Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I rise this evening for this short Special Order to express my personal outrage regarding the treatment of some brave military personnel who simply are trying to tell the truth.

Madam Speaker, over the past 3 months, I have outlined for our colleagues evidence that came from military officers that we had knowledge of Mohammed Atta and al Qaeda prior to September 11 and the attack against us in New York City. This information came about from a top secret program known as ``Able Danger'' which was a program that was developed by Special Forces Command as a planning process to deal with al Qaeda cells.

The military officers involved with this program identified 5 specific cells around the world, one of which was a Brooklyn cell, and this Brooklyn cell, one year before 9/11; in fact, in January and February of 2000, actually identified Mohammed Atta, 3 of the other terrorists that were involved in the 9/11 attack, and identified this in a chart that was produced as a part of their planning process.

Furthermore, Madam Speaker, these military officers have testified, and will testify under oath, that in September of 2000, one year before September 11, they made 3 attempts to transfer information regarding the Brooklyn cell and Mohammed Atta to the FBI. An FBI employee has again agreed to testify under oath that she arranged the 3 meetings and agreed to set up for the FBI the opportunity to receive this data. All 3 meetings were canceled by lawyers within the previous administration, the Clinton administration.

We still do not know who gave the ultimate order or why those meetings were canceled, but we do know that in September of 2000, attempts to transfer information regarding al Qaeda, the Brooklyn cell, and Mohammed Atta were thwarted.

This information was presented to the 9/11 Commission in an effort to provide a clear and concise analysis of what happened prior to 9/11. On 2 separate occasions, a Lieutenant Colonel from the Army, Anthony Shaffer and a commander from the Navy, Scott Philpott, offered to provide information to the 9/11 Commission that they, in fact, were involved with Able Danger and that they identified Mohammed Atta prior to 9/11.

Colonel Shaffer, who was promoted during the past year, during a time in which his security clearance had been temporarily lifted by the Defense Intelligence Agency, has been the subject of gross and outrageous harassment. I have been on the Committee on Armed Services for 19 years, and my job as a member of that committee has been to support our military personnel when they are assigned overseas or when they are at home during their training and other operations. As I mentioned to Secretary Rumsfeld in a hearing last Thursday, a full committee hearing, I have supported every major reform that he has put forth over the past several years regarding our military, the way our military operates, and the way the Pentagon is organized.

Madam Speaker, Secretary Rumsfeld has repeatedly told us that his top priority is the morale and the welfare of our troops. The commander of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, both the recent and now the current Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, repeatedly tell us their top priority is the protection of our military personnel in uniform. And now, we find out that Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer, a Bronze Star recipient, 23-year veteran of military intelligence, serving in Afghanistan, embedded with our troops in harm's way, has had gross distortions and absolute outrageous claims made against him publicly by the Defense Intelligence Agency as a way to silence him.

Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer has been prohibited from talking to Members of Congress. He has been stopped from testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee in spite of the fact that five senators from both parties were present at a hearing 2 weeks ago. Lieutenant Shaffer was in the room. Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer was in the room, yet he was not permitted to testify. His lawyer, in fact, made statements for him.

But in an attempt to totally discredit Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer, in an attempt to try to diminish his credibility before the American people and the Congress, the Defense Intelligence Agency has resorted to a new set of lows in terms of the credibility of our American military. And no, Madam Speaker, I do not think this action by the Defense Intelligence Agency has been brought forward by uniformed military personnel. It has been brought forward by the bureaucrats, the sort of bureaucrats who linger from one administration to the other and who have the embarrassment of having to understand what Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer and commander Scott Philpott did in warning us, attempting to warn us about the 9/11 attacks.

The Defense Intelligence Agency, 1 day before Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer was to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee, permanently pulled his security clearance, and the reasons they gave, Madam Speaker, were outrageous. They are scandalous. They said that he had forwarded phone calls on his cell phone while being deployed in Afghanistan for a total cost of approximately $67. They said that he had received mileage and toll fees improperly for attending a military conference at Fort Dix, New Jersey, which anyone in this body would say he was eligible to attend. $341. They said that he, in fact, received an award for which he was not entitled, even though his superior officers nominated him for that award. But in one of the most despicable acts I have ever seen a Federal agency involve itself in in 19 years, they said on the record that Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer stole pens from the U.S. government.

Now, what they did not say, Madam Speaker, was that Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer, when he was 15 or 16 years old, as the son of an officer assigned to one of our embassies, admitted to stealing some pens which he gave to some disadvantaged people. Now, clearly, when he was 15 or 16, he was not working for the military. He was not a military intelligence officer. He was yet to take his lie detector test for admission into that category, and he admitted all of this. But in this current effort to try to discredit Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer, the Defense Intelligence Agency went to the outrageous length of publicly acknowledging that Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer had stolen pens and failing to mention how old he was when the theft took place, that he publicly admitted himself before being employed by the military.

Madam Speaker, we have a major problem in America. Sandy Berger, our National Security Advisor, stole documents from the National Archives, stole documents and put them in his clothing and took them out because they would incriminate him and President Clinton about what they knew before 9/11. He stole them. He placed them inside of his coat, in his pants, in his shoes, and he took those documents out of the National Archives because he did not want the 9/11 Commission to see what was in there. When he was caught, and finally brought to justice, his security clearance was lifted for 3 years.

Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer simply told the truth and because Defense intelligence bureaucrats are unhappy about being embarrassed they have removed his security clearance permanently. Is that what America is about, Madam Speaker? Is it about protecting a national security advisor who steals classified documents from the archives of the United States about what happened before 9/11 and gets a 3-year lift of his clearance, and a uniformed military officer who simply tells the truth has his security clearance permanently lifted?

Madam Speaker, if we do not right this wrong that will send and is sending a signal to every uniformed officer in America, if you tell the truth and if that truth embarrasses a bureaucrat or a political appointee, you are more expendable than the civilian officer, and

that cannot stand. We must do better. Anthony Shaffer deserves justice.

Mr. Speaker, fifteen years ago, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed into law by President George H.W. Bush. As the first declaration of its kind, it was a significant moment in the battle for equality among the disabled. It is essential that on the anniversary of the ADA, we take some time to seriously reflect on the impact it has had on the lives of the 14 percent of Americans who live with at least one disability.

As a result of this act, those with disabilities are now able to travel more freely, enjoy a greater range of recreational and employment opportunities, and ultimately enjoy a higher overall standard of living. Otherwise productive Americans are no longer ostracized from their social surroundings or forced to live their lives in nursing homes or similarly confining facilities.

While more work remains to be done to ensure full integration of the disabled population into American life, I would like to acknowledge the continued success of the ADA in reinforcing the American ideals of compassion and equality for all.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today with profound sadness and tremendous gratitude to honor the life of my good friend, Lew Fisher, a generous and dedicated community leader who will be greatly missed in Aston, Delaware County, Pennsylvania. As his family, friends and neighbors mourn the passing of Lew Fisher, I want to take a few moments to remember his work and difference he made in the community he served so faithfully for over 20 years.

Lew spent almost his entire life in Aston, he loved it there and spent 20 years giving his service as a Township Commissioner without reserve to the people he called his neighbors. He leaves behind an impressive list of accomplishments that most people only hope to achieve in their lifetime. Lew will be remembered for many different reasons, including his generosity to the Aston community. His inspirational leadership had a profound effect on helping people better their lives. Even with all of his work in public service and with community organizations, Lew endeared himself to many because of his generous spirit and wise counsel. On a personal note, I benefited tremendously from his advice during my years of public service. Whether it was a township concern or just a relaxed visit with an old friend, the Aston locals always knew they would find the support and guidance they were looking for in a chat with Lew. While in his presence you were immediately put at ease with his warm smile, his firm handshake, his gentle voice and his admirable character.

Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in remembering a dedicated community leader and friend to many in the 7th Congressional District. I wish Lew's wife of 52 years, Florence and family, my heartfelt condolences and may they find comfort in knowing that the many people he impacted deeply value his dedication and generosity and the example of his life and work.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Mikhail Volynets, recipient of the AFL-CIO's 2004 George Meany-Lane Kirkland Human Rights Award, was elected Chairperson of the Independent Trade Union of Miners of Ukraine in 1995, and became its president in 1997. Having previously worked as a miner, and then as a mining engineer, Mr. Volynets participated in the Ukraine's first miner's strikes in 1989, later leading a series of successful mass protests in 1991. Using his leadership position, Mr. Volynets organized the Trade Union of Miners to become an instrumental part of Ukraine's Orange Revolution, which resulted in Viktor Yuschenko's rise to the Presidency in the fall of 2004. Having first been elected to the Ukrainian Parliament (Rada) in 2002, Mr. Volynets is currently a Deputy in the Rada, working to further secure democracy in Ukraine. I congratulate Mr. Volynets for his courage and determination in the face of fear and uncertainty.

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to recognize today the accomplishments of Frances R. Major of Royersford, Pennsylvania--whom I consider the Betsy Ross of today--as she retires her sewing needles with the Valley Forge Flag Company. Mrs. Major has been working at the Valley Forge Flag Company in Womelsdorf, Pennsylvania since 1941 and has truly left her mark on history.

Not everyone could go to Pearl Harbor or Ground Zero, but Mrs. Major faithfully sewed our Stars and Stripes as our country's major historic events unfolded. Many flags were sewn through her tears, but it was always a labor of love and her patriotic honor to do something personally for America. ``Each time something bad happened, it only made me sew that much faster,'' she said. Through good times and bad, her spirit remained strong and she literally stitched the bad times away finishing her work with her identification number seven in the upper left corner of the flag. The numbers were written so supervisors could track how many flags each seamstress had completed each day.

It is often said that America succeeds due to the remarkable accomplishments and contributions of her citizens. Mrs. Major leaves a significant legacy as a standard bearer for her profession. She continues to lead a life full of love, friendship, hospitality and service to her family as well as her community. She is an exceptional woman, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, and American.

As we unfold and proudly wave an American flag, we might see Frances' number seven--her indelible mark on history. At this time, I would ask my colleagues of the 109th Congress to join me in paying special tribute to Mrs. Frances Major. On the occasion of her retirement, we thank her for her dedicated service and we wish her all the best in the future.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend and

colleague for yielding to me and thank him for this outstanding Special Order. I hope that our colleagues tonight have been listening, because they have seen an outstanding assemblage of excellent young Members of Congress who are picking up the mantle and taking the lead on homeland security issues in our committee.

This is the first year for the full operation of the authorization committee for homeland security funding and oversight, and it is extremely important that we get off to a good start. I just want to say, as a Member who was very aggressively behind this committee, I am overwhelmingly pleased and positive with the type of membership we have on this committee. My colleague, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Dent), is an example of an outstanding leader who is committed; and he has brought together an assemblage of Members tonight who have articulated the various parameters of the concerns we face, from first responders, to our borders, to protecting our ports and our airports, and for all of the significant work that has been accomplished under Secretary Ridge, now being accomplished under our current new Secretary and under the able leadership of the chairman of our House Homeland Security Committee, the gentleman from California (Mr. Cox), and our appropriations subcommittee, the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Rogers).

Mr. Speaker, later on this evening I will be offering another Special Order that will reveal some absolutely amazing information for the American people. I will divulge tonight the information that prior to 9/11, not only did we know about the Mohammed Atta cell, but that the Special Forces Command in our military actually wanted to take action against that cell, and we did not take that action.

I will be discussing our intelligence in detail, and by following through on a special project that was initiated under the leadership of General Shelton focusing on al Qaeda. But at this point in time, I wanted to stop by and thank our distinguished Members, thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Dent) for his leadership, and say to those who participated in this Special Order, if we are going to win the battle and protect the homeland, all Members must play the critical role that you have played tonight and pick a specialty area that you have a focus on so we as a team can make sure that our country is properly protected.

Mr. Speaker, I rise this evening to discuss for the next 45 minutes the most important topic that will allow us to protect the homeland, provide for the security of the American people and our allies and our troops around the world: our intelligence.

Last Thursday, Mr. Speaker, I had a meeting with the very able and distinguished chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra). We discussed many things, one of which was a source that I had hoped that we could get some information to assist us in understanding the threats in Iraq and the Middle East, and especially in regard to Iran.

I said to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra), I am going to make a prediction to you. Based on my source, I said, common wisdom tells us that the winner of the election in Iran that will take place on Friday and Saturday our time will probably be Rafsanjani. He is the name that most pundits have said would be the likely winner in a two- person runoff against the more conservative and not well-known mayor of Tehran. But I said to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra), based on information we had, the election was not going to be close; it will be a landslide. But the conservative mayor of Tehran, a relative unknown, had been anointed by Ayatollah Homeni in Iran and he would in fact win the Iranian election.

We all saw the results, Mr. Speaker, on Saturday night and Sunday morning as, in fact, the mayor of Tehran won the election with a margin of 62 to 38 percent, an overwhelming landslide. I raise this issue, Mr. Speaker, because good intelligence and good information is the most critical tool that we can have over the next several years and decades to protect our homeland.

Mr. Speaker, I rise because information has come to my attention over the past several months that is very disturbing. I have learned that, in fact, one of our Federal agencies had, in fact, identified the major New York cell of Mohamed Atta prior to 9/11; and I have learned, Mr. Speaker, that in September of 2000, that Federal agency actually was prepared to bring the FBI in and prepared to work with the FBI to take down the cell that Mohamed Atta was involved in in New York City, along with two of the other terrorists.

I have also learned, Mr. Speaker, that when that recommendation was discussed within that Federal agency, the lawyers in the administration at that time said, you cannot pursue contact with the FBI against that cell. Mohamed Atta is in the U.S. on a green card, and we are fearful of the fallout from the Waco incident. So we did not allow that Federal agency to proceed.

Mr. Speaker, what this now means is that prior to September 11, we had employees of the Federal Government in one of our agencies who actually identified the Mohamed Atta cell and made a specific recommendation to act on that cell, but were denied the ability to go forward. Obviously, if we had taken out that cell, 9/11 would not have occurred and, certainly, taking out those three principal players in that cell would have severely crippled, if not totally stopped, the operation that killed 3,000 people in America.

Tonight, I am going to provide some background to my colleagues, because I think this represents a major problem with our intelligence that needs to be focused on by the committees of the House and the Senate, by the leadership of the House and the Senate, by John Negroponte, the new person assigned by President Bush, and a very able man, to integrate the 33 classified systems overseen by the 15 Federal agencies.

I want to also start off by praising Porter Goss, the director of the CIA. Porter served us extremely well in this body as the chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence; and he went over to the CIA with an aggressive agenda to change that agency, and he has begun that process. We, in this body, need to rally the American people to support the efforts brought forward by Porter Goss and to allow John Negroponte to undertake perhaps the most difficult task in protecting the security of America, a task that will not be easy, given the history of our Federal agency system.

Let me take my colleagues back, Mr. Speaker, to 1999. It was, in fact, the spring of 1999 when I was first involved in taking a delegation of 10 Members of Congress to Vienna with the support of my friend and colleague, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), and with the support of the Clinton State Department.

