Curt Weldon

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I, first of all, want to thank the distinguished chairman and the ranking member for their outstanding support of this legislation, and this legislation is extremely important because it sends a signal not just to our colleagues but to the country that this is an institution where we all work together in a very compatible way. Oftentimes people who watch C-SPAN and people who read about the Congress think that we are filled with adversity, that we do not get along, and nothing could be further from the truth. This is a great institution. I have had the pleasure of serving here now 19 years. I am in my tenth term, and I have met some wonderful people, people on both sides of the aisle, people who may disagree on the issues but are strong and close friends when we get together when we are not in session or when we have events that are important for this country. But what makes this institution work are the staff, the people who work behind the scenes, the people who take down the minutes of what is said, the clerks, the people who record, the people who run the C-SPAN camera system, the people who run this institution of the building itself, the Architect of the Capitol and the employees. And while many members of the public do not get to see behind the scenes, there are in fact two Cloakrooms, one for each side of the aisle. Yet we are certainly welcome to go into either Cloakroom anytime. There is no prohibition, and I am sure Helen has served perhaps as many meals to Democrats as she has to Republicans. And it is appropriate that we honor someone who has been with this institution for one-third of the history of this institution. Can we imagine that, Mr. Speaker? This woman served this country and this institution for a period of time that is equal to one-third of the history of this Nation and this institution. A woman who started following in her father's footsteps when she was a teenager, he would bring here down here to the Republican Cloakroom. Her father ran the Cloakroom where, during the hours that we were in session, Members can go back and take telephone calls. They can purchase a sandwich or a cup of soup. They can sit and chat. And Helen was always there for the past 71 years to provide an atmosphere of friendship, an atmosphere of positive reinforcement after Members of Congress from time to time would leave the well after having given lengthy speeches. And she served during unbelievable times, starting with the Great Depression and serving in this institution when some of the great moments in our country's history were declared, when some of the greatest State of the Union speeches were made. So she is a part and a legacy of what makes this institution great, and it is only appropriate that we honor her in this way because, in fact, Mr. Speaker, she served 71 years. There is no employee in the history of the Congress, including Members of the House or Senate, who has served more than Helen Sewell. Helen could not be with us today, Mr. Speaker, but she is watching this proceeding from her bed at her retirement home. We have talked to Helen's family. We talked to her daughter, and they are watching with her. And, Helen, we are not allowed to speak to you directly because that violates the rules of the House, but through the Speaker, I will say to you, Helen, that we wish you well. We are all thinking about you. Many of your friends are signing a card for you, and if you look behind me, these beautiful roses will be delivered to you later on today as a symbol of the love that all 1,500 Members of Congress that you have come in contact feel about your service. Every Member of Congress has had a chance to interact with Helen Sewell. Think of that. Fifteen hundred Members of Congress that have come and gone over the past 71 years have interfaced with this lady. In fact, Mr. Speaker, we keep these photographs in the back of the Cloakroom that I thought it might be appropriate to let our constituents see. Here is Helen Sewell, and it shows the love by Presidents of the United States who also served as former Members of Congress. We can see by the admiration that these Presidents have for Helen that they enjoyed her company, and we can see the high degree of respect that they would pay to her when they frequently visited the House Chambers. Now, because she worked for us I do not have any photographs of Democrat Presidents, but I know President Clinton was just as fond of Helen Sewell as were Republican Presidents, but it is just that she worked for our side. This is another photograph of Helen with one of our dear Presidents. So, Mr. Speaker, this resolution is a celebration of this institution. It is a celebration 1 week before Christmas, where we in fact are wrapping up the business of the people. But we take the time to honor those people who allow this institution to work, the people whom you do not see, the people who do not make the speeches, the people who do not go out and get their pictures on national TV and in the media, but the people whom really we rely on to allow us to be successful. Helen, we thank you for your great support and the commitment you have made to America in support of our Congress. Helen has three children: Jameille Thomas, Anthony Sewell, and Ava Fuller. Ava, thank you for talking to me today and telling me about your mother. Helen's father brought her to this institution, and we want to also recognize Helen's father. And, boy, did he have an appropriate name: Benjamin Franklin Jones. It was Helen's father who brought her to this institution 71 years ago to allow her to begin to work and love this institution that was such a critical part of her life. Helen was also involved with her church. She was active with the Petworth United Methodist Church here in D.C. She was a trustee. She was a church historian. She was an active member of the Northwest Civic Association. Helen has nine grandkids, and I have been told she has too many great grandkids to number, that it is probably in the dozens and dozens. And we also, Helen, have to tell a few secrets about you, because as these Members of Congress would go into the back Cloakroom to get sandwiches we would sometimes have to get Helen's attention. Helen had a small TV set, one of these small 10-inch TV sets. And Helen's favorite preoccupation, when she was not waiting on Members of Congress, was watching the soaps. Helen was a national expert and historian on the soap operas. She could tell us any day of the week who was dating whom and which person was, in fact, in trouble with which other person. Helen, we will preserve those memories of your activities in the Cloakroom and the fact that your famous word of hollering to us ``next'' will be remembered by all the Members of Congress that miss you today. But when they enter the Cloakroom and see that sign above it that says ``Chez Helen,'' the House of Helen, that was in fact provided by our former colleague Amo Houghton, we want you all to know, Helen, that we love you, that we miss you, that your retirement is a symbol of work that you have put forward and it is a symbol of how we in this institution have to from time to time stop and say ``thank you,'' ``thank you'' to those people behind the scenes who make this Congress and this institution such an important part of America's history and legacy.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to pay tribute to our distinguished chairman and the distinguished ranking member for such a fantastic job under very difficult circumstances to get this conference report to the floor. This was a very difficult piece of legislation, but the chairman persevered and we are very happy to have the legislation here tonight. I know our soldiers all around the world are happy that this bill is going to be brought forward because there are so many positive things in it. I have the particular pleasure of serving as the chairman of the Air, Land Subcommittee; and I want to pay tribute to my good friend and ranking member, Mr. Abercrombie from Hawaii, who is not here right now, for the excellent work that he did. In supporting the global war on terrorism in our area, we have included a number of additional programs, including $450 million for up-armored Humvees, $260 million for other armored tactical vehicles, $450 million for small arms, $250 million for ammunition, $30 million for Stryker combat vehicle combat losses, $180 million for radios, $117 million for blue force tracking, $285 million for night vision devices, $35 million to counter improvised explosive devices, $108 million for countering rockets, artillery, and mortars, $50 million for Hellfire missiles, and $180 million for unmanned aerial vehicles. Mr. Speaker, these are all critically important platforms for the troops in the ongoing battle against terrorism, as well as the theater of operation. We have also reinstated the C-130J multiyear procurement. We have put some language on the future combat systems budget. We reduced it by $50 million to make sure we are giving the taxpayers the best possible oversight of the SCS program. We have also attempted to put some more accountability in the DOD acquisition programs and significant language in other provisions that we think are going to provide the taxpayers and the warfighter with more accountability and more efficiency. Mr. Speaker, I want to pay particular thanks to the leadership, both Mr. Skelton and Mr. Hunter, for including two very important commissions that we worked hard to achieve, the Nuclear Strategy Forum and the EMP Commission. I want to pay particular thanks to Mr. Roscoe Bartlett, Chairman Bartlett, for his outstanding work on this issue. The EMP Commission now will have an ongoing process of evaluating our military platforms against the threat of an EMP. Overall, Mr. Speaker, this process has been long. I think this is the latest we have ever gone with the Defense authorization bill, and the credit for all of this outstanding work goes to my distinguished chairman. He is a great American. The one thing about Mr. Hunter and the one thing about Mr. Skelton, everything that we do, they keep in mind the warfighter, the soldier. Each of them has made trip after trip into the theater, into Iraq, into Afghanistan, meeting the troops and making sure that we are in fact holding the Defense Department accountable to giving our troops the best possible equipment and technology. I am happy to support this conference report. I would ask all of our colleagues to give an overwhelming vote of support for this. Again I want to thank the distinguished chairman and ranking member for their leadership.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I rise to oppose this resolution. I have been in this body 19 years, and I did not support setting artificial dates to remove our troops from Bosnia, Somalia, Kosovo, East Timor, Macedonia and all the other times that we have deployed our troops. In fact, even when we were told back in 1997, the year after we entered Bosnia, that our troops would be home by Christmas, I did not rise to bring them home. We were told in Christmas of 1998 they would be home and Christmas of 1999. The fact is we still have troops in the Balkans. They have been there 10 years, even though it was not part of the original plan. Mr. Speaker, all of us support our troops, but I want to tell my colleagues, in my 19 years I learned a lesson of supporting the troops from the gentleman from Pennsylvania. He took me under his wing when I came here as a freshman 19 years ago. I have traveled with him around the world. I have seen his personal dedication to the men and women who serve. Now, there are many others in this body on both sides of the aisle that we can say the same thing about, but I want to stand up as a Representative from the other side of Pennsylvania and tell the story of Jack Murtha who epitomizes what our military's all about. I wish I could say I have been to Landstuhl, a medical facility in Germany, as many times as Jack Murtha has been there. I wish I could say that weekly I would go over to Walter Reed Hospital and meet with the troops as Jack Murtha has done week after week after week. I wish I could say I have gone and held the hands of the wives and the children of the sailors at Bethesda as Jack Murtha has done. Mr. Speaker, I wish I could say that I have done all that, but I cannot. Jack Murtha is one of a kind. He is an example for all of us in this body, and none of us should ever think of questioning his motives, his desires or support for our American troops. Mr. Speaker, I also want to say I have been here 19 years. I have been here with Republican and Democrat Presidents. Yes, Jack Murtha's been there. He stood up when Bill Clinton tried to cut the funding for our troops, and he stood with us on some very tough votes. He stood up with us on the tough policy questions. He was with us on missile defense. He was with us when others in his party would not be with us on defense and security issues. On some very tough leadership spots Jack Murtha was there, and for the 5 years that President Bush has been President, I cannot count on my hands the number of times Jack Murtha has stood with our President in supporting our troops in supporting more money, in supporting the policies that give us the kind of capability that we need. Mr. Speaker, we are in a sad state today. We are in a tough time with our troops. They are wondering what is going on back here. It is not about Jack Murtha trying to undermine anyone, just as I and others would not have tried to do that in the other 40 deployments in the 19 years that I have been here, but it is wrong, Mr. Speaker, that a gentleman with the reputation and leadership of Jack Murtha should have to wait 5 months to get a response to a letter expressing his concerns to the administration. That is not right. So, Mr. Speaker, I would hope we would all come together, and I would hope that our Commander in Chief would invite the good gentleman from Pennsylvania down to the White House to have a discussion about how we can move forward together to support the troops and win the day in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I include material regarding Able Danger for the Record: House of Representatives, Washington, DC, November 9, 2005. Hon. Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary, Department of Defense, The Pentagon, Washington,

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Concurrent Resolution 307, 109th Congress, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, first of all, let me thank my friend and colleague for allowing me to take this 5-minute special order before his 1 hour. I will be brief, but I rise for an issue of severe concern to me, Mr. Speaker. As someone who has spent 19 years working on defense and security issues in this Congress and currently serves as the vice chairman of the Armed Services and Homeland Security Committees, I have to report to my colleagues continuing efforts to try to find out what happened before 9/11 and, unfortunately, have to report that we are being stonewalled. In fact, Mr. Speaker, I cannot use any other term but the appearance of a cover-up. Just a few moments ago, I questioned one of the cochairs of the 9/11 Commission, Lee Hamilton, why the Commission has not yet responded to a letter that I sent to them on August 10 of this year, which I will enter into the Record at this point. August 10, 2005. Hon. Thomas H. Kean, Chairman, Hon. Lee H. Hamilton, Vice Chairman, 9/11 Public Discourse Project, One DuPont Circle, NW., Washington, DC. Dear Chairman Kean and Vice Chairman Hamilton: I am contacting you to discuss an important issue that concerns the terrible events of September 11, 2001, and our country's efforts to ensure that such a calamity is never again allowed to occur. Your bipartisan work on The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States shed light on much that was unclear in the minds of the American people regarding what happened that fateful day, however there appears to be more to the story than the public has been told. I bring this before you because of my respect for you both, and for the 9-11 Commission's service to America. Almost seven years ago, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1999 established the Advisory Panel to Assess Domestic Response Capabilities for Terrorism Involving Weapons of Mass Destruction, otherwise known as the Gilmore Commission. The Gilmore Commission reached many of the same conclusions as your panel, and in December of 2000 called for the creation of a ``National Office for Combating Terrorism.'' I mention this because prior to 9/11, Congress was aware of many of the institutional obstacles to preventing a terrorist attack, and was actively attempting to address them. I know this because I authored the language establishing the Gilmore Commission. In the 1990's, as chairman of the congressional subcommittee that oversaw research and development for the Department of Defense, I paid special attention to the activities of the Army's Land Information Warfare Activity (LIWA) at Ft. Belvoir. During that time, I led a bipartisan delegation of Members of Congress to Vienna, Austria to meet with members of the Russian parliament, or Duma. Before leaving, I received a brief from the CIA on a Serbian individual that would be attending the meeting. The CIA provided me with a single paragraph of information. On the other hand, representatives of LIWA gave me five