Floor Statement of Senator Judd Gregg on the Iraq Study Group Implementation Act of 2007

Mr. President, I wish to join with my colleagues this morning, especially in thanking and congratulating the Senator from Colorado (Salazar) and the Senator from Tennessee (Alexander) for bringing forward this approach. There is no question but we are going to begin disengaging in Iraq. The question is, is that going to be done in a manner which strengthens our security as a nation or is it going to be done in a manner which undermines our security as a nation?

Are we going to leave an Iraq which is stable enough to govern itself and to maintain its own security and to have a government that functions? Or are we going to leave an Iraq which becomes divided into warring factions which may lead to, literally, a genocidal event, an element of which is a safe haven for al Qaeda, an element of the country which is perceived as a threat to Turkey.

Clearly, we cannot precipitously abandon the people of Iraq or our own national interests in having a stable Iraq. So we need to look for a process which is going to allow us to proceed in an orderly way and in a way which, hopefully, can start to bring our own nation together as we try to address this most difficult issue.

Looking to the proposal of the Iraq Study Commission is, in my opinion, the appropriate way to proceed. It is interesting that today we are going to see, I believe, the passage of a supplemental bill which will fund our soldiers in the field ,which we absolutely have an obligation to do; which, after a lot of pulling and tugging and different ideas put on the table has reached a position which, hopefully, will have a consensus vote and will represent a majority which will be able to pass that bill and thus fund the soldiers in the field, in a manner which has both sides working together- the Democratic leader having endorsed the language and the President having endorsed the language.

But this agreement today, which includes the Warner language I supported, is a precursor to the next step- a broader coalition within our political process of developing a plan for disengagement from Iraq that assures the security of the United States and the stability of that country.

The step which is being proposed by the Senator from Colorado and the Senator from Tennessee and is supported by the Senator from Pennsylvania and the Senator from Arkansas, myself, and the Senator from Utah, is an effort to set out a blueprint or a path which we can hopefully follow in a bipartisan way as we proceed down this road. The Iraq Study Group did this country an enormous service, former Congressman Hamilton and former Secretary of State Baker, in extensively studying the issue and coming back with very concrete and specific proposals as to how we can hopefully effectively deal with settling the Iraq situation out.

So, I congratulate this group of Senators for this initiative. I'm happy to join in it. I look forward to it being a template upon which we build a broader coalition which I hope will be bipartisan, which I hope can settle out a little the differences which have so divided our nation and which will give not only the Iraqi people the opportunity to have surviving a stable government, but give ourselves the direction we need to assure our safety as we move forward in this very perilous time confronting terrorists who wish to do us harm. I yield the floor.