The 11-member delegation of five Democrats, five Republicans and myself, along with the State Department employee, traveled to Vienna to meet with five senior leaders of the Russian political parties. Our purpose was to try to reach a framework that could allow for a peaceful resolution of the war in Kosovo on the terms that the U.S. had desired after Ramboullet.

After securing a military plane, my Russian friends told me they were bringing a Serb along with them, a Serb who would be able to understand what we were talking about and help us decide and determine whether or not Milosevic back in Belgrade would accept any recommendations that we would develop. I did not know anything about the Serb. I knew the Russians. But I figure I had better ask the CIA what they knew about this Serb so I could be better prepared, and to make sure that the Serb was not a part of the Milosevic regime, because that would cause myself and my colleagues to be in violation of the Hobbs Act because we were at war with Serbia at that time.

So I called George Tenet. I said, Director Tenet, can you give me some information about this Serb? His family is evidently well known. I need to know whether or not he is a part of the Milosevic regime. I need to know any other information you can provide to me because we are going to meet with him when we travel to Vienna to meet with the Russian leaders to help provide a beginning of a solution to end the war in Kosovo.

He called me back the next day and he gave me a couple of sentences and said not to worry, he was not a part of the Milosevic regime. And he had strong ties to the Communist Party inside of Moscow and had ties to other leaders in the Russian Government. It was not much to go on.

But at the time, Mr. Speaker, I was chairman of the Defense Research Subcommittee of the Armed Services Committee. My job was to oversee the funding, approximately $40 billion of defense research money on new systems and new technologies. And one of the most striking technologies was the work being done by the Army's Information Dominance Center at Fort Belvoir, formerly known as the LIWA, the Land Information Warfare Assessment Center. I had visited the LIWA several times and was tremendously impressed with not just the ability to provide security for our Army classified systems, but I saw a unique approach to doing well beyond that, data mining, data collaboration, using cutting-edge software tools like Starlight and Spires, able to do profiling. Having plussed-up funding for this facility after talking to George Tenet, I called my friends at the Army's Information Dominance Center and said, can you do something for me as a favor, off the record? And they said sure, Congressman, whatever you like. Would you run me a profile of this Serb, for the same reason I had asked the Director of the CIA. They said, no problem, Congressman; we will get back to you in a few hours. And they did. They gave me 10 pages of information, Mr. Speaker, about the Serb and his ties. Now, the information was not vetted but it was from a number of sources that the Information Dominance Center was able to pull together very quickly. I used that information as we traveled to Vienna to understand who we were meeting with. We had those meetings for 2 days and my colleagues, my five Republican and five Democrat colleagues, worked aggressively to establish a framework that would begin the end of the Kosovo war. In fact, it was historic.

When we returned to Washington several weeks later I was contacted by the FBI and they said, Congressman, we would like to debrief you. We would like you to tell us what you know about that Serb that you all met in Vienna. I said, no problem, I will be happy to do it Monday afternoon in my office. The Friday before the Monday, my D.C. office paged me with a 911 page. When I called them they said, you have got to call CIA Congressional Affairs immediately, which I did. CIA

Congressional Affairs said, Congressman Weldon, we are going to fly two agents to Philadelphia this evening. They will meet you at the airport, at a hotel, at your home, wherever you want to meet them. And I said, I am sorry, I cannot do it. It is a weekend. It is a Friday night. I have got events already planned. What is the urgency of this meeting? And the CIA Congressional Affairs person said well, Congressman, we have been tasked by the State Department to brief our Ambassador, who is negotiating the final terms to end the war in Kosovo, and he needs to know something about this Serb that you met in Vienna. I said, well, the FBI has already called me for that. Can we not do it together? And finally, after pushing back for 10, 15 minutes, the CIA agreed. And so on Monday afternoon in my office I hosted four agents, two FBI and two CIA. These agents asked me four pages of questions about the Serb that I had met with along with our colleagues in the House.

When I finished answering all their questions and giving them all of the information I had, I said to them, now you know where I got my data from, right? And they said, well, you got it from the Russians. I said, no. Well, you got it from the Serb. I said, no. I said, before I left Washington, before I left my office, I called the Army's Information Dominance Center and asked them to do me a favor. They ran a profile and gave me 10 pages. The CIA rep and the FBI rep said, what is the Army's Information Dominance Center, congressman?

It was then, Mr. Speaker, that I knew we had a problem; that our intelligence systems were not linked together, that the stovepipes were so great that we would never be able to deal with emerging transnational terrorist threats. So beginning in the spring of 1999, I began a process working with the Army, and their subgroup working with them, Special Forces Command down in Florida, which had a similar capability to develop a national prototype, a prototype that could be providing support for the President, the National Security Adviser, and all of our policymakers. In fact, working together over a multiweek period, we came up with a plan, a document. And Mr. Speaker, I would like to place this document in the Record at this point in time.

National Operations and Analysis Hub: NOAH

Policy makers' tool for acting against emerging

transnational threats and dangers to U.S. national security.

Policy makers need better decision support tools.

Policy makers continue to work in a vacuum. Briefings and

testimonies are the primary vehicles for transmitting

information to leadership.

The volume of information germane to national issues is

expanding so rapidly that policy makers are overwhelmed with

data.

Policy makers need robust situational awareness over

growing asymmetric threats to national security.

Policy makers need an overarching information and

intelligence architecture that will quickly assimilate,

analyze and display assessments and recommended course of

action from many national agencies simultaneously.

Policy makers need tools to aid them in developing courses

of action against threats to U.S. policy, interests, or

security.

Policy makers need virtual communications with one another.

White House, Congress, Pentagon and at the agency levels

should each have centers they can go to and receive, send,

share, discuss, and collaborate on assessments before they

act.

National Level Collaboration Solution: NOAH, National

Operations and Analysis Hub.

Tasks supported by NOAH's overarching collaborative

environment:

Provide Multi Issue, Multi-agency Hybrid Picture to White

House Situation Room, JCS;

HUMINT Support;

Peackeeping Missions;

Humanitarian Aid;

Battle Damage Assessment;

Develop and Leverage new Technologies of important to

national security;

Support Congressional Committees/Hearings;

Apply Analysis of Foreign Threat to Policy;

Provide Hybrid Situational Awareness Picture of the Threat;

Incorprote Industrial Efforts of Interests to the Policy

Maker;

Link academia directly to policy maker; and

National Emergencies.

NOAH can leverage existing networks to address diverse

issues:

NOAH's Hub Center if linked to other agency centers

electronically;

Each key agency must prossess a Pod Site and be connected

to the NOAH network;

The Pod can consist of a large screen and appropriate

connect for collaboration. Operations Centers can simply be

converted into NOAH;

National Policy makers cannot control agency Pods, agencies

must post replicated data on the NOAH system so that sister

groups can access data;

Support multi-level security requirements and can sanitize

and ``push'' data to many types of users to many levels;

NOAH can address National, law enforcement and military

needs. The situation will determine the mission;

Ties policy maker, military and law enforcement together;

Goals of the NOAH Hub Center is to apply agency operations,

strategies analysis, tactical assessments to a course of

action for the policy maker; and

Optimizes group of expertise within each organization--

experts always on hand regardless of issue.

NOAH and Pod Site Network:

Part of national policy creation and execution system;

Will existing sites and connectivities where available;

Will share tools available at LIWA IDC so every agency has

same tools;

All agencies will post data on NRO highway in a replicated

format sensitive to classification;

NOAH's Global Network will use NRO System as backbone;

All centers connect to other centers electronically; and

Mechanism for gathering, analyzing, displaying, tailoring,

and disseminating all kinds of information quickly at the

national level.

