Success in Anbar Province

Floor Speech

SUCCESS IN ANBAR PROVINCE -- (Senate - April 30, 2007)

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, my good friend the majority leader neglected to mention the front-page story in the New York Times yesterday about the extraordinary success our troops are having in Anbar Province, the center of much of the al-Qaida activity in Iraq, with Sunni sheikhs, tribal leaders coming together to support, not just verbally but in terms of supplying military personnel, fighters to take on al-Qaida in Anbar Province. It is a piece of good news in admittedly a cloudy picture in Iraq. It is also the case, I am confident, that a majority of Democrats in both the House and Senate believe that funds should be supplied for the troops. That certainly has been the view of the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin. Hopefully, we will find a way forward after the bill that regretfully has the surrender date in it tomorrow is sent down to the President and vetoed. Beginning Wednesday, we will be discussing how to go forward. The majority leader and I have had some preliminary discussion about that. Hopefully, we can resolve this matter in the very near future to provide the funding for the troops so General Petraeus's mission, for which we confirmed him 81 to nothing, will have the resources to be completed later this year.

I yield the floor.

Source