Lindsey Graham

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I wish to comment on the fact that I believe the body has come to agreement on my resolution, along with Senator Menendez, standing behind Israel in its conflict with Hamas. As I speak, apparently there is a ground action going on by the Israelis in Gaza. From my point of view, do what you have to do to defend yourself. I can't believe they have actually waited this long. I can't imagine what the American response would have been. If one rocket had come from our neighboring nations toward our country, we would not be so restrained. A two-state solution seems to be a very reasonable approach. The problem is, as the Presiding Officer knows, Hamas doesn't recognize Israel as an entity. It is pretty hard to negotiate with somebody who doesn't recognize you exist and tells their schoolchildren you don't exist. The hatred that comes from Hamas in their schools toward Israel is not conducive to peace. The resolution passed unanimously by the Senate the very night Israel decided to use ground force I think is appropriate and very symbolic. The Senate does not see a moral equivalency. As Prime Minister Netanyahu said: Israel uses missiles, in collaboration with the United States, to produce the technology called Iron Dome to defend civilians. Hamas uses civilians to cover their missile program, making human shields of their own people. That says all we need to know. So I am pleased that in a bipartisan fashion, unanimous in nature, the U.S. Senate is on record supporting the State of Israel in this conflict, understanding their justification for defending themselves and that there is no moral equivalency here. To my Israeli friends and allies, we wish you well. I expect that you will continue to defend yourselves against a terrorist organization. To the Palestinians who have formed a unity government, you need to break away from Hamas. There will never be peace until you marginalize the terrorist organization called Hamas, until you reject what they stand for and the way they have behaved. Finally, to those who wish for Israel to give up land and withdraw from territories, please remember, that is exactly what Israel did in Gaza. They withdrew all their forces, and what have they gotten in return? Tens of thousands of rockets. So to those who are pushing a peace plan in the Middle East between the Palestinians and the Israelis, I hope you remember security for Israel has to be the centerpiece of any peace deal. How can you obtain peace when one of the members of the Palestinian Government--Hamas--has fired thousands of rockets, caring less where they fall? They couldn't care less if it falls on a kindergarten or a military base. They just care to kill Israelis. Israelis have killed civilians, but they go the extra mile in time of war and conflict to minimize casualties. They tell them: We are going to bomb you. They pass out leaflets. They tell people to leave. That says a lot about the Israelis. So the Senate is in Israel's camp in a bipartisan fashion. I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. GRAHAM. I withdraw my request.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Yes, continue.

Mr. GRAHAM. I thank the Senator from Tennessee for his leadership. We are working together. We hope to make this bipartisan. If there is an agreement reached with the Iranians--and I agree, I hope there will be, that Congress can have a say about that agreement. President Obama felt as though he needed to come to Congress to get approval to enter into Syria. The Senator led the effort to pass the resolution in the Foreign Relations Committee, the Senator and Senator Menendez working together. The Senator from Tennessee delivered Republican votes to try to help the President. He drew a red line and nothing happened. So if he believes he needs input from the Congress about going to Syria, I hope the President will understand that the Congress wants input when it comes to the Iranian nuclear program. As a matter of fact, I hope we will demand it, because of all the decisions President Obama will make in his two terms as President, on the foreign policy front this is the most consequential. Why do I say this? The Iranian regime with a nuclear capability is a nightmare for the world. Does Senator Corker agree with me, based on his travels in the region, that if we allowed the Iranians to have a robust enrichment capability--and what am I talking about is taking uranium and enriching it to the point where they can use it for commercial fuel to run a nuclear power reactor. The problem with enrichment is you can go beyond making commercial grade fuel. You can actually use that process to make a bomb. Without enrichment capability you can't make the bomb. So they are demanding the right to enrich and it was given away in March. It was a huge mistake. If you made a list of countries you would not trust to enrich uranium--based on their behavior and disruptive nature--I would put Iran on the top of the list. My fear is that we are about to do with the Iranians what we did with the North Koreans--that you have a deal on paper that gives them an enrichment capability to be contained by U.N. inspection. And in North Korea the rest is history. When it comes to the Iranians, I am not going to turn our fate over, as a nation, to a bunch of U.N. inspectors trying to contain their uranium enrichment program. I know Israel will not. But this is the ripple effect. Does the Senator agree with me that any right to enrich we give to the Shia Persians in Iran, the Sunni Arabs are going to insist on an equivalent right?

