A resolution calling for the prosecution of Iraqis and their supporters for war crimes, and for other purposes.

Mr. President, I was alarmed over the past weekend to note the suicide bombing which was perpetrated on Saturday where four United States soldiers in the 3rd Infantry Division were murdered by a suicide car bomb, with a bomber driving a taxi filled with explosives to a highway checkpoint in central Iraq. This is the first such attack on American troops in this war, a war in which Iraqi forces have been accused of dressing as civilians and employing so-called human shields.

In an interview which appeared on ABC Television on Sunday, March 30th, Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz stated that this was to be the policy of Iraq. This statement was in response to a question by ABC News correspondent Richard Engel, a question related to the comment by the Vice President of Iraq the preceding day, Saturday, March 29th, and then again by a Defense Ministry spokesman on March 30th, that Iraq is ``welcoming the use of [such] suicide attacks.''

I am today introducing a resolution which condemns this practice as a war crime, to put the government of Iraq on notice that the United States, Great Britain, and coalition forces will be prosecuting these atrocities as war crimes. Human Rights Watch commented on this matter, condemned the act in a press release issued just today, saying: ``Feigning civilian or noncombatant status to deceive the enemy is a violation of the laws of war. . . .''

On March 29, that is last Saturday, at a U.S. military roadblock near Najaf, an Iraqi noncommissioned officer, reportedly posing as a taxi driver, detonated a car bomb that killed him and four U.S. soldiers. Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan said in a Baghdad news conference that such attacks would become ``routine military policy.'' The executive director of the Human Rights Watch, Mr. Kenneth Roth, said: ``When combatants disguise themselves as civilians or surrendering soldiers, that is a serious violation of the laws of war. Any such blurring of the line between combatant and noncombatant puts all Iraqis at greater risk.''

International law prohibits attacking, killing, injuring, capturing, or deceiving the enemy by resorting to what is called perfidy. A ``perfidious attack'' is one launched by combatants who have led opposing forces to believe that the attackers are really noncombatants. Acts of perfidy include pretending to be a civilian who cannot be attacked, or feigning surrender. Surrendering soldiers cannot be attacked, so it is perfidious to use that protected status to attack as the opposing forces let down their guard as they try to take the ``surrendering'' soldiers into custody.

Now, this technique, this tactic, has been sanctioned, as noted, at the highest level of the Iraqi government by the Vice President of Iraq and by Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz. Minister Aziz has been the leading Iraqi spokesman for more than a decade, going back, actually, before the gulf war in 1991. When Minister Aziz speaks, there is no doubt that he is speaking at the highest level of the Iraqi government.

The Iraqi government awarded the suicide bomber two posthumous medals and the Vice President said the suicide attacks will become routine military policy in Iraq and in the United States unless the Bush administration abandons the (then) 10-day-old war and pulls back its troops.

The interview by ABC TV news correspondent Richard Engel went on to question Deputy Prime Minister Aziz about the nature of such attacks in the future, and Minister Aziz commented: ``There will be others. Iraqis, Arabs, maybe Muslims, yes. We welcome them.''

Minister Aziz took pride in pointing out: ``[T]he first one who did it was an Iraqi. He was not a foreigner.''

It is my view that this is one of a series of acts by the Iraqi Government in violation of the laws of war itemized in the Hague and Geneva Conventions, and that more and varied types of atrocities may be expected by the desperate Iraqi Government.

That is why I have prepared today this resolution which calls upon:

. . . the governments of the United States, the United

Kingdom, and other nations comprising the coalition

conducting Operation Iraqi Freedom [to] prosecute by trial by

tribunal each person in the Government of Iraq, each person

in the armed forces of Iraq, and any other person, regardless

of nationality, who orders, directs, solicits, procures,

coordinates, participates in, or supports acts in violation

of the international law of armed conflict (including the

aspects of such law known as the Hague and Geneva

Conventions) . . . .

