January 7, 2009 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — SENATE S157 

Erma Ora—who would stand with him 

her entire life and was just as beloved 

as he was in West Virginia and in 

Washington. Senator BYRD always 

knew Erma’s greatness saying she was 

not only his wife but his best counselor. 

Speaking of West Virginia, the Senate knew from his first days here that 

he would advocate fiercely for the citizens of our State and throughout the 

years would bring prosperity to West 

Virginia. 

While they knew these things in 1959, 

today we know Senator BYRD as the 

conscience of the Senate. We know him 

as the Senator with the greatest longevity. In West Virginia we now know 

him as the West Virginian of the 20th 

century and I am glad the Nation has 

had the opportunity to get to know 

Senator BYRD over these last 50 years. 

I know my colleagues join me in congratulating Senator BYRD on a recordsetting 50 years in the Senate. Senator, 

I wish you many more. 

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I 

want to join Senator REID and all of 

my colleagues in congratulating Senator ROBERT BYRd on reaching yet another historic milestone in his lifetime 

of public service. 

In the history of the U.S. Senate, 

only one Senator, ROBERT CARLYLE

BYRD, has served for 50 years. 

A half century of service to his State, 

our Nation, this institution, and our 

Constitution. That is a remarkable 

achievement and one that we are not 

likely to see again for a very long time. 

Senator BYRD is, of course, a great 

student of history and the author of 

the definitive work on the history of 

the Senate. In fact, one could say that 

ROBERT C. BYRD is Senate history. 

Senator BYRD has served with (not 

under, with) 11 Presidents—very soon 

to be 12 Presidents. 

He was the first U.S. Senator ever to 

cast 15,000 votes, and he is the only 

Senator ever to cast 18,000 votes. 

Senator BYRD has served as majority 

leader, and held more leadership positions than any Senator in history. 

To help put the length of his service 

in perspective, consider a few facts: 

When Senator BYRD cast his first 

vote in the Senate—on January 8, 

1959—his colleagues included Senators 

John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson. 

Vice President Richard Nixon was the 

Presiding Officer. Hawaii was not yet a 

State. And a state-of-the-art computer 

would have taken up half of the space 

of this Chamber and had roughly the 

same amount of computing power as a 

Palm Pilot. 

He has been a candidate for election 

13 times—10 times as a candidate for 

the Senate and 3 times as a candidate 

for the House. He won every time. 

And he has become perhaps the most 

popular political figure in West Virginia history. He was named West Virginian of the Century by the residents 

of his home State. 

Senator BYRD’s recent reelection to 

this body is a testimony to West Virginians’ enduring respect and admiration for this proud son of ‘‘the Mountain State.’’ 

It is an honor to serve with this giant 

of Senate history, and to share with 

him this milestone. Again, I commend 

him and congratulate him. 

Madam President, I yield the floor, 

and I suggest the absence of a quorum. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The 

clerk will call the roll. 

The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll. 

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, 

I ask unanimous consent the order for 

the quorum call be rescinded. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without 

objection, it is so ordered. 

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, 

I would like to offer my very sincere 

and heartfelt congratulations to the 

President pro tempore of this body, 

Senator ROBERT BYRD. He has served in 

the body for 50 years. I have had the 

privilege of working on the Appropriations Committee with him. There has 

been no one who has been more faithful 

to the Constitution, to the goals of the 

Senate or who has served this Senate 

more honorably. I wish to say congratulations, Mr. Chairman. May you 

have many more years. 

f 

LAWFUL INTERROGATION AND 

DETENTION ACT 

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, 

I would like to speak—and I am joined 

on the floor by my comember of the Intelligence Committee, Senator RON

WYDEN, who will also speak on this 

issue—about the bill that Senators 

ROCKEFELLER, WYDEN and WHITEHOUSE

and I introduced yesterday. It is the 

Lawful Interrogation and Detention 

Act. 

I began this effort some time ago because I believe very strongly it is time 

to end the failed experiment at Guantanamo. It is time to repudiate torture 

and secret disappearances. It is time to 

end the outsourcing of coercive interrogations to outside contractors. 

I believe it is time to return to the 

norms and values that have driven the 

United States to greatness since the 

days of George Washington but have 

been tarnished in the past 7 years. 

That is what both Senator WYDEN and 

I hope this bill will do. 

I have sent a copy of it to Presidentelect Obama’s transition team. I have 

had occasion to talk with him about it 

and indicated that we look to work 

closely with him. 

