National Defense Authorization Act For Fiscal Year 2008--Continued

Floor Speech

NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2008--Continued -- (Senate - July 17, 2007)

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Good morning. Not long ago, a woman who lives in Pawtucket, RI, wrote me:

I care about the human spirit, which I think is deeply wounded by our occupation in Iraq. I have three friends serving this country because they believe it is their duty. I believe it is your duty to bring them home. I beg you for an end to this war.

She is not just a lone voice from one State. All over this country, Americans call for an end to this war. At the grocery store, around the kitchen table, and in places of worship, Americans are sharing their frustration and outrage at a President who refuses to listen, refuses to admit mistakes and misjudgments, and stubbornly refuses to change course.

The amendment sponsored by my distinguished senior Senator, Jack Reed of Rhode Island, and the honorable chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin of Michigan, would require a redeployment of American troops to begin within 120 days of enactment. It sets a reasonable, responsible goal: that the redeployment be completed by April 30 of next year--2008.

Let us be clear: the Levin-Reed amendment offers a new direction in Iraq.

A vote for the Levin-Reed amendment is a vote to support our troops and their families who are bearing the burden of repeated deployments, long separation, and sometimes debilitating injury, and they bear it with courage, fortitude, and honor. This measure supports them by bringing the troops home safely and with honor.

A vote for the Levin-Reed amendment is a vote that will help give our military the time and the resources to rebuild and recover from the strain on our troops and equipment.

A vote for the Levin-Reed amendment opens strategic doors to renew diplomacy in the Middle East and throughout the world and to begin restoring America's standing, prestige, and good will in the global community.

More and more of our colleagues in this body recognize the need for this new direction. Many of those who supported the war in the past have now said they can no longer support President Bush in his failed and misguided course in Iraq. But I say to my friends, when the issue before us is our single most important matter of foreign policy and national security, words alone are not enough.

When our Nation's course has been as misdirected and mismanaged as it has been, words alone are not enough.

When, in the face of this policy's failure and the resulting chaos in Iraq,
corrective action is called for, words are not enough.

And when the opportunity for that correction is within our reach, within our grasp, if only we would seize it, mere words are not enough.

This is a day when we are called upon to act. The question before us is simple: Are you in favor of bringing our troops home? That is a serious question, and it demands serious, reasoned, and thoughtful debate.

I was recently struck by words spoken in this Chamber by Senator Richard Lugar of Indiana. Senator Lugar's words imparted a thoughtfulness that too long has been missing from this debate. Too often, this administration communicates not with reason but with slogans and sound bites: ``Stay the course.'' ``Support the troops.'' ``Global war on terror.'' ``Cut and run.'' ``Precipitous withdrawal.'' I say to anyone watching this debate: When you hear those words coming from this Chamber, I hope an alarm bell goes off in your head, a signal that thinking and reason have ended and sloganeering has begun. You deserve better.

In May of 2003, President Bush landed on the

aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and said this:

Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed.

In the background, of course, was the banner that read: ``Mission Accomplished.''

Then, over a year ago, in June 2006, President Bush announced Operation Together Forward, a ``joint effort to restore security and rule of law to high-risk areas in the capital city'' of Baghdad.

Then, this January, the President said he would send tens of thousands more troops there, part of a surge to try yet again to secure Iraq's capital.

The months since President Bush's surge have been among the deadliest of the war. Nearly 600 U.S. soldiers have died since the announcement of the surge, and over 3,500 have been wounded. Last month, more than 100 American service members died in Iraq. The month before that, more than 100 American troops lost their lives. The month before that, April of this year, over 100 American deaths. Between February 10 and May 7 of this year, the Pentagon reports U.S. forces sustained an average of 25 casualties each day--more than during that time in the previous year.

Alasdair Campbell, the U.K.'s outgoing Defense Attache at its Baghdad Embassy, said in May:

The evidence does not suggest that the surge is actually working, if reduction in casualties is a criterion.