The resolution specifies a series of circumstances where there is:

. . . abuse of places protected from military attack under

international law, such as the use of mosques and hospitals

as military headquarters or for other military purposes;

. . . the ruse by which Iraqi combatants wear civilian

clothing instead of, or over, uniforms to conceal their

status as combatants and, while so clothed, attack coalition

forces;

. . . the ruse by which Iraqi combatants feign surrender to

coalition forces to gain advantage used by the Iraqi

combatants to attack personnel of the coalition forces;

. . . the use of civilians or other persons protected under

international law as human shields for Iraqi combatants on

the battlefield;

. . . assault, murder, kidnapping, or torture of civilians

or other persons protected under international law in order

to terrorize those persons or others or to prevent them from

gaining the protection of coalition forces;

. . . abuse, torture, assault, or murder of personnel of

coalition forces entitled to treatment as prisoners of war or

of civilians entitled to a protected status under

international law; and

. . . recruitment or encouragement of non-Iraqi foreign

nationals to engage in violations of the international law of

armed conflict.

We are saying what has occurred in Iraq today are the actions of a desperate nation.

I believe it is very important that the upper echelon of the Iraqi Government, people such as the Vice President, people such as Deputy Prime Minister Aziz, be put on notice that these acts in violation of The Hague and Geneva Conventions will be dealt with very forcefully by a tribunal which is yet to be established.

I do not specify at this time the kind of tribunal. That will require some further analysis. It could be a military tribunal to try those offenses where the victims are soldiers of the U.S. Army, or of the British Army, or soldiers of the coalition forces.

It might be an international tribunal such as that which was established for the former Yugoslavia, or Rwanda.

It is worth noting, and the Iraqi officials ought to be watching, what has happened at The Hague and what happened in Rwanda. The former head of state of Rwanda is now serving a life sentence--notwithstanding that he was the head of state of Rwanda--for crimes against humanity. In a well-publicized case, former Yugoslavian President Milosevic is now on trial in The Hague for violations of international law and crimes against humanity. Many have been sentenced for criminal conduct, for violations of international law in Bosnia and in Kosovo. So at this early stage I believe it is important that the word go out to the Iraqi high command and to those who follow orders of the Iraqi high command that they will be prosecuted as war criminals.

It is not a defense that someone says that he or she is operating under an order from a superior officer. In a very celebrated case in World War I, a German U-boat sank an Allied ship. As it went down, those in lifeboats were machinegunned by the submarine, which had surfaced. The perpetrator of the machinegunning entered a defense that the machinegunner was operating under superior's orders. That was soundly rejected. So the principle has been established as a matter of international law that it is no defense to say a person operates under superior's orders.

Of course, it is not a defense at all for ranking officials such as the Iraqi Vice President and the Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister, who know better, who are engaging in these violations of international law. Those who carry out the orders of these Iraqis ought to be on notice, too, that these matters will not be over when we win the war, when the war stops, because these individuals will be pursued in trials just as the head of state of Rwanda was pursued and is serving a life sentence; just as former President Milosevic is being pursued and prosecuted; as so many others are being pursued.

This word ought to go out in a very forceful way to the Iraqis that this conduct in violation of international law will not be tolerated.

In 1998 I introduced S. Con. Res. 78 calling for a war crimes tribunal to try Saddam Hussein as a war criminal. On March 13, 1998, that was passed unanimously, 93 to nothing, by the Senate. So there is a demonstrated interest on the part of this body in acting very forcefully to give notice to, not only Saddam Hussein, but other Iraqi officials and those who carry out their orders that they will be prosecuted as war criminals if they continue to violate international law.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I join my colleagues today in mourning the passing of a giant of the 20th century--our former colleague, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan. The list of his contributions to this Nation is long and impressive: from White House aide, to Ambassador to India and the United Nations, to Senator from the State of New York for 24 years. Pat Moynihan left an indelible mark on our Nation and the world.

Senator Moynihan has been described as the best thinker among politicians since Woodrow Wilson and the best politician among thinkers since Thomas Jefferson. Few Senators in the 241-year history of this institution have had the intellectual impact on public policy as did Patrick Moynihan. From tax policy to environmental protection, he was an always constructive and frequently dominant advocate. He frequently converted a Senate committee hearing or floor debate into what was his first passion, a college classroom. Those of us who were fortunate to be his students are forever in his debt.