Overview--National Operations and Analysis Hub:

Center dedicated to National Policy Makers at White House,

Congress and National Agencies;

Provides system of system advanced technological

communications environment to harvest, analyze, display data

as needed;

Coordinate and synchronize information among IC, S&T

centers, military services;

Provide near real time situational awareness at the

national level;

Link virtually via a pod site to every participating member

agency; and

Pod sites designed to pull together agency resources on

single system of systems.

NOAH's is staffed by members from participating agencies.

The staff has a 24 x 7, high bandwidth, virtual connectivity

to experts at agency Pod Sites. This provides decision makers

with real-time situational awareness of adversary picture and

courses.

Steps to Achieve NOAH Capability:

Establish baseline capability by building initial Hub

Center and congressional virtual hearing room. Equip White

House Situation Room to Collaborate with these sites;

Staff the Hub Center with two reps from each of the 28 key

participating agencies;

Link up NOAH internal and external collaborative

environment;

Hook in Back up Site for redundancy and begin training on

collaborative tools;

Build the 28 Key Agency Pod Sites along model of the

Information Dominance Center at Fort Belvoir, VA;

Link all Pod Sites to NOAH hub center establish Protocols

for Inter-agency data sharing;

Exercise live ability to retrieve, collate, analyze,

display disparate data and provide policy makers course of

action analysis at the NOAH Hub Center; and

Refine procedures and Protocols.

Agencies Represented in the National Collaborative Center:

Central Intelligence Agency; Defense Intelligence Agency;

National Imagery and Mapping Agency; National Security

Agency; National Reconnaissance Office; Defense Threat

Reduction Agency; Joint Chiefs of Staff; Army/LIWA; Air

Force; Navy; Marine Corps; Joint Counter-Intelligence

Assessment Group; ONDCP; and FBI.

Drug Enforcement Agency; U.S. Customs; National Criminal

Investigative Service; National Infrastructure Protection

Center; Defense Information Systems Agency; State Department;

Five CINCs; Department of Energy; Department of Commerce;

Department of the Treasury; Justice Department; Office of the

Secretary of Defense; National Military Command Center; and

National Joint Military Intelligence Command.

Elements to be connected to the national collaborative

center would include the White House Situation Room, a

Congressional Virtual Hearing Room and a possible redundant,

or back-up site.

This document, as you can see, Mr. Speaker, is entitled the NOAH, National Operations and Analysis Hub, Policy Makers' Tool for Acting Against Emerging Transnational Threats and Dangers to U.S. National Security. This 9-page briefing, Mr. Speaker, was put together in the spring of 1999.

I asked the Deputy Secretary of Defense, John Hamre, to take a look at this capability. He went down to the LIWA and he came back and he said, Congressman, you are right. I agree with you. This capability is amazing. It offers unlimited potential. How about sending me a letter describing your interest, Congressman?

So on July 30, 1999, I sent this 3-page letter to Deputy Secretary John Hamre, Deputy Secretary of Defense, at his request, talking about creating an integrated collaborative center for all of our intelligence. I would like to place this letter in the Record at this point in time, Mr. Speaker

House of Representatives,

Washington, DC, July 30, 1999.

Hon. John Hamre,

Deputy Secretary of Defense,

The Pentagon, Washington, DC.

Dear Dr. Hamre: I believe the time has come to create a

central national level entity that can acquire, fuse and

anaylze disparate data from many agencies in order to support

the policy maker in taking action against threats from

terrorism, proliferation, illegal technology diversions,

espionage, narcotics, information warfare and cyberterrorism.

These challenges are beginning to overlap, thereby blurring

their distinction while posing increasing threats to our

Nation.

Before we take action to counter these emerging threats, we

must first understand their relationship to one another,

their patterns, the people and countries involved, and the

level of danger posed to our Nation. The Department of

Defense has a unique opportunity to create a centralized

national center that can do this for the country. It would be

patterned after the Army's Land Information Warfare Activity

(LIWA) at Fort Belvoir, but would operate on a much broader

scale. This entity would allow for near-time information and

analysis to flow to a central fusion center, which I would

designate the National Operations Analysis Hub (NOAH). I

think this title is fitting, as NOAH will provide a central

hub built to protect our nation from the flood of threats.

NOAH would be comprised of a system of agency-specified

mini-centers, or ``pods'' of participating agencies and

services associated with growing national security concerns

(attachment 1). NOAH would link the policymaker with action

recommendations derived from fused information provided by

the individual pods. NOAH would provide the automation and

connectivity to allow the pods to talk together, share data

and perspectives on a given situation in a near real-time,

computer-based environment.

The NOAH center in the Office of the Secretary of Defense

would be comprised of representatives from an initial cluster

of pod sites to include: CIA, DIA, National Imagery and

Mapping Agency (NlMA), NSA, NRO, Defense Threat Reduction

Agency (DTSA), JCS, Army, Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps,

ONDCP, FBI, DEA, Customs, National Criminal Investigative

Service (NCIS), National Infrastructure Protection Center.

Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), State, the five

CINCS, DOE, INS, Commerce. Treasury.

Elements which would be connected into NOAH would include

the White House Situation Room, a Congressional Virtual

Hearing Room and a possible redundant (back up) site.

The benefits of creating a NOAH include:

For national policy makers, a national collaborative,

environment offers situations updates across a variety of

issues and offers suggested courses of action, based on

analysis, to help government officials make more informed

decisions.

For the Intelligence Community, a national collaborative

environment will help end stovepiping and create more robust

strategic analyses as well as near real-time support to field

operations.

For military commanders and planners, a national

collaborative environment offers full battlefield

visualization, threat profiling, robust situational

awareness, as well as near real-timer support to special

missions such as peacekeeping, humanitarian aid, national

emergencies or special operations.

For law enforcement, a national collaborative environment

provides investigative and threat profiling support, and

field station situational awareness.

Along with its system of connected agency pod sites, NOAH

would permit the display of collaborative threat profiling

and analytical assessments on a large screen. It would be a

national level operations and control center with a mission

to intergrate various imagery, data and analytical viewpoints

for decision-makers in support of national actions. I see

NOAH as going beyond the capability of the National Military

Command Center (NMCC) and the National Joint Military

Intelligence Command (NJMIC), providing recommended courses

of action that allow us to effectively meet those emerging

challenges from asymmetrical threats in near real-time. Given

its mission, I believe that NOAH should reside in the Office

of the Secretary of Defense (Attachment 2).

I am aware of the initiative to link counterintelligence

groups throughout the community. I am also aware of the

counterterrorism center at the CIA, the new National

Infrastructure Protection Center at the FBI, and a new HUMINT

special operations center. I have heard of an attempt to

connect the Office of Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) and OSD

assets with federal, state and local law enforcement

agencies. I also have seen what the Army has done at LIWA,

which has created a foundation for creating a higher-level

architecture collaborating all of these efforts. Each of

these independent efforts needs to be coordinated at the

national level. I believe LIWA has created a model that

should be used as a basis for creating the participating

agency pod sites.

I do not expect that establishment of NOAH should exceed

$10 million. Each agency involved could set up its own pod to

connect with the central NOAH site or to exchange data with

any of its participants. Each agency could dedicate monies to

establish their own pod site, while the $50 million available

in DARPA for related work could be used to establish the NOAH

structure immediately.

The NOAH concept of a national collaborative environment

supporting policy and decision-makers mirrors the ideas you

have expressed to me in recent discussions, and it is a

tangible way to confront the growing assymetrical threats to

our nation. I have a number of ideas regarding staffing

options and industry collaboration, and would appreciate the

opportunity to discuss them with you. Thank you for your

consideration. I look forward to hearing from you at your

earliest convenience.

