Hearing of the Senate Appropriations Committee Subject Fiscal Year 2003 Supplemental Budget Request

HEARING OF THE SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE
 
SUBJECT: FISCAL YEAR 2003 SUPPLEMENTAL BUDGET REQUEST
 
SEN. PATTY MURRAY (D-WA): Yes, Mr. Secretary, thank you very much for being here today.

The president outlined to the American people that the Iraq war and Iraq's future will have broad benefit for our country and for the Middle East. And your comment a moment ago about our responsibility to reconstruct Iraq sort of puzzles me. Doesn't the president's larger objective for the Middle East and for our relations with the Muslim world and for the war on terrorism require us to have a long- term commitment to reconstruction in Iraq?

SEC. RUMSFELD: Sure. I hope I didn't say anything that left the contrary impression. There's no question but that I was referring to the military side.

We feel we need to stay there as long as is necessary but not any longer. Conversely, if you talk about the United States and the international community, we have to have an interest and we have to see that that country gets put on a path toward some sort of representative government that is not going to threaten its neighbors. There's no question but that if that is successful, as I believe it will be, that the economic circumstance in the region will be vastly better for Turkey, for Jordan and for the other countries in the region.

SEN. MURRAY: Your term of putting it on a path concerned me. It sounded like we're going to put it on a path and walk away.

SEC. RUMSFELD: No, no, I don't mean to suggest that at all.

SEN. MURRAY: Okay. Well, then are we working with the coalition of the willing, however -- 60 countries, whatever are involved—to get these countries to join the American taxpayers in paying for this reconstruction?

SEC. RUMSFELD: We are indeed. Dov Zakheim's been our kind of a lead person in helping to raise money, and not just money, but in-kind contributions. And he has worked hard on it and the Department of State has worked hard on it. They're sending out cables, and responses are coming in and nations are stepping forward.

SEN. MURRAY: Are we going to work through the United Nations to get those commitments?

SEC. RUMSFELD: I have no doubt in my mind but the United Nations will have a role. I just don't know what it is. It was—I know that France has indicated they would prefer that the United Nations not have a role, but I don't know what that will mean.

(To Mr. Zakheim) Do you want to comment?

MR. ZAKHEIM: Yes. We have already—I'm working alongside my counterparts, Alan Larson at the State Department, undersecretary there, and Undersecretary John Taylor of the Treasury, and senior officials at AID and other departments. We are working together reaching out to a number of countries, who have been very positive about their willingness to contribute to to reconstruction after the conflict. We don't know, as the secretary just said, where the U.N. will be on this, but our intention is to reach out not just to individual countries but to international financial institutions, to the EU, basically to anyone who is willing to help.

SEN. MURRAY: I appreciate that.

Let me ask you another question. We've seen a lot of the news reports about the new health care technologies that are being deployed in Iraq, and I think that's very impressive to many of the families who are watching their sons and daughters and spouses over there. Can you talk about some of those new health care technologies, and specifically, whether this supplemental request contains sufficient funding to speed care for our military?

SEC. RUMSFELD: I do not know what's in the supplemental on that subject. I know that the armed forces have made significant progress in a variety of different ways. Number one, of course, and the most important, has been the ability to remove people from a battlefield very promptly and get them into an environment—health care environment that's as fine as can exist. A second thing they have done is they have made advances in techniques that can be used on the --

SEN. MURRAY: Right. I was talking about the technologies, the new technologies we --

SEC. RUMSFELD: Oh, here's one. The skin exposure reduction paste --

SEN. MURRAY: Exactly.

SEC. RUMSFELD: -- is an example; that we could provide you a list of some of these things that have been done.

SEN. MURRAY: Right. Okay. I would appreciate that. I'd like to know what's in the supplemental on that.

And one final comment in my last few seconds here. I think we are all very disturbed by the images of the POWs, and I know their families here in this country are really—there's a lot of anxiety.

And I really want to urge you to communicate with these families, stay in touch with them. I know you're doing some of that, but I think that's extremely important.

But I just wanted to ask quickly if you could update us on the efforts by the International Red Cross to see these POWs and whether or not we've had any progress?

SEC. RUMSFELD: I do not know what the status is of the International Red Cross ability to get access to our POWs. I know that we have contacted the International Red Cross and encouraged them to take a look and visit the now more than 4,500 prisoners of war that have been taken by coalition forces and that are currently in camps in Iraq just behind the battlefields.

SEN. MURRAY: How about our POWs that are --

SEC. RUMSFELD: As I say, I do not—to my knowledge, the International Red Cross has not yet been successful in gaining access to them.

SEN. MURRAY: Well, I would just encourage you to stay in close touch with our families here who are watching news reports with a great deal of anxiety.