Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2004

DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2004

AMENDMENT NO. 1277

    Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, yesterday as a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, I sat through a 5-hour hearing with the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Mr. George Tenet. It was one of the longest hearings I have ever been a party to in that committee. Virtually every member of the committee was present for the entire hearing. I think we can accurately draw the conclusion from that that it was a hearing of great importance because it addressed an issue which is central to our foreign policy and our national security, and that is the intelligence agencies of our Government.

    We are asking now some very difficult but important questions along two lines. First, was the intelligence gathered before the United States invasion of Iraq accurate and complete? Secondly, was that information relayed and communicated to the American people in an honest and accurate fashion? Those are two separate questions that are related.

    Yesterday, Director Tenet reiterated publicly what he has said before on July 11, that he accepted responsibility for the fact that in the President's State of the Union Address last January a sentence was included which was at best misleading. The sentence, of course, related to whether or not Iraq had attempted to obtain uranium from the African nation of Niger. What I am about to say is not from the hearing yesterday but rather from public disclosures and press reports relative to that issue.

    What we know is this: The allegations and rumors about Iraq obtaining uranium and other fissile materials from the country of Niger had been discussed at some length for a long period of time. In fact, documents had been produced at one point that some believed implicated the Iraqis and the Niger nation in this particular transaction. It is also true, though, that the people who are expert in this area had looked carefully and closely at that documentation and many had come to the opposite conclusion. Some had concluded this information, whether it was from British intelligence sources or American intelligence sources, was dubious, was not credible. Then it was disclosed that the documentation was actually a forgery.

    Many of those documents have been made public. Yesterday a leading newspaper in Italy published the documentation and it was reported on the news channels last night in the United States that when those documents were carefully reviewed, it was found that, in fact, they contained things which on their face were ridiculous, names of ministers in Iraq and Niger who had not been in that position for years, supposedly official seals on documentation which, when examined closely, turned out to be patently false and phony.

    So it was with that backdrop that the President, in his State of the Union Address, considered a statement concerning whether or not Niger had sold these fissile materials to Iraq.

    It has been disclosed publicly and can be discussed openly on the Senate floor that there was communication between the Central Intelligence Agency and the White House on this issue. It is apparent now to those who have followed this story that there was a discussion and an agreement as to what would be included in the speech. The 16 famous words relative to this transaction have now become central in our discussion about the gathering and use of intelligence.

    What I heard yesterday during the course of 5 hours with Director Tenet is that we have been asking the wrong question. The question we have been asking for some period of time now since this came to light was, Why didn't Director Tenet at the CIA stop those who were trying to put misleading information in the President's State of the Union Address? That is an important question. Director Tenet has accepted responsibility for not stopping the insertion of those words. But after yesterday's hearing and some reflection, a more important question is before the Senate. That question is this: Who are the people in the White House who are so determined to include this misleading information in the State of the Union Address and why are they still there?

    That goes to the heart of the question, not just on the gathering of intelligence but the use of the intelligence by the Executive Office of the President. That is an important question. It is a question we should face head on.

    An attempt was made last night by my colleague from New Jersey, Senator Corzine, to call for a bipartisan commission, a balanced commission, to look into this question about intelligence gathering and the use of the intelligence leading up to the war on Iraq. His amendment was defeated by a vote of 51 to 45 on a party-line vote—all Republicans voting against it; all Democrats supporting it. Senator Corzine's effort for a bipartisan, balanced, evenhanded commission was rejected by this Senate.

    The amendment which I bring today offers to the Senate an alternative. If the Senate does not believe there should be a bipartisan commission to investigate this question, this use of intelligence, then what I have said in this amendment is that we are calling on the President to report to Congress, the appropriate committees in the classified and unclassified fashion, whether or not there was a misuse of intelligence leading up to the war on Iraq. Those are the only two options before the Senate.

    In this situation, we have the Intelligence Committee in the House and the Senate looking at the classified aspect of this issue. We have said in the Senate that we do not accept the idea—at least, the Republican side does not accept the idea—of a bipartisan commission looking at this issue. So, clearly, the responsibility falls on the shoulders of the President.

    This amendment says that the President will report to the appropriate committees of Congress on this use of the intelligence information.