Adele and I offer our condolences to Elizabeth and their family, and we will recognize in our prayers the loss that the Nation and each of us individually have suffered.

Mr. President, I add that I consider it a terrible irony that on the eve of Senator Moynihan's death, March 26, the White House announced the signing of amended Executive Order 12,958. This Executive order delays the release of millions of long-classified Government documents and grants to Government bureaucrats new authority to reclassify information. The vast majority of these documents are more than 25 years old and were to have been automatically declassified on April 17 of this year.

I consider this ironic because Senator Moynihan was a champion of open government. Among his many writings, including 18 books, was ``The Torment of Secrecy: The Background and Consequences of American Security Policy.'' Senator Moynihan concluded that book with these words:

A case can be made that secrecy is for losers, for people

who don't know how important information really is. The

Soviet Union realized this too late. Openness is now a

singular and singularly American advantage. We put it in

peril by poking along in the mode of an age now past. It is

time to dismantle government secrecy, this most pervasive of

cold war era regulations. It is time to begin building the

supports for the era of openness, which is already upon us.

Mr. President, we in the Senate and those in the White House should heed Pat Moynihan's wise words. As a former chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, I can tell you that this administration is being excessively cautious in keeping information from the American people. Certainly, when we are at war and facing increased threats from international terrorist networks, we need to keep secret that information that could pose a threat to our security if it were to fall into the wrong hands. But that hardly seems to be the case with most of the information that is covered by this overly broad Executive order.

Again, I emphasize that the overwhelming bulk of this material is more than 25 years old. Ultimately, excessive secrecy will undermine the public's confidence in our Government and its essential institutions. Excessive secrecy denies to the American people their full capability to participate, evaluate, and act as they determine to be in the national interest.

By restricting access to crucial and often conflicting information, excessive secrecy creates the environment for what is known as incestuous amplification. This is a military term and is defined by Jane's Defense Weekly. Incestuous amplification is ``a condition in warfare where one only listens to those who are already in lockstep agreement, reinforcing set beliefs and creating a situation ripe for miscalculation.''

Excessive secrecy undermines the classification value of information which is genuinely critical to our national security. Last year, I had the honor to cochair a joint House-Senate inquiry into the events of September 11, 2001. Our purpose was to help the American people understand what our Government knew about potential threats from al- Qaida prior to the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and how our intelligence and law enforcement agencies responded. But even more important, our responsibility was to develop an action plan of recommendations to mitigate a repeat of this tragedy.

Our staff reviewed more than 500,000 pages of documents. We conducted 22 hearings, 13 of them closed, 9 open to the public. We filed our final report--the classified version--on December 20, 2002.

The joint inquiry has requested declassification of our final report, as well as key documents related to the Government's knowledge of al- Qaida and potential terrorist threats. For 100 days, congressional staffers have been working with the Central Intelligence Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and other relevant agencies to get the final report of the joint inquiry declassified. We have not yet been successful. I am hopeful that we can present most of this material to the public at the earliest date. We have already released, in declassified form, our findings and our recommendations.

I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a copy of those recommendations at the conclusion of my statement.

Mr. President, I want to read one of the recommendations from the joint inquiry committee. It is recommendation No. 15:

The President should review and consider amendments to the

Executive Orders, policies and procedures that govern the

national security classification of intelligence information,

in an effort to expand access to relevant information for

Federal agencies outside the Intelligence Community, for

State and local authorities, which are critical to the fight

against terrorism, and to the American public.

In addition, the President and heads of Federal agencies

should ensure that the policies and procedures to protect

against the unauthorized disclosure of classified

intelligence information are well understood, fully

implemented, and vigorously enforced.

Congress should also review the statutes, policies, and

procedures that govern the national security classification

of intelligence information and its protection from

unauthorized disclosure.

Among other matters, Congress should consider the degree to

which excessive classification has been used in the past and

the extent to which the emerging threat environment has

greatly increased the need for real-time sharing of sensitive

information.

