William R. Richardson: “if I were a NATO ally, I would be scratching my head in wonderment and asking has the U.S. Congress gone mad, or is this…”

“if I were a NATO ally, I would be scratching my head in wonderment and asking has the U.S. Congress gone mad, or is this a joke? Did the Americans hear that the cold war is over, or is this a time warp? Whatever happened to consultation with our NATO allies? What does the President think about this initiative? Oh, I forgot, we now have 230 Secretaries of State and Defense, and we do not need an executive branch. We now have an imperial Congress with a constitutional authority to run foreign policy. Mr. Chairman, this is a bad bill. It is an attempt to dictate the terms of NATO expansion with no criteria for membership. England is against this, France is against this, Germany is against this. Russia is going to think we are indicating aggression. Slovakia is run by an authoritarian leader. Poland is run by a former Communist Party member. Should we not be discussing these issues with others, rather than dictating to NATO and the executive branch? We are also starting a new military assistance program, an entitlement program. This is going to take money from other strategic allies like Israel, like Turkey, like Pakistan. Mr. Speaker, let us not allow this amendment of the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Torricelli] to go down. It corrects a serious flaw. This bill is not going to become law, but it sends a chilling signal to our allies that the United States is divided, that there is no cohesion between the executive and congressional branches.”