House Foreign Affairs Committee Hearing Seeks Clarification on War Effort

Washington, D.C.--Congressman Eliot Engel (D-NY), a senior member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, questioned Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Admiral Michael Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, about President Obama’s new strategy on Afghanistan, focusing on avoiding an open-ended war and in finally finding Osama bin Laden and his top henchmen.

Congressman Engel said prior to the Committee hearing Wednesday, “President Obama stated throughout his campaign last year that Afghanistan was ‘the real central front in the war on terror.’ This is where the attacks of 9-11 were hatched and where terrorists were given free reign to train in order to attack America and its citizens. We must not forget that this was why we went there in the first place.”

“The President was elected in part because of his position on this war and I am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for now. However, I will not stand for another Iraq. The strategies of the past were clearly not the answer; perhaps the administration’s strategy will turn the tide of this war. However, I will not support an open-ended war. There must be a clear mission and goal outlined by the administration to go along with any troop deployments. We must ensure that the mission is sound and the plan is clear before we send more of our sons and daughters in to harms way and commit more of our nation’s dollars towards achieving those goals.”

The following is the exchange between Congressman Engel and Secretary Clinton, Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen. You can view the video on Congressman Engel’s website - http://engel.house.gov/index.cfm?sectionid=178&sectiontree=6,178

ENGEL – I saw the President’s speech last night and am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. But my fear, as is the fear of so many others, is that we could easily get bogged down in an endless war. What happens if this doesn’t work? Do we leave in three years as the President stated, or do we stay longer? What happens if Gen. McChrystal makes another public speech, saying that he needs 10,000 more troops, in attempting to back the President into a corner, what do we do then? We talk about Afghanistan and Pakistan, and I noted that just last week Pakistan’s representative abstained in the recent IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) resolution critical of Iran’s nuclear program. If these are our allies, I’d hate to hear what our enemies think.

Finally, where is Osama bin Laden? And why can’t we seem to get him? We are relying on our intelligence to tell us that this is what we should be doing next in Afghanistan, and our intelligence can’t even tell us where he is. There was a recent Senate report that shortly after the war in Afghanistan began we had Osama bin Laden and we let him slip through our fingers. How can we rely on our intelligence now when we can’t even capture one guy in eight years?

MULLEN – Actually there has been a considerable diminishment of al Qaeda over the last couple of years in terms of their leadership, obviously not bin Laden and al Zawahiri specifically. What I’ve learned over the years, particularly in the last several years, is individuals like him, and not quite frankly unique to him, is that Job #1 for them is survival. They do it really well. We have good intelligence and good agencies and it has improved a great deal and I rely on them tremendously. That said, it’s still a big problem and it doesn’t mean we’re not trying to find him and the rest of the leadership

As far as getting bogged down in an endless war, it’s not going to happen. It’s very clear, this president has said it, and military leadership understands it - this is not open-ended, we are not going to escalate it. We believe in these troops and this strategy and the civilian surge that goes with it. The opportunity we have now is because Pakistan is making progress, we have a new president in Afghanistan, and we have the right leadership on the ground and the right leadership in the embassy. We believe now is the right time and we can actually turn this thing around. And so, I don’t have an expectation that we are going to get bogged down or there will be a request for significant troops

CLINTON – Congressman, I think that your focus on bin Laden is absolutely appropriate. I share your frustration that it's been eight years since the attack that devastated New York has not led to the killing or capturing of bin Laden and his principal lieutenants. As Admiral Mullen said, we have degraded their leadership and we have been successful in going after a number of the mainstays of his organization. But we haven’t gotten him, al Zawahiri, or Mullah Omar and I think that has to be a primary goal in what it is we are doing. It certainly is for me and I think it is for the President, and part of the strategy we are unfolding we think will assist us. I will just add that this strategy has mostly been on the military side and influenced by Gen. Petraeus and Gen. McChrystal, one of whom is our foremost expert on counter-insurgency and the other on counter-terrorism. I think there is reason to put a lot of stock in their opinions.

GATES – I will just add that the President gives the orders but every man and woman that is deployed overseas is deployed over my signature. And if I came to conclude that we were bogged down and we were stalemated and we were sending young men and women into a maw, with no purpose and no hope for success, I wouldn’t sign anymore of those orders.