National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018

Floor Speech

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Mr. President, thank you.

Prior to arriving in the U.S. Senate after the election of 2010, I was a Member of the House of Representatives, and I am one of the 30 percent of us in Congress today who were here in 2001 and approved the use of military force in response to the terrorist attacks of 9/11.

I hate to say this at this moment because the vote is so closely pending, but I don't know what the right answer to this question is-- the one we face today. I firmly believe that it is the U.S. Senate and U.S. Congress's authority and constitutional responsibility to declare war. I worry that the resolution that is before us only eliminates the current resolutions, only eliminates the current authority. What is missing is the followup.

I just heard my colleague from Connecticut indicate that he will work vigorously to see that we have the opportunity to vote for a resolution authorizing force, but in some ways we have the cart ahead of the horse.

I will be the one who will always argue that it is our responsibility, it is Congress's responsibility to make these decisions as determined by the U.S. Constitution. It gives us that authority and that responsibility. The question in my mind is, Is it prudent to eliminate the authorization today before we have a new authorization in place? And I don't know the answer to that question.

While I have heard my colleagues say we will work to accomplish that, having experienced the U.S. Senate now for the last 7 years, I worry that a 6-month opportunity will be forgone, those authorizations may not occur, and, at best, once again the U.S. Senate may be presented with a fait accompli, which is, here is a resolution authorizing force. We are out of time. The 6 months is gone. Take it or leave it.

We will have a gun to our heads to approve, in an expeditious way, something that is not really what I would be supportive of. Once again, I will have the dilemma: Do I vote for some authorization of force even though it is not the one that is well thought out?

If I thought we were going to do an authorization of force, I would have expected it to have occurred already. I commend Senator Corker, the chairman of the committee, and many of my colleagues who have worked to put an authorization--a resolution in place and voted it out of committee, but no vote has occurred on the U.S. Senate floor, and no vote has occurred in the U.S. House of Representatives. I don't know whether we are setting the stage for us to be once again in a position of ``Here it is; take it or leave it,'' or worse than that, I suppose, is leaving those who serve our country in a position of not knowing whether their Congress supports their efforts.

It is not as if this is prospective; we already have troops on the ground in Afghanistan. I just returned from Afghanistan. That was my fourth visit there. I was there over the Labor Day weekend. I came to the conclusion that we belong in Afghanistan. I don't believe this is about rebuilding Afghanistan as much as it is about protecting Americans. There are 21 terrorist organizations at work in Afghanistan, out to kill citizens of the United States, attack us, and we have the Government of Afghanistan allowing us the opportunity to be engaged in a battle to defeat those terrorist organizations.

The idea that we would walk away--in fact, I heard my colleagues earlier talk about how long we have been there. Does anybody talk about how long terrorism is going to be with us? So the idea that we should set a parameter for our timeframe, knowing that we are engaged in a great battle for the future of our Nation with terrorist organizations that want us dead, seems to be the wrong way to look at this issue. I don't know what the right timeframe is, and I am saddened that we are still there, but it is not a matter of time, it is a matter of accomplishment of the mission of ending terrorist attacks against the United States. Nine-eleven remains fresh in my mind.

So the issue we face is, Does this resolution offered by the Senator from Kentucky put us in a position in which we finally do what we are supposed to do, which, in my view, is authorize, declare war--not necessarily an authorization of use of force, but whatever that mechanism of authorization is, does this resolution, this vote we will take today, does it put us in a position to take advantage of the circumstance in which Congress finally utilizes its authority and accepts its responsibility? I don't know the answer to that question.

We are making progress in Afghanistan. The greatest evidence of that to me was my visit to Bagram, to the hospital, during which I learned that 84 percent of the patients at the hospital are Afghani, not Americans.

I support the statement of strategy by the administration in regard to our efforts in Afghanistan and particularly the need to deal with Pakistan as a sanctuary.

The last thing I would want to do, having just returned from visiting with troops, including many Kansans, is make a decision today that they are no longer supported by Congress.

Going to war is something that, in my view, has been too easy in the United States, and we have had Presidential leadership for a long time that has downplayed the importance of war. We have been told that it will be easy, that oil revenues will pay for the war. It seems as if our political leadership in this country wants the American citizens to believe that we can go to war and that they will not suffer any consequence or participate in any way.

Declaring war and the authorization of use of military force by Congress brings the American people into this, rather than downplaying the significance and sacrifice. It makes certain that others, not just our military men and women and their families, make a sacrifice, that we are all in this together, and would involve Congress making a decision that this endeavor, whatever it is, is worth the potential loss of life by Americans who serve in our military.

These are difficult and challenging but important decisions, and I want to work with my colleagues to find the right solution--not just to walk away from a resolution but to make sure we have in place something that gives the authority to our troops to succeed.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senator McCain be recognized prior to Senator Corker's speaking time.

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Mr. President, I modify my request and ask unanimous consent that Senator McCain and Senator Reed be recognized prior to Senator Corker's speaking time.

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