Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to have the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Boyd) removed as a cosponsor to H.R. 1756.

Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to recommit.

Yes.

Mr. Speaker, this is a good Defense bill, and I want to compliment my great friend the gentleman from Missouri for his leadership in helping to put together this bill that passed the committee unanimously, came to the floor, and we can expect a big vote, I think, of support from the Members of this body. We are about to make this bill better.

In 1987 this committee, the Armed Services Committee, sent a letter to the leadership in Israel, and we told them that there were lots of things that they could defend against very effectively, that if tactical aircraft were sent into Israel in an attack they would shoot down all of them, and they have proven that, but that if ballistic missiles were launched for Tel Aviv, every single one of them would impact because they had no defenses. And we urged them to join with the United States in developing a system of missile defense. And upon our urging, they started what is known as the Arrow missile program. It has come a long way. It has been deployed.

And that prophetic letter that we sent them in 1987, of course, was followed by real missile attacks on Israel. They didn't quite have that system up at that time. We rushed PATRIOTs over. They now have the Arrow missile defense system up. But in the most recent attacks we have seen short-range missiles that also impacted in Israel.

This motion to recommit is $200 million that is dedicated to integrating our missile defense systems with those of Israel, using the great innovation of Americans along with their great innovative capabilities, to defend against this new era of terrorists with high technology.

Mr. Speaker, I yield at this time such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Kirk), who has been a leader in putting this motion to recommit together.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.

And let me just remind all my colleagues that the day will come when missiles from other countries, adversarial countries, will not fall harmlessly into the Sea of Japan. They will not fall harmlessly into desert sands. We will have a time when we have to defend against incoming ballistic missiles in this country and across the borders of our allies, including Israel.

Do what is right for the United States, and what we do today in providing missile defense will protect the next generation of Americans. Vote ``yes'' on this motion to recommit.

Will the gentleman yield?

Will the gentleman yield for just 5 seconds?

I thank my friend for yielding.

This amendment was offered by Mr. Cantor and was not ruled in order by the Rules Committee. So this was not without precedent.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

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

Mr. Chairman, as legislators, we meet once again to address the wide range of important national security activities undertaken by the Departments of Defense and Energy. We all take our legislative responsibilities very seriously, and this is especially true during a time of war.

And it's always true of my good friend and colleague, Ike Skelton, the great gentleman from Missouri, our chairman. I want to thank Chairman Skelton for the excellent job that he's done in putting this bill together, and also thank all of our subcommittee chairmen and ranking members who have put together a composite that very strongly meets the needs of our men and women in uniform.

As a result of Mr. Skelton's efforts to put forward this bill, our committee reported out the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008 last Wednesday. The vote was unanimous, 58-0.

I support this bill. It reflects our committee's continued strong support for the brave men and women of the United States Armed Forces, and in many ways this bill is a very good bill.

It authorizes the President's request for $503.8 billion for the fiscal year 2008 base budget of the Department of Defense and national security programs of the Department of Energy. This amount provides for end-strength growth in both the Army and Marine Corps, continuing initiatives started several years ago by the Armed Services Committee.

In fiscal year 2008, the Army would be authorized 525,400, which is 3,000 more than authorized last year, and the Marine Corps would be authorized 189,000, 9,000 more than last year. The bill also includes $142 billion to cover fiscal year 2008 war costs, as requested by the President.

Some of the initiatives in this legislation continue or build upon successful programs or reinforce good legislation that the House has already passed. For example, this legislation has provisions that are essential to maintain a robust defense industrial base. Last year, the Defense authorization bill tried to strike a fair balance between requiring the use of domestic specialty metals for our weapons systems and offering a waiver process in case sufficient metals are not available. H.R. 1585 establishes a formal rulemaking process for waivers that apply to multiple contracts to facilitate transparency and the gathering of broad industry input. In this way, the market will be able to respond to supply shortages, fostering investment in domestic industries.

Other initiatives in this bill modify existing authorities or establish promising new programs and policies, such as adding $4.1 billion for the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles, so-called MRAPs. Separately, H.R. 1585 levels the playing field between U.S. companies and foreign countries with which we have free trade agreements. It rectifies a critical flaw in the U.S. Code that effectively penalizes U.S. companies for complying with U.S. law, while allowing foreign manufacturers to provide noncompliant components and systems.

These and other sections go a considerable way in ensuring that our brave men and women in uniform have the best available tools to protect our national security interests, but this bill is not a perfect bill. We can and we should improve it.

This legislation cuts missile defense programs by almost $800 million. In 2006, there were about 100 foreign ballistic missile launches around the world, including from North Korea with short-range missiles and a longer-range TD-2 missile; and from Iran with its development and testing of short- and medium-range ballistic missiles. I wonder whether in the face of this growing threat we should be slowing down the development and fielding of a robust, layered ballistic missile defense system that would prove critical to our Nation's defenses.

This bill recommends a reduction of more than $860 million for the Army's Future Combat Systems program. In the past, our committee made smaller cuts to drive behaviors that would lead to a successful system. With the magnitude of this cut, I worry about the long-term impact on the capability of the U.S. Army and wonder whether we should not restore some of this funding to ensure that the Army is as prepared as possible to meet future challenges.

And finally, this bill provides significant resources for shipbuilding. I am concerned, however, that we have not fully funded two of the three additional ships that the language purports to have added. The bill is approximately $145 million less than the amount the Navy needs to buy and take delivery of an additional dry cargo ship, which was number two on the Navy's unfunded priority list. Also, the bill provides $588 million for advanced procurement for an additional ship-set of reactive plant heavy components for a Virginia-class submarine in 2008, but it remains up to future Congresses to complete the funding and turn these components into an additional submarine before 2012.

As in years past, I believe that this legislation reflects many of the Armed Services Committee's priorities in supporting our Nation's dedicated and courageous servicemembers.

I want to thank again Chairman Skelton for putting together an excellent bill and helping us stay focused on delivering a bill that helps us protect, sustains and builds our forces.

I look forward to working with my colleagues to improve and pass H.R. 1585.

Mr. Chairman, at this point, I would like to yield 15 seconds to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Price).

Yes, I yielded for purposes of the motion.

Madam Chairman, at this time, I would like to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Everett), the ranking member of the Strategic Forces Subcommittee.

Madam Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Westmoreland) for purposes of a motion.

Motion to Rise Offered by Mr. Westmoreland

Madam Chairman, I think we only have about 2\1/2\ minutes left on this side. I would continue to reserve and ask my good friend from Missouri to recognize some more of his speakers.

I want to thank all Members who participated in the general debate, and all the great subcommittee chairmen and ranking members, and the chairman of the committee for putting together this great bill, and will now enter the amendment process.

There is just one point that I wanted to make in listening to my colleague finish up in talking about the mental health of America's soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines.

One observation that I have made over the years in being around people that wear the uniform is that while a number of the stresses and the difficulties that have been spoken of are real, it is also real that the coolest, calmest, most balanced, most stable American citizens, I believe, are the folks that wear the uniform in Iraq and Afghanistan. And while it is true that enemy fire can hurt you and damage you mentally as well as physically, it is also true that that fire can make you stronger.

Having spent time with guys like Chuck Yeager, guys like the great Vic Taylor, many others who have been under fire and in various situations in real combat in the world's wars, it has always occurred to me that the people who have the greatest mental stability are people that come out of the combat zones.

So I want to make sure that this debate doesn't send the message that somehow Americans who wear the uniform are victims, and that the inevitable result of their wearing the uniform and serving in combat is that they are going to somehow be damaged mentally, because that is not the case.

And I would just conclude by reflecting on the fact that I take a number of folks who are wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan hunting, which the Hunter family likes to do, and I take them hunting with my grandchildren. And there are few people that I will trust my grandchildren with, but the people I will trust my grandchildren with out in the great outdoors, with loaded weapons, are members of the United States Army and the United States Marine Corps who have been to combat. Those people have the greatest sense of balance and sense of judgment.

And, again, in my mind, America's citizens who are the coolest and the calmest under fire and have the greatest sense of balance and judgment are people that wear the uniform and have been in combat.

Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I rise to speak about the amendment. I don't rise in opposition to the amendment, but I would like to take the time and address the issue.

Madam Chair, we've looked over the amendment. It's really an adjustment of a part of the base bill that we have that allows for this memorandum of understanding between these three primary entities, State, DOD and AID, to make sure that they have an understanding of authorization of the carrying of the weapons by contractors, the rules of engagement, coordinating movement of contractors, collecting information relating to offenses under UCMJ and also, additionally, what the gentlelady has offered in her amendment, the issuance of guidance on all equipment, including uniforms, body armor, weapons and the collection of information related to casualties suffered by contractors.

And our only concern, of course, is that we have enough time for this memorandum of understanding to be put together after the bill becomes law, which in some cases is late December, hopefully long before then. And so what we do need is to have the ability of the administration, if they don't have that together. And one thing we all agree on is you've got to do this right when they do it, when they issue this memorandum of understanding. So they need to have time to do it; that we do have a waiver or an extension of time that would be allowed.

And so I've talked this over with the gentlelady, who is the author of the amendment. She's amenable to extending the time period for this memorandum of understanding to be worked out, and the chairman has graciously agreed that he also supports that.

And so just in a simple informal colloquy, I'd just ask the chairman if it's his agreement that, in conference, we would work to extend the time wherein the memorandum of understanding could be worked out if, in fact, it can't be done within 90 days of the first of January 2008. Would the gentleman agree to effect that in conference?

Absolutely.

I would further ask the gentlelady if that's fine with her, if she would be in accord with that.

Thank you very much. In that case we support this amendment and would not object to its adoption.

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

Will the gentlelady yield?

I just wanted to thank the gentlelady for, respectfully, for her addition to this amendment and her concern about the contractors. And you know, just reflect for a second, that our contractors who go over to the warfighting theaters in Iraq and Afghanistan undertake enormous danger, and a large number of them have been killed and wounded. And many of them, the ones that I have met, are largely American veterans who have, they go for two reasons; one is they do make good money. It's a job, it's a worthwhile job. They feel like they're supporting our country. They also have a great, the ones I've talked to, have a great deal of concern for the troops. They have a feeling of partnership with the people that wear the uniform of the United States, and they are a great asset to this country. And I think it's appropriate that we follow, we carefully watch how they're treated and how they're protected. I think that's absolutely appropriate.

I thank the chairman for embedding this base provision in the base bill, and

members on the Republican and Democrat side who've worked to put this together, and I thank the gentlelady for her thoughtful addition.

Would the gentleman yield?

