Angie Craig: “I will be brief. Others are gathered here to speak on the Hutchison amendment. But let me first of all recognize the…”

“I will be brief. Others are gathered here to speak on the Hutchison amendment. But let me first of all recognize the Senator from Texas for highlighting and bringing to the surface an issue that is growing in the minds of many of us and we hope will alert the minds of many Americans. We were engaged here for a week on the debate on the expansion of NATO. This Senate more than likely will vote to expand NATO in the course of this session. But as we do, we ought to remember the consequence or the potential impact of that kind of a vote. And I think it is reflected in this drifting policy that we have currently in Bosnia. Peacekeeping operations so designated by our President are important and should be well defined. But I will tell you, the Senator from Texas is right. Our President operates in an unauthorized situation in Bosnia today. The Senator from Oklahoma has brought up the mounting costs. We are able to measure some $8 billion in costs. We know they are much larger than that. The mission appears at date to be endless as it relates to some culmination. Do we have to lose American men and women in Bosnia before our citizens wake up or, more importantly, the Congress begins to move with its constitutional authority to deal directly with this issue? I hope not. The mission in Bosnia is now just what we were promised it would not be. We were promised it would not be an unauthorized, open-ended, nation-building deployment with no withdrawal criteria.”