[Congressional Record: November 30, 2010 (House)]
[Page H7743-H7749]
THE STATE OF OUR NATIONAL SECURITY
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 6, 2009, the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Franks) is recognized
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. Mr. Speaker, I know that it comes as no
surprise to this House that I have been one very critical of this
administration's policies on a number of different fronts, and I
suppose that will be no different tonight. But Mr. Speaker, I guess I
wanted to start out tonight by addressing the WikiLeaks issue. I know
that a lot of people across America have looked upon this with
interest, and I guess it's significant in my mind that what we've seen
on the WikiLeaks issue is really more confirmatory than it is anything
that's informative. In many ways what the WikiLeaks information has
demonstrated is that this administration has practiced for a long time
a foreign policy of appeasement, and I think it has been a disaster for
our country, Mr. Speaker.
I suppose it goes without saying that the most pressing question is
how a 22-year-old private first class in a remote location in Iraq
could have gained access to so many of these documents, especially
since they are far outside his scope of responsibilities. It
represents, really, a glaring failure on parts of the State Department
and even some parts of the Defense Department. And some of these
commonsense security measures could have been implemented prior to
this. The Pentagon has since announced that it will be implementing new
policies, including a technology that makes it impossible to copy
classified documents to portable storage devices. Now the fact is that
it has taken too long for such a commonsense policy to sink in, and
this administration certainly had lead time to consider this long
before now, but I guess it is, in a sense, indicative of why
bureaucracies are so inefficient most of the time. It took the leak of
hundreds of thousands of sensitive documents before this government
decided to get up to speed with the unique risks posed by one of the
most basic modern conveniences, that being the computer.
Private Bradley Manning, the U.S. Army soldier suspected of leaking
the documents, and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange hid behind the
claim that the government's so-called ``lack of transparency'' is
unjustified. This is their main reason for justifying their own
actions, Mr. Speaker. Unfortunately, in that process they have provided
a wealth of aid and comfort to groups that are at war with the United
States of America. Of course Mr. Assange claims to be fighting for
truth and transparency. The reality is that his desire to promote
himself has outweighed his concern for scores and perhaps hundreds of
innocent lives that he has endangered with his reckless publicity in
this kind of a stunt in the guise of some greater cause.
But Mr. Speaker, it's telling that the foreign media sometimes is
almost more comforting to justice than the American media sometimes.
The American media willingly complied in disseminating this information
and they are complicit, in my judgment, in any harm that will come to
American servicemembers or American personnel across the country as
well.
Just to give you an example, Mr. Speaker, the same New York Times
that was reticent to cover the story that's often referred to as
``Climategate'' willingly ran the WikiLeaks cover story on the front
page of their newspaper. Now this is a hypocrisy, Mr. Speaker, that I
think is absolutely astounding. In other words, just to put it in
perspective, I will just read what one of the bloggers there of The New
York Times said. Andrew Revkin of The New York Times, he is actually a
reporter, was one of the first ones to cover Climategate. And in his
first story only a matter of a few hours after Climategate's blog
posted, in his story he states, ``The documents''--this is the
Climategate documents, Mr. Speaker--``appear to have been acquired
illegally and contain all manner of private information and statements
that were never intended for the public eye, so they will not be posted
here.'' Well, how gallant, how noble of Mr. Revkin to want to protect
some of his perhaps liberal friends from being exposed in some of the
over-hyped notion of global warming, but yet when people's lives are at
stake, when American national security is at stake, then all of a
sudden The New York Times is all too willing to publish the WikiLeaks
information in the interest of full disclosure and grand journalism,
and I find that unbelievable, Mr. Speaker. If the Times reporters had
felt such urges of chivalry when it comes to protecting the men and
women who give up their lives so that we can all sleep peacefully at
night, it's just a strange time for them to do that. And to cap it all
off, Mr. Speaker, it is rumored that the leading candidate for Time
magazine's ``Man of the Year'' now is none other than WikiLeaks' Julian
Assange.
Mr. Speaker, before I yield to one of my colleagues here, I would
just like to say that, unlike authoritarian regimes across the world,
democratic governments like ours hold secrets largely because citizens
agree that they should in order to protect legitimate policy and
national security. But this massive breach of our national security has
endangered our ability to build trust and cooperation with our allies,
it has certainly not served the public's interest, and most of all, it
has strengthened and emboldened our enemies. Mr. Assange and WikiLeaks
should be profoundly ashamed, and I think they should be pursued with
whatever legal actions can be brought, and of course The New York
Times, for their complicity in this effort, should be ashamed beyond
measure.
With that, I would like to yield to my good friend, Congressman
Lamborn from Colorado, to see if he has any thoughts.
Mr. LAMBORN. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Let me point out that, to its credit, The Wall Street Journal did not
accept
[[Page H7744]]
the offer to disseminate these WikiLeaks latest round of documents from
the diplomatic arena, and I think that that is to their credit.
Unfortunately, The New York Times did not have the same scruples, which
is extremely disappointing to me.