I thank the gentleman for yielding, and on our side we think this is an excellent amendment. And I want to thank the gentleman whom I've traveled with to the warfighting theaters, and thank him for his concern for our troops, and we support the amendment strongly.

Madam Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from West Virginia (Mrs. Capito).

Madam Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Madam Chairman, I just want to say that we on this side are in total agreement with her amendment. We thank her for bringing it in such a thoughtful way and we support it.

Madam Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I just want to say, we appreciate the gentleman and his amendment on this side and thank him for bringing it to the floor.

Mr. Chairman, at this point, I would like to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Turner).

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I just want to thank the gentleman. What an essential and important amendment this is.

We recognized and have embedded in law the remedies for a service person who may be overseas and may lose his house or may have a judgment taken against him, a civil law liability judgment, and we have tried to protect him from that. And the idea of having a child taken from you while you are serving overseas can only have a demoralizing effect on members of the armed services.

So this protection is very much needed, and I thank the gentleman from Ohio. We have total support on this side for his amendment.

Mr. Chairman, at this time, I would like to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Buyer) for the purposes of a colloquy with myself and Mr. Skelton.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I support the chairman and I will support the gentleman's request for a study by the GAO after 1 year to assess the impact to the Department of Veterans Affairs and the DOD of providing Federal pricing to DOD to purchase drugs in a retail pharmacy.

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

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I have enormous respect for my great friend from New Jersey, who has shared and fought on common ground with this Member for many years on items of interest and national defense that we shared support of.

In this case, I must oppose this amendment strongly for this reason. The nation that he's talking about, Iran, borders obviously one of our important warfighting theaters, that is, Iraq. We have seen evidence, it has been reported by our warfighting commanders that Iran has participated in moving instruments of death; that is, extremely effective IEDs that have been used against American troops and will prospectively be used against American troops, into Iraq from Iran.

The idea that we are saying that in this piece of the budget we cannot plan for interdiction of those items, of those weapons that are moving across the border, that we can't plan, for example, for Special Forces operations that we might need to implement or to move into action, to preempt this movement of deadly devices across the border, that we can't plan to extract hostages if they should be taken by Iranian militia or Iranian members of the armed forces is just not practical and it's not reasonable.

You have an Iranian military and intelligence body which has decided to become involved in the war in Iraq. They have moved across the border, and they have moved effective weapons across the border that are being used against American troops. I think it is not wise for us to advertise to our adversaries and to the world that we are establishing a policy that we will not even use money to contemplate or to plan for a reaction against us. I think we have to let them know that we have license, as Americans, to take any actions that might be necessary to protect American troops.

I would object very strongly to this amendment.

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

Would the gentleman yield an additional 3 minutes?

I thank my friend for yielding.

Mr. Chairman, I would just respond to my friend from New Jersey in this way: It says that you can't plan for a major contingency. I am looking at scenarios, and if you have a scenario where you have convoys of IED material being moved from Iran into Iraq and you want to send a team over and make a strike and close a canyon or close a mountain pass or hit that convoy with a major strike, I think many people would classify that as a major action, a major contingency.

So I think that we blurred the line here in that we may have to take what I would consider and many Members here would consider to be major contingencies. The problem is, you have to take those things very quickly.

This war against terror is an era when time is truly of the essence, when hours are important, when minutes are important, when days are important. The idea we have to come back, if you have got to close a pass to keep IEDs that are killing Americans in Iraq from going across that line, we have to come back and get permission from Congress to do that, I think that is not a good advertisement or a good statement of impunity to communicate to the other side, where they think they now have an insulation between an immediate reaction by American Armed Forces.

That is the essence of our resistance to this amendment, and I think it is still very solid.

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

Mr. Chairman, let me just say to my friend, I just reviewed it the other day, and I don't need to look at any statements by George W. Bush about whether or not we should have gone into Iraq, because the most damning statements about Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction, the most conclusive statements that indeed he must have them and that he must be brought to justice quickly, were not made by George W. Bush. They were made by people with the last name of Clinton, of Gore, of Kerry. I reviewed all of the videotapes of their speeches in which they absolutely laid out a case against Saddam Hussein.

So I hope we don't replow the ground of who shot John here in terms of statements with respect to the state of Iraq and its weapons of mass destruction.

I think we need to get back to the substance of this debate, and that is, are we foreclosing an immediate response if it is necessary.

I yield to the gentleman from Missouri.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 30 seconds to explain again why I think it is impractical to put this dividing line between this funding.

If there has to be a strike, if there has to be preemption because IED material is moving across the border that could injure our soldiers, our sailors, our airmen, our marines, probably the reactive force is going to be led by one of the combatant commanders who is in the Iraqi theater and who is being funded by money under OEF or OIF. It is probably not going to come. And the idea you can't have uniformed personnel expending his time and his staff's time planning what it is going to take to defend his soldiers, sailors, airmen or marines from interference from the Iranian side of the border, is, in my estimation, not practical.

Those are the forces that are going to be responding, and I think we have to let them put together that contingency plan.

Notice to Alter Order of Consideration of Amendments

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

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

Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment. We have been at war with the radical Islamic jihadists ever since they supported and fomented that storming of our embassy in 1979. They held Americans hostage and they held them for 444 days, and every President since President Carter has renewed the national emergency with respect to Iran, most recently on March 8 of this year.

If you look at the War Powers Act, Mr. Chairman, it states that a national emergency does justify the President utilizing his constitutional powers as Commander in Chief. My reading of this amendment is that this proposal, this amendment, changes the War Powers Act and extracts that power from the President of the United States. We have had Democrat and Republican Presidents renewing that finding and that national emergency status with respect to Iran.

Just to say further, Mr. Chairman, we all know, and I just talked about this, we know that Iran through its proxies helped and aided in the attack against Americans at Khobar Towers, which killed 19 Americans and injured 372 other Americans and other people who were in that area. We know that the Iranian-backed insurgents are killing American troops with IEDs, and some of that IED expertise and the materials themselves are being transferred from Iran. We know that they are assisting in attacks against Americans in Afghanistan.

A couple of weeks ago the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Pace, said, ``We have intercepted weapons in Afghanistan headed for the Taliban that were made in Iran. The arms included mortars and C-4 plastic explosives.''

So, Mr. Chairman, every Member of this body should be strongly opposed to this particular amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from Nevada (Ms. Berkley).

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

I would just offer to my colleague who just spoke and my other colleagues that there are the strongest statements for invasion of Iraq that took place before President Bush came into office, and those were the now famous speeches that were made by three Senators by the name of Kerry, Clinton, and Gore.

Mr. Chairman, the War Powers Act clearly calls for the ability of the Commander in Chief to introduce American military force where an emergency with respect to a nation has been declared. That emergency with respect to Iran has been declared by every American President since President Carter in 1979. This is not extra-constitutional. The law as it presently exists is consistent with the Constitution. This would infringe. In fact, this would roll back the War Powers Act. Every Member should vote against this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, we are in strong opposition to this amendment. In fact, the Armed Services Committee under the very able chairmanship of the gentleman from Missouri has finished a number of oversight hearings. The subcommittees that are involved in the Armed Services Committee and in Defense Appropriations Subcommittee have undertaken extensive hearings and analysis of every weapons system that we have. And, of course, you have many weapons systems that were built 20-30 years ago that were highly relevant, like the C-130s that Members fly on, that are the backbone of the transportation system, the intratheater transportation system in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bradley fighting vehicles, M-1 tanks. There is no weapon system that comes out of a production line with the word ``Cold War'' on it, so the relevance and the importance and the use of weapons has been carefully and closely analyzed by the important committees, the oversight committees, and we are aided in that by the Quadrennial Defense Review that is done by the administration where they make their case for what they think that we need, and the President makes that proposition which is manifested in his budget. And after hearings, the members of this committee and the full body, this House of Representatives, respond with our cut on what we think we should do with respect to arming and maintaining and equipping our military forces.

So I would just strongly oppose the gentlelady's amendment, and say I have great respect for the gentlelady.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Boren).

Mr. Chairman, I would just say we strongly oppose this amendment, and I yield back the balance of our time.

Mr. Chairman, I'm not in opposition to the amendment, but I ask unanimous consent to claim the time in opposition.

Mr. Chairman, if Mr. Israel had additional speakers, I'd be happy to defer to him and then take my time afterwards, if he has somebody ready to talk.

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

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank Mr. Israel and Ms. Lee for bringing this amendment. We all have our eyes focused on the warfighting theaters in Iraq and Afghanistan, and if we turn our focus to Darfur and look at the history and the number of deaths which number, and the estimates I have seen are between 250,000 and 400,000, many of them inflicted by this so-called janjaweed militia which comes into villages in Darfur and ravages the village, burns them, we have seen the pictures that have been circulated by our own Member, Mr. Wolf, and by Senator Brownback from their recent trips, which show burned-out villages with the women abused, with many of the villagers killed, some of them killed by strafings, by helicopter gunships which have been purchased from China and from Russia, with small arms sales taking place specifically from the Chinese and the Russians. And we see a situation in which the Free World and the civilized world has not been able to have much of an effect.

I'd ask Mr. Israel, my colleague, of your take on this very difficult situation.

I yield to the gentleman from New York.

I thank the gentleman, and let me make an offer to this gentleman.

You have got this great idea of using this airfield, which is about 100 miles from the border, to bring in nongovernmental organizations which can bring

in food, bring in medicine to the displaced villagers. We work in my office with a number of groups, one of them called Rescue Task Force, which has built medical centers around the world and brought in food and medicine in many very difficult situations.

I'd like to offer to work with the gentleman with this nongovernmental organization, Rescue Task Force, and others to bring in food and medicine to that particular location. Let's see if we can't maybe help lead out by getting some NGOs to start using this particular airfield. And I'll be happy to join the gentleman; I know Mr. Saxton will be happy to join in this, Mr. Wolf and others.

Let's get a letter, maybe a meeting with the State Department, with the administration, see if we can't get this review of this airfield immediately and start getting some supplies into it, and maybe we can lead the world, the humanitarian world, as Americans, as we do so often, in moving supplies into the airfield that you have identified.

So I support this very, very strongly. And I didn't know if Mr. Saxton wanted to involve himself in this discussion, but I know he wants to help here, too. If the gentleman would take me up on that offer, and if he's got a nongovernmental organization in mind, let's move out on this one. It looks like an excellent, excellent opportunity for cooperating and helping.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back my time.

Would the gentleman yield?

