Congressional Record Statement of U.S. Senator Russ Feingold
On A Time Frame For U.S. Military Mission in Iraq
October 25, 2005
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I had the opportunity to give three speeches
on the floor so far about issues concerning the fight against terrorism
globally and the relationship of the Iraq war to that struggle and that
battle.
Today, I come to the floor to talk about why I think we need a timeframe
for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. I do not mean a rigid timetable,
nor do I mean a timetable that is not connected to clear and achievable
benchmarks. But what we do need is a public, flexible, realistic timetable
that will tell people when and how we expect to finish the military
mission in Iraq.
As my colleagues may know, I have suggested a target date of December
31, 2006, the end of next year, for the completion of our military mission.
Today, I want to talk a little bit about why a flexible timetable for
withdrawal will help make the U.S. stronger and our enemies weaker.
Some have argued that a timetable is designed to appeal to the American
public, that it has no relationship to our security or to our achieving
policy goals in Iraq. Actually, it is just the opposite. I proposed
a timeframe because I think it has everything to do with improving our
national security strategy.
Our fundamental national security goal must be to combat the global
terrorist networks that attacked and continue to threaten the United
States. An increasing number of military experts and members of the
public have concluded that our military presence in Iraq is not consistent
with that goal and that it is, in fact, undermining that goal. I think
it has become increasingly clear that we have created a breeding ground
for terrorism in Iraq and that the apparent indefinite presence of tens
of thousands of U.S. troops is often fueling, not dampening, the insurgency
in that country.
Melvin Laird, a former Republican Congressman from my State of Wisconsin,
who was the Defense Secretary under Richard Nixon, said:
We owe it to the rest of the people back home to let them know there
is an exit strategy. And more important, we owe it to the Iraqi people.
Our presence is what feeds the insurgency. And our gradual withdrawal
would feed the confidence and the ability of average Iraqis to stand
up to the insurgents.
GEN George Casey, the commanding general of the allied forces in Iraq,
made a similar point in testimony to Congress last month. He testified
that:
..... getting Iraqis into leading the counterinsurgency effort as they
are capable will allow us to gradually reduce the visibility of coalition
forces across Iraq and, ultimately, as conditions warrant, to begin
to reduce our presence in Iraq, taking away an element that fuels the
insurgency; that is, the perception of occupation.
He went on to call reducing the visibility and presence of coalition
forces a key element of our overall counterinsurgency strategy.
Melvin Laird and General Casey know that our presence has fed this insurgence,
making it easy for the insurgents to convince new recruits that we are
there to stay.
Mr. President, I know, you know--we all know--that is not the fault
of our men and women in uniform who are serving courageously; it is
the fault of the administration for sending them into battle without
a clearly defined or well-thought-out mission.
In February, I asked one of the top allied commanders in Iraq when I
was there in the Green Zone what would happen if we suggested to the
world that there is a timeframe for achieving our military mission.
This is what I asked him. His response to me, which of course was off
the record, was that, ``nothing would take the wind out of the sails
of the insurgents more'' than providing a clear public plan and timeframe
for a remaining U.S. mission.
The President himself in June told the Nation that he did not support
putting more troops into Iraq because, he said, ``sending more Americans
would suggest that we intend to stay forever.''
Even the President has acknowledged the problem with feeding the insurgency
if it appears our presence there is permanent, or ever expanding. I
think that same logic applies to the President's refusal to issue a
public timetable.
To the extent that we do not explain what our military goals in Iraq
are and when we hope to achieve them, we are playing into the hands
of the insurgents. The insurgents are motivated by our presence and
they feed off conspiracy theories and suspicions regarding American
intentions. And, of course, our brave service-members and their families
deserve some clarity about how long they are likely to remain in Iraq.
The President is one of an ever-narrowing group of people who believe
that a timetable works against our goals in Iraq. Military experts,
people I talked to in Iraq, and the American people increasingly agree
that the administration's refusal to even suggest a timetable for meeting
our military goals in Iraq is feeding the insurgency.
The lack of a timetable doesn't just feed the insurgency, it also discourages
Iraqi ownership of their own political process. By making it clear that
the U.S. will not be there indefinitely, we will help the Iraqis move
toward the real political independence they need and dispel some of
the cynicism about American intentions that empowers some of the more
extreme elements of Iraqi society.
