John Murtha

Mr. MURTHA

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Speaker, the history of the United States has been built on the western expansion of its population. The young days of the Republic saw ambitious men and women looking westward for opportunities which did not exist on the eastern seaboard. But the first obstacle they saw as they looked west was the Appalachian Mountain Range. As settlers began the trek westward in the late 1700's, the difficulties they encountered were enormous. Many died; many turned back. But just as many persisted, and communities began to be established in the fertile lands west of the first range of the Appalachians. One area which attracted settlers was on a high plateau between two ranges of the Appalachians, and in 1795, Somerset County, PA was established. In 1995, Somerset County is celebrating its bicentennial. The hard- working citizens of this area have seen many changes and challenges over the past 200 years, but the early pioneering spirit of the people who founded Somerset County can still be found there today. This spirit has led to vibrant communities throughout the county, proud of their heritage, but also looking forward to a bright future. Travelers on the Pennsylvania Turnpike know Somerset as an exit high in the Pennsylvania mountains. Driving by, they see a magnificent county courthouse in the Borough of Somerset, and a spot to break up the trip to points east and west. But getting off the highway and traveling through the county would introduce them to many historic communities located in the beautiful Pennsylvania highlands which offer a great deal in terms of recreation and friendliness. As Somerset County, PA celebrates the 200th anniversary of its founding, I would like to offer my congratulations to its citizens as they move forward into a third century of work and growth, and invite my colleagues to come experience the celebrations planned to take place all summer long.

Mr. MURTHA

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment, amendment No. 53.

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, today I want to rise in support of deficit reduction, and I think it is important to go back and look from a historical perspective of what I am trying to do and what I think is important. If we are going to pass a budget resolution, I am convinced it is absolutely essential that we show we are going to make the spending cuts first. I do not think, based on my years here in Congress, it is possible to cut taxes and at the same time balance the budget. I am convinced that when President Reagan came to office, he believed he could balance the budget in the 8 years that he was here. I am convinced that President Bush believed that he could balance the budget in the 4 years that he was here, and even before that, President Carter talked about balancing the budget. Because of the tax cut we implemented during the Reagan administration, the deficit got larger. Now, it was not that Congress did not cooperate, not want to balance the budget. There were all kinds of efforts during that period of time. Probably the most important single thing that happened was that entitlements increased substantially during this whole period. During the period of time that, the 12 years, almost every single appropriation bill that was sent to the Congress was reduced by the Congress, and the Presidents, President Reagan and President Bush, signed those bills. We worked out a compromise, and yet the national debt grew. It grew from $1 trillion to $4 trillion. What I am saying today and what I am trying to impress upon the Members who have been advocating a tax cut is that first we ought to focus on the deficit and try to put the savings that we get from rescissions like this, and by the way, some of these rescissions I agree with, and some of them I do not agree with, but we ought to take the savings from these rescissions and put them against the deficit. Most of the cuts that were made in the budgets that were sent to us were made in defense, and they were forced by the fact that there was no place else to go. It was defense against domestic programs, and we cut about $155 billion in a 12-period from defense. All of us believed that we were cutting the right amount at the right time. We had budget resolutions which passed, usually partisan budget resolutions, but in the end the bills passed in a bipartisan manner. Democrats and Republicans voted for them. I am proud to say that the members of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee have reduced the size of the military after the cold war and after the Berlin Wall came down in a way that we retained a world class military. The Chief of Staff of the Army just testified before Chairman Young and the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee today and talked about how good the Army is compared to after the Vietnam war, after the Korean war, and after World War II. It could be better. It is about an 8 on a 1-to-10 scale is what he testified today. And as I look down the road and as I worry about the possibility of a tax cut versus deficit reduction, I see defense competing with critical domestic programs. I see Social Security and Medicare and all of those programs overwhelming defense, and I do not think there is any way that we can keep that from happening. I am concerned that Members with less experience that do not recognize or realize the difficulty we have gone through and the work that we have done, and we were probably the only committee in the House over those 12 years that actually made a reduction; everybody else might have made cuts in increases, but we in Appropriations made actual reductions in budget requests from the President, and we struggled with those budget requests, trying to make sure the funding priorities went to readiness, to quality of life, and I think that Desert Storm shows exactly what happened. For instance, when Desert one went down in 1980, we had a very inept force, a force that was hollow, a force without training, a force with poor equipment. Half the combat aircraft of this country were deadlined because of lack of spare parts, and when that operation went in 1980, we went to the desert with only four or five helicopters. We lost a number of people. We could not even effect a rescue of our diplomats who were captured by the Iranians. And yet a decade later, in 1991, we pulled off Desert Storm, a magnificent operation. So through this period when we made all of these cuts in defense, we actually were able to build our quality force, went to an all-volunteer force, put a GI bill in place, put new equipment in their hands, and it culminated with an operation where we had a very minimal loss of casualties and a phenomenal military success. So I believe very strongly we have to be careful. We should send a message to the country that we are interested in deficit reduction first, and this is a policy statement that I believe the Congress should make, and I would hope that Members on both sides would support this as the goal. Obviously after that, after we make the spending cuts, after the deficit is reduced, we can look at the possibility of tax cuts. So, Mr. Chairman, I feel very strongly about it, and I would hope that Members in this House on both sides of the aisle would support my amendment to emphasize deficit reduction rather than tax cuts. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Visclosky]. (Mr. VISCLOSKY asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. MURTHA

