Rep. John Duncan (R-TN): We Don’t Need and Cannot Afford a War in Syria

Delivered on the floor of the House of Representatives, April 12, 2018

In the days leading up to the Congressional vote on whether to go to war in Iraq years ago, Fortune Magazine had an article headlined "We Win – What Then?"

The article said a prolonged war in Iraq would make American soldiers "sitting ducks for Islamic terrorists."

Another national magazine at that time, U.S. News and World Report, had an article headlined, "Why the Rush to War?"

Now that war has been frequently referred to as possibly the greatest foreign policy mistake in US History.

The night before the Iraq war vote, a television station in Knoxville had a poll showing 74% in favor of the war, 9% against, and 17% undecided. I was one of six Republicans who voted against going to war, and for three or four years, that certainly was the most unpopular vote I ever cast. But slowly, slowly, slowly, it became my most popular vote.

We were basically conned into that war by a group called Neo-Cons, so called neo-conservatives, who George Will once described as being "magnificently misnamed" because they were really the "most radical people in this City," meaning
Washington.

In addition to our disaster in Iraq, we have now been at war in Afghanistan for 17 years, seemingly permanent, forever wars that have cost us trillions of dollars and caused many thousands of Americans to be killed or maimed.

What a waste.

President Reagan once said we should never go to war unless there were no other reasonable alternatives and then only as a very last resort.

We have had too many leaders who never went to war themselves, such as the new National Security Advisor, John Bolton, who seem far too eager for others to go to war so these chicken-hawks can feel more important or think of themselves as modern day Winston Churchills.

Now we seem to be rushing into another war in Syria. I am thankful that conservatives like Tucker Carlson and Pat Buchanan are questioning this new rush to war.

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Rep. John Duncan: There Is Nothing Patriotic or Conservative About Our Bloated Defense Budget

Several times over my 29 years in Congress I have wondered whether there are any fiscal conservatives at the Pentagon.

It seems that the Defense Department is just like every other gigantic bureaucracy. When it comes to money, the refrain is always "more, more, more."

On November 14, the House passed what one Capitol Hill paper described as a "$700 billion compromise defense bill." It was $80 billion over the budget caps and many billions more than even President Trump had requested.

I opposed almost all the major initiatives of the Obama administration. But it was false to say that the Defense Department was "depleted" or "eviscerated" during those years, or that now we must "rebuild the military."

In fact, public relations experts in future years should conduct studies about how the Defense Department has been able to convince the public it has been cut when it is getting more money than ever.

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