Representative Franks, as we look at some of the reports of what were
contained in these diplomatic leaks, there are some really troubling
national security implications that arise. One is that we find, for
instance, that it is confirmed that Iran has received 19 advanced
missiles from North Korea. Now we have long suspected that there have
been ties on a covert basis between those two countries, we have some
evidence of that; this just makes it more of a glaring issue. And our
administration needs to be doing more, not just to stop WikiLeaks in
the future from revealing our national secrets, but in stopping Iran
and North Korea from the propagation of deadly nuclear and missile
technology that they seem to be doing. The fact that Iran has received
19 advanced missiles from North Korea, each of which is capable of
reaching Western Europe or even Moscow, is very troubling to me. These
are our NATO allies that we are bound to defend if they are attacked,
and I don't think our administration is doing enough to stop the
propagation, the dissemination of deadly technology from North Korea to
other countries.
When we are done talking about WikiLeaks, Representative, I would
like to make sure we talk more about some of these national security
implications as well.
I would like to yield back at this time.
Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. Well, thank you, Mr. Lamborn. It is my
judgment that this would probably be a good time to transition to that.
And we would also like to hear from Congressman Steve King from Iowa.
Steve, do you have any thoughts about this? Because some of these
national security issues I know Doug and I are kind of obsessed with
them--for good reason, but we know that they care about national
security in Iowa as well.
{time} 2100
Mr. KING of Iowa. I thank the gentleman from Arizona for yielding and
for managing this Special Order here tonight and for bringing this
issue, Mr. Speaker, before the American people.
This is a critical national security issue. And I'm so grateful that
we have individuals here in this Congress, as intended by our Founding
Fathers, that focus on a variety of issues that could clearly see and
be focused on the intelligence that can bring this before the American
people in such a way that they can understand, Mr. Speaker, that you
will turn your focus hopefully on this subject matter.
There has been a lot of discussion across the country now and in the
news media about the WikiLeaks issue. And I look at this, and I think
Julian Assange, an Australian citizen, a person who made his living as
a hacker, a person who is proud of being able to crack anybody's
security code and get in there and pull that information out and then
dump it into the public arena, into the public media sphere. For what
purpose? What possible constructive purpose could be achieved by an
individual who is a product of Western civilization pouring forth state
secrets from Western civilization itself? It has to be for either self-
aggrandizement, for that or the combination of undermining Western
civilization. An enemy, an enemy of the things that we believe in.
And I don't stand here with the intent to indict the Aussies. I love
the Australians. They are a free spirited, strong free market, free
will group of people. They had to also take a continent and settle a
continent about the size of the United States itself and make a living
down there in an environment that's sometimes beautiful and sometimes
harsh. They have a spirit of their own. They remind me that in every
conflict that the United States has been in they got there first, and
some of them they've been in all of them. It's a pretty good thing to
say about the relationship between the United States and Australia.
There's not much to say about their citizen--whom I wish today were
an American citizen, and at that point I think he might be subject to
charges of treason against the United States.
So as I listened to the speakers here, I reached into my dog-eared
Constitution and took up this definition, the constitutional definition
of treason, and it says--and I know that some have called for charges
of treason to be brought against Mr. Assange. I know they apply to an
American citizen. But this says, Article III, section 3: Treason
against the United States shall consist only in levying war against
them or in adhering to their enemies--which certainly al Qaeda and the
Taliban and the enemies of the terrorists who are lining up against us
are our enemies--and giving them aid and comfort, giving aid and
comfort to the enemies.
Well, Mr. Speaker, I think it's a subject that we wouldn't have much
debate on here in this Congress that Mr. Assange has given aid and
comfort to the enemy. He's empowered the enemy. He's put Americans at
risk. He's put the allies of Americans at risk. And in this precarious
situation around the globe, in this geopolitical-military-economic
chess game that goes on constantly on the entire planet, he's taken
away some of our advantage and he's given it to our enemies.
And I wish and I hope that there's a way that we can find a way to
prosecute a man like that, that we can protect ourselves. And if we
fail to do that, or even if we're successful in that and it exposes
some other vulnerabilities, I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that this Congress
take a look at some new legislation, a new structure of law, that's
really not brought about because of the actions of Mr. Assange but
brought about because of the actions of our enemies, our terrorist
enemies.
And I have come to realize, and I think that there will be a
significant number of Members of Congress that have come to realize,
that we don't have the tools to fight these enemies; that the idea that
we could catch terrorists like, for example, Osama bin Ladin's
chauffeur, and we can't find a way to try that chauffeur and put him on
trial with legitimate expectations of an effective prosecution and a
conviction and a penalty.
We have Khalid Sheikh Mohammed sitting down in Guantanamo Bay yet.
Two years into the Obama Presidency, when President Obama said he was
going to close Guantanamo Bay and try these terrorists in civilian
courts, and now we found out what happens when you try these terrorists
in civilian courts--a whole bunch of evidence that's essential to the
conviction has been left out of the prosecution, and they were not
successful in an effective prosecution and conviction of the last
terrorist that was tried in civilian court.
So I look at this and I make the charge that I think our military
tribunals are a useful way to do this and Guantanamo Bay is the best
place on the planet to keep them. But we don't quite have the
legislative tools. We don't have the judicial tools.