Mr. GRAHAM. Along those lines, Senator Menendez has been one of the leading voices in the Senate and in the Nation about having a cautious eye toward Iran. They have an enrichment capability. Over the last decade it has grown moderately. This idea of moderate voices in Iran--the President of Iran was elected as a moderate. I don't believe that dichotomy really exists. This whole game of good cop/bad cop is going on in front of our eyes-- in this case good president/bad ayatollah. The ayatollah, the Supreme Leader of Iran, weighed in a few days ago talking about centrifuges 10 times greater than they have today. I am sure what he is trying to do is become the bad guy. When he puts out the number 190,000 and you wind up with 15 or 20, it is like a good deal. I can promise you one centrifuge in the hands of the Iranians is a risk. Thousands of centrifuges in the hands of Iranians is stupid. We would be crazy to let that happen. If they want a nuclear power program for peaceful purposes, sign me up. As a matter of fact, as far as any deal, I would put in the deal the ability for the international community--Russia, the United States, and China working together or separately--to build a powerplant inside of Iran to give them nuclear power as long as we control the fuel cycle. Fifteen nations have nuclear power programs that do not enrich. Canada and Mexico have nuclear power programs, but they don't enrich uranium. As a matter of fact, we are telling our friends in South Korea: Don't begin to enrich. We are telling our friends in the United Arab Emirates: You can have nuclear power, but don't enrich. I would find it incredible for us to tell allies that we trust them not to enrich because it could set off unintended consequences, but we are agreeing to let one of the enemies of mankind have that capability because they are demanding it. I hope and I pray a deal can come about that will neuter the nuclear ambitions of the Iranians and give them what they claim to want--a peaceful nuclear power program. But I don't believe that is what they want. I don't think they would be doing all the things they have been doing--lying, cheating, and building plants under a mountain--if all they wanted was a peaceful nuclear power program. As a matter of fact, our intelligence community tells us the program they have today has been put to military use. They denied that, but we can't get to the bottom of it. What is the Senator's view about the likelihood of the Iranians lying about the fact that they have tried to militarize their program?

Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to enter into a colloquy with the Senator from Tennessee.

Mr. GRAHAM. I couldn't agree more. As a matter of fact, dismantling has become something new. They have a big stockpile of highly enriched uranium. We are talking about diluting it, but the U.N. resolution called for its removal, so this deal is to the left of the U.N. resolution. As a matter of fact, this whole agreement is getting to the left of what the United Nations has been. What about this scenario? It is one thing to have fissile material in the hands of the ayatollah and they could make a bomb, but they still have a lot of highly enriched uranium still inside of Iran. What is the possibility of a dirty bomb, where they turn that highly enriched uranium over to a terrorist organization and it makes its way here without their fingerprints being on it?

Mr. GRAHAM. I know the Senator is supposed to be chairing a hearing here in a moment. But the Senator is the ranking member on Foreign Relations. I wish to compliment the Senator from Tennessee and Senator Menendez. The Senators have been a very effective team. The subject matter is Iran. July 20 will be here shortly. I ask Senator Corker, what is his view of where we stand with the Iranian nuclear program and what are his concerns?

