Political Quotes

“My concern is not just of today; it has been there for some significant period of time. This Senator has pressed the questions on that situation at every opportunity I have had to date. I will also reflect on the personal involvement I have had in addition to the period in Vietnam. When I first came to the Armed Services Committee, I worked under some of the greatest men I have ever known in the Senate: Scoop Jackson, John Stennis, Barry Goldwater, John Tower. I try, as best I can, in my duties as Senator today to draw on the wisdom they imparted to me in their teachings. Those men were historic in proportion to the Senate. I shall never achieve but a small fraction of their stature but, nevertheless, having the responsibility, I do my very best. I remember John Stennis asked me to work on a report for him of the effort we made to rescue the hostages illegally taken by the Government of Iran at the embassy. We all remember that challenge. The Pentagon prepared what I thought was a well thought through plan to rescue those hostages. It was the right thing to do. We put our military at great risk. It was a plan to use covert action and helicopters. I will not dwell on it because I did write that report for Senator Stennis. It is somewhere in the archives. The bottom line, a series of primarily mechanical failures, due to dust being taken into the intake systems, prevented the consummation of what I still to this day say could have been a successful operation.”