    Why is this an important discussion? It is particularly important from several angles. First, if we are engaged successfully in a war on terrorism, one of the greatest weapons in our arsenal will be intelligence. We will have to depend on our intelligence agencies to anticipate problems and threats to the United States. We will have to gather credible information, process that information, determine its credibility, determine its authenticity, and use it in defense of the United States. Now, more than ever, intelligence gathering is absolutely essential for America's national security.

    Second, the President has said we are now following a policy of preemption; we will no longer wait until a country poses an imminent threat to the United States or our security. If the President and his administration believe a country may pose such a threat in the future, the President has said we are going to protect our right to attack that country to forestall any invasion or attack on the United States.

    How do you reach the conclusion that another country is preparing to attack? Clearly, again, by intelligence gathering. Now, more than ever, in the war on terrorism and the use of a policy of preemption, we depend on intelligence. Those are the two central points.

    Equally, if not more important, is what happened in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq. For months, the President, the Vice President, and his Cabinet all sought to convince the American people this invasion of Iraq was not only inevitable but was, frankly, in the best interests of America's national security. The administration, the President, gathering the intelligence data, presented it to the American people in a variety of different fashions. We can all recall how this started. It was almost a year ago that in Crawford, TX, we first heard the President while he was in summer retreat suggest that something had to be done about Iraq and used the words "regime change."

    Then, over the months that followed, a variety of different rationales came forward for the need to invade Iraq and remove Saddam Hussein. First and foremost—and nobody argued this point on either side of the aisle—Saddam Hussein was a very bad leader, not just for the people of Iraq but for the region and a threat to the world. His removal from power from the beginning was certainly something that everyone understood would be in the best interest of the people of Iraq.

    But the obvious question was, if you are going to set out just to remove bad leaders of the world, where would you draw the line and what would those leaders do in response? So the administration said there are more arguments, even more compelling rationales.

    First and foremost, in Iraq they were developing nuclear weapons. We recall that conversation. As evidence of that, administration officials talked about the fact that Iraq had obtained certain aluminum tubes that could likely be used for the development of new nuclear weapons.

    Now, in fact, we know on reflection that there was even a debate within the administration whether these aluminum tubes could be used for nuclear weapons. Despite that, the administration said categorically, we believe they will be used for nuclear weapons and we believe that is a rationale for the invasion.

    Second, on other weapons of mass destruction, chemical and biological weapons, the administration went so far in its presentation to suggest that there were 550 sites where there was at least some possibility of weapons of mass destruction. They went into detail about how these weapons could threaten Israel, could threaten other countries in the region, might even threaten the United States. That information was given repeatedly.

    The fact is, we are 10 weeks after the successful completion of our military invasion of Iraq. More than 1,000 inspections have been made in Iraq. No weapons of mass destruction have been found. There has been some small evidence related to the discovery of something buried in a rose garden that could have been a plan for the use of a nuclear device. There has been the discovery of these mobile units in trailers which might have been used for the development of biological weapons. Those things have been discovered but of the so-called 550 sites, the fact is we have not discovered or uncovered one as I stand here today.

    I am confident before this is over that we will find some evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. It could happen as soon as tomorrow. I think that will happen. I believe that will happen. But we were told we were dealing with 550 sites. Statements were made by the President, the Vice President, Ms. Condoleezza Rice and others, that Saddam Hussein had arsenals of chemical and biological weapons. They have not been apparent.

    To think in that lightning-fast conquest of Baghdad, somehow Saddam Hussein had the time to literally wipe away or destroy any evidence of weapons of mass destruction strains credulity.

    What we have now is a serious question as to whether the intelligence was valid and accurate or whether it was portrayed to the American people in a valid and accurate way.

    We also had allegations that Saddam Hussein was linked with al-Qaida. Of course, this is something of great concern to the American people. We know that the al-Qaida terrorists are responsible for September 11, the loss of at least 3,000 innocent American lives on that tragic day. We would and should do what we can in any way, shape, or form to eliminate al-Qaida's threat to terrorism. I joined the overwhelming majority of the Senate, giving the President the authority and power to move forward on this question as to whether or not we should eliminate al-Qaida and its terrorist threat. The fact is, now, as we reflect on that information provided by the administration prior to the invasion of Iraq, there is scant information and scant evidence to link Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida.