pages of far more in-depth analysis. This was cause for concern, but my debriefing with the CIA and FBI following the trip was cause for outright alarm: neither had ever heard of LIWA or the data mining capability it possessed. As a result of experiences such as these, I introduced language into three successive Defense Authorization bills calling for the creation of an intelligence fusion center which I called NOAH, or National Operations and Analysis Hub. The NOAH concept is certainly familiar now, and is one of several recommendations made by your commission that has a basis in earlier acts of Congress. Despite my repeated efforts to establish NOAH, the CIA insisted that it would not be practical. Fortunately, this bureaucratic intransigence was overcome when Congress and President Bush acted in 2003 to create the Terrorism Threat Integration Center (now the National Counterterrorism Center). Unfortunately, it took the deaths of 3,000 people to bring us to the point where we could make this happen. Now, I am confident that under the able leadership of John Negroponte, the days of toleration for intelligence agencies that refuse to share information with each other are behind us. The 9-11 Commission produced a book-length account of its findings, that the American people might educate themselves on the challenges facing our national effort to resist and defeat terrorism. Though under different circumstances, I eventually decided to do the same. I recently published a book critical of our intelligence agencies because even after 9/11, they were not getting the message. After failing to win the bureaucratic battle inside the Beltway, I decided to take my case to the American people. In recent years, a reliable source that I refer to as ``Ali'' began providing me with detailed inside information on Iran's role in supporting terror and undermining the United States' global effort to eradicate it. I have forwarded literally hundreds of pages of information from Ali to the CIA, FBI, and DIA, as well as the appropriate congressional oversight committees. The response from our intelligence agencies has been underwhelming, to put it mildly. Worse, I have documented occasions where the CIA has outright lied to me. While the mid-level bureaucrats at Langley may not be interested in what I have to say, their new boss is. Porter Goss has all of the information I have gathered, and I know he is ready to do what it takes to challenge the circle-the-wagons culture of the CIA. And Pete Hoekstra, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, is energized as well. Director Goss and Chairman Hoekstra are both outstanding leaders that know each other well from their work together in the House of Representatives, and I will continue to strongly support their efforts at reform. All of this background leads to the reason I am writing to you today. Yesterday the national news media began in-depth coverage of a story that is not new. In fact, I have been talking about it for some time. From 1998 to 2001, Army Intelligence and Special Operations Command spearheaded an effort called Able Danger that was intended to map out al Qaeda. According to individuals that were part of the project, Able Danger identified Mohammed Atta as a terrorist threat before 9/11. Team members believed that the Atta cell in Brooklyn should be subject to closer scrutiny, but somewhere along the food chain of Administration bureaucrats and lawyers, a decision was made in late 2000 against passing the information to the FBI. These details are understandably of great interest to the American people, thus the recent media frenzy. However I have spoken on this topic for some time, in the House Armed Services and Homeland Security Committees, on the floor of the House on June 27, 2005, and at various speaking engagements. The impetus for this letter is my extreme disappointment in the recent, and false, claim of the 9-11 Commission staff that the Commission was never given access to any information on Able Danger. The 9-11 Commission staff received not one but two briefings on Able Danger from former team members, yet did not pursue the matter. Furthermore, commissioners never returned calls from a defense intelligence official that had made contact with them to discuss this issue as a follow on to a previous meeting. In retrospect, it appears that my own suggestions to the Commission might have directed investigators in the direction of Able Danger, had they been heeded. I personally reached out to members of the Commission several times with information on the need for a national collaborative capability, of which Able Danger was a prototype. In the context of those discussions, I referenced LIWA and the work it had been doing prior to 9/11. My chief of staff physically handed a package containing this information to one of the commissioners at your Commission's appearance on April 13, 2004 in the Hart Senate Office Building. I have spoken with Governor Kean by phone on this subject, and my office delivered a package with this information to the 9-11 Commission staff via courier. When the Commission briefed Congress with their findings on July 22, 2004, I asked the very first question in exasperation: ``Why didn't you let Members of Congress who were involved in these issues testify before, or meet with, the Commission?'' The 9-11 Commission took a very high-profile role in critiquing intelligence agencies that refused to listen to outside information. The commissioners very publicly expressed their disapproval of agencies and departments that would not entertain ideas that did not originate in-house. Therefore it is no small irony that the Commission would in the end prove to be guilty of the very same offense when information of potentially critical importance was brought to its attention. The Commission's refusal to investigate Able Danger after being notified of its existence, and its recent efforts to feign ignorance of the project while blaming others for supposedly withholding information on it, brings shame on the commissioners, and is evocative of the worst tendencies in the federal government that the Commission worked to expose. Questions remain to be answered. The first: What lawyers in the Department of Defense made the decision in late 2000 not to pass the information from Able Danger to the FBI? And second: Why did the 9-11 Commission staff not find it necessary to pass this information to the Commissioners, and why did the 9-11 Commission staff not request full documentation of Able Danger from the team member that volunteered the information? Answering these questions is the work of the commissioners now, and fear of tarnishing the Commission's legacy cannot be allowed to override the truth. The American people are counting on you not to ``go native'' by succumbing to the very temptations your Commission was assembled to indict. In the meantime, I have shared all that I know on this topic with the congressional committee chairmen that have oversight over the Department of Defense, the CIA, the FBI, and the rest of our intelligence gathering and analyzing agencies. You can rest assured that Congress will share your interest in how it is that this critical information is only now seeing the light of day. Sincerely, Curt Weldon, Member of Congress. This letter asks significant questions about a Top Secret intelligence unit in the military that identified Mohammed Atta and three associates in a Brooklyn cell 1 year before 9/11. Mr. Speaker, these individuals are still in the military, and they have offered to testify publicly, but this administration is gagging them. This administration is not allowing these military officers to speak, and in fact, the Defense Intelligence Agency is in the midst of destroying the career of a 23-year Bronze Star recipient, a lieutenant colonel in the Army, for doing one thing, for telling the truth. Mr. Speaker, there are bureaucrats in this administration, in the previous administration who do not want the story of Able Danger to come forward. Even though this secret intelligence unit was ordered by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, carried out by Special Forces Command, and we now know had information 2 days before the attack on the Cole that could have prevented 17 sailors from losing their lives; and in January of 2000, identified Mohammed Atta and, in September of 2000, tried to transfer that information to the FBI on three occasions. In fact, Mr. Speaker, the 9/11 Commission did not mention Able Danger at all. When they were asked about it by the New York Times in August of this year, they said, Well, it was historically insignificant. Mr. Speaker, Louis Freeh, the FBI Director during the time of 9/11, was interviewed on national news by Tim Russert on ``Meet the Press'' 2 weeks ago, and when he was asked about his role in the information on 9/11, he said, Well, you know, if we would have had the information from the Able Danger team, and I quote, ``that is the kind of tactical intelligence that would have made a difference in stopping the hijacking.'' Louis Freeh says it could have stopped the hijacking, and the 9/11 Commission now says it is historically insignificant. Mr. Speaker, there is something wrong in the Beltway. Tomorrow, at 12:30 in the House gallery, I will unveil additional new information on Able Danger. I will unveil an enhanced set of investigations because, Mr. Speaker, in the end, the families of the 3,000 victims, the families of the 17 sailors, the people in this country deserve to know the truth. What happened before 9/11? Why is information being held in secret? Why are military officers being gagged? Why can the truth not be told? Mr. Speaker, we must in this body demand the truth publicly.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to talk to our colleagues and through our colleagues to the American people about an issue that troubles me greatly. I have been in this institution 19 years, and during those 19 years I have been on the Committee on Armed Services. Currently, I am the vice chairman of that committee and chairman of the subcommittee that oversees the purchase of our weapons systems. In the past I have chaired the research subcommittee. I have chaired the readiness subcommittee, and I have spent every available hour of my time working to make sure that our military troops were properly protected and have the proper equipment and training. I am a strong supporter of our military. Whether it was in the last 2 years of the Reagan administration, the four years of the Bush administration, the 8 years of the Clinton administration, or the current administration of President George W. Bush, I have been a strong supporter of our military. I am a strong supporter of President Bush. I campaigned for him. I am a strong supporter of Secretary Rumsfeld. I say all of that, Mr. Speaker, because tonight I rise to express my absolute outrage and disgust with what is happening in our defense intelligence agencies. Mr. Speaker, back in 1999 when I was Chair of the defense research subcommittee, the Army was doing cutting-edge work on a new type of technology to allow us to understand and predict emerging transnational terrorist threats. That technology was being done at several locations, but was being led by our Special Forces Command. The work that they were doing was unprecedented. And because of what I saw there, I supported the development of a national capability of a collaborative center that the CIA would just not accept. In fact, in November 4 of 1999, 2 years before 9/11, in a meeting in my office with the Deputy Secretary of Defense, Deputy Director of the CIA, Deputy Director of the FBI, we presented a nine-page proposal to create a national collaborative center. When we finished the brief, the CIA said we did not need that capability, and so before 9/11 we did not have it. When President Bush came in after a year of research, he announced the formation of the Terrorism Threat Integration Center, exactly what I had proposed in 1999. Today it is known as the NCTC, the National Counterterrorism Center. But, Mr. Speaker, what troubles me is not the fact that we did not take those steps. What troubles me is that I now have learned in the last 4 months that one of the tasks that was being done in 1999 and 2000 was a top-secret program organized at the request of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, carried out by the general in charge of our Special Forces Command, a very elite unit focusing on information regarding al Qaeda. It was a military language effort to allow us to identify the key cells of al Qaeda around the world and to give the military the capability to plan actions against those cells so they could not attack us as they did in 1993 at the Trade Center, at the Khobar Towers, the U.S.S. Cole attack, and the African embassy bombings. What I did not know, Mr. Speaker, up until June of this year, was that that secret program called Able Danger actually identified the Brooklyn cell of al Qaeda in January and February of 2000, over 1 year before 9/11 every happened. In addition, I learned that not only did we identify the Brooklyn cell of al Qaeda, but we identified Mohamed Atta as one of the members of that Brooklyn cell along with three other terrorists who were the leadership of the 9/11 attack. I have also learned, Mr. Speaker, that in September of 2000, again, over 1 year before 9/11, that Able Danger team attempted on three separate occasions to provide information to the FBI about the Brooklyn cell of al Qaeda, and on three separate occasions they were denied by lawyers in the previous administration to transfer that information. Mr. Speaker, this past Sunday on ``Meet the Press,'' Louis Freeh, FBI Director at the time, was interviewed by Tim Russert. The first question to Louis Freeh was in regard to the FBI's ability to ferret out the terrorists. Louis Freeh's response, which can be obtained by anyone in this country as a part of the official record, was, Well, Tim, we are now finding out that a top-secret program of the military called Able Danger actually identified the Brooklyn cell of al Qaeda and Mohammed Atta over a year before 9/11. And what Louis Freeh said, Mr. Speaker, is that that kind of actionable data could have allowed us to prevent the hijackings that occurred on September 11. So now we know, Mr. Speaker, that military intelligence officers working in a program authorized by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the general in charge of Special Forces Command, identified Mohammed Atta and three terrorists a year before 9/11, tried to transfer that information to the FBI were denied; and the FBI Director has now said publicly if he would have had that information, the FBI could have used it to perhaps prevent the hijackings that struck the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the plane that landed in Pennsylvania and perhaps saved 3,000 lives and changed the course of world history. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight because we have been trying to get the story out about Able Danger and what really happened. Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, I have to rise tonight to tell you that as bad as this story is, and as bad as it is that the data was not transferred to the FBI, and as bad as it is that the 9/11 Commission totally ignored this entire story and referred to it as historically insignificant even though it was authorized by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, even though Louis Freeh has now said it could have provided information to prevent the attack against us, the 9/11 Commission ignored it. Not because the commissioners ignored it, but because someone at the staff level on the 9/11 Commission staff decided for whatever reason that they did not want to pursue the Abel Danger story. Mr. Speaker, in August and September I met with the military officials involved with Abel Danger and one by one they told their story, until, Mr. Speaker, leaders in the Defense Intelligence Agency, including the deputy director, decided they do not want the story told. I think because they perhaps are fearful of being embarrassed and humiliated. So what direction had they taken, Mr. Speaker? They have gagged the military officers. They have prevented them from talking to any Member of Congress. They have prevented them from talking to the media. And the Defense Intelligence Agency has began a process to destroy the career and the life of Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer. Now, it might be easy for us to ignore this, Mr. Speaker. We all have busy careers and worry about reelections every 2 years and worry about our own families and our jobs. But I cannot do that in this case and neither can this body, and neither can the other body. You see, Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer took an oath to defend our Constitution. He took the words ``duty, honor, country'' seriously and devoted 23 years of his life in four deployed intelligence operations of our military to protect America. During the time he served our country, he has received the Bronze Star, an award that does not come easily, for showing acts of courage, leadership, and bravery in the course of his activities. He has received public commendations from previous directors of the Defense Intelligence Agency, including General Patrick Hughes, including generals at Special Forces Command, and including Admiral Wilson of the Defense Intelligence Agency. He has received dozens of letters and commendations for his work. The laudatory comments I reviewed in his files are unbelievable. But, you see, Mr. Speaker, there is a problem. The Deputy Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency was in a meeting with Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer almost a year before 9/11, and Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer showed him a disk in his office with information about al Qaeda and Mohammed Atta, and the Deputy Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency stopped the briefing and said, you cannot show me that. I do not want to see it. It might contain information I cannot look at. Now, Tony Shaffer was not in the room alone, Mr. Speaker. There were other people, and we know their names. So we have witnesses. Now, the Deputy Director has denied that meeting and denied he was there and denied this particular story, but the fact is he knows that we are going to pursue it. So what has happened to Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer, Mr. Speaker? The Defense Intelligence Agency has lifted his security clearance. One day before he was to testify before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, in uniform, they permanently removed his security clearance. And now our Defense Intelligence Agency has told Colonel Shaffer's lawyer that they plan to seek a permanent removal of his pay and his health care benefits for him and his two children. Why, Mr. Speaker? Because Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer, like Commander Scott Philpot of the Navy, like J. D. Smith, and like a host of other Able Danger employees, has told the truth. Now, Mr. Speaker, I sat here in the 1990s and I sat here during the 9/11 investigation and watched a ridiculous situation develop with Sandy Berger, the National Security Adviser under President Clinton. He walked into the National Archives before he was to testify before the 9/11 Commission looking through documents. He took documents out of the archives and stuffed them in his socks and pants so that no one would see them as he left the National Archives. Now, that is a felony, tampering with Federal documents and removing classified information regarding our security and information that the 9/11 commission needed to see. Sandy Berger initially lied about it. He said he did not do it. Then he admitted it, and he was given a punishment. And, oh, by the way, his security clearance was temporarily lifted, but he will get it back again, for lying, for stealing, and for committing an act of outrage against our country's security. Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer, a Bronze Star 23-year military veteran, simply told the truth and now his life is being ruined. His career is ended. He is no longer in military intelligence. They have taken his security clearance, and they are about to destroy him as a person. They are about to deny him the basic health care and the salary that he has earned, and they are doing it in this way. This is outrageous. It is evil. They do not want to fire Tony because they also do not want him to talk to the media. So by suspending him and removing his pay and his health care, they hurt him bad, but he cannot talk because he is under suspension and his lawyer has advised him that to talk to the media, to talk to Members of Congress, even when he is not being paid, would cause him further problems and totally prevent him from ever having this gross problem reversed. Mr. Speaker, this is outrageous. Mr. Speaker, this is not America. Over my 19 years in Congress, I have led 40 delegations to the former Soviet Union. I have sat in the face of the Soviet Communists and confronted them on full transparency. I sat at the table with President Lukashenko of Belarus, who has been called by our Secretary of State the last dictator in Europe. I took both delegations to North Korea, Mr. Speaker, and sat across the table from Kim Gye Gwan and I told him we abhor the way they treat their people, the way they lie about what is happening, and the way they distort information. Mr. Speaker, I took three delegations to Libya to meet with Qadhafi, and I told him that we are absolutely outraged at what Libya did in helping complete the Lockerbie bombing and the bombing of the Berlin nightclub. You know, Mr. Speaker, I never thought I would have to take the floor of this Chamber and make the same statements about the Defense Intelligence Agency. As a supporter of the President, as a supporter of the military, Mr. Speaker, if we allow this to go forward, then we send the signal to every man and woman wearing a uniform that if you tell the truth, you will be destroyed if a career bureaucrat above you does not like what you are saying. If you tell the truth, we will take your health care benefits away from your kids. If you tell the truth, we will ruin you. Mr. Speaker, this is not America. Mr. Speaker, this is not what I have been told by Secretary Rumsfeld that we are doing with our troops in protecting them, in giving them the best equipment and the best training. This is not what I spend hours in committee hearings on. This sends the wrong signal to America's troops. It tells them, do not be honest. Do not respect the fact that you have to be truthful. If there is somebody that the truth offends, then you better be silent. Mr. Speaker, I have today asked for an independent investigation of the Defense Intelligence Agency and their efforts at destroying Tony Shaffer's life. This is outrageous, Mr. Speaker. They trumped up charges against him. They said while he was overseas in Afghanistan, forward deployed, that he forwarded cell phone calls from his official phone to his personal phone; and when they checked that out, it ran up a cost to the taxpayers of about $60. The second verbal charge they gave him was that he went to a course at the Army War College and he got reimbursed for his travel, his mileage and tolls, 100-some dollars. And they said he received a commendation for which he was not entitled, even though it was signed by his commanding officer and the acting Secretary of the Army. But they went beyond that, Mr. Speaker. They went beyond that with this man. They said he had $2,000 of debt, personal debt. Well, I would like to have every Pentagon employee tomorrow, I would like to have the senior leadership show us what debt they have in the Defense Intelligence Agency so we can make that public. They even went to this length, Mr. Speaker: the Defense Intelligence Agency wrote in an official document that Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer stole public property. A serious charge. Well, when you check what that public property was, it was an assortment of pens, government pens. But what they did not say in the Defense Intelligence report was that he took those pens when he was 15 years of age and was with his father when he was on assignment at one of our embassy outposts. He took the pens to give to other students at the school when he was 15 years of age. And by the way, Mr. Speaker, it was Tony Shaffer himself who admitted to that thievery when he applied for his security clearance. So the Defense Intelligence Agency knew that during his entire career of 23 years, but they put that in the document against him. This is a scandal, Mr. Speaker. It is an outrage. It is a travesty. Everyone that worked with Tony Shaffer, the Navy officers, the private citizens have all said the same thing. This is a scandal to get Tony Shaffer because he has told the truth. Now, this Defense Intelligence Agency and this Deputy Director had the audacity to have their legal counsel send Tony Shaffer's lawyer a letter on September 23. I cannot put that letter in the Record because it is privileged information, but it will eventually come out. But in that letter, in the second to last paragraph, the legal counsel for the Defense Intelligence Agency says to Mr. Shaffer's lawyer, he cannot receive any more classified information from the Defense Intelligence Agency because I checked and his security clearances have all been removed. Therefore, he is not allowed to look at anything that is secret or confidential. Now, that is a letter sent by the general counsel of the DIA on September 23 of this year. Two weeks later, Mr. Speaker, to show the stupidity of the Defense Intelligence Agency, they send seven packages to Mr. Shaffer's lawyer of his personal belongings, which the Deputy Director of the DIA told my staff 3 months ago did not exist any more. And in those seven boxes, Mr. Speaker, were five classified memos. The Defense Intelligence Agency sent five classified memos to Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer, which they told him on September 23 he was not allowed to have access to. Mr. Speaker, that is a felony; and I have asked the Inspector General and the legal officials to investigate and prosecute the Defense Intelligence officials who sent five classified documents through the mail or by hand delivery to Tony Shaffer. In addition, Mr. Speaker, the Defense Intelligence Agency, in its absolute total stupidity, included in those boxes $500 worth of Federal property, including a multi-hundred dollar GPS system owned by the Federal Government, which they sent to Tony Shaffer, I guess to keep. They also sent, Mr. Speaker, 25 pens, brand new, and marked on them is ``Property of the U.S. Government.'' The Defense Intelligence Agency, in its absolute utter stupidity, sent Tony Shaffer Federal property which they accused him of taking when he was 15 years of age. Mr. Speaker, there is something desperately wrong here. There is a bureaucracy in the Defense Intelligence Agency that is out of control. They want to destroy the reputation of a 23-year military officer, Bronze Star recipient, hero of our country, with two kids because people in defense intelligence are embarrassed at what is going to come out. And what is going to come out, Mr. Speaker? Well, we are going to find out, Mr. Speaker, that that unit, Able Danger, not only identified Mohammed Atta before 9/11, not only did they try to pass that information to the FBI, not only was that large data destroyed in the summer of 2000, but now, Mr. Speaker, I can add a new dimension to this whole story. Yesterday, Mr. Speaker, I met with another Able Danger official. I was not aware of this official's knowledge because he does not live within the Beltway. This official, Mr. Speaker, has impeccable credentials. I cannot reveal his name today. I will to any Member of this body, any of our colleagues that want to come to me, I will tell you privately who this official is, and you will agree with me when I tell you his name that he has impeccable credentials. This official yesterday, Mr. Speaker, in a meeting in my office, told me that he has never been talked to by the Pentagon. He has never been talked to by the Defense Intelligence Agency in their supposed investigation. He has never been talked to by the 9/11 Commission staff in their investigation; yet this official had a leadership position in Able Danger. This official told me that there is a separate cache of information collected from over 20 Federal agencies in 1999 and 2000 on Able Danger that still may exist. Now, the Pentagon has told us all this material was destroyed, and now I have a senior official telling me there is a second pot of information that may well still exist. Furthermore, at the hearing over in the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, when Senator Specter asked why this data was destroyed, the witness who destroyed the data said, well, I was told that we could not keep this data for more than 90 days because it might involve information that contains U.S. persons, so we had to destroy it. Well, I found out that is not the story. The reason the data was destroyed was because Special Forces Command asked the Army for that data and within a matter of days, that data was destroyed so the Army would not pass it to Special Forces Command. Yet there still is, was and I hope still is a massive pot of data. But furthermore, that official that I talked to yesterday will also say that there was no 90-day requirement, as was testified before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. He said on a regular basis they kept information from Able Danger data mining for months and months and months. In fact, he will say he had a discussion with a lawyer in DOD named Schiffren who told him do not worry about it, just fill out a document, sign your name that you need it, put it in the box, and you can keep it as long as you want. Mr. Speaker, that is entirely contradictory to what the Defense Intelligence Agency has been telling us, to what DOD has been telling us. Now we have someone who is willing to come forward and say that 90- day period is not real, they kept Able Danger information for months and months and months. Mr. Speaker, there is something desperately wrong here. A sitting President of the United States resigned his position because he tried to cover up a third-rate burglary when some low-level operatives from the Republican committee to reelect him broke into the Democrat headquarters in Washington, D.C. No one was killed. No money was stolen. No State secrets were stolen. It was a third-rate burglary, but it caused the resignation of President Richard Nixon. Mr. Speaker, we are talking about the deaths of 3,000 Americans. Mr. Speaker, we are talking about 2.5 terabytes of data about al Qaeda. That is equal to one-fourth of all of the printed material in the Library of Congress. Mr. Speaker, we are talking about Mohammed Atta and three of the terrorists that attacked us on 9/11. Mr. Speaker, we are talking about military intelligence officers, including an Annapolis graduate who will command one of our destroyers in January of 2006 who risked his entire career to state on the record I will swear until I die that I saw Mohammed Atta's face every day starting in January of 2000, a year and a half before 9/11. Mr. Speaker, this is not somebody off the street, this is a graduate of Annapolis, a 23-year Naval officer who will command one of our destroyers in January who is agreeing with Lieutenant Shaffer. We have three other people who have testified under oath that they saw the same photograph, and the person I met yesterday will testify that he had the name of a Mohammed Atta before 9/11 but not the face. Mr. Speaker, this is not some third-rate burglary coverup. This is not some Watergate incident. This is an attempt to prevent the American people from knowing the facts about how we could have prevented 9/11 and people are covering it up today. They are ruining the career of a military officer to do it and we cannot let it stand. I do not care whether you are Democrat or Republican, you cannot let a lieutenant colonel's career be ruined because of some bureaucrat in the Defense Intelligence Agency. If we let that happen, then no one who wears the uniform will ever feel protected because we will have let them down. Anyone who wears the uniform of this country who is serving today expects us to back him or her up and that is not happening. We are seeing lying, distortion. Mr. Speaker, do you know, Wolf Blitzer on CNN told my staff that a Department of Defense employee told him that Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer was having an affair with one of my employees. How low can we go, Mr. Speaker? How low can we go to allow this Defense Department to try to ruin the reputation and the personal life of a lieutenant colonel with a Bronze Star? To Wolf Blitzer, Mr. Speaker. We need to know the name of that defense official who told Wolf Blitzer who told my staff, and he is not the only one. I have other media people who will come forward in this grand effort to destroy the reputation of a uniformed military officer, to create scandalous accusations. He does not even know my staff, to accuse him of stealing pens when he was 15, to take away his health care benefits for his two kids because he is telling the truth. What do we stand for if not the truth? Is it more important that we be politically correct? Is it more important that I not rock the boat because my party is in the White House, because I campaigned for Bush, and support Don Rumsfeld. Is that more important? If that is more important, I do not want to be here. I will leave. I will leave my post, but I will not do it until we get justice for this man and for these people who the 9/11 Commission called historically insignificant. Mr. Speaker, there is something wrong inside the Beltway. Mr. Speaker, there is something desperately wrong when a military officer risks his life in Afghanistan time and again, embedded with our troops under an assumed name with a false beard and a false identity, forward deployed with our troops, gets castigated, gets ridiculed, gets some low life scum at the Pentagon spreading malicious lies about this individual, and then say to his lawyer, we are going to take away his health care benefits, we are going to take away his salary. Mr. Speaker, if we allow this to stand as Democrats and Republicans, then none of us deserve to be here. When we all go overseas and meet the troops, we tell them how proud we are of them. We provide funding for them. We give them training and take care of their families. What we are allowing to happen right now is the Defense Intelligence Agency to ruin the career and the life of a man who spent 23 years protecting his Nation. If Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer was telling this story alone in a vacuum, that would be one thing. But he has been corroborated over and over again. I have met with at least 10 people who fully corroborate what Tony Shaffer says. Those meetings with the FBI, the FBI employee still works there and she told the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, I set those meetings up with the FBI to transfer information about al Qaeda and Able Danger. So she is still there and she testified. What we have here, I am convinced of this now, is an aggressive attempt by CIA management to cover up their own shortcomings in not being able to do what the Able Danger team did: They identified Mohammed Atta and the al Qaeda cell of Brooklyn 1 year before 9/11. But even before that, as the story unfolds, you are going to hear the story that they also identified the threat to the USS Cole 2 weeks before the attack, and 2 days before the attack were screaming not to let the USS Cole come into the harbor at Yemen because they knew something was about to happen. Mr. Speaker, bad news never comes easy; but in a democracy, the bad news has to come out so we can make sure it does not happen again. Mr. Speaker, this whole thing started, not to embarrass anyone, this whole thing started because none of us knew that Mohammed Atta was identified before 9/11. It started because this Congress, this body in particular, tried to establish what is now in place back in 1999, a national collaborative center, but the CIA said we did not need it. The American people deserve to have the answers here. They deserve to know why 3,000 people died. They deserve to know what we could have done and should have done to better prepare ourselves and to work to prepare for the next incident. The American people need to know where those multiple terabytes of data is. Is it still being used? We know in January of 2001, General Shelton was given a 3-hour briefing on Able Danger. So even if they destroyed the data back in the summer of 2000, in January of 2001 there was enough material to give General Shelton, Commander of the Joint Chiefs, a 3-hour briefing. Mr. Speaker, there is something here. I am not a conspiracy theorist, but there is something desperately wrong, Mr. Speaker. There is something outrageous at work here. This is not a third-rate burglary of a political campaign headquarters. This involved what is right now the covering up of information that led to the deaths of 3,000 people, changed the course of history, led to the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, and has disrupted our country, our economy and people's lives. Mr. Speaker, we could ignore this. I cannot. If it means I have to resign from this body, I will resign. I will not allow, after 19 years in this body and as a vice chairman of the Committee on Armed Services, bureaucrats in the Defense Intelligence Agency to concoct stories, to talk about the theft of pens when this lieutenant colonel was 15 years old, to talk about this man's personal debt of $2,000. I would hate to check the indebtedness of Members of Congress. I know mine is more than $2,000. Mr. Speaker, this is not America. I had a group of college students down from Drexel University. There were about 20 of them, including representative students from eight other nations. We talked about this. Of course we have talked about all of the problem countries in the world. We talk about our values as a Nation, the need for a democracy to have people involved, to have transparency, to have people who respect the rule of law and the Constitution. How do I tell them that is what is working here, Mr. Speaker, when the Pentagon says that these people who simply want to tell the truth are not allowed? They are saying it is for classified purposes, yet the DOD lawyer on the Senate side there is nothing classified about any of the information. It is not about classified programs. I would be the last to want to see anything classified revealed. I have seen many, many instances where I have been given sensitive information that only a few people in the Congress and the country had. I would never reveal it. It is not about that. This is not about the DIA, this is not about the CIA, this is about CYA. It is about CYA by bureaucrats in the Defense Intelligence Agency and possibly some political operatives that do not want the facts to come out about Able Danger and the information that the Able Danger team put together. And in the process, they are going to destroy a man, a man who has been recognized by his country, who has a family, and who simply wants to do the right thing. Mr. Speaker, I hated to take the floor tonight, but I did not know what else to do. We have committees of Congress working on this. I want to thank the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wolf), chairman of the FBI Appropriation Committee on Oversight. He is as outraged as I am. I want to thank the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner), who is looking at this, and the gentleman from California (Chairman Hunter). The Committee on Armed Services has a full-time staffer assigned to get to the facts of this. I want to thank the gentleman from New York (Mr. King), chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security, because he is looking at this. I want to thank the gentleman from Michigan (Chairman Hoekstra) and the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. He has met with Tony Shaffer and has offered to get more information. I want to thank my colleagues on the other side of the aisle for standing up and beginning to ask questions, and I want to thank Senator Specter and Senator Biden, who attended a Committee on the Judiciary hearing and expressed their outrage. I want to thank Senator Sessions, Senator Kyl, and Senator Grassley, who were all there. In fact, Senator Grassley called it a coverup. Mr. Speaker, I cannot tell you the number of Members who have come to me and said this is unacceptable. I would hope that as a result of what we have heard tonight every Member of Congress will ask for an inquiry. The gentlewoman from Georgia (Ms. McKinney) wrote a letter to the chairman of the Committee on Armed Services asking for an investigation. We have from Republicans to Democrats, left to right, conservatives to liberals. What is happening here is unacceptable. It is unimaginable. It is un-American. All over the world tonight, young Americans are wearing our uniforms. They are doing a great job. They make us all proud when we travel overseas. They make us proud because of the pride they have. When I talk to them, they say I am glad to be doing what I am doing. I am doing the right thing for our country. I will go any place the Commander in Chief sends me. Whether I am in Afghanistan or Iraq, they will tell me that. Whether we are in Kosovo or Somalia, they will tell us that. Whether we are at Hurricane Katrina, whether we are at Hurricane Andrew, or whether we are out in California, the earthquake, or the Midwestern floods, our troops are all the same. They respect our country. They respect our Constitution. If we allow this travesty to continue, Mr. Speaker, then we have let all of those people down for some nameless, faceless bureaucrat who is fearful that the information will finally come to light, that the DIA just did not get it. Back in 1999 and 2000, they did not have a clue. They had millions of dollars, hundreds of millions of dollars, and could not do what a 20- member team did in being able to identify Mohammed Atta before the 9/11 attacks. DIA does not want that to come out, Mr. Speaker. They do not want that to come out. Heaven forbid the Defense Intelligence Agency, with hundreds of millions of dollars, would have a 20-member team do what they could not do because they were using new technology and new software. They do not want that to come out. That is why that Deputy Director, when he was at that meeting, said, I do not want to see this. Do not show it to me. And that is why today that Deputy Director is trying to ruin the career of Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer. The only way to resolve this, Mr. Speaker, is to have a full independent investigation by the Inspector General of the Pentagon. I have asked Secretary Rumsfeld today to do that. I would ask my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to join me in that request. Let the independent inspector for the Pentagon go in, not DIA. DIA cannot investigate itself. It does not have the capability to do that. It does not have the integrity to do that. Let the Inspector General do the investigation and while that is being done, protect Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer. He does not deserve to have his career ruined or destroyed for telling the truth. And while we are at it, Mr. Speaker, if DIA is going to continue to press this ridiculous set of facts, then as I said earlier, I want DIA prosecuted for the five felonies they committed in sending classified documents to a person that 2 weeks earlier they said was incapable of receiving classified information. And if this continues, I want DIA held responsible for illegally transferring $500 of public assets to a person, that in the process of sending that stuff to him, DIA committed fraud against the taxpayers. I want them held accountable: DIA's stupidity; DIA's incompetence. We have a new nominee for the head of DIA, and I am going to ask every Senator to fully explore each of these issues before that person is confirmed. I will meet with every Senator personally and go over all of this information. And I would encourage the Senators and the House Members to interview the other people who worked with Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer and to get their assessments of what is going on there. They will all tell them the same thing: Shaffer is being abused and used as a scapegoat. If they can ruin Shaffer, they can silence the story. It cannot happen, Mr. Speaker. We cannot let it. That is not what America is about. That is not what we say to our enlisted personnel when they sign up for duty. That is not what we say when we pass our defense bills every year. This man is being maligned and mistreated. He is being harassed. The most scurrilous accusations, totally unfounded, have been given to the American media; and I will name names, and I will ask for an investigation of the people who made those statements to these media people because it all needs to be put on the record. And as someone tomorrow who will chair another hearing on our defense oversight to try to get the best value for the dollars for our military, I ask all of our colleagues, Mr. Speaker, on both sides of the aisle to join us. This is not Republicans or Democrats. It is about what is fundamental to this country. I would ask our constituents across America we represent to join us, to express their outrage, to e- mail, make phone calls, write letters to the Secretary of Defense, the President of the United States, to Members of Congress to simply let the story be told. Let the Able Danger story finally come out to the American people. Let them understand what really happened. Let Scott Philpott talk. Let Tony Shaffer talk. Let the others who have been silenced have a chance to tell their story to Congress and openly to the American people. In the end, the country will be stronger.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I rise this evening for this short Special Order to express my personal outrage regarding the treatment of some brave military personnel who simply are trying to tell the truth. Madam Speaker, over the past 3 months, I have outlined for our colleagues evidence that came from military officers that we had knowledge of Mohammed Atta and al Qaeda prior to September 11 and the attack against us in New York City. This information came about from a top secret program known as ``Able Danger'' which was a program that was developed by Special Forces Command as a planning process to deal with al Qaeda cells. The military officers involved with this program identified 5 specific cells around the world, one of which was a Brooklyn cell, and this Brooklyn cell, one year before 9/11; in fact, in January and February of 2000, actually identified Mohammed Atta, 3 of the other terrorists that were involved in the 9/11 attack, and identified this in a chart that was produced as a part of their planning process. Furthermore, Madam Speaker, these military officers have testified, and will testify under oath, that in September of 2000, one year before September 11, they made 3 attempts to transfer information regarding the Brooklyn cell and Mohammed Atta to the FBI. An FBI employee has again agreed to testify under oath that she arranged the 3 meetings and agreed to set up for the FBI the opportunity to receive this data. All 3 meetings were canceled by lawyers within the previous administration, the Clinton administration. We still do not know who gave the ultimate order or why those meetings were canceled, but we do know that in September of 2000, attempts to transfer information regarding al Qaeda, the Brooklyn cell, and Mohammed Atta were thwarted. This information was presented to the 9/11 Commission in an effort to provide a clear and concise analysis of what happened prior to 9/11. On 2 separate occasions, a Lieutenant Colonel from the Army, Anthony Shaffer and a commander from the Navy, Scott Philpott, offered to provide information to the 9/11 Commission that they, in fact, were involved with Able Danger and that they identified Mohammed Atta prior to 9/11. Colonel Shaffer, who was promoted during the past year, during a time in which his security clearance had been temporarily lifted by the Defense Intelligence Agency, has been the subject of gross and outrageous harassment. I have been on the Committee on Armed Services for 19 years, and my job as a member of that committee has been to support our military personnel when they are assigned overseas or when they are at home during their training and other operations. As I mentioned to Secretary Rumsfeld in a hearing last Thursday, a full committee hearing, I have supported every major reform that he has put forth over the past several years regarding our military, the way our military operates, and the way the Pentagon is organized. Madam Speaker, Secretary Rumsfeld has repeatedly told us that his top priority is the morale and the welfare of our troops. The commander of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, both the recent and now the current Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, repeatedly tell us their top priority is the protection of our military personnel in uniform. And now, we find out that Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer, a Bronze Star recipient, 23-year veteran of military intelligence, serving in Afghanistan, embedded with our troops in harm's way, has had gross distortions and absolute outrageous claims made against him publicly by the Defense Intelligence Agency as a way to silence him. Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer has been prohibited from talking to Members of Congress. He has been stopped from testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee in spite of the fact that five senators from both parties were present at a hearing 2 weeks ago. Lieutenant Shaffer was in the room. Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer was in the room, yet he was not permitted to testify. His lawyer, in fact, made statements for him. But in an attempt to totally discredit Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer, in an attempt to try to diminish his credibility before the American people and the Congress, the Defense Intelligence Agency has resorted to a new set of lows in terms of the credibility of our American military. And no, Madam Speaker, I do not think this action by the Defense Intelligence Agency has been brought forward by uniformed military personnel. It has been brought forward by the bureaucrats, the sort of bureaucrats who linger from one administration to the other and who have the embarrassment of having to understand what Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer and commander Scott Philpott did in warning us, attempting to warn us about the 9/11 attacks. The Defense Intelligence Agency, 1 day before Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer was to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee, permanently pulled his security clearance, and the reasons they gave, Madam Speaker, were outrageous. They are scandalous. They said that he had forwarded phone calls on his cell phone while being deployed in Afghanistan for a total cost of approximately $67. They said that he had received mileage and toll fees improperly for attending a military conference at Fort Dix, New Jersey, which anyone in this body would say he was eligible to attend. $341. They said that he, in fact, received an award for which he was not entitled, even though his superior officers nominated him for that award. But in one of the most despicable acts I have ever seen a Federal agency involve itself in in 19 years, they said on the record that Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer stole pens from the U.S. government. Now, what they did not say, Madam Speaker, was that Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer, when he was 15 or 16 years old, as the son of an officer assigned to one of our embassies, admitted to stealing some pens which he gave to some disadvantaged people. Now, clearly, when he was 15 or 16, he was not working for the military. He was not a military intelligence officer. He was yet to take his lie detector test for admission into that category, and he admitted all of this. But in this current effort to try to discredit Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer, the Defense Intelligence Agency went to the outrageous length of publicly acknowledging that Lieutenant Colonel Shaffer had stolen pens and failing to mention how old he was when the theft took place, that he publicly admitted himself before being employed by the military. Madam Speaker, we have a major problem in America. Sandy Berger, our National Security Advisor, stole documents from the National Archives, stole documents and put them in his clothing and took them out because they would incriminate him and President Clinton about what they knew before 9/11. He stole them. He placed them inside of his coat, in his pants, in his shoes, and he took those documents out of the National Archives because he did not want the 9/11 Commission to see what was in there. When he was caught, and finally brought to justice, his security clearance was lifted for 3 years. Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer simply told the truth and because Defense intelligence bureaucrats are unhappy about being embarrassed they have removed his security clearance permanently. Is that what America is about, Madam Speaker? Is it about protecting a national security advisor who steals classified documents from the archives of the United States about what happened before 9/11 and gets a 3-year lift of his clearance, and a uniformed military officer who simply tells the truth has his security clearance permanently lifted? Madam Speaker, if we do not right this wrong that will send and is sending a signal to every uniformed officer in America, if you tell the truth and if that truth embarrasses a bureaucrat or a political appointee, you are more expendable than the civilian officer, and that cannot stand. We must do better. Anthony Shaffer deserves justice.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, fifteen years ago, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed into law by President George H.W. Bush. As the first declaration of its kind, it was a significant moment in the battle for equality among the disabled. It is essential that on the anniversary of the ADA, we take some time to seriously reflect on the impact it has had on the lives of the 14 percent of Americans who live with at least one disability. As a result of this act, those with disabilities are now able to travel more freely, enjoy a greater range of recreational and employment opportunities, and ultimately enjoy a higher overall standard of living. Otherwise productive Americans are no longer ostracized from their social surroundings or forced to live their lives in nursing homes or similarly confining facilities. While more work remains to be done to ensure full integration of the disabled population into American life, I would like to acknowledge the continued success of the ADA in reinforcing the American ideals of compassion and equality for all.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I rise today with profound sadness and tremendous gratitude to honor the life of my good friend, Lew Fisher, a generous and dedicated community leader who will be greatly missed in Aston, Delaware County, Pennsylvania. As his family, friends and neighbors mourn the passing of Lew Fisher, I want to take a few moments to remember his work and difference he made in the community he served so faithfully for over 20 years. Lew spent almost his entire life in Aston, he loved it there and spent 20 years giving his service as a Township Commissioner without reserve to the people he called his neighbors. He leaves behind an impressive list of accomplishments that most people only hope to achieve in their lifetime. Lew will be remembered for many different reasons, including his generosity to the Aston community. His inspirational leadership had a profound effect on helping people better their lives. Even with all of his work in public service and with community organizations, Lew endeared himself to many because of his generous spirit and wise counsel. On a personal note, I benefited tremendously from his advice during my years of public service. Whether it was a township concern or just a relaxed visit with an old friend, the Aston locals always knew they would find the support and guidance they were looking for in a chat with Lew. While in his presence you were immediately put at ease with his warm smile, his firm handshake, his gentle voice and his admirable character. Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in remembering a dedicated community leader and friend to many in the 7th Congressional District. I wish Lew's wife of 52 years, Florence and family, my heartfelt condolences and may they find comfort in knowing that the many people he impacted deeply value his dedication and generosity and the example of his life and work.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, Mr. Mikhail Volynets, recipient of the AFL-CIO's 2004 George Meany-Lane Kirkland Human Rights Award, was elected Chairperson of the Independent Trade Union of Miners of Ukraine in 1995, and became its president in 1997. Having previously worked as a miner, and then as a mining engineer, Mr. Volynets participated in the Ukraine's first miner's strikes in 1989, later leading a series of successful mass protests in 1991. Using his leadership position, Mr. Volynets organized the Trade Union of Miners to become an instrumental part of Ukraine's Orange Revolution, which resulted in Viktor Yuschenko's rise to the Presidency in the fall of 2004. Having first been elected to the Ukrainian Parliament (Rada) in 2002, Mr. Volynets is currently a Deputy in the Rada, working to further secure democracy in Ukraine. I congratulate Mr. Volynets for his courage and determination in the face of fear and uncertainty.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I am proud to recognize today the accomplishments of Frances R. Major of Royersford, Pennsylvania--whom I consider the Betsy Ross of today--as she retires her sewing needles with the Valley Forge Flag Company. Mrs. Major has been working at the Valley Forge Flag Company in Womelsdorf, Pennsylvania since 1941 and has truly left her mark on history. Not everyone could go to Pearl Harbor or Ground Zero, but Mrs. Major faithfully sewed our Stars and Stripes as our country's major historic events unfolded. Many flags were sewn through her tears, but it was always a labor of love and her patriotic honor to do something personally for America. ``Each time something bad happened, it only made me sew that much faster,'' she said. Through good times and bad, her spirit remained strong and she literally stitched the bad times away finishing her work with her identification number seven in the upper left corner of the flag. The numbers were written so supervisors could track how many flags each seamstress had completed each day. It is often said that America succeeds due to the remarkable accomplishments and contributions of her citizens. Mrs. Major leaves a significant legacy as a standard bearer for her profession. She continues to lead a life full of love, friendship, hospitality and service to her family as well as her community. She is an exceptional woman, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, and American. As we unfold and proudly wave an American flag, we might see Frances' number seven--her indelible mark on history. At this time, I would ask my colleagues of the 109th Congress to join me in paying special tribute to Mrs. Frances Major. On the occasion of her retirement, we thank her for her dedicated service and we wish her all the best in the future.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend and colleague for yielding to me and thank him for this outstanding Special Order. I hope that our colleagues tonight have been listening, because they have seen an outstanding assemblage of excellent young Members of Congress who are picking up the mantle and taking the lead on homeland security issues in our committee. This is the first year for the full operation of the authorization committee for homeland security funding and oversight, and it is extremely important that we get off to a good start. I just want to say, as a Member who was very aggressively behind this committee, I am overwhelmingly pleased and positive with the type of membership we have on this committee. My colleague, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Dent), is an example of an outstanding leader who is committed; and he has brought together an assemblage of Members tonight who have articulated the various parameters of the concerns we face, from first responders, to our borders, to protecting our ports and our airports, and for all of the significant work that has been accomplished under Secretary Ridge, now being accomplished under our current new Secretary and under the able leadership of the chairman of our House Homeland Security Committee, the gentleman from California (Mr. Cox), and our appropriations subcommittee, the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Rogers). Mr. Speaker, later on this evening I will be offering another Special Order that will reveal some absolutely amazing information for the American people. I will divulge tonight the information that prior to 9/11, not only did we know about the Mohammed Atta cell, but that the Special Forces Command in our military actually wanted to take action against that cell, and we did not take that action. I will be discussing our intelligence in detail, and by following through on a special project that was initiated under the leadership of General Shelton focusing on al Qaeda. But at this point in time, I wanted to stop by and thank our distinguished Members, thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Dent) for his leadership, and say to those who participated in this Special Order, if we are going to win the battle and protect the homeland, all Members must play the critical role that you have played tonight and pick a specialty area that you have a focus on so we as a team can make sure that our country is properly protected.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I rise this evening to discuss for the next 45 minutes the most important topic that will allow us to protect the homeland, provide for the security of the American people and our allies and our troops around the world: our intelligence. Last Thursday, Mr. Speaker, I had a meeting with the very able and distinguished chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra). We discussed many things, one of which was a source that I had hoped that we could get some information to assist us in understanding the threats in Iraq and the Middle East, and especially in regard to Iran. I said to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra), I am going to make a prediction to you. Based on my source, I said, common wisdom tells us that the winner of the election in Iran that will take place on Friday and Saturday our time will probably be Rafsanjani. He is the name that most pundits have said would be the likely winner in a two- person runoff against the more conservative and not well-known mayor of Tehran. But I said to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra), based on information we had, the election was not going to be close; it will be a landslide. But the conservative mayor of Tehran, a relative unknown, had been anointed by Ayatollah Homeni in Iran and he would in fact win the Iranian election. We all saw the results, Mr. Speaker, on Saturday night and Sunday morning as, in fact, the mayor of Tehran won the election with a margin of 62 to 38 percent, an overwhelming landslide. I raise this issue, Mr. Speaker, because good intelligence and good information is the most critical tool that we can have over the next several years and decades to protect our homeland. Mr. Speaker, I rise because information has come to my attention over the past several months that is very disturbing. I have learned that, in fact, one of our Federal agencies had, in fact, identified the major New York cell of Mohamed Atta prior to 9/11; and I have learned, Mr. Speaker, that in September of 2000, that Federal agency actually was prepared to bring the FBI in and prepared to work with the FBI to take down the cell that Mohamed Atta was involved in in New York City, along with two of the other terrorists. I have also learned, Mr. Speaker, that when that recommendation was discussed within that Federal agency, the lawyers in the administration at that time said, you cannot pursue contact with the FBI against that cell. Mohamed Atta is in the U.S. on a green card, and we are fearful of the fallout from the Waco incident. So we did not allow that Federal agency to proceed. Mr. Speaker, what this now means is that prior to September 11, we had employees of the Federal Government in one of our agencies who actually identified the Mohamed Atta cell and made a specific recommendation to act on that cell, but were denied the ability to go forward. Obviously, if we had taken out that cell, 9/11 would not have occurred and, certainly, taking out those three principal players in that cell would have severely crippled, if not totally stopped, the operation that killed 3,000 people in America. Tonight, I am going to provide some background to my colleagues, because I think this represents a major problem with our intelligence that needs to be focused on by the committees of the House and the Senate, by the leadership of the House and the Senate, by John Negroponte, the new person assigned by President Bush, and a very able man, to integrate the 33 classified systems overseen by the 15 Federal agencies. I want to also start off by praising Porter Goss, the director of the CIA. Porter served us extremely well in this body as the chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence; and he went over to the CIA with an aggressive agenda to change that agency, and he has begun that process. We, in this body, need to rally the American people to support the efforts brought forward by Porter Goss and to allow John Negroponte to undertake perhaps the most difficult task in protecting the security of America, a task that will not be easy, given the history of our Federal agency system. Let me take my colleagues back, Mr. Speaker, to 1999. It was, in fact, the spring of 1999 when I was first involved in taking a delegation of 10 Members of Congress to Vienna with the support of my friend and colleague, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), and with the support of the Clinton State Department. The 11-member delegation of five Democrats, five Republicans and myself, along with the State Department employee, traveled to Vienna to meet with five senior leaders of the Russian political parties. Our purpose was to try to reach a framework that could allow for a peaceful resolution of the war in Kosovo on the terms that the U.S. had desired after Ramboullet. After securing a military plane, my Russian friends told me they were bringing a Serb along with them, a Serb who would be able to understand what we were talking about and help us decide and determine whether or not Milosevic back in Belgrade would accept any recommendations that we would develop. I did not know anything about the Serb. I knew the Russians. But I figure I had better ask the CIA what they knew about this Serb so I could be better prepared, and to make sure that the Serb was not a part of the Milosevic regime, because that would cause myself and my colleagues to be in violation of the Hobbs Act because we were at war with Serbia at that time. So I called George Tenet. I said, Director Tenet, can you give me some information about this Serb? His family is evidently well known. I need to know whether or not he is a part of the Milosevic regime. I need to know any other information you can provide to me because we are going to meet with him when we travel to Vienna to meet with the Russian leaders to help provide a beginning of a solution to end the war in Kosovo. He called me back the next day and he gave me a couple of sentences and said not to worry, he was not a part of the Milosevic regime. And he had strong ties to the Communist Party inside of Moscow and had ties to other leaders in the Russian Government. It was not much to go on. But at the time, Mr. Speaker, I was chairman of the Defense Research Subcommittee of the Armed Services Committee. My job was to oversee the funding, approximately $40 billion of defense research money on new systems and new technologies. And one of the most striking technologies was the work being done by the Army's Information Dominance Center at Fort Belvoir, formerly known as the LIWA, the Land Information Warfare Assessment Center. I had visited the LIWA several times and was tremendously impressed with not just the ability to provide security for our Army classified systems, but I saw a unique approach to doing well beyond that, data mining, data collaboration, using cutting-edge software tools like Starlight and Spires, able to do profiling. Having plussed-up funding for this facility after talking to George Tenet, I called my friends at the Army's Information Dominance Center and said, can you do something for me as a favor, off the record? And they said