I'm hopeful that this Congress will consider a proposal that's rooted
in this thought; that we will set up a special court like a FISA court,
or perhaps even the FISA court, and ask them to immediately adjudicate
when we catch somebody that's working against the United States, that's
perpetrating terrorism against the United States, and be able to
process them immediately through a special court, and have that court
be able to rule that this was an attack against Americans or whether it
was an attack against America's civilization that was designed to
spread terror and fear here rather than a crime that was committed
against individual Americans, and be able to rule that that individual
then fit within the category of an enemy of the United States, an enemy
in this war on terror that we have, and then instantly move them off of
the shores of the United States and down to Guantanamo Bay or another
jurisdiction that's even further removed from these courts, and under
Article III, section 2, strip these Federal courts from the
jurisdiction of ruling upon these decisions of terrorists that are
attacking America.
If we do that--and it's a pretty sticky constitutional question on
how we would deal with American citizens in that category, but it's not
when we deal with someone like Julian Assange. An Australian citizen
could be put into that category, moved over to a place offshore of the
United States outside of the jurisdiction of the Federal courts, the
civilian Federal courts in the
[[Page H7745]]
United States, and adjudicated under a military tribunal in a fashion
that was designed by this Congress and directed by this Congress.
That's what I'm hopeful that we'll be able to do.
Mr. LAMBORN. I think this recent civilian trial of the person
formerly who was in Guantanamo Bay, who was tried in New York City, I
believe, who was found not guilty of about 250 counts of murder--
although that's about how many people were killed in the terrorist
attack on the embassy in Africa--but was found only guilty of
conspiracy to destroy government property when over 200 people were
murdered in that terrorist attack shows the weakness of using civilian
trials to try these terrorists who are committing acts of war against
our country.
And the WikiLeaks documents, getting back to those, show that this
administration has been trying to place these Guantanamo detainees in
other countries around the world, like Saudi Arabia. They are offering
them money. They are offering them concessions if they'll take some of
these people off of our hands so that the President can move closer to
his goal of closing Guantanamo Bay. But that is a misguided policy from
day one.
These people should not be released. I think Saudi Arabia said in one
of the cables that was disclosed, or they said later on, that they
would just release the people eventually if they were sent to their
country and they would ultimately, as we know from cases in the past,
many of them would find their way back to the battlefield where they
would kill Americans or American allies.
So I think that the whole misguided policy of Guantanamo Bay being
closed is exposed by some of these WikiLeaks documents. But still,
these should have never been disclosed in the first place. This
administration needs to find a way to punish those involved and make
sure it never happens again.
Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. I guess, Mr. Speaker, I would like to agree
with the gentleman from Colorado because, you know, many of us,
including the gentleman from Colorado, including the gentleman from
Iowa, were very vociferous in saying that there would come a time where
it would be obvious to the world that these civilian trials wouldn't
work for enemy combatants that are terrorists that were taken off the
battlefield in Afghanistan or Iraq or wherever it might be, because we
knew that this would give al Qaeda and other terrorist groups a perfect
opportunity, a staging ground, as it were, to be able to manipulate our
system.
Not only does it give them the ability to have discovery where they
are able to potentially undermine our security apparatus and gain
information that is critical to protecting our agents in the field, but
this also gives them the ability to claim all kinds of things before
the world. And of course you know the security elements of it are
astonishing. And of course they use our own court system and our own
court rules to make it very possible for them to escape justice.
I thought, to paraphrase President Bush, he said something like this.
He said, We should not allow our enemies to use, to destroy liberty by
using the forums of liberty to destroy liberty itself. And the reality
is is that sometimes we can become victims of our own ostensible
decency.
And this administration, in its kowtowing to terrorists, has been
more committed to protecting terrorist rights than it has been to
protecting the lives of American citizens. And I think that is profound
beyond anything I could suggest.
{time} 2110
Because it just tells me that somehow the administration has a
philosophical bent that is going in a way that I think endangers
American freedom and future generations. And I am hoping that somehow
they will wake up in time. But yes, the gentleman is correct that
WikiLeaks, among other things, has exposed once again this
administration's effort to try to put these combatants in different
countries to try to avoid the trap that they have set for themselves in
America by insisting that this be done in civilian trials.
And again, it is a disgrace beyond words that this man that was
instrumental in the murder of about, I think it was 224 people, Mr.
Lamborn, and yet he gets conspiracy to destroy government property. And
that is unfortunately--you know, sometimes the administration thinks of
these things always in sort of academic terms. But this is real life.
And national security in the 9/11 age is something we should all be
focused on. And this administration seems to be asleep at the wheel.
And I just wonder if my colleague from Iowa might have any thoughts on
that.
Mr. KING of Iowa. I thank the gentleman from Arizona. And I reflect
upon a trip that I made down to Guantanamo Bay I believe it was a year
ago last Easter. And the trip was designed to fill me and a handful of
other members on the Judiciary Committee in on the practices and the
facilities that they had at Guantanamo Bay. And I think this is
something that the American people have not had an opportunity to
witness or actually hear about within the news, that there is a
facility that's perfectly structured for the job that we have, which is
to bring these terrorists to a location and legitimately try them and
give some resolution to their circumstances.
And I don't remember the exact number of inmates that they had down
there at the time, but it was down to the hard core of the hard core.
They had already released those that could be released. And the rest of
them were a danger to Americans, a danger to free people everywhere,
and a danger if they were released to come back, and as Mr. Lamborn
said, to attack Americans again, but also NATO troops and other people
that represent the free world.
