Robert C. Byrd

To start--in an appropriations supplemental, a multiyear appropriations request, strikes me to be very, very strange.

Yet, there appears to be a growing drum beat of opinion that Congress has no choice but to undertake a complete overhaul of intelligence in the few weeks remaining in the session.

I do not believe that we can overstate the importance or the difficulty of the challenge before the Congress.

The size of the insurgency in Iraq has been consistently underestimated, in terms of the size and the force.

The doctrine of preemption says that one man, the President, shall have power to declare war.

It seems to me that we ought to at least bow to the Constitution as we enter into this temple of the destructive doctrine of first strike.

I cannot see how under the doctrine of preemptive strike that any President can make this decision by himself.

In your view, Dr. Kissinger, why did our intelligence agencies fail so tragically? Was it because of how our agencies were supposed to work with each other on an organizational chart, or was it because enough money was not getting to the…

So as I understand your response, you do not think that the intelligence community would have come to any different conclusion about Iraq's nonexistent weapons of mass destruction if the 9/11 Commission's recommendation for intelligence…

I thank you for holding these hearings on the 9/11 Commission's recommendations for intelligence reform.

I just don't believe that we're giving enough attention to the war in Afghanistan.

I don't think this is an unimportant question or an impossible one...

Could I impose on the chairman and the ranking member just briefly? What is the current monthly cost of operations in Afghanistan, and how much of the $25 billion in this budget request is for operations in Afghanistan?

Where there is no vision, the people perish.

What about those who have said, hell no, we won't go?

Are these reports accurate? Is there now or will there soon be a cutback in the R&R leave for our troops in Iraq?

When can our troops expect their leave to be restored?

So there's--there will not be a cutback in the R&R leave for our troops in Iraq?

I'm growing increasingly concerned about the continuing and possibly growing insurgency in Afghanistan.

But would that--would the committee have the understanding that anything that goes beyond Afghanistan and Iraq comes back to this committee?

I want to be sure that none of that money can be used for making wars elsewhere.

I fully agree and I compliment you and our ranking member.

I think we can do more, however, without infringing on the flexibility that the Defense Department so badly wants.

The amendment that you and Senator Warner are proposing on this $25 billion request is a vast improvement, and I thank you, a vast improvement over the outrageous power and money grab that the President sought in his original request to…

I commend you, Mr. Chairman, for the steps you've taken to impose accountability on the Defense Department and to provide the means for Congress to exercise some oversight of how this money is spent.