Sincerely,

Curt Weldon,

Member of Congress.

Secretary Hamre was interested and he told me, Congressman, I will even pay the bill. The Defense Department will provide the funding for this. And I do not care where they put it, Congressman. It could be at the White House, it could be at the NSC, wherever it is most appropriate, but I will pay the bill. But, Congressman, the problem is not with me or the money. You have got to convince the CIA and the FBI that this is something they want to pursue.

In fact, he wrote me a letter, Mr. Speaker, dated October 21, 1999: ``Dear Congressman Weldon, I wholeheartedly agree that combating asymmetrical threats challenging national security requires a collaborative interagency approach as suggested in your concept of the National Operations Analysis Hub. We are actively engaged in assessing how the department should leverage ongoing activities and develop a long-term strategy along these lines. I will keep you apprised of our progress. I would be happy to meet with you on the subject.''

And then he puts a personal comment on the note that I will read. ``Sir, this is a mealy-mouth response because no one wants to commit to a LIWA-based solution. You know I am very impressed by LIWA and see them involved in a range of activities. I would like to get together with you to review some of our thinking when you have time. John.''

Mr. Speaker, I would like to place this in the Record.

Deputy Secretary of Defense,

Washington, DC, October 21, 1999.

Hon. Curt Weldon,

House of Representatives,

Washington, DC.

Dear Congressman Weldon: I wholeheartedly agree that

combatting the asymmetrical threats challenging National

Security requires a collaborative, inter-agency approach, as

suggested in your concept of the National Operations Analysis

Hub. We are actively engaged in assessing how the Department

should leverage ongoing activities and develop a long-term

strategy along these lines.

I will keep you apprised of our progress, and I would be

happy to meet with you on this subject.

Sincerely,

John J. Harme.

Mr. Speaker, that was in October of 1999 at John Hamre's suggestion on November 4 of 1999, almost 2 years before 9/11. I had John Hamre and the representatives of the CIA and the FBI in my office. And at John Hamre's suggestion, we went through the 9-page briefing to create an overarching national collaborative center. When I finished the briefing which had been prepared for me with our intelligence officials off the record, the CIA said, Congressman Weldon, that is all well and good, but we really do not need that capability. It is not necessary. We are doing something called CI-21; and, therefore, we do not need to pursue that multi-system approach that you have outlined where we bring in all of these other classified systems.

I was very unhappy with that response because I knew full well the Army and our special forces commands were using that capability at that very moment in a special project against al Qaeda.

So, Mr. Speaker, in 1999 and in 2000 and in 2001, I put language in each of our defense bills calling for the creation of a national collaborative center to bring together our disparate intelligence capabilities and systems for 3 consecutive years. And, in fact, one of

those bills required a response by the CIA as to why this system had not been put into place.

But in the meantime, on November 12, 1999, the Defense Information and Electronics Report published an article about the need for a massive intelligence network for shared threat information. On April of 2000, Signal Magazine did another story on a fusion center concept taking root as we kept pushing this process.

Mr. Speaker, the following are both of these articles:

[Nov. 12, 1997]

Defense Information and Electronics Report

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 11 o'clock and 54 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until tomorrow, Tuesday, June 28, 2005, at 9 a.m., for morning hour debates.

Mr. Speaker, in this job, all of us are used to misinformation, lies and distortions and manipulation by the media. We refer to that as spin; but, Mr. Speaker, I never expected such spin to come from the no-spin zone of Bill O'Reilly.

Mr. Speaker, on Friday my staff confirmed that I was to do a television show with Mr. O'Reilly last evening. It was initially scheduled to be seven o'clock. I had a 5:15 meeting scheduled with the Secretary of Energy.

At some point in time yesterday morning, the O'Reilly show changed that appointment to 5:50. My 5:15 meeting was still in place. My staff was fully in touch with the O'Reilly show. We gave them the information, and I attended a very important meeting with Secretary of Energy Bodman in his office, a classified meeting, on the specific problems with the threats of the nuclear program and capabilities of the former Soviet states.

That meeting ran over, partly because the meeting was interrupted several times by important phone calls the Secretary had to make.

Following that meeting, which ended somewhere around 6:15, as my colleagues know, we had a series of six votes on the House floor.

Mr. O'Reilly proceeded to tell his national audience last night that I ``snubbed'' him; that I failed to call him; that I was inconsiderate; that I was rude.

Talk about spin, Mr. Speaker. So today, I sent a memo to Mr. O'Reilly explaining the facts, and I would remind Mr. O'Reilly that the Secretary of Energy and an important meeting on nuclear issues in the former Soviet States takes my top priority.

So do the six votes I had to pass last night on the defense appropriation bill for 2006.

Mr. O'Reilly, we do not need more spin. We need honesty and candor. You call for it every day. Now perhaps your staff is not providing the appropriate level of service to you.

Mr. Speaker, because I had some contacts from constituents and Members, I would put the summary of my statement to Mr. O'Reilly and the notes of my staff about their contact with Mr. O'Reilly's show into the Congressional Record.

Bill O'Reilly, I have now witnessed the ultimate spin--

from, of all people, you.

My scheduled taping last evening between 6-6:30 pm was pre-

empted by a prolonged 5:15 pm meeting with the Secretary of

Energy Sam Bodman regarding important National Security

issues related to non-proliferation activities in the former

Soviet states and by a series of 6 recorded votes on the

Floor of the House that started at 6:30 pm and lasted until

7:15 pm.

Contrary to your spin, my staff did give notice to your

staff of both conflicts and kept them informed of my status

during the scheduled taping. In addition my staff offered for

me to appear as soon as votes ended. Finally when I tried to

personally reach you, your staff was not willing to provide

my staff with a suitable number.

As much as I would have enjoyed returning to your show, my

job as a Member of Congress and as Vice Chairman of both the

House Armed Services Committee and Homeland Security

Committee is to cast my recorded vote on issues that affect

our nation, in this case, the 2006 Defense Appropriations

bill and related amendments which will fund our troops

through 2006.

I hope you understand these obligations and I apologize for

any inconvenience this unanticipated series of events caused

to you and your staff.

Curt Weldon.

As of Friday, O'Reilly was marked as tentative on the PR

calendar and CW's calendar at 7:00 pm.

After I left on Friday the DOE meeting was set up for 5:15

pm.

At some point on Monday morning, O'Reilly was confirmed by

PR and changed on their calendar to 5:50.

At 12:35 pm, I was notified of the change via e-mail from

Kristina.

I spoke to Peter on the phone and asked if O'Reilly could

be moved to later given Curt's 5:15 meeting. He informed me

it couldn't but not to worry if Curt wasn't there right at

6:00.

The change was made to CW's calendar at 1:25 pm.

I spoke to Porter around 1:30 and informed him of Curt's

schedule prior to O'Reilly (i.e. a meeting with the Sec. of

DOE). I told him Russ would be with him and gave him mine and

Russ' numbers.

From 5:45-6:30 Porter called me looking for Curt and Russ.

I informed him they were still in the classified meeting and

I was not able to get in touch with him.

Around 6:15 I asked if they need to cancel--Porter said

that wasn't an option.

Mr. Speaker, I rise this evening to introduce legislation to authorize and request the President of the United States to award the Medal of Honor to Richard D. Winters of Hershey, Pennsylvania, for acts of valor on June 6, 1944, in Normandy, France while an officer in the 101st Airborne Division.