What this bill would do is require the 

President to close the detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay within 12 

months. The need to close this facility 

is clear. Along with the abuses at Abu 

Ghraib, Guantanamo has been decried 

throughout the world. It has helped our 

enemies recruit, it has reduced America’s credibility worldwide, strained relationships with our allies, and created 

a misguided dual legal system. 

Additionally, the Supreme Court now 

has ruled four times that the procedures put in place at Guantanamo are 

illegal. First, in Rasul v. Bush, the 

Court ruled the administration could 

not hold detainees outside U.S. law on 

Guantanamo soil; second, Hamdi v. 

Rumsfeld, in which the Court ruled the 

Government could not detain a U.S. 

citizen without due process and struck 

down the executive’s process of labeling detainees as unlawful enemy combatants; third, Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, in 

which the Court struck down the administration’s process for trying detainees outside the civilian legal system or the Uniform Code of Military 

Justice; and most recently in 

Boumediene, in which the Court ruled 

that detainees must be afforded habeas 

corpus. 

Guantanamo was explicitly created 

to be a separate and lesser system of 

justice, to hold people captured on or 

near the battlefield in Afghanistan indefinitely. In 7 years, it has produced 

three convictions, including Australian 

David Hicks—who agreed to a plea bargain to get off the island, and Osama 

bin Laden’s driver, Salim Hamdan, 

whose sentence is almost already up. 

The hard part about closing Guantanamo is not deciding to go do it; it is 

figuring out what to do with the remaining detainees. Under the Lawful 

Interrogation and Detention Act, the 

approximately 250 individuals now 

being held there would be handled in 

one of five ways. 

No. 1, they can be charged with a 

crime and tried in the United States in 

the Federal civilian or military justice 

systems. These systems have handled 

terrorists and other dangerous individuals before and are capable of dealing 

with classified evidence and other unusual factors. 

Second, individuals could be transferred to an international tribunal, if 

such a tribunal exists. 

Third, detainees could be returned to 

their native countries or, if that is not 

possible, they could be transferred to a 

different country. 

To date, more than 500 men have 

been sent from Guantanamo to the custody of other countries. Recently, Portugal and other nations have suggested 

they would be open to taking some of 

the remaining detainees as a way to 

help close Guantanamo. That is good 

news. 

If there are detainees who cannot be 

charged with crimes or transferred to 

the custody of another country, there 

is a fourth option. If the Secretary of 

Defense and the Director of National 

Intelligence agree an individual poses 

no security threat to the United 

States, the U.S. Government may release him. This may work, for example, 

for the Chinese Uighurs remaining at 

Guantanamo. I believe five or six 

Uighurs have already been released. 

The District Court for the District of 

Columbia has ordered that the remaining 17 Uighurs be released into our 

country. That decision has been stayed 

upon appeal. 

Finally, for detainees who cannot be 

addressed in any one of the other four 


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S158 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — SENATE January 7, 2009 

options, the executive branch could 

hold them under existing authorities 

provided by the law of armed conflict. 

I believe these options provide sufficient flexibility to handle the 250 or so 

people now being held at Guantanamo. 

If the incoming Obama administration 

decides that other alternatives are 

needed, I hope they will come to the 

Congress, explain the specifics of the 

problem, and we will work toward a 

joint legislative solution. 

The three other provisions in the legislation end parts of the CIA’s secret 

detention and interrogation program. 

Some of the details of the program 

are already publicly known, such as 

the use of waterboarding on three individuals some years ago. Other aspects 

remain secret, such as the other authorized interrogation techniques and 

how they are used. 

There have been public allegations of 

multiple deaths of detainees in CIA 

custody. There was one conviction of a 

CIA contractor in the death of a detainee in Afghanistan, but other details remain classified. 

But it is well known that on August 

1, 2002, the Justice Department approved coercive interrogation techniques, including waterboarding, for 

the CIA’s use. This, despite the fact 

that the Justice Department has prosecuted the use of waterboarding, and 

the State Department has decried it 

overseas. 

The administration used what I believe to be faulty logic and faulty reasoning to say that waterboarding was 

not torture. In fact, it is. 

We will never turn this sad page in 

our Nation’s history until all coercive 

techniques are banned and are replaced 

with a single, clear, uniform standard 

across the U.S. Government. I cannot 

say that too strongly. 

That standard established by this 

legislation is the interrogation set of 

protocols outlined in the Army Field 

Manual. 

This is the field manual. It is not a 

casual document. It has been developed 

and revised over a period of time. It 

contains 19 specific interrogation techniques. They work for the military and 

operate under the same framework as 

the time-honored approach of the FBI. 