And as we are looking at that facility, oh, it's a pretty wonderful
facility if you want to be in a jail and be a Muslim, for example. And
you walk into these cells, first of all the temperature is set at 75
degrees. Seventy-five. My house is a lot warmer than that in Iowa in
the summertime. Because 75 degrees, they argued, was their cultural
temperature. And I don't know that that's true. I would think 140
degrees is more likely some of their cultural temperature. But in any
case it's set at 75.
And you open the door on any of the cells, and they have their own
personalized cells, there is an arrow there that points towards Mecca.
So they never have to guess which direction that they are praying.
Every one of them gets a nice fancy prayer rug that's all embroidered.
It takes a lot of hand work. It's a beautiful piece of work. And they
get a little skullcap that's also hand-worked and done. And the Korans
that they get are carried in a ziplock bag so they are nice and
protected and never touched by the hands of an infidel, because that
might anger the inmates at Gitmo. And they had their nice television
and a little break room that they got together. And here is this flat
screen TV. And that went on pretty fine for a while.
Oh, by the way, their meals, they get a choice out of nine selections
a day of Islamicly approved meals. And they can pick three squares out
of the nine every day that fit within their cultural heritage in their
way. It isn't like Americans are serving them ham and beans like they
would give me or you or anybody else that was in there. They get to
select from this special menu, a special menu for special people that
get a special rug and a special skullcap and a special ziplock bag-
delivered Koran that is never touched by an infidel.
And they have as many as 20 attacks on Americans a day at Guantanamo
Bay. About half of them are physical attacks, where they try to get one
of our guards down, usually Navy personnel, and get their handcuffed
chains around their throat and try to strangle them, attack them with
the metal that's part of their restraints. And the other half are
throwing human feces in the face of our troops. What is the punishment
for that? If it happened to be a domestic prisoner in a domestic
prison, if you continued with that you would find yourself in solitary
confinement. And eventually, the punishment would go to the point where
you would be locked up in prison for life. Eventually.
But what we do is nothing. There is no penalty. If Khalid Sheikh
Mohammed attacks the guards every day, several times a day, the worst
thing we can do to him is cut his outdoor exercise down to 2 hours a
day. Two hours a day outdoors. The rest of the time
[[Page H7746]]
you are in 75-degree air conditioning with your own selected meals,
three out of the nine that are the choice of the menu there, on your
own specialized prayer rug with your own Koran. And there was one
inmate that wanted a Bible in Gitmo. He converted to Christianity. But
it was verboten to bring a Bible into Guantanamo Bay because it would
set the inmates off, the other inmates off who thought that a Bible was
an insult and affront to them.
And they were watching their flat screen TV in their little break
room, and a lady came on to do a commercial, and she had a short-
sleeved shirt on and showed her elbow. Showed her elbow. I don't get
really all that worked up over an elbow. But they got all worked up
over the elbow and trashed the room, tore up the furniture, broke the
flat screen TV, scattered it all. It was like a little riot in their
little break room. What's their punishment for that? New furniture, new
flat screen TV. We coddle these prisoners. We don't even have a
punishment for those that attack our American guards.
And we set up the trial room so that there are microphones, a sound
system, places for witnesses to sit, places for family members to
observe, a sound-proof glass that's there. And when it gets down to the
critical component of the testimony, we have an officer that is
assigned with the job to cut off the testimony until such time as the
witnesses that don't have access to classified are marched out of the
witness chamber, and they pick up the testimony.
This facility is laid out for the purposes of trying people where
national security is an issue. And if we had been trying the individual
you talked about, Mr. Lamborn, I believe he would have been convicted
in Guantanamo Bay. Because the evidence that was necessary to convict
him would have been used rather than held back for fear that it becomes
a spillage of a national secret that becomes the subject here of the
WikiLeaks.
So those are things that go across my mind. We have got to do a lot
more. We have got to be a lot smarter about this. What would be very
helpful is if we had a Commander in Chief who was making the ask of
this Congress rather than us trying to push that chain uphill, having a
President that would actually be pulling it in that right direction. I
yield back.
Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. Thank you, Mr. King. You know, I suppose that
there are a lot of different issues we could talk about with the
WikiLeaks situation here. But I would point out that probably one of
the big things that it showed is that just our appeasement toward our
enemies. And I think probably one of the most dangerous areas there has
been is just the passive nature that this administration has shown
toward North Korea.
North Korea is one of the most dangerous police states in the world.
And they have shown time and again that they are not interested in
becoming a stable diplomatic partner really to any member of the
international community for that matter, but certainly not the United
States.
And a recent timeline of North Korea's blatant provocations would
probably be worth looking at here. Just to give you an example, in
March of 2010 they were involved in the sinking of a South Korean
submarine. It killed 46 sailors. In November of 2010, U.N. Security
Council reports revealed that North Korea has been passing, as Mr.
Lamborn said, forbidden nuclear technology to state sponsors of terror.
I know Mr. Lamborn mentioned the missile technology, which is more
recent, but also nuclear technology to sponsors of terrorism, including
Iran and Syria. Of course the Syrian plant was almost a mirror image of
the one in North Korea. And fortunately our friends in Israel were able
to make sure that that one didn't work so well any more. And they did
the world a great favor in that regard. Because nuclear weapons in the
hands of Iran or Syria would be a great danger to the human family to
say the very least.