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Let me offer we have these great nongovernmental organizations, we have a lot of people who have been displaced and abused in Darfur. They desperately need food and medicine. I will commit to the gentleman that we will try to work with these NGOs that we know of and let's try to work together in a partnership and try to get a plane load of supplies into that airfield or another one by the first of July. That's a little more than a month from now.

Let's work together. We will start working today to try to get this done. Let's prod the good old State Department and DOD to get out there and survey that airfield.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Saxton).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Boustany).

Mr. Chairman, how much time do we have on this?

Thank you. I just wanted to say that we strongly support this amendment on this side. We think it's an excellent amendment. We thank both of the authors, the gentleman from Louisiana and the gentleman from Oklahoma, for bringing this amendment to us. We support it very strongly.

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

Mr. Chairman, I rise to claim the time in opposition to this, although I do not oppose the amendment.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That's exactly what I wanted to do.

I just wanted to get on the record that I support this amendment very strongly, the idea of saving energy. I would hope that the gentleman would agree that, wherever possible, the energy-saving devices, these light bulbs, should be made in the United States.

They are paid for with Department of Defense funds. The average American worker spends over $1,000 a year out of his or her paycheck to support the defense function of government, and it is appropriate that American workers be allowed to make the new, innovative, energy-saving devices that we are using at bases throughout the country.

I yield to the gentleman to ask him if he wouldn't agree with me that, wherever it is practical, that American-made bulbs should be used in this replacement program.

I yield to the gentleman.

I thank the gentleman.

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

Mr. Chairman, although I don't oppose the amendment, I ask unanimous consent to claim the time.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I want to thank the gentleman for his amendment. I think it is absolutely appropriate. We support it.

Mr. Chairman, this is the provision that we put into the law last year when we saw that American fallen service personnel were being transported in what we thought was a less than dignified manner and escorted in a less than dignified manner to their final resting places.

Of course, I went to the Department of Defense initially and had them involved in discussions with the committee with respect to effecting informally a policy that would have dedicated aircraft and would have a dedicated honor guard and military escort that would complete the transport of fallen American service personnel from Dover to their final resting places. We couldn't work something out, so we ended up putting that in law, and having the full support of the other body, that, indeed, is the practice.

I have been around the country now to various places where American heroes have come home, and there has been an outpouring of gratitude from a number of communities and families that in fact the system is working well now with dedicated military aircraft, with the appropriate honor guard escorting the fallen American heroes, and the families now feel much better about the process.

Now, I would hope that, in practice, the U.S. military is not, as a rule, taking people to a home of record when in fact their final resting place may be hundreds of miles away, but I understand that the gentleman has two cases where that, in fact, would have taken place if they hadn't made contact with the DOD and the DOD hadn't sorted that out.

And so I think this is absolutely appropriate to put into statute what, essentially, they've been doing, as I understand, as a matter of practice in carrying out the mandate that we gave them last year with the new law that came from this committee.

So I support the gentleman. I thank him for offering this amendment, and we certainly support it on this side.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back.

Mr. Chairman, we support this amendment and think it will be very useful, and thank the gentleman for offering such an outstanding amendment, and we support it.

Madam Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Madam Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton).

Madam Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Saxton).

Madam Chairman, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the chairwoman of the Strategic Subcommittee, the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Tauscher).

Madam Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the ranking member of the Strategic Subcommittee, Mr. Everett.

Madam Chair, very simply, testimony by General Bell, who is commander of U.S. Forces Korea, before the HASC on March 7 said: ``I've got 800 of these missiles pointed at U.S. troops right now in South Korea. So I would support vigorously a robust approach to theater ballistic missile defense, layered defense, intercontinental ballistic. It's a very important part of the total approach to this very serious problem.''

I would very strongly recommend a ``no'' vote on this amendment.

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

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Madam Chairman, let me just make this clear. This is a net cut in missile defense. This is not a matter of taking money from something that we don't need and moving it to something we urgently need. This is a net cut of $764 million.

Now, my great friend from North Carolina (Mr. Spratt) made the point we spent well over $100 billion on missile defense since Ronald Reagan reminded us that we live in the age of missiles. On the other hand, the strike on 9/11 probably cost us, in terms of economic destruction, $500 billion plus.

We can't afford not to have robust missile defense. That means you take down incoming missiles at all phases, in boost phase, in midcourse, and, lastly, in terminal phase. We need robust missile defense. We need to defend this country. We need to restore this money, and the Franks amendment is right on target.

Will the gentlelady yield?

I thank the gentlelady for yielding and I appreciate her courtesy. And let me just say why I think you may want to consider supporting this amendment.

We had a discussion and we had some confusion a couple years ago with respect to missile defense, the systems that we were placing in Fort Greely, Alaska. The question was whether money that was R&D money could be used for construction, basically for pouring concrete, and we had a tremendous tug-of-war over that. So there is some ambiguity here.

We have got 14 missiles that could be used to intercept a couple of rogue incoming missiles even out of the test bed. So we could use these test missiles to protect our country in extreme circumstances.

I don't think it is a bad thing to clearly lay that out and clarify it in light of the fact that we did have confusion over the color of money in the missile defense programs between R&D and MILCON.

So would the gentlelady consider that in supporting the gentleman's amendment?

Would the gentleman yield?

I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I support his amendment.

As many of us on the Armed Services Committee have traveled to Iraq a number of times, and we utilize right now bases throughout Iraq, like the Balad Air Base, which was previously a fighter air base for Saddam Hussein's tactical aircraft, we use those bases, it makes absolute sense that we shouldn't somehow put Iraq in a different category than every other ally of the world which allows us to have a basing in their country. So designating that we may have temporary basing in Iraq is absolutely normal relations with Iraq, something that we have with dozens and dozens of other nations; and that will allow us in times of exigency to be able to use runways for resupply, for tactical air operations, for other

operations that extend important American foreign policy in that region of the world.

And so I think the gentleman has a very commonsense amendment, and I would support it.

Madam Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

My colleagues, I have a lot of respect for my friend from Virginia, but this amendment is a bad amendment. It's an amendment which goes to the very core of the Guantanamo facility, the purpose of the Guantanamo facility, the nature of the people who are imprisoned in the Guantanamo facility, and the ongoing war against terrorism.

Now, I'm reading my friend's amendment, and it directs DOD to undertake a plan for the transfer of each individual presently imprisoned at Guantanamo.

Ladies and gentlemen, the people who are imprisoned in Guantanamo are largely terrorists. They include people like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who has admitted in court that he planned the attack on 9/11 that destroyed thousands of American lives.

It includes people like Abu Zubaydah, who helped smuggle now deceased al Qaeda leader al-Zarqawi and some 70 Arab fighters out of Kandahar, Afghanistan into Iran, who also tried to organize a terrorist attack in Israel, who was recruited by Osama Bin Laden.

It includes Ahmed Galeni, who worked for al Qaeda's chief of external operations and forged or altered passports for many al Qaeda members, who knew and met many of the operatives involved in the attacks, including Fahid Masala, who was asked to help the group purchase TNT for trucks and gas cylinders that would later be used to construct a car bomb, requests which he fulfilled.

Ladies and gentlemen, these are people who understand how to kill large numbers of people. The last thing you want to do is to take people from an extremely secure facility that has been designed to ensure that they don't escape, that they're not able to spread their understanding of car bombs and other destructive devices to other terrorists or prisoners.

Now, the gentleman's initial amendment that was filed on this went a bit further. It talked about moving the detainees to places in the United States. And if you think it through, that's where we would probably have to transfer them. If it orders DOD to put together a transfer plan, the logical recipients of that transfer plan will be bases and facilities in the United States.

Now, that means that unless you isolate these terrorists, these people that know how to make car bombs, you're going to put them in facilities in the U.S. with American criminals, and they are presumably going to teach these people how to make things like car bombs and other destructive devices. In this case, you have to keep them isolated.

And I would say to my colleague, you know, we have had, under the tribunals that we have put together to determine whether people are just farmers in the field or whether they really were terrorist combatants, we've released a number of people who have gone back to Afghanistan and gone back to their home countries. A few of them have actually shown up on battlefields around the world fighting us again, which shows that our standard for releasing them has in some cases been too liberal, not too conservative.

But the idea of taking people who know how to kill large numbers of people with destructive devices and moving them, spreading them around to other institutions where they may give that knowledge to other people, other criminals who have hurt Americans, who might be inclined to hurt more Americans, is not a good idea. We need to keep them isolated.

And I would say to my colleague I have been down to Guantanamo. I am sure he has also. We feed those people well. They have a better medical system than most HMO systems in America. Not one person has been murdered in Guantanamo. And none of us can say about our State prisons nobody has ever been murdered in our State prison. Every single Member of this body has State prisons in their districts or their State in which more murders have taken place than in Guantanamo. Nobody is making a suggestion that we close our State prisons because they have a bad reputation nationally or internationally.

So I would respectfully urge a very strong ``no'' vote on this amendment. I think it is a bad amendment. I respect the author, but I think it takes us in the wrong direction.

Let's keep these people collected. Let's keep them isolated. Let's keep the rest of the world safe.

I would be happy to yield to the gentleman.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to yield as much time as he might like to Mr. McCotter.

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

Mr. Chairman, I am not opposed, but I would like to take the time in opposition.

I just want to say to my friend that I certainly share his goal of renewable energies being used in the Department of Defense. And I have a colloquy I would like to enter into with the gentleman because I know he had to go to some lengths to be able to make sure that his amendment was in order under our rules, particularly our offset rules.

At this time, I would like to ask my friend from New Jersey to clarify part of his amendment that I have found troubling. And that is, Mr. Andrews, if I understand your amendment correctly, the Secretary of Defense would be prohibited from using third-party financing options, such as energy saving performance contracts, known as ESPCs, and enhanced use leases, EULs, in meeting your requirement for them to purchase 25 percent of their electricity from renewable resources by 2025; is that correct?

I will yield.

So if I understand you correctly, it is not your intent to limit the Department's use of third-party financing while they work to achieve the 25 percent requirement that your amendment lays out.

With that clarification, would you be willing to work with us to further refine this as we move to conference?

I thank the gentleman.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to turn now to the gentleman who is going to make all of this work, and that is the chairman of the committee, my good friend, Mr. Skelton.

I happily support Mr. Andrews' amendment. And I hope that you will work with us here as we move down the line toward conference to ensure that these tools that have been available for increasing efficiency and energy use will be available under Mr. Andrews' amendment.

I would yield to the chairman of the committee.

Thank you. Mr. Chairman, I very strongly support this amendment.

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

Mr. Chairman, I just want to thank my chairman, Mr. Skelton, the gentleman from Missouri, for such a wonderful job on this bill. We are totally in agreement with the manager's amendment and support it.