The Pentagon's survey found that, on average, more than 100 Iraqi civilians were killed or wounded each day between February and May--nearly double the daily total from the same period 1 year ago.

The number of unidentified murdered bodies found in Baghdad soared 70 percent during the month of May--726, compared to 411 in April. At least 21 unidentified murdered bodies were found in Baghdad just this past weekend. The displacement of Iraqi civilians has continued throughout the spring--90,000 Iraqis per month in March, April, and May of 2007, according to the Brookings monthly Iraq Index. The average weekly number of attacks across Iraq surpassed 1,000, compared to about 600 weekly attacks for the same period 1 year ago. More than 75 percent of the attacks were aimed at U.S. forces.

In an interview with the Washington Post in June, retired general Barry McCaffrey said:

Why would we think that a temporary presence of 30,000 additional combat troops in a giant city would change the dynamics of a bitter civil war?

In a survey taken in February and March of this year, 53 percent of Iraqis viewed their security environment as ``bad or very bad,'' and even in that environment, 78 percent of Iraqis, in an ABC News study, do not support having American or coalition forces in their country. Only 18 percent have confidence in U.S. and coalition troops, the BBC has reported, and 51 percent approve of attacking our forces.

David Kilcullen, General Petraeus's top counterinsurgency adviser, said last month:

We haven't turned the tide. We haven't turned the corner. There isn't light at the end of the tunnel.

We will not turn the tide, we will not turn the corner, and there will be no light at the end of the tunnel until this administration makes it clear that our intent is to withdraw our forces rapidly and responsibly.

The other side argues that to dispute this President's judgment is to fail to support the troops, even though that very judgment has catastrophically failed the troops and our country.

I traveled to Iraq in March, in my capacity as a new member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, to get a firsthand look. I met brave Rhode Islanders in Fallujah and at a medical center where Rhode Islanders are helping provide care to our wounded soldiers. They, like all our troops in Iraq, are serving our Nation with dedication, courage, and honor. Our troops are working so hard and accomplishing so much, but this administration has not given them the support they need--not in the field of battle, not when they return home, and, most importantly, not with wisdom to match their bravery.

As I traveled around Rhode Island in the last few years I met mothers who felt they had to buy body armor for their sons who were being shipped to Iraq because they could not trust this administration to provide it.

Just this week, USA Today reported extensively on the Pentagon's failure to address the Marines' request for Mine Resistant Ambush Protection--or MRAP--vehicles.

In February, a series of articles in the Washington Post highlighted shortfalls in the care and treatment of our wounded warriors at the Walter Reed Army hospital. The Nation's shock and dismay reflected the American people's support, respect, and gratitude for the men and women who put on our Nation's uniform. They deserve the best, not shoddy medical equipment, rundown facilities, and bureaucratic snafus.

This administration says we need to support the troops. I agree. We can support the troops by ensuring that they have the equipment, resources, and protection they need--and by caring for them when they return home. We can also support them with wise strategies arising from honest debate.

The President says Iraq is part of a vast ``global war on terror'' and that remaining mired in a conflict there is critical to our national security. But the war in Iraq has made us less, not more, secure. The way to reverse this trend is to redeploy our troops out of Iraq.

After our country has expended over $450 billion and lost more than 3,600 American lives, according to the unclassified key judgments of the National Intelligence Estimate released yesterday, al-Qaida and other Islamist terrorist groups remain undiminished in their intent to attack the United States and continue to adapt and improve their capabilities.

While the Bush administration wallows in Iraq, al-Qaida has protected sanctuary along the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, again according to the unclassified key judgments of the NIE.

National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell told the Senate Armed Services Committee that he believes a successful attack by al-Qaida would most likely be planned and come out of the group's locations in Pakistan, not Iraq. Al-Qaida, the perpetrators of the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States, remains a significant threat to our country and our national security, and 4 years of war in Iraq has not changed that fact.

President Bush and his diehard allies say that what we and the American people support is cut-and-run or a precipitous withdrawal.