In November of 2010, North Korea shelled the Yeonpyeong Island, a
group of South Korean islands, and it claimed the lives of two South
Korean marines. Two civilians I believe were also killed. It wounded
somewhere around 15 marines and three other civilians. And of course
this administration, while they have some shows of resolve here lately,
a lot of these things have occurred because they have stood by and let
North Korea get away with this so long. And really in a sense North
Korea sometimes does this to get attention, and they have no respect
for innocent human life. So blowing up a few people to try to get one
of the Democrat administrations to give them more money is something
that they don't hesitate to do. And they have done this on a regular
basis.
The U.S., Mr. Speaker, must move to re-list North Korea as a state
sponsor of terrorism and call on all responsible nations to adopt tough
new sanctions on the North Korean regime. The North Korean regime will
collapse on itself if China and other countries in the world do not
continue to prop them up.
{time} 2120
China should be especially called upon to stop enabling this regime
and to join responsible nations in sending an unequivocal message to
North Korea, abandon your aggressive agenda now. And, of course, you
know it shouldn't come as a surprise to us, but China's objections kept
us from seeing a U.N. Security Council report revealing that North
Korea has been passing banned technology to nations like Syria and
Iran, and they delayed that for 6 months.
In other words, because of China, because of their commitment to
delay this, Iran was given 6 additional months to work on advancing
their nuclear capacity without public scrutiny. And there is no telling
how far they were able, willing to go, really, to advance this effort.
But they were eventually forced to see this information like the rest
of the world.
Mr. Speaker, I just have to say that, you know, weakness and
passiveness is provocative. It invites aggression, and it is time that
this administration and the United States embark on one singular goal
for North Korea, and that is to see that North Korean Government fall
and North Korea be reunited and somehow, some semblance of freedom come
to that people and that this country, like many of its people, would
like for it to be reunited with the world community in a responsible
way.
To pursue a lot of diplomacy with North Korea is wasted effort, and
we should be pursuing now the effort to see a North Korea and South
Korea reunited under a free government like South Korea.
I wonder if my friend from Colorado would have any comments on that?
Mr. LAMBORN. I thank the gentleman from Arizona for yielding.
I would like to say that this administration has not done enough with
North Korea. Some good efforts have been made, but much more needs to
be done and much more needs to be done with Iran.
I am particularly appalled that we did nothing in the last year, when
the Green Revolution started, when the fraudulent election took place,
Ahmadinejad was reelected as President. There was rampant fraud
throughout the country. It was obvious to any observer, and the people
of Iran were offended and resented that and they rebelled and took to
the streets.
We did nothing to support them.
That would have been, and maybe still is, the best way possible to
overthrow this murderous regime in Tehran. But we are doing nothing to
help the opposition.
That type of lack of effort, I don't understand it. It's our best
shot at freeing the people of Iran so that they can become more
democratic and peace loving. There are many pro-Western Iranians,
especially young people. Some of them have been to the West, and they
like the West. And yet we are doing nothing to support those in
opposition to this government.
And to find out from WikiLeaks, to have the confirmation that 19
intermediate range missiles that could go as far as Moscow or Western
Europe have been sent from North Korea to Iran, and that we know Iran
is working on a nuclear weapon at the same time to put on these
missiles, there is no question about that, this is unacceptable. This
should not be happening. We should not be allowing North Korea to send
deadly arms to countries like Iran or Syria. Rumors have it that they
want to do the same with Burma or Venezuela. We have to not let North
[[Page H7747]]
Korea proliferate like this, and our administration should and needs to
do more.
Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. Before I yield to my friend from Iowa, I would
just like to kind of follow up what the gentleman from Colorado said.
You know, sometimes I think we are unaware as a people--and certainly
this administration seems oblivious--to how serious a nuclear Iran,
what a serious danger to the peace of the entire human family that
would represent.
But just for a moment, let's consider that for a moment. You know,
the Ahmadinejad government, the government of the mullahs and
Ahmadinejad there, have, through their very brazen, open statements,
have condemned Israel, have condemned the United States and threatened
both of our countries in very specific terms, wanting to see Israel
wiped off the map and the United States be ended as a world power and
to see us completely brought to our knees.
I mean, it's hard to even, to repeat some of the things that this
Iranian administration has said about America. And it's very clear what
their intent is, and there are two elements to every threat, Mr.
Speaker, when it comes to national security. One is the intent of a
potential enemy and the second one is the capacity of that enemy to
carry through with their threats.
And if we have not understood by now the intent of jihad, the intent
of state sponsors of terrorism like Iran, then we are not listening
very well, Mr. Speaker. The intent is clear. Iran would see America
destroyed tomorrow if they could. Now, not the Iranian people, but the
Iranian Government, as it stands now, would see America in ashes if
they could.
So the idea of allowing them to gain nuclear capability seems to be
just astonishing beyond words to me, Mr. Speaker. I mean, this
administration seems to have embraced some sort of a surreptitious
policy of allowing Iran to gain nuclear weapons and then pursuing the
traditional idea of containment, like we have in other situations with
the Soviet Union.
But that won't work with a jihadist government. Because when we were
dealing with the Soviet Union, we put our security, in a sense, in
their sanity. We knew that they wanted to survive and we had the
capability to respond in such an overwhelming way that they were
deterred from attacking America. But when it comes to the jihadist
mindset, Mr. Speaker, that is no longer a strategy that can be
embraced.