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

Mr. Chairman, I thank my friend for yielding. I just want to join with our chairman, Ike Skelton, in thanking all of our staff, who have done a wonderful job in bringing together hundreds of issues at the subcommittee level, at the full committee level, and now on the House floor, and in these difficult times.

In these partisan times, when we all have to wear our partisan hat at times, this committee, which I think is the most bipartisan committee in the House of Representatives, has done a good job. We have provided good tools, good equipment, good resources for the people that wear the uniform of the United States, and a lot of that should be credited to our chairman, the gentleman from Missouri, Mr. Skelton.

Many thanks, Ike, for your great work on this bill. I am sure we will have a great vote on it tomorrow, after we present you with an irresistible motion to recommit. I look forward to closing out the bill with you tomorrow. I know you will drive it successfully through the conference.

Thank you for everything that you have done in stitching this thing together. It is important for our troops, and I think we have done a pretty effective job today of moving it down the line. Many thanks.

Madam Speaker, after reading an opinion from the Department of the Interior Solicitor, I feel compelled to clarify the intent of Section 1077 (c) of P.L. 109-364. While others may misinterpret and even distort the actual impact of this language upon the healthy Kaibab Mule Deer and Roosevelt Elk herds that are currently living on Santa Rosa island, I want to make clear this section's intent is to protect both herds from extermination. It is just that simple and it does not do anything more narrow or broad. Nothing could emphasize this intent more clearly than Conference Report 109-702's explanation that Section 1077 was intended to ``prohibit the Secretary of the Interior from exterminating or nearly exterminating the deer and elk on the island.''

Clearly, when this provision became law, it directed the National Park Service (NPS) to allow the deer and elk that have thrived on Santa Rosa Island to remain on the Island beyond 2011--the last year of the term within the settlement agreement. The use of helicopters is included within the settlement agreement and referenced by Section 1077(c) as it is likely the most effective way to conduct an extermination program. Section 1077(c) was not intended to prohibit only that method of extermination. These beautiful and healthy animals should remain on the island for visitors to enjoy. They should not be ruthlessly and systematically destroyed for some ill-conceived notion of native versus non-native, as others advocate.

The Solicitor has acted inappropriately by pulling a theory of congressional intent out of the air. Clearly, the intent of the language was not to ``preclude the Department of the Interior from participating in any plan approved in the settlement agreement.'' In fact, the language, which is now law, was intended to do what it clearly states: (1) vitiate the settlement agreement with respect to the deer and elk draw-down and eradication plan and (2) allow the elk and deer to remain on Santa Rosa Island indefinitely. I want to highlight the intent of allowing the deer to remain on the Island and make it clear that means these herds must be left to live on Santa Rosa Island. The congressional intent of this section was not to protect them only from slaughter, but also to protect them from relocation.

I must add, I find it deeply troubling that the administration, when testifying against the same provision before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources on May 16, 2006, testified that this provision would, ``. . . require the Secretary of the Interior to stop the plan to remove the deer and elk from the island as required by a court-ordered settlement agreement. This provision would effectively overturn the 1998 settlement agreement, that the NPS is legally bound to, that requires the phase-out of non-native deer and elk over several years and their complete removal from the Island by the end of 2011.'' I am bewildered why such an about-face has been made on a provision that is identical to the current law provision, having just passed the House of Representatives.

In closing, I hope this statement clarifies the intent of both P.L. 109-364 and the accompanying Conference Report 109-702. Both are clear on their face, but as the lead House negotiator of the Conference Committee of H.R. 5122, I felt it important to clear up any uncertainty brought forward by interpretations following a short-sighted agenda. This important conservation provision must stand and be properly interpreted so that the elk and deer are not slaughtered. Simply restated, it would be a tragedy to have these healthy populations of elk and mule deer exterminated from public lands to forward a misguided agenda of what belongs on Santa Rosa Island. Section 1077(c) is intended to prevent such eradication carried out by NPS or other parties to the settlement agreement.

My intent was clearly for the elk and deer herds to remain on Santa Rosa. This intent was clearly manifested in my numerous floor and committee statements in which I described my intent that wounded veterans are to be allowed to hunt these animals following the transfer of Santa Rosa from private ownership. My committee and floor statements regarding Santa Rosa Island, particularly floor statements made on December 16, 2005, and May 10, 2006, demonstrate this intent.

I also discussed the Santa Rosa provision with CNN's Anderson Cooper on June 13, 2006. A transcript of the interview follows:

Joe Johns, CNN Correspondent: 25 miles off the coast of

Santa Barbara, more than triple the size of Manhattan, the

crown jewel of the Channel Islands National Park. The remote

and largely untouched Santa Rosa Island. Canyons, coastline,

chaparral and pines and you own it. Taxpayers pay $30 million

for Santa Rosa Island. A treasure trove of ancient artifacts.

Torrey Rick, Archaeologist: It's incredible. I mean you

don't get this kind of stuff anywhere else in the world,

really.

Johns: Human bones found here date back 13,000 years. It's

also unique for its inhabitants. The little island fox,

endangered but so far not extinct. With all this at stake and

more, the question before Congress is whether this park

should be protected and open to all Americans year-round. Or

should it also be used as a place where disabled veterans can

come to hunt deer and elk? Which means tourists have to be

kept safely out of the crossfire. Congressman Duncan

Hunter, the powerful chairman of the House Armed Services

Committee, has been pushing for months to give the vets

special privileges on Santa Rosa.

Rep. Duncan Hunter, (R) California: I was driving south

with a bunch of marines, some guys fresh back from Iraq and

one of them said, there's Santa Rosa Island and they're going

to close it and they're going to wipe out the entire deer and

elk herd.

Johns: But the idea of handing over hunting rights on an

island that's supposed to be for everybody has infuriated

some Democrats from California, who say it's like telling the

public you bought it, now keep out.

Rep. Lois Capps, (D) California: It's outrageous and I told

him so. This is a Republican leadership that wants to kick

taxpayers off a national park that they paid $30 million for.

Makes you wonder, first it's Channel Islands National Park,

is it going to be Yellowstone, is it going to be the

Shenandoah's?

Johns: It's not that disabled veterans aren't important.

It's just that there are plenty of good hunting spots that

aren't in national parks. For instance, military bases in

remote areas. It's a battle playing out allover America but

especially in the west, over how best to use national parks.

In this case whether to restore the park to its pristine

condition or to allow other uses.

Much of this is about the animals. The park service only

wants animals here that are native to Santa Rosa. So the deer

and elk shipped in nearly a century ago by the family that

used to own the land must now go. So what about a compromise?

Why not allow both hunting and tourists full-time? Well

hikers and bullets are not a great trail mix. So long as

there's hunting here, the park service has to keep the public

out. The park service says the game needs to go.

Russell Gallipeau, U.S. Park Service: I'm not against

providing access to anybody. I just think that hunting and

public use of this island are not compatible. And it's not a

purpose for which this park was set aside.

Johns: So as taxpayers you paid for a remote national park,

but now a powerful congressman says it should be managed as a

place for disabled war vets to hunt deer and elk. For $30

million, Santa Rosa may well be the biggest game trophy out

there. Joe Johns, CNN, Santa Rosa Island, California.

Cooper: Well as Joe just mentioned Congressman Duncan

Hunter is the force behind the move to keep the elk and deer

on the island for hunting. We spoke earlier.

Cooper: So Congressman Hunter, you know your critics say

look, taxpayers spent $30 million to buy Santa Rosa Island.

But as long as there's hunting there, 90 percent of it's

closed to non-hunters for about half of the year. They say

that's unfair.

Hunter: Well, let me--let's put this in context. My son,

who's a marine, did a couple of tours in Iraq and when he

came back, he and I started taking wounded marines and

soldiers hunting. We went to Arizona, Colorado, lots of good

places. We had one hunt we took a person with a spinal

disability. That is, a paralyzed veteran into Colorado, into

the big national forest. And it's very difficult for them to

have a real quality experience. Now, this island, Santa Rosa

Island, which is off the California coast, which is 52,000

acres, has a very small number of public visitors. About 15 a

day from the statistics I've seen.

Cooper: But the reason that there are only 15, the national

park says about 5,000 people a year visit Santa Rosa Island.

The reason more people aren't able to do it is because they

can only visit about 10 percent of the island for half the

year because of this hunting. If you close down the hunting,

then the whole island basically would be open to visitors and

to taxpayers who paid for it.

Hunter: Listen, here's all we want. All we want is about

two weeks a year for the paralyzed veterans to come over. I

would be happy to stipulate that no congressman come over, no

VIPs. Only people who are paralyzed veterans, who are very

disabled veterans. And actually the reason most people don't

go over to Santa Rosa Island is because it's a major boat

trip or a plane trip. And tourists who are driving down the

coast of California don't want to take a plane or a boat to

simply get to another island. So we could easily accommodate

the paralyzed veterans, they could have a great time. They

could have the adventure of a lifetime.

And you know something, they may be wheelchair-bound but

their spirits are free, they like adventure. This is a great

place to take your family. And this could be a special niche

for those people. And you know something else, the people of

the United States, if the taxpayers knew that this was going

to be used by paralyzed veterans, they'd say fine.

This is the park service that says, we want to wipe out this

deer and elk herd because they're not native. They just want

to do it because they've got the power to do it. They could

easily accommodate our veterans.

Cooper: Is this the role of a national park? The national

park service which runs this, basically would be subsidizing

a hunting program. They say and critics say, look, there are

other places for people with disabilities to hunt. We talked

to the Paralyzed Veterans Association they say you know some

states even allow those with disabilities to hunt from their

cars.

Hunter: Listen, the reason the national park people have

their nice jobs and the reasons we as members of the American

public get to enjoy national parks is because of people who

wear uniforms who go out in dangerous parts of the world and

secure our freedom. So let in some paralyzed veterans, many

of whom have been injured in combat, to come have a small

piece of this island that almost nobody goes to anyway, is a

small repayment for their service to our country. I think the

taxpayers would appreciate that.

Cooper: Congressman Hunter, appreciate you joining us,

thanks.

Lastly, a letter provided by the Wounded Warrior Project reaffirms discussions and the intent to allow wounded and disabled veterans to enjoy Santa Rosa Island. The letter follows:

August 28, 2006.

Hon. Duncan L. Hunter,

Chairman, House Committee on Armed Services,

House of Representatives, Washington, DC.

Dear Chairman Hunter: On behalf of the Wounded Warrior

Project (WWP), I am responding to your legislation that will

cease the elimination of all elk and deer on Santa Rosa

Island in California and could provide unrivaled hunting

opportunities for severely wounded veterans.

