On the recordJuly 23, 2013
I thank the gentleman for yielding. Let me associate myself with your remarks. Respectfully, we need to assure we have a relationship with the Pakistani Government to make sure that their nuclear weapons capacity is well secured. And while polls may reflect, as the gentleman says, a very poor view by Americans of Pakistan, we need their support and cooperation not only for the 68,000 troops we have there but the international forces that are working with our troops to help the people of Afghanistan have a better life. So yes, there may be corruption and there may be ill will among the Pakistani people, in our view, of our involvement over there, but we need to, as we exit Pakistan, to make sure that we get our forces out of there using the road network. Otherwise, we'll have to take a lot of our supplies and men by air, and that would be enormously expensive. We need to keep a good relationship with the Pakistani Government. I appreciate the gentleman yielding to me.