If the CIA would abide by its terms, it 

would work for the CIA as well. 

These techniques were at the heart of 

former FBI Special Agent Jack 

Cloonan’s successful interrogation of 

those involved in the 1993 World Trade 

Center bombing. They were also the 

tools used by Special Agent George 

Piro to get Saddam Hussein to provide 

the evidence that resulted in his death 

sentence. 

We have powerful expert testimony 

that the Army Field Manual techniques work against terrorist suspects. 

The manual’s use across the Government is supported by scores of retired 

generals and admirals, by GEN David 

Petraeus, and by former Secretaries of 

State and national security advisers of 

both parties. 

Majorities in both Houses of Congress 

passed this provision last year as part 

of the fiscal year 2008 intelligence authorization bill. I offered that amendment, as I believe Senator WYDEN will 

remember, in the joint conference between the House and the Senate Intelligence Committees, and it was added 

to the bill. 

It sends a clear message that we do 

not support coercive interrogations. 

But, regrettably, the President’s veto 

of the bill stopped it from becoming 

law. 

The President-elect agrees that we 

need to end coercive interrogations and 

to comply strictly to the terms of the 

Convention Against Torture and the 

Geneva Conventions. So we look forward to working with him to end this 

sad story in our Nation’s history. 

The third part of this legislation is a 

ban on contractor interrogators at the 

CIA. Now, this is interesting. Unlike 

the FBI, where FBI agents do their own 

interrogations, CIA agents do not carry 

out all their interrogations. They hire 

contractors to do so. As General Hayden has testified, the CIA hires and 

keeps on contract people who are not 

intelligence professionals and whose 

sole job is to break detainees and get 

them to talk. 

Now, I firmly and staunchly believe 

that outsourcing interrogations, 

whether coercive or more appropriate 

ones, to private companies is a way to 

diminish accountability. 

I also believe the use of contractors 

leads to more brutal interrogations 

than if they were done by Government 

employees. 

Think about it. You can have a set of 

interrogation practices and, dependent 

upon who administers them and the 

length of time they are administered 

and the combination in which they are 

administered, they can have very different effects on an individual. 

There are surely areas where paid 

contractors make practical and financial sense. Interrogation, a form of collecting intelligence, is not one of them. 

The fourth and the final provision in 

this legislation requires that the CIA 

and other intelligence agencies provide 

notification to the International Committee of the Red Cross, the ICRC, of 

their detainees. Following notification, 

the CIA will be required to provide 

International Red Cross officials with 

access to detainees in the same way 

the military does. 

Access by the ICRC is a hallmark of 

international law and is required by 

the Geneva Conventions. Access to a 

third party and the ICRC, in particular, was seen by the United States 

in 1947 as a guarantee that American 

men and women would be protected if 

they were ever captured overseas. 

I believe it still remains that guarantee. 

We remain a nation at war, and credible, actionable intelligence remains a 

cornerstone of our war effort. But this 

is a war that will be won by fighting 

smarter, not sinking to the depths of 

our enemies. 

Our Nation has paid an enormous 

price because of these interrogations. 

They cast shadow and doubt over our 

ideals and our system of justice. Our 

enemies have used our practices to recruit more extremists. Our key global 

partnerships crucial to winning the 

war on terror have been strained. It 

will take time to resume our place as 

the world’s beacon of liberty and justice. But I deeply believe, and the cosponsors believe, this bill will put us on 

that path and start the process. 

So I urge its passage. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the 

RECORD the history of this legislation 

and the matters it contains. 

There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the 

RECORD, as follows: 

LEGISLATIVE ACTIVITY ON GUANTANAMO AND

CIA INTERROGATIONS

April 30, 2007: Introduced the first Senate 

legislation to close Guantanamo (co-sponsors: Dodd, Whitehouse, Kennedy, Clinton, 

Kerry). 

July 11, 2007: Introduced amendment to 

close Guantanamo to the FY08 Defense Authorization bill. Amendment blocked from 

receiving Floor consideration. (co-sponsors: 

Harking, Dodd, Clinton, Brown, Bingaman, 

Kennedy, Whitehouse, Obama, Salazar, Durbin, Byrd, Biden, Hagel, Boxer, Feingold). 

December 5, 2007: Offered amendment to restrict CIA to Army Field Manual interrogation techniques to the FY08 Intelligence Authorization conference report. Amendment 

adopted, passed in conference report by 

House and Senate, vetoed by President Bush 

March 8, 2008. (amendment co-sponsors: 

Hagel, Whitehouse, Feingold). 

