National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2006 - Resumed

NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2006--Resumed -- (Senate - July 21, 2005)

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Mr. REED. Mr. President, I thank the chairman.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.

Mr. REED. Mr. President, let me begin by commending Chairman Warner and Senator Levin for the way they have brought this bill to the floor. It is a collaborative effort, a collegial effort which has brought to the floor a very good bill, which we hope can be improved by the amendment process. But we begin, I think, in a position of great strength and great unified support for our military forces across the globe, these young and women who make us so proud and do so much to protect our country.

I would like to step back for a moment and try to have an assessment in the context of our deliberations today with respect to the Defense authorization bill. It has been 28 months since the war in Iraq began. It has been 26 months since President Bush declared ``mission accomplished'' onboard the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln. And it has been almost 13 months since the sovereignty of Iraq was handed over from the Coalition Provisional Authority to the people of Iraq.

It is time, I think, for an assessment. It is time for an assessment in the context of our deliberations today with respect to this very important legislation governing the conduct of our military forces around the globe.

In October 2002, I was one of 23 Members of this body who voted against the congressional authorization to use force against Iraq. Regardless of how we voted that day, on this day we are united in support of our forces in the field. We have to give them what they need to do the job they were called upon to perform.

Back in October 2002, I was not convinced there were weapons of mass destruction that could be used effectively by the Iraqis. I was also concerned that our stay in Iraq would not be tranquil, that we would not be greeted as liberators, but we would literally be sucked into a swirling vortex of ethnic and sectarian rivalries, of ancient feuds, of economic problems, of infrastructure problems, which I think should have provided us a more cautionary view of our preemptive attack.

Again, despite our forebodings then, our mission now is to be sure we provide the resources necessary for our soldiers and sailors and marines and airmen and airwomen to carry the day for us.

What we have seen since that day, in my view, has been a series of mistakes and errors by the administration in carrying out their policies, and also an inability to recognize some of these mistake and to take effective corrective action. I think this inability to recognize what has gone wrong--to admit it and to correct it--still acts to interfere with the successful implementation of our objectives in Iraq.

One of the most glaring and most obvious aspects of our runup to the war in Iraq is the fact that the American people were told one thing and in reality it turned out to be something quite different. The administration argued that Iraq posed an imminent threat to the Nation, which we all know today is simply not true, and some of us then believed was not true.

In his State of the Union to the American people in January 2003, the President talked about Saddam Hussein seeking significant quantities of uranium from Africa.

Those assertions proved unsubstantiated. In his address to the U.N. Security Council, Secretary of State Powell claimed Iraq had seven mobile biological agent factories. That, too, proved to be inaccurate.

In a February 2003 statement, President Bush stated:

Senior members of Iraqi intelligence and al Qaeda have met at least eight times since the early 1990s. Iraq has sent bomb-making and document forgery experts to work with al Qaeda. Iraq has also provided al Qaeda with chemical and biological weapons training.

Again, these assertions have not been substantiated in the intervening days. Many leaders in the administration stated that Iraq attempted to buy high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production. These assertions also proved to be without major substantiation.

Based on these statements by our Nation's leaders, the majority of the Congress and the American people supported our operations in Iraq in October 2002. But it was not long until these misstatements became clearer to the American public.

The CIA sent two memos to the White House 3 months before the State of the Union Address expressing doubts about Iraq's attempt to buy yellowcake from Niger.

In 2002, the CIA produced a report that found inconclusive evidence of links between Iraq and al-Qaida and was convinced that Saddam Hussein never provided chemical or biological weapons to terrorist networks.

Experts at the Department of Energy long disputed the assertion that the aluminum tubes were suitable for nuclear weapons production.

The administration's use and misuse of prewar intelligence has caused an upheaval in the intelligence community and made Congress, the American people, and the world community skeptical of actions with Iraq and other countries of concern.

I believe this mistake will take years to overcome. What it has done, I think, is provide a sense of skepticism in the American public about the justifications for our operations in Iraq. This skepticism has slowly been eating away, as reflected in the polls, the view of the American public as to the usefulness of our operations in Iraq. Once again, what is heartening is the fact that this skepticism has not translated into anything other than unconditional support for our American soldiers and military personnel. That is critical to what they do and critical to what we should be encouraging here.

