National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008--Continued

Floor Speech

NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2008--Continued -- (Senate - July 17, 2007)

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Ms. CANTWELL. Madam President, I rise because I believe we need to have an up-or-down vote on the bipartisan Levin-Reed amendment. I believe it is time to change course in Iraq. I believe a majority of the Senate believes we need to change course in Iraq and change the combat role the United States is playing to a role of support. We have lost more than 3,600 U.S. soldiers, and my State of Washington has been deeply involved from the very beginning, from the deployment of the USS Abraham Lincoln to the service of the Stryker brigade from Fort Lewis and the continued service of that brigade on the front lines in Iraq today. The Stryker brigade has suffered severe casualties, and they continue to serve us well.

The cost of this war has been great, over $450 billion. The United States is now spending $10 billion a month in Iraq. What we are asking is the ability to find out whether a majority of the Senate supports changing the course in Iraq. By filibustering, the other side is preventing us from finding that out. I am not saying I don't support the rights of the minority to filibuster. I do. But I also respect the strong desire by the American people to see where every Senator stands on this proposal to change the course in Iraq being proposed today. That is what the debate is about, whether we are going to see how each Senator votes on this issue. If the filibuster continues, we won't see that vote.

Some people have talked about the surge. I respect those who believe and advocate for the surge. I do not support the surge as a strategy. This Senator bought into the milestones that this body approved in the Warner-Frist amendment. I believed in a bipartisan effort of 79 Senators, in legislation that was a part of the Defense authorization act that was then signed by the President of the United States in January 2006.

The Warner-Frist amendment said, in a bipartisan fashion, what this body wanted to see happen in Iraq. It said that 2006 should be the year of significant transition. We said that 2006 is when Iraqi Security Forces should take the lead. That is when they should create conditions for a phased redeployment of United States forces from Iraq. That was the goal at the end 2006. I took those goals seriously.

The Warner-Frist amendment said we should be telling the leaders of all groups and all political parties in Iraq that in 2006 they needed to make the political compromises necessary to achieve the broad, sustainable political settlements that were essential for bringing Iraq together and defeating the insurgents. Even during that time period, President Talabani of Iraq said that by the end of 2006 they would be able to take over all 18 provinces under their security. So, yes, this Senator was greatly disappointed when those goals were not met. Again, I did not support the surge because the 2006 milestones were not met. It showed that we were not making sufficient progress in Iraq and needed a change of course.

And by any measure today, the Iraqis have not and are not making progress on the political and security benchmarks that need to be achieved. Debaathification reform, amendments to the Iraqi Constitution, the passage of an oil law--all of these things are being stymied. Only seven of the 18 provinces have acquired full responsibility for their own security, even though there are 349,000 Iraqi security forces that have been trained and equipped.

The violence continues in Iraq, everywhere from Kirkuk to Basra. This Senator wants to see a change in how we are approaching this situation. I want to see more of an aggressive effort on diplomacy and international engagement to press for political solutions to stabilize Iraq.

This is what the Iraq Study Group called for. It said:

The United States should immediately launch a new diplomatic offensive to build international consensus for stability in Iraq and the region.

That is what the Iraq Study Group recommended. It saw that at the heart of the violence in Iraq were political disagreements causing a lot of turmoil within the country. Those disputes require a diplomatic and political solution.

I believe this is what is at the core of the Levin-Reed amendment--a strategy to press for a political solution. I know my colleagues disagree on dates and guidelines in the amendment. However, I believe in the Levin-Reed amendment, which calls for a comprehensive diplomatic, political, and economic strategy that includes sustained engagement with Iraq's neighbors and the international community for the purposes of collectively bringing stability to that region. I applaud Senator Hagel for including language in this amendment requiring the United States to work with the United Nations to appoint an international mediator for Iraq.

I know people believe the United States should continue to play a primary role in Iraqi disputes, but the United Nations and United Nations Security Council must have a significant role. The international community should engage in these political and ethnic issues that are stymying us. I believe it is time for the international community and the United States not to be for the long, hard slog of deployment but for the long, hard slog of diplomacy. The Levin-Reed amendment creates a framework for international engagement that has been missing.

Why do I believe this is so important? I believe this is important because I think one of the key benchmarks we are missing that has caused great consternation is the issue of equitable distribution of Iraqi oil revenue. I wish the Iraqis had successfully passed an oil law and it had stabilized the region. It is no surprise that three different regions of the country are concerned about the distribution of oil revenue. There is a lot of concern about exactly who will have control over the oil in those areas, how much oil revenue will be distributed by the federal government, and what role the new Iraqi national oil company will play. But also at the heart of this dispute are Iraqi fears that, in the draft oil law, there is a great deal of benefit for foreign oil companies. In fact, the Bush administration has pushed the current draft of an oil law that allows for the privatization of Iraqi oil.

I know that there is a dangerous perception that somehow we went to Iraq for oil. That was not something this Senator believed. However, there have been many statements that concern me. In fact, Ahmed Chalabi was quoted as saying:

American companies will have a big shot at Iraqi oil.

