WASHINGTON, 5 November 2003 — President Bush will soon sign the $87.5 billion package he requested for Iraq and Afghanistan, but his Democratic critics used its final approval by Congress to highlight what they say are his failed policies in Iraq.
The Senate, on a voice vote Monday, gave its assent to the legislation three days after the House blessed it by 298-121. It closely tracks the outlines of an $87 billion plan Bush requested Sept. 7 in a nationally broadcast speech.
“Our country is being tested,” White House press secretary Scott McClellan said in a statement released in Crawford, Texas, where the president spent a long weekend. “Those who seek to kill coalition forces and innocent Iraqis want America and its coalition partners to run so the terrorists can reclaim control.”
He said the money, coupled with assistance from international donors, will help make Iraq more secure and help the transition to self-government for Iraqis. The money also will help Afghanistan become a peaceful, democratic and stable nation, he said.
During Monday’s debate, Republicans defended the package as the best way to restore order in Iraq. The bill is dominated by $51 billion for US military operations in Iraq and $18.6 billion to restore its oil industry, train police officers and otherwise rebuild the country’s economy and government.
“Security brings stability, and stability fosters democracy,” said Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, who helped write the bill. That, he said, “offers the fastest way to get our military men and women home.”
Democrats were less charitable. A day after 19 Americans died in the bloodiest day for US forces in Iraq since March — including 16 soldiers killed when an Army transport helicopter was shot down — many Democrats said what was really needed were more contributions of troops and money from US allies.
“The administration’s lack of postwar planning for Iraq is producing an erratic, chaotic situation on the ground with little hope for a quick turnaround,” said Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W. Va. “We appear to be lurching from one assault on our troops to the next while making little if any headway in stabilizing or improving security in the country.”
In addition, Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., and four other top Democrats wrote Bush urging him to work harder to get multinational help and mobilize former Iraqi Army units.
They said those and other steps would help in “securing and sustaining the support of the American people,” as would “leveling with them about the stakes and costs of this effort.”
In an anticlimactic voice vote for which only a handful of senators appeared, Byrd was the only one to say “Nay.”
The bill completed Monday includes $64.7 billion for US military operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. The money includes everything from salaries owed reservists called to active duty to buying aircraft parts, missiles and thousands of extra sets of body armor for ground troops.
In the starkest departure from Bush’s proposal, there is $18.6 billion — $1.7 billion below the president’s plan — for retooling Iraq’s economy and government.
Though Bush got less than he wanted for Iraqi aid, the White House fended off lawmakers of both parties who had forced a provision through the Senate making half the aid to Iraq a loan.
House-Senate bargainers killed that language last week, leaving the aid a grant that Baghdad will not have to repay.
