Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2007
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2007 -- (Senate - August 03, 2006)
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Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I will speak to the Defense appropriations bill which is before the Senate and discuss the war in Iraq in the context of this bill.
This bill includes $50 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Earlier this week, we added another $13.1 billion for emergency funding for the Army and Marine Corps to repair and replace badly needed equipment. I supported these additional funds and I support this bill.
I have this vision in my mind of our soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan driving down those dusty roads wondering if a bomb is going to explode, and I think about us in the safety of this Senate Chamber here at home. I think to myself, if it were my son or daughter in uniform serving our country, risking their lives, would I want them to have everything possible to come home safely? The answer is very obvious.
Although I had great misgivings about the decision which led us into this war in Iraq. I was one of 23 Senators from both sides of the aisle who voted against the authorization of force that initiated this war. My belief at the time as a Member of the Senate Intelligence Committee was that the American people were not being given the full story, they were not being given the facts.
We were told that Iraq was a great threat to the United States with weapons of mass destruction and nuclear weapons. We were told that there was some connection between September 11 and al-Qaida terrorism and Saddam Hussein and Iraq. It turned out that none of those things were true. It was also very obvious from the outset, as we initiated this war in Iraq and invaded this country, we did it with the valued assistance of the United Kingdom and many other countries, but the burden fell on American soldiers, marines, airmen, and sailors more than any others, and the burden fell on American taxpayers and American families more than any others.
So now we are in the fifth year of this war. We have been briefed from time to time about the progress we are making, and there are positive things which we should not overlook. Saddam Hussein is gone. He was rooted out of a hole in the ground. He is being held for trial. That is certainly a positive thing in the history of this world. We also know that the Iraqi people have been given an opportunity which no one might have dreamed of a few years ago, to have free elections and to elect their own government. That is a very positive thing. Of course, the courage of individual Iraqi citizens as well as the courage of our soldiers is an inspiration to all of us as we consider this situation.
But we have to say, if we are honest and objective, that the situation in Iraq is far from peaceful, it is far from stable. Mr. President, 2,585 American soldiers have given their lives in this battle, over 100 of them from my home State of Illinois. Almost 20,000 of these soldiers have returned home seriously injured, many of them amputees, 2,000 of them with serious head injuries. Their lives will be quite different because of their service to our country and because of their experience in this war.
We have spent some $320 billion on this war. We are spending at the rate of $3 billion a week on the war in Iraq. We are cutting back on spending in our own home budget for things as varied as aid to education, money for our schools, cutting back at the National Institutes of Health for medical research, cutting back in so many areas because war takes money away from a country that might spend it at home. That is the reality of what we face.
We know the funds in this bill will not carry our military through the year 2007. The President and Secretary of Defense continue to send us so-called emergency bills which are supposed to be reserved for unanticipated surprise expenses. That is how we funded the war in Iraq, which is now going into its fifth year. These are certainly not unanticipated expenses. We know a war costs, and it costs greatly.
There are the short-term costs of war, the $320 billion price tag, but there are other costs that will be with us for a long time. A Pulitzer Prize-winning economist has estimated that the cost of medical treatment for veterans with brain injuries from the Iraqi war will be at least $14 billion over the next 20 years. To date, 1,700 of these soldiers have returned with serious traumatic brain injury. In a recent calculation of 115 soldiers who were exposed to blast injuries, such as IEDs, 62 of the 115 had some form of a traumatic brain injury.
It means, of course, in the most serious cases, extensive surgery and rehabilitation in an effort to get back to a normal life. It means in some other cases that they will lapse into epileptic seizures that will need to be carefully watched and treated for many years to come. This number, $14 billion for the next 20 years for brain injurie alone associated with the war in Iraq, tells us that we will pay, as these soldiers and their families will pay, for a long time to come.
The numbers I have given do not include the billions of dollars which we will need to repair and replace equipment for the Active-Duty units and the National Guard and Reserve. LTG Steven Blum of the National Guard bureau said:
Today, here at home, I have less than 34 percent of the equipment I'm supposed to have.
In my hometown of Springfield, IL, I visited the National Guard at the Camp Lincoln facility. I looked at their empty parking lot: 85 percent of our Guard units in Illinois have been over at least once. They have run this equipment into the ground, and they have left a lot of it behind; it was just worn out. In a war, equipment is burned up at four or five times the normal rate. I can understand that. They are racing to make sure they are safe, and it takes its a toll on vehicles and equipment.
They come home now to find empty parking lots and empty equipment lockers. Our National Guard units do not have the equipment they need to train to be ready if called up again. They do not have the equipment they need to respond to homegrown emergencies, whether it is a flood or a situation they need to be there for. Many of them have to beg, borrow, and scratch to find what they need.
According to Army officials, two-thirds of the Army's active brigades are not ready for war. There is substantial criticism of previous Presidents that we had a hollowed-out Army, an Army in name only, that wouldn't be there if we needed it. Now the Army is being very forthright and saying, yes, we have paid a heavy toll, not just in lives--and that is the most important thing--but in training and readiness and basic equipment.
