The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:34 a.m. in room SR325, Russell Senate Office Building, Hon. Richard G. Lugar (chairman of the committee), presiding.

Present: Senators Lugar, Chafee, Allen, Voinovich, Biden, Sarbanes, Feingold, Boxer, Bill Nelson, and Corzine.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. RICHARD G. LUGAR, CHAIRMAN

The CHAIRMAN. This hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is called to order. This is a very special meeting. We have the Secretary of State with us. We appreciate that we are in the process of concluding a rollcall vote on the Senate floor, but the time of the Secretary and of all members is valuable. Therefore, I will proceed with my opening statement. Hopefully, we will be joined shortly by the ranking member of the committee, Senator Biden, and then we will call upon the Secretary for his testimony. At some point, as I have advised the Secretary, we are hopeful to have a quorum of our membership. At such appropriate time as I see that we will continue the Law of the Sea markup, hopefully can have a vote and at least take committee action on that important convention as a part of our work today.

Today the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is pleased to welcome Secretary of State Colin Powell. Mr. Secretary, we are eager to hear your views on the status of our alliances, the Bush administration's plans for making further progress in Iraq and Afghanistan, the status of negotiations pertaining to the Middle East and the Korean Peninsula, and your assessments of the State Department's budget.

During last year, American foreign policy achieved an extensive list of accomplishments, some of which have gone unnoticed but shall not today. The President put forward bold plans to fight the global spread of AIDS and to establish the Millennium Challenge Corporation, which will encourage political and economic progress in developing nations that embrace positive reforms. Congress worked closely with the White House and the State Department on these initiatives, and passed legislation that would implement them.

Our commitment of substantial funds to the Liberian crisis and to the Middle East Partnership Initiative have similarly dem

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The United States continues to make progress in securing international assistance for counterterrorism efforts throughout the world. In particular, great strides were made during 2003 to solidify cooperation from Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf states. Many nations in Europe, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia have continued to be good allies in the war on terror.

In our own hemisphere, the Colombian Government, with U.S. support, has made measurable progress in increasing personal security for its people. Murders and kidnapings were down significantly in 2003. Colombians are traveling in parts of the country that until recently were thought to be too dangerous.

In Russia, the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program and its associated programs continue to safeguard and destroy the arsenal of weapons of mass destruction built by the former Soviet Union. Through the G-8 Global Partnership Against Spread of Weapons of Mass Destruction, we have secured $10 billion in commitments for this endeavor from our allies over the next 10 years of time. Congress passed legislation that allows the NunnLugar program to be used outside the states of the former Soviet Union and, with President Bush's strong encouragement, chemical weapons destruction at Shchuchye in Russia has been accelerated. We must ensure that the funding and momentum of the program is not encumbered by bureaucratic obstacles or undercut by political disagreements.

The United States has also moved forward in the area of arms control negotiations. Last year, at the request of the President, the Senate ratified the Moscow Treaty governing the strategic nuclear arsenals of Russia and the United States. In coming weeks, the Foreign Relations Committee intends to report the resolution of ratification of the IAEA Additional Protocol to the Senate. This protocol will strengthen the international community's ability to detect illegal weapons programs. Yesterday President Bush called for immediate ratification of the Additional Protocol.

Libya's decision to open its weapons of mass destruction program to international inspection and its acceptance of responsibility for Pan Am 103 constitute a remarkable success for United States foreign policy, resulting from close cooperation with allies, specifically Great Britain, firm diplomacy, and the demonstrations of our resolve in Iraq and Afghanistan.

State Department diplomacy played an important role in the growing opportunity for rapprochement between India and Pakistan. If this initiative can produce a more stable and prosperous subcontinent, our own security will be immeasurably improved.

American diplomacy also contributed to movement toward a peace agreement in Sudan, the ratification of a constitution in Afghanistan, and the conclusion of a breakthrough tax treaty with Japan, which will be a boost to any American company doing business in that country.

During the last year, even as our relationships with some of our NATO allies were strained by the war in Iraq, the Senate ratified the treaty admitting seven Eastern European nations to NATO. The administration also secured agreement for a central NATO role

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er mission for itself in maintaining stability in the greater Middle East. This should include an expanded NATO presence in Afghanistan outside Kabul and a role in Iraq's stabilization. Progress in these areas by NATO would help heal the rifts created by disagreements over the use of force in Iraq.

Our efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, though difficult, have produced important successes. The people of those two countries are better off now than they were under Saddam Hussein and the Taliban. Schools are operating. Police forces and national armies are being trained. Free media is being established and women are participating in society in many more ways than they have done before.

However, our experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan demonstrate we must be better prepared to undertake post-conflict missions. To this end, the Foreign Relations Committee has organized a Policy Advisory Group that is attempting to come to grips with how the State Department and our government as a whole should organize and prepare itself to deal with complex emergencies. Some of the best national security minds in Washington have participated in these discussions, including Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Marc Grossman. I anticipate that the committee will put forward a legislative proposal in the coming weeks.

Public diplomacy is another area where deficiencies must be corrected if our policies are to succeed in the Middle East and elsewhere. I was heartened by the appointment of Margaret Tutwiler as Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy. She has worked well with our committee and is committed, as you are, Mr. Secretary, to boosting the effectiveness and frequency of our communications with foreign populations. I believe this will require a sea change in the orientation of the State Department, particularly as it relates to training, language expertise, and avenues of professional advancement.