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Chairman, in December I took a trip down to Fort Hood, where I met with 3 of the division commanders. In the continental United States there are eight divisions, and I met with three of them. We talked about the readiness at Fort Hood and the problem they have had with lack of money in order to maintain readiness. I do not mean to say that if they were to be deployed, by the time transportation would be available they would not be ready to move. But they were in a state of sea readiness, which is substantially below the rate we would like to see if they were to go into combat tomorrow. We could probably get them up to a top level in 30 to 45 days. But the key to our success in deploying troops to Saudi Arabia in order to stop the Iraqis was the fact that we had troops ready to move and we were able to move enough troops to Saudi Arabia to discourage Saddam Hussein in the last incursion from going into Kuwait. It is essential that we have transportation available, and that we have troops available in a state of readiness where they can move very quickly, That is a good investment. It saves us a substantial amount of money in the long run. From Fort Hood I went down to Fort McPherson, where I met two more of the division commanders. So I met with five of the eight division commanders. Each one of them said to me that their readiness was on shaky grounds, that they had a state of readiness where they were concerned about the amount of money available. I disagree with what the gentleman from Wisconsin is trying to do. In the past we have always felt that emergency supplementals should not be offset. He takes a different position, and I understand that. His position is that because of the balanced budget amendment, it ought to be offset. I take the position, the same position I have always taken, that this is an emergency supplemental, we are paying for deployments that the President ordered, they are humanitarian type deployments in most cases--the Kuwaiti deployment was paid for by the Kuwaitis--and they should not be offset. As a matter of fact, when I was down at Fort McPherson, we went on down to Fort Bragg, and I talked to a couple of NCO's who are doing the training. The one NCO who had been in the Army for about 5 years took two salad dressing containers, and he said, ``This is the way I train my troops. I move this salad container''--I said, ``Wait a minute. You are not using this one?'' He said, ``No, we don't have what's necessary in order to do an adequate job of training because the money has been cut back so much.'' This is an example from enlisted people of what is involved in the actual training. We had a terrible tragedy the other day at one of the bases. Some of the Rangers were involved. That is very difficult training. It is some of the most difficult training in any of the Armed Forces. They push them to the hilt. I do not know that happened there. I hope this did not happen because of inadequate supervision. I hope it did not happen because they did not have the money to get the helicopters out there. I have no idea what the results were, but I am concerned when those kinds of accidents start to happen. At one time in the 1970's we only flew about 12 hours a month. We had accidents with some of the airplanes of the Air Force, and we had a very high accident rate. When we start losing the training time, we start increasing the accidents, and it is counterproductive and it costs us a lot more money. We have been very careful in the way we have reduced the structure of the Armed Forces. As I said before, we duty side in a 3 or 4-year period, and during that 3- or 4-year period we have tried to make sure that the Air Force that is still there had what is needed in order to deter aggression, in order to perform and protect the forces that the American President feels are necessary. Obviously, our main line of defense is nuclear deterrence. We also have to worry about the possibility of somebody floating a nuclear device into one of our harbors, and we have to spend money on those kinds of things. I am convinced that the offset that my friend, the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Obey], offers goes too far. I am not in favor of rescissions, but I would rather see Mr. Obey's offset defeated, have us pass the bill as it is, and will work it out in conference. Mr. Chairman, I urge a defeat of the Obey substitute and passage of the bill so we can get it to conference.