    The list goes on. It has raised serious questions about the intelligence gathering leading up to the invasion of Iraq and the portrayal of that information to the American people. There is nothing more sacred or important in this country than that we have trust in our leaders when it comes to the critical questions of national security. When a President of the United States, with all of his power and all of his authority, stands before the American people and says: I am asking you to provide me your sons, your daughters, your husbands, your wives, your loved ones, to stand in defense of America—that, I think, is the most solemn moment of a Presidency. That is what is being questioned now. Was the information, for example, in the State of the Union Address, accurate in terms of America's intelligence? Two weeks ago the President conceded at least that sentence was not.

    What I have asked for in this amendment is that the Bush White House come forward with information on the gathering and use of this intelligence. With this information, they will be able to tell us with more detail exactly how the intelligence was used, intelligence related to the possession by Iraq of chemical and biological and nuclear weapons and locations, the links of the former Iraqi regime to al-Qaida, the attempts of Iraq to acquire uranium from Africa, the attempts of Iraq to procure aluminum tubes for the development of nuclear weapons, the possession by Iraq of mobile laboratories for the production of weapons of mass destruction, and the possession by Iraq of delivery systems for weapons of mass destruction, and any other matters that bear on the imminence of the threat from Iraq to the national security of the United States.

    I go into particular detail in paragraph B of this amendment where it relates to the acquisition of uranium from Africa because I think this has become abundantly clear. Some person or persons in the White House were bound and determined to include language in the President's State of the Union Address which was misleading, language which the President has disavowed, language which in fact Director Tenet said should never have been included.

    When you look at the uranium claims that were made in the President's State of the Union Address, and then read the statements made afterwards by members of the Bush White House, we can see on their face that we need to know more. Bush Communications Director Dan Bartlett, discussing the State of the Union Address, said last week that:

    There was no debate or questions with regard to that line when it was signed off on.

    I will tell you point blank that is not factual, based on statements made by Director Tenet.

    On Friday, July 11 of this year, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice said there was "discussion on that specific sentence so that it reflected better what the CIA thought."

    Miss Rice said, "Some specifics about amount and place were taken out."

    Director Tenet said Friday that CIA officials objected and "the language was changed."

    White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said Monday, July 14, that Miss Rice was not referring to the State of the Union speech, but she was, instead, referring to President Bush's October speech given in Cincinnati—even though Miss Rice was not asked about that speech.

    We have a situation here where the President and his advisers and speech writers were forewarned in October not to include in a speech in Cincinnati any reference to the acquisition of uranium by Iraq from the nation of Niger or from Africa. That admonition was given to a member of the White House staff and that element was deleted from the President's speech.

    Now we have statements from the President's National Security Adviser suggesting that there was still some discussion that needed to take place when it came to the State of the Union Address. I will tell you that is not a fact. This amendment which I am offering is asking that we have final clarity on exactly what happened in the White House on this critical piece of information that was part of the President's most important speech of the year, his State of the Union Address.

    White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer also said on Monday, July 14, that while the line cut from the October speech in Cincinnati was based on Niger allegations, the State of the Union claim was based on "additional reporting from the CIA, separate and apart from Niger, naming other countries where they believed it was possible that Saddam was seeking uranium."

    But Fleischer's words yesterday contradicted his assertion a week earlier that the State of the Union charge was "based and predicated on the yellowcake from Niger."

    Consider the confusion and distortions which we have already received from this administration about that line in the speech, and what it was referring to. That is a clear indication that more information is needed, more clarity is needed. We need from the President leadership in clearing this up and, frankly, clearing out those individuals who attempted to mislead him in his State of the Union Address.

    Miss Rice was asked a month ago about the President's State of the Union uranium claim on ABC's "This Week," and here is what she replied:

    The intelligence community did not know at the time or at levels that got to us that there was serious questions about this report.

    But senior administration officials acknowledged over the weekend that Director Tenet argued personally to White House officials, including Deputy National Security Adviser, Stephen Hadley, who is in the office of Condoleezza Rice, that the allegations should not be used in the October Cincinnati speech, 4 months before the State of the Union Address.

