JSTARS is essential to the C2 [command and control] analysis and targeting cycle and their loss would significantly degrade NATO's ability to bring dynamic targeting strike assets to bear on Regime forces.

the JSTARS ability to acquire and pass updated geo-locations in near-real-time acts as a valuable force-multiplier for many of our assigned intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) assets.

I would hope that we could pursue the possibility of using American helicopters, rather than the Mi-17.

I join my colleagues in thanking you for your service and note that the description that you gave earlier of trading, I think you put it, size or number or quantity for quality is a dilemma faced by many of your colleagues in DOD.

if we can declassify some of this information, it would really enhance the appreciation and understanding of the American public in general.

submarine forces provide assurance, deterrence, and valuable contributions to the forward defense of the United States.

I am greatly concerned by the potential impact that some of these proposals could have on the ability of our military to attract the quality of people, and they are people of truly extraordinary quality, as you know better than I.

Thank you for those comments. I will say on behalf of the State of Connecticut, we've been proud to support that sub base because it performs such an important mission.

I believe that we need more effective measures for enforcement to counter that approach, because it will undermine your best efforts.

I'm concerned, and my guess is you share that concern, about the reduction from 72 to 59 in fiscal year 2012 going to 2013.

I think there is no other way to put it.

We owe them better. We must do better for them.

I have one more area that I would like to cover and that is in terms of human trafficking.

I have introduced a bill. It has bipartisan support here and in the House to try to impose stronger criminal penalties on contractors who engage in this practice.

I think other members of the committee and Congress would as well and hope that your persuasive efforts and your efforts to lead by example on this score are persuasive to the Pakistanis.

I think that you will find a very high degree of support for any programs that provide job opportunities, training, counseling, education.

I share the concerns that have been raised about helicopters sold by the Russians to the Afghanistan forces.

Unemployment rates among the recently returned veterans, particularly our younger veterans, are significantly higher than the general population, which I think is absolutely unacceptable and intolerable.

I am very sympathetic to your answer. I am very supportive as a longtime prosecutor before I moved to this job...

I thank the distinguished Senator from Oklahoma for his courtesy and his leadership on so many issues. Mr. President, I want to particularly say to my colleague from Vermont how much I appreciate his leadership on the Judiciary Committee…

I am honored to rise today after my distinguished colleagues have spoken on this issue so powerfully and eloquently, but I do so reluctantly because I rise in the face of a continuing assault on women's health care in this country--an…

I wish to join in acknowledging Senator Kirk's contribution to this amendment. The reason I have offered it is very simply to send a message and have the effect that no corrupt elected official, no official convicted of a felony in…

I thank the Presiding Officer, the distinguished Senator from New York, and my colleagues, Senator Lieberman, Senator Collins, and Senator Brown, for their superb leadership on this issue, and I am very pleased to strongly support the…

I call up amendment No. 1498. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report. The assistant legislative clerk read as follows: The Senator from Connecticut [Mr. Blumenthal], for himself and Mr. Kirk, proposes an amendment numbered 1498 to…

essentially this amendment, very simply and directly, assures that Members of Congress who may be prosecuted and convicted of the offenses specified in the amendment also should see their pensions revoked, along with potentially other…