Finally, a timetable is important because it enables us to devote more
resources to the other national security issues that demand our attention.
To fight the global terrorist networks that threaten the U.S., we need
to focus energy and resources on countering emerging terrorist tactics,
dealing with the threat of ``loose nukes,'' and repairing the damage
to our Army, to name just a few urgent priorities. Drawing down U.S.
troops in Iraq will allow us to focus on these priorities. It is time
to make sure that our Iraq policy is advancing, not undermining, our
national security goals.
The administration and its allies have offered various arguments as
to why they can't or won't come up with a clear plan and timeline for
military success in Iraq.
One argument has been that the U.S. pullouts from Somalia in the 1990s
and Lebanon in the 1980s emboldened terrorists and others who oppose
American interests. To pull out of Iraq without having put down the
Iraqi insurgency once and for all would supposedly be another sign of
American weakness.
But our decisions about national security shouldn't be made based on
conjecture about the ``message'' that some might perceive. No one, including
the Bush administration, can know how the insurgents in Iraq might feel
about the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. We do know, however,
that right now we are making the insurgency stronger with our indefinite
presence in Iraq, and our failure to articulate a timetable for military
withdrawal. We also know that our commitment of resources--money, troops,
time--to Iraq is detracting from our ability to focus on our most pressing
national security goals and stretching our military to the breaking
point. Terrorists will not feel particularly emboldened about us putting
our Iraq policy on track so that we can focus our attention on eliminating
them. The President suggests that if he issues a timetable for how long
he expects U.S. troops to remain in Iraq, our enemies will think that
we are weak. But without a plan to finish our military mission, our
enemies will know that we have fallen into a trap and we can't figure
out how to get out. That is what they will know if we do not apply some
common sense to this situation.
When I pressed Secretary Rice on the need for a timetable last week,
she responded that ``we'd like our discussions of withdrawal and of
bringing down the numbers of forces to be results-based rather than
time-based.'' But of course a timetable should be results-based. As
I have said over and over, any timetable needs to be flexible and needs
to be tied to achievable benchmarks. The point is to have some idea
of when those benchmarks, those results, can be achieved. Without such
a timetable, and without clear, realistic benchmarks. we cannot hold
ourselves accountable for meeting our goals. Nor can we give our troops
and the American people the clarity they deserve about their mission.
The Bush administration, with all these arguments, has succeeded in
one thing: in intimidating people into not uttering the words ``timetable,''
or ``timeframe,'' or ``target date'' for finishing the military mission.
But with the words of Republicans like Melvin Laird and military leaders
like General Casey, more and more people understand that having a flexible
timetable will strengthen our national security. This is not a timetable
where the objective is troop withdrawal, the objective is to focus on
our national security needs and the timetable is one step towards that
goal. A timetable is not about domestic politics--it's about undercutting
insurgency recruiting and unity, encouraging more Iraqi ownership and
responsibility, and creating space for other important U.S. national
security efforts.
I again emphasize that the timeframe I have proposed is a flexible one--not
a drop-dead date, not a deadline, not a formula for ``cut and run.''
It is linked with a call for more clarity about what we want the U.S.
military to achieve in Iraq.
Please note that I am only referring to a timeframe for the military
mission in Iraq, not for our broader political and other missions in
Iraq. We all understand that our engagement in Iraq will not end with
the U.S. military mission. We will still have a great deal of tough
diplomatic work to do in Iraq well after the bulk of U.S. troops leave,
and probably some serious security cooperation as well.
We will continue to devote resources to Iraq, without a doubt. But as
it stands today, we have focused on Iraq to the exclusion of critically
important national security priorities. And we have done so at great
cost to the outstanding men and women of the U.S. military, and to their
families. When I speak to service men and women in Wisconsin and in
Iraq, and when I speak to their families, their pride in their service
is evident and it is well earned. But their frustration with this open-ended
commitment, with the stop-loss orders and the multiple deployments,
with the extensions and the uncertainties, is equally evident, and it
is very painful. We can do better by them, by insisting on clarity,
by insisting on accountability, and by assuring them that we have a
plan with clear and achievable goals.
We must stop feeding the insurgency in Iraq, and focus on the fight
against the terrorist networks that threaten the security of the American
people. A timetable can make us stronger, and our enemies weaker. That
is the strategy we must pursue, and I look forward to working with colleagues
here in the Senate to move such a proposal forward. I yield the floor.
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