The Levin-Reed amendment requires that we begin redeploying American troops from Iraq 4 months after the measure is enacted--not 4 days, not 4 weeks, but 4 months. Surely, with the greatest military in the world, we have the capacity to plan in 4 months to begin a redeployment of our troops. In fact, I would be surprised and concerned if our military were not already planning for such a contingency.

Then, the Levin-Reed amendment sets a date for redeployment of April 30, 2008. If this amendment became law tomorrow, that would give our military and this administration more than 9 months to plan and implement our troops' redeployment--a redeployment that leaves a military presence for force protection, training, and counter insurgency in Iraq. Is that truly a precipitous withdrawal? It is not. Those who say it is are not being straightforward with the Senate and with the American people.

Let me say this, because it is one of the elements of this issue which President Bush has completely and willfully overlooked: The time it will take for us to redeploy should not be idle or wasted time; it must be a time of great energy and effort, because it is our time of opportunity to begin the tough process of diplomacy that can help stabilize the Middle East and restore America's standing and prestige around the world.

It is a window of time in which we must aggressively engage the region and the world community in the ongoing work to rebuild Iraq and restore stability there, in which we can confound the insurgents who foment civil war from within Iraq and the global jihadists who import violence from without it. It is a window in which Iraq's political leaders can be motivated to work for cooperation, unity, and real progress.

In a recent op-ed in the Washington Post, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger described the reality that the cauldron of Iraq may overflow and engulf the region. He goes on to say that:

The continuation of Iraq's current crisis presents all of Iraq's neighbors with mounting problems. ..... Saudi Arabia and Jordan dread Shiite domination of Iraq, especially if the Baghdad regime threatens to be a satellite of Iran. The various Gulf sheikdoms, the largest of which is Kuwait, find themselves in an even more threatened position. Their interest is to help calm the Iraq turmoil and avert Iranian domination of the region.

Then he says that:

Given a wise and determined American diplomacy, even Iran may be brought to conclude that the risks of continued turmoil outweigh the temptations before it.

But make no mistake, as long as we occupy Iraq, the broader international engagement we need will remain elusive. With the announcement of a U.S. redeployment, Iraq's neighbors must face the prospect that the Iraq cauldron may overflow, and they will, therefore, be obliged to take a more helpful--in the case of Saudi Arabia--or a more tempered--in the case of Iran--role in the area's future. They will have no other practical choice because their own national interests will now be squarely on the line.

As ADM William J. Fallon has said:

I see an awful lot of sitting and watching by countries in the neighborhood. It is high time that changed.

Well, it is high time that changed, but our mediate and buffering military presence prevents that from changing.

A redeployment will also deprive the insurgents of a strong recruiting tool--the al-Qaida narrative that the United States has imperial designs over Muslim lands, which resonates strongly in the Middle East due to their own colonial experiences with the British and the Ottomans.

If we make it clear that our troops are coming home--and, critically important, that we are not leaving permanent bases behind--the insurgents and terror networks will lose this defining argument.

The Bush administration and its supporters noted that the Sunni sheiks of Anbar Province have recently turned against al-Qaida in Iraq. When I met with Marine commanders in Fallujah during my trip to Iraq in March, they told me the same thing--and what an important and exciting development that was.

The marine general briefing us made clear that these Sunni sheiks turned against al-Qaida in the realization that the United States would not be in Iraq forever, thanks to the political debate this Congress has insisted on since the November election. It was the prospect of our redeployment that moved them to action.

Once all factions in Iraq must face the naked consequences of their actions, we should hope, and expect, to see similar moments of strategic clarity emerge.

How are they doing without that pressure? Last week, we saw a report from the White House that was deeply troubling. The report said that it has become significantly harder for Iraqi leaders to make the difficult compromises necessary to foster reconciliation.

In particular, the administration has focused on four objectives: provincial elections, deBaathification, constitutional reform, and the hydrocarbons law. These are the exact same issues U.S. and Iraqi military leaders stressed to us during our trip in March. Without progress in these areas, I was told by our generals, our military tactics would not succeed in accomplishing the ultimate goal.

