Ukraine Invasion War Crimes Deterrence and Accountability Act

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, I thank my dear friend, Chairman Meeks, for working with me on this important legislation. This is a historic time, and it is a historic bill.

This is the largest invasion in Europe since World War II, with war crimes in Europe the likes of which we haven't seen since my father's generation in my father's war.

Mr. Speaker, the world is watching, and history will judge us all by how we act, by our actions. As the chairman said, the tape is filming; the reel is filming this. We are seeing these horrific images coming out of Ukraine as I speak, and sadly, there will be many more. We have just hit the surface.

Corpses are littering the streets of Bucha, their hands tied behind their backs and bullets in their heads. Some are decapitated.

A pregnant woman, covered in blood--these monsters bombed a maternity hospital, for God's sake--as she gets wheeled out, holding on to her womb or baby. Sadly, and tragically, both she and her baby did not survive that day.

Mothers are raped in front of their children, and young girls are raped in front of their families--girls.

The bodies of families are half-buried together in shallow graves, with their hands still sticking out of the ground.

My God, what is happening in this world? I never imagined or thought I would see this in my lifetime. This is of centuries ago, not today.

The bombing of apartments and public buildings providing refuge to children and the elderly, including a theater in Mariupol that had the word ``children'' written outside so large in Russian that the satellites could see it--we could see it from satellites. What do the Russians do? They bombed it. They bombed it knowing that there were children inside.

Today, just today, most disturbing, we have reporting out of Ukraine that Russia is bringing in mobile crematoriums to deal with the carnage because there are so many bodies in the streets. They are bringing in mobile crematoriums in an effort to hide the evidence of their crimes.

These are Putin's war crimes, and he will be held responsible. He and his cronies, and the Russian troops who have carried them out, must be held accountable.

Sadly, these are not the first war crimes committed by Putin's troops, as the people of Chechnya, Georgia, and Syria can attest.

We cannot wait for the next atrocity before we act. We must do what we can now to deter Russian leaders, commanders, and troops in the field from committing further war crimes.

That is why we introduced this legislation. It will ensure the United States helps the people of Ukraine gather, analyze, and maintain the evidence of these war crimes.

It will also put Russian troops--I think ``troops'' is probably not the right word--these Russian monsters and their leaders on notice that the world is watching.

The world is watching them right now, and we are taking names. We are taking the names of these war criminals; we are taking photographs; we are taking surveillance; and we are taking the satellite imagery to document this injustice, this crime against humanity. And we will seek justice.

Mr. Speaker, I am very proud of the bipartisan efforts that our committee has made. But on the topic, I just have to--my God, I can't believe we are here even talking about this. I can't believe this is actually happening in this world, in this century.

These horrific atrocities in Bucha have made one thing crystal clear: No country can remain neutral in the face of this evil. The entire world needs to rally against Mr. Putin and these war crimes. Passing this bill is a step forward to getting justice done.

I was a Federal prosecutor for a good part of my life, and I have dealt with a lot of victims. I have seen a lot of really awful things that man can do to mankind. I have to say, Mr. Speaker, this is probably--in fact, it is absolutely the worst thing I have seen in my lifetime.

The world is watching, and history will judge us all. All nations will judge us all by what we do here and now.
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Mr. McCAUL. Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith).

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Madam Speaker, I thank my good friend for yielding, and I thank both Ranking Member McCaul and Chairman Meeks for their extraordinary leadership on this important bill that is before us today.

I want to thank Mr. Meeks for his eloquent remarks a moment ago summarizing the absolute atrocities that are being committed by Vladimir Putin, his military, and Lukashenko who is the enabler, the President of Belarus. The gentleman has described in vivid detail just how horrific this is. And as my good friend from Texas said a moment ago, my father fought in World War II as well in the South Pacific, but the crimes that were committed by imperial Japan and by the Nazis are now being replicated on a grand scale by Vladimir Putin. It has to stop, and it has to stop yesterday. So I rise in strong support of this legislation.

