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Kennedy: No Iraq "Surge" without Hill's OK
President Bush won't announce his plan to increase the number of troops in Iraq until tomorrow night, but Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) has already introduced legislation that would require Bush to get Congress' approval for his plan.
Via Georgetown Law's Marty Lederman, the relevant section of the bill reads:
Prohibition.--Notwithstanding any other provision of law, no Federal funds may be obligated or expended by the United States government to increase the number of United States forces in Iraq above the number for such forces which existed as of January 9, 2007, without a specific authorization from Congress by law for such an increase.
Lederman also has the full text of the bill, which mostly just provides justification for the sought prohibition.
Sen. Kennedy's remarks upon introducing the bill are below.
Update: Kennedy will actually be making the following remarks at 1:00 PM today at the National Press Club. And the bill has not yet been introduced, but will be later today.
Kennedy's remarks:
The American people sent a clear message in November that we must change course in Iraq and begin to withdraw our troops, not escalate their presence. The way to start is by acting on the President’s new plan. An escalation, whether it is called a surge or any other name, is still an escalation, and I believe it would be an immense new mistake. It would compound the original misguided decision to invade Iraq. We cannot simply speak out against an escalation of troops in Iraq. We must act to prevent it.Today I am introducing legislation to reclaim the rightful role of Congress and the people’s right to a full voice in the President’s plan to send more troops to Iraq. My bill will say that no additional troops can be sent and no additional dollars can be spent on such an escalation, unless and until Congress approves the President’s plan.
My proposal will not diminish our support for the forces we already have in Iraq. We will continue to do everything we can to make sure they have all the support they truly need. Even more important, we will continue to do all we can to bring them safely home. The best immediate way to support our troops is by refusing to inject more and more of them into the cauldron of a civil war that can be resolved only by the people and government of Iraq.
This bill will give all Americans – from Maine to Florida to California to Alaska and Hawaii – an opportunity to hold the President accountable for his actions. The President’s speech must be the beginning – not the end – of a new national discussion of our policy in Iraq. Congress must have a genuine debate over the wisdom of the President’s plan. Let us hear the arguments for it and against it. Then let us vote on it in the light of day. Let the American people hear – yes or no – where their elected representatives stand on one of the greatest challenges of our time.
Until now, a rubber stamp Republican Congress has refused to hold the White House accountable on Iraq. But the November election has dramatically changed all that. Over the past two years, Democrats reached for their roots as true members of our Party. We listened to the hopes and dreams of everyday Americans. We rejected the politics of fear and division. We embraced a vision of hope and shared purpose. And the American people voted for change.
Many of us felt the authorization to go to war was a grave mistake at the time. I’ve said that my vote against the war in Iraq is the best vote I’ve cast in my 44 years in the United States Senate.
But no matter what any of us thought then, the Iraq War resolution is obviously obsolete today. It authorized a war to destroy weapons of mass destruction. But there were no WMDs to destroy. It authorized a war with Saddam Hussein. But today, Saddam is no more. It authorized a war because Saddam was allied with al Qaeda. But there was no alliance.
The mission of our armed forces today in Iraq bears no resemblance whatever to the mission authorized by Congress. President Bush should not be permitted to escalate the war further, and send an even larger number of our troops into harm’s way, without a clear and specific new authorization from Congress.
Our history makes clear that a new escalation in our forces will not advance our national security. It will not move Iraq toward self-government, and it will needlessly endanger our troops by injecting more of them into the middle of a civil war.
... Comparisons from history resonate painfully in today’s debate on Iraq. In Vietnam, the White House grew increasingly obsessed with victory, and increasingly divorced from the will of the people and any rational policy. The Department of Defense kept assuring us that each new escalation in Vietnam would be the last. Instead, each one led only to the next.
There was no military solution to that war. But we kept trying to find one anyway. In the end, 58,000 Americans died in the search for it.Echoes of that disaster are all around us today. Iraq is George Bush’s Vietnam.