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Chairman, a couple of things I wanted to mention about the seriousness of this legislation. All of us take credit for the number of jobs that have been reduced in the Federal Government. Out of the 150,000 jobs that will have been reduced over a 3- or 4-year period, 80 percent of those jobs came from defense, active and civilian side. Fifteen percent of the budget is defense today, defense-related. In 1960, 50 percent of the budget, or the money that we spent in the Federal Government, was for defense. It is 4 percent of the GDP. That is the lowest level of spending in history. And when somebody gets up and says you can take just a small percentage out of defense and, for instance, I have to say that the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Obey] and I normally agree that these things should not be offset. He feels strongly now because it is coming out of domestic. I do not think it ought to be offset because it is an emergency and we cannot afford to take this out of defense, and I hope in the end we will be able to work this out. We can no longer afford to pay for these operations out of the hide of the Defense Department, because all we do is reduce readiness. All these deployments, some were agreed to, some were not agreed to, by the Congress. Some were advocated by the Congress, some were not. The President has every right to deploy troops in an emergency situation, in a national security situation. I have urged every White House over the years to consult with Congress when it is for humanitarian deployment so that we will know what the cost is and how we are going to pay for it. The gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. McDade] and I last year worked with the national security adviser, and we came up with language that said the White House will confer with Congress before they make humanitarian deployments. No President likes to do that. I remember when Secretary Weinberger came before the Congress, and you could not ask him one question because if you had 5 minutes, your 5 minutes were gone. I would say to him, ``You can't reduce taxes, increase defense and balance the budget, because at some point defense is going to be hurt.'' Now, in the exercise that is going on now, and I understand the constituents' concern and the voters want to move towards a balanced budget. The problem is that defense, even though it is a much smaller percentage of the gross domestic product, it is still not being able to be increased in the future. And anything we take out of defense hurts readiness. It hurts quality of life. I went down to Fort Campbell. Sixty percent of the children going to school on the base needed some kind of supplement from the Federal Government. They were living and had to have some sort of help to pay for their meals. We have got a backlog of real property maintenance of $12 billion, and depot maintenance of $2 billion. So anybody who thinks there is an excess of money in the Defense Department does not understand how the system works. In the end we will have another reprogramming, we will have all kinds of changes made in the amount of money the Defense Department has. It is absolutely essential they get this legislation as quickly as possible so we can go to conference and get the whole thing worked out. I would urge the Members to support this supplemental.

Mr. MURTHA

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Speaker, let me come at this from a little different direction. Let me say, Mr. Speaker, that I come at this from the same position I have always taken. When I went down to see President Clinton right after he was elected, I said ``Mr. President, we have been cutting the defense budget substantially over the last 6 or 7 years, and we have been trying to do it in a way where we did not end up with a hollow force. We did not want the disaster we had after World War II, after Korea, and after Vietnam. I said to him that the only way that I can support this reduced budget, which he was proposing, was if he sent a supplemental appropriation for extraneous operations. As many of the Members know, I opposed the Somalia incursion, and yet last year, in a bipartisan effort, we funded that program substantially without offsets. The Haiti invasion I personally supported. Most of the members of the subcommittee did not support it. However, we felt very strongly that the Congress passed legislation which supported Haiti, and this helps to refund money that the military has already spent. There is no way that we can continue the type of readiness we need to deploy troops quickly if we offset this money. Mr. Speaker, I know there are two plans. One is to offset if from the rescissions, and one is to offset if from the Defense Department. I do not like either, but my proposal is that we move this supplemental forward. I am in favor of a restrictive rule. I feel very strongly about it, that we have to move this forward so that in the end we will be able to work this thing out. In working with the new chairman, the gentleman from Florida, Bill Young, and the gentleman from Louisiana, Bob Livingston, the chairman, there has been no proposal that I have made that they have not listened to and tried to find a way to work out. I understand the pressure. I did not vote for the balanced budget amendment. Two-thirds of the House did, so I understand why there is a feeling that it is necessary, but I support the administration's position that this money should not be offset. Actually, Mr. Speaker, if we were to offset all the money for these kinds of operations, it destroys the very thing we have done over the last few years, and that is to try to very delicately reduce the size of the force and make money available when there is an extraneous operation. Many of the Members on the subcommittee feel exactly the same way, many of the Members of the floor feel Speaker, I am hopeful that as this legislation works its way through the Congress, we will be able to make some changes that are reasonable. There is no question in my mind, Mr. Speaker, the Senate will eliminate the $600 million which the chairman put into the bill, and he feels very strongly about, because I do not think the offsets can be found from the Defense Department without hurting the very viability and readiness of the Defense Department. I feel strongly that there should be a restricted rule, that we should move forward with this legislation. All the Commanders in Chief of the various regions have said to us they have to have this legislation by the end of March. It is absolutely essential we get it through the House, that we get it over to the Senate, let the Senate act on it, and then we will work our will in conference. Mr. Speaker, I just want to add that I understand what the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Obey] is trying to do. I feel very strongly, I am against that just as much as I am against the rescissions, so may feeling is very clear. My position is very clear. I am against any offsets. I think this bill should not be offset. I do not think we ought to take it out of the hide of the military. On the other hand, I think we ought to move this legislation forward. I think this is the only way to get the legislation through in any method so we can start addressing it in the Senate. I support what the Committee on Rules has done. I think this is the only kind of a rule that will expedite the matter and we should pass the legislation as quickly as we can and get to conference where we can work out the details.

