President Bush's $87-billion supplemental appropriations request for the occupation and rebuilding of Iraq and Afghanistan forces us to consider significant domestic questions, but also forces us to ask the fundamental question of what is required for an honorable completion of our responsibilities in Iraq and an expeditious exit. Domestically, this spending is an enormous addition to our national debt. With this year's deficit estimated to surpass last year's record-setting deficit of $374-billion, an additional $87-billion is another crushing burden, not on us, but on our children and grandchildren. Additionally, while American roads, bridges, schools, water and sewer lines, and electric grids are deteriorating, there will be scant federal funding to contribute to American reconstruction because we are making the decision that it is more important to rebuild Iraq. But, we are also making the decision to do it alone. The president, with the concurrence of the majority in Congress, has avoided any sacrifice by most Americans, including the sacrifice of paying for the occupation and reconstruction of Iraq. This is in sharp contrast with a frequently cited analogy, the Marshall Plan.
The Marshall plan, from 1948 to 1952, was paid for by postwar America without adding additional debt to our coffers. In fact, our public debt actually declined from $216-billion in 1948 to $214-billion four years later. But today the only Americans who are being asked to sacrifice are our brave men and women in uniform and their families, and our children and grandchildren who will eventually be called upon to pay this crushing debt.
On the Senate floor, sponsors of the $87-billion appropriation stated that there were only two choices: support the $87-billion or abandon it.
There is a third way. We can choose to conduct our international negotiations in a manner that will bring soldiers from other nations to Iraq. We need these troops as an addition to the presence of U.S. military forces in Iraq to increase security and end the shooting gallery that we have forced our troops to endure. Additional foreign troops can also serve as a substitute for American troops so our soldiers can begin to rotate home. Without a commitment from our allies of troops and money, there will be no additional protection for U.S. troops who are on the ground and no other forces to share the burden in Iraq.
While the problem of isolating ourselves from our allies is significant, there is a broader failure to focus our foreign policy on the greatest threat facing Americans at home and U.S. interests abroad - the networks of international terrorists. We must restart the war on terrorism, which has effectively been in abeyance since this administration shifted our military and intelligence resources from Afghanistan to Iraq in the spring of 2002. That shift was misguided. We have allowed al-Qaida to regenerate. We have allowed other terrorist networks - Hezbollah, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad - to continue their devious activities.
We still have not caught al-Qaida's and the Taliban's senior leaders, including Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar. We are witnessing a resurgence of the Taliban in Afghanistan. International terrorists operating from the sanctuary of Syria are now targeting U.S. citizens. As a result, we have again been forced to endure bombings and significant loss of life in Riyadh, Israel, the Gaza Strip and elsewhere.
As a result, I am concerned that this $87-billion supplemental appropriation is in essence a blank check for the president's failed policy. It will remove a substantial portion of the pressure for real progress in the internationalization of the occupation and reconstruction efforts directed at Iraq. Passage of this supplemental spending bill will remove the incentive for this administration to negotiate.
Only with significant international assistance that includes troops and money - combined with significant decision-sharing by the United States with our traditional allies - will our nation be able to have a reasonable expectation of an honorable and expeditious exit from Iraq. But, this spending plan leads us in the opposite direction. We will do it alone. It will increase the risk to our brave soldiers. It will unnecessarily transfer reconstruction costs to future generations of U.S. taxpayers and postpone the time when the United States can honorably and expeditiously leave Iraq. For those reasons, I voted against this appropriation.
