Providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 4548) to authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2005 for intelligence and intelligence-related activities of the United States Government, the Community Management Account, and the Central Intelligence Agency Retirement and Disability System, and for other purposes.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

(Ms. HARMAN asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, strong intelligence is our first line of defense in the war on terrorism. And make no mistake, we are at war. The gruesome beheadings of Danny Pearl, Nick Berg, Paul Johnson, and yesterday's murder of 33-year-old Kim Sun Il of South Korea are stark reminders of the nature of our enemy.

Our brave men and women in the intelligence community are on the front lines fighting that enemy. They risk their lives for our freedom and they deserve our unflinching support. Yet, unfortunately, Mr. Chairman, this legislation deprives them of full support. This bill provides less than one-third of the key funding that the intelligence community has told us they need to fight the war on terrorism. Less than one-third.

I want to use my time to engage the gentleman from Florida (Chairman Goss) in a brief dialogue on this important issue. I would like to ask my colleague directly, on my time, Mr. Chairman, does this bill provide all of the counterterrorism funding that the intelligence agencies have told our committee they need for the coming year? Yes or no.

I yield to the gentleman.

Well, Mr. Chairman, I appreciate that response, but the classified schedule of authorizations in the majority's bill specifically states that the additional funds are only for the first quarter of the year. Well, that is woefully inadequate.

The gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Cramer), the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Peterson) and the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Boswell) all proposed an amendment to fully fund counterterrorism. Let me demonstrate exactly what this full funding amendment does. The majority's bill funds only first quarter ops tempo for counterterrorism. The full funding amendment, which we hope to offer, funds a full year for counterterrorism.

The majority's bill gives the CIA 11 percent less than fiscal year 2004 funding, whereas the full funding amendment we had hoped to offer gives the CIA 5 percent more than 2004 funding. The majority's bill funds only 5 percent of the NRO's CT budget, 19 percent of NSA's CT budget, 26 percent of NGA's CT budget, and 35 percent of the CIA's CT budget. The full funding amendment funds 100 percent of these budgets.

Finally, the majority's bill provides no supplemental funding for critical CT HUMINT support functions whereas the full funding amendment provides full funding for all the HUMINT support functions.

In short, Mr. Chairman, H.R. 4548 is too weak. What is the President going to tell the American people when they learn that we are going to have a gap in counterterrorism funding next year? There could be a gap of 3 to 4 months before we pass a new supplemental. And during that gap, our Nation will be at unnecessary risk at a time when, for example, we will be having events like the presidential inauguration and the Super Bowl.

The majority has twisted itself into a pretzel trying to justify this weak bill, all the while bemoaning the harmful impact of budgeting-by- supplemental on our intelligence community's ability and our committee's ability to do robust oversight.

Jim Pavitt, the CIA's Deputy Director for Operations, gave a speech this week in which he said that, ``there is no end in sight'' to the terrorist threat we face. Terrorism is no longer a one-time emergency. It is no longer something we should scramble around to fund. It is our way of life. It is our central national security challenge. And if the White House or the majority does not understand that, then we are in serious danger.

In our committee we offered several amendments to strengthen intelligence and strengthen oversight. They were common sense measures. Yet, all of them were rejected on party line votes.

Mr. Chairman, we know terrorists are actively planning to attack us again. We know there is nuclear material out there that is unaccounted for for sale to the highest bidder. We know the next attack will be followed by the usual Washington hand-wringing about why we did not do more.

The rule under which we debate today has squandered an opportunity to do much more. We have lost an opportunity to strengthen intelligence, to strengthen congressional oversight, to retire the soon-to-be-vacant DCI position and replace it with a 21st century organization capable of integrating 15 intelligence agencies into one intelligence community and to keep full faith with the brave men and women who are on the front lines at this hour risking their lives for our freedom.

This bill is weaker, far weaker than the American people deserve.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton), the ranking member on the House Committee on Armed

Services, the committee on which I was honored to serve for 6 years.

Mr. Chairman, those of us on this side of the aisle feel it is important to fund stronger intelligence in the global war on terror, and it is now my pleasure to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Reyes), a dedicated member of our committee.

Mr. Chairman, it is my pleasure to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Boswell), ranking member of the Subcommittee on Human Intelligence, Analysis, and Counterintelligence.

(Mr. BOSWELL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I would point out to the gentleman from Florida (Chairman Goss) that our amendments were shared in advance and our views on budgeting by supplemental have been known for years and are shared by the majority.

Mr. Chairman, it is my pleasure to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Peterson), a courageous member of our committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Cramer), a dedicated member of our committee, who is ranking member on the Subcommittee on Technical and Tactical Intelligence.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Eshoo).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt), a reasonably recent and very dedicated member of our committee.

Mr. Chairman, I commend the last speaker for his sincere efforts at bipartisanship.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Ruppersberger), our rookie on the committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee).

Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. I want to assure her that I understand and fully support the general principle reflected in her point and appreciate her intention in raising this issue. I also want to assure the gentlewoman that, as this bill moves forward, we will be mindful of the issue and will try to be helpful.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

(Ms. Harman asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I would point out to our last speaker that the DOD appropriations bill is a $400 billion bill, a small fraction of which is for intelligence. In my view, that is not the place for this debate about fully funding counterterrorism intelligence. The intelligence bill is where we should make our stand. And I do appreciate the gentleman from California's (Mr. Hunter) clarification, as he just said, that the additional counterterrorism funding in his bill is only for a couple of months.

That is the point we are trying to make, Mr. Chairman. We all are patriots. We all support the troops. We all support our intelligence personnel. We just think that the primary mission of the intelligence community ought to be funded in the base bill, the one we are voting on today.

Mr. Chairman, the Intelligence Authorization bill represents the culmination of many months of work by our community to provide the intelligence community with the resources it needs to safeguard our national security. It also presents an opportunity to lay down important oversight markers so that we can fulfill our constitutionally mandated duty to provide oversight of the intelligence community. The Intelligence Committees were created for precisely this reason, and if we simply become a rubber stamp for the administration, then we might as well cease to exist.

At the outset, let me commend our diligent staff on both sides of the aisle for their hard work and late nights, and let me commend all members of our committee on both sides of the aisle for their focus and dedication to getting it right. Four of them, the gentleman from Florida (Chairman Goss), the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Bereuter), the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Burr), and the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Collins), will leave us this year, and I wish them fair winds. I also want to explain the gentleman from Florida's (Mr. Hastings) absence. Our thoughts are with him as he cares for his ailing mother.

Mr. Chairman, this debate has been very difficult, certainly for me. As everyone here knows, over five terms in Congress, I have voted for every intelligence authorization bill and every defense authorization bill, and I have often worked to try to plus-up amounts in those bills. The brave men and women of the intelligence community rely on us. Without us, they cannot do their job. I have traveled around the world and visited with them, and their bravery and courage speaks volumes about how much they love this country.