August 1, 2008: Introduced legislation restricting the CIA to the Army Field Manual, 

banning contractor interrogations, and providing access to detainees to the ICRC (cosponsors: Rockefeller, Whitehouse, Hagel, 

Feingold, Wyden). 

January 6, 2009: Introduced legislation to 

close Guantanamo, restricting the CIA to 

the Army Field Manual, banning contractor 

interrogations, and providing access to detainees to the ICRC (cosponsors: Rockefeller, 

Wyden, Whitehouse). 

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Now I will defer to 

my distinguished friend, my colleague, 

the Senator from Oregon, the Honorable RON WYDEN. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon is recognized. 

Mr. WYDEN. Madam President, I am 

very pleased to be able to be out on the 

Senate floor today with our incoming 

chair of the Intelligence Committee to 

discuss this legislation. Senator FEINSTEIN and I have sat next to each other 

on the Intelligence Committee now for 

I think about 8 years. We have talked 

about this issue on many occasions. I 

commend the Senator from California 

for all of her leadership. 

This is the right way to start off our 

committee on breaking with the last 8 

years of flawed policies that have been 

of dubious effectiveness and dubious legality. I am very pleased, honored to be 

one of our cosponsors, and I note that 

our outgoing chair, Senator ROCKEFELLER, is one of our cosponsors, and 

SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, the distinguished Senator from Rhode Island, is 

one of the cosponsors and is a great addition to our committee as well. So I 


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January 7, 2009 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — SENATE S159 

thank the chair for all of her leadership. 

What I think Senator FEINSTEIN has 

touched upon, and very thoughtfully, 

is, if you share our view that it is possible to fight terrorism ferociously 

without compromising American laws 

or American values, you must, as Senator FEINSTEIN has correctly stated, 

you must be smarter in order to strike 

that balance in a dangerous world. 

Regrettably, this administration has 

not been willing to show this sort of 

wisdom. All too often for the last 8 

years the administration has engaged 

in complicated legal gymnastics to justify antiterrorism programs that, in 

my view, are of questionable effectiveness, questionable legality. Today, the 

incoming chair of our committee, Senator FEINSTEIN, is helping us with this 

important legislation. The Lawful Interrogation and Detention Act is helping us to right the balance and show 

the country that with smart antiterrorism policies we can effectively fight 

the war against terrorism and at the 

same time restore our moral authority 

and protect our values. 

I will tell you, based on the information I have seen again and again, and 

what we are told by military leaders, 

these coercive techniques simply are 

not effective. General Petraeus, for example, has discussed with respect to 

soldiers in Iraq, that coercive techniques may be usable in terms of forcing someone to talk, but that does not 

necessarily mean the person will say 

something that protects American security. 

Senator MCCAIN, our distinguished 

colleague from Arizona, has made 

much of the same point. Certainly, the 

use of these techniques in a number of 

instances can be detrimental to our national security. Certainly, the techniques have discouraged allies in the 

past from cooperating with us and, 

frankly, in my view, they serve as 

something of a recruiting poster for 

our enemies. 

One of the areas I hope to pursue in 

the future, not as part of this legislation but working with our incoming 

chair, working with our ranking minority member, Senator BOND, and the 

administration of the President-elect, 

is I hope to be able to declassify a significant portion of the history of this 

program, particularly the legal 

underpinnings of this program, so the 

American people will actually be able 

to see that much of what has been done 

in the last 8 years simply is not as effective in the war against terrorism as 

the American people deserve. 

Certainly, it is important to recognize that when Americans are captured 

abroad in the future, international 

standards of prisoner treatment, particularly the Geneva Convention, will 

sometimes be the only shield they 

have. These standards have evolved 

from hopeful ideals into widely observed rules of conduct, partly because 

the most powerful country on Earth 

has led by example. 

Anytime our Government attempts 

to dodge these standards, it weakens 

them, and it increases the risk of abuse 

for our prisoners. The fact that our 

worst enemies have horrifying and barbaric methods for dealing with prisoners does not, in my view, make these 

methods useful or legitimate. 

I am confident that President-elect 

Obama is not going to engage in many 

of the practices that we have seen in 

the last 8 years. But I certainly want 

to pass legislation that codifies these 

important principles and makes sure 

that none of his future successors engage in these practices. That means 

you have to make the laws plain; you 

have to make them strong. This legislation will make them plainer and 

stronger than they are today. I would 

submit that is essentially what Senator FEINSTEIN has been working for all 

these past years. 