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, Senator McCain and I have decided to come down before the Fourth of July break to talk about two issues that are very important to our national security. The first issue I would like to discuss is the threat we face as a nation from terrorist safe havens in Syria and now Iraq. The President has indicated in recent days that it is unacceptable to allow terrorist organizations such as ISIS to have safe havens from which to launch attacks against our country. Mr. President, we agree. What are you doing about it? I understand Iraq is complicated. I understand you would need a new government in Iraq that Sunnis could buy into to probably turn Iraq around. That is a problem, but that is a separate problem from safe havens that can be used to launch attacks against the United States. Please do not turn over to the Iraqi politicians the timeline as to whether we will act to protect ourselves. This is the FBI Director: ``My concern is that people can go to Syria, develop new relationships, learn new techniques and become far more dangerous, and then flow back.'' Americans are now in Syria. Some 7,500 foreign fighters from 50 countries have gone to Syria. They are now in Iraq. The Islamic State in Iraq and Syria was kicked out by Al Qaeda. These are the most extreme people on the planet. They have now gone into Iraq and taken large territories and up to $500 million in resources. They had a $30 million-a-year budget. They have more money than they ever dreamed of. Their desire to hit the homeland is growing. Last week the leader of this group said: We will be coming to America next. Mr. President, do not use the political problems in Baghdad as an excuse not to act when it comes to denying safe havens to terrorists who have espoused attacking our country. Where is your plan to dislodge these people in Syria and Iraq? Where is your plan to deal with the safe haven issue? Where is your plan to hit a terrorist organization that is desirous of hitting us? Mr. President, you cannot have it both ways. You cannot alert us as a nation that we are threatened by a safe haven in Iraq and Syria and do nothing about it. I understand the political complexities that exist in Iraq, but I also understand the need to deal with the safe haven issue. What do you envision as a solution to the safe haven problem in Syria and Iraq? When are we going to act? Is there no military component available to the United States to hit a terrorist organization that is operating out in the open in Syria and Iraq, that represents a direct threat to our homeland? Mr. President, now is the time for you to come up with a plan to deal with the safe havens. That issue is separate and apart from dealing with the political complications and the meltdown in Iraq. You have said and the Director of National Security Mr. Clapper has said that Syria is an apocalyptic state; it is in a very bad way; that the jihadists in Syria represent a direct threat to our homeland. The same jihadists in Syria have moved now into Iraq. Three years ago when Senator McCain was urging airstrikes and that a safe zone be established, there were fewer than 1,000 foreign fighters in Syria. Today we think there are up to 26,000 ISIS types in Syria. Now they are moving to Iraq at lightning speed, taking town after town, amassing resources in terms of military hardware and money that will make them not just a terrorist organization but a terrorist army. Mr. President, there is a terrorist army on the march in Iraq and Syria. They have indicated they want to hit our Nation. They want to strike us in the region, throughout the world, and here at home. You seem to have no plan. We want to help you. We understand this is complicated, but you, as Commander in Chief above all others, have a duty to come up with a solution to this problem. You have defined the problem well, but you have done nothing to solve the problem. We stand ready to help you solve that problem. Now, as we try to figure out where to go in Iraq and what is the right strategy, the one thing that is important to me is not to rewrite history. I do not want to dwell on the past, but I am not going to sit on the sidelines and let this administration--which, as Senator Obama, Senator Clinton, and Senator Kerry, was all over the Bush administration for the mistakes they made. That is the way the political process works. When the Iraq war was going poorly on President Bush's watch, Senator McCain called for the Republican-appointed Secretary of Defense to resign. I would argue that Senator McCain above all others has been consistent when it comes to Iraq. It does not matter who is making the mistake; if he believes one is being made, he will speak up. The line that there were just a few dead-enders in Iraq was not true. The reason we knew it was not true is that Senator McCain and I went to Iraq numerous times. The first time we went, we were in an SUV with a three-car convoy. We went down to Baghdad, had dinner, and went shopping. Every time thereafter, the security was tighter, our ability to leave the base was restricted, and the people on the ground who were fighting the war were telling us: This thing is not going well. Every time we would hear from the Bush administration that the media was misrepresenting the truth and that this was just a few dead-enders, we knew better. We spoke up. Abu Ghraib was a direct result of being overwhelmed by circumstances on the ground. We thought that once the Iraqi Army disbanded and Saddam Hussein was displaced, we would be able to handle Iraq with a few thousand troops. The Bush administration was wrong in that calculation. Senator McCain spoke up, and the surge did work. To President Bush's undying credit: You corrected the mistakes that happened on your watch. You kept an open mind. You changed strategy because the strategy you originally pursued had failed. President Obama, your strategy has failed. The idea of abandoning Iraq, disengaging politically and militarily, has come home to haunt us as a nation. Senator