For all of these reasons, I stand here today with a heavy heart because I feel that unfortunately and needlessly, this bill could have and should have provided for stronger intelligence and stronger oversight.

I yield to the gentleman from California.

Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, if I could just respond to the gentleman, and I would be happy to yield again if I have any more time if he wants to respond to what I have to say, I appreciate that comment, but mine is a bit different. I understand that we may not fully know what we need. That is why we have supplementals. But in this case we do fully know what we need. We know what the agencies in the intelligence community need for counterterrorism because they have told us, and the amendments we wish had been in order had an unclassified piece, which basically says we should fully fund counterterrorism, and a classified piece, where we carefully allocated across the intelligence community all the money these agencies have told us they need. They told us it is hard to plan for their year without knowing for sure that they will get money.

And the last point I want to make to the gentleman, and I do appreciate what he is saying, is that I do not think we will pass another supplemental until sometime after the first quarter of next year. We will be gearing up in a new Congress, and if we pass the supplemental in next March or April, as I pointed out in my earlier remarks, we may have a gap in funding counterterrorism just at the time when we have the presidential inauguration and the Super Bowl, and those are huge events were maximum counterterrorism efforts are needed.

Mr. Chairman, I do not oppose the amendment, but I ask to control the time on this side.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I support the Goss amendment to restore the level of funding requested for NDIC, the National Drug Intelligence Center. I was concerned to learn that these funds had been cut, as have others for key satellite programs, and I am pleased that the chairman has now decided to restore the level of funding the Center needs to carry out its important counternarcotics mission. Hopefully we will address other shortfalls that some on our side have identified in the conference.

Mr. Chairman, I would just like to make an additional comment about a subject the chairman raised at the end of general debate, and that was when he called additional budget authority monopoly money. I certainly share his view that we should appropriate the funds that we authorize. That is why this side wants to authorize additional funds and then hopefully to get them appropriated. I have spoken to the highest levels of this administration about my keen view that the amount of money to fully fund counterterrorism for fiscal year 2005 is not so great.

It is not a big budget buster, certainly not as big as many other requests made by this administration.

I see the gentleman from California (Mr. Lewis) in the room, for whom I have high regard. It would be my hope that sometime soon, even perhaps in the defense appropriations bill that comes out of conference, we will increase the funding for counterterrorism for fiscal year 2005.

Mr. Chairman, I support the Goss amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, it has our support.

Mr. Chairman, I do not oppose this amendment, but I will control the time on this side.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I want to support the author of this amendment for his carefully crafted amendment and excellent remarks. I believe it is imperative that we maintain an effective and efficient process for designating foreign terrorist organizations and understand better the threat posed by those terrorist organizations and their links to weapons of mass destruction.

I understand, as the gentleman said, that the Committee on the Judiciary and the Committee on International Relations have been working on a stand-alone bill to require the Secretary of State to review designations every 4 years, not every 6, as this amendment provides.

I think this additional flexibility would be a good thing and would suggest, for example, that a bill, which I assume will be taken up at another time, should include a provision allowing the Secretary of State to remove groups from the list of foreign terrorist organizations if they renounce terrorism. This is one way of using our soft power instead of relying solely on military power to influence groups on the list. I would hope that these details and others could be worked out separately, or in the conference on this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I would just like to add that from 1999 to 2000, I served as a member of the so-called Bremer Commission on Terrorism, headed by former Ambassador L. Paul Bremer, who now serves as civil administrator in Iraq. The issue of listing groups and states as terrorist actors was something we considered carefully. In fact, we spoke out about one such state.

I think this is an excellent tool to help defeat the threats we face. I really want to commend the gentleman from California (Mr. Gallegly) for offering this improvement to our intelligence authorization bill.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I reiterate my support for this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, reserving the right to object, though I will not object, I want to be sure that the language that has not been read is consistent with the language I just reviewed.

I yield to the gentleman from New York.

Mr. Chairman, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. Chairman, I do not oppose the amendment, but I will control the time on this side; and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I want to commend the gentleman from New York (Mr. Boehlert) not only for the amendment but for, as he said, engaging the gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos) in a constructive effort to improve the amendment, and I think it is a lot better. Frankly, I wish that our bill that we are considering and voting on today had engaged the minority more constructively at an earlier stage; I think it would have been a lot better.

I do support the Boehlert amendment. I fondly remember our trip, six countries, 6 days. I think the gentleman left out Sicily, so we might add 7 countries in 6 days.

Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I thought our Sicily stop was outstanding, which is why I brought it up.

But I think that the improvements made to this amendment by the gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos) are noteworthy. What he did, as I understand it, was to insert a bit of the history here, the role of sanctions initiated by President Reagan, the role of international legal negotiations to get Libya to renounce terrorism and turn over terrorism suspects to international courts, and the role of diplomacy in previous administrations and by the British and others before the beginning of this administration. Though this administration did play a role, and I commend it, in President Qadhafi's stunning decision to do the right thing, that should be reflected, and is, in this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I will put two very important articles on this subject in the Record. One is by Dr. Flynt Leverett entitled ``Why Libya Gave Up the Bomb'' from the January 23, 2004, New York Times; and the second is a Middle East Institute Policy Brief by two former assistant Secretaries of State and former ambassadors, Martin Indyk and Edward S. Walker entitled ``What Does Libya's Disarmament Teach About Rogue States?'' dated April 7, 2004.

Finally, let me make two other points. We have seen in recent days troubling allegations that Colonel Qadhafi was himself involved in ordering assassinations of Saudi leaders. These

are, of course, press reports. But these stories remind us that the success of our policies toward Libya remain an open question, and I am sure the gentleman from New York (Mr. Boehlert) agrees with me that we need to be clear-eyed and diligent to make certain that these promises by Colonel Qadhafi are kept, and that in other respects, he does not convert to any of his old habits.

I yield to the gentleman from New York, the sponsor of the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for those comments and strongly agree with them.

In closing, Mr. Chairman, let me just mention that on that trip that was described, we did spend a day and evening in Baghdad. It was my second visit. We met with troops, but we also met with all of our intelligence personnel at the scene in addition to the leaders of the CPA. What is troubling about that, and I believe the gentleman from Florida (Chairman Goss) has commented on this in another appearance, our appearance yesterday in the Committee on Rules, because the timing of our trip was February 2004. While we were in Baghdad, General Taguba was doing his investigation of prison abuse and so forth in Baghdad, and we were never told by these intelligence leaders that that investigation was ongoing. That was wrong. That diminishes our oversight, and those folks whom we support as robustly as we can need to be fully candid with our committee, especially when we are seeking them out to try to help them.

Mr. Chairman, I would conclude by saying that I support the gentleman's amendment as improved by the gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos).