    CIA officials raised doubts about the Niger claims, as Director Tenet outlined on July 11, last Friday. The last time was when "CIA officials reviewing the draft remarks" of the State of the Union "raised several concerns about the fragmentary nature of the intelligence with National Security Council colleagues."

    Here is what it comes down to. We now have a battle ongoing within the administration over the issue of gathering and use of intelligence. The American people deserve more. They deserve clarity. They deserve the President's disclosure. They deserve the dismissal of those responsible for putting this misleading language in the President's State of the Union Address. I think what is at stake is more than a little political embarrassment which this administration has faced over the last several days. What is at stake is the gathering and use of intelligence for the security of the United States of America.

    This issue demonstrates the administration's intelligence-derived assertions about Iraq's levels of weapons of mass destruction-related activities raised increased concern about the integrity and use of intelligence and literally the credibility of our Government.

    We now know that when Secretary Colin Powell, the Secretary of State, was to make his address to the United Nations several days after the President's State of the Union Address, he sat down and, it has been reported in U.S. News and World Report, for a lengthy gathering with Director Tenet at CIA headquarters and went through point by point by point to make certain that he would not say anything in New York at the United Nations which could be easily rebutted by the Iraqis. Secretary Powell wanted to be careful that every word that he used in New York was defensible. And one of the first things he tossed out was that element of the President's State of the Union Address which related to acquiring uranium from Africa.

    Secretary Powell took the time and, with the right advisers, reached the right conclusion that certain things being said about Iraq that were being hyped and spun and exaggerated could not be defended. And he was not about to go before the United Nations Security Council and to use that information. He was careful in what he did because he knew what was at stake was not only his personal credibility but the credibility of the United States. That is why this incident involving the State of the Union Address is so important for us to look into.

    On the question of weapons of mass destruction, on August 26 of last year, Vice President Cheney said:

    Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us.

    On September 26, 2002, the President said:

    The Iraqi regime possesses biological and chemical weapons.

    On March 17, 2003, President Bush told the Nation:

    Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised.

    On March 30, 2003, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, said:

    We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south, and north somewhat.
    Not only did the administration tell us that there were over 500 suspected sites Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was even specific as to their location.

    Here we are 10 weeks later and 1,000 inspections later with no evidence of those weapons of mass destruction.

    On the al-Qaida connection, last year Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld described evidence about a connection between Iraq and al-Qaida as "bulletproof." But he did not disclose that the intelligence community was, in fact, uncertain about the nature and extent of these ties.

    In his speech before the United Nations Security Council on February 5, 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell said, in addition to the al-Qaida-affiliated camp run by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in areas not controlled by the Iraqi regime, two dozen extremists from al-Qaida-affiliated organizations were operating freely in Baghdad.

    The claim of a close connection between the Iraqi regime and al-Qaida was key to the fears that Iraq could team up with terrorists to perpetrate another devastating attack on the United States. It is critical that the truth of these assertions be examined in light of what the United States has found during and after the war.

    On the issue of reconstituting its nuclear weapons program in addition to the dispute about whether Iraq was trying to acquire uranium from Africa, the intelligence community was divided about these aluminum tubes that Iraq purchased and whether they were, in fact, intended to develop nuclear devices or only conventional munitions. Administration officials made numerous statements, nevertheless, expressing certainty that these tubes were for a nuclear weapons program.

    In a speech before the United Nations General Assembly on December 12, 2003, the President said,

    Iraq has made several attempts to buy high-strength aluminum tubes used to enrich uranium for a nuclear weapon.

    On September 8, 2000, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice said on CNN's "Late Edition" that the tubes "are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge programs."

    On August 26, Vice President Dick Cheney told the Veterans of Foreign Wars that "many of us are convinced that Saddam will acquire nuclear weapons fairly soon. Just how soon we cannot gauge."

    On March 16, the Vice President said:

    We believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.

    Consider these assertions and these statements leading up to our decision to invade. The hard question which has to be asked is whether the intelligence supported the statements. If the intelligence did not, then in fact we have exaggerated misleading statements which have to be made part of our record.