Another European oil executive said:

For any oil company being in Iraq is like being a kid in FAO Schwarz.

This Senator did not pay much attention to that, but I am paying attention now to the fact that this current draft of an oil law says the Iraqi National Oil Company would have exclusive control--that is the federal entity--of just 17 of Iraq's 80 known oil fields.

All the rest, along with all the undiscovered oil, would be open to foreign control. So the majority of oil in Iraq would be open to foreign control. Why is this such a big deal? It is important because at one time Iraqi oil reserves were seen as the second largest in the world. Today they are probably somewhere between the third and fourth largest oil reserves.

In fact, the Heritage Foundation, in 2003, released a paper advocating for the privatization of Iraq's oil and arguing that Iraq's reconstruction and privatization of its oil and gas sector could become a model for oil industry privatization in other OPEC states as well.

I know that may be attractive to people who think we should stay there and somehow glom on to Iraqi oil. This Senator does not believe that is what we should be doing.

I know that many people have mentioned former Secretary of State Kissinger's recent policy op-ed piece. He said we cannot allow the Iraqi energy supply to be controlled by a country with Iran's revolutionary and taunting foreign policy. He suggested that, if we leave and Iran takes over, they will have control of the Iraqi oil. But I would refer those who agree with Kissinger to the Iraq Study Group's conclusion:

The United States can begin to shape a positive climate for diplomatic efforts internationally with Iraq through public statements that reject the notion that the United States seeks to control Iraq's oil or seeks to have permanent bases within Iraq.

We are sending the wrong message in Iraq if we continue to support a policy that gives the Iraqi people and the Iraqi Government the notion that we are there to try to control the oil.

Like the Iraq Study Group, I believe the international community and international energy companies should invest in Iraqi oil. Foreign expertise in investment is important to upgrading the infrastructure and boosting production. But that international involvement must come at Iraq's initiative, and the Iraqi people must decide what level of foreign participation is best for their country.

We need to send the Iraqi people, the people of the Middle East, and the world a message that is loud and clear--we do not intend to stay in Iraq for their oil. To that end, I am happy to cosponsor with my colleague Senator Biden a resolution that calls on us to clearly articulate that we have no intention of keeping permanent U.S. bases in Iraq or any intentions of exercising control over Iraqi oil.

Before we went into Iraq, there were a lot of people, including the Vice President, who said we would get X million barrels a day from Iraq. Former Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz estimated at one point in time the oil revenues of that country would bring us between $50 and $100 billion over the next 2 to 3 years. One State Department spokesperson said oil would be the ``engine of Iraq's reconstruction. No one is talking about a Marshall plan for Iraq because the oil will take care of that.''

That did not happen. Today we see a bogged-down political process in Iraq because they are fighting over oil. We can move ahead, and this amendment by my colleagues Senators LEVIN and REED gives us the framework to do that. Our efforts here in the Senate are moving forward on a diversified plan to get off our overdependence on Middle East oil. They are also critically important.

I know some would say: Well, it is important that we make sure that terrorists don't get their hands on Iraqi oil money. I would remind my colleagues that a U.S. Government report that was obtained by the New York Times said many insurgents involved in terrorist attacks in Iraq are already raising $25 to $100 million a year from oil smuggling and criminal activities.

It is important to secure Iraqi oil infrastructure and for the Iraqis to resolve their disputes over oil rights.

I believe we should move ahead on a framework that has more international involvement. The United States and the international community should be trying to bring Iraqis together to reach compromises on these important issues. I believe this is something the United States can achieve.

Some people may look at the problems in Iraq, the ongoing ethnic violence, the division between the Sunnis and Shiites and the Kurds, and think it is impossible to stabilize the country. But the United States has stepped up to serious international challenges in the past and stabilized new governments that have also been plagued by ethnic violence and long histories of dispute.

How did we do it? All we have to do is look at the former Yugoslavia where the international community got together with various parties, from the European Union to Russia to NATO to countries in the region, and built a framework that ended serious ethnic violence. The civil war in Bosnia resulted in 100,000 to 110,000 deaths. While it is not on the same scale as the challenges we face in Iraq, the peace the United States was able to help achieve was nonetheless remarkable.

We must do the same thing in Iraq. We need the help of the United Nations, the Arab League, and the rest of Iraq's neighbors, and we need the framework in the amendment my colleagues Senators LEVIN and REED have authored. It would put us on a path toward a real comprehensive diplomatic and political solution for Iraq.

We deserve the chance to have an up or down vote on the Levin-Reed amendment. It is now an important time for us to realize that the benchmarks we set have not, and are not, being met. We need a change of course in Iraq. We need to have more involvement by the international community in solving the political problems on the ground. The Levin-Reed amendment would make a strong statement about what the U.S. hopes to achieve in stabilizing the Iraqi government. And we need to put to rest the notion that the United States will stay in Iraq for oil or for permanent U.S. bases. We cannot continue in an endless combat role in Iraq.

We need to change the course, and we can have a policy that allows us to do that by holding an up or down vote on this amendment today.

I yield the floor.

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