Let me just say, Mr. Speaker, if Iran gains a nuclear capability, if
they gain nuclear weapons, this world will step into the shadow of
nuclear terrorism. Terrorists will have these weapons and, Mr. Speaker,
I can't express to you the danger that that will represent and the
change that it will represent to all of us in the free world and,
really, throughout the planet.
Because Iran has shown themselves willing to make some of the most
deadly weapons that we face in Iraq and blowing up our soldiers with
their explosively formed penetrators. They pay money to see some of the
Taliban kill American soldiers in Afghanistan. They have demonstrated
their intent very clearly, and this administration seems willing to
allow them to have the capacity to carry out that intent.
Mr. Speaker, let me just, while I am walking by the neighborhood,
remind this administration that Iran has done military exercises that
appear to every reasonable military analyst to be preparation for an
EMP attack against this country or some other enemy that they might
have.
Mr. Speaker, I think that this administration seems woefully
unprepared or even unaware of how serious an electromagnetic pulse or a
high altitude nuclear blast to create an electromagnetic pulse could be
to this country. Mr. Speaker, if Iran gains a nuclear capability it
will give them the asymmetric capability to, in fact, launch an EMP
attack against this country, and that could cripple our infrastructure.
It could cause an almost inarticulable damage to this country.
The EMP Commission says a major EMP attack on this country could be
the one thing that could defeat the U.S. military. It could see more
than 60 percent of the population of the United States unsustainable. I
don't know how you wrap your mind around a number like that.
But, yet, that is the path that we are on with this administration
continuing to allow Iran to gain nuclear weapons. And I would just call
upon the Senate, Mr. Speaker, tonight on this floor, to pass the grid
bill that we passed out of this body some time ago to begin to protect
our electric infrastructure from either geomagnetic storms or from a
high altitude electromagnetic pulse from a nuclear weapon that could be
launched against us like Iran.
This administration has paid no attention to that, and yet it
represents a very real, very credible threat against the United States,
and it is the ideal asymmetric weapon for terrorists, and they know it.
We have discovered their writings. They understand that and yet we
stand by, and this administration embraces the notion that we can allow
a jihadist, terrorist state like Iran to gain the world's most
dangerous weapons and to be able to potentially launch against this
country an attack that could be absolutely devastating to our
civilization.
I just continue to be astonished that this administration has
forsaken its number one constitutional duty in making sure that the
protection of the citizens of this country and the national security of
this country are job one.
{time} 2130
And I really don't know what to add to that except maybe to ask my
friend from Ohio--from Iowa--I know you are not from Ohio--to comment.
Mr. KING from Iowa. Well, I thank the gentleman from Arizona. And I
loved Ohio until Ohio State beat the Hawkeyes a week and a half ago,
but I'm holding my judgment until next year when we have some
reconciliation meeting that takes place.
I'm very interested in the comment that you have made, the shadow of
nuclear terrorism, that comment. When we think about this as Americans,
watching this world, this Western civilization world falling under the
shadow of nuclear terrorism, if we think worrying about some jet
airliners being flown into the Twin Towers or into the Pentagon just
down the road a little ways or off into the field in Pennsylvania, what
that did to this country, how it shook up this country, how it
immobilized our financial markets and our daily lives, right down to
football games and weddings were brought to an immediate halt, even
though it was more than 1,000 miles away, nearly 2,000 miles away to
get to the other side of the continent, they stopped their football
games there, too. They stopped their weddings there, too. And I suppose
they stopped some funerals for a while. That's how much it devastated
this country. And I thought that we really should have looked at those
crises on September 11, 2001 and said it's not going to break our
stride. We're going to keep our pace. We're going to go forward, and
we're going to live, and we're going to live while we adapt to the new
threat that has come upon us.
But this new threat that's out there now that hangs over our head,
the shadow of nuclear terrorism that hangs over our head out of North
Korea, who is completely belligerent today, and out of Iran as well.
And I will tell you, Mr. Speaker, that I wasn't very happy with the
job that was done by then-Commander in Chief Bill Clinton on each of
these issues but primarily with Korea. I thought that he was too soft,
too tepid, not bold enough, and I looked through that and I thought
North Korea will march through his path and they'll become a nuclear
power and nothing is going to stop them because we are not bold, we're
not strong enough, and we didn't show the resolve necessary to cause
them to back up and back off, North Korea. Also true with Iran.
And as I watched President Bush, Bush 43, come into office, I was
hopeful there would be a bolder position with regard to our posture
towards North Korea and towards Iran. And I can remember serving here
in this Congress through some of those years. And I watched how the
political handcuffs were put on George W. Bush in such a way that he
didn't have the political support to use the bold actions that I
believe might have been necessary then to avert the nuclear power that
has materialized in North Korea nor the impending nuclear power that
appears
[[Page H7748]]
to be materializing in Iran. I don't think that George Bush was able to
utilize those tools. I don't know if he had the will. I believe he did.
I believe he had the judgment, but I don't think he had the political
tools because this Congress was so lined up against George Bush, there
were so many debates that emerged from over on this side of the aisle
that attacked the President, the Commander in Chief, and undermined our
military when they were in the field where lives were being sacrificed
for our liberty, 44 votes forced by this Speaker of the House that were
designed to unfund, underfund or undermine our troops. And all of that
was designed to expand their political power and diminish the power of
the Commander in Chief.
