http://www.vote-smart.org/speech_detail.php?speech_id=M000003667&keyword=&phrase=&contain=Date: 03/18/2003
I find myself angered, saddened and dismayed by the situation in which this nation finds itself tonight. As the world's sole superpower in an increasingly hostile and dangerous world, our government's obligation to protect the security of the United States and the law abiding nations of the world could not be more clear, particularly in the aftermath of September 11.
Yet the Administration's handling of the run up to war with Iraq could not possibly have been more inept or self-defeating. President Bush has clumsily and arrogantly squandered the post 9/11 support and goodwill of the entire civilized world in a manner that will make the jobs ahead of us -- both the military defeat and the rebuilding of Iraq -- decidedly more expensive in every sense of that word.
The Administration's indifference to diplomacy and the manner in which it has treated friend and foe alike over the past several months have left this country with vastly reduced influence throughout the world, made impossible the assembly of a broad, multinational effort against Saddam Hussein, and dramatically increased the costs of fulfilling our legitimate security obligations at home and around the world. At home, the Administration has given too short shrift to the needs of homeland security, ignoring the advice of their own experts, doing the job on the fly and on the cheap. To this administration, homeland security is a fine political weapon, but not high enough a priority to force a reassessment of their tax cuts to the rich and the special interests.
That said, Saddam Hussein is a tyrant, truly the personification of evil. He has launched two wars of aggression against his neighbors, perpetrated environmental disaster, purposefully destabilized an entire region of the world, murdered tens of thousands of his own citizens, flouted the will of the United Nations and the world in acquiring weapons of mass destruction, conspired to assassinate the former President of the United States, and provided harbor and support to terrorists bent on destroying us and our friends.
From that perspective, regardless of the Administration's mishandling of so much of this situation, no President can defer the national security decisions of this country to the United Nations or any other multilateral institution or individual country.
Even having botched the diplomacy, it is the duty of any President, in the final analysis, to defend this nation and dispel the security threats - threats both immediate and longer term - against it. Saddam Hussein has brought military action upon himself by refusing for twelve years to comply with the mandates of the United Nations. The brave and capable men and women of our armed forces and those who are with us will quickly, I know, remove him once and for all as a threat to his neighbors, to the world, and to his own people, and I support their doing so.
My strong personal preference would have been for the Administration -- like the Administration of George Bush, Sr. -- to have given diplomacy more time, more commitment, a real chance of success. In my estimation, giving the world thirty additional days for additional real multilateral coalition building -- a real summit, not a five hour flyby with most of the world's powers excluded -- would have been prudent and no impediment to our military situation, an assessment with which our top military brass apparently agree. Unfortunately, that is an option that has been disregarded by President Bush.
In the colloquial, we are where we are. It will take years to repair the needless damage done by this Administration, damage to our international standing and moral leadership, to traditional and time-tested alliances, to our relations with the Arab world, ultimately to ourselves. Let's finish the process we began twelve years ago of disarming Saddam and ridding the world of this menace that. Let's begin to rebuild our sense of national unity. Let's begin the work of building a stronger, safer world, of rebuilding alliances, and staying the course of long term involvement the Middle East in order to reclaim our rightful place of respect in the world order.
Speaker: Senator Thomas
'Tom' Harkin (IA)
Title: Congressional Budget for the US Government for Fiscal Year 2004 - Iraq
Location: Washington, DC
Date: 03/18/2003
CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET FOR THE U.S. GOVERNMENT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2004
http://www.vote-smart.org/speech_detail.php?speech_id=M000014345&keyword=&phrase=&contain=Is war justified? I have absolute confidence in the men and women of our Armed Forces. Faced with war, they will win, and will do so with courage, discipline, and skill. But even with our overwhelming strength, even assured of victory, war is a terrible prospect. Thousands of innocent people will die. Iraq will be left in chaos. We will be left to occupy a country most likely for years, left with the responsibility on our taxpayers of rebuilding it.
America has always been reluctant to engage in war. And this will be the first war ever in which we have invaded where there has not been an imminent threat.
I believe there are at least four tests that must be met before we go to war. First, we must face an imminent threat. That has not been shown. Could Saddam be a threat down the line sometime? Perhaps. But we could contain him with inspections, and not just a handful but 500 or 1,000 inspectors—there is no limit on how many inspectors we could have; we could put in 1,000 inspectors. Would that cost more money? Sure. A lot less than a war.
So we must face an imminent threat, and that has not been shown.
Secondly, war should be the last resort, not the first. Even if a threat is demonstrated, we should launch a war only after we have exhausted all reasonable alternatives, as we required in the resolution last fall. In this case, we clearly have not.
Third, we must have substantial support among our allies and work with the United Nations. The agreements Saddam Hussein has violated are with the U.N. He didn't make those agreements with the United States, he made them with the United Nations. So since it is not a bilateral problem, it is a multilateral problem, we should be working through the United Nations. There is no doubt we can win a war against Iraq on our own—no doubt about that—but we are going to need the other nations to help rebuild Iraq after the war.
Finally, before we go to war, the fourth thing we need is a full debate in the Congress. Thus, I applaud Senator Byrd and Senator Kennedy for their resolutions to move the debate forward. But now the clock has run out. I can't for the life of me understand, why the British House of Commons can have a full day of debate today on whether or not to pass a resolution to go to war, but the U.S. Congress can't.
I think back to our own Revolution which gave us the power. It is in the Constitution of the United States that only Congress has the power to declare war. And there can be no mistake about it. This is not an intervention. This is not military police activity. This is not defending ourselves against an imminent threat. This is an invasion and a full-scale war against a country.
I believe the Congress, and only the Congress, has the right to do that, and we have not even had the debate. It is time we have the debate.
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