National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017

Floor Speech

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Mr. GIBSON. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of this bill. I thank the chairman and the ranking member. I think we have made significant progress in restoring readiness to our Armed Forces and also a marked progress in reform, which is very necessary to our national security going forward.

Mr. Chairman, I want to express my gratitude to the chairman and ranking member for including a bill that I drafted along with the help of so many others--Chairman Turner, Representative Walz of Minnesota-- that stops the drawdown of our Armed Forces. So critically important for restoring deterrents, peace through strength, is that we not give pink slips to the 67,000-plus troops that were heading in that direction in the next 2 years. This committee working together in a bipartisan way stopped that drawdown, and I think that is critically important.

Related, I would say that the work that we are doing on the global response force, the GRF, is also critically important to deterrents. And I believe that ultimately it strengthens the hands of diplomats when we have the ability to strategically maneuver. I am appreciative of the resources and the oversight in this bill to strengthen the GRF.

Finally, let me say how much I really appreciate the pay raise to the troops. After 29 years in uniform, I can't adequately describe how much I appreciate the sacrifices and the service of our servicemen and - women. Giving them this pay raise, I think, was critically important.

I urge all my colleagues to support this bill.

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