While that was going on, North Korea was furiously building a nuclear
capability, Iran was building a nuclear capability, and one thing that
did happen very good, and many of them did happen good under George
Bush, was he began the process to establish the missiles in Poland and
the radar in Czechoslovakia and he had it set up to go to protect
Western Europe and eventually America from missiles coming out of Iran,
and what happened? We elected a new President, one who I don't think
has an understanding of this geopolitical chess game that's going on
with our national security and the destiny of all humanity, who did
what? Pulled the missiles out of Poland, the radar out of
Czechoslovakia, and the headlines in the Warsaw paper said
``betrayed.'' Betrayed. And I believe that that was the largest and
most colossal foreign policy mistake made by the Obama administration
that emboldened not just Iran to accelerate their nuclear endeavors but
emboldened North Korea as well to go to the point of shelling the
island in South Korea because they know or they believe, and I actually
think they know, this President doesn't have the resolve to do the
confrontation necessary to protect our liberty.
So we live now under the shadow of a nuclear terrorism that is
emerging.
And I would just ask this question, does this Nation have the
capability and the will to shut off that capability, that building
capability in Iran and in North Korea? If we do, we have a strong
position to negotiate from. If we do not, we need to achieve that
ability and negotiate from a strong position.
There is more I would say, but I yield back to the gentleman the
Arizona.
Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. I thank the gentleman. I would like to yield
to the gentleman from Colorado.
Mr. LAMBORN. I thank the gentleman, Representative Trent Franks from
Arizona, and I thank Steve King for making some good points about Iran
and the mistakes made by this administration in canceling the third
site. And I was with the group that went and talked to the people in
Warsaw and Prague, and they were not happy. They put the best face on
it. They knew it was inevitable, but they were not and are not happy.
And, yes, there are attempts to contain Iran with a theater defense,
and that's good as far as it goes. But theater defense for missiles
against missiles is not the same as defense against intercontinental
ballistic missiles. And that's what we would have had with the ground
based interceptors in Poland.
So, yes, I do like that we will have Aegis ships with theater missile
defense missiles on them in places around Iran. I'm troubled by the
role of Turkey. I think they are not as stable of an ally as they once
were under their current leadership. And I'm not sure they're very
dependable these days. I hope they become more so. But Iran is
developing threats that will go beyond our theater defenses faster than
we will have intercontinental protection in place. So they will be able
to go beyond our theater defenses before we have intercontinental
defenses. So their threat is emerging faster than our defenses will be
put into place.
And that is what concerns me about the phased adaptive approach,
which is the theater defense in the alternative to the third site that
would have been in Poland. And I yield back to the gentleman from
Arizona, who is an expert on these issues
Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. Well, I think the gentleman is absolutely
correct, not that I'm an expert, but that your points are absolutely
correct.
I would say that it's important to realize that the European site was
not only a redundant protection to the United States from potentially
ICBMs coming from Iran, but it was also something that could have
calculated or factored into the calculus of Iran in moving towards
developing nuclear capability in the first place, because in a sense,
Mr. Speaker, missile defense is the last line of defense against an
incoming missile. And I think everyone can understand that basic
equation. But it's also the first line of defense against nuclear
proliferation. Because a rogue state like Iran knows that they face
great challenges and great dangers by pursuing nuclear weapons because
they realize that their neighbors understand the aggressive nature of
that rogue state of Iran and can't abide them having nuclear weapons,
and they realize that could potentially invite some type of preemptive
attack. But they continue to do that because they understand the
strategic advantage that they would gain to threaten their neighbors
would be overwhelming.
But if indeed, Mr. Speaker, we could have been in a place in Poland
to be able to intercept or knock down any missiles coming toward our
allies in Europe or the United States, it could have demonstrated to
Iran that they would not have gained any strategic advantage by
continuing forward, and it may some day in the history books be written
that that is where we lost the battle because that is maybe where Iran
began to see that they were going to be able to get away with creating
a nuclear capability.
But, Mr. Speaker, it's astonishing that this administration betrayed
the people of Poland, betrayed the people of the Czech Republic. When
we had made promises to them, we did everything we could to reach out
to them to have courage to stand with America in this endeavor, and
then our own administration pulls the plug and betrays them. And now it
makes it very difficult for other allies to express that same kind of
courage.
Of course the phased adaptive approach is a name that we put on. It's
a good name. There's nothing wrong with the name. Some of our military
leaders understand that there are many, as Mr. Lamborn said, many
important aspects to the phased adaptive approach. The irony is that
the Bush administration was pursuing the phased adaptive approach long
before the Obama administration ever even understood that there was
such a thing. And these things were on the books, and all the Obama
administration really did was to cancel the third site and
unfortunately then make it clear that we would not have redundant
capability to interdict any ICBMs or long-range missiles that Iran
could place a nuclear weapon on because we simply would not be able to
do it in time. Our Aegis capability is a wonderful capability, Mr.
Speaker. But the present Aegis capability does not have the capacity or
the speed to shoot down ICBMs, unless they're in a perfect spot, which
is a very rare occurrence. And I would just suggest to you that this
administration, once again, has placed their ideological commitment to
the left above national security.