Mr. MURTHA

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, a few days ago this Congress in its wisdom passed a Balanced Budget Amendment. Two-thirds of the Members in this body said that ``We want to balance the budget,'' and I understand that. I realize the deep concern of the American people about the deficit. On the Subcommittee on Defense of the Committee on Appropriations, for years we have been trying to reduce the size of the expenditure because we know that the pressure is on defense versus domestic. We recognize that we have to do it in a way that we do not have the same debacle we had after World War II, after Korea, and after Vietnam. I think we have done a pretty good job. There is no question many of the things that my good friend, the gentleman from California, Duke Cunningham, has said are true. Many of the things that each of the Members have said today are true. There is a threat from the former Soviet Union. However, Mr. Chairman, more of a threat to our viability is the readiness of the troops. I think this Congress spoke absolutely correctly when it said ``Readiness is first, theater missile is second, and third is a space- based national missile ballistic system.'' When we go to a base and 60 percent of the kids are on food stamps, when you have a billion dollar backlog in real property maintenance, which is the heart of readiness, when you have a $2 billion backlog in depot maintenance, when you deploy troops to Iraq or to Korea and cannot sustain that deployment, and I know the chiefs say they can deploy to two different theaters. They cannot deploy to two different theaters and sustain that for any length of time, in my estimation. Mr. Chairman, if we do not adopt this amendment, the thrust of this amendment, I believe that we will be hurting the very thing that all us are trying to improve and keep. I have been working 7 years trying to make sure that the medical facilities and the quality of life for the men and women under arms is at a higher level, and it is no easy task, because every time I turn around, the military finds a way to reprogram that money, finds a way to use it for something else. The Members will be facing the supplemental in a few days. My good friend, the gentleman from Florida, Bill Young, and I have worked out the best type of supplemental we can possibly work out. I do not think the money should be offset because it is paying for extraordinary operations. I think it ought to be money that is emergency money, as the President asked for, but because of the pressure of the budget, it is going to be offset. I understand that. I do not agree with it, but I understand that. There is nobody in this Congress that knows more about the effects of missile attacks than I do. As Members will remember, I am one of the 80 Democrats, and I led the fight for the authorization to go to war in Saudi Arabia. A unit from my home town, one young fellow a block and a half away from me, was killed in a missile attack. I lost more people in the Saudi Arabia war than any other Member of Congress, so there is nobody that understands the importance of a theater missile system more than I do. There is nobody who understands the importance of protecting this great country against any threat. However, we do not have the money to protect against any threat in the world. Anybody on our Subcommittee on Defense on the Committee on Appropriations will remember the difficulties we face every year. Somebody got up a few minutes ago and they said that the Committee on Armed Services put a pay raise in for the Members of the Armed Forces. Half the people I have talked to have been deployed over 50 percent of the time, and the Administration had not asked for a pay raise. I forced the issue, and the Committee on Armed Services did in fact put the pay raise in. The tally for that pay raise was $11 billion, one of the most important things we could have done last year, because it had such a beneficial impact on the men and women serving in our Armed Forces. Certainly, if we ask them to go forth and spend so much time away from home, as many of the Members have done, the least we can do is make sure they have the quality of life. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of what we are trying to do today to take a reasonable position, continue the research, but do not make people believe that we can deploy this system prematurely. I would hope the Members would consider very seriously supporting the Edwards amendment and keeping the readiness of this great country at the highest level possible.