We are now engaged in this war. People are skeptical and critical of the premises advanced by the administration. But we must, in fact, stay until the job is done, until a satisfactory outcome is achieved.

The military phase of Operation Iraqi Freedom was brilliantly executed and a great success. It shows the extraordinary preponderance of military power we can wield in a conventional conflict where we are sending task forces of tanks and mechanized infantry against other conventional military forces.

Perhaps, however, the most important part of the operation was not defeating the enemy in the field but winning the peace in Iraq. That larger task has not gone as well as we all had hoped. One reason is because we did not plan for operations after our conventional success. According to an article in the Philadelphia Inquirer, when a lieutenant colonel briefed war planners and intelligence officials in March 2003 on the administration's plans for Iraq, the slide for the rebuilding operation, or phase 4-C, as the military denotes it, read ``To Be Provided.'' We went in with a plan to defeat the military force in Iraq but no plan to occupy and reconstruct the country.

What makes this lack of a plan worse is that the experts knew and told the Pentagon what to expect. The same Philadelphia Inquirer article states there was a ``foot high stack of material'' discussing the probability of stiff resistance in Iraq. A former senior intelligence official said:

It was disseminated. And ignored.

There was ample planning done but not used. We have had, as all military forces, contingency plans dating back many years for possible operations in Iraq, including occupation operations. They were ignored. There was a feeling--an erroneous feeling--we would be greeted as liberators, that it would be basically a parade, rather than the struggle we have seen today.

The results are clear as to this lack of planning. The insurgency today is robust, and it continues to inflict damage not only against American military personnel but also against Iraqis who are struggling to develop a democratic country.

In May there were about 700 attacks against American forces using IEDs, the highest number since the invasion of Iraq in 2003. The surge in attacks has coincided with the appearance of significant advancement in bomb design. This is not only a robust insurgency, it is a very adaptable insurgency. They are learning as they fight, and that makes them a formidable foe.

Improvised explosive devices now account for about 70 percent of American casualties in Iraq. Recent U.S. intelligence estimates put the insurgents' strength at somewhere between 12,000 and 20,000. I would note that in May 2003, insurgent strength was estimated to be about 3,000 persons. So this is not the last gasp of the insurgency. This is an insurgency that has momentum, has personnel, and increasingly has technical sophistication.

As of today, July 21, 1,771 American soldiers have been killed, and 13,189 have been wounded. I say American soldiers. I will use that as a shorthand for valiant marines, Navy personnel, Air Force personnel, because every service has suffered in Iraq.

One of the reasons the insurgency may be stronger is because most of the 300-mile border with Syria remains unguarded because of a lack of sufficient troops, allowing insurgents and foreign fighters to freely move back and forth between the countries. This insurgency is also allowed to move freely within the country because there are insufficient troops to break insurgent strongholds.

We have seen operations, very successful operations, such as the tremendously valiant and skillful operations of marines reducing the number of insurgents in Fallujah. But then at the end of the day, or days later, Marine forces withdraw or pull back, and Fallujah again is a source of at least incipient resistance to the central Government of Iraq.

In addition, these insurgents continue to have ample ammunition because it is estimated that even today approximately 25 percent of the hundreds of munitions dumps have not yet been fully secured. I was amazed, in my first trip to Iraq--one of five I have taken--to be up in the area of operations of the 4th Infantry Division with General Odierno, and also at the time with General Petraeus, then the commander of the 101st, when they pointed out there were hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of ammunition dumps unsecured by any military personnel, international, American, or Iraqi.

If you want to know where all this ammunition and explosives are coming from, well, it was there. It was stolen. It was diverted. It was hidden away. And now it is being used against our soldiers.

To me, that is a glaring example of why we should have had more troops on the ground at the beginning and, indeed, more troops on the ground today. But that was not done.

Perhaps the most well-known consequence of undermanning is the abuses at Abu Ghraib. It was a prison out of control, and one primary reason was the lack of U.S. military personnel. In 3 weeks, the population of this prison rose from 700 prisoners to 7,000. Yet the number of Army personnel guarding these prisoners remained at 90 personnel.

As former CPA Administrator Paul Bremer stated in October 5, 2004:

The single most important change, the one thing that would have improved the situation, would have been having more troops in Iraq at the beginning of the war and throughout.

