Chuck Hagel: “I returned Sunday night from a 9-day trip to Turkey and central Asia. I would like to share with this body and my…”

“I returned Sunday night from a 9-day trip to Turkey and central Asia. I would like to share with this body and my colleagues some observations from that trip and of the last year and a half. There are dangerous and serious events and conflicts occurring all over the globe today. The most urgent and most immediate has occurred in Pakistan and India, but beyond Pakistan and India, beyond the subcontinent of Asia, we find a continuing problem with the Asian financial crisis throughout Southeast Asia, IMF funding, China MFN status, China technology sales, Russia-Japan economic trouble. We are in terrible trouble in the Middle East peace process, probably at its lowest ebb since the process began; Bosnia-Kosovo, east Africa, central Asia where there is fighting now in the northwest corner of Georgia; Azerbaijan and Armenia are at war over Nagorno-Karabakh, and other areas of the world that are of great concern to the stability and concern of the world. These situations are all connected. We must develop a foreign policy that captures the completeness of this interconnect. We also must tone down our rhetoric and speak and act responsibly. Actions have consequences. Words have consequences. Words have consequences especially overseas. We are seeing a geopolitical, military, and economic structure shift like the world has never seen.”