Regionally, more attention must be paid to Latin America. Venezuela, Bolivia, and Haiti face severe challenges to their constitutional governments, and Mexico's importance to our prosperity and security continues to be misunderstood and undervalued by policymakers in both executive and legislative branches. President Bush's immigration proposal is an excellent starting point, but the U.S.-Mexican bilateral relationship must be elevated to a higher priority.

With the establishment of the Global AIDS Initiative and the Millennium Challenge Corporation, this administration has done more to improve our engagement with Africa than any administration in recent memory. I believe, however, that our policies will not be fully successful in Africa until we improve our economic engagement with the continent. To this end, I am hopeful for strong administration support of the extension of the African Growth and Opportunity Act, AGOA, which I have introduced in the Senate.

Mr. Secretary, this partial but lengthy list of foreign policy successes and priorities demonstrates how expansive the global challenges for the United States are. We want to hear from you about

want to compliment you personally on your efforts to expand ading for the State Department and for foreign assistance proams. You have brought strategic vision to budgetary questions volving the Department and this committee could not ask for a ter partner in explaining the importance of our international afrs budget to the American people.

The progress we have made in the last 3 years has begun to rese the damaging slide in diplomatic funding that occurred durthe 1990s. Most Americans recognize the importance of investents in national security, but often our national conception of forn affairs focuses too heavily on the crisis of the moment and Is to appreciate the painstaking work that occurs every day in e State Department and in other agencies. To win the war ainst terrorism, the United States must assign U.S. economic d diplomatic capabilities the same strategic priority we assign to litary capabilities.

We must continue our investment in diplomats, embassy secuy, foreign assistance, and other tools of foreign policy. If a greatcommitment of resources can prevent the bombing of our embass, secure alliance participation in expensive peacekeeping efforts, improve detection of terrorists seeking visas, the investment will ve yielded dividends far beyond its costs.

yield now to my distinguished friend Senator Biden for his ening statement.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., RANKING
MEMBER

Senator BIDEN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

It is great to have you before us, Mr. Secretary. We are a friendly wd, and I have told any staff member if they editorialize with eir facial expressions they are fired. I want to just say for the ord, I get as angry as you when that happens. But you are in endly territory here, among Democrats and Republicans.

Let me say I associate myself with some of the remarks my colgue the chairman has made. There are a number of successes at are out there. But it is the nature of this oversight process, tend to focus on those things which are in limbo or where there lisagreement.

I want to say at the outset before I give you my formal statement it I also know that, having been here for now I guess seven esidents, that there are always and should be, and it is healthy, agreements within administrations about policy, but once policy determined there is a team, everybody is on the same team. So m going to be asking you some questions here which for all I ɔw you might have been on the other side of an argument interlly, that may be more consistent with what I think should have ppened or maybe not. But I do not want you to-we have known h other a long time and I know you will not; this is not about 1, this is about policy areas I would like to explore.

So welcome. I realize this is now the political season. We are ng into a Presidential election. But the problems we face and › seriousness with which we have to address them, particularly

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Our Iraq policy I believe at this moment appears to be a little bit in limbo. The June 30 deadline for transfer of sovereignty is looming and Mr. Sistani's demand for elections has put in doubt our ability to proceed on key points of the November 15 agreement, which is starting to look a little more difficult to implement here. I have had the opportunity, as I know my colleague the chairman has and others, to have some private and frank conversations with the Secretary General of the United Nations. We all understand his dilemma as well and we are trying to figure our way through this. I agree that we need to end the appearance of occupation as soon as possible, but it is also vital, it is also vital that Iraqis have some confidence in the process and believe that a neutral referee is going to be on the scene after June 30 so that the current disputes do not escalate into a civil war.

I think, quite frankly, as you know because I am like a broken record with you on this and with others in the administration, I believe we have missed some meaningful opportunities to share the burden more fully with our friends and allies in Iraq, and I hope we do not miss the final opportunity because I think we are at a point where everyone in Europe, including the French, have decided that, notwithstanding their occasional unwarranted and untoward comments and actions, that success in Iraq is essential. I think everybody is, sort of like that old expression: Nothing to focus one's attention like a hangman's noose. Failure in Iraq is of greater danger, quite frankly, to the French and the Europeans than it is even to us, because it is their front yard and our back yard.

So I think the elements are there to significantly broaden the coalition to take on responsibility for securing the peace in Iraq, and I look forward to hearing some of your thinking, if time permits today—if not, I know you are always available on the U.N. role in Iraq's future beyond generic assertions that it is going to be significant, or whatever phrase the President uses, also on the possibility of holding direct elections for a transitional government.

On the security side, I had the privilege of preceding you in Brussels at the NAC when you appeared on a Friday calling for NATO to participate in Iraq and eventually take that over. I could not agree with you more. I would like to talk to you a little bit about that if time permits, and I would appreciate an update, if you are able to in open session, on recent discussions with our NATO allies on those matters. Obviously, if you would rather not do some of this in public, even though it is not, quote, "classified," but would limit your negotiating ability, I appreciate that.

On Afghanistan, I am very pleased the administration has agreed to expand the International Security Force. I do not want to get you in trouble, but if I am not mistaken a guy named Powell suggested that a couple years ago. But progress I think has been awfully slow. I have had the opportunity, as others have, to spend some time with a man I have great respect for and I know you do, General Jones, our Supreme Allied Commander-NATO, and as you know he has some concerns about the pace as well. The administration's security solution, which is these small Provincial Recon