sure, Congressman, whatever you like. Would you run me a profile of this Serb, for the same reason I had asked the Director of the CIA. They said, no problem, Congressman; we will get back to you in a few hours. And they did. They gave me 10 pages of information, Mr. Speaker, about the Serb and his ties. Now, the information was not vetted but it was from a number of sources that the Information Dominance Center was able to pull together very quickly. I used that information as we traveled to Vienna to understand who we were meeting with. We had those meetings for 2 days and my colleagues, my five Republican and five Democrat colleagues, worked aggressively to establish a framework that would begin the end of the Kosovo war. In fact, it was historic. When we returned to Washington several weeks later I was contacted by the FBI and they said, Congressman, we would like to debrief you. We would like you to tell us what you know about that Serb that you all met in Vienna. I said, no problem, I will be happy to do it Monday afternoon in my office. The Friday before the Monday, my D.C. office paged me with a 911 page. When I called them they said, you have got to call CIA Congressional Affairs immediately, which I did. CIA Congressional Affairs said, Congressman Weldon, we are going to fly two agents to Philadelphia this evening. They will meet you at the airport, at a hotel, at your home, wherever you want to meet them. And I said, I am sorry, I cannot do it. It is a weekend. It is a Friday night. I have got events already planned. What is the urgency of this meeting? And the CIA Congressional Affairs person said well, Congressman, we have been tasked by the State Department to brief our Ambassador, who is negotiating the final terms to end the war in Kosovo, and he needs to know something about this Serb that you met in Vienna. I said, well, the FBI has already called me for that. Can we not do it together? And finally, after pushing back for 10, 15 minutes, the CIA agreed. And so on Monday afternoon in my office I hosted four agents, two FBI and two CIA. These agents asked me four pages of questions about the Serb that I had met with along with our colleagues in the House. When I finished answering all their questions and giving them all of the information I had, I said to them, now you know where I got my data from, right? And they said, well, you got it from the Russians. I said, no. Well, you got it from the Serb. I said, no. I said, before I left Washington, before I left my office, I called the Army's Information Dominance Center and asked them to do me a favor. They ran a profile and gave me 10 pages. The CIA rep and the FBI rep said, what is the Army's Information Dominance Center, congressman? It was then, Mr. Speaker, that I knew we had a problem; that our intelligence systems were not linked together, that the stovepipes were so great that we would never be able to deal with emerging transnational terrorist threats. So beginning in the spring of 1999, I began a process working with the Army, and their subgroup working with them, Special Forces Command down in Florida, which had a similar capability to develop a national prototype, a prototype that could be providing support for the President, the National Security Adviser, and all of our policymakers. In fact, working together over a multiweek period, we came up with a plan, a document. And Mr. Speaker, I would like to place this document in the Record at this point in time. National Operations and Analysis Hub: NOAH Policy makers' tool for acting against emerging transnational threats and dangers to U.S. national security. Policy makers need better decision support tools. Policy makers continue to work in a vacuum. Briefings and testimonies are the primary vehicles for transmitting information to leadership. The volume of information germane to national issues is expanding so rapidly that policy makers are overwhelmed with data. Policy makers need robust situational awareness over growing asymmetric threats to national security. Policy makers need an overarching information and intelligence architecture that will quickly assimilate, analyze and display assessments and recommended course of action from many national agencies simultaneously. Policy makers need tools to aid them in developing courses of action against threats to U.S. policy, interests, or security. Policy makers need virtual communications with one another. White House, Congress, Pentagon and at the agency levels should each have centers they can go to and receive, send, share, discuss, and collaborate on assessments before they act. National Level Collaboration Solution: NOAH, National Operations and Analysis Hub. Tasks supported by NOAH's overarching collaborative environment: Provide Multi Issue, Multi-agency Hybrid Picture to White House Situation Room, JCS; HUMINT Support; Peackeeping Missions; Humanitarian Aid; Battle Damage Assessment; Develop and Leverage new Technologies of important to national security; Support Congressional Committees/Hearings; Apply Analysis of Foreign Threat to Policy; Provide Hybrid Situational Awareness Picture of the Threat; Incorprote Industrial Efforts of Interests to the Policy Maker; Link academia directly to policy maker; and National Emergencies. NOAH can leverage existing networks to address diverse issues: NOAH's Hub Center if linked to other agency centers electronically; Each key agency must prossess a Pod Site and be connected to the NOAH network; The Pod can consist of a large screen and appropriate connect for collaboration. Operations Centers can simply be converted into NOAH; National Policy makers cannot control agency Pods, agencies must post replicated data on the NOAH system so that sister groups can access data; Support multi-level security requirements and can sanitize and ``push'' data to many types of users to many levels; NOAH can address National, law enforcement and military needs. The situation will determine the mission; Ties policy maker, military and law enforcement together; Goals of the NOAH Hub Center is to apply agency operations, strategies analysis, tactical assessments to a course of action for the policy maker; and Optimizes group of expertise within each organization-- experts always on hand regardless of issue. NOAH and Pod Site Network: Part of national policy creation and execution system; Will existing sites and connectivities where available; Will share tools available at LIWA IDC so every agency has same tools; All agencies will post data on NRO highway in a replicated format sensitive to classification; NOAH's Global Network will use NRO System as backbone; All centers connect to other centers electronically; and Mechanism for gathering, analyzing, displaying, tailoring, and disseminating all kinds of information quickly at the national level. Overview--National Operations and Analysis Hub: Center dedicated to National Policy Makers at White House, Congress and National Agencies; Provides system of system advanced technological communications environment to harvest, analyze, display data as needed; Coordinate and synchronize information among IC, S&T centers, military services; Provide near real time situational awareness at the national level; Link virtually via a pod site to every participating member agency; and Pod sites designed to pull together agency resources on single system of systems. NOAH's is staffed by members from participating agencies. The staff has a 24 x 7, high bandwidth, virtual connectivity to experts at agency Pod Sites. This provides decision makers with real-time situational awareness of adversary picture and courses. Steps to Achieve NOAH Capability: Establish baseline capability by building initial Hub Center and congressional virtual hearing room. Equip White House Situation Room to Collaborate with these sites; Staff the Hub Center with two reps from each of the 28 key participating agencies; Link up NOAH internal and external collaborative environment; Hook in Back up Site for redundancy and begin training on collaborative tools; Build the 28 Key Agency Pod Sites along model of the Information Dominance Center at Fort Belvoir, VA; Link all Pod Sites to NOAH hub center establish Protocols for Inter-agency data sharing; Exercise live ability to retrieve, collate, analyze, display disparate data and provide policy makers course of action analysis at the NOAH Hub Center; and Refine procedures and Protocols. Agencies Represented in the National Collaborative Center: Central Intelligence Agency; Defense Intelligence Agency; National Imagery and Mapping Agency; National Security Agency; National Reconnaissance Office; Defense Threat Reduction Agency; Joint Chiefs of Staff; Army/LIWA; Air Force; Navy; Marine Corps; Joint Counter-Intelligence Assessment Group; ONDCP; and FBI. Drug Enforcement Agency; U.S. Customs; National Criminal Investigative Service; National Infrastructure Protection Center; Defense Information Systems Agency; State Department; Five CINCs; Department of Energy; Department of Commerce; Department of the Treasury; Justice Department; Office of the Secretary of Defense; National Military Command Center; and National Joint Military Intelligence Command. Elements to be connected to the national collaborative center would include the White House Situation Room, a Congressional Virtual Hearing Room and a possible redundant, or back-up site. This document, as you can see, Mr. Speaker, is entitled the NOAH, National Operations and Analysis Hub, Policy Makers' Tool for Acting Against Emerging Transnational Threats and Dangers to U.S. National Security. This 9-page briefing, Mr. Speaker, was put together in the spring of 1999. I asked the Deputy Secretary of Defense, John Hamre, to take a look at this capability. He went down to the LIWA and he came back and he said, Congressman, you are right. I agree with you. This capability is amazing. It offers unlimited potential. How about sending me a letter describing your interest, Congressman? So on July 30, 1999, I sent this 3-page letter to Deputy Secretary John Hamre, Deputy Secretary of Defense, at his request, talking about creating an integrated collaborative center for all of our intelligence. I would like to place this letter in the Record at this point in time, Mr. Speaker House of Representatives, Washington, DC, July 30, 1999. Hon. John Hamre, Deputy Secretary of Defense, The Pentagon, Washington, DC. Dear Dr. Hamre: I believe the time has come to create a central national level entity that can acquire, fuse and anaylze disparate data from many agencies in order to support the policy maker in taking action against threats from terrorism, proliferation, illegal technology diversions, espionage, narcotics, information warfare and cyberterrorism. These challenges are beginning to overlap, thereby blurring their distinction while posing increasing threats to our Nation. Before we take action to counter these emerging threats, we must first understand their relationship to one another, their patterns, the people and countries involved, and the level of danger posed to our Nation. The Department of Defense has a unique opportunity to create a centralized national center that can do this for the country. It would be patterned after the Army's Land Information Warfare Activity (LIWA) at Fort Belvoir, but would operate on a much broader scale. This entity would allow for near-time information and analysis to flow to a central fusion center, which I would designate the National Operations Analysis Hub (NOAH). I think this title is fitting, as NOAH will provide a central hub built to protect our nation from the flood of threats. NOAH would be comprised of a system of agency-specified mini-centers, or ``pods'' of participating agencies and services associated with growing national security concerns (attachment 1). NOAH would link the policymaker with action recommendations derived from fused information provided by the individual pods. NOAH would provide the automation and connectivity to allow the pods to talk together, share data and perspectives on a given situation in a near real-time, computer-based environment. The NOAH center in the Office of the Secretary of Defense would be comprised of representatives from an initial cluster of pod sites to include: CIA, DIA, National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NlMA), NSA, NRO, Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTSA), JCS, Army, Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, ONDCP, FBI, DEA, Customs, National Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS), National Infrastructure Protection Center. Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), State, the five CINCS, DOE, INS, Commerce. Treasury. Elements which would be connected into NOAH would include the White House Situation Room, a Congressional Virtual Hearing Room and a possible redundant (back up) site. The benefits of creating a NOAH include: For national policy makers, a national collaborative, environment offers situations updates across a variety of issues and offers suggested courses of action, based on analysis, to help government officials make more informed decisions. For the Intelligence Community, a national collaborative environment will help end stovepiping and create more robust strategic analyses as well as near real-time support to field operations. For military commanders and planners, a national collaborative environment offers full battlefield visualization, threat profiling, robust situational awareness, as well as near real-timer support to special missions such as peacekeeping, humanitarian aid, national emergencies or special operations. For law enforcement, a national collaborative environment provides investigative and threat profiling support, and field station situational awareness. Along with its system of connected agency pod sites, NOAH would permit the display of collaborative threat profiling and analytical assessments on a large screen. It would be a national level operations and control center with a mission to intergrate various imagery, data and analytical viewpoints for decision-makers in support of national actions. I see NOAH as going beyond the capability of the National Military Command Center (NMCC) and the National Joint Military Intelligence Command (NJMIC), providing recommended courses of action that allow us to effectively meet those emerging challenges from asymmetrical threats in near real-time. Given its mission, I believe that NOAH should reside in the Office of the Secretary of Defense (Attachment 2). I am aware of the initiative to link counterintelligence groups throughout the community. I am also aware of the counterterrorism center at the CIA, the new National Infrastructure Protection Center at the FBI, and a new HUMINT special operations center. I have heard of an attempt to connect the Office of Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) and OSD assets with federal, state and local law enforcement agencies. I also have seen what the Army has done at LIWA, which has created a foundation for creating a higher-level architecture collaborating all of these efforts. Each of these independent efforts needs to be coordinated at the national level. I believe LIWA has created a model that should be used as a basis for creating the participating agency pod sites. I do not expect that establishment of NOAH should exceed $10 million. Each agency involved could set up its own pod to connect with the central NOAH site or to exchange data with any of its participants. Each agency could dedicate monies to establish their own pod site, while the $50 million available in DARPA for related work could be used to establish the NOAH structure immediately. The NOAH concept of a national collaborative environment supporting policy and decision-makers mirrors the ideas you have expressed to me in recent discussions, and it is a tangible way to confront the growing assymetrical threats to our nation. I have a number of ideas regarding staffing options and industry collaboration, and would appreciate the opportunity to discuss them with you. Thank you for your consideration. I look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience. Sincerely, Curt Weldon, Member of Congress. Secretary Hamre was interested and he told me, Congressman, I will even pay the bill. The Defense Department will provide the funding for this. And I do not care where they put it, Congressman. It could be at the White House, it could be at the NSC, wherever it is most appropriate, but I will pay the bill. But, Congressman, the problem is not with me or the money. You have got to convince the CIA and the FBI that this is something they want to pursue. In fact, he wrote me a letter, Mr. Speaker, dated October 21, 1999: ``Dear Congressman Weldon, I wholeheartedly agree that combating asymmetrical threats challenging national security requires a collaborative interagency approach as suggested in your concept of the National Operations Analysis Hub. We are actively engaged in assessing how the department should leverage ongoing activities and develop a long-term strategy along these lines. I will keep you apprised of our progress. I would be happy to meet with you on the subject.'' And then he puts a personal comment on the note that I will read. ``Sir, this is a mealy-mouth response because no one wants to commit to a LIWA-based solution. You know I am very impressed by LIWA and see them involved in a range of activities. I would like to get together with you to review some of our thinking when you have time. John.'' Mr. Speaker, I would like to place this in the Record. Deputy Secretary of Defense, Washington, DC, October 21, 1999. Hon. Curt Weldon, House of Representatives, Washington, DC. Dear Congressman Weldon: I wholeheartedly agree that combatting the asymmetrical threats challenging National Security requires a collaborative, inter-agency approach, as suggested in your concept of the National Operations Analysis Hub. We are actively engaged in assessing how the Department should leverage ongoing activities and develop a long-term strategy along these lines. I will keep you apprised of our progress, and I would be happy to meet with you on this subject. Sincerely, John J. Harme. Mr. Speaker, that was in October of 1999 at John Hamre's suggestion on November 4 of 1999, almost 2 years before 9/11. I had John Hamre and the representatives of the CIA and the FBI in my office. And at John Hamre's suggestion, we went through the 9-page briefing to create an overarching national collaborative center. When I finished the briefing which had been prepared for me with our intelligence officials off the record, the CIA said, Congressman Weldon, that is all well and good, but we really do not need that capability. It is not necessary. We are doing something called CI-21; and, therefore, we do not need to pursue that multi-system approach that you have outlined where we bring in all of these other classified systems. I was very unhappy with that response because I knew full well the Army and our special forces commands were using that capability at that very moment in a special project against al Qaeda. So, Mr. Speaker, in 1999 and in 2000 and in 2001, I put language in each of our defense bills calling for the creation of a national collaborative center to bring together our disparate intelligence capabilities and systems for 3 consecutive years. And, in fact, one of those bills required a response by the CIA as to why this system had not been put into place. But in the meantime, on November 12, 1999, the Defense Information and Electronics Report published an article about the need for a massive intelligence network for shared threat information. On April of 2000, Signal Magazine did another story on a fusion center concept taking root as we kept pushing this process. Mr. Speaker, the following are both of these articles: [Nov. 12, 1997] Defense Information and Electronics Report

