M. Speaker, I rise in support of this rule and in support of the Fiscal Year 2010 Defense Appropriations Bill, which the House will take up shortly.
M. Speaker, H.R. 3326 is a good bill. It provides support for our military families, and it provides our troops with the funding and equipment they need to successfully perform their duties and carry out their assigned missions.
But I do not support it without reservations.
I believe this Congress has not yet come to grips with what our policy is in Afghanistan.
We recently passed an emergency supplemental appropriations bill that provides billions of dollars for the war in Afghanistan - a measure I opposed.
I believed then, as I do now, that it is a mistake to spend billions and billions of dollars more for a war that has no clearly defined mission.
And my concern deepened when I recently read reports that indicated that General McChrystal believes we will have to expand our forces, and thereby expand our mission, in Afghanistan - meaning more money and more troops right now just to get the job started.
I still have this sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that we're getting sucked into something where the mission and goals are vague, and it's unclear how it will end.
M. Speaker, I remain skeptical about our policy in Afghanistan.
I think the Administration needs to provide Congress, the nation and our military families with more clarity on this issue - and if they don't, I believe Congress should demand it.
Like all my colleagues, I have had many conversations with the men and women who serve in Iraq and Afghanistan - sometimes when they are about to deploy, sometimes when they've just come home, sometimes when they come to my district office, and often because we just run into one another at a coffee shop, diner, community center, or on the street.
I believe we owe them a great deal for their service. We owe them the respect of looking them in the eye and telling them that we know exactly what we're doing when we vote for money and missions that will send them directly into harm's way, some place where they might not return safe and sound to their families and loved ones.
M. Speaker, I'm not asking for a protest vote on this bill. On this day, I intend to support this bill. But I raise these concerns because I firmly believe they need and deserve more discussion and more debate. Congress has been too quiet - and that needs to change.