Madam Speaker, on March 8 I chaired a hearing at the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission entitled ``Accountability for Russia's War Crimes and Aggression Against Ukraine.'' The day before I also introduced a resolution calling for accountability for Vladimir Putin for his crimes against the Ukrainian people and his aggression against Ukraine.

The witnesses could not have been more clear that delay is denial and that we need to act now.

I was very much involved with the court in the former Yugoslavia and very involved with the court for Sierra Leone. David Crane led that effort. I was very involved with the Rwandan court and tried to get a court for Syria but failed. I pushed hard for it with a resolution on this floor, and the House did pass it.

But the key here is timeliness. Don't wait.

The ICC, while it may do some good here, and they do have an investigation that they have instituted, the ICC has been notoriously slow. They have had less than 10 convictions over 20 years. Now, if that venue works, great. But my concern--and I think the concern shared by many, particularly in the NGO community--is that there needs to be another venue stood up quickly that could make the difference.

At the March hearing, David Crane, the founding Chief Prosecutor of the U.N. Special Court for Sierra Leone, talked about an international tribunal created by the United Nations General Assembly. We are all thinking, Hey, when it gets to the Security Council, the Security Council will have two vetoes at least. It will be Russia, and it will be China. Not so in the General Assembly. They can stand up a court and they can do it tomorrow that would indict Vladimir Putin on the next day.

There is certainly enough evidence--keep building the evidence, of course--but there is enough evidence to do it right now, and that, hopefully, will tell everybody around him that the time will come when you will be in the dock as well.

I remember meeting with Slobodan Milosevic in Serbia and going to Bosnia and Croatia many times during that horrific war in the Balkans. Time and time again he thought he was untouchable, total impunity because of that. He killed so many because there was no accountability. Well, he went to The Hague as part of the ad hoc tribunal, and he died while the proceedings were underway. But he would have been held to account.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this. We have already had one vote in the General Assembly, 141 out of 198 voted and a number of people abstained. You only need a simple majority.

I did ask our number two at the State Department, at Gregory Meeks' hearing earlier today, to take back to the administration the idea of looking at all the venues. But let's get a court constituted immediately. If the ICC wants to step in at some point, fine. But indict Putin. Indict him, and you will see some people running like rats on the ship who were a part of his regime knowing that they, too, will be held accountable and sent to prison for the rest of their lives.

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Mr. McCAUL. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time for the purpose of closing.

Madam Speaker, we rise today not as Republicans or Democrats but as Americans and as a united Congress on behalf of the American people condemning these atrocities.

Madam Speaker, there is a group called the Wagner Group that is entering Ukraine right now. They are the worst of the worst. They are mercenaries. They are cold-blooded killers. Mr. Putin has sent them to Africa to kill people in Mali and Libya, and they have been in the Donbas previously. They have a saying, these Wagner thugs, these monsters, that our business is killing, and business is good.

This is sick. They rape women and girls. They kill for a living, and, yes, now they are entering Ukraine.

Sadly, Madam Speaker, I am not sure Bucha is the last we are going to see of this, and when the dust clears from Mariupol, God knows what we are going to find there. God only knows. When they are talking about mobile crematoriums to hide the evidence of so much carnage and so many bodies to be burned. This has to stop.

We are standing together united as Americans condemning this, and as a former Federal prosecutor, yes, to indict Mr. Putin for his crimes against humanity.

Mr. Putin thought his legacy after this fiasco was going to be reclaiming the glory of the empire. He would be known as great as the czars or maybe Stalin. Maybe he is like Stalin. His legacy is not going to be reclaiming the empire. His legacy is going to be that of a war criminal. That will impact his psyche, and that will impact all those around him, including his oligarchs, that no one is safe here, that you will be indicted internationally, and that you will be brought to justice.

For without justice in the face of these crimes against humanity, what good are we? So this is an historic moment.

I want to thank the chairman, as always, on this committee for working with me to stand up against evil, because that is exactly what this is.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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