Mr. MURTHA

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to a dedicated member of the federal financial management community upon his retirement as Director of Operations for the Department of Defense Comptroller after more than 30 years of service to his country. Mr. John A. Flinn is most deserving of our tribute. He has consistently demonstrated the qualities expected of our finest public servants. His efforts have been a primary factor in the effective formulation and presentation of the Department of Defense Operation and Maintenance budget for more than 20 years, and the fact that our military today is the finest it has ever been is in no small part due to his efforts. Mr. Flinn's Federal career commenced in 1961 with the Department of the Navy. He served in many responsible positions with the Navy before being selected to work in the Office of the Secretary of Defense in 1974. Since 1986, Mr. Flinn has served as Director of Operations, the primary DOD Comptroller interface with Congress and the Military Departments for the Military Personnel and Operation and Maintenance appropriations. His knowledge and expertise in operating budgets is unequaled in the Defense Department. During his 8 years as Director for Operations, he has gone beyond his regular duties to play a major role in the Department's transition to operations in a post-cold-war environment. The high esteem accorded Mr. Flinn by myself and my colleagues is reflected in the many times he was requested by name to testify before the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee. He always provided candid and accurate testimony. Mr. Flinn was the primary focal point within the Comptroller for developing budgets to support Desert Shield/Desert Storm. The unprecedented funding mechanism in which many nations provided both financial and in-kind resources, required the establishment of new and innovative approaches to meeting the service's funding requirements. Mr. Flinn was able to develop and implement this innovative funding mechanism because he had the respect and confidence of the Military Departments and our staff. Mr. Flinn's most enduring contribution, however, will always be his steadfast advocacy in support of our soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines, and their families. Mr. Speaker, it is a great honor for me to present the credentials of Mr. Flinn before the Congress today. It is clear that Mr. Flinn has played a key role in ensuring effective financial management for the Defense Department and for the taxpayers of the United States. We wish him success in his coming endeavors. He will be missed.

Mr. MURTHA

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Speaker, I would like to take a moment to note the retirement of John Reck, the chairman of the United Steelworkers Association's Pennsylvania legislative committee. John has spent 43 years with the USWA in Pennsylvania, serving in virtually every elective and appointive office in the organization. He has served as a member of various boards and commissions in the Commonwealth, and has been instrumental in negotiating labor agreements for the USWA in Pennsylvania. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate John and wish him well in his retirement. The USWA loses an important figure with his retirement, but John Reck has made the USWA in Pennsylvania a stronger and more effective organization through his work. His legacy will continue to influence the USWA in Pennsylvania, and his efforts on behalf of steelworkers will be long remembered.

Mr. MURTHA

Mr. MURTHA. Mr. Speaker, on January 10, the Defense Department testified before the House Judiciary Committee on the balanced budget amendment. The Defense Department's testimony should set off alarm bells for anyone who cares about America's Armed Forces. According to the Defense Department's Comptroller, a balanced budget amendment which all but ends the congressional ability to even modestly increase revenues would force defense spending cuts over the next 7 years of between $220 billion in the best case to $520 billion in the worst case. The $220 billion reduction is projected if entitlements are not exempt from cuts. But if Social Security and Medicare are shielded from reductions, the defense share of necessary spending cuts grows close to the half trillion dollar figure. To put the magnitude of these cuts into perspective, the GAO tells us we are already $150 billion short over the next 5 years in paying for the severely downsized force structure and modernization plan set in place by President Clinton. What does it mean for America's security if we are to double, treble, or even quadruple the size of this problem? How will we come up with an additional quarter or half trillion dollars in domestic program cuts just to maintain our current force? What if we can't? Defense Department officials say life under the cuts this version of the balanced budget amendment would mandate would be characterized by a hollow, demoralized force which cannot be modernized and which quickly loses its technological edge. It would mean further base closings, further personnel cuts, and further hardships on our remaining troops. It would certainly change our ability to project force globally and would leave a potentially dangerous vacuum around the world. Everyone agrees we must move toward a balanced budget and proceed with deficit reduction. We can and we must do this through careful thought-out proposals that are fully debated in Congress. But to force further draconian cuts on our Armed Forces through an inflexible balanced budget amendment risks our troops' ability to defend our Nation, risks our standing in global affairs, and risks the entire defense structure of the United States. During my 20 years in Congress I've consistently worked with Members on both sides of the aisle to make sure we didn't have a hollow force. My advice now is to slow down and think carefully about what the balanced budget amendment will do to our national security. At the very least, the impact of a balanced budget amendment on the Armed Forces should receive full hearings in the House National Security Committee and House Budget Committee. But if we vote before these hearings take place, I hope every Member of the House will carefully consider how the implementation of a balanced budget amendment would affect our Armed Forces and the most important duty we have as Members of Congress--protecting the national security of the United States.