Foreign Affairs

As chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, Rep. Rohrabacher has been at the forefront of many foreign policy and national security debates over Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and China.  During a visit to Iraq this year, Rep. Rohrabacher asked Prime Minister Nouri-al Maliki to consider using a portion of future oil revenues to repay some of the hundreds of billions of dollars America has spent freeing his country from Saddam Hussein's ghoulish dictatorship.  The Iraqi government's official response was "Thank you very much for liberating Iraq, but sorry, you're not going to get a cent," and the Rohrabacher delegation was asked to leave the country.

The entire free world should be happy that the people of Libya rose up, fought, and succeeded, with American and NATO aid, in bringing down Col. Muammar Gaddafi.  He was a bloody tyrant who had engaged in terrorism against the United States and murdered his own people.  The people of Libya now have enormous new economic potential.  However, it was the American people who spent close to $1 billion we could not afford on the military operation that defeated the Gaddafi dictatorship.  Although our intervention was well-intentioned, we are now deeper in debt for having done so.  Rep. Rohrabacher has called on the new Libyan government, when it is able, to repay the American people for the costs incurred to secure their freedom.  Countries have reimbursed the United States in the past for military action taken on their behalf.  Libya would be right to now do the same.

The fact that Iraq will not even consider doing so suggests we should immediately terminate any and all aid to that country.

In Afghanistan, which will never have the resources to pay us back, America cannot afford to continue with failed "nation building."  Rep. Rohrabacher introduced H. Res. 423, which calls for an alternative strategy in Afghanistan to defeat the Taliban and their al-Qaeda allies.  The plan advocates shifting focus away from an effort to transform Afghanistan into a centrally controlled, Western-style democracy, to an effort working within the tribal and ethnic structures that already exist in Afghanistan.  That's the only way to make sure any return of the Taliban or other radicals is thwarted.

After 9/11, we utilized these factors and leveraged American airpower and Special Forces to drive out the Taliban.  Now, after our brave Navy SEAL Team 6 has done such a courageous and magnificent job disposing of the murderous terrorist Osama bin Laden, we should declare victory in Afghanistan and bring our troops home immediately.