Mr. Speaker, I do not take this issue lightly. It is with extreme concern that I had to resort to taking this action to right a wrong that occurred 61 years

ago. 61 years ago, Mr. Speaker, on D-Day at a placed called Brecourt Manor, Dick Winters led an ad hoc group of paratroopers, mostly from E Company, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, against a numerically superior force of German defenders, manning a battery of four 105- millimeter guns.

These guns were zeroed in on firing on Utah Beach during the initial D-Day seaborne landings. With only 12 men, Dick Winters led the attack that destroyed the German battery, killed 15 Germans, wounded many more, and took 12 prisoners.

The base-of-fire technique that Dick Winters used would become a textbook case for assault on a fixed site and is still taught at West Point.

Winters and his men destroyed these guns during a vicious engagement, lasting over 2 hours against heavy machine gun and infantry fire. This action saved countless American lives on Utah Beach. Dick would later be wounded, refused to be evacuated, maintaining that he would stay with his company.

He was nominated for the Medal of Honor by Colonel Robert Sink, his commanding officer of the 506th Regiment, a West Point graduate. His application for denial of the medal was based on an utterly arbitrary reason. The division commander directed that only one Medal of Honor was permitted to be awarded in the 101st Airborne Division for the Normandy campaign.

Mr. Speaker, it was never the intent of Congress to have an artificial limitation imposed on a solder who committed acts of heroism and bravery as documented by his colleagues, by his subordinates, and by his leaders. Winters was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the Nation's second highest military award for his actions. This is a high honor, but he deserves the Medal of Honor as recommended by his commanding officer.

The Army has reviewed the matter and maintains that the Distinguished Service Award is appropriate. Thousands of people worldwide disagree. Again, Mr. Speaker, because of an artificial limitation imposed by the commander of the 101st Airborne that only one medal be given for the Normandy campaign, Dick Winters' recognition and the recognition of those who served with him have been denied.

Dick Winters was immortalized by HBO in the miniseries ``Band of Brothers,'' produced by Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg. Andy Ambrose, the son of Stephen Ambrose who wrote ``Band of Brothers,'' has publicly supported Winters for the Medal of Honor, and so have thousands of other people all across the country, including every military person that served with Dick Winters and observed his heroism.

The entire Pennsylvania congressional delegation, all 19 members, Democrats and Republicans, including the gentleman from Hershey, Pennsylvania (Mr. Holden), where Dick Winters resides, have signed on as original co-sponsors of this legislation. Both chambers of the Pennsylvania State legislation having agreed and have publicly supported and passed legislation encouraging Congress to take this action.

Dick Winters is a humble man. He did not want this kind of attention. In fact, those who have supported this effort who came to me have said that Dick Winters did not want this to take place. But all of those people who served with Dick Winters, all of those soldiers who were there, who saw, who observed, and who realized his heroism in landing on D-Day and taking Easy Company all the way in to Hitler's headquarters, understand that Dick Winters deserves the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Again, Mr. Speaker, when Congress enacted the legislation creating the Medal of Honor, it did not allow artificial imposition of limitations. It said whatever soldier under any condition that is recognized by his or her peers for their actions should be eligible to receive this commendation.

In the case of Dick Winters, because of an artificial limitation, he has been denied that solemn honor of our country.

My bill does not mandate that the President award this Medal of Honor. It simply authorizes and allows the President to make this honor if he so chooses.

Mr. Speaker, we just celebrated D-Day. Sixty-one years later, when hundreds and thousands of American men stormed the beaches to liberate Europe, one of those bravest heroes, one of those extraordinary of the ordinary people who responded was Dick Winters. I encourage my colleagues to sign on and join us in righting this wrong and providing the support for the President to give Richard D. Winters the Medal of Honor.

Mr. Chairman, I, first of all, want to thank my distinguished chairman and the ranking member for their work.

Let me say this at the outset. I cannot tell the Members how proud I am to serve on this committee. Every day that I serve in this institution, I am happy that we work so well together. But this committee, I think, sets the entire example for the entire Congress. Democrats and Republicans, we work together.

I think the best evidence of that is, we had a vote out of committee of 61 of the 62 members coming together, and where we had areas of disagreement, we have been able to work those out. What a real credit and testimony to this Congress and those 62 members who are on this committee and to our leader.

The chairman has done a fantastic job. He has done what many said was the impossible, and I applaud him for that, under extremely difficult circumstances.

The gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton) has been a tireless advocate for what is right for our military, and I applaud him for that. To the gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Abercrombie), my ranking member, I thank him. He is a great American and it is great to work with him.

And I want to add a special amount of praise to our new staff director, who is sitting here for the first time at the table. I look forward to what I know is going to be an extremely productive relationship with a real professional who is going help us in our job.

Mr. Chairman, in my part of the bill in the Tactical Air and Land Forces Subcommittee, we had some difficult decisions to make. I had $10 billion of requests for plus-ups that I could not meet, that the services wanted, that Members came to me for. It was impossible. We did the best that we could.

And again this committee did what we did last year. It was this committee that called for additional funding to up-armor our Humvees and take care of the troops that were in harm's way. It was this committee that led the White House last year in getting that first $25 billion supplemental.

This weekend, I will take a bipartisan delegation back to Iraq, and we will spend Memorial Day in theater with the troops seeing the visible examples that we have helped provide to allow our military to be so capable and so successful. And that was our primary focus in the defense bill this year, how best to support our military and civilian personnel in the war against terrorism.

The second thing that we did, and it was difficult, was accountability for DOD programs. And that is not easy. We have services each wanting their own individual platforms while accomplishing the same objective. We put language in this that says they cannot do that. We cannot afford to have the exact same helicopter for the Army that meets the exact same need of the Marine Corps. Why do we not come together with one platform for both? This committee took that action, and I am proud to say that is a part of our recommendation.

We also said that in the case of new technology and new programs, we want to see the technology before we buy it. What disappointed me was that some of the contractors and some of my good friends in this body tried to mischaracterize the language we put in the bill on the Presidential helicopter.

Our language on the Presidential helicopter was not to score a point against or for any contractor or any region of the country. I fully support the decision of the Navy and the Marine Corps and the down- select that they made. And it is not about ``Buy America'' or not buying America. It is about what is the best helicopter to meet the needs of our President. But I would say we have to have closer control over the dollar amount going into this program.

We also had to make a difficult decision, as my chairman outlined, on Future Combat Systems. We cut the program by $400 million; but it was the right decision to make financially, to make sure that we are protecting the taxpayers' interest as well as giving the warfighter the best technology. We made a number of other changes in terms of the overall purchasing of our major platforms. I will not go into them. I will submit them all for the Record.

In closing, I want to say again how proud I am to serve with a Democrat and Republican who truly understand how to lead, to work together, and in the end to do what is best for our warfighters. I thank my distinguished chairman and ranking member and the gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Abercrombie), as my own subcommittee ranking member, for their cooperation on this final product. It is deserving of a ``yes'' vote from every Member of this body.

Jurisdiction includes $67 billion in DOD procurement and research and development.

Bill increases the requested authorization for programs within the jurisdiction of the Tactical Air and Land Forces Subcommittee by $4.5 billion.

Focus: First, how best to support our military and civilian personnel serving in the global war on terrorism; and second, accountability in DOD programs.

Legislative initiatives that seek to redress several unfavorable trends in the Department of Defense:

Programs being called joint programs with only one service participating in the program. This results in large, single service and program research and development expenditures for service unique programs followed by short production runs and inefficient use of taxpayer dollars.

