MSNBC "Rachel Maddow Show"- Transcript: War Against ISIL

Interview

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Senator Kaine, it`s great to have you here. Thanks for your time.

SEN. TIM KAINE (D), VIRGINIA: Thanks, Rachel. Great to be with you.

MADDOW: What is your understanding about what is about to happen on this subject? And is it what you have been advocating for?

KAINE: Well, Rachel, I started this talk in June of 2014 about the need for Congress to approve a mission against ISIL, which was then seemingly a threat. I don`t think any of the previous authorizations cover what we`ve been doing since August 8th. We are in our seventh month of war, but I was heartened when the president in the State of the Union said he would be seeking congressional authority.

And again, I`m not sure of exactly the day, but I think very soon, the White House will send a proposed mission statement for this war and in the Foreign Relations Committee, I serve on committee in the Senate, we will be undertaking to question administration witnesses about the proposal, the limitations in the proposal, and we will probably add our own revisions and amendments to it. It`s way past time that we do this. We`ve already lost American service members lives in operation and inherent resolve without Congress doing what we`re supposed to do.

So, I`m glad that day is finally arriving because there are many questions we need to ask.

MADDOW: In terms of the scope of those questions, and what you think your committee and the rest of Congress will be doing with the proposed language, obviously, it seems clear to me as it does to you they were putting the cart before the horse to debate a war that`s already been under way for six months.

KAINE: Indeed, absolutely.

MADDOW: Is there, weirdly though, some sort of strategic upside to that? Because now, one of the things you can debate is not, you know, wondering what might work against ISIS, but what we have been trying already, debating whether or not we`ve been fighting them effectively for these past six months.

KAINE: Absolutely. And you`ll see us doing that, and that question of effectiveness and the mission has many components. Are there geographic limitations to the battle? You talk about the death of the ISIL commander in Afghanistan? Should there be a sunset clause? I think there should be, where the president would have to come back and seek a new authorization after a certain period of time.

Are we -- is this just a mission against ISIL, or, as you know, during the early authorizations, the administrations both wishing Obama developed a broad notion of associated forces that will enable us to take the fight probably far beyond what Congress originally intended. And then there`s some probably the most critical question is, what does the White House say about the use of any American ground troops in this mission?

Our work thus far has been largely in waging I think a pretty significant air campaign that`s been effective in Iraq to support ground troops from the region, and the president has said on the number of occasions, we`re not going to be using American ground troops in this particular war, but we need to kind of dig into that.

I suspect you`ll see that as a significant point of difference between members of Congress who are overwhelmingly in support of military action against ISIL. But there are some differences on important details.

MADDOW: When I -- when I imagine what these hearings are going to be like, and what this debate is going to be like, we know enough already from the news to know that ISIS is not degraded or undermined to a degree that the U.S. is going to feel comfortable with in terms of our national security and the risk to destabilizing the region. So, we know there`s going to be bad news to hear about ISIS` persistence in the face of these 2000 air strikes.

I worry and wonder and anticipate that because of that, the debate is inexorably going to steer toward a bigger response than we`ve already got.
It is inexorably going to steer toward ground troops or toward activating other kinds of military resources that we haven`t thrown at this problem thus far. Do you think that`s an inevitable course of that debate?

KAINE: The debate is certainly going to have people making that argument, Rachel. I`m skeptical about it and I`ll tell you why. You know, again, I introduced a resolution. We ought to take military action against ISIL that I introduced in September. But do I think a weariness about ground troops makes a lot of sense.

Last week, King Abdullah of Jordan was here and sadly, he was here on the very day when the Jordanian pilot was burned and that video was released. It was kind of a very emotional meeting with him.

But he said something very powerful, he said, look, this is not America`s fight. This is the region`s fight against its own terrorism.
Now, we need your help but you have a right to expect that we in this region will stand up against this regional terrorism. We`ll stand up against it. And if we do, you should help us. You can`t carry the burden of the fight alone.

We`ve already been the party that has directed more than 80 percent of the air strikes. These nations in the region, they have a lot of weapons and I know because the U.S. has sold them a lot of weapons. But other than Jordan, they`re not really all in, trying to beat this extremism, which is created in the region and which poses a much more direct threat to them immediately than it does to the United States.

So, sure, we`ll have a debate back and forth about ground troops, but the point that I`m going to be making is this: the U.S. cannot police a region that does not want to police itself. Now, we and other nations can help a region that will police itself, but one of the important questions is, how seriously are the countries in the region taking this fight to ISIL? And if they`re not, that`s going to be a significant question that we`re going to have to ask why and get good answers about.

MADDOW: Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia, thank you so much for your time tonight, sir.

KAINE: Absolutely.

MADDOW: And I have to say, just personally, thank you for being so loud about this issue, about Congress` responsibility here. You were loud about it when a lot of other people weren`t, and I think you gave other people courage to speak up on this subject. Thanks for being ahead on this one, sir.

KAINE: And I`m going to keep being loud, Rachel.

MADDOW: Good. Well done, sir. Thank you very much.

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