[From the New York Times, 23 January 2004]

Why Libya Gave Up on the Bomb,

(By Flynt Leverett)

Washington.--As President Bush made clear in his State of

the Union address, he sees the striking developments in

relations with Libya as the fruit of his strategy in the war

on terrorism. The idea is that Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi's

apparent decision to renounce weapons of mass destruction was

a largely a result of the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, which

thus retroactively justifies the war in Iraq and holds out

the prospect of similar progress with other states that

support terrorists, seek weapons of mass destruction and

brutalize their own people.

However, by linking shifts in Libya's behavior to the Iraq

war, the president misrepresents the real lessons of the

Libyan case. This confusion undermines our chances of getting

countries like Iran and Syria to follow Libya's lead.

The roots of the recent progress with Libya go back not to

the eve of the Iraq war, but to the Bush administration's

first year in office. Indeed, to be fair, some credit should

even be given to the second Clinton administration. Tired of

international isolation and economic sanctions, the Libyans

decided in the late 1990s to seek normalized relations with

the United States, and held secret discussions with Clinton

administration officials to convey that message. The Clinton

White House made clear that no movement toward better

relations was possible until Libya met its responsibilities

stemming from the downing of Pan Am Flight 103 over

Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988.

These discussions, along with mediation by the Saudi

ambassador to the United States, Prince Bandar bin Sultan,

produced a breakthrough: Libya turned over two intelligence

officers implicated in the Pan Am 103 attack to the

Netherlands for trial by a Scottish court, and in 1999

Washington acquiesced to the suspension of United Nations

sanctions against Libya.

Then, in the spring of 2001, when I was a member of the

State Department's policy planning staff, the Bush

administration picked up on those discussions and induced the

Libyans to meet their remaining Lockerbie obligations. With

our British colleagues, we presented the Libyans with a

``script'' indicating what they needed to do and say to

satisfy our requirements on compensating the families of the

Pan Am 103 victims and accepting responsibility for the

actions of the Libyan intelligence officers implicated in the

case.

We also put an explicit quid pro quo on the table: if Libya

met the conditions we laid out, the United States and Britain

would allow United Nations sanctions to be lifted

permanently. This script became the basis for three-party

negotiations to resolve the Lockerbie issue.

By early 2003, after a Scottish appeals court upheld the

conviction of one of the Libyan intelligence officers, it was

evident that our approach would bear fruit. Indeed,

Washington allowed the United Nations sanctions against Libya

to be removed last summer after Libya reached a compensation

agreement with the Pan Am 103 families and accepted

responsibility for its officials' actions.

But during these two years of talks, American negotiators

consistently told the Libyans that resolving the Lockerbie

situation would lead to no more than elimination of United

Nations sanctions. To get out from under the separate United

States sanctions, Libya would have to address other concerns,

particularly regarding its programs in weapons of mass

destruction.

This is the content in which Libyan officials approached

the United States and Britain last spring to discuss

dismantling Libya's weapons program. The Iraq war, which

had not yet started, was not the driving force behind

Libya's move. Rather, Libya was willing to deal because of

credible diplomatic representations by the United States

over the years, which convinced the Libyans that doing so

was critical to achieving their strategic and domestic

goals. Just as with Lockerbie, an explicit quid pro quo

was offered: American officials indicated that a

verifiable dismantling of Libya's weapons projects would

lead the removal of our own sanctions, perhaps by the end

of this year.

The lesson is incontrovertible: to persuade a rogue regime

to get out of the terrorism business and give up its weapons

of mass destruction, we must not only apply pressure but also

make clear the potential benefits of cooperation.

Unfortunately, the Bush administration has refused to take

this approach with other rogue regimes, notably Iran and

Syria. Until the president is willing to employ carrots as

well as sticks, he will make little headway in changing

Iranian or Syrian behavior.

The president's lack of initiative on this point is

especially disappointing because, in the diplomatic aftermath

of the Sept. 11 attacks, the administration has a singular

opportunity to effect strategic realignments by both Iran and

Syria. Well-placed Iranians, including more pragmatic

elements of Iran's conservative camp, have indicated through

diplomatic channels and to former officials (including

myself) their interest in a ``grand bargain'' with the United

States. Basically, Tehran would trade off its ties to

terrorist groups and pursuit of nuclear weapons for security

guarantees, a lifting of sanctions and normalized relations

with Washington.

Likewise, senior Syrian officials--including President

Bashar al-Assad himself, in a conversation in Damascus last

week--have told me that they want a better strategic

understanding with the United States. To achieve this,

however, Washington needs to be willing to spell out what

Syria would get in return for giving up its ties to

terrorists and its chemical weapons and ballistic missiles.

As Mr. Assad told me, Syria is ``a state, not a charity''--if

it gives up something, it must know what it will gain in

return.

One reason the Bush administration was able to take a more

constructive course with Libya was that the White House,

uncharacteristically, sidelined the administration's

neoconservative wing--which strongly opposes any offer of

carrots to state sponsors of terrorism, even when carrots

could help end such problematic behavior--when crucial

decisions were made. The initial approach on the Lockerbie

case was approved by an informal coalition made up of

Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser, and

Secretary of State Colin Powell. Likewise, in the lead up to

the negotiations involving Libyan weapons of mass

destruction, the neoconservatives at the Pentagon and in the

shop of Under Secretary of State John Bolton were left out of

the loop.

Perhaps a coalition among members of the State Department's

bureau of Near Eastern affairs and the National Security

Council's more pragmatic elements can chart a similar course

involving Iran and Syria. However, until the administration

learns the real lessons of the Libyan precedent, policy

toward other rogue regimes is likely to remain stuck in the

mind of ideology.

Flynn Leverett, a visiting fellow with the Saban Center for

Middle East Politics at the Brookings Institution, was senior

director for Middle Eastern affairs at the National Security

Council from 2002 to 2003.

Mr. Chairman, I do not oppose the amendment, but I will control the time on our side.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I will support the amendment, though I wish it had included a clear statement about the importance of U.S. obligations to adhere to international laws, conventions and treatises to prevent torture, cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment of human beings.

Mr. Chairman, one of the most troubling aspects of this whole detainee issue, besides the absolutely reprehensible abuse of prisoners, is the all-out assault on the rule of law that is clearly revealed in legal memos that seem to justify abuse and even torture of detainees.

None of us is naive here, and as a member of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, I strongly believe in the importance of interrogations and understand that interrogations can yield information that protect thousands or millions of Americans. We have to interrogate prisoners, but over the many years of our country's history, we have always done those interrogations consistent with the rule of law, and only recently have some very troubling memoranda surfaced at the highest levels of the Justice Department and the Defense Department that raise questions and that actually assert that the President of the United States in his role as commander in chief could actually be above the law.

I thought, Mr. Chairman, that we had defeated that idea at Runnymede centuries and centuries ago and that our country was built on a foundation of the rule of law, and I worry, Mr. Chairman, that if we do not observe the rule of law, not only do we undercut our moral authority, but we endanger our troops who might be treated just the way some of our people are treating other troops.