The Wounded Warrior Project applauds any effort that

supports our endeavors to assist severely injured military

personnel. WWP has reached thousands of wounded service men

and women, providing assistance in the transition from a

hospital bed to an independent and productive life and we

believe that Santa Rosa could offer the wounded another

chance to participate in meaningful and enriching

recreational activities such as fishing, hunting and camping.

This legislation is consistent with Wounded Warrior

Project's adaptive sports and outdoors programs like hunting

and fishing, snow and water skiing, canoeing and diving. For

that reason we encourage the House of Representatives to pass

this provision to potentially allow the use of the island for

disabled service members.

We hope that together with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife

Service and other federal organizations, a viable and

sustainable daily operations system for the management of

Santa Rosa Island can be developed and that our nation's

wounded warriors will be able to enjoy the world class

hunting that the island has to offer.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

John Melia,

Executive Director.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend from California for giving me some time.

You know, in Iraq it is tough, it is difficult, it is dusty and it is dangerous; but we are following the same pattern that we followed for the last 60 years in bringing freedom to other parts of the world. It is not a smooth road.

First, you stand up a free government. We have done that. It is an inept

government. It bumbles along, as most new governments do. But it is a free government, and it represents the people.

The second thing that you do is stand up a military capable of protecting that free government.

Thirdly, the Americans leave, because we don't covet anything that another country has.

We are right now in the second phase of standing up a military capable of protecting this government. My good friend who just spoke talked about the difficulty of standing up the Iraqi military. I know a couple of years ago in the first battle of Fallujah when we rushed green Iraqi troops to that battle and we thought they were going to help the United States Marines, the next day they were gone. They didn't show up for roll call. But this time when you go out there and you are in Fallujah and Ramadi, the Iraqi military is standing and fighting.

We sat there about a month ago with the Sunni leaders of the national police in Ramadi and Fallujah, and they sat there side-by-side with the Shiite leaders of the Iraqi Army and talked about how they are working together, this time to push back against al Qaeda, whose rough edge has made enemies in the Anbar province.

Now, we got 129 battalions in the Iraqi Army, and, personally, I think that the standup of the Iraqi Army and the reliability of the Iraqi Army is the key to America's success in Iraq and our successful turnover of the security burden.

We have got to make sure that every one of those 129 Iraqi battalions moves into an operation where they do two or three months in a military operation where they have to work out, exercise their logistic chain, their chain of command, the commander has got to coordinate with the guy on the right and the guy on the left. At that time they can rotate into the battlefield and displace American heavy combat forces. That is the right way to leave Iraq. Not this way.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I think it's important to interpret this debate. I have heard the Speaker talk about redeployment and say that there is a lot of discretion that is left to the administration. There is no discretion. The dates of so-called redeployment are defined. You either start going out July 1 or October 1. Redeployment means withdrawals.

If generals do not start redeploying, do not start withdrawing from the battleground, you can bet Democratic leadership will be here pulling them into hearings, asking them why they didn't saddle up their brigades, their battalions and their divisions and start to move them off the battlefield. So let's get this straight. This is about withdrawing from the battlefield.

Listening to this debate, and listening to the controversy and the statements by Democratic leadership that have preceded this vote today, there is a constant theme: Somehow American soldiers and marines are victims. They are victims of extended tours; they are victims, the last gentleman said, they claim, of not getting enough health care. They are people that have been victims in the war against terror.

Let me tell you, I have seen the timelines that are given, the 270 days for Marines, the 365 days. A number of them have gone through one, two, three and sometimes four tours. Our Americans, and that includes my son, who is deploying now for the third time, will not fail, they will not crack, they will not stretch. They will hold, and they will carry out this mission against terrorists.

We are right now in the second phase of a program we have used for 60 years to stand up free governments around the world. You stand up a free government. We have done that.

Secondly, you stand up a military capable of protecting that free government. That is a second stage. That is a stage we are in right now.

Thirdly, we leave, because America doesn't covet anything that another nation has.

We are in the second stage right now. It's tough, and it's difficult. This is a tough, difficult mission, but it is a mission that we can accomplish.

I am reminded, lastly, that the Speaker talked about stopping the war. That is how she described this bill. The Democratic leadership does not have the power to stop the war against terror. All they have the power to do is to leave the battlefield. That would be a disaster for the United States of America.

I want to thank my friend, Mr. Lewis, for giving me a chance to talk about this supplemental bill, this very bad bill, once again.

Mr. Speaker, I have carefully reviewed the language on page 72 of this bill with our counsel as to the exact legal effect of this bill. This bill says that an American unit cannot be introduced into Iraq until a 15-day waiting period has expired. Now, what does that mean? That means if you have hostages being held in a place in Iraq and you want to move a Delta force team across the line, you can't do that for 15 days under the law, should this become law. It says if you have a fleeting target, like the Zarqawi strike that we made a couple of months ago, and time is of the essence and you want to take an F-16 out of Incirlik, Turkey and make a strike, you can't do it without waiting for 15 days after notifying the House Armed Services Committee, the Senate Armed Services Committee, and presumably the Appropriations Committee.

Mr. Speaker, if we have an extreme situation in Iraq where Americans have to be rescued or reinforced, I don't want them to come back and notify me

or notify the committee. I want them to do what they have to do and carry out their mission.

This is a very defective bill, and this 15-day waiting requirement in this war against terror where time is of the essence, where American military teams move across country boundaries every day without certifying anything to anybody, this is a real disservice to the forces that work not only in Iraq, but should this be applied to other parts of the world in a future time would be a real disservice to everybody who fights in the war against terror.

I strongly support the motion of the gentleman from California.

Mr. Chairman, I want to add my voice to the eloquent voice of the chairman, Mr. Skelton. I want to thank him, and thank also Dr. Snyder and John McHugh, the chairman and ranking member of Personnel, for their hard work on this bill. And for all the other Members who worked on this, I know Mr. Filner and Mr. Buyer were also architects of this bill. But especially our chairman, who has a heart

for the military and perhaps is the most adept custodian of the history of military personnel matters in the Armed Services Committee; a guy with a great eye and ear for history and for the sense of tradition that kind of brings us together on the Armed Services Committee to find common ground on important issues to the folks that wear the uniform. This is one of those issues, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, young people right now are serving this country in far away places like Ramadi and Fallujah and Mosul and Kabul, and many other places around the world where the war against terror brings them face to face with danger every day. Some of those, the great members of the U.S. military, give their last full measure of devotion. Some of them are wounded and come back through Landstuhl and then to Bethesda and Walter Reed.

And, Mr. Chairman, I am reminded of Ronald Reagan's speech in 1981, when he stood on the west steps of the Capitol and he gestured out to the west and he said, There's the Washington Monument, dedicated to the Father of our Country, and beyond that, the Lincoln Memorial, dedicated to the man who saved the Union. But beyond those monuments are thousands of monuments with crosses and Stars of David, dedicated to Americans who gave that full measure of devotion to the same degree that the Founding Fathers did, and that's Arlington Cemetery.

And he mentioned that under one of those markers lies a man named Martin Trepto, who was killed in World War I. He had gone to fight with the Rainbow Division in France, and after a few months or a few weeks in country, he was killed. When his friends found his body, they found that he kept a diary, and he had written these words, and I am paraphrasing: I must fight this war as if the success or failure of America depends on me alone.

I can tell you, Mr. Chairman, in going out to the warfighting theaters, that standard is the same standard that is carried by the young men and women of America's Armed Forces. And because of that, it is all the more compelling that we do everything possible to make sure that they have good care when they come home, and when they are wounded and when their families similarly are wounded by their wounds; and to make sure that we have a government which is friendly to them.

A lot of this problem at Walter Reed and Bethesda and the rest of our medical care apparatus is this; we need to have a system that is friendly, friendly to that 22-year-old marine wife who drives a couple hundred miles, maybe leaves the kids with the mother-in-law while she goes with her husband to undertake therapy at one of our hospitals. To be able to get in and get out without having to get bogged down in a mass of bureaucracy. It is toward those ends that we dedicated this bill.

And again, I think the chairman has done a great job, as have Mr. McHugh and Mr. Snyder. And let me tell you a couple of the highlights here.

I like the idea that you have got a limitation on 17 cases per case manager. That means that each case manager is going to have a lot of time to spend with each case, with each individual. And you also have the family advocate who will help with housing and transportation and all those things. That is almost as important as the case manager, because that helps a family to be with their loved one while they are undertaking their treatment.

I also like this handoff between the VA and DoD. We now have a physical meeting where you don't have the bureaucracy finally telling us after 3, 4 or 5 months that the records have been lost, that they have been misplaced or that there are some missing. And lastly, when we do the evaluation, to have experts who will assist the servicemember in making sure that his or her file is complete when they go for disability. That means if you've got that frag wound in your left leg, you make sure that you've got a record of that in that disability packet when you go before the board.

Now, there are lots of other good language in this bill and good provisions in this bill that will accrue to the benefit of the servicemember and their family, but I think those are especially important.

Lastly, I think the hotline is important, Mr. Chairman, where people can call in and let the system know that it's messed up and that it's not serving them well. And I know that the wonderful men and women who serve our U.S. military will respond to that and will make things right.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for letting me speak for a couple of minutes about this bill.

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

I would like to yield 4 minutes to Dr. Gingrey, the gentleman from Georgia.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to yield to the gentleman from New York (Mr. McHugh) as much time as he desires. And I would just note that Mr. McHugh, along with Dr. Snyder, are chief architects of this legislation; and Mr. McHugh is the guy I like to refer to as the guy from the 10th Mountain Division in New York, a guy with enormous dedication to the men and women who wear the uniform.

I just want to take a second, Mr. Chairman, to thank the gentleman who just spoke as one of the finest members of our committee and to point out, too, and he went over a number of the high points in this bill, and this idea of having an independent medical officer who helps the service personnel, making sure that they have got in their files when they go before that evaluation board, making sure they have got that record of that shrapnel wound to the calf or to the side, that in cases in times past you would have service personnel who were highly frustrated because they have been wounded, they knew where the wounds were, and yet somehow the paperwork had disappeared. So having that professional to help prepare it is very, very important; and I thank the gentleman for his great service and work on putting this thing together.

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

Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. Chairman, I would like to yield to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Saxton) 4 minutes.

Mr. Chairman, I yield as much time as he might consume to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Wilson), who has done an excellent job on this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I would yield the balance of my time to any other Members that would like to speak on the majority side, and if there are not, Mr. Chairman, give the chairman of the Veterans' Affairs Committee the option of us simply yielding back our time or if he would like to have some of our time, giving that to him.