    On the question of mobile biological warfare laboratories, Secretary of State Powell said in his speech to the United Nations Security Council that "we know that Iraq has at least seven of these mobile, biological agent factories."

    On May 28, 2003, the CIA posted on its Web site a document it prepared with the Defense Intelligence Agency entitled "Iraqi Mobile Biological Warfare Agent Production Plants." This report concluded that the two trailers found in Iraq were for biological warfare agent production, even though other experts and members of the intelligence community disagreed with that conclusion, or believe there is not enough evidence to back it up. None of these alternative views were posted on the CIA's Web page.

    Did this Nation go to war based on flawed, incomplete, exaggerated, or misused intelligence?

    I am a member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which is conducting this review. I support that review because there is a lot we need to get into. We have oversight responsibilities over the intelligence agencies.

    I commend our Chairman, Senator Roberts, and our ranking member, Senator Rockefeller, on that committee. They have requested that the Inspectors General of the Department of State and the Central Intelligence Committee work jointly to investigate the handling and characterization of the underlying documentation behind the President's statement in the State of the Union Address. I certainly support that investigation.

    But the question of how intelligence related to Iraq was used by policymakers is a different question that simply must be determined.

    What we are saying now is if the Senate, as it did last night, rejects the idea of a bipartisan commission to look into the question, at the very least we should say in this Department of Defense appropriations bill that the President has a responsibility to report to Congress on this use of intelligence and information. It really goes to the heart of the President's responsibility as the head of our country and as Commander in Chief. He needs to have people near and around him giving him the very best advice based on the best intelligence. It is not only good for his administration, but it is essential for the protection of this Nation.

    I yield the floor.

    Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, before the Senator leaves, I wish to say categorically that had I been the Vice President of the United States, based upon the intelligence briefings that I have participated in now for over 20 years, I would have made exactly the same statements the Vice President made.

    I believe sincerely that the record of history shows clearly that Iraq has tried to acquire and did acquire nuclear capability in the past. The Israelis destroyed it once. We know he was trying again to reestablish them.

    There is no question that he had weapons of mass destruction. He used them on the Iranians. He used them on the Kurds. Gas is a weapon of mass destruction.

    There is also no question at all that he had the vehicles to transport weapons of mass destruction. Why did he build the vehicles if he didn't have them?

    This nit-picking at the language that was used—it was used, we now know, in error in terms of veracity as far as the reliance upon the concept of what the British had because it was later disclosed that one of the things they had was a forged document. Why did the United Nations, 17 times, ask to examine that country to find the weapons of mass destruction if the world did not believe he was after weapons of mass destruction, after he used them on the Iranians more than 15 years ago? They bombed the plant that absolutely had the reactor in it. And we knew he had weapons then.

    I have to say that when we look at what has happened, when our troops went into those barracks after the war commenced, they found that the Iraqis had special masks to protect them against weapons of mass destruction. We don't have those kinds of weapons.

    The Senator is a member of the Intelligence Committee. I am reliably informed that at a classified session yesterday he asked CIA Director George Tenet the very questions which he has asked on the floor, and he received the answers. Some of the Members don't like the answers, but they received them. Had Director Tenet took responsibility for a mistake in his agency—clearly he had problems about the way that document was handled and in terms of the speech.

    This is the third time this has come up now on this bill. This amendment would fence the Community Management Agency of the CIA, one of the most important and vital works of the agency. It would take $50 million from them.

    I am not going to do it now, but sometime in the future I am going to ask the Senator whether he believes that he never had weapons of mass destruction. Does he believe Iraq never had weapons of mass destruction? Does he believe there was no reason to go in there and do what we did?

    The problem is this amendment standing alone would deny the following programs funding:

    Assistant Director of the CIA to allocate their collection efforts against terrorists and other high-priority target activities. This is their central community program.

    Talking about the intelligence community, one of them is the National Drug Intelligence Center's Analysis of Information for Narcotraffickers—a vital concept that deals with counterterrorism activities.

    The second is the National Counterintelligence Oversight Analysis Assessment of Vulnerabilities to Foreign Intelligence Services.

    The next is efforts to improve the intelligence community's expertise in foreign languages.

    This was identified as the key unmet need by the joint inquiry that investigated the 9/11 activities.