Each service would like its 100 percent solution to every requirement, but that simply cannot be afforded. We want to make sure valid needs of the services are met, but affordability and unique solutions to requirements have to be balanced. We cannot afford to continue to have individual, service solutions within our ground forces for helicopters, tactical wheeled vehicles, blue force tracking, body armor, armored vehicle upgrades, vehicle add-on armor kits, and unmanned aerial vehicle systems, as well as other programs.

Also, programs cannot continue to be allowed to enter pre-production R&D, with immature technologies and ill-defined or unrealistic requirements.

Further, the Office of the Secretary of Defense is there for a purpose, to exercise oversight and reconcile differing service requirements. OSD needs to start exercising its responsibility in programs like unmanned aerial vehicles and helicopter development.

We must stop the trend toward excessive research and development and procurement concurrency in acquisition programs, resulting in not ``flying before buying,'' potential extensive post production modifications, and the associated increased acquisition costs. An example is in the action we have taken on the VXX--the presidential helicopter replacement program. The companies involved have tried to portray the action we have taken as a win for their particular marketing strategy when all that our legislation requires is flying the VXX before buying. It is not a Buy American provision. It is not trying to reverse the source selection. It is simply telling the Pentagon to test and fly the R&D aircraft before you buy production aircraft, so we don't have to go back and spend millions of dollars on already produced aircraft because the test results were not available in time to incorporate fixes into production aircraft. The Pentagon request to us would have us authorize procurement of 15 of the required 23 VXX aircraft before any testing has been done--likely resulting in expensive retrofits to production aircraft.

Other legislation includes:

Multiyear Procurement for UH-60 helicopters;

Multiyear Procurement for the Apache helicopter Target Acquisition/ Pilot Night Vision Sensor;

Multiyear Procurement for Apache Helicopter Block II conversion;

A Requirement for an Acquisition Strategy for Tactical Wheeled Vehicle programs;

A Requirement for Full and Open competition for the Objective Individual Combat Weapon;

A Requirement for use of the Tactical Common Data Link by all services for tactical unmanned aerial vehicles;

A Requirement for the Office of the Secretary of Defense to approve all new UAV programs;

An annual Government Accountability Office review of the Future Combat Systems program;

A Requirement to maintain the lethality and survivability requirement of the Non Line of Sight Cannon as established in the operational requirements document;

A Requirement for an independent analysis of the FCS manned ground vehicle weight requirement; and

A Requirement for a single, joint heavy lift rotorcraft program.

In addition adjustments have been made to the following programs:

The C-130J multiyear procurement is reinstated to the levels projected in the fiscal year 2005 budget, resulting in an authorization for 9 C-130Js and 4 KC-130Js, with advance procurement for those same quantities included for fiscal year 2007. [This program has been poorly managed by the Pentagon, but we need the tactical airlift that these aircraft will provide and termination costs were estimated to exceed the one year procurement value of these aircraft.]

The Future Combat Systems' budget request is reduced by $400 million.

The Joint Strike Fighter program is reduced by $150 million, the amount requested for advance procurement--again to require flying test aircraft before procuring production aircraft.

The Heavy Lift Rotorcraft replacement program is restructured and combined with the Joint Heavy Lift rotorcraft program.

The Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle program is reduced by $30 million, as the requested amount is early to need.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

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

Mr. Chairman, this is an amendment that I wish I did not have to offer because the amendment follows the language of the President of the United States, our leader, who has called for joint cooperation with Russia on missile defense. The amendment calls for the language of our Secretary of Defense, who has called for joint cooperation on missile defense. The language calls for an amendment that my good friend, the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt), and I offered in 1998 in H.R. 4 that actually calls for a national missile defense, and as a part of that called for joint cooperation on missile defense.

In fact, the weekend before the vote on H.R. 4, I took Don Rumsfeld, private citizen; Jim Woolsey, private citizen; Bill Snyder, private citizen; and Democrat Jim Turner and other Republicans to Moscow, and we told the Russians that our move in moving forward on missile defense and not only abrogating the ABN treaty was not about us scoring a strategic advantage over them, but was about an effort to protect ourselves, as they had been doing with their system around Moscow. And we told them that we saw threats coming from North Korea, China and Iran and, therefore, we had to take the action.

Mr. Chairman, for the past several years we have had a joint program with the Russians called RAMOS. A year ago, our four star general, General Kadisch, came in and said to me, Congressman, I have got to cancel the program, but I want to do a follow-on with the Russians. And I said, that is great because that is the intent of the President and that is the intent of the Congress. He said, But Congressman, I cannot get a meeting with my Russian counterparts.

So in April of last year, we took, at the request of General Kadisch and General Obering, General Shakleford to Moscow with us. And General Shakleford sat across the table in Straya Polochad, the equivalent of the West Wing in Moscow with General Balyevsky who would become the chief of the general staff. During the summer of last year, they negotiated a multi-phase agreement to work with the Russians on joint use of their large phased array radar, which we need; on joint use of the Russian missile systems for targeting purposes, which we want. But because none of the Missile Defense Agency, but because of the bureaucracy in the Pentagon, today we have no cooperative program with Russia, and that is unacceptable and it is outrageous.

So this amendment gets to the heart of the office of Secretary of Defense and the policy shop. You do not override the President of the United States. You are not the ultimate decision-makers above the Congress. The Congress made a conscientious bipartisan veto-proof effort in passing H.R. 4 in 1998. We were the ones that called for this cooperation. The President has said this repeatedly, and this amendment says to those bureaucrats in the policy shop, do your job.

I thank my colleagues for their effort. I ask all of my colleagues to support this because this is about our word. This is about the trust of America. This is about building a relationship that our Missile Defense Agency wants.

General Obering was in my office 2 months ago with a policy person sitting across the room, and General Obering looked at him and said, I want to do this. What we are saying is we support General Obering. We support the Secretary of Defense. We support the President of the United States. And to those bureaucrats in the Pentagon, wake up and listen, because that is who this amendment is aimed at.

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

Mr. Speaker, this is a difficult issue for me. I am a diabetic. I have diabetes in my family. I am cochairman of the Congressional Diabetes Caucus. My wife is a full-time diabetes educator. She has spent her entire time as a health care professional educating and working with diabetics.

The gentleman from Delaware (Mr. Castle) and the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Langevin) are very good friends of mine. I have studied all their information. I have tried to be as open about this as I possibly can be. But I can say, Mr. Speaker, that in the end it comes down to not eliminating any type of research, because that is allowable in this country; it is whether or not we should use Federal funds. California is using some $3 billion right now on what this bill is attempting to deal with.

In the end, Mr. Speaker, this is a very personal decision. It is one that I agonized over. I am not a medical professional. I consulted with all four of my friends who are medical doctors in this Chamber. They have studied medicine, they understand medical research, they understand bioethics far better than I ever will, and I come down on their side. I come down on the side of life.

I will oppose the bill that is being offered by my friend, the gentleman from Delaware (Mr. Castle) and my friend, the gentlewoman from Colorado (Ms. DeGette) and I will support the alternative that is being offered by this conference.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, as an author of this legislation with the distinguished ranking member and the distinguished chairman, I thank the chairman for working with us on this compromise. The chairman has been one of the tireless advocates in this body on behalf of the first responder community; and I want to tell the gentleman they recognize that. On behalf of the 1.2 million men and women who serve in the 32,000 departments across America, they understand that the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Rogers) is listening to them.

Last week, when I approached the gentleman from Kentucky (Chairman Rogers) and the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Sabo), our colleague, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell), the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews), the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), and a whole host of Members on our side of the aisle over here, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Boehlert) and others, it was with a great deal of enthusiasm that the chairman said he would work

with us, and that allows us to bring this amendment forward today.