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

Mr. Chairman, if we could ask unanimous consent that on Armed Services we could reclaim our time that we yielded back, we would like to yield it to the Veterans' Affairs Committee.

I would ask unanimous consent to reclaim my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from California.

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

I just want to mention that in 2005, and working with Mr. Buyer and working with Mr. Skelton and other Members of the Armed Services Committee and Veterans' Affairs Committee, we put together this Disability Claims Commission with an eye toward trying to make the evaluations that are arrived at in DOD and the VA system consistent. In this bill that we are passing today, we are directing DOD and VA to go back and, as this commission meets and continues to work, to focus on their work product and what they are doing; and, hopefully, we can have some value added as a result of their focusing on the commission that currently is in place.

I yield to the gentleman from Indiana.

Mr. Chairman, if I have got a couple of minutes left, if any member of the Veterans' Affairs or the Armed Services Committee would like to use the rest of the time, I would be happy to yield to them.

Appearing that there isn't anybody, I yield back at this point, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I just want to say that I think this is an excellent amendment from our side. I want to thank the gentleman for offering it, and we have absolutely no objections to this amendment. We support it very strongly. Good work.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank my friend on the great work he has done being the chief architect on this bill. And I have absolutely no objections to the gentleman's amendment. I think it is good and I support it.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I wanted to thank the gentleman for yielding. And, you know, the Marine motto is ``Always Faithful,'' and once again, the gentleman, who is a great former marine, is being always faithful, not just to the men and women of his service, the Marine Corps, but those of all services who have been wounded in the war against terror. I want to thank the gentleman. I support this amendment very strongly.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank my friend, a former member of the committee, for his work. We support this amendment strongly.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlelady, and we support the amendment on this side. I thank her for her contribution.

Mr. Chairman, I just want to say we support the gentlewoman's amendment and have no opposition to it here on our side.

Would the gentleman yield?

I want to join in thanking the gentleman for an excellent amendment, and thank him for his very thoughtful addition to this important bill.

I want to support the gentleman's amendment, and thank him for his valuable contribution to this process.

Would the gentleman yield?

I also want to thank the gentleman for his very thoughtful amendment.

Since this is the last amendment, I thought I would take this opportunity to thank my great friend, Ike Skelton, for bringing our team to the floor and moving this very important legislation very effectively. I thank both gentlemen.

Mr. Speaker, I want to address my good friend, Mr. Murtha, who pointed out that there was a shortage of Humvees back here, particularly up-armored Humvees. Well, let me show you how many Humvees we had at the end of the Clinton administration: up-armored Humvees, zero.

We didn't have any up-armored Humvees for the National Guard to train on, for the Army to train on, for the National Guard to deploy or for the Army to deploy. We had zero. Actually, we had 1,300 at the end of 2000, 1,300. We now have 18,400 up-armored Humvees. We have got roughly 15 times as many up-armored Humvees as we had at the end of the Clinton administration.

Now, let me remind my colleagues how much body armor we had at the end of the Clinton administration, body armor. If I hear another parent call up because they are listening to this debate and they are listening to information which is erroneous, I think it is important for us to remind them, there was nobody armored at the end of the Clinton administration, not one stitch of bulletproof armor at the end of the Clinton administration. Today there are just under 1 million sets of body armor for our troops.

Now, let's talk about what we didn't fund in this bill. We didn't fund the ambush protection vehicles to the full extent that the Army asked for. The Army asked for $4.75 billion worth of ambush protection vehicles. Those are vehicles with the V-shaped hulls so that land mines will be deflected and they have strong enough sides so that IEDs will be deflected.

Now, my colleagues, I will tell you why everybody, Democrats and Republicans, should vote against this particular supplemental, and it is because of one of the restrictions that is placed

on this. There is a 15-day notice and wait period in this bill that says that no unit can deploy until notice is given 15 days before that deployment. We have not done that since our birth as a Nation, saying you can't deploy reinforcements, you can't deploy an emergency unit. It could be a bomb-clearing unit; it could be an IED unit. It could be a medical unit. You can't deploy it for the men and women of the Armed Forces who are engaged in combat until 15 days have expired. We have gone over this with the lawyers and they say it is a 15-day notice and waiver. You can't do it.

Vote ``no'' on this very bad, very defective bill.

Would the gentleman yield briefly?

I thank my friend for the courtesy of yielding.

Mr. Speaker, let me just say we took a 1999 101st Airborne battalion. We compared them today with the 100,000 pieces of new equipment that they have got. The 1999 Airborne Battalion today, if it was rated C-1 in 1999, would be rated unready today, not because they are not good warfighters or capable, but because there is brand-new equipment. If you don't have your flu shot, you are rated unready for combat.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Would the gentleman yield just briefly?

I thank the gentleman.

I think the gentleman would agree that 28,000 up-armored Humvees today is a lot better than the 1,300 that we had before. The body armor, you have 1 million sets of body armor today, much better than we had before.

The Armed Services Committee put in 10,000 jammers.

I thank the gentleman.

I am going to speak a little bit during our section on this bill, but I just wanted to invite the majority leader, Mr. Hoyer, to come back down to the floor and to talk a little bit about the statement that he just made to the effect that there hasn't been any oversight over the last several years.

I am reminded of our teams that left the Armed Services Committee, went out to the companies that were up-armoring Humvees, started to move that schedule to the left, that means getting those Humvees quicker to the troops; and when they were told that there was a steel shortage, moving to the steel mills, finding out what the problem was. When they were told it might be a problem with too many shifts or not enough shifts with union employees, meeting with union employees, getting those shifts put on line, getting that steel produced, getting it to the Humvee factories and moving it out to the field.

I am also reminded of the times when we moved ahead quickly with what the gentleman has criticized as sole-source contracts when our troops in the field didn't have any dismounted jammers. That means the ability to stop an electronic signal that fires off a roadside bomb that hurts our troops. This committee moved quickly to give the Secretary of Defense the ability to waive all acquisition and competition regulations so you could do one thing, get equipment that protects our troops to the battlefield quicker. And we did that in terms of the first dismounted jammer that we produced, something that a marine or a GI could carry on a patrol that would keep a bad guy from detonating a roadside bomb that could kill him or his squad. Using this new system instead of the old system, we were able to, R&D, build in the United States and move into the warfighting theater 10,000 jammers for our troops within 70 days.

Now, the system that the gentleman is wedded to and loves so much, the slow system, the system in which you have interminable appeals, in which you have competitions that take months and months, sometimes years, is now working on the next generation of portable jammer. It has been a year, and we don't have that jammer fielded yet for troops in a portable fashion.

So I would just say to the gentleman who has been criticizing the contractor corps, 389 American contractors have been killed in this war so far, in this war against terror. They are great people, probably some of them from the gentleman's district. And the idea that he is trying to offer to this body, which I think is smart enough to reject that idea, that somehow there was no oversight in the theater, and by making these fairly minor changes, and these are fairly minor changes, we marked them up, they are nips and tucks in the oversight system. Somehow the judgment of the thousands of people who oversee our contracts around the world will now go from bad to good. That is obviously in great error. In fact, the same people are in place administering contracts; the same people are risking their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan to

support our warfighters. And by and large, they are doing an excellent job.

And we are going to get into later, into the added restrictions that the majority has placed on people who are participating in contract decisions, participating in a broad category called ``administering'' and the vagueness that attaches to that that might make a person civilly liable if they walk into the wrong meeting at the wrong time and they are ultimately prosecuted or fined civilly for making that mistake.

You know, we have great members of our staffs in the Armed Services Committee and indeed in all the committees in the House of Representatives. We shouldn't put a more onerous burden on the people that work in the rest of government than we would put on our own staff.

And I would say to my colleagues, one thing you have got to have when you have penalties, whether they are civil or criminal, that attach to action, you better define the action and you better define it clearly enough that staff members know exactly what they are doing and know exactly where the line is so they don't cross that line.

And let me just finish by saying that the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), who I consider to be a friend, has done a real disservice to the great men and women who serve in a contracting capacity for this country by implying that somehow they haven't been doing their job and somehow the committees of this Congress have not been doing their job in this war against terror.

I thank my friend from Virginia for yielding me a couple of minutes.

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

Mr. Chairman, I have given a fair amount of consideration to this bill, H.R. 1362. I have a couple of observations to share with you.

First, I am very proud of the work that the Armed Services Committee has done with respect to this bill to craft what I consider to be a better bill. I want to thank the chairman, my good friend from Missouri, Mr. Ike Skelton, for making sure that we participated in this markup and holding the markup of H.R. 1362.

I had serious concerns about the original bill as reported out of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, including a number of provisions that, through amending title 10, U.S. Code, and other procurement regulations, would have had the effect of preventing the Department of Defense from serving warfighter needs in the most expeditious manner possible. That is an issue that I spoke to just a minute ago in my exchange with Mr. Waxman.

As my colleagues from the Armed Services Committee know, this committee has given a great deal of attention to matters pertaining to acquisition reform. This has been especially true during wartime as our committee has worked hard to ensure that the brave men and women serving our country receive what they need when they need it as they deploy to Iraq, Afghanistan, and other theaters of operation.

At the same time, we have been vigorous advocates for competition and cost control measures. I firmly believe that the Armed Services Committee is best suited to properly balance the need for improving accountability in defense contracting while at the same time ensuring that the Department of Defense can carry out its duties to the warfighter. I am pleased that the chairman agreed to hold an Armed Services Committee markup of this bill. In continuing its rich tradition of deliberation and robust oversight of matters within its jurisdiction, the committee produced a higher quality piece of legislation.

I supported Chairman Skelton's mark because I believe the mark remedied the most serious deficiencies of the base bill and was truly a bipartisan measure. The Armed Services Committee mark encouraged competition and cost controls while protecting procurement flexibilities important to the national interest.

Secondly, it provided Congress with additional tools for oversight and reinforced standards of integrity widely held by the dedicated men and women of the defense acquisition workforce.

But, unfortunately, we are not here today to vote for the Armed Services Committee mark. We are not even here to vote for the Committee on Oversight Government Reform mark, which leads me to my second set of observations.

We are here today to vote for a piece of legislation that was not voted out of any committee. Those who would say this bill received unanimous support in two committees would not be telling it as it is. The full truth is that the Speaker wanted to put a rush on this bill so she could say Congress did something about contract reform. It was introduced late one night, and in 24 hours it was being voted out of committee. In two more business days a markup was scheduled in the Committee on Armed Services. Late that night, additional text was added that changed the bill yet again, and I think in a potentially dangerous way.