McCain and I said back in 2011: If we do not leave a residual force behind as an insurance policy for our own national security interests, we will regret it. Madam President, 10,000 to 15,000 soldiers, well placed, would have given the capacity to the Iraqi Army to allow them to be more effective, and what we see on the ground today would have never happened. I am convinced that ISIS would never be in Iraq the way they are today if there had been an American military component--10,000 to 15,000--providing capacity and expertise to an Iraqi army that is literally falling apart. I am convinced today that if we had continued to push the Iraqi political system to reconcile, we would not be where we are today. Dave Petraeus and Ryan Crocker--one general and one diplomat--spent hours every day of the week practically pushing the Sunnis, the Shias, and the Kurds to solve their problems with the political process. It was working. In 2010 we made a fateful mistake. We allowed Syria to go bad. Syria became the supply center for Al Qaeda in Iraq, which was on its back. In 2010 the surge had worked. Al Qaeda in Iraq, which was the predecessor to ISIS, was completely devastated. They are back in the game for three reasons: Syria became a failed state. We had a chance to stop that and did not. They were being resupplied from Syria with equipment and fighters. We decided to disengage from Iraq politically. We had a hands-off approach to the political problems in Baghdad. We withdrew our troops all from 2010 to 2011. Those three things became a perfect storm to lead us to where we are today. We do want to look forward because looking backward does not solve the problem. But here is what we will not accept. We will not accept a rewriting of history. When this administration says the reason we have no troops in Iraq today is because of the Iraqis, that is an absolutely false statement. In May of 2011 Senator McCain and I, at the request of Secretary Clinton, went to Iraq to talk about a follow-on agreement, a strategic partnership agreement that had in its making a military component that would give legal protections to our troops who were left behind. I remember this as if it were yesterday. We were in a meeting with Prime Minister Malaki. We were talking about leaving troops behind and whether the Iraqis would give us the legal protections we needed because I told Prime Minister Malaki: No American politician is going to allow soldiers to be left behind in a foreign country without legal protection. If a person was charged with a crime in Iraq, given the inventory in their legal system, I did not feel comfortable allowing that soldier to go into the Iraqi legal system. We would deal with disciplinary problems. He turned to me and said: How many soldiers are you talking about? I turned to Ambassador Jeffrey, the U.S. Ambassador, General Austin, the commander, and said: What is the answer? They replied to me: We are still working on that. The Prime Minister of Iraq laughed. This was in May of 2011. We could not tell the Prime Minister of Iraq how many troops we were talking about. We went to the Kurdish portion of Iraq and talked to President Barzani. He would have accepted any amount of troops we wanted to leave behind. He was openly embracing the follow-on force. We met with Mr. Allawi, one of the leaders of the Iraqiya Sunni bloc, who was very open minded to a follow-on force. The day after we left Iraq, Prime Minister Malaki issued a statement saying that if the other parties would agree, he would agree to a follow-on force. On November 15, 2011, we had a hearing with General Dempsey and Secretary Panetta in the Armed Services Committee. We asked the following question: Was it the Iraqis who rejected a follow-on force, originally envisioned to be 18,000 or 19,000? The bottom-line number from the Pentagon was 10,000. I asked the question. Was it the Iraqis who said: No, we do not want 18,000. That is too many. The numbers kept going down to finally 3,000. Senator McCain asked the question. The answer was: The reduction in numbers that we will be willing to offer to the Iraqis did not come from a rejection by Iraq but by a reduction of the numbers by the White House. In other words, the cascading effect of the numbers from 18,000 to 3,000 was not because Iraq said no; it was because the White House kept changing the numbers to the point that the force envisioned would be ineffective and fail. Those are the facts. Senator McCain will address the statements by the President before, during, and after, but I am here to tell you, without any doubt in my mind, the reason we don't have troops in Iraq after 2011 is because the Obama administration wanted to get to zero. They wanted to honor our campaign promise to get us out of Iraq. They did so, and now they are trying to blame the Iraqis. They are trying to rewrite history. I can understand why they don't want to own what happened in Iraq. I can't understand why we would let them get away with it, and I am not going to let them get away with it. Going forward, we have a mess on our hands, and I want to help the President where I can. But, Mr. President, you were very good at questioning the policies of the Bush administration, and you held nothing back. I am here to tell you I know what you are saying about Iraq is not true. On October 21, during a conference call with staff, Denis McDonough and Tony Blinken--former National Security Adviser to Biden and now National Security Council--briefing staff members about the problems with legal immunity was asked a question by Senator McCain's staff person: If you could get a legal agreement that we felt was solid, would you leave any troops behind, and they said no. So we are going to write them a letter. There are several of our staff who were on that phone call and we are going to ask Mr. McDonough and Mr. Blinken: Did you say that, and they can say whatever they want to, but I have people I know and I trust who were on that phone call and they know what was said. With that, I will turn it over to Senator McCain.

