Rules of Engagement under careful review by United States in Congress

Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 37 (Monday, March 15, 2010)]
[House]
[Page H1415]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

                          RULES OF ENGAGEMENT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the
gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BURTON of Indiana. You know, tonight, Madam Speaker, I was going
to talk about health care. I think that subject's been covered fairly
well by my predecessors, but I will be talking about it later this
week, like all my colleagues on the Republican side will.
  But what I'd like to talk about is what my colleague from North
Carolina just talked about a few minutes ago, and that's the rules of
engagement in the conflict in Afghanistan and Iraq.
  One of the things that really surprised me was that we have three
Navy SEALs that are being court-martialed right now for capturing an al
Qaeda terrorist in Fallujah, Iraq. And this terrorist took four
American contractors, one who was a retired Navy SEAL, he tortured
them, he killed them, dragged their bodies through the streets, and
then burned their bodies and hung them from a bridge. I think most
people in America, Madam Speaker, probably saw that and were horrified
that someone could be that inhumane.
  But this man is an al Qaeda terrorist, one of the leaders over there,
and we've been after him for some time. So we sent these three Navy
SEALs to get him, and they did their job. These Navy SEALs, and many of
the super-trained military personnel that we have, do an outstanding
job in going after these people and risk their lives. In fact, in
Afghanistan, we lost 19 Navy SEALs doing their job not too long ago
when they went after an al Qaeda terrorist.
  In any event, they captured this terrorist, and they brought him back
so that he could be questioned and dealt with. They turned him over to
the Iraqi military for a couple of days, and then he was turned back
over to them. And then he said that he had been hit in the stomach by
one of the Navy SEALs, and he had a split lip.
  Now, bear in mind that this guy had murdered and tortured four
American contractors and hung their bodies from a bridge. And he was
complaining because he was hit in the stomach and had a bloody lip.
Well, the Navy SEALs said that they didn't do that, and there's several
witnesses that said they didn't do that. But one person off in the
distance said that he saw some kind of an altercation. And because of
that, they're being court-martialed.
  Now, get this, Madam Speaker. They're being court-martialed for
risking their lives and capturing a terrorist who killed and tortured
four American contractors and who, we believe, was involved in
beheading some other Americans.
  I can't believe it. I don't understand what the administration and
what our Defense Department's doing. We should be going after these
people, and we can't go after them with kid gloves. We can't keep--we
can't coddling them. These people are terrorists.
  And my colleague from North Carolina that talked about the rules of
engagement--now in Afghanistan we have military personnel over there
that are told when and how they can shoot at the enemy who may be
firing at them. And I've been told that many of the Taliban and al
Qaeda terrorists over there, if they see they're going to be hit or
attacked, they'll drop their guns after firing at the American
personnel and our NATO allies. It's just crazy. You can't run a war
like that.
  And so I'd like to say to the Defense Department and to the President
of the United States, if he were listening--I know I can't talk to him
directly because I can only talk to the House and my colleagues. I
can't talk to the people of America, even if they might be paying
attention. But we can't run a war like this. We have to go after the
terrorists, no holds barred. If we catch them and they're terrorists we
should bring them to justice or kill them. It's just that simple.
  And we shouldn't be holding our military personnel like these three
Navy SEALs up to a standard that's impossible for them to be able to
attain. They have to do their job. They risk their lives. Many of them
get killed and come back maimed. I've been out to Walter Reed and to
Bethesda, and I've seen the horrible things that happen in war and how
they lose their arms and legs and are maimed for life. But they do that
to help us maintain our freedom and our democracy, our Republic.
  And so I hope that somebody in the Defense Department may be
listening and paying attention, Madam Speaker, and in the
administration. We need to take the gloves off of our men and women in
combat and let them know we're behind them 100 percent. And these Navy
SEALs should not be court-martialed, as is the case right now.
  We have sent 140,000 petitions to the Defense Department asking for
this case to be dropped. I hope it will be dropped. But we are not
going to let this thing go away. We're going to fight for these Navy
SEALs until we get them exonerated. If anything, they should get medals
for what they did.