Commending Outstanding Efforts of Armed Forces and Employees of State Department and USAID in Response to Earthquake and Tsunami of December 26, 2004

COMMENDING OUTSTANDING EFFORTS OF ARMED FORCES AND EMPLOYEES OF STATE DEPARTMENT AND USAID IN RESPONSE TO EARTHQUAKE AND TSUNAMI OF DECEMBER 26, 2004 -- (House of Representatives - April 05, 2005)

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Mr. CROWLEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this resolution and I would like to give a special thanks to the sponsor of this resolution, my good friend from Oregon, Mr. BLUMENAUER.

Like several of my colleagues on the House International Relations Committee, I had the opportunity to meet with many of the men and women of our Armed Forces, the Department of State and the United States Agency for International Development operating in the tsunami affected region.

My trip to the region began in Singapore, where I met with members of our Armed Forces who were using the Singapore Air Force base as a staging ground for missions into the hardest hit area of the tsunami, Banda Aceh, Indonesia.

They were running operations out of the base 24 hours a day thanks to the support of our Singaporean friends.
While I was at the base I met with a Marine who was injured just days before in a helicopter crash but he remained in high spirits and was eager to get back out to help the survivors of the tsunami.

Singapore has been such a strong ally and a solid supporter of our relief mission; I want to publicly thank the government and people of Singapore for their role in the assistance to the tsunami affected region.

After Singapore, I traveled to Sri Lanka and went south of Colombo to Galle, a tourist town, which was ravaged by the tsunami.

During my day in Galle, I visited a maternity hospital that had been badly damaged and is now unusable, but I met with a doctor who told me about a c-section he was performing when the wave hit the hospital.

This doctor was able to finish the surgery by flashlight and saved the mother and child. These are some of the stories we may never have heard.

As I traveled on the road back to Colombo stretching the length of the shore I saw more affects of the Tsunami, train tracks were turned into corkscrews and buildings were totally destroyed.

But within all this rubble was American Marines and USAID Disaster Assistance Relief Teams working hand in hand with the Sri Lankan's clearing destroyed homes.

I asked one of the marines about his daily activities and he told me what brought him the most joy was playing with the local children who had lost their families and homes and that just making them smile and keeping them active brought him so much fulfillment.

As those children grow up they will always remember that marine who brought a little sense of normalcy back to their lives.

Also, during a meeting with the U.S. Embassy in Colombo, I met the director of the U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance, OFDA, covering South Asia, which with the help of this committee; I was able to establish this branch.

I was caught off guard when William Berger, the director of the OFDA, thanked me for establishing this office and told me that the funding I was able to secure has saved thousands of lives and will continue to.

It's a real testament to the effect our committee has on the lives of those living so far away.

I urge all of my colleagues to support this important resolution.

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