But no member of Oversight and Government Reform or Armed Services got to vote on those changes. Instead, the language simply appeared out of nowhere and the rule for H.R. 1362 let the new bill move to the floor.

What would the new language do? It is hard to say because the text is subject to broad interpretation, which is precisely what concerns me. One thing can safely be said. It is ironic that the original bill would have required agencies to hire thousands of additional personnel, but at the same time this new language would presume those personnel are dishonest and would attempt to restrict their decisionmaking ability or their ability to seek further employment.

I am all for accountability and performance in Federal contracting. I am likewise for accountability and performance in the legislative branch. Frankly, I am disappointed in the final product of this bill, and I am referring to the parts that were put in after we marked up our portion of the bill.

Mr. Chairman, let me go right back to Mr. Hoyer and Mr. Waxman and their assertion that somehow we are leaving a period of no oversight, and they have brought now oversight to the warfighting process and accountability for the contracts that are let pursuant to this war against terror. That is absolutely not the truth.

As anybody knows when you are fighting a war, you need to move quickly. I use once again the example of the jammers that we got out the door under a new waiver strategy where you waive all acquisition regulations. You go in and build something that the troops need immediately on the battlefield. You don't give a 6-month appeal to the folks that lose the competition. You don't give small business set- asides because there is one thing you don't have, you don't have time.

When we have troops that are experiencing bombs on the battlefield that are detonated remotely, you have to move quickly to get the jammers that will jam that electronic device. When you have new explosives that are penetrating your Humvees, you have to get steel on the sides of those Humvees quickly.

When you are moving a military force down the road and you have to get fuel to that force, whether it is in movement or in base, you have to move quickly. You cannot have 6-month appeal periods. You cannot have buyers'

forums that take months to set up. You have to move quickly.

Now, when you have time, you want to absolutely have competition, and I can just tell my colleagues that that is always in my interest to have competition, get the best buy for the buck, and we have had a number of forums incidentally. We introduced the Challenge Program where any company that could come in and say, I could make a better tire for the Humvee than the incumbent, or I can make a better windshield or a better engine, that guy or lady has got the right to go in and challenge the incumbent company that has the present contract and show how they can do it cheaper or make something that has better warfighting capability. We introduced that legislation. That is called the Challenge Legislation.

But let us not mix that up with this idea that somehow you can have competition on every single aspect of the battlefield, and when you need a new jammer to stop roadside bombs, you go out and you start a month-long search, and then you have a 6-month competition, and then after the award you have a 6-month appeal, and by that time you are ready for the next war. You are not even relevant to the situation that is hurting your young men and women on the battlefield right now.

So there is some good substance in this bill, and I like it, but there is a lot of rhetoric. There is a lot of worthless, political rhetoric that preceded this bill, and I hope that the American people will not be snagged by that one. There are times that you have to move quickly.

I am reminded of one contractor that came back. One of the contractors who was not one of the 389 who has been killed in this war, and he showed me a picture of a crater, of a mortar crater. He said, That is where I was standing 5 minutes before that mortar landed. He said, I do not care how much you award this contract for, I am not going back to that dangerous AO.

Let me tell you, there are a lot of people who do go back time and time again. They are good Americans. They are honest Americans, and they are the same folks carrying out the contracting and administering the support of our Armed Forces who were there 6 months ago. The idea that somehow they have been crooked up to now, that now they are going to be straightened out by Mr. Hoyer and Mr. Waxman is absolutely outrageous.

So having said those gentle words, I look forward to the continued discussion. Mr. Waxman has taken the floor. I would be happy to yield to Mr. Waxman if he has got a rejoinder.

Let me just take my time back. I am not making it personal. Mr. Waxman made a statement, I am talking. Mr. Waxman, I will let you respond to this. We are not making it personal.

What I am telling you is that there are exigencies in the battlefield, and you got this from your own leadership, gentlemen like Mr. Murtha who said you cannot have these long delays in awarding contracts and have this vigorous oversight period; you cannot have that hold up a battlefield situation. You do have to award sole-source contracts, and you have to award them to people who can move very quickly and get things done. That is my point.

The idea that we are supposed to stop that or that we have not exercised any oversight is simply not accurate. There is no personal animosity toward you as a fine Member of this body, but those statements are not accurate, and I yield to the gentleman.

If the gentleman will allow me to say this, I think that that is a good provision. In fact, we supported that provision in the Armed Services markup.

Let me tell you a provision I do not support, and maybe you can help us with this. You refer in the revolving door that says that a person cannot take a job with a company in which he has administered----

Would the gentleman allow me to have a minute of his time so I can just offer this one point?

I thank the gentleman. Mr. Waxman, the two provisions that were put in after the markup, the one that talks about a person who participates in a meeting as a senior staff, that means if a person walks in a room and if they are involved in a discussion, they could be subjected to massive civil penalties at a later time if there is a contract awarded.

I would simply say that I think in areas where you have civil penalties you have to have great clarity, and I have not seen a definition of ``senior staff'' or ``senior participants'' in DOD, and I think that that is a real problem. I think it is a problem of vagueness and one that could keep people from entering the civil service in this role and in this capacity.

Mr. Chairman, let me just rejoin to that. We have looked up ``personally'' and ``substantially.'' That could involve standing there in a room and giving advice. So that can be just a person giving advice which could expose them to a $50,000 civil penalty, from what I have seen.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I thank my colleague for yielding.

Mr. Chairman, let me just say about the major points of this bill, which we marked up, that we are in agreement with it. Contrary to Mr. Waxman, we did look at them before we came to the floor.

We agree with the no more than 1 year for sole source, that is good; the plan to minimize use of sole source, that is good; maximize fixed- price procurement, that is good; quarterly report to Congress, good; codify the right to review unredacted copies of reports, that is good.

What I think you need to be very careful about, because if you are going to penalize people, if you are going to give them $50,000 civil penalties, you need to have it clearly laid out for those people who may be professional members of our staffs, who may be good people who come in from the outside and go to work in DOD and wanting to serve this country, let's make sure that walking into a room and participating in a conversation about a contract doesn't then expose them to civil penalties later on.

So I am looking at title III, and I am looking at the word on line 17, it talks about participated personally and substantially at a senior personnel level.

Does that mean, and this relates, of course, to elimination of loopholes that allow former Federal officials to accept compensation from contractors or related entities? I think that is good.

But I think we need to make it very clear as to whether a staff member, like one of your staff members, Mr. Waxman, going to work for DOD, who walks in a room and is asked a question about a defense system and answers that question, participates in the conversation, whether he has then violated the law.

Now, if you turn, and I want you to take a look at that, that is line 18. Now, turn the next page, page 14, and go down to the bottom, and it talks about the administration of a contract, which could also be a violation of a law.

So if one of your former staff members or one of mine who goes to work for DOD should participate in the administration, let me just ask you, ask the gentleman from California, if it's a defense system, and your former staff member is assigned to go out to a range to see if that piece of equipment has arrived at the range and if it's being tested, is that involving itself in administration of the contract? Is that person, that former staff member of yours, now involved in administration such as to expose him to civil penalties? That is my question. I think we need to have that clarified.

Mr. Speaker, I like this motion to recommit. You know, all of us have shown our support for the troops. Almost every Member in this body has shown support by traveling to the warfighting theaters. This is a chance to show support in another way, to show that we believe that the military is an outstanding profession, one which many of our young people who are in institutions of higher education may want to engage in. And this elevates, I think, the military profession by showing that we accord it respect by putting this requirement in this motion to recommit.

So I thank the gentleman for offering it. I think it is excellent. I would commend it to all the Members of this body. And I want to thank the chairman for his offering of the base bill, and for the ranking member, Mr. Davis, for their hard work.

I thank my friend for yielding, and with that kind of introduction, I will just shut up and sit down. I thank him for that very kind introduction.

I just got back from Iraq with Congressmen Dan Boren and Ken Calvert and Randy Neugebauer. We were at Landstuhl Hospital in Germany, which is the first place where our wounded soldiers and marines are taken after they have been wounded on the battlefields of Afghanistan and Iraq. They are stabilized and treated there, and then they are flown back to Walter Reed and Bethesda.

We went over the new technologies that are being utilized right now and the new focus being put on our wounded soldiers. Let me tell you, that operation is first class.

One thing, and the gentleman talked about Walter Reed and I thought it might be appropriate to bring up an issue that all Members of this body can participate in and help in, and it is this: last year I started in San Diego in Balboa Hospital, which is where a lot of our wounded marines are, and in Walter Reed. We started these forums for getting jobs for our guys and ladies who have gone through their therapy, they are being separated from the service, they have been wounded and they are going to go back into the private sector.

So one thing that I thought we would do out in Balboa, and we did one of them here at Walter Reed, was to bring in people from industry and introduce them to our wounded soldiers and marines and try to help get them jobs. Hopefully, a young marine would stand up and say I am a generator mechanic from such and such a town in Vermont or Maine or California or Iowa, and we would be able to match them up with a company that might need such a talent in their company.

So we started doing that, and the first session I had was in the dayroom in Balboa Hospital in San Diego, and we actually had CEOs from major corporations in the dayroom and the marines all came in and told us what they did and introduced themselves, and we immediately had a number of people hired right there at that point in time.

Well, I got back, and the Armed Services staff told me you may be breaking the law.

I said, What are you talking about?

They said, We have talked to the ethics lawyers on the Hill and there may be a question if a Member of Congress tries to help somebody get a job with private industry. There is the implication that reciprocal treatment will be required at some point: you are getting a favor and you will give a favor back.

I said, What can we do?

They said, You need legislation that will end up with the Ethics Committee and House Administration Committee expressly permitting Members of Congress to help get jobs for our wounded soldiers and marines.

So last year, a month or two before we broke, we passed a resolution in the full House urging the Ethics Committee and the House Administration Committee to give us express permission to get jobs for our wounded folks. Every Member of the House can help us on this. I know that Vic Snyder who heads up the Personnel Subcommittee on the great Armed Services Committee and John McHugh are very much supportive of this.

Hopefully, we will get this recommendation up before the Ethics Committee and the House Administration Committee. At that point I can see this entire House of Representatives doing great work because you can take a young man or woman from a town in America who has had an injury and gone through rehab and is looking to go into the private sector. A lot are staying with the service, but the ones that aren't staying with the service, we could call up the Congressman from that particular district that young person is going back to and find out if there is a company that needs that generator mechanic or that young man or woman who is interested in law enforcement or some other profession.