Last November, Mr. Chairman, I spoke at the memorial service for our fallen firefighters. We paid tribute to 111 brave Americans, most of them volunteers, who paid the ultimate price in protecting America. Each year in this country, we lose over 100 police officers, we lose over 100 firefighters, paramedics, and EMTs. The difference in terms of law enforcement support, and we spend about $3 billion to $4 billion a year on local law enforcement at the Federal level, is that 85 percent of our first responders in the fire community are volunteers. They get paid nothing. They serve on behalf of these 32,000 departments while doing their full-time job and then come home on weekends and at nights and serve their communities. It is up to us to make sure they have the proper equipment they need.

Now, Members need to understand there is a distinction between the grant program running through the States and the grant program increased by this amendment. The grant program that this amendment increases is directly accessible to the fire departments. There are no middle people. There is no bureaucracy. There is no overhead. They go on line for 30 days once each year, and they apply directly. The grants are actually reviewed by other firefighters. There is no politics. That is why over 19,000 departments in this country have received one or more grants that have benefited our local towns.

This money is not just for homeland security; it is to better equip those departments who, back in 2000, we recognized need national help.

The second part of this amendment provides additional funding to the SAFER program, a program to encourage cities to hire more paid firefighters, volunteer departments to come up with more creative ways to encourage volunteers, and volunteer departments who may have to hire a full-time driver or a full-time officer, to have some of that funding available through this SAFER bill.

It is a significant increase when the program was appropriated to the level of $65 million this fiscal year, to add another $25 million in this amendment to that program.

Let me say just in closing, Mr. Chairman, that we are asking our fire and EMS departments to do more. The recent round of base closings that was announced on Thursday largely closes Guard and Reserve facilities. That is going to put increased pressure for homeland security on those 32,000 fire departments. They are not going to be able to rely on those local Guard and Reserve units, because their facilities are being shut down, so it is all the more reason that this amendment makes sense. It is good policy. It is good fiscal sense. It is paid for.

I commend all of the authors and everybody involved and especially again I want to thank the chairman for his vision, for his foresight, and for working with the ranking member to make this possible.

Mr. Speaker, Ms. Kerry Ambrose has been in Bolivia for the past year as a volunteer with the Peace Corps. Ms. Ambrose is following the footsteps of over 178,000 Americans who have served as Peace Corps volunteers in 138 countries over the past 44 years. Kerry is doing extraordinary work in her village and I commend her dedication and service to improve the lives of others. I would like to share with you her editorial submitted to my local newspaper, The Delaware County Times.

[From the Delaware County (PA) Times, Apr. 3, 2005]

Opinion: Serving Peace Corps Means Making a Difference

(By PCV Kerry Ambrose)

I live in a small pueblo in Bolivia. My house has running

water but no shower so we bathe via buckets. I consider

myself lucky, though, as some of my friends only have water

for a few hours a day, if that.

The family I live with sells chickens. I see the chickens

before they are killed. I also watch the grandmother of my

house wash piles of chicken claws in a bucket in order to

make her delicacy--chicken foot soup.

My family hand-washes its clothes every other day. I still

have not mastered the art completely and often the children

laugh good-naturedly. My family happens to have a TV in one

of its rooms. Most families do not. Most families have a

small room that serves as the living room, bedroom, and

kitchen. Oftentimes the floor is packed dirt and the roof is

thatched.

My favorite part of my day is after waking up. I heat water

on our stove and make

mate, a type of tea served here. My favorites are manzanilla,

which is chamomile, as well as cocoa leaf mate, which is

supposedly good for the stomach.

I sit on the steps of our house in the chill morning light

with the steaming hot cup of mate in my hands as I look out

on into the distance. I live in the altiplano, which is a

flat plain above the tree line. It stretches for miles in all

directions and looks like a vast sea of earth striving to

meet the unreachable horizon.

The wind is harsh as there is no protection from it and for

the most part the soil is rocky and hard. Many of the people

here depend on the mines, but there are also farmers and

herders. All are difficult livelihoods in such an unforgiving

place. The altiplano, though, has a stark and desolate beauty

to it that creeps in to haunt the soul. It's untouched in

many places and is wild and untamed in a way that I imagine

the prairie lands of the U.S. were before the settlers.

I am a volunteer in the Peace Corps, which is why I am

living here. I mainly work in the schools teaching

environmental education and health classes. This year though

I am also helping teach physical education from kindergarten

through sixth and am hoping to start a basketball intramural

league and maybe an art mural club.

The children are so motivated. Everyday I look into their

bright eager eyes and smiling faces and cannot help but

become inundated with love. I have so much hope for all these

children, these brilliant minds waiting to blossom, but I

know that the people of this town, this country, are poor.

Many of the girls see no future beyond having seven or eight

children to help with the farm work, the mortality rate here

is as high as almost 50 percent in some areas so the birth of

many children guarantees the survival of a few.

The streets of the cities are not lined with gold, but

rather with funeral parlors displaying miniature coffins. My

heart breaks knowing some of these children I see will go on

to sniff glue, become alcoholics, and abuse their wives

because these are the examples they know and see. I am

determined to help in what little way I can to instill a

sense of self-esteem. They may be poor in material objects,

but they are not poor in spirit.

I have been here already for a year. Peace Corps volunteers

make the commitment to serve for 27 months. When the tragedy

of Sept. 11 happened, I personally made the decision to join

after I finished college. Many people of the world view

America with contempt. I wanted to do what I could to make

the most out of the privileges my citizenship automatically

bestowed upon me.

I came to Bolivia with idealistic notions that I could

somehow change the world. I still hope to make a difference

each day I walk hand in hand with a small child looking up at

me with eyes so wide. However, I have been humbled in that I

realize by simply living here I have learned more this past

year about myself, people, and the world then I could have

possibly envisioned or ever repay, although I intend to try.

Kerry Ambrose is the daughter of Pamela Ambrose and Gary

Pattinson, and a graduate of Gamet Valley High School. She

was sworn in as a Peace Corps volunteer on April 7, 2004.

Learn more about this organization by visiting

www.peacecorps.gov or if interested in donating supplies for

a future project or school, contact Kerry at

[email protected]

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding and thank the chairman and ranking member for their outstanding work, and the subcommittee chairs and ranking members as well.

This bill is the best indication to the first responder community across the country that Congress was listening. It was not this way 5, 6 or 7 years ago when the first funding for training first responders was being developed by bureaucrats in Washington, who had no idea of what the real threats were out there across America.

It was not the case over the past several years as States and counties siphoned off administrative dollars that should have gone for the first responders.

This bill changes all that because this bill is based upon the committee listening to the first responder community. It provides a more consistent approach that is based on the threats that we see out there, and it responds to the needs that were presented to us by the representative groups of the first responder community. In fact, Mr. Chairman, that is why every first responder organization in America supports this legislation. I applaud my colleagues for this outstanding work.

As to the other programs that we fund, like the grant program for firefighters which my colleague just spoke on of, I am proud of the fact that in a tough budget environment, separate from this legislation, we have appropriated over $3 billion to almost 20,000 fire and EMS departments across the country, direct allocations, not through any bureaucracy, but directly through firefighters deciding on the priorities of fire groups and EMS groups across the country. That program will see another one-half billion dollars at a minimum in the next fiscal year.

So we are taking care of the priorities and the needs, we are responding to local concerns, and the key message of this legislation is that we have listened to those people who are across America in 32,000 fire and EMS departments, thousands of police departments who every day for every call respond to America's needs.

I commend, again, the committee for its outstanding work, and I look forward to continuing the aggressive schedule the chairman has laid out before us for the Committee on Homeland Security in this session of Congress.