    Each of those programs is essential to our national security.

    In order to make his point on this concept, the Senator again seeks to fence off $50 million for those vital activities. I hope the Senate listens to us about what he is willing to do in order to make this statement again.

    I shall move to table this amendment. But, again, I have been asked this question many times personally at home by the press and by family friends. Some of us are exposed to intelligence at a very high level of Government. We can't come out and talk about it.

    I noticed in the paper yesterday that some of our people because of this issue are starting to "lip off" about intelligence matters that should be classified. The Senate and the Congress should come back to order on that. We are allowed access to classified information—and to have us, because of some question about one phrase in the President's speech, suddenly decide that classification means nothing, is wrong, and it is not in the best interest of the United States.

    Now, Senator Inouye and I have been involved in extremely classified information for years. As a matter of fact, at our request, there was what we call a "tank" built in our building so we could have those people come visit us and we would not have to go out and visit the CIA or the other intelligence agencies. And we do listen to them.

    Based on everything I have heard—everything I have heard; and the two of us have shared the chairmanship of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, which is defense intelligence related, since 1981—everything I have heard convinces me, without question, that Iraq tried to develop a program of weapons of mass destruction, and did, in fact, have weapons of mass destruction. And we were justified—just as the Israelis were over 15 years ago when they went in and bombed one plant—we were justified to go in and just absolutely disestablish that administration because it had rebuked the U.N. 17 times in terms of the attempt to locate those weapons of mass destruction and to do what Saddam Hussein agreed he would do after the Persian Gulf war. He agreed to destroy them. He admitted he had them. He agreed to destroy them. And we tried to prove he destroyed them. Now, what is all this question about whether he had them? Because he admitted he had them.

    It is time we settle down and get back to the business of providing the money for the men and women in uniform around the world, and to ensure that the people who conduct our intelligence activities have the money to do what they have to do.

    The extended debate on this floor about intelligence activities because of that one 17- or 16-word—I don't remember—the small phrase in the President's State of the Union message is starting to really have an impact on the intelligence-collecting activities of this country. We do not want to besmirch that. We have the finest intelligence service in the world. If someone made a mistake—and now it has been admitted there was a mistake; not in whether or not he was trying to put together his nuclear weapons program—the mistake was in reference to what the British did have; and it was later found that the foundation for what the British thought they had was a forged document.

    Intelligence is absolutely essential to a nation that bases its capability to maintain peace on force projection, and we have to rely on many people to provide us information. Human beings make mistakes. God forbid that anyone would ever say because of one mistake we should harness the core efforts of our intelligence efforts and deny them the money this bill has for them to proceed until this commission, which the Senator wants to create, reports. I cannot believe we would delay the release of these funds for those reasons.

    The ongoing efforts of the Intelligence Committee are known. The Senator is a member of the Intelligence Committee. We who are members of the Subcommittee on Defense Appropriations have access to everything they have access to, because we manage the money that finances the agencies they investigate. So there is a whole series of us here who have access to extremely classified information.

    We classify it primarily because there are so many people involved that many lives might be in jeopardy if we disclose the sources of that information or we disclose the impact of that information in terms of the relationship to some of the programs we are funding today.

    I urge the Senate to settle down. I urge the Senate to settle down. We do not need this continued debate about the words in that State of the Union message. That is history, and it is going to be examined in terms of politics in the future.

    Now we had arranged the schedule this morning so we could conduct our business and still start the markup of four separate appropriations bills. I must be absent now as chairman of the committee for a period of time.

    I move to table the Senator's amendment, and I ask unanimous consent that the vote on that occur at a time to be determined by the majority leader after consultation with the minority leader. At the time of the stacking of votes on this and other amendments, I shall seek approval for a recorded vote on this amendment.

    The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?

    Mr. DAYTON. Madam President, reserving the right to object, I ask what the Senator's intention is regarding the schedule right now after the Senator concludes his remarks?

    Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, I have a motion to table. Has the motion to table been accepted by the Chair?

    The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has a unanimous consent request.

    Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the time for that vote be determined by the majority leader after consultation with the minority leader.