Now, let me add quickly that the beheading of Americans and other nationals is absolutely outrageous, and nowhere do I think that behavior is consistent with even rational or humane behavior. It is abhorrent and appalling, and I strongly condemn it.

But in conclusion, I think it is important that we support this amendment, but I think it is also important that as we do support this amendment, we think about the fact that the rule of law must always apply as we treat detainees and proceed with the important work of interrogations.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I would say to the gentleman from Texas that I appreciate his comments welcoming my comments. That, again, is in the spirit of bipartisanship. We all do better when we are bipartisan.

I would just also make a comment to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Goss). I certainly agree that a lot of material is in our committee spaces, but we will consider an amendment later this afternoon on this subject of the committee's ability to oversee the detainee problem. Some of us remain skeptical that our committee has gotten all the material we need and certainly skeptical that we have gotten adequate candid testimony from administration officials.

I would also point out to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Goss) that while we were in Baghdad, we should have been told about some issues directly relevant to our jurisdiction, such as this issue of ghosting of detainees as described by General Taguba in his report, and that is the placing of detainees without revealing their numbers or their identity in prisons so that, as I understand it, the International Red Cross and other outside observers would not be aware of their existence. This is a serious issue directly relevant to our jurisdiction. I believe that it was known to those we met with in Baghdad and they should have informed us; at least that is my personal opinion.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt), another member of our committee to comment on the Johnson amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I see no additional speakers on our side. I support the amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to this amendment, and I will control the time on our side.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Let me just say to the sponsor of the amendment that all of us in this House, on a bipartisan basis, recognize and respect and honor the heroism and sacrifice of the men and women in the intelligence community. I have spoken to it two or three times already today. That is not the issue. The issue is additional language in this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Ruppersberger), our rookie.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I want to agree with the comments of the last speaker and commend his service as part of the Central Intelligence Agency. He brings great expertise to this House, and I as one Member value it enormously.

He may not know that the Bremer Commission on which I served recommended that the Deutch Guidelines not apply in the case of recruitment of terrorist spies. We, too, found that, though well- intended, and I believe they were well-intended, those guidelines inhibited the aggressive recruitment of people who had the qualifications to penetrate the worst terrorist organizations, which we need them to do. Yes, these are unsavory characters, and yes, we need them, provided that they are reasonably vetted so that we know that they are reliable, but nonetheless, yes, we need them. I do not want to be heard to be ambivalent about this at all.

A few years ago, our committee found that those guidelines had not been rescinded; and on a bipartisan basis, we directed that the DCI rescind them and replace them, and that was done at our direction. That was one of our impressive bipartisan actions, and so I would just point out that, while the language of this amendment commending our people in the field who take risk on our behalf is excellent, the problem we are having on this side is with the findings that very narrowly focus on a very few years of history.

The history is longer, and let me say in the spirit of bipartisanship that we all got it wrong after the Cold War. We all thought the world would be more peaceful. We all thought there would be a peace dividend. That is why the 41st President, President Bush, began to draw down both the Defense and Intelligence budgets, anticipating a more peaceful world, which obviously did not come to pass.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, how much more time do we have?

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I would just point out to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood) that the findings section of this amendment claims there was a funding reduction in the Intelligence budget of 11 percent between 1993 and 1995. This narrow period matches a period when President Clinton was in office and Democrats still controlled the Congress.

But the decline commenced in the first Bush administration, in 1990, as the Soviet empire was collapsing. And the trend continued through the 6-year period of Republican control of Congress until 9-11.

It is good that we have increased the budget. I hope everyone in this House supports those increases. Certainly those of us on this side of the debate are talking about full funding of counterterrorism, because it turns out that the world was not more peaceful after the fall of the Berlin Wall. The world was more dangerous, and all of us underestimated the lethality of the threats we faced.

In hindsight, we all, over three administrations, should have done a lot more. In foresight, hopefully together on a bipartisan basis, we will.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, how much time is remaining on our side?

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt), a member of our committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I do not think we have any further speakers on this amendment, but I would like to enter into a dialogue with the amendment's sponsor to suggest to him that we might agree by unanimous consent that the sense of Congress in his resolution be the entire resolution.

We strike the findings, because our side feels that they are not complete and that some of them may be misleading. And that, as I said, on a bipartisan basis we all were wrong in 1990 when the wall came down and we expected a more peaceful world.

Would the gentleman be amenable to striking the findings and having his resolution be the Sense of Congress, as he has drafted it, which I would predict would be adopted unanimously?

I yield to the gentleman from Michigan.

Well, reclaiming my time, Mr. Chairman, I am disappointed in that answer only because I think there is plenty of blame to go around over three or four administrations and findings that made that clear, I think, would be more helpful.

Let me reiterate my strong view, and the view of everyone that I can imagine on our side, that we support the men and women of the intelligence community. That is something I have said over and over and over again in our committee briefings, hearings, and travels. Everywhere we go around the globe, and the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Goss) and I and others have traveled to places like Pyongyang, and Baghdad and Kabul and Libya and elsewhere. We have always thanked the men and women of the intelligence community with whom we have met.

I wish that this would have been drafted on a bipartisan basis with what we would view as a fairer statement of findings over a longer period of time. I think that that would do more honor to the capable men and women who are now in harm's way. So I regrettably urge a ``no'' vote on this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of H.R. 4548, and I ask my colleagues on both sides of this great House to support this bill. Casting their vote is a vote of confidence, respect, and deep admiration for the honorable and heroic patriots who toil quietly, and usually without notice, throughout the intelligence community in order to keep

us safe, prosperous, and free in this wonderful country. It is imperative that these men and women understand in these troubled times that this House holds them in the highest regard and appreciates that the work accomplished by them is critical to the defense of our liberty and security. Amid great sacrifice and often intense conditions, the men and women of the intelligence community continue to perform their missions with great energy and admirable devotion to duty. We commend these officers. The security of our Americans at home and abroad truly relies on their success.

Mr. Chairman, if my colleagues like the Defense appropriation bill that passed yesterday on a vote of 403 to 17, then this bill should equally please my colleagues today. Yesterday's Defense appropriation bill was coordinated closely with the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, and our funding levels are very, very close. The Intelligence bill currently before the House, however, authorizes funding slightly above the level the appropriators set for intelligence funding. In fact, this Intelligence bill funds the intelligence community at its highest levels in history. It exceeds the total fiscal year 2004 appropriated level for the intelligence community, including all supplementals, approximately by hundreds of millions. As my colleagues know, we cannot be totally precise on the numbers we speak. For all intelligence programs in this bill, the committee authorizes a total of approximately 16 percent over the President's February request.