Mr. GRAHAM. Quite the opposite. If we go back and look at the tape around this debate, the President basically said: We left Iraq and we are not going to be bogged down by Iraq. There was no regret that I am so sorry we couldn't convince the Iraqis to leave a residual force behind because that would have been the best outcome for Iraq and the United States, and I regret that we could not get there and they will regret their decision. None of that happened. It was all about the last combat soldier is out. We are done with Iraq. We have given them all the help we can give them. We are going to move on, and we are not going to be bogged down. Now the place is going to hell. It is a direct threat to the United States, and they are trying to rewrite history--and I think it was October.

Mr. GRAHAM. The Iraqis did not want to leave a force behind.

Mr. GRAHAM. If you listen to the people who are launching these attacks, they say they are going to Jordan. What are they trying to accomplish? Bizarre as it may sound to the average American, they have a very specific plan and it sort of goes like this: They want to purify their religion. They are Sunnis. They have a version of Islam, Sunni Islam that is beyond horrific, that is a woman's worst nightmare. If you want to find a world of women, go to Syria, Iraq, and eventually Afghanistan, I am afraid. You would not believe what these people are capable of doing, what they will do to a person who smokes. They will chop your finger off. I mean, they will kill children in front of their parents. These people represent the worst in humanity. My fear is, the President's fear, that the stronger they get over there the more exposed we are over here. So, Mr. President, if you believe it is not in our national security interests to allow these folks to have a safe haven in Syria and now in Iraq, what are you doing about it? You have political problems in Iraq, I have got that, but why does that prevent us from attacking these people in Syria where their leadership resides and where their supply depots are? There has to come a time when this country is going to commit to defending itself. My goal is to keep the war over there so it doesn't come back here. Senator McCain, 3 years ago now almost, urged us to act in a way that would have allowed the moderate forces of the opposition to be empowered and to avoid where we are today. We chose not to act, at our own peril. So I make this crystal clear, this area Senator McCain has described in Iraq represents a terrorist safe haven in the hands of people who want to attack us here at home. I am not making that up. The Director of National Intelligence, the FBI Director, and Jeh Johnson, the head of Homeland Security, have all said Syria represents a threat to the homeland. Well, if a Syrian enclave and safe haven represents a threat to the homeland, an Iraqi enclave bigger and richer surely represents a threat to the homeland, and the President admitted as much. So I don't want to hear any more discussions about we have to wait until Iraq gets its house in order until we protect American national security interests. As to Jordan, now is the time in a bipartisan fashion for the Congress to speak with one voice and tell the world and everyone in the region that we will defend Jordan. The King of Jordan is the last moderate voice in the Middle East surrounding Israel. The King of Jordan has been the most faithful ally to America. The King of Jordan has been effectively engaged with Israel. The King of Jordan represents the best hope in the Middle East. If we allow a terrorist army--not an organization, now, an army of committed jihadists--to invade that country and put the King at risk, that will be one of the great tragedies in modern history. I think it is now time to let the terrorist army know: You are not going into Jordan, and say it in such a fashion as to not give Iraq away. But if we don't reinforce Jordan quickly, it would be a mistake. I have high confidence in the Jordanian military, but let me say this: It is in our interests for the King to survive; it is in our interests for Jordan to flourish; it is in our interests for ISIS to be stopped in their tracks in Iraq; it is in our interests for them to be wiped off the face of the Earth to the extent possible; it is in our interests to go on the offensive before it is too late. One thing I can say I have learned from 9/11 is thinking and believing if we ignore them they will ignore us is a very bad mistake. On September 10, 2001, the day before 9/11, we didn't have one soldier in Afghanistan, we didn't even have an ambassador, and we sent no money in terms of assistance to the Taliban. We were completely disengaged from Afghanistan. How well did that work? Anytime you disengage from people that bloodthirsty and you believe it will not come back to haunt you, you are making a mistake. Anytime a group will kill women in a soccer stadium for sport and we think we are safe if we ignore them, we are making the mistake for the ages. These people, the ISIS, represent a depraved form of humanity in the category of the Nazis. And what are we doing about it? I am tired of ceding city after city, country after country to radical Islam. Now is the time to fight back--fight back as if it meant fighting for your home and your family, because it does--fight back over there so we don't have to fight them here. And they are coming here. If you don't believe me, ask them. The best way to keep them from coming here is to align ourselves with people over there who do not want their agenda for their family and are willing to fight along our side. Right now, who feels comfortable fighting with America? Right now, our enemies are emboldened, our friends are afraid. Now is the time to turn this around, Mr. President. You are waiting and waiting and thinking and thinking, and they are on the march. I know this is complicated, but the one thing that is not complicated is that the terrorist organization you said could not have safe haven has the largest safe haven in the history of the world. They are richer than they have ever been, they are more powerful than they have ever been, and you are doing nothing about it. You need to do something about it before it is too late, and we stand ready to help you.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be recognized for 4 minutes.