    Mr. REID. Madam President, I reserve the right to object. The Senator from Illinois is also a member of the Appropriations Committee, but he wants to have an opportunity to respond.

    Mr. DURBIN. I do.

    Mr. REID. He can do it any way he chooses. We are not going to have a vote right away, so he can attempt to have the floor. I wonder if the Senator from Alaska would—we have no right to object in any way to the motion to table, but the Senator from Illinois has more to say.

    Mr. STEVENS. I have no objection if the Senator wishes to respond. I wish to get my motion to table on the record, and I am happy for the Senator to speak after that motion in relationship to the amendment. I have no problem with that. I just want to get my part of this business done so I can go chair that committee markup.

    The PRESIDING OFFICER. The motion to table is pending.

    Mr. STEVENS. Is there an objection to my request that the motion to table vote be postponed until a time certain to be determined by the majority leader after consultation with the minority leader?

    The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?

    Mr. STEVENS. I am prepared to yield the floor, and you can talk as much as you want.

    Mr. REID. Has the unanimous consent request been agreed to?

    The PRESIDING OFFICER. No, it has not.

    Without objection, it is so ordered. The request is agreed to.

    Mr. REID. Madam President, before the distinguished chairman of the Appropriations Committee leaves the floor, the Senator from Minnesota asked a question: What are we going to do now? We have a number of amendments lined up. We are not going to do those because the two managers of this bill are members, of course, of the Appropriations Committee, as are Senator Durbin and myself.

    Mr. STEVENS. Will the Senator yield?

    I would be prepared to make a request that after Senator Durbin makes his remarks there be a period for morning business during which the Senator from North Dakota may be able to speak for up to 30 minutes on a matter not related to this bill.

    Mr. REID. Reserving the right to object, the Senator from Wyoming wishes to speak for 10 minutes, I am told, on the bill itself.

    Is that right?

    Mr. THOMAS. Yes. I was going to follow up on what has been said.

    Mr. REID. The Senator from North Dakota has no objection to him going first, he being the Senator from Wyoming.

    Mr. STEVENS. That is fine.

    Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Wyoming have 10 minutes to speak on the bill, and following that time, the Senator from North Dakota have 30 minutes as in morning business, and following that the Senator from——

    Mr. DAYTON. Minnesota.

    Mr. STEVENS. Minnesota.

    Mr. DAYTON. I would like to speak on Senator Durbin's amendment. I would agree to 5 minutes.

    Mr. STEVENS. Could it be that we agree to 30 minutes of debate pertaining to matters relating to this amendment, notwithstanding the motion to table has been made? Is that agreeable? That will give us enough time to get back.

    The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

    Mr. REID. Also, Mr. President, if I could, Senator Kennedy is going to be here at around 11 o'clock. Of course, that has slipped.

    Mr. STEVENS. It is roughly 11 o'clock.

    Mr. REID. He will offer the next amendment. Perhaps then Senator Byrd will. Really, we are narrowing the number of amendments that are going to be offered.

    Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I don't know what the Senate would do without the assistance of the distinguished Democratic whip. We have in history Light Horse Harry, and this is our "Heavy Horse" Harry. He does the heavy work around here, and we all appreciate him.

    The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.

    Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, pursuant to the unanimous consent agreement, I can assure my colleagues I will not take 30 minutes. I will be extremely brief because I already stated my case in support of this amendment. But I would like to respond to the Senator from Alaska.

    He and I have had some titanic struggles on this floor over a variety of issues, but I have the highest regard and respect for him personally. I am certain he did not mean to suggest nor did he say I have disclosed any classified information in my statement this morning. I would not do that, not knowingly. What I have disclosed to the Senate, in preparation for a vote on this amendment, has all been a matter of public record and published information.

    There are many other things I have learned as a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee to which I can't make reference, because it is classified and very important, that remain classified. But I don't know which bill you would go to if you didn't go to the Defense Department bill to deal with questions of intelligence. It is one of the few, if only, bills coming before the Senate relating to intelligence gathering. We don't have a full blown discussion here about appropriations for the Central Intelligence Agency and all the intelligence aspects of the Federal Government. It is a carefully guarded secret of our Government as to how much is being spent and how it is spent. Many people have objected to that over the years. I understand their objections. I also understand the wisdom that we try to keep in confidence exactly what we are doing to gather information to protect America. About the only place where we openly discuss the funding of intelligence is in this bill. If you don't come to this floor on this bill to suggest that we can do a better job in gathering intelligence to protect America, then, frankly, there is no other appropriations bill to which you can turn.