This bill increases investment in human intelligence and the capabilities that they represent for us, the core mission of our intelligence community. It improves intelligence analysis, coverage in depth, so that we have more focused, sharper information for our decisionmakers. It strengthens intelligence community language capabilities across the board, through both improved legislative authorities and initial investment, so we have the people who know the languages we need to know to do our job.

It improves the structure and management of the disparate elements of the intelligence community's information technology systems by creating an intelligence community Chief Information Officer, hopefully to get better coordination so that we can overcome some of the problems we learned as we reviewed the events of 9/11. It bolsters U.S. counterintelligence resource capabilities; and, specifically, it adds 22 percent above the President's request for human intelligence and human-related programs. That is the core business of intelligence. Substantial increases in funding for improved analytical capabilities, as I have said, are included.

Significant additional amounts for information technology infrastructure, what we call enterprise architecture, is included, and information-sharing capabilities, which are critical. Tens of millions are included for improved foreign language capabilities.

This money has been carefully applied; it is carefully managed. This bill is very close to the bill passed unanimously out of our sister committee in the other body, with one major exception, of course, that they did not have the benefit of the contingent emergency relief fund during their consideration.

So, it is fair to say that our bill is more generous to the global war on terror than the other body's version, and that bill enjoys bipartisan support, unanimous bipartisan support I am informed.

Some in the minority have suggested that voting down this bill somehow better supports our intelligence community and makes our country safer. In my view, that is a convolution to the point of absurdity. They say if an attack happens before the election, it will somehow be our fault for not funding the global war on terror.

I would point out that the 2004 fiscal year goes on until October, and any shortage of resources would be of interest to those who did not support the $87 billion supplemental bill for fiscal year 2004.

All I would say is that the majority in the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence voted to support the men and women of the intelligence community in this bill today. We did not vote against the community and we did not shortchange the community in the global war on terrorism.

Now, there is an irony here. For years, I have been trying to get more support for intelligence. Usually the record will show that usually the cutting amendments have come from certain Members of the minority, as is their right. Now, it seems my sin is to bring forth a bill that spends not enough on intelligence rather than too much. Frankly, I think I should declare victory and say thank you all for listening.

But I will be disappointed, on a serious note, if at the end of this day, Members on all sides cannot agree that this bill authorizes proper sums carefully managed and properly coordinated with the appropriators and the other affected committees.

This is a very good bill with many important aspects that I have outlined. Indeed, it is with some hope I note the classified version of the minority views in their very first paragraph admit as much. Members who took the time to come up to the committee spaces to review the classified annex, which is available to all Members as usual, have seen the important work this committee has done.

Our work is not done in the public with klieg lights all the time. But it is a little misleading to suggest, as some have, that the committee product is less worthy because we do take seriously the responsibility, our commitment it is, to safeguard properly classified material by using closed sessions. That, incidentally, has been the practice for all the recent Congresses that I have been on the committee.

We must also be mindful that our enemies watch and hear what we say. Our audience is the American people primarily. Those are the people to whom we are accountable and responsible and proud of the work we do, and are pleased to share it with them. But, unfortunately, our enemies are listening too, and we are a Nation at war. Sometimes the enemy is able to gauge their conduct on how this body acts. They are able to use psychological warfare to drive wedges. They also could gain an enormous advantage if we do not take the appropriate opportunities to keep from public discourse our committee discussion on the sensitive intelligence matters that we are charged with overseeing. And when we have that debate in committee, I like the committee to have the full range of conversation, so we start out with the idea in closed session and then we winnow out what we can talk about in public, which is why we are here today talking about what we can talk about in public.

For the past 7-plus years, I have been working to refit the intelligence community for its future, with the members of the committee, for whom I am extremely grateful, to posture it for the days ahead. We have always worked hard on the committee to create a constituency for intelligence inside and outside of this institution. We have insisted that the committee be both supportive advocates and constructive overseers. None of like gotcha politics when it comes to national security.

I have tried to engage the past two administrations on the needs to retool the Intelligence Community for smarter, better days ahead, and I have had the full support of the committee in our efforts so far. This bill continues that effort. I urge its adoption.

Mr. Chairman, I submit the following for the Record.

Statement of Administration Policy--H.R. 4548--Intelligence

Authorization Act for FY 2005

The Administration supports House passage of HR 4548, which

authorizes appropriations for fiscal year 2005 for the

conduct of the intelligence and intelligence-related

activities of the United States Government. The committee-

reported bill authorizes funding that strengthens core

intelligence capabilities and supports intelligence

activities that would sustain the Global War on Terror.

Now more than ever before, our Nation's security relies on

accurate, timely, and actionable intelligence--and the

challenges facing the intelligence community are difficult

and complex. This makes it vitally important for the

administration and Congress to work together to provide the

intelligence community with the tools and resources it needs

to enhance our national security posture, win the Global War

on Terror, and reduce the proliferation of weapons of mass

destruction.

We are making advances in our ability to collect, process,

and analyze intelligence information. Although not part of

this bill, crucial innovations such as the PATRIOT Act and

the Terrorist Threat Integration Center are helping us to

protect our homeland by sharing information better than ever

before. The President has also expressed his interest in

working with Congress, when the time is right, to examine

structural reforms that may be needed to improve our

intelligence capability in the future. The upcoming reports

of the Senate intelligence Committee and the 9/11 Commission,

along with the work of the Commission on Intelligence

Capabilities Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction, will

provide important information that will help Congress and the

Administration in this effort.

The Administration looks forward to working with Congress

to support the vital work of the intelligence community,

especially its counterterrorism activities, to assure

continued strong, flexible intelligence capabilities, and to

refine certain provisions in this bill, including relating to

procurement, to ensure that these provisions maintain the

flexibility the President needs to most effectively manage

the ongoing war against terrorists of global reach.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, officially yes, because we do have the statement of support from the administration on this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young), the distinguished chairman of the House Committee on Appropriations.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Nevada (Mr. Gibbons), a chairman of a subcommittee of the committee.

Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Burr), a valued member of the committee and distinguished Member.

(Mr. BURR asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I would say to the distinguished gentleman in the well who just finished that I would have been pleased to have the opportunity to try and work out his amendment if we had seen it ahead of time before committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Collins).

Mr. Chairman, could I inquire the status of the time on both sides?

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood), the distinguished chairman of the Subcommittee on Terrorism and Homeland Security.

(Mr. LaHOOD asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra), who is the chairman of our Subcommittee on Technical and Tactical Intelligence but was also on probably the most recent delegation back from Iraq, and I appreciate the extra effort that he and his colleagues made.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. Cunningham), a member of our committee who is probably better known as a world-class pilot.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Everett).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. Hunter), who is actually known as the chairman of the House Committee on Armed Services, and otherwise known as our colleague and friend.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

First of all, I want to assure the gentlewoman that I associate myself with stronger intelligence. Her poster, I think, is excellent, and I am delighted that we all agree on that.