The Director of National Intelligence, in consultation with

the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of State, the

Secretary of Homeland Security, and the Attorney General,

should review and report to the House and Senate Intelligence

Committees on proposals for a new and more realistic approach

to the processes and structures that have governed the

designation of sensitive and classified information.

The report should include proposals to protect against the

use of the classification process as a shield to protect

agency self-interest.

The public has the right to know what its Government has done and is doing to protect Americans and United States interests. Potential embarrassment is not a good enough reason to keep past or current Government materials secret.

One of the most fitting tributes we could pay to Pat Moynihan would be a heightened recognition of the damage that excessive secrecy exacts on our Government's credibility, and to recommit ourselves to a Government which trusts its people to know the truth.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to print in the Record an editorial from the New York Times of March 28, 2003.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I came to the floor to say a few words about Senator Patrick Moynihan. Obviously, I didn't know him for all of his very successful and rather stupendous life, but I knew him rather well for that portion spent in the Senate. Even as to that portion, it was not my privilege to spend a great deal of time on the same committees with the Senator. But it was obvious to me he was a very big man, not big only in stature--he was very tall--but clearly he spoke eloquently and could grasp the situation with a demeanor and in a manner that was not very common and ordinary here.

From my standpoint, we struck up a friendship principally based upon his asking me a lot of questions about the budget and about my work as chairman or ranking member on the Senate floor.

Today it was my privilege to attend, with my wife Nancy, his funeral mass and some of the other ceremonial

events that bid him goodbye. My wife Nancy and I got to share with his marvelous wife Elizabeth; everybody calls her Liz. We had had on one occasion as couples an opportunity to travel with Senator Moynihan and his wife and others on a very lengthy trip that included China and other parts of the world, Japan. It was rather marvelous to have him regale us with stories and tales and history as we would be traveling from one country to another. When he was around on those kinds of events, you didn't have to have books to read. You would just get a seat close to him and ask questions, and he would tell you something significant, different, important, something you clearly never would read and never had heard.

We all miss him. There is no doubt about it.

One day I recall the close of a budget session, a long debate on the budget. Final passage came up. It had been a very arduous and difficult one, much like the last one we just experienced, but more so. I had counted votes and thought I would win. I thought I would get 51 votes, which is what I needed. I noted that during the time of the debate and in particular the closing, Senator Moynihan had listened a little more than I had expected. No reason for him to do that. Senators were in and out.

I had also noticed during the course of events that he would stop by and talk with me and say something to me about what was going on.

The vote occurred, and I was not paying attention to the vote. I knew I would get the votes necessary. But when the votes were counted, I had one more than expected. So I asked, who was that; what happened? Somebody on the other side of the aisle, without saying much and perhaps without talking to his own leadership, had voted for the resolution. Sure enough, it was Patrick Moynihan. I didn't have a chance then to say anything to him, but later on, I purposely found him and thanked him, and I asked him what was that all about.

He said: Well, to tell you the truth, that Budget Act is too confusing and confounds everybody. You worked too hard to try to get it done, and you made an awful lot of sense. I just decided that regardless of the philosophy, that was enough for me to vote for the budget resolution, in the sense that I was just voting for you.

Things like that don't happen very often. I am sure everybody has stories similar to that and more so. Today, as we attended the funeral mass, there were literally hundreds of people from all walks of life-- kind of befitting what he had done and the life he had lived. On one side I noticed the Secretary of Defense had kind of eased his way into the church and was kneeling on one side there in an inconspicuous way-- many ambassadors, a lot of Senators, a very large entourage of Senators. Perhaps as many as 10 former Senators from our day who now live somewhere else doing other things had found their way into Washington to be there.

I choose today for these very few moments to say thank you to him for his great service in the Senate, to his family, and particularly to his wife, who obviously sacrificed greatly while he was being a Senator. She, too, has a profession of her own and was somewhat restrained and had to live more of a life in Washington, tied sort of to his career, than she had at other times in her life. But from what I have gathered, they were both great citizens and very pleased and proud to be part of this Senate.

I thank him and bid him adieu.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, it was with great sorrow that I learned last week of the death of our former colleague, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York.