Subsequently, he might have modified or somehow explained this comment, but I think that is an accurate assessment. On October 5, 2004, that was his assessment. Today, months after President Bush declared the end of major combat operations and predicted that troop levels would be at 105,000, over 138,000 troops are still stationed in Iraq and are likely to be there for some time. I would argue that that, in fact, is not sufficient force. When we cannot secure the borders, when we cannot secure ammunition dumps, when we cannot do many things that are central to stability in Iraq, then we need more forces on the ground.

One of the more frustrating aspects of the administration's unwillingness to adjust troop levels was that Congress was ready and willing to help. You can't have additional forces on the ground in Iraq unless you have additional forces in the Army and the Marine Corps, our land forces. Senator Hagel and I first raised concerns about this issue in October 2003. We offered an amendment to the fiscal year 2004 emergency supplemental to raise the end strength of the Active-duty Army by 10,000. The amendment was passed by this body, but it was dropped in conference, primarily because of the opposition of the administration. Then again in 2004, Senator Hagel and I offered an amendment to the fiscal year 2005 Defense authorization bill which was passed by concerned Senators by a vote of 94 to 3. This amendment raised Army end strength by 20,000 personnel and the Marines' end strength by 3,000.

However, the President's budget request this year did not acknowledge these end-strength increases. We will therefore try again. The bill which we are presently considering authorizes an end strength of 522,400 personnel for the active Army, 40,000 more than the President requested, and 178,000 active personnel for the Marines, 3,000 more than requested. I hope, in fact, we might be able to augment even these end-strength numbers.

In addition, I hope we can finally pay for these increased regular soldiers not through supplemental appropriations but in the regular budget itself. We are deluding ourselves to think that we can live for the 5 or 10 years we will have a significant engagement in Iraq--and that is roughly along the lines of even admissions by the Department of Defense--unless we are prepared to have not a temporary fix to the end strength but a permanent fix, paid for through the budget and not through supplementals.

One other aspect, in addition to the notion of end strength and the number of personnel on active duty, is how do we recruit and retain these soldiers to maintain overall end strength. This issue is of acute concern because unless we are able to attract new soldiers and Marines and unless we are able to retain the seasoned veterans, we will no longer have the kind of force we need.

When Senator Hagel and I first offered our amendment in October 2003 to increase end strength, there was a headline which said quite a bit. Its words were, ``Another Banner Military Recruiting and Retention Year.'' Back in 2003, we could attract soldiers, Marines to the service, much more so than today. That was the time period to act. Not only was the need obvious, but the means to obtain objective, willing recruits were also much more evident.

Since the administration has refused to raise the numbers of troops overall--and the number of troops in particular in Iraq--the Army has been worn down by repeated deployments and a persistent insurgency. Now, ironically, even if we raise end-strength numbers, it is going to be very difficult for the Army to recruit these new soldiers. The Army missed its February through March 2005 recruiting goals. In June, the Army recruited 6,157 soldiers, 507 over their goal. However, the June 2005 goal was 1,000 fewer soldiers than the preceding year. One might think that the goalposts were moved.

As of June 30, the Army recruited 47,121 new soldiers in the year 2005, but that is just 86 percent of its goal. General Schoomaker, Chief of Staff, said the Army will be hard pressed to reach its goal of 80,000 Active-Duty recruits by the end of the fiscal year in September.

Despite the improvement in June, the Army has only 3 months left to recruit soldiers; that is, it will have to recruit on an average of 11,000 soldiers a month, which is a target way beyond the expectation of anyone. The June numbers were also not anywhere near the 8,086 recruits the Army brought in during January. This recruiting problem is persistent, and it is causing extreme difficulty.

These are Active-Duty recruits. The Army National Guard also has its challenges in recruiting. The Army National Guard is the cornerstone of U.S. forces in Iraq. I am extraordinarily proud of my Rhode Island Guard men and women. They have served with great distinction. During the first days of the war, the 115th and the 119th military police companies and the 118th military police battalion were in the thick of the fight in Fallujah and Baghdad. Since that time, we have had our field artillery unit, the 103rd field artillery unit, deployed. We have had a reconnaissance unit, the 173rd, deployed. The 126th aviation battalion, the Blackhawk battalion, has been deployed. They have done a magnificent job. The Army National Guard, however, is also seeing the effects of this operation and the strains are showing.