Second of all, I want to tell the gentlewoman that I totally agree that the form is not pretty. I do not like supplementals either. We work with what we have to work with. But the substance, I think, came out as well as it could. And I want to thank the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Armed Services for reaching out to help us with the bridge.

In a more direct answer to the gentlewoman's question a while ago about what requests were, and I am going to be very candid, these were the requests we were working with. And they are not for the whole year, but they are the requests to deal with the war on terror. And we actually come up with 32 percent more than what the CIA requested, 100 percent of what DIA requested, 39 percent more than what NSA requested, 88 percent more than NRO, and 19 percent more than NGA.

So we are way ahead in bridging. But obviously, her point is we have not gone for a whole year, and we all understand that. The question is will there be a short-change? And my answer is no. And the problem I have with her solution that she had proposed, somewhat belatedly, if I may say that, and I will come to that point if I have time, is that authorized money without appropriated money behind it is monopoly money, as we all know, and that was part of the problem.

Now let me go to the gentleman from Missouri's (Mr. Skelton) point, which I think was a very poignant point and I have huge regard for the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton), as we all do: What happened this year? And the answer is that normally we do work out all of our differences before we bring our bill out. We get them done in committee. This year we are on a schedule. I thought we had all our differences worked out. I honestly did not know we were going to have some of these amendments that she came up with until a couple of hours before the meeting. I asked that they try to be worked out. Apparently they were.

Normally we need more than 2 or 3 hours to work out something as important as a budget. So I do not think there is any bad intention. What I think is that there is more work to be done, and there will be an opportunity between now and the conference.

I urge support for this bill because I think it is a great place to go forward.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

The Chairman. The Clerk will designate the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

The purpose of this amendment is very simple. It restores the funding for the National Drug Intelligence Center to the levels contained in the President's fiscal year 2005 budget request. In fact, a number of actions were taken in committee regarding NDIC this year in response to an ongoing investigation into activities there. This amendment does nothing to affect these investigations that are ongoing in any way. It does not change in any reporting requirements nor does it lift any fences that were put in place. But what it does do is it restores the authorization level to include $8 million that had been cut from the President's fiscal year 2005 budget request.

I am doing this to address the concern that the cut might significantly impact the important mission of the National Drug Intelligence Center, and the reason I have brought the amendment forward is because I wanted to have the distinguished gentleman from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha), who I felt has actually been the person who is most instrumental in this particular program, have as much time as he wanted to address this issue. I wanted to make sure he had the opportunity.

In any event, I am assuming he would support the amendment. In the absence of knowing nothing beyond that, I am going to suggest that this amendment be adopted.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, pending the arrival of the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha), if he is able to be here, I would be very happy to yield such time as he may consume to the distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. Lewis), the man with whom our committee works very closely. He is the appropriator for our business, and we are indeed indebted and grateful for the kind attention and the generosity that he bestows on the intelligence community.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I would urge support for the amendment. Not knowing that there would be a contrary wish from the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murtha), whose guidance I would follow very closely on this, I am going to make that assumption. I hope that is a correct assumption and has the support of the other side, as we have heard expressed.

I yield to the gentlewoman from California.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back my time.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Johnson) for bringing this amendment forward and for yielding me the time.

As my ranking member has said, the use of interrogation is absolutely critical. It is a very important tool in the war on terrorism. Getting information timely, not only saves lives for our forces, but in the type of unconventional war we are fighting today, it is critical to know where the next bad surprise is going to come from, because these folks do not fight fair, as you say.

Equally, in order to protect the tool that we have, the proper use of interrogation, we need to prevent the abuse of interrogation. We all understand that, and unfortunately, I think that those of us who understand it and have looked into it are a little puzzled by the fixation that the liberal media has assigned to some of this, what I would call, aberration problem that took place at Abu Ghraib, which was admittedly terrible, but I believe it is an aberration.

I would like to point out to the American people that our committee does have oversight over interrogation, and we have looked into what has happened in the intelligence aspects, the interrogation aspects. We have had numerous briefings, and we had a rather full-scale day of hearings settled for, I guess it was last Friday. Unfortunately, that was preempted by the sad events with President Reagan's, the national day of mourning for State ceremony for former President of the United States, Ronald Reagan. So the government was closed, and obviously we have had to postpone.

But we are on top of the hearings in keeping up with this, and we have reams of material and reports, and we are obviously going to have more, because more reports are taking place.

I think the purpose of the gentleman's amendment is very, very important. We must not lose sight that interrogation is a critical tool, and despite the hype and the sensationalism that the liberal media is fixing on, and it is a shame they do not talk more about the cruelty and the barbarity, as the gentleman has alluded to, of the enemy than they do of some people who got out of control on our team.

I would also like to say that for the record, it is my understanding, and we do not know all of the facts yet, that perhaps the reason that the gentlewoman did not get an intelligence briefing in February while she was in Iraq is because the prisoners that were involved, we are finding out, were prisoners of crimes, of murder and rape and so forth, and not necessarily subjects of intelligence interest.

Now, that needs to be pursued further, but you can understand that if they are just criminals, that there would not be a huge reason to go out and get the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence involved, its abuse of prisoner handling, if that is the issue.

So we have got an area of jurisdiction there where we will sort out. I do think that it is extremely important that we support this amendment. And I thank the gentleman for bringing it forward. I think it is a huge improvement to our bill, and I will be very happy to accept it from our perspective.

Mr. Chairman, I actually urge support of this. When something bad is going to happen, we want to make sure that it is the bad guys that get us and not the good guys. And we are concerned that we have not, in our own country, focused enough on that subject.

I think this amendment helps the good guys and hurts the bad guys, so I urge its support.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

(Ms. SLAUGHTER asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Mrs. Myrick) for yielding me the customary 30 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, the fact that the American intelligence apparatus is broken is well-known. In the global war on terror, the most important weapon we have to protect the Nation and its people is intelligence. Today, more than ever, we must make the creation of a strong and flexible intelligence apparatus one of the highest priorities of this body. The terrorist attacks of September 11, combined with the continuing threat of further attacks, underscore the importance of this legislation.

Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, the bill reported out of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence falls far short of what our intelligence community has requested and what the American people expect. Now listen up. This bill provides less than a third of the key operational funding the intelligence agencies have told us that they need to prevent the next terrorist attack. The scheme for funding the counterterrorism operations is to give the agencies, listen, I want my colleagues to hear this, they are going to give them a third of the money they need, and then after the election they will come back and ask for the other two-thirds. Does this sound like we are concerned about the intelligence community? Does it sound like we are worried that we are at war? The answer is no. The election is the deciding point on when we come back and ask for the money.

The plan will starve the counterterrorism efforts, leaves the intelligence community anemic. Funding the intelligence community in bits and pieces, a portion now and a supplemental after the election, is not only irresponsible, it is reckless. Senior intelligence community officials have said that operating this way could jeopardize key counterterrorism operations. That is what they tell us.