Senator Moynihan, was an intellectual giant in the Senate and throughout his service to our Nation. The breadth of his interests--and his knowledge--was extraordinary. From questions about the architecture and urban development of Washington, D.C. to the problems created by single parent families to the workings of the International Labor Organization, Senator Moynihan had thought deeply and designed policy answers. I don't think there was a Senator who served with Pat Moynihan who didn't learn something from Senator Moynihan's vast stock of personal experience, understanding of history, and ability to draw parallels between seemingly unrelated topics to enlighten our understanding of both.

I will always have fond memories of the several occasions on which I joined Senator Moynihan in the Senators' private dining room and was treated to a lunchtime tutorial. I could ask a question on virtually any topic and get a dissertation in response. Our conversations ranged from art history to baseball, American history, our Middle East policy, the history of science and scientific advancement, and more. Seemingly there was no topic on which Pat did not have unique insight, and I always came away from those lunches feeling like I had just emerged from an intellectually stimulating graduate seminar.

I had the particular pleasure of serving with Senator Moynihan on the Finance Committee for eight years. As Chairman and as ranking member of the Finance Committee, Senator Moynihan was a true leader. Starting in 1993, when I took Senator Bentsen's seat on the Committee and Senator Moynihan claimed his chairmanship, Chairman Moynihan successfully guided the 1993 economic plan through the committee and the Senate. That budget, which I was proud to help shape and support, laid the foundation for the record economic expansion of the 1990s.

After Republicans took control of the Senate in the 1994 election, Senator Moynihan was a fierce critic of their excessive tax cut proposals. We joined in opposing shortsighted proposals to have Medicare ``wither on the vine,'' turn Medicaid into a block grant, and destroy welfare rather than reforming it. Senator Moynihan was, as always, an especially passionate defender of teaching hospitals, warning that the plan to slash spending for Medicare's graduate medical education would threaten medical research in this country--a fear that has proved well-founded as teaching hospitals have struggled to survive the much smaller changes enacted as part of the compromise Balanced Budget Act that emerged in 1997.

The Finance Committee--and the Senate--would not have been the same without him. Who else will be able to gently tutor witnesses on the relevance of the grain trade in upstate New York in the early nineteenth century to a current debate about health care policy? Who else will call for the Boskin and Secrecy Commissions of the future? And who else will educate his colleagues on the impact on our society of the demographic time bomb of the baby boom generation?

The Senate has lost a legend. The country has lost a brilliant and unconventional thinker who contributed greatly to our society on fronts ranging across transportation, welfare and poverty, racism and civil rights, and architecture and urban planning.

I will miss Pat Moynihan. I will miss his sly wit, his apt and splendidly diverse quotations, his sharp questioning and distrust of glib answers, and his fierce humanity. On behalf of myself and my wife Lucy, I want to express my deepest condolences to his wife Liz, their children and the rest of his family and friends. My heart goes out to them.

Mr. President, I rise today to honor Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, an intellectual pioneer who I felt honored to serve with in the U.S. Senate. He rose from humble beginnings to Harvard, and to a life of service in four different Presidential administrations, as an ambassador to India and the U.N., and as New York's Senator for four terms. Throughout his career in service, he paved his own path--one of integrity, independence, and principled leadership on the critical national questions of our age.

Whenever he spoke I listened closely, because I knew I would always learn something from him. He possessed tremendous intellect and foresight, showed unflagging courage in championing unsung causes, and commanded extraordinary respect on both sides of the aisle. He was a true renaissance man who put action behind his diverse interests: from protecting the sanctity of the American family, to preserving historic art and architecture, to restoring Pennsylvania Avenue as America's ``main street,'' to saving Social Security for future generations.

I offer my condolences to his wife Elizabeth, who was truly his life partner. There will no doubt be a memorial built in his honor someday soon on the streets of New York; but Senator Moynihan's legacy is already living--in safer streets in our cities, a cleaner environment, and a stronger national community. To borrow a memorable Moynihan phrase, his life defined public service and public policy up for all who aspire to contribute to our country.