So I think there is a lot of opportunities here and I look forward to working with you and with the great gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Hayes) and all of our colleagues to try to put this together.

If the gentleman will yield further, nobody knows the companies and the businesses in their district better than a Member of Congress, and so I think if we can just pass this little provision in the Ethics Committee that will allow us to do it, we will be able to call up a Member of Congress from whatever district the young man or young woman has a residence in, find out what particular companies have disciplines in the area of occupation that this person specializes in. I think we can marry them up and get some jobs pretty quick.

Absolutely. The one thing that we have learned is that when people get concussions, there may be a lasting effect on those concussions, and we talked to several concussion specialists who now are focusing on Landstuhl and when the young people come back, especially when they have been attacked by IEDs, by weapons systems that have a blast effect, to have a new focus on the after effects of having concussions, and so that is something that is being done right now.

Typically, in the old days, it was done, of course, in sports medicine, for example, guys that were boxers or played football and took numerous hits, and the effect of numerous concussions was studied and was followed.

What we are focusing on here is, you have been in an IED attack or you have had a mortar attack that is close and that gives a concussive effect, it is important to monitor that individual for an extended period of time, not just figure, okay, he was knocked out or she was knocked out, but now they are fine. Monitor them for a period of time. So we have a new focus there in Landstuhl and that focus, it was important to Mr. Neugebauer especially, and Dan Boren and Mr. Calvert, who were on the trip with me, were all very interested in making sure that the information that is derived from observation of a patient who newly comes in, comes in and is stabilized there, that then is sent to Walter Reed and to Bethesda so there can be follow-up work so that we can treat the entire patient, and maybe that patient has a fragment wound, making sure that you take care of that, but at the same time make sure that we monitor the effects of concussions, which can in some cases have a lasting effect.

So it is just one example of new focuses and new technologies that are being placed on our wounded soldiers, and the folks there do a great job.

To go to Walter Reed for a minute and this problem we have with the outpatient, the inpatient care is good at Walter Reed. In fact, I was with a wounded Marine and a wounded soldier and it was either the same day or day or two before the story in the Washington Post broke. We have great inpatient capability there. What we have got to have is we have got to have what I would call a family friendly system that is consumer friendly and consumer easy, so that that 22-year-old wife of a Marine corporal, who is undergoing therapy there at Walter Reed and doing rehab there, so that it is easy to walk through the bureaucracy.

So we build these bureaucracies. We inadvertently build them, like the one we built up that says now you cannot get a job for a wounded person or you are violating an ethics rule. We get sometimes so twisted and tied up in this multiplicity of rules that we end up losing sight of the real goals of what we are here for.

So I think we need to make this a consumer friendly system for a person who has got a lot of things on their mind and maybe has some kids back home and they are coming several hundred miles to get rehab treatment or therapy can easily and quickly walk through the system without having to go through a phonebook thick of regulations and sign a million dotted lines.

That is something we can do, one-stop shopping that is easy and simple. That is not bad to have throughout the Federal bureaucracy, but especially when you have military families that have a lot of problems and a lot of things on their mind, we need to have a customer friendly system. That is what we need to develop.

Mr. Speaker, I want to yield myself 1\1/2\ minutes to respond to the first assertion just made by my colleague, to the effect that we sent the troops in without what he called life-saving equipment.

When we finished the Clinton administration, virtually no one in any of the 10 Army divisions, which, incidentally, had been cut from 14 Army divisions when that administration went into power, none of the 10 divisions that were left, virtually none of them had any bulletproof vests, any of this body armor that we talk about that our troops have today.

When we went into the first operation, we had much more than the Clinton administration had. At that point we had a number of the inserts, of the so-called Small Arms Protective Inserts. We had the outer tactical vests that incorporate those inserts with all of our Marines, with all of the infantry units going in with the U.S. Army. And very quickly after that, we developed a plan in which we fielded body armor for not only the people on the front lines, the infantry, the artillery, the armor, but also everybody that is in theater.

Mr. Speaker, it is absolutely outrageous to tell the American people that the Americans were dangerously unequipped when we went into Iraq. We went in with better equipment than we have ever had in any wars that this country has ever fought. And today, we have fielded over 40,000 pieces of new equipment that we didn't have 4 years ago that makes our troops yet more efficient.

I would like to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Linder).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 7 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher).

Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield 5 minutes to Mr. Westmoreland, the gentleman from Georgia.

Mr. Speaker, let me just take 2 minutes to respond to my colleague who has just made a number of points.

First, there are a number of live Democrats that I like to refer to. When somebody asks me whether or not Saddam Hussein was indeed a dangerous terrorist in and of himself, I like to take the words of all of the Democrat leadership of this country in the 1990s, when, in their words, there was no Bush administration to trick them, who made that point very, very forcefully.

Secondly, the invasion of Iraq and the taking of Baghdad in record time with very low casualties has been described by most military leaders as being a remarkably efficient and effective operation. In fact, while we had people saying that our troops would be bogged down, the same talk shows would be interrupted with a news flash that Tommy Franks had taken yet another stronghold of Saddam Hussein.

We took Baghdad with very low casualties, very, very quickly, in a very effective and efficient military operation.

Lastly, I don't think that the gentleman can say that there have been no ripples, no ripples whatsoever in the Middle East with respect to freedom and democracy and people wanting to be free as a result of the elections in Iraq. There clearly was action in Libya where they moved lots of parts of their nuclear weapons program which are now residing in the United States, I think as a result of American actions there. Clearly actions toward freedom, toward ejecting the Syrians from Lebanon and moving toward multiparty elections in Egypt. All imperfect to be sure but nonetheless reactions from our operation in Iraq.

Lastly, I would just say to my colleague let me just say to my colleague, there are no smooth roads. The smooth roads not taken, that have been held out by the armchair critics, like we should have kept Saddam Hussein's army in place, that was an army with 11,000 Sunni generals. What are you going to do with an army with 11,000 Sunni generals? Certainly not establish stability in a country in which you have a Shiite majority.

The idea that we needed to have 300,000 Americans in Iraq and yet at the same time put an Iraqi face, as a number of the critics have said, on the military apparatus.

So I think a number of the gentleman's points have been strongly disproven by the American operation in Iraq. We are in the second period right now of a three-phase operation: stand up a free government; stand up a military capable of protecting that free government; lastly, the Americans leave. Let's give the second phase a chance to work.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Wilson).

I like a full debate. If the gentleman will hold on.

Let me allow the gentleman from Missouri to yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts.

Mr. Speaker, I want to yield myself 15 seconds to make a response to that last point.

My last point wasn't that Lebanon is California or New York or Massachusetts. My last point was that the free elections in Iraq inspired the Lebanese to work to eject the Syrian influence, which I think the gentleman would agree was not a good influence in Lebanon. It inspired people to want to be free.

If the gentleman gets more time, I will be happy to engage with him.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Wilson).

Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Kirk) for 4 minutes.

I thank my friend for yielding.

This is, indeed, a sad time in our country. Five years ago we came to this floor united. We joined in sending our troops off in this war against terror.

You know, Madam Speaker, for the first number of strikes that were delivered by Muslim extremists in this war, the terrorists chose the battlefields. They chose a battlefield as a Marine barracks in Beirut. And Mr. Skelton and I were there, he shortly after the explosion that killed our Marines, I shortly before that explosion. They chose the Khobar Towers, they chose the embassies in Africa, they chose the USS Cole, and then they chose New

York, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania. We chose the next two battlefields, Afghanistan and Iraq.

Our Democrat colleagues say that Iraq was the wrong battlefield, and I have heard resonating through the floor over the last 4 days statements that they were tricked, hornswoggled, fooled about Saddam Hussein.

From my side of the argument as to whether or not Saddam Hussein was a dangerous terrorist, I will simply offer all the statements by every Democrat leader in America during the 1990s, when there was no Bush administration to, in the words of my Democrat colleagues, ``trick them.'' I will offer their statements about Saddam Hussein.

Madam Speaker, we have expanded in the last 60 years. We have been in the business of expanding freedom. We understood after World War II that if we didn't change the world, the world would change us. And that lesson was relearned after 9/11.

No one would argue that it is not in our interest to have a Japan on the other side of the Pacific, where we stood up a free government, where we have a free nation, or that it is not in our interest to have a free El Salvador in our own hemisphere, or that it is not in our interest to have those dozens of nations that were behind the Berlin Wall that are now free and working for freedom. Many of them are partners in Iraq. We understand that.

And now we are trying to expand freedom in a different part of the world, a very dangerous part of the world. And we are undertaking the same three-point strategy that we have had for 60 years: Number one, you stand up a free government; number two, you stand up a military capable of protecting that free government; and, number three, the Americans leave.

And we can build on this Baghdad plan, which is right now in the execution phase, this plan of having two or three Iraqi battalions out front, with an American backup battalion to mentor them, and we can rotate every one of the 129 Iraqi battalions through this type of a combat rotation, stand them up, give them battlefield experience, and then the Americans can leave.

Now, Madam Speaker, I have heard it said throughout this debate that there was somehow a smooth road not taken. And let me just say, that is not true. There are no smooth roads in the Middle East. There are no smooth roads to standing up new governments, especially in communities and states where people have been trained to live under dictatorships.

And for those who say if we had just kept Saddam Hussein's army in place, with it is 11,000 Sunni generals, everything would have been fine and we would have had a peaceful situation in Iraq right now, that is nonsense. And for those who said if we had had 200,000 or 300,000 troops, the Shiites and Sunnis would have forgotten their ancient rivalries, that is also nonsense.

What are the facts, the reality, our Democrat friends say we have to be realists here, is this is a tough, difficult road. We are on the second stage right now. Most importantly, Madam Speaker, our troops are in the field already on this plan that is now being retroactively disavowed by the Democratic leadership.

You know, it was in June, I think it was 2130 hours, June 6, 1944, when the first elements of the first aircraft of the Pathfinder companies went out in front of the 82nd Airborne over Normandy, and they shortly were followed by hundreds of airplanes with American paratroopers. The 82nd Airborne going into Normandy had the full support and prayers of everybody in the United States Congress.

Today, you have got an 82nd Airborne Second Brigade now operating under this plan in Baghdad already there in Baghdad. Now, is this going to be the day, I would ask my colleagues, when some trooper from the 82nd Airborne writes on the concrete wall next to his position in Baghdad, ``This is where I stood when the United States House of Representatives led by the Democrat leadership rejected my mission''? I hope that doesn't happen, Madam Speaker.

Vote ``no'' on this resolution.