Sadly, this year the bill fell victim to partisanship and the cold hard fiscal realities of tax cuts and spending caps. Every single Democrat member voted against favorably reporting this bill, and this is unprecedented. Typically, the importance of this bill trumps personal ideologies or the prevailing partisan winds; but knowing the ranking member and the other Democrat members of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, I know that they must have very serious concerns to vote against the authorization bill.

Five dedicated distinguished Democrat members of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, including the gentlewoman from California (Ranking Member Harman), offered five important amendments to the bill. However, the Committee on Rules tossed out four of these vital substantive amendments. The Committee on Rules will not allow the full House to consider and debate and amend to withhold a portion of the funding until the Secretary of Defense provides all information concerning the dealings of the Department of Defense and Ahmed Chalabi. This is information to which Congress is entitled. This is information the American people want to know. Who was this man who had such an incredible effect and so much influence on whether or not we went to war? What did we do besides give him $33 million?

Members will not be able to consider an amendment to restructure our dilapidated intelligence apparatus. Shockingly, the committee Republicans even made out of order an amendment to fully fund American counterterrorism efforts.

Yesterday, a member of the Committee on Rules tried to suggest that the amendments were proposed for political reasons. Far from it. Our Nation's security is at risk, and the integrity of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Democrats, and all Democrats, should not be questioned.

Reported out of committee on party lines, the rule does make in order an amendment to express the sense of Congress and support of the intelligence community and an amendment expressing the sense that the world is a safer place now that Libya has dismantled its weapons of mass destruction. These amendments were presumed to take precedence over the ones that really dealt with the committee and its budget. They do nothing to improve American counterterrorism operations.

Mr. Speaker, this is a seriously, fatally flawed bill; but, again, the Committee on Rules has muzzled debate on some of the most important issues concerning American intelligence operations. This is a double blow. It is another Committee on Rules strike against deliberation, discussion, and serious consideration; and it is a strike against the safety of America.

I am shocked at the rule and the underlying legislation before us this morning, and I urge my colleagues to oppose the rule so that the full House

can participate in a comprehensive debate on the most important issue confronting us today and to consider the vital amendments to improve the intelligence community.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Harman), the ranking member of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.

(Ms. HARMAN asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Peterson).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Cramer).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Boswell).

(Mr. BOSWELL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Eshoo).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Reyes).

Mr. Speaker, I am stunned at what the previous speaker has just said. What does he mean that no Democrat has expressed any outrage? Has the gentleman polled every Democrat in the country? Does he know that no Democrat has expressed outrage over the beheading of American citizens?

Mr. Speaker, let me reclaim my time. I just think that is an outrageous statement to make, and I do not believe that anybody in America is going to be impressed by that.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Ruppersberger).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).

(Mr. HOLT asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I will close. I urge Members to vote no on the previous question. If the previous question is defeated, I will offer an amendment to the rule that will allow the House to vote on a critical amendment that was defeated on a straight party line vote last night at the Committee on Rules.

The amendment by the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Peterson) would fully fund the counterterrorism needs of the intelligence community by increasing by 100 percent the funds authorized in the contingency emergency reserve. What many Members may not realize is that the President's budget request covered just a fraction of the intelligence community's counterterrorism requirements, less than a third. They say the rest of the funds will be requested only after the November election.

Well, the Nation's intelligence agencies have indicated that they need additional funds and the Peterson amendment will make sure that they receive them now, not after November elections.

Mr. Speaker, fighting terrorism is not now and has never been a partisan issue. After 9/11, Republicans and Democrats stood side by side on the steps of the Capitol united in our effort to root out terrorists and to keep America safe. It is hard for me to understand why Republicans would now actively work to keep the House from adequately funding the counterterrorism efforts.

The intelligence bill has long been considered in this House under an open rule. Any Member who wished to bring an amendment to the floor could do so, but last year things began to change. Republicans started to pass rules that restricted amendments, that allowed them to pick and choose which amendments could be debated in the floor of the House. This year they have taken it too far.

The Peterson amendment is far too important not to be considered and is far too important to be subject to petty partisan games. It deserves a separate vote here on the floor today.

So I urge Members on both sides of the aisle to vote no on the previous question. Let me make it very clear that a no vote will not stop the House from taking up the intelligence bill and will not prevent any of the amendments made in order from being offered. However, a yes vote will mean that the House will not have the opportunity to fully fund the Nation's counterterrorism needs.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that the amendment be modified in the form at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I can assure the gentlewoman that that is the case.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Let me tell my colleagues a little bit about the genesis of this amendment. Early in February, as a senior member of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, I was asked to lead a delegation for a mission to Iraq and Afghanistan. That delegation included the distinguished gentlewoman from California (Ms. Harman), the ranking member of the committee, and there were four others. There were six of us. We planned a most ambitious schedule for 6 days: six countries, 6 days.

Our purpose was not to determine the progress on the Constitution, important though that was; not to check on the morale of the troops, important though that always is; not to check on how we were spending our money on the reconstruction, and that too is very important. Our purpose as members of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence was to meet with members of the intelligence community on-site in that war zone to hear from them in their own words their assessment of the situation. I want to compliment all of the members of that delegation for the outstanding contribution they made to that mission.

But before we were going and still in the planning stages, I had a call from the State Department, Ambassador Burns, who directs the Near East desk. He said, Mr. Chairman, I would like you and the delegation to consider making an addition to your trip, another stop. I said, have you looked at our schedule? Six countries in 6 days. We do not have time to wind our watch. He said, let me talk to you about it. Then he came up to Capitol Hill; and in the secure sanctuary of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence rooms on the fourth floor of the Capitol, he said, We would like you to go to Libya. We would like your delegation to meet with Colonel Qadhafi. I said, Are you kidding? Are you serious? Libya is engaged in state-sponsored acts of terrorism against American citizens. It has endured U.N. sanctions; that has been going on for 20 years; disregarded world condemnation, and dismissed diplomatic settlements. What has changed? And he said, in the secure sanctuary of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence quarters on the fourth floor of the Capitol, There is movement; There is progress. We think it would be very valuable for your bipartisan delegation to go to Libya to meet Colonel Qadhafi, because we want to demonstrate in tangible form that if he begins to cooperate with us, we will cooperate with him.

After checking with the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Harman), she agreed. She thought it would be a good idea, and off we went. We spent 8 hours in the country, the final 2 hours in a tent in the middle of the Libyan desert outside of Surt, Colonel Qadhafi's hometown. We talked about weapons of mass destruction. We talked about the war on terrorism. We talked about the shooting down of Pan Am Flight 103, which has a searing impact on my soul forever more because there were 35 students from Syracuse University on that flight. We talked about all of the gut-wrenching issues that are so important to our security and the security of the Free World, and it was a meaningful discussion. And the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Harman) can characterize it from her standpoint what she thought of it.