The Army currently estimates that it needs $17 billion to address these readiness needs. The Marine Corps needs between $12 and $15 billion. General Blum reports the National Guard is ``even further behind and even a more dire situation than the active Army. .....We both have the same symptoms but [the Guard] has a higher fever.''
The National Guard's budget problems will only grow worse if the administration's plans are followed. The Army National Guard currently has 340,000 members, and it is working to recruit up to 350,000. There was a time in the Persian Gulf war when National Guard units and Reserve units were almost shunned. The regular Army said: Leave them at home. We will take a few of them, but we will do the job. We will tell you if we need you. It did not take long in Iraq and Afghanistan for our regular Army to understand they needed the National Guard and Reserve and needed it desperately. The Department of Defense budget only plans to fund 324,000 guardsmen over the next 5 years when we know we will need 350,000. That is something we should face more realistically.
The men and women in our military and their families give everything we could possibly ask of them. I cannot tell you how many times I have been to sendoffs and welcome homes in Illinois for Guard and Reserve units. I cannot tell you what it is like unless you have been there to stand there with mom and dad in tears watching their soldier, whom they love so much and respect so much, off to war. It is a story that has been repeated many times in the history of our Nation, but it never gets easy for that family sending off someone they dearly love.
In my home State of Illinois, 85 percent of our Guard units have been mobilized in the last 3 years and many have gone more than once. Of the 34 percent of the Illinois Guard equipment that has not been deployed, 10 percent has been deemed unacceptable due to age and lack of parts and inadequate armor protection. These dire equipment shortages undercut the Guard unit's ability to train and be prepared.
Our guardsmen, God bless them, will find a way to serve. They will make do. They will scratch it together and they will answer the call. They always do. But we know what has happened. We have had soldiers stand up and say publicly: We have been digging through landfills to find armor to try to protect ourselves. Things are getting better. There are improvements. The humvees which we are now sending are armored up, at least to the latest threat that we face, even though the threat seems to change and grow by the day.
Our soldiers deserve the best. They deserve planning and decision making at the highest levels of Government that respects their sacrifice and provides the resources they need to fulfill their missions. We underestimated the cost of this war, it is clear. We overestimated the danger of Iraq to the United States. That is clear. We underestimated the insurgency which now threatens our troops. We underestimated the civil war which now appears to be breaking out. Six thousand civilians have died in the last 2 months in Iraq. We are perilously close to a civil war situation. And our soldiers, our American soldiers, are caught in the middle of this deadly crossfire in Iraq.
I am afraid that this civil war is underway, and I am afraid it is not ours to win. This is a war that the Government and people of Iraq must deal with. They have to find a way to end the sectarian violence, to reign in the murderous militias. Baghdad, when I visited a year and a half ago, was the central point for American protection and security. We were hurried from the airport by convoy, first by helicopter and then by convoy, into the so-called green zone, an old palace of Saddam Hussein's which is guarded in three our four different perimeters to make sure it was safe--and still it was not. There we have not only our personnel from the embassy and important decision makers at the highest level of the military but a lot of soldiers, a lot of marines, and a lot of sailors. Baghdad, that was the central place, the central point of our effort for security in Iraq.
Now, unfortunately, the security in that city has deteriorated dramatically, deteriorated to the point where we need thousands more American soldiers, not to mention Iraqi soldiers, to move in and make it safe.
At some point in this terrible situation, there will be a tipping point when the forces of chaos and hatred will gain the upper hand in Iraq. I hope it hasn't been reached yet. I am afraid if we don't change course and the Iraqi Government doesn't change course, we will.
I understand we have a vote scheduled for 4 o'clock, so I conclude by saying I will support this bill. Although I question the policy that brought us to this point, although I question this administration's plan to bring an end to this war in Iraq, my questions cannot be at the expense of shortchanging our troops. We must have the courage and vision to chart the right course so that the Iraqis stand up and defend their own country and that American soldiers start to come home with their mission truly accomplished.
I yield the floor.
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Mr. DURBIN. Will the Senator from Michigan yield for a question?
Ms. STABENOW. I will be happy to.
Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I say through the Chair, I commend the Senator from Michigan. I know she has a substantial Lebanese population in her State. We have a substantial Lebanese population as well. They are fine people, good people, who have made a success here in America, proud of their heritage in Lebanon. They are following every day, every minute the news that is coming back that reminds us of the suffering that is taking place both in Israel and in Lebanon.
I am glad the Senator from Michigan has addressed this issue. I would like to ask the Senator this. I have prepared a bill, with Senator Sununu and Senator Feingold as cosponsors, which addresses another aspect of this issue. There are many Lebanese who are currently visiting in the United States or studying in the United States here legally on visas, whose visas may expire at any time--tomorrow or in the next week or month. Many of them are concerned about being forced to return to a war zone, being asked to return to a place that may be dangerous.
We know we evacuated American citizens out of Lebanon for fear for their own safety and warned the others not to stay. We know many other countries did the same.