As with Vietnam, the only rational solution to the crisis is political, not military. Injecting more troops into a civil war is not the answer. Our men and women in uniform cannot force the Iraqi people to reconcile their differences.
The President may deny the plain truth. But the truth speaks loudly and tragically. Congress must no longer follow him deeper into the quagmire in Iraq.
Comments (25)
Crust wrote on January 9, 2007 11:40 AM:One key word is missing from Kennedy's statement: Afghanistan. To my mind, one of the best arguments, both substantively and politically against the surge/escalation idea is that it will take troops away from Afghanistan. To quote the Baltimore Sun (Sun (http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nationworld/bal-te.afghanistan07jan07,0,3288686.story?page=2&coll=bal-attack-headlines ):
"Already, a U.S. Army infantry battalion fighting in a critical area of eastern Afghanistan is due to be withdrawn within weeks in order to deploy to Iraq.
"According to Army Brig. Gen. Anthony J. Tata and other senior U.S. commanders here, that will happen just as the Taliban is expected to unleash a major campaign to cut the vital road between Kabul and Kandahar. The official said the Taliban intend to seize Kandahar, Afghanistan's second-largest city and the place where the group was organized in the 1990s...
"Conway said U.S. commanders understand that the Afghan war is an "economy of force" operation, a military term for a mission that is given minimal resources because it is a secondary priority, in this case behind Iraq...
As Yglesias comments (http://www.matthewyglesias.com/archives/2007/01/surging_backwards/#comment), we probably haven't crossed the tipping point in Afghanistan...yet. We have a lot fewer troops in Afghanistan, which nonetheless is the larger and more populous country. It fills silly even to point it out, but of course it was an Afghan regime that sheltered Al Qaeda who attacked us on 9/11. In Afghanistan, we have a relatively clear idea of who's wearing the white hats and who's wearing the black hats (relative to Iraq, anyway). For all these reasons, we should if anything be moving troops from Iraq to Afghanistan, not the other way around.
I don't know why Dems aren't making more of this argument. In fairness, some Dems have mentioned the tradeoff between Iraq and other military priorities notably Afghanistan -- Bill Clinton and Russ Feingold come to mind -- but they should be making a lot more noise.
(I made a similar comment to the above at Yglesias' blog.)
Dave from the Lake Effect Zone wrote on January 9, 2007 11:45 AM:Wow. George W. Bush is getting his ass kicked by Ted Kennedy. That's gotta smart. That's all I can say about that.
Legalize wrote on January 9, 2007 12:39 PM:I pray to my heathen, liberal God of secularism that Kennedy and the Dems back this up with their new-found political muscle. For the good of this country, USE IT without mercy; it is the only thing the administration understands. Use it now while the public is firmly anti-escalation, before this thing gets even more out of hand.
Joe wrote on January 9, 2007 1:35 PM:You folks better wake up and be saved---the terrorists will never give up. Go, George, Go
Legalize wrote on January 9, 2007 1:55 PM:When will you be enlisting, Joe?
Ray wrote on January 9, 2007 2:01 PM:Wake up and be saved?!
Cut the crap. Wake up means start paying attention to what is actually happening in the world, not what is happening in the delusional fantasy land of Mr. Bush.
This surge plan is just another piece of the administration's cya strategy in Iraq.
Having lied, concealed and mislead the country into this excursion that had nothing whatsoever to do with terrorist, and in the process demonstrating the incompetence of the US government to terrorist far and wide, we as a nation need to wake up and start actually fighting terrorist's threats with effective action.
This surge is not an effective action. It is political theater. Political theater that will put American service men and women at risk. Political theater without any nameable benefit.
Let's come up with a plan that might actually accomplish something for a change.
Tyranny injustice for all wrote on January 9, 2007 2:32 PM:Imagine the signing statement on that one. "This law applies to all but the POTUS."
sybelia wrote on January 9, 2007 2:44 PM:If you care about changing direction in Iraq, now is the moment to act.