    I assume you might argue that the Department of Homeland Security, our new Department, has some aspects of intelligence. Maybe that argument can be made. But the most compelling argument is on this bill, the Department of Defense bill. That is why this amendment is not superfluous or out of line. This is where the amendment needs to be offered because what we are saying is, America is only as safe as the men and women who are protecting it, men and women who are in uniform, literally putting their lives on the line, and men and women working for our Government gathering information so that we can anticipate threats and make certain we protect the people.

    What I have said in this amendment is we, clearly, know now that in the President's State of the Union Address statements were made which the President has disavowed as not being accurate and which the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency has said should not have been included because they were misleading. That is a critical element.

    We gather across this Rotunda in the House of Representatives once a year, the combined membership of the House and the Senate, the Cabinet, the Supreme Court, the diplomatic corps, to hear the President deliver the State of the Union Address. It is his most important speech of the year. He outlines to the people the accomplishments of our Nation and the challenges we face.

    This President came before us last January in an atmosphere leading up to an invasion of Iraq, a war. I don't think there is any more serious undertaking by a government than to say we are going to war. We are asking our citizens to put their lives on the line for the security of America. The President came to the people with that message.

    We now know that at least one major part of that message—they say it is only 16 words but it was a major part of his message—was not accurate.

    Do I think the President intentionally misled the American people? There is no evidence of that whatsoever. I have not heard a single person say he intentionally misled the American people in making that statement. But I will tell you this, there were people in that White House who should have known better. They had been warned 4 months before not to use the same reference in a speech the President was giving in Cincinnati. They had been told by the CIA that the information was not credible, could not be believed, should not be stated by the President of the United States, and that section was removed from the President's speech in October.

    Those same people in the White House, bound and determined to put that language in the President's State of the Union Address, put in misleading language which attributed this information not to our intelligence, because our intelligence had disavowed it, discredited it, said we can't believe it.

    No, they attributed it to British intelligence. Our people believed the British intelligence had been wrong from the start and yet we allowed that to be included in the speech.

    Across America and around the world, people heard our President say that Iraq was acquiring uranium—or attempting to—from Niger in Africa to develop nuclear weapons. That is a serious charge. It is as serious as any charge that has been made against Saddam Hussein's regime. Someone in the White House decided they would cut a corner and allow the President to say this by putting in that phrase "based on British intelligence."

    I would think the President would be angered over the disservice done to him by members of his staff. I would think the President would acknowledge the fact that even if Director Tenet could not discourage that member of the White House staff and stop them from putting in that language, the President has within his ranks on his staff some person who was willing to spin and hype and exaggerate and cut corners on the most important speech the President delivers in any given year.

    That is inexcusable. This amendment says that this President will report to Congress on exactly what happened in reference to that State of the Union Address, that finally we will know the names of the people involved, that they will be held accountable for this misconduct which has caused such embarrassment, not just to the President, not just to his party, but to our Nation.

    We need to be credible in the eyes of the world. When statements such as the one made by the President are clearly disavowed by the President, it affects our credibility.

    Last night we tried to create an independent bipartisan commission to look into this question in an honest fashion. It was rejected on a party-line vote with every Republican voting against it.

    Now I have taken the second option. Now we call on the President himself. Harry Truman from Independence, MO, used to say "the buck stops here," when it comes to the President. The buck has stopped on the President's desk. The question is, What will he do to establish his credibility, to make certain that the next State of the Union Address is one that is credible in the United States and around the world and to make sure those people who misused the power of their office to lead him to make those misleading statements are removed once and for all?

    It is a painful chapter in American history but it is one we cannot avoid. So long as it is unresolved, there will be a shadow over the intelligence gathering and use of this administration. That is not in the best interest of national security. It is not in the best interest of the people.

    We in Congress have our responsibility, as a coequal branch of Government, to enforce oversight and to make certain that the American people are well served.

    I yield the floor.