The Guard missed its recruiting goal for at least the ninth straight month in June. They are nearly 19,000 soldiers below authorized strength. The Army Guard was seeking 5,032 new soldiers in June, but signed up roughly 4,300. It is more than 10,000 soldiers behind its year-to-date goal of almost 45,000 recruits, and it has missed its recruiting target during at least 17 of the last 18 months. Lieutenant General Blum, Chief of the National Guard Bureau, said it is unlikely that the Guard will achieve its recruiting goal for fiscal year 2005, which ends September 30.

Today our Army is one Army. It is not an active force with reservists in the background. A significant percentage of the forces today in Iraq are National Guard men and women. We cannot continue to operate our Army, not only to respond to Iraq but to other contingencies, if we do not have a fully staffed National Guard and Reserves.

Looking at the Army Reserve, the story is the same. So far this year, the Army Reserve has only been able to recruit 11,891 soldiers. Their target is roughly 16,000. At this point, they are about 26 percent short of their goal.

One Army recruiting official noted that since March, the Army has canceled 15 basic training classes for the infantry at Fort Benning because it did not have the soldiers, 220 to 230 of them for each those classes. Now they will begin processing smaller classes of about 180 to 190.

Complementing the recruiting effort, of course, is the retention effort. Retention is a ``good news'' story. Retention rates are high. But they won't address certain key personnel vacancies which are being discovered within the military.

From October 1 to June 30, the Army reenlisted about 53,000 soldiers, 6 percent ahead of its goal. At that pace, the Army would finish this fiscal year with 3,800 troops ahead of the targeted 64,000. However, that still is a 12,000-troop shortfall when you look at the recruiting and retention numbers together.

One method the Army is using to maintain retention levels is the so-called stop-loss procedure, where someone who might be able to leave the service at the end of enlistment, if their unit is notified to go to Iraq, they cannot leave during that notification period and during that deployment period. That adds to retention a bit, but it is not something that, over time, year in and year out, can be sustained.

So we have a situation now where our Army is deeply stressed, and this stress is demonstrated very clearly in recruitment, very clearly in making end-strength numbers which we are trying to increase.

The Army is also trying to deal with this issue of recruitment and retention by looking at their standards. One of the dangers--and it hasn't become manifest yet but it certainly has been in previous conflicts--is that there is a huge effort or tension, if you will, to reduce standards in order to get people to come in. I don't think that has happened yet, but that is looming over the horizon. I think we have to be conscious in this body to look carefully at the numbers, not just in terms of how many soldiers enlisted but also that we are continuing to maintain adequate quality within the forces. I think we are, but I am afraid that continued pressure on the forces will force military personnel to begin to look at ways they can attract forces by weakening the criteria.

We are in a situation where we have to be very conscious of the stress that is on the Army, and we also have to do more to support the Army, particularly in recruiting and retaining. The Congressional Research Service has determined that approximately 50 new incentives have been signed into law since the United States invaded Iraq. These are positive tools to enhance recruitment and retention. But while these incentives are needed, we must acknowledge the cost the Government is paying is a significant sum. We must pay that sum, but we must recognize that this is an expensive proposition of recruiting volunteers in a time of war.

The other aspect that we should be concerned about is the fact that we have seen a situation in Iraq where now we are discovering shortages of key personnel, complaints that the soldiers in the field, the units in the field, were not fully resourced, had inadequate training, again, most demonstrably the Abu Ghraib situation where the lack of resources and training were singled out. What we have found though is that, going back, no one seemed to be complaining--at least to us--about these lack of resources.

One fear I have is that there essentially has been a chilling effect by Secretary Rumsfeld with respect to advice flowing from the field into the Pentagon and to him. The most notorious example of this might be the treatment of General Shinseki, as we all recall. He was asked--he did not volunteer--about the size of the force needed in Iraq. And he said something on the order of several hundred thousand soldiers. He was immediately castigated by the Secretary, who said his estimate was far from the mark. Secretary Wolfowitz called the estimate outlandish, and then, in his few remaining days in the Army, General Shinseki felt shunned by the civilian leadership of the Pentagon. In fact, General Shinseki's observation was more accurate than any of the plans being advanced by the Secretary of Defense.

