McConnell on Honoring America's Veterans, Investing In American Strength

Statement

"This weekend -- with parades and gatherings, solemn ceremonies and phone calls to loved ones -- America will mark Veterans Day by expressing our gratitude to the men and women who have served our nation in the armed forces.

But Veterans Day is much more than a once-a-year observation.

It's a reminder of our daily obligation to honor their service, uphold our promises to care for them when they come home, and do everything we can to equip those defending our nation today and tomorrow for success.

Today, I'm reminded of some letters I've saved in my archives. They're letters my father sent home to my mother from his own service in Patton's Army in 1945.

With Nazi Germany on the ropes; with peace within reach, my dad was already seeing firsthand the sorts of threats that would define the next half century of American history. In the parts of his letters that made it past Army censors, he told us how the Russians were going to be a big problem.

Today, America faces threats every bit as grave. Like those of the 1940s, our adversaries today aren't being shy about their efforts to win the next half century of competition with America and the West.

As one recent analysis summed it up, Russia, China, and Iran are, "working to end the world order that has prevailed for three generations under American leadership.'

"Under American leadership.'

This didn't happen by accident. The Western order of peace and freedom was delivered by the sacrifices of American servicemembers like my father, and preserved by generations of brave men and women in uniform ever since.

Right now, we have an obligation to these servicemembers… to our allies… and to the American people to behave like the world-leading power we actually are. We have a duty to invest seriously in American strength.

It's time to offer a clear strategy for victory against Russia, and then deliver the resources Ukraine needs to achieve it, right now.

Putin is not deterred. And his imperial ambitions do not end at Ukraine's border with the NATO alliance.

If the United States abandons our support for Ukraine's resistance, we would risk yet another generation of American forces becoming veterans of war in Europe.

It's time to get serious about deterring Iran -- the world's leading sponsor of terrorism, and the leading sponsor of violence against American servicemembers in Iraq and Syria. I welcome yesterday's strike on an Iranian facility in Syria. But it will probably take more than striking ammunition warehouses to restore the deterrence the Biden Administration's policies have actually squandered.

It's time to redouble our efforts to equip allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific to raise the costs of further aggression from communist China.

And as I've said repeatedly, it's long past time to make commonsense policy changes to address a southern border crisis that has required U.S. servicemembers to help border patrol to maintain order.

These are the tasks before us. And they will not get any easier to address the longer we wait."

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