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, contrary to what may be popular belief, there are plenty of Democrats in this body who are very much worried about Iraq. The question is, What do we do about it? I will be the first to admit it is complicated. The first thing we have to assess as a nation is, does it really matter what happens in Iraq? Clearly, I think it does. Economically, if Iraq becomes a failed state, the oil production in the south will fall into the hands of the Iranians, and Iraq will become a failed state that spreads economic chaos throughout the region. We will feel it at the gas pump, and we will eventually feel it in our wallets. An economic collapse in Iraq would affect our economy. I think it would throw the world oil market into turmoil. So it matters economically. Militarily, does it matter? It does in this regard: ISIS is an offshoot of Al Qaeda because Al Qaeda kicked them out. These people now are going to have a safe haven from Aleppo, Syria, to the gates of Baghdad. They have sworn to attack us. Part of their agenda is to strike our homeland. Their goal is to create an Islamic state--a caliphate--that would put the people under their rule into darkness. I don't want to hear any more war-on-women stories unless we address Iraq and Syria. Do we want to see a war on women? I will show my colleagues one. Can we imagine what little girls are thinking today in the Sunni part of Iraq and in Syria? Can we imagine the hell on Earth? The people who will do that to their own--what would they do to us? I don't mean to be an alarmist, but I am alarmed. I am just telling my colleagues what they are saying they will do. Our Director of National Intelligence has said that the safe haven for ISIS in Syria, and now in Iraq, presents a great threat to our homeland. The mistake President Obama is making is not to realize we need lines of defense. Why did we want to leave a residual force behind in Iraq? Ten thousand to 15,000 would have given the Iraqi military the capacity they don't possess today, the confidence they don't possess today. It would have given us an edge against ISIS we don't have. A Toyota truck doesn't do very well against American air power. But when we have no American air power and when the intelligence capability of the American military leaves, the Iraqi Army goes dark. We have seen a collapse of the Iraqi Army that I think could have been prevented. We can't kill all the terrorists to keep us safe. Our goal in this trying time is to have lines of defense, to keep the war over there so it doesn't come over here. It is in our national security interests to partner with people in Iraq. There were many who wanted a different life than ISIS would have. There are many Shias who want to be Iraqi Shias, not Iranian Shias. I have been there enough to know. So this fateful decision to look for ways to get out totally has come back to haunt us, and we are on the verge of doing the same thing in Afghanistan. I promised my colleagues the Taliban would be dancing in the streets--they just do not believe in dancing--when they heard we were leaving in 2016. Can we imagine how the Afghan people feel who have fought these thugs by our side believing we would not abandon them and now to hear we are going to pull all of our troops out but for a couple of hundred. Can we imagine how a young woman in Afghanistan feels. Can we imagine how people in Pakistan feel--a nuclear-armed nation that could be in the crosshairs of the people trying to take Afghanistan down. But it is not just about the people in Afghanistan. What about us? President Obama is going back to a pre-9/11 mentality. On September 10, 2001, we had not one soldier in Afghanistan, not one dollar of aid, not even an ambassador. So those in America who think if we leave these guys alone they will leave us alone, you are not listening to what they are saying. The only reason 3,000 Americans died on September 11 and not 3 million is they can't get the weapons to kill 3 million of us. If they could, they would, and they are very close. So, Mr. President: Recalculate your decision on Afghanistan. If you pull all of our troops out, the Taliban will regroup, the Afghan National Army will meet a terrible fate, and the people who wish us harm will be coming back our way. The region between Afghanistan and Pakistan is a target-rich environment for the world's most radical terrorists, radical Islamists. So at the end of the day, Mr. President: Your job is to protect us. You are destroying the lines of defense that exist. The Afghan people are willing to have us stay there in enough numbers to protect them and us. Mr. President: Before it is too late, change your policies in Afghanistan. Mr. President: Do not take this country back to a pre-9/11 mentality where we treat terrorists as common criminals when we read them their rights rather than gathering intelligence. We are letting our defenses erode all over the world. The enemies are emboldened and our friends are afraid. I can tell my colleagues this. If we continue on this track, it will come here again. With that, I yield the floor for Senator Chambliss.