This aspect of criticizing professional officers who come forward publicly at our request and give their professional opinion does not create the kind of environment that is conducive to bringing forward advice and to recognizing problems and to providing the kind of leadership which is necessary.

It wasn't just limited to General Shinseki. The former Secretary of the Army, Secretary Thomas White, defended the Army on several occasions, disagreed with the Secretary. He was, for all intents and purposes, cashiered. That sends a bad signal, and it has a chilling effect. We are living with that chilling effect today, unfortunately.

Then again, as I mentioned, as we look at Abu Ghraib, that is one of most serious issues we face here, this lack of resources, the lack of training. All of that was not apparently diagnosed and reported in adequate ways so it could be corrected in a timely way. We have seen how this incident has caused tremendous implications in the Islamic world. It has questioned our conduct. It has set us up for criticism, and it has been--in terms I used with Secretary Rumsfeld when he appeared before us--a disaster for us. Still, I don't think we have fully accounted for what happened. I don't think we adequately understand how techniques that were developed for use at Guantanamo, which was deemed by the President to be not under the legal control of the Geneva Convention, how those techniques might relate to Iraq which, according to the President, was fully subject to the Geneva Conventions. How did those techniques move from one area to another area? It wasn't simply five or six individual soldiers; it was something more than that. We have had several snapshots. We have had 12 reports, but they have looked at various pieces. I don't think we have a comprehensive view of what happened.

More importantly, I think we have yet to be able to step back and determine, in a careful and thoughtful way, what the rule should be. As I talk to senior officers, one of their demands is: Give us clear rules. Give us the policy. And that policy has to be produced not in the secretive corridors of the Pentagon but here--and perhaps not here, directly in the Congress, but through a commission that we can adopt that will look at what happened, put all the pieces together and then recommend what changes we must make so that we can conduct this war on terror without sacrificing our principle dedication to international laws and also without putting our troops in danger. Because unfortunately what we do, even if it is the aberrant acts of a few soldiers, could easily be emulated by others when our soldiers fall into their hands. That would be terrible.

Now, there is another aspect of the problem. We can win a military victory in Iraq, but unless we restore the country economically and help them develop a viable political process, we will not succeed. The reconstruction activities to date have been sadly lacking and lagging. We have approximately $18.1 billion committed to the effort, but these dollars have not been spent well or wisely. Most of the money is going to what they call ``security premiums'' because of the instability in Iraq.

My colleagues, including Senator Lautenberg, were talking about some of the aspects of what appears to be excessive billing by our contractors. And, of course, more and more attention is being paid to the issue of corruption and bribery within the context of the Iraqi economy. All of this suggests that we have a long way to go before we can demonstrate to the Iraqi people those palpable benefits which I believe can help them and force their allegiance to their government more quickly.

One of the areas of concern is oil production. There were those in Washington, before the invasion, who said that within a few months we will be pumping oil and it will be a profit center, it will pay for the whole war, and we don't have to worry about anything. We are not nearly paying for this war with the proceeds of Iraqi oil production.

The goal was to export a certain number, and we are falling short of that number of barrels per day. Iraqi oil revenue will be $5 billion to $6 billion short this year. That revenue pays for many things--subsidies for petroleum in Iraq, food, civil service, and it pays for infrastructure. Who is going to make up that shortfall? If we leave in a situation when the Iraqis cannot generate enough money to pay their own budget, what is going to happen to that country?

So we have huge economic problems. Another manifestation of the economic problems of the Iraqi Government is electricity. It is the key to stability. There are places in Baghdad today that are enjoying fewer hours of electricity than they did under Saddam Hussein. As a result, there are brownouts and blackouts. It is a direct reminder to the people that things are not going so well. We need to get that situation in order.

Now, as General Abizaid pointed out:

Military forces, at the end of the day, only provide the shield behind which politics takes place.

Providing politics that are open, transparent, and legitimate, we have been trying to do that.

