Fourth, we should ensure that Russian banks are subject to the significant tax penalties imposed on noncompliant banks by the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, or FATCA, the antitax evasion law set to take effect in July. Russian banks and financial institutions that fail to register with the Internal Revenue Service and obtain the required identification number by July 1 of this year will be noncompliant with FATCA and become subject to a 30-percent withholding tax on any U.S. investment earnings. We should not negotiate with either Russia or certain Russian banks on measures to provide relief from FATCA's sanctions until Russia honors its diplomatic commitments and takes steps to diffuse tensions in Crimea and eastern Ukraine, including by withdrawing Russian troops from the border region.

Finally, we should use the existing authorities to take on Russia's manipulation of energy prices and supplies which it has used to coerce not only Ukraine but also many of its neighbors. To be most effective, these actions should be taken in close coordination with our friends and allies in Europe, many of whom are directly affected by Russia's abuses and threatened by its actions. We must take concrete steps toward substituting energy from other sources for the countries that would be impacted by a reduction of Russian energy. We must actively become involved in energy development, diversification, and conservation, even if it means paying higher prices for fuel, to break Russia's iron grip on this market, and to prevent future acts of attempted political extortion by Russia from being effective.

The people of Ukraine are proud of their fight for freedom at the Maidan, as are the people of Afghanistan of the courage they showed, when they voted in record numbers to reject the Taliban in their April 5 election. Both countries are struggling for values that we, as a Nation, have always shared. They both deserve our support, and we should continue to give it to them.

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