George Bush will speak to the nation tomorrow, and early reports say that he will announce an escalation of the war in Iraq. He wants to spend more of our money and lose more of our loved ones in pursuit of his dangerous fantasies.
But escalation is not President Bush's decision to make. He must have the people's consent.
Senator Ted Kennedy is announcing legislation that will prevent any further escalation in Iraq until two important things happen: the president presents a plan for success and Congress approves it.
I've already added my name to the list of Americans who demand a voice in the debate over escalation. Will you join me?
http://www.tedkennedy.com/ourdecision
As Speaker Pelosi said on Sunday, "If the president wants to add to this mission, he is going to have to justify it."
Thank you!
karl wrote on January 9, 2007 3:33 PM:Here's what I don't like about it and why it probably won't fly: it's presented as a check on how W fights the war, instead of whether he fights it. Kennedy actually makes an excellent case that this war is injust, criminal, and unwinnable. So why the backpeddling, pandering, mush-headed BS about giving our troops "all the support they need." F that! This should be a bill about declaring this whole war null and void, and bringing all of those kids home before they get killed, instead of after.
In a time of legitimate warfare (if such exists), the commander in chief must be able to make strategic decisions on his own. Kennedy's trying to make warfare something that's conducted by committee, at the glacial pace of lobbying, filibustering, and debated, and we will all come to regret that, if we endorse it now. We have here a crew of incompetent criminals staging a bogus and disastrous war. It's a mistake to merely try to slow them down and muck up their bookkeeping (and thereby making it harder for honest people to lead efficiently down the road), when we should instead be throwing them out and stopping the war altogether.
rjatlanta wrote on January 9, 2007 3:36 PM:George Bush is a dry drunk so overwhelmed by his own ego he is incapable of admitting his mistakes and must go to any length, no matter the cost to anyone else, to cover the fact he is overwhelmed. Trying to have a rational conversation with a person who is irrational is impossible. The Democrats need to step up and say "enough of this, NO MORE!"
Marty Didier wrote on January 9, 2007 4:24 PM:I'm with you Ted Kennedy, enough of this craziness and you know better than many with what is meant by "craziness"!
Gregory Frost wrote on January 9, 2007 5:53 PM:Go Kennedy. Idiots who argue that we MUST increase troop strength in Iraq to protect us from terr'ists have apparently had their brains removed and set in jars for some future use--you seem to have missed the dozens of bait-and-switches that have led to this moment: Saddam has WMD (lie, all but proven by weapons inspectors by the time Bush--NOT Saddam--kicked them out); Saddam was in league with Al Quaeda (lie that apparently only Dick "I have secret special information you don't" Cheney believes); we're bringing Democracy to Iraq (and where would we find any evidence of that in the civil war and protracted slaughter going on there?); and now "the surge." Next month: "Evil Monkeys from the Planet Zuup Must Be Stopped There Before They Invade Here." Bush*t.
Rosie wrote on January 9, 2007 11:37 PM:If only GWB had actually gone to Nam... Doubt he would have gotten us into this mess if he'd actually experienced real battle, seen real kids' heads blown off, real suffering, all the while wondering what it was all for...
Now the "war on terrah" has become "operation save Dubya's legacy or his butt." Wonder how many of our kids will die for the latest "reason," while being told some false story. I for one would not want to sacrifice my life for one of Dubya's lies, which unfortunately, many of our kids have. Oh, but I fully expect that tomorrow Dubya will present to the American citizens another lie. It will go something like we have to stop those terrorists over there and we can't let them gain control of Iraq or its oil. He won't admit that (1) he's the one to destabilized Iraq in the first place based on a pack of lies, (2) his administration never planned for anything past "mission accomplished," (3) he provided a terrorist training ground. They're a team of bunglers. So yaddi daddi daddi... My ears are plugged. I've absolutely had enough.
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