There has been established a process to draft a constitution. We hope by August 15, 2005, a draft is presented to the nation and can be voted on by October 15. If the constitution is approved, a permanent government can be elected by December 15 and take office by December 31, the end of this year. But it is a very difficult process. If you look at the headlines today, Sunni members of the parliamentary commission are at least temporarily boycotting it because of fears for their safety. There are suggestions that some provisions of the constitution would be difficult for us to support--they are heavily allied with Islamic law, or they don't provide for a robust secular sector in Iraq.

For all these reasons, we still have a long way to go in the political process and the economic process that will provide us the final means to leave the country, to take out significant military forces.

There is one other aspect of the political process and of the economic process, and that is the role not of our military forces but of our State Department personnel. One of the things that struck me when I was in Iraq last Easter was the comment by soldiers in the field that they needed more State Department support, not in Baghdad but in the field--Fallujah, Mosul, and those towns--to carry out the reconstruction, provide political advice, and be the confidants and advisers of Iraqi civilian officials. The sad story is that we don't have enough State Department personnel outside of Baghdad to do these jobs.

In Baghdad, the State Department authorized 899 positions but has only filled 665. The State Department has then authorized 169 for the rest of the country--in fact, I suggested that the level should be higher--but only 105 of those have been filled. Iraq is short about 298 needed State Department personnel. These are the people who are doing what is so critical at this juncture--providing political mentoring, providing technical assistance, providing those resources that complement military operations. Without them, military operations would not ultimately be successful.

There are several reasons for this situation with the State Department. First, the tour for State Department personnel in Iraq is not 3 years, but 6 months or a year, so State is running through people at a very rapid rate.

There is a general shortage of mid-level officers for the State Department worldwide, and those are the officers who would be placed outside Baghdad. They have the experience and expertise to operate independently. The problem is opening up too many new posts. We have situations in which new nations evolved. They have to be supported by State Department personnel.

Secretary Powell did a great job in engaging new personnel to come to the State Department, but these are entry level personnel, and the midlevel, key midlevel personnel are inadequate in terms of numbers, not in terms of skills or talents--certainly not that--but in terms of numbers.

There is another obvious reason. It is very dangerous to be outside the green zone in Iraq. All of these State Department personnel need to be protected, and that is slowing down their ability to deploy into the field.

I understand also there are incentives being considered by the State Department to get more people there. However, unless we have a robust complement of AID officials, State Department experts to help support our military efforts, we will not be able to obtain a satisfactory resolution in Iraq. I hope we can do more to do that.

This is a very perilous time in Iraq. Just this week, a Shi'a leader stated that Iraq was slipping into civil war. If it does, then we will have a terrible burden with our forces deployed in the midst of a civil war. Some others have said there has been an incipient civil war for months now and one of a more major characteristic ready to break out. We do need to respond to these issues.

There is another policy impact with respect to Iraq, and that is the impact on its other worldwide missions, like our ability to maintain our successes in Afghanistan and keep open all options with regards to North Korea and Iran.

The war in Iraq also has tremendous impact on our economy. We are a great power, and that is a function of several components. One is military power, but also economic power. If we are not able to support and afford these efforts over the 5 years, 10 years, or more this global war on terror is going to take place--and all observers see this as a generational struggle, not an episodic one--then we are not going to have the economic staying power.

Frankly, our economy is performing in a fitful fashion. We have a huge fiscal deficit that is draining our ability to fund needed programs--not just military programs but domestic programs also. We have a huge current accounts deficit which, again, will come home one day when those foreigners who are lending us money will ask for the money back with interest. These economic forces will, I think, not support indefinitely the kind of expenditures we need to protect ourselves.

So along with reforming and strengthening our military, we have to reform and strengthen our fiscal policies in the United States. We cannot continue to spend in supplementals billions of dollars a year. We have to recognize that and we have to take steps, and we have to ultimately pay for this war.

It seems to me in this context illogical, if not absurd, to advancing huge additional tax cuts at a time when we are struggling to conduct a war. If that had been our attitude in World War II, we never would have succeeded. We would have been bankrupt before 1945. At that time, we responded, as we have in every major conflict. We asked all Americans to share the sacrifice, not just those in uniform, but those on the homefront, those who can help pay for the war, as well as those who are fighting the war.