Then we completed the rest of our mission. We went to Jordan, we went to Iraq, we went to Afghanistan, we went to Turkey. This was a world- wind visit of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, very serious business, doing very important work. As a matter of fact, 3 of the 6 days, we did not even sleep in a hotel; we slept in the airplane. We got back home, and we reported everything to the committee and to the State Department.

Since then, there has been a great opening up with Libya. Colonel Qadhafi, I do not think he went to bed one night and suddenly woke up and said, Hey, those guys are right and I have been wrong. I am going to change my ways. I think he looked around at the world and he said, the war on terrorism could negatively impact him like it negatively impacted his neighbor to the north, who is now behind bars, Saddam Hussein. I think he said that he wants to be concerned about his legacy and in what shape he was going to leave that country. I think he decided that it would be best to cooperate.

What has happened since then? He has turned over the weapons of mass destruction, he has made his country open for inspection, and he is cooperating fully.

Does that mean we can clap our hands and say, boy, is this not a great victory? Although it is a great victory as far as it goes, and it does prove that leadership really results in something positive if we work together. But the fact of the matter is, we have to continue to be cautious, but we have to be very deliberate.

That country is moving in the right direction. Let us hope they continue that movement. We want signals to be sent to others. We want Iran and North Korea and other nations, others who are on the list of countries that sponsor state terrorism, to get the message; and we think that this amendment that I am offering, this sense of the Congress amendment, will do the right thing in the appropriate way.

Let me add that there are a number of Members on both sides of the aisle that have worked very cooperatively on this. The gentleman from California (Mr. Lantos) had some suggestions for language. That is what my modifying amendment includes, the suggestions he made. That is the way we work best together, when we reach across the center aisle and find common ground.

So I would urge the adoption of my amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

The only reason we left out Sicily, because the initial was 6 countries in 6 days; but as the gentlewoman will recall, when we added Libya, there were requirements on the pilots in that they could not fly a certain amount of time beyond their standard time, so we could not go any farther than Sicily. We had to exit Libya, but we could not go any farther than Sicily, so we stayed overnight and got up the next morning and off we went.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. Let me stress we have to be cautious, but deliberate. But as a favorite son of the gentlewoman's State, the great President that we just lost, I am reminded of his admonition: trust, but verify.

Mr. Chairman, I will complete the balance of my time by just once again emphasizing that all is not over, all is not hunky- dory, as the phrase goes; but there has been significant movement in the right direction, thanks to good intelligence, thanks to firm and decisive leadership. But we have to go forward with the admonition that we trust, but verify.

So I would urge strong support of this amendment for all the reasons that have just been enumerated by the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Harman) and this gentleman, and I would urge a ``yes'' vote on my amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I might consume.

I rise today, and I am not one that normally comes to the floor; but given my time as a special agent with the FBI and watching the intelligence community get really abused in the 1990s and to see this very partisan debate engaged in this Intelligence authorization, I felt compelled to come to the floor, at least to try to interject some common sense and some plea that we could get back to the serious work of protecting the United States of America. One way we do that is we stand tall and we stand together and we commend those who are risking their lives every day in what is an art, a skill, to some degree a science, of collecting intelligence around the world.

The 1990s was brutal to intelligence collection. Funding was reduced. As a matter of fact, the number of intelligence operatives declined by 27 percent from 1992 to 1999. From 1991 to 1997, the number of stations declined by 30 percent. The number of assets declined by 40 percent. The intelligence reporting declined by approximately 50 percent. As a matter of fact, George Tenet said in front of the commission, When I became DCI, I found a community and a CIA whose dollars were declining and whose expertise was ebbing.

There was a feeling in the community of intelligence that they were the stepchild; they were the sinister folks who we did not need to spend money on anymore, who had passed their prime after the close of the Cold War. They became the great awful folks that we wanted to blame for a lot of things.

As a matter of fact, in the Deutch guidelines of 1995, they basically said that CIA operatives around the world could not associate with unsavory characters. I have to tell my colleagues that as an agent of the FBI, if you were not dealing with some unsavory characters, you were not catching bad guys. That is exactly what we needed to do. My colleagues can imagine the morale and the confusing message that we send to somebody who is risking their life in some remote corner of the world, dealing with somebody who would just as soon slit your throat as to say hi, and say to them, boy, you cannot deal with unsavory characters to save and defend the United States of America; it might embarrass us somewhere along the way.

Well, if we are going to defeat terrorism, we need to deal exactly with those unsavory characters. The gentlemanly days of Ivy League spies are over. The threat today are those who behead their hostages. The threat today are those who use illegal operations and criminal enterprise to conduct horrible acts against the United States, including flying airplanes into buildings.

So what we do by this amendment is say, yes, we have made some mistakes; yes, we did not hold you in high regard in the last decade, but we do today and we appreciate your work. You will not be on TV. You probably will not write a book. You probably will not be famous, but you are risking your life every single day for the defense of the United States.

I talked to a CIA station chief just this weekend who said our business is really to steal secrets, and all we want is the appreciation of what we do, the art of getting to them before they get to us.

These are great Americans, and when we tell them not to do something, they will not do it. When we tell them that we care and believe in them, they are going to do it. So this amendment is exactly that. It is us standing together, trying to set aside our partisan differences on what should never be a partisan issue, the safety and security of the United States of America.

So, to every FBI agent who gets up in the morning and worries that on their watch something bad is going to happen, to every CIA agent, to every other intelligence operative that we have employed by the United States of America who stands tall as a patriot for their Nation, we ought to say today, we recognize we did not treat you well, but we understand how valuable you are today, and we will stand with you. We will stand with you all the way. We are going to give you the resources you need, and we are going to give you the respect that you should command.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Simmons), whose service in the CIA has been unparalleled, and his service to his country is unmatched.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Illinois (Mr. LaHood).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murphy).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume just to clarify and point out that in fiscal year 1993, President Bush requested a 4 percent increase, and the Democrat Congress that year cut the request by 10 percent, effectively reducing the funding by 5 percent from the 1992 appropriation.

I understand the politics of being a convert to intelligence. Thank you. Let us stand together and say, okay, that time has gone, we are going to move forward, we are going to stand with the intelligence community.

Mr. Chairman, I yield the remainder of my time to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Goss), the chairman of the committee.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Mr. Chairman, facts are very stubborn things. Given the sense of where the intelligence community is today, they are beleaguered at every corner. For years, their hands were tied behind their back. And now you have commissions coming out and say, gee, we tied your hands and now we are faulting you for not being super heroes and doing super work without the funding and resources.

I think it is accurate, and I think we should make that statement that we all recognize those shortcomings of 1990s, but we will stand with you today. It is an important commitment for the morale of the intelligence officers in the field.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.