Mr. GRAHAM

Mr. GRAHAM. I would not send $1 to Iraq. I would not send one soldier to Iraq, one airman to Iraq until we understand that over the arc of time Maliki has to go. I have been there more times than I can count. Maliki did some good things on his watch, but he has become a political leader who cannot bring the country together. But that, to me, is a concern that is addressed after we stop the momentum on the battlefield. Does the Senator from Arizona believe it is still possible that the Kurds, the Sunnis, and the Shias, that we know fairly well, can regroup and reconcile with themselves if we act decisively?

Mr. GRAHAM. This was in a meeting in his office. He asked me, What kind of force are you talking about? I turned to General Austin and Ambassador Jeffries and I asked them, What is the number? Answer the Prime Minister's question. They said, We are still working on that. The Prime Minister looked at me and said something to the effect, Well, I don't know what I am supposed to be agreeing to. We come back to Washington. We go to the Vice President's house. We talk to Mr. Donilin, saying they need a number--sometime--and they said they would get back to us about the number. I am still waiting on that phone call. During my questioning of General Dempsey about the follow-on force, I asked him--General Austin recommended somewhere in the 18,000 to 20,000 range, the Pentagon got down to 10,000, and below that they felt very uncomfortable. I asked him directly, Did the number cascade down or did the number go down because the Iraqis said, That is too many Americans; we don't want that many Americans on our soil. He said, No, sir; the numbers kept cascading down because the White House kept changing the number. So I want the record to reflect that in a meeting with the Prime Minister of Iraq, when he asked me how many troops we are talking about, we could not give him an answer. I want the record to reflect the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs said the numbers went down and down and down not because the Iraqis were saying no but because the White House kept lowering the number--to the point that it got to be absurd, and we will prove that over time.

Mr. GRAHAM. Yes, I will be glad to. And to put it in context, in 2008 we signed a strategic framework agreement. It was envisioned that we would negotiate a follow-on force with advisers and some special forces units to secure our Nation as well as to protect our gains. In the process of trying to get the Iraqis on board, Hillary Clinton called me to ask if my colleague, the Senator from Arizona, and I think Senator Lieberman--maybe he didn't go; I can't remember--would go over there and talk to Barzani, Allawi, and Maliki, and we said, Sure, we would be glad to. Here is what I found. I found in the meeting with Prime Minister Maliki, who was very openminded about a follow-on force--Barzani said, I will take 250,000 Americans; that was never in doubt about where the Kurds were--Allawi understood, the Sunnis understood the need for a follow-on force. It really was about the Shia politics. After we got back, Maliki said, If the other groups will do it, I will do it. But he says, What kind of force are you talking about, Senator Graham?

Mr. GRAHAM. Is it fair to say the Air Force in Iraq is grounded for all practical purposes?

Mr. GRAHAM. So, to the President: We agree with you that Iraq matters. We agree with you that it is not in our national security interests to have ISIS occupy territory from Aleppo to Baghdad. But here is what is a mystery to me: How do we turn this around unless we stop their advance inside of Iraq and we go after them in Syria? As to political reconciliation, I completely agree that is the ultimate change that needs to occur, that air strikes alone will not get us to where we want to go, but it is a chicken-and-egg concept for me. Can my colleague from Arizona imagine a scenario where we can get all the parties together when ISIS is winning on the battlefield?

Mr. GRAHAM. I am sorry I was late. Actually, I had an exchange with General Dempsey about this very topic. Does the Senator from Arizona see any scenario where ISIS is militarily stopped and that the Iraqis can retake ground lost to ISIS without U.S. air power being involved?

Mr. GRAHAM. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. GRAHAM. Did my colleague hear President Obama say it is unacceptable for Iraq or Islamists to have safe havens in Iraq and Syria? Did my colleague hear him say that?

Mr. GRAHAM. My point is, does my colleague agree he is right? It is not acceptable for our national security interests for ISIS to have a safe haven in Syria and Iraq that could run from Aleppo to Baghdad; that that is not a good thing for us?