Yet today we are advancing two, in my mind, almost contradictory proposals. We are going to stay the course in Iraq, we are going to take a generation, if necessary, to defeat global terror, we are going to do it not only with military resources, but we are going to have to mobilize resources of the world to change the social and political dynamics of countries across the globe, particularly Islamic countries--all that very expensive--but, of course, we are going to cut taxes dramatically. We have to decide in a very significant way whether we can afford this dramatic contradiction. I don't think we can.

We have a great deal to do in the next few days with respect to this legislation. I think it is important to get on with it. I hope not only do we stay the course in Iraq, but we stay the course on this legislation. The majority leader has suggested he is prepared to leave this bill in midcourse to turn to legislation with respect to gun liability immunity. That would, in my view, be moving from the national interest to one very special self-interest, the self-interest of the gun lobby.

We have soldiers in the field. We have sailors, marines, air men and women who are risking their lives. I think they would like us to finish our job before moving on to something else. I hope we don't move off this bill. Stay the course on this legislation. We will have amendments, debate them, hopefully we will adopt those to improve the bill, and then we will send, I hope, to conference a good piece of legislation of which we can be proud and, more importantly, that can assist our soldiers, sailors, marines, and air men and women in the field.

I yield the floor.

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Mr. REED. Mr. President, if I may respond, I appreciate not only the leadership of the chairman, but also his incredible commitment to our military forces. My point is very simple. I think we should finish this bill. We have waited weeks to go on it. But I also point out that if other matters come before the Senate, as Senators we have the full right to use all of the procedures, we have the right to debate. I would hate to be in a situation--and I hope that is not the case--where if we attempt, let's say, next week to engage in extensive and productive debate about a particular issue, we are not reminded that we are holding up the Defense authorization bill; that no one will suggest our ability to debate an issue which, frankly, is on the agenda not through our desires but others', would somehow be interpreted as slowing down our ability to respond to the needs of our soldiers, sailors, marines, air men and women.

I am on record saying I would like to see us finishing this bill without interruption, but if there is an interruption, then this Senate and our colleagues have to have the right to fully debate any measure that comes before the floor, and I don't think we should be--and maybe I am anticipating something that will not evolve--be put in the position of being hurried off the floor because the Defense bill has to come back.

We have the bill before us now. I think we should stick to the bill.

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Mr. REED. Mr. President, let me thank Senator Lugar for his commendable amendment and thank Senator Cornyn for allowing me to proceed. I would like to speak to the possible procedural posture we will be in next week.

We are now on the Defense authorization bill, which is critical to providing resources to our service men and women who are engaged today, as we speak, in a global war on terror. But tomorrow the majority leader intends to file a cloture petition on the motion to proceed to the gun industry immunity bill. That means on Tuesday morning we will have a cloture vote, and the vote will present a stark choice for all Senators. We can stay on the Defense bill and finish our work on behalf of our soldiers, sailors, air men and women, or we can leave the Defense bill for an undetermined period of time and move to a special interest bill to give legal immunity to the gun industry.

If the Senate invokes cloture on the motion to proceed to the gun industry bill next Tuesday, we will be on that motion for the next 30 hours. On Wednesday, when that time runs out, the majority leader would then file another cloture petition on the bill itself. The Senate would then spend the next 2 days on the immunity bill, and we would have another cloture vote Friday. If the Senate invoked cloture on the bill next Friday, we could face another 30 hours on the gun immunity bill, pushing final passage until at least next Saturday and potentially delaying passage of the Defense authorization bill until after the August recess.

We face a situation where the majority is asking Senators to delay consideration of a bill to support our troops, possibly for up to a month, so that we can take up a bill to give a special interest gift to the gun industry.

Senator Frist said this morning that lawsuits against gun manufacturers like Beretta are the reason to take up this measure because they provide small arms to the U.S. Army and the Department of Defense. First, Beretta is a privately held corporation owned by an Italian parent. There is no obligation for them to disclose their finances. But their competitors, Sturm Ruger and Smith & Wesson, continue to assure their shareholders in SEC filings that this litigation is not having an adverse material effect on their financial position. So I don't know how much credence we can give to that.

I believe we should stay on this bill, finish our obligation to our service men and women, and then at some other time, take up this bill because such a bill about immunity requires extensive debate. That is a requirement that many Senators will not forgo.

I urge the majority leader to reconsider his proposal. I thank the Senator from Texas and yield the floor.

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