Chuck Grassley: “the last amendment I am going to propose on this bill states that subsidized carriers must provide U.S. flag and U.S.…”

“the last amendment I am going to propose on this bill states that subsidized carriers must provide U.S. flag and U.S. crews for the entire defense sealift voyage. This amendment is responding to the desire, presumably, behind the bill, presumably behind cargo preference legislation for 50 years, a necessity of having American ships and U.S. crews delivering our products, our materiel, to the war zone. So it requires that we have U.S. flag and U.S. crews for the entire defense sealift voyage. Most believe that if we pay these U.S.-flag carriers this billion dollar corporate welfare subsidy over the next 10 years, they will carry out their obligation to deliver military sustainment cargo all the way into the war zone with their U.S.-flag commercial vessels with U.S. crews. Unfortunately, neither the VISA program, which is already in place, nor this bill, H.R. 1350, guarantees this. So the legislation purports that it is necessary, for our own national security, to have our own U.S. ships and our own U.S. crews to deliver to the war zone our war materiel. Yet, there is no guarantee from this legislation and no guarantee from VISA that this will be the situation. What typically is the practice is that U.S.-flag vessels will deliver war sustainment materiel to its commercial hub--that hub could be Rotterdam, as an example--and then unload it onto foreign-flag, foreign-crewed vessels, which will then carry the materiel into the war zone.”