I ask the Senator from Michigan, in addition to her excellent amendment relative to humanitarian assistance for those both in Lebanon and Israel, does she feel this temporary protected status which we would offer on a temporary basis should be expedited as well so these visitors will have a chance, if they want, to stay in the United States in a safe place until the hostilities have ended?
Ms. STABENOW. I thank my friend and our leader from Illinois, and I commend him for this legislation. In fact, I am proud to lend my name to the legislation. I hope we move urgently to let people know that they will not be required to go home to a place where we have been evacuating thousands and thousands of people, sending ships in to evacuate Americans.
I must say, we have had over 25,000 people from Michigan alone. We have seen over 13,000 come back. Those who are still there are desperately concerned about their family members, not being able to hear from them. Often there is no phone, no computer. So the idea of sending people here back into that violence makes absolutely no sense.
I commend the Senator. I hope part of what we would do before we leave is to make it clear that we would not ask those innocent people to return to a war zone.
Mr. DURBIN. If the Senator will further yield for a question through the Chair, I am sure the Senator is aware that we have done this before. When people are visiting in the United States and hostilities break out in their homeland, we have offered them a chance to stay here on a temporary basis.
I might add, there are safeguards built into this process. If there is anyone about whom we have a question as to whether or not they are safe to remain in the United States, they will not receive this temporary status. That goes without saying. We want to make certain that the people who remain here are truly those innocent travelers--students, members of families--who are concerned about whether returning home could endanger them or people who are here.
I ask the Senator from Michigan, if we are in a predicament where a family is here visiting their relatives in Chicago or Detroit and they have small children and they are from one of the parts of southern Lebanon that has been under fire, does it not stand to reason that we as a compassionate people would say to them: You can wait. Stay with your family. We are not going to force you to leave. We have done this in the past, and I hope the Senator from Michigan believes, as I do, that it is reasonable to do it under these circumstances.
Ms. STABENOW. I say to my friend from Illinois, I could not agree more. When you talk about people who come to visit, I think about the group of families and children I met with on Saturday who actually came home from Lebanon--escaped, essentially--but were talking about their family members who are here. Bint Jbeil--that is the town in southern Lebanon where they identified a Hezbollah stronghold--is also a place that 15,000 people in Michigan call their hometown. People have come to visit in the summer, to do the things that we all do: to go to the family wedding, to visit grandpa and grandma; as older citizens, coming to visit the grandchildren. There are all kinds of families who come back and forth all the time. That we would have people that are here be forced to go back to a war zone is really unthinkable.
I commend again our distinguished Senator from Illinois for his leadership, focusing on this issue which is so critical. I hope we would in fact bring that bill before the Senate for a vote or seek unanimous consent before we leave. It is absolutely critical.
I hope, again, we are going to make it clear that for those, whether they are in Lebanon or Israel, who have found themselves without any prior warning to be in a situation where they are innocently caught in the violence that has occurred, we, as Americans, need to do what we know how to do, which is to reach out and to help and be a part of a worldwide humanitarian effort. We need to address those issues--whether it is food, clothing, shelter, crucial issues to so many people, tens of thousands of people, probably hundreds of thousands, who find themselves in a situation where they are looking around for someone to help them.
America needs to be an important leader in lending our support. I am hopeful this amendment of $200 million will be included as an emergency spending category in this legislation.
Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be added as a cosponsor to the pending amendment by the Senator from Michigan.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. DURBIN. Will the Senator yield for a question?
Ms. STABENOW. I am happy to yield.
Mr. DURBIN. I would like to finish the comments I made about this temporary protected status so the record is clear for colleagues who are following this important debate--and particularly our Lebanese-American friends who are watching this, I am sure, with great interest, because of the efforts of the Senator from Michigan--I would like to put in the RECORD at this point that in 1990, Congress enacted the Temporary Protected Status Statute. It grants that for 1 year nationals from El Salvador who were residing in the United States the right to stay. That was done of course because of hostilities.
After that, the Attorney General, administratively, in consultation with the State Department, granted this as well to residents from the following countries: Kuwait, Rwanda, Lebanon--this was during the period from 1991 to March of 1993--Kosovo, the provinces of Serbia, Bosnia, and Herzegovina, and Angola and Sierra Leon.
I might also say to the Senator from Michigan, what we are hoping to add, as a separate bill that might pass independently or be part of this bill, is consistent with what we are currently doing. We have offered this temporary relief from deportation or temporary protected status to those who are from the countries of Burundi, El Salvador, Honduras, Liberia, Nicaragua, Somalia, and Sudan.
The reason I raise these issues is I want all my colleagues to know what we are suggesting is entirely consistent with the values of previous administrations of both political parties. It is an act of compassion and humanitarianism which I think reflects well on the United States, as does the amendment by the Senator from Michigan.
This may not be in the form of a question--it might not qualify for ``Jeopardy''--but I say to her: I commend her for her humanitarian assistance, and I hope she will join us in helping to pass the other amendment as a separate issue.
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