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, in this job, all of us are used to misinformation, lies and distortions and manipulation by the media. We refer to that as spin; but, Mr. Speaker, I never expected such spin to come from the no-spin zone of Bill O'Reilly. Mr. Speaker, on Friday my staff confirmed that I was to do a television show with Mr. O'Reilly last evening. It was initially scheduled to be seven o'clock. I had a 5:15 meeting scheduled with the Secretary of Energy. At some point in time yesterday morning, the O'Reilly show changed that appointment to 5:50. My 5:15 meeting was still in place. My staff was fully in touch with the O'Reilly show. We gave them the information, and I attended a very important meeting with Secretary of Energy Bodman in his office, a classified meeting, on the specific problems with the threats of the nuclear program and capabilities of the former Soviet states. That meeting ran over, partly because the meeting was interrupted several times by important phone calls the Secretary had to make. Following that meeting, which ended somewhere around 6:15, as my colleagues know, we had a series of six votes on the House floor. Mr. O'Reilly proceeded to tell his national audience last night that I ``snubbed'' him; that I failed to call him; that I was inconsiderate; that I was rude. Talk about spin, Mr. Speaker. So today, I sent a memo to Mr. O'Reilly explaining the facts, and I would remind Mr. O'Reilly that the Secretary of Energy and an important meeting on nuclear issues in the former Soviet States takes my top priority. So do the six votes I had to pass last night on the defense appropriation bill for 2006. Mr. O'Reilly, we do not need more spin. We need honesty and candor. You call for it every day. Now perhaps your staff is not providing the appropriate level of service to you. Mr. Speaker, because I had some contacts from constituents and Members, I would put the summary of my statement to Mr. O'Reilly and the notes of my staff about their contact with Mr. O'Reilly's show into the Congressional Record. Bill O'Reilly, I have now witnessed the ultimate spin-- from, of all people, you. My scheduled taping last evening between 6-6:30 pm was pre- empted by a prolonged 5:15 pm meeting with the Secretary of Energy Sam Bodman regarding important National Security issues related to non-proliferation activities in the former Soviet states and by a series of 6 recorded votes on the Floor of the House that started at 6:30 pm and lasted until 7:15 pm. Contrary to your spin, my staff did give notice to your staff of both conflicts and kept them informed of my status during the scheduled taping. In addition my staff offered for me to appear as soon as votes ended. Finally when I tried to personally reach you, your staff was not willing to provide my staff with a suitable number. As much as I would have enjoyed returning to your show, my job as a Member of Congress and as Vice Chairman of both the House Armed Services Committee and Homeland Security Committee is to cast my recorded vote on issues that affect our nation, in this case, the 2006 Defense Appropriations bill and related amendments which will fund our troops through 2006. I hope you understand these obligations and I apologize for any inconvenience this unanticipated series of events caused to you and your staff. Curt Weldon. As of Friday, O'Reilly was marked as tentative on the PR calendar and CW's calendar at 7:00 pm. After I left on Friday the DOE meeting was set up for 5:15 pm. At some point on Monday morning, O'Reilly was confirmed by PR and changed on their calendar to 5:50. At 12:35 pm, I was notified of the change via e-mail from Kristina. I spoke to Peter on the phone and asked if O'Reilly could be moved to later given Curt's 5:15 meeting. He informed me it couldn't but not to worry if Curt wasn't there right at 6:00. The change was made to CW's calendar at 1:25 pm. I spoke to Porter around 1:30 and informed him of Curt's schedule prior to O'Reilly (i.e. a meeting with the Sec. of DOE). I told him Russ would be with him and gave him mine and Russ' numbers. From 5:45-6:30 Porter called me looking for Curt and Russ. I informed him they were still in the classified meeting and I was not able to get in touch with him. Around 6:15 I asked if they need to cancel--Porter said that wasn't an option.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I rise this evening to introduce legislation to authorize and request the President of the United States to award the Medal of Honor to Richard D. Winters of Hershey, Pennsylvania, for acts of valor on June 6, 1944, in Normandy, France while an officer in the 101st Airborne Division. Mr. Speaker, I do not take this issue lightly. It is with extreme concern that I had to resort to taking this action to right a wrong that occurred 61 years ago. 61 years ago, Mr. Speaker, on D-Day at a placed called Brecourt Manor, Dick Winters led an ad hoc group of paratroopers, mostly from E Company, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, against a numerically superior force of German defenders, manning a battery of four 105- millimeter guns. These guns were zeroed in on firing on Utah Beach during the initial D-Day seaborne landings. With only 12 men, Dick Winters led the attack that destroyed the German battery, killed 15 Germans, wounded many more, and took 12 prisoners. The base-of-fire technique that Dick Winters used would become a textbook case for assault on a fixed site and is still taught at West Point. Winters and his men destroyed these guns during a vicious engagement, lasting over 2 hours against heavy machine gun and infantry fire. This action saved countless American lives on Utah Beach. Dick would later be wounded, refused to be evacuated, maintaining that he would stay with his company. He was nominated for the Medal of Honor by Colonel Robert Sink, his commanding officer of the 506th Regiment, a West Point graduate. His application for denial of the medal was based on an utterly arbitrary reason. The division commander directed that only one Medal of Honor was permitted to be awarded in the 101st Airborne Division for the Normandy campaign. Mr. Speaker, it was never the intent of Congress to have an artificial limitation imposed on a solder who committed acts of heroism and bravery as documented by his colleagues, by his subordinates, and by his leaders. Winters was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the Nation's second highest military award for his actions. This is a high honor, but he deserves the Medal of Honor as recommended by his commanding officer. The Army has reviewed the matter and maintains that the Distinguished Service Award is appropriate. Thousands of people worldwide disagree. Again, Mr. Speaker, because of an artificial limitation imposed by the commander of the 101st Airborne that only one medal be given for the Normandy campaign, Dick Winters' recognition and the recognition of those who served with him have been denied. Dick Winters was immortalized by HBO in the miniseries ``Band of Brothers,'' produced by Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg. Andy Ambrose, the son of Stephen Ambrose who wrote ``Band of Brothers,'' has publicly supported Winters for the Medal of Honor, and so have thousands of other people all across the country, including every military person that served with Dick Winters and observed his heroism. The entire Pennsylvania congressional delegation, all 19 members, Democrats and Republicans, including the gentleman from Hershey, Pennsylvania (Mr. Holden), where Dick Winters resides, have signed on as original co-sponsors of this legislation. Both chambers of the Pennsylvania State legislation having agreed and have publicly supported and passed legislation encouraging Congress to take this action. Dick Winters is a humble man. He did not want this kind of attention. In fact, those who have supported this effort who came to me have said that Dick Winters did not want this to take place. But all of those people who served with Dick Winters, all of those soldiers who were there, who saw, who observed, and who realized his heroism in landing on D-Day and taking Easy Company all the way in to Hitler's headquarters, understand that Dick Winters deserves the Congressional Medal of Honor. Again, Mr. Speaker, when Congress enacted the legislation creating the Medal of Honor, it did not allow artificial imposition of limitations. It said whatever soldier under any condition that is recognized by his or her peers for their actions should be eligible to receive this commendation. In the case of Dick Winters, because of an artificial limitation, he has been denied that solemn honor of our country. My bill does not mandate that the President award this Medal of Honor. It simply authorizes and allows the President to make this honor if he so chooses. Mr. Speaker, we just celebrated D-Day. Sixty-one years later, when hundreds and thousands of American men stormed the beaches to liberate Europe, one of those bravest heroes, one of those extraordinary of the ordinary people who responded was Dick Winters. I encourage my colleagues to sign on and join us in righting this wrong and providing the support for the President to give Richard D. Winters the Medal of Honor.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, this is an amendment that I wish I did not have to offer because the amendment follows the language of the President of the United States, our leader, who has called for joint cooperation with Russia on missile defense. The amendment calls for the language of our Secretary of Defense, who has called for joint cooperation on missile defense. The language calls for an amendment that my good friend, the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt), and I offered in 1998 in H.R. 4 that actually calls for a national missile defense, and as a part of that called for joint cooperation on missile defense. In fact, the weekend before the vote on H.R. 4, I took Don Rumsfeld, private citizen; Jim Woolsey, private citizen; Bill Snyder, private citizen; and Democrat Jim Turner and other Republicans to Moscow, and we told the Russians that our move in moving forward on missile defense and not only abrogating the ABN treaty was not about us scoring a strategic advantage over them, but was about an effort to protect ourselves, as they had been doing with their system around Moscow. And we told them that we saw threats coming from North Korea, China and Iran and, therefore, we had to take the action. Mr. Chairman, for the past several years we have had a joint program with the Russians called RAMOS. A year ago, our four star general, General Kadisch, came in and said to me, Congressman, I have got to cancel the program, but I want to do a follow-on with the Russians. And I said, that is great because that is the intent of the President and that is the intent of the Congress. He said, But Congressman, I cannot get a meeting with my Russian counterparts. So in April of last year, we took, at the request of General Kadisch and General Obering, General Shakleford to Moscow with us. And General Shakleford sat across the table in Straya Polochad, the equivalent of the West Wing in Moscow with General Balyevsky who would become the chief of the general staff. During the summer of last year, they negotiated a multi-phase agreement to work with the Russians on joint use of their large phased array radar, which we need; on joint use of the Russian missile systems for targeting purposes, which we want. But because none of the Missile Defense Agency, but because of the bureaucracy in the Pentagon, today we have no cooperative program with Russia, and that is unacceptable and it is outrageous. So this amendment gets to the heart of the office of Secretary of Defense and the policy shop. You do not override the President of the United States. You are not the ultimate decision-makers above the Congress. The Congress made a conscientious bipartisan veto-proof effort in passing H.R. 4 in 1998. We were the ones that called for this cooperation. The President has said this repeatedly, and this amendment says to those bureaucrats in the policy shop, do your job. I thank my colleagues for their effort. I ask all of my colleagues to support this because this is about our word. This is about the trust of America. This is about building a relationship that our Missile Defense Agency wants. General Obering was in my office 2 months ago with a policy person sitting across the room, and General Obering looked at him and said, I want to do this. What we are saying is we support General Obering. We support the Secretary of Defense. We support the President of the United States. And to those bureaucrats in the Pentagon, wake up and listen, because that is who this amendment is aimed at. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I, first of all, want to thank my distinguished chairman and the ranking member for their work. Let me say this at the outset. I cannot tell the Members how proud I am to serve on this committee. Every day that I serve in this institution, I am happy that we work so well together. But this committee, I think, sets the entire example for the entire Congress. Democrats and Republicans, we work together. I think the best evidence of that is, we had a vote out of committee of 61 of the 62 members coming together, and where we had areas of disagreement, we have been able to work those out. What a real credit and testimony to this Congress and those 62 members who are on this committee and to our leader. The chairman has done a fantastic job. He has done what many said was the impossible, and I applaud him for that, under extremely difficult circumstances. The gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton) has been a tireless advocate for what is right for our military, and I applaud him for that. To the gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Abercrombie), my ranking member, I thank him. He is a great American and it is great to work with him. And I want to add a special amount of praise to our new staff director, who is sitting here for the first time at the table. I look forward to what I know is going to be an extremely productive relationship with a real professional who is going help us in our job. Mr. Chairman, in my part of the bill in the Tactical Air and Land Forces Subcommittee, we had some difficult decisions to make. I had $10 billion of requests for plus-ups that I could not meet, that the services wanted, that Members came to me for. It was impossible. We did the best that we could. And again this committee did what we did last year. It was this committee that called for additional funding to up-armor our Humvees and take care of the troops that were in harm's way. It was this committee that led the White House last year in getting that first $25 billion supplemental. This weekend, I will take a bipartisan delegation back to Iraq, and we will spend Memorial Day in theater with the troops seeing the visible examples that we have helped provide to allow our military to be so capable and so successful. And that was our primary focus in the defense bill this year, how best to support our military and civilian personnel in the war against terrorism. The second thing that we did, and it was difficult, was accountability for DOD programs. And that is not easy. We have services each wanting their own individual platforms while accomplishing the same objective. We put language in this that says they cannot do that. We cannot afford to have the exact same helicopter for the Army that meets the exact same need of the Marine Corps. Why do we not come together with one platform for both? This committee took that action, and I am proud to say that is a part of our recommendation. We also said that in the case of new technology and new programs, we want to see the technology before we buy it. What disappointed me was that some of the contractors and some of my good friends in this body tried to mischaracterize the language we put in the bill on the Presidential helicopter. Our language on the Presidential helicopter was not to score a point against or for any contractor or any region of the country. I fully support the decision of the Navy and the Marine Corps and the down- select that they made. And it is not about ``Buy America'' or not buying America. It is about what is the best helicopter to meet the needs of our President. But I would say we have to have closer control over the dollar amount going into this program. We also had to make a difficult decision, as my chairman outlined, on Future Combat Systems. We cut the program by $400 million; but it was the right decision to make financially, to make sure that we are protecting the taxpayers' interest as well as giving the warfighter the best technology. We made a number of other changes in terms of the overall purchasing of our major platforms. I will not go into them. I will submit them all for the Record. In closing, I want to say again how proud I am to serve with a Democrat and Republican who truly understand how to lead, to work together, and in the end to do what is best for our warfighters. I thank my distinguished chairman and ranking member and the gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Abercrombie), as my own subcommittee ranking member, for their cooperation on this final product. It is deserving of a ``yes'' vote from every Member of this body. Jurisdiction includes $67 billion in DOD procurement and research and development. Bill increases the requested authorization for programs within the jurisdiction of the Tactical Air and Land Forces Subcommittee by $4.5 billion. Focus: First, how best to support our military and civilian personnel serving in the global war on terrorism; and second, accountability in DOD programs. Legislative initiatives that seek to redress several unfavorable trends in the Department of Defense: Programs being called joint programs with only one service participating in the program. This results in large, single service and program research and development expenditures for service unique programs followed by short production runs and inefficient use of taxpayer dollars. Each service would like its 100 percent solution to every requirement, but that simply cannot be afforded. We want to make sure valid needs of the services are met, but affordability and unique solutions to requirements have to be balanced. We cannot afford to continue to have individual, service solutions within our ground forces for helicopters, tactical wheeled vehicles, blue force tracking, body armor, armored vehicle upgrades, vehicle add-on armor kits, and unmanned aerial vehicle systems, as well as other programs. Also, programs cannot continue to be allowed to enter pre-production R&D, with immature technologies and ill-defined or unrealistic requirements. Further, the Office of the Secretary of Defense is there for a purpose, to exercise oversight and reconcile differing service requirements. OSD needs to start exercising its responsibility in programs like unmanned aerial vehicles and helicopter development. We must stop the trend toward excessive research and development and procurement concurrency in acquisition programs, resulting in not ``flying before buying,'' potential extensive post production modifications, and the associated increased acquisition costs. An example is in the action we have taken on the VXX--the presidential helicopter replacement program. The companies involved have tried to portray the action we have taken as a win for their particular marketing strategy when all that our legislation requires is flying the VXX before buying. It is not a Buy American provision. It is not trying to reverse the source selection. It is simply telling the Pentagon to test and fly the R&D aircraft before you buy production aircraft, so we don't have to go back and spend millions of dollars on already produced aircraft because the test results were not available in time to incorporate fixes into production aircraft. The Pentagon request to us would have us authorize procurement of 15 of the required 23 VXX aircraft before any testing has been done--likely resulting in expensive retrofits to production aircraft. Other legislation includes: Multiyear Procurement for UH-60 helicopters; Multiyear Procurement for the Apache helicopter Target Acquisition/ Pilot Night Vision Sensor; Multiyear Procurement for Apache Helicopter Block II conversion; A Requirement for an Acquisition Strategy for Tactical Wheeled Vehicle programs; A Requirement for Full and Open competition for the Objective Individual Combat Weapon; A Requirement for use of the Tactical Common Data Link by all services for tactical unmanned aerial vehicles; A Requirement for the Office of the Secretary of Defense to approve all new UAV programs; An annual Government Accountability Office review of the Future Combat Systems program; A Requirement to maintain the lethality and survivability requirement of the Non Line of Sight Cannon as established in the operational requirements document; A Requirement for an independent analysis of the FCS manned ground vehicle weight requirement; and A Requirement for a single, joint heavy lift rotorcraft program. In addition adjustments have been made to the following programs: The C-130J multiyear procurement is reinstated to the levels projected in the fiscal year 2005 budget, resulting in an authorization for 9 C-130Js and 4 KC-130Js, with advance procurement for those same quantities included for fiscal year 2007. [This program has been poorly managed by the Pentagon, but we need the tactical airlift that these aircraft will provide and termination costs were estimated to exceed the one year procurement value of these aircraft.] The Future Combat Systems' budget request is reduced by $400 million. The Joint Strike Fighter program is reduced by $150 million, the amount requested for advance procurement--again to require flying test aircraft before procuring production aircraft. The Heavy Lift Rotorcraft replacement program is restructured and combined with the Joint Heavy Lift rotorcraft program. The Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle program is reduced by $30 million, as the requested amount is early to need.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, this is a difficult issue for me. I am a diabetic. I have diabetes in my family. I am cochairman of the Congressional Diabetes Caucus. My wife is a full-time diabetes educator. She has spent her entire time as a health care professional educating and working with diabetics. The gentleman from Delaware (Mr. Castle) and the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Langevin) are very good friends of mine. I have studied all their information. I have tried to be as open about this as I possibly can be. But I can say, Mr. Speaker, that in the end it comes down to not eliminating any type of research, because that is allowable in this country; it is whether or not we should use Federal funds. California is using some $3 billion right now on what this bill is attempting to deal with. In the end, Mr. Speaker, this is a very personal decision. It is one that I agonized over. I am not a medical professional. I consulted with all four of my friends who are medical doctors in this Chamber. They have studied medicine, they understand medical research, they understand bioethics far better than I ever will, and I come down on their side. I come down on the side of life. I will oppose the bill that is being offered by my friend, the gentleman from Delaware (Mr. Castle) and my friend, the gentlewoman from Colorado (Ms. DeGette) and I will support the alternative that is being offered by this conference.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, as an author of this legislation with the distinguished ranking member and the distinguished chairman, I thank the chairman for working with us on this compromise. The chairman has been one of the tireless advocates in this body on behalf of the first responder community; and I want to tell the gentleman they recognize that. On behalf of the 1.2 million men and women who serve in the 32,000 departments across America, they understand that the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Rogers) is listening to them. Last week, when I approached the gentleman from Kentucky (Chairman Rogers) and the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Sabo), our colleague, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell), the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews), the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), and a whole host of Members on our side of the aisle over here, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Boehlert) and others, it was with a great deal of enthusiasm that the chairman said he would work with us, and that allows us to bring this amendment forward today. Last November, Mr. Chairman, I spoke at the memorial service for our fallen firefighters. We paid tribute to 111 brave Americans, most of them volunteers, who paid the ultimate price in protecting America. Each year in this country, we lose over 100 police officers, we lose over 100 firefighters, paramedics, and EMTs. The difference in terms of law enforcement support, and we spend about $3 billion to $4 billion a year on local law enforcement at the Federal level, is that 85 percent of our first responders in the fire community are volunteers. They get paid nothing. They serve on behalf of these 32,000 departments while doing their full-time job and then come home on weekends and at nights and serve their communities. It is up to us to make sure they have the proper equipment they need. Now, Members need to understand there is a distinction between the grant program running through the States and the grant program increased by this amendment. The grant program that this amendment increases is directly accessible to the fire departments. There are no middle people. There is no bureaucracy. There is no overhead. They go on line for 30 days once each year, and they apply directly. The grants are actually reviewed by other firefighters. There is no politics. That is why over 19,000 departments in this country have received one or more grants that have benefited our local towns. This money is not just for homeland security; it is to better equip those departments who, back in 2000, we recognized need national help. The second part of this amendment provides additional funding to the SAFER program, a program to encourage cities to hire more paid firefighters, volunteer departments to come up with more creative ways to encourage volunteers, and volunteer departments who may have to hire a full-time driver or a full-time officer, to have some of that funding available through this SAFER bill. It is a significant increase when the program was appropriated to the level of $65 million this fiscal year, to add another $25 million in this amendment to that program. Let me say just in closing, Mr. Chairman, that we are asking our fire and EMS departments to do more. The recent round of base closings that was announced on Thursday largely closes Guard and Reserve facilities. That is going to put increased pressure for homeland security on those 32,000 fire departments. They are not going to be able to rely on those local Guard and Reserve units, because their facilities are being shut down, so it is all the more reason that this amendment makes sense. It is good policy. It is good fiscal sense. It is paid for. I commend all of the authors and everybody involved and especially again I want to thank the chairman for his vision, for his foresight, and for working with the ranking member to make this possible.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, Ms. Kerry Ambrose has been in Bolivia for the past year as a volunteer with the Peace Corps. Ms. Ambrose is following the footsteps of over 178,000 Americans who have served as Peace Corps volunteers in 138 countries over the past 44 years. Kerry is doing extraordinary work in her village and I commend her dedication and service to improve the lives of others. I would like to share with you her editorial submitted to my local newspaper, The Delaware County Times. [From the Delaware County (PA) Times, Apr. 3, 2005] Opinion: Serving Peace Corps Means Making a Difference (By PCV Kerry Ambrose) I live in a small pueblo in Bolivia. My house has running water but no shower so we bathe via buckets. I consider myself lucky, though, as some of my friends only have water for a few hours a day, if that. The family I live with sells chickens. I see the chickens before they are killed. I also watch the grandmother of my house wash piles of chicken claws in a bucket in order to make her delicacy--chicken foot soup. My family hand-washes its clothes every other day. I still have not mastered the art completely and often the children laugh good-naturedly. My family happens to have a TV in one of its rooms. Most families do not. Most families have a small room that serves as the living room, bedroom, and kitchen. Oftentimes the floor is packed dirt and the roof is thatched. My favorite part of my day is after waking up. I heat water on our stove and make mate, a type of tea served here. My favorites are manzanilla, which is chamomile, as well as cocoa leaf mate, which is supposedly good for the stomach. I sit on the steps of our house in the chill morning light with the steaming hot cup of mate in my hands as I look out on into the distance. I live in the altiplano, which is a flat plain above the tree line. It stretches for miles in all directions and looks like a vast sea of earth striving to meet the unreachable horizon. The wind is harsh as there is no protection from it and for the most part the soil is rocky and hard. Many of the people here depend on the mines, but there are also farmers and herders. All are difficult livelihoods in such an unforgiving place. The altiplano, though, has a stark and desolate beauty to it that creeps in to haunt the soul. It's untouched in many places and is wild and untamed in a way that I imagine the prairie lands of the U.S. were before the settlers. I am a volunteer in the Peace Corps, which is why I am living here. I mainly work in the schools teaching environmental education and health classes. This year though I am also helping teach physical education from kindergarten through sixth and am hoping to start a basketball intramural league and maybe an art mural club. The children are so motivated. Everyday I look into their bright eager eyes and smiling faces and cannot help but become inundated with love. I have so much hope for all these children, these brilliant minds waiting to blossom, but I know that the people of this town, this country, are poor. Many of the girls see no future beyond having seven or eight children to help with the farm work, the mortality rate here is as high as almost 50 percent in some areas so the birth of many children guarantees the survival of a few. The streets of the cities are not lined with gold, but rather with funeral parlors displaying miniature coffins. My heart breaks knowing some of these children I see will go on to sniff glue, become alcoholics, and abuse their wives because these are the examples they know and see. I am determined to help in what little way I can to instill a sense of self-esteem. They may be poor in material objects, but they are not poor in spirit. I have been here already for a year. Peace Corps volunteers make the commitment to serve for 27 months. When the tragedy of Sept. 11 happened, I personally made the decision to join after I finished college. Many people of the world view America with contempt. I wanted to do what I could to make the most out of the privileges my citizenship automatically bestowed upon me. I came to Bolivia with idealistic notions that I could somehow change the world. I still hope to make a difference each day I walk hand in hand with a small child looking up at me with eyes so wide. However, I have been humbled in that I realize by simply living here I have learned more this past year about myself, people, and the world then I could have possibly envisioned or ever repay, although I intend to try. Kerry Ambrose is the daughter of Pamela Ambrose and Gary Pattinson, and a graduate of Gamet Valley High School. She was sworn in as a Peace Corps volunteer on April 7, 2004. Learn more about this organization by visiting www.peacecorps.gov or if interested in donating supplies for a future project or school, contact Kerry at ambrose81@comcast.net