Washington, DC – Today at a Democratic Policy Council (DPC) oversight hearing on the war in Iraq, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton discussed with three former top military officers who served in Iraq the need for a change of course and the Bush Administration’s failed handling of the war. Senator Clinton and her Democratic colleagues emphasized that the Republican leadership has failed to fulfill their responsibility to conduct oversight of the war in Iraq. Underscoring the need for the American people and members of Congress to have real answers, Senator Clinton called for the National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq to be declassified, echoing comments she made earlier in the day in Binghamton, New York. Read more.

Senator Clinton in April wrote to Senator John Warner, Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, urging him to hold hearings with retired generals who were directly involved in the planning and conduct of military operations in Iraq and who had raised questions about the management of our operations in Iraq. Read more.

“It is frustrating, to say the least, that I serve on the Armed Services Committee and we have not had any hearings on this. We hear from the Administration witnesses time and time again, and, as you know very well, it is hard to get behind the testimony and the evidence,” Senator Clinton said in her opening statement. “I hope that your very strong endorsement of bipartisan hearings that bring in people who have been on the front lines and can begin to unravel this terrible dilemma we find ourselves in and all of the reasons for it, will be taken to heart.”

Senator Clinton discussed the situation on the ground with three former top military officers who served in Iraq: Major General John R.S. Batiste, U.S. Army (Ret.) was senior military assistant to then-Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz and commander of the 1st Infantry Division, and served in Iraq in 2004 and 2005; Major General Paul D. Eaton, U.S. Army (Ret.) was responsible for training the Iraqi military from May 2003 to March 2004, and for rebuilding the Iraqi police force from March through June 2004; and Colonel Thomas X. Hammes, USMC (Ret.) served in Iraq in 2004, and was responsible for establishing bases for the newly reconstituted Iraqi armed forces. He is currently Marine Senior Military Fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies, National Defense University. Senator Clinton asked the former military leaders for their insight on what we can do right now in Iraq, what they see is currently at stake and the consequences of the Administration’s strategic plunders.

“Our problem with dealing with the administration is, as what we said, you know, their rhetoric has not been matched by resources or resolve in the way that it needs to be and so we constantly hear the drumbeat of you know, ‘We can’t change, we have to do this’ as we are being told it has to be done,” said Senator Clinton in her questioning. “We know this is not working, and we know that it is creating very difficult problems for us down the road.”

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