It would be putting it mildly to say I was not reassured by the signals I received from our meetings with Iraqi officials. There was a severe disconnect between the urgency of our generals about this legislation and the absence of equivalent urgency, or even energy, on the part of Iraqi officials. One American soldier I met put it in plain, homespun terms:

If your parents are willing to pay for the movies so you don't have to use your own money, or if you can get your big sister to do your homework for you, who wants to give that up?

Well, Mr. President, it is time. To quote the report:

1, the government of Iraq has not made satisfactory progress toward enacting and implementing legislation on de-Baathi-Ðfication reform. This is among the most divisive political issues for Iraq and compromise will be extremely difficult.

2, the current status [of efforts to enact hydrocarbon legislation] is unsatisfactory. The government of Iraq has not met its self-imposed goal of May 31 for submitting the framework hydrocarbon revenue-sharing laws.

3, the government of Iraq has not made satisfactory progress toward establishing a provincial election law.

4, the government of Iraq has not made satisfactory progress toward establishing a date for provincial elections. Legislation required for setting the date has not been enacted.

5, the government of Iraq has not made satisfactory progress toward establishing provincial council authorities.

So how does the administration respond to the list of unsatisfactory progress on their key elements? Let's turn again to the White House report:

De-Baathification:

This does not, however, necessitate a revision to the current plan and strategy.

Hydrocarbon legislation:

This does not, however, necessitate a revision to our current plan and strategy.

Provincial elections.

However, at this time, this does not necessitate a revision to our current plan and strategy.

It is clear that the Iraqis have not yet made that progress. Yet this President and this administration refuse to take the one step that could truly galvanize real change in Iraq--announcing a redeployment of American forces. They must look into the abyss. We must announce that we will redeploy

our troops. This is a necessary step.

A redeployment of our troops creates the potential to change the overarching dynamic for the better, freeing us to focus more effectively on strategies to counter al-Qaida and stabilize the region.

This is a critical step, and thoughtful, reasoned political and diplomatic leadership will be essential to take advantage of the new dynamic a redeployment offers.

This is a positive step, to improve our posture and advance our strategic interests.

I know my Republican colleagues wish to couch this change of course in terms of failure and abandonment. Whether this is just for rhetorical advantage, or whether they just cannot see redeployment as a calibrated part of a new and more promising regional strategy, I do not know. Let me say this, though. This is not a test of resolve. We have an enormously complex problem, a problem we have tried to solve by military force alone. Despite heroic efforts by our military, that strategy has failed--catastrophically. It did not fail because anything was lacking in our troops, it failed because the strategy was wrong--wrong at its inception, wrong in its execution, and wrong now.

We in the Senate must challenge the administration to summon the political courage and the moral courage to face the fact that the strategy was wrong and needs to change. It is never easy to admit mistakes, but when the lives of our troops and the strategic position of our country are at stake, they have to do what is right, not what is politically comfortable or fits the rhetoric. This should not be too much to ask of a President of the United States.

If, as so many believe, we are on a continuing collision course with the
facts, with the lessons of history; if our strategy is, in fact, ill-advised; if we indeed are creating and maintaining a poisonous dynamic in the region for ourselves, can we not at least consider that redeployment--specifically, the credible threat of redeployment--can open new doors for resolving the civil conflicts over which we are now the unwelcome police?

The measure now before the Senate sets forth a thoughtful, responsible path to redeploy our troops out of Iraq. It provides our military commanders with the time and resources they need to redeploy our troops safely. It will focus Iraq's political leaders on making progress, where, to put it mildly, thus far insufficient progress has been made on measures critical to their nation's future and our success. And it will galvanize the international community and the region in the practical and self-interested pursuit--or acceptance--of a more stable, more secure Iraq.

The Levin-Reed amendment is the new direction Americans have called for. It is the change of course we desperately need. In a few hours, this long debate, this long night, will draw to a close. I urge my colleagues to let us vote up or down, yes or no, on the new direction the Levin-Reed amendment embodies.

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