{time} 2140
You know, there may be some day when we wished we had these days back
again. With all of the challenges we face, it seems like the
administration forgets its first responsibility, its first
constitutional duty of defending the citizens and the national security
of this country. It shouldn't surprise us that they forget the idea of
property rights, and it shouldn't surprise us that they forget the idea
of protecting the rights of innocent, unborn children. And it shouldn't
surprise us that they are willing to put people on the courts that have
no respect for the Constitution. And it shouldn't surprise us that
somehow the foundations of the Nation, the right to live and be free
and pursue our dreams, is subordinated to the notion that we want to
build a large State. Those things shouldn't surprise us. But if this
administration continues to go in the direction it is going, Mr.
Speaker, I am afraid that we will all wish we had these days back again
when we could have prevented some great tragedies that may befall us
because of the ideological commitment of this administration to weaken
America.
[[Page H7749]]
I wonder if my good friend, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert)
has any comments along those lines.
Mr. GOHMERT. I have the same concerns my good friend from Arizona
has. As has been discussed here, people around the world, nations
around the world watch everything we do to determine are we serious
about providing for a defense for America. Are we serious about
providing a defense for our allies. Are we serious about standing up
against rogue nations, against attacks on freedom and liberty.
I know there is some disagreement among historians, but there are
those who believe that when the Secretary of State 60 years ago gave a
speech which in essence indicated that Korea was really outside our
sphere of influence, North Korea had been massing and they had been
preparing, but it happened that they began moving south after that
speech. People notice when there is a weakness evidenced in America's
leadership, and often it leads to acts of violence.
Do you think it was any accident that the flotilla went against the
Israeli blockade of Gaza where thousands of rockets had flown into
Israel, destroying, killing, terrorizing Israelis. We agreed originally
that the blockade was necessary because of all of the death and
destruction. Was it any accident that the flotilla ends up setting sail
to try to at least challenge that blockade after this White House snubs
the prime minister of Israel, treats them worse than Chavez or some
Third World dictator, treats them so shabbily, and begins to side with
Israel's enemies, like in May voting with Israel's enemies to make them
disclose all of their weaponry. I mean, was it any accident that is
when those who want to challenge Israel's very existence sent the
flotilla south? I don't think so.
When it comes to strong leadership that protects America, I mean, my
friends have been discussing this issue of Guantanamo. I know that you
would be as delighted as I was to read the headline, ``5 Charged in 9/
11 Attacks Seek to Plead Guilty.'' A New York Times article, Guantanamo
Bay, Cuba: ``The five Guantanamo detainees charged with coordinating
the September 11 attacks told a military judge on Monday that they
wanted to confess in full, a move that seemed to challenge the
government to put them to death. At the start of what had been listed
as routine proceedings Monday, Judge Henry said he had received a
written statement from the five men dated November 4 saying they
planned to stop filing legal motions and to `announce our confessions
to plea in full'. Speaking in what has become a familiar high-pitched
tone in the cavernous courtroom here, the most prominent of the five,
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed said, `We don't want to waste our time with
motions.' '' That was what they said.
This administration, unfortunately, came in after, just a month after
this because this is December 8, 2008. These guys were ready to plead
guilty. They were ready to be put to death. They had already
proclaimed, as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed did, as well as authorized by the
other four, they were ready to plead guilty and take their punishment.
Oh, no. The strong leaders in this administration came in and said,
whoa, whoa, not so fast. We want to give you a show trial in New York
City, cost ourselves billions of dollars, put New Yorkers at risk so
you can have a big show, and we can pound our chest and talk about how
civilized we are.
What civilized nation would not protect itself so it can remain
civilized instead of being overtaken by barbarians? The civilized thing
to do is to protect the civilized people that put you in office. But
that is not what this administration did. They came in and basically
said, you know what, hold off on that guilty plea. Once these guys
heard they were going to get a show trial, well for heaven's sake, they
pulled back on their guilty pleas and here 2 years later, 2 full years
later, this administration has now announced basically that we are not
sure when we are going to get around to bringing them to trial. We are
not sure where we are going to try them. It has shown weakness in
leadership.
I just remind my friend, and I know he knows the quote from John
Stuart Mill, who said in the 1800s: ``War is an ugly thing, but not the
ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and
patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse.
The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing
which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable
creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the
exertions of better men than himself.''
Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. Mr. Speaker, it is kind hard to top that. The
message I was hoping that could be relayed more than anything else is
that there has been a general lackadaisical, asleep-at-the-wheel,
detached perspective of this administration when it comes to national
security. And unfortunately, we live in a 9/11 world where there are
those out there who don't hold to the ideals of freedom and protecting
innocent life, like has been the ideal of America. This administration
is continuing down this path.
Mr. Speaker, I don't want to have to come to this floor in future
days and have to decry what we failed to do. I think there is still
time for this administration to wake up and realize that allowing Iran
to gain nuclear weapons, allowing North Korea to proliferate nuclear
capability, missile capability throughout the world, allowing
terrorists to use the forms of liberty to destroy liberty itself in our
civilian courts, allowing the potential of terrorists to gain control
of an EMP capability that could threaten our whole society, standing by
while the Senate sits quietly and does nothing to pass the GRID bill
passed in the House of Representatives, these are very, very important
things, Mr. Speaker. I just hope somehow this administration realizes
that their first purpose and their first responsibility to God,
country, and their fellow human beings is to protect the lives and
constitutional rights of the citizens of the United States.
Mr. Speaker, I hope that happens.
____________________