I want to mention a couple of the 

other provisions. I was struck by Senator FEINSTEIN’s comment with respect 

to the use of contractor interrogators 

at the CIA. As Senator FEINSTEIN

noted, we do not get to have a lot of 

open sessions in our Intelligence Committee. That is for obvious reasons; we 

are dealing with classified material. 

But I have felt, as Senator FEINSTEIN, 

very strongly about this topic and actually raised this concern with Admiral McConnell at his confirmation 

hearing to head our intelligence service. I remain concerned about this 

issue, and that provision in the Feinstein legislation is especially important, in my view, because interrogators 

must be accountable. Under the clear 

language with respect to these interrogators in the Feinstein legislation, 

that will be the case. 

Finally, let me comment on the provision that closes the prison at Guantanamo. During the past 8 years, I was 

concerned about the potential impact 

of this legislation and this provision. I 

was concerned at that point because it 

was not clear to me that President 

Bush had a competent plan for dealing 

with all of the prisoners currently held 

there. 

I was concerned that closing Guantanamo could simply lead to a massive 

upswing in extraordinary rendition. 

Fortunately, President-elect Obama is 

working on a different strategy for 

dealing with those prisoners at Guantanamo, so I no longer have the same 

concern that under his administration 

we would simply have prisoners handed 

over to foreign countries that would 

torture them. I have long believed that 

if you looked at the intent of the Bush 

administration in this area, they 

sought to create a prison at Guantanamo Bay that would be under U.S. 

control but beyond the reach of U.S. 

law. Now the Supreme Court has definitively ruled that constitutional 

protections apply to people at Guantanamo Bay. So I would hope that even 

the prison’s strongest advocates would 

say it serves no useful purpose. 

The combination of the clear language in the Feinstein legislation we 

discuss today and that President-elect 

Obama is looking at a comprehensive 

plan for dealing with the prisoners at 

Guantanamo leaves me with a reassurance that there is a chance to close 

this prison and do it in a responsible 

fashion that will protect America’s national security interests. 

There are four of us who are sponsoring this legislation. We have sought 

for many months to get these issues of 

interrogation and Guantanamo right. 

We have consistently tried to pursue 

this in a bipartisan fashion. We are 

going to continue to do so in this session. 

I believe, under the leadership of our 

incoming chair, it is going to be possible to get our Nation’s counterterrorism program back on a firm legal and 

operational footing and prevent the 

mistakes of the past from being repeated. 

I yield the floor. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California. 

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, 

I thank the Senator. We are both westerners. We did sit together for about 8 

years on the committee. As such, I 

have had a chance to discuss a great 

deal about this topic. It is a matter of 

very deep conscience and a sense of 

values of everything this Nation stands 

for, the thing that sets us apart from 

many other countries who pick people 

up and do horrible things to them. We 

don’t do that. We have always had such 

pride in that. The Senator hit a nail on 

the head. People may talk, but they 

can say anything they want. It is not 

necessarily valuable. It is not necessarily actionable intelligence. Sometimes it might be. But there are other 

ways of doing this and not sacrificing 

the values we hold dear. The nearest 

tool to achieve that is the Army Field 

Manual. 

It has been great for me to work with 

the Senator from Oregon, and I look 

forward to working with him in the future. I thank him very much. 

I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The 

clerk will call the roll. 

The legislative clerk proceeded to 

call the roll. 

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 

order for the quorum call be rescinded. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without 

objection, it is so ordered. 

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that I 

be allowed to speak for such time as I 

may consume in morning business. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without 

objection, it is so ordered. 

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Thank you, 

Madam President. 

I come to the floor today to offer my 

support for S. 147, the Lawful Interrogation and Detention Act, which my 

very distinguished colleagues, Senator 

FEINSTEIN of California and Senator 

WYDEN of Oregon, have just spoken 

about. 


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S160 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — SENATE January 7, 2009 

This bill would do three very important things. The first is force the closing of the interrogation and detention 

activities at the Guantanamo Base. I 

have supported previous legislation 

that would do this. I enthusiastically 

support this legislation to do it. 

The Bush administration has created 

a pretty significant mess with the activities down at Guantanamo. Unfortunately, some things you can snarl up so 

tightly that it becomes very difficult 

to unsnarl them, and I am afraid that 

is exactly the situation with Guantanamo. It will be difficult to unsnarl. It 

is a real challenge for the incoming administration. But it is vital that we do 

so because it has become a symbol to 

the rest of the world of America’s departure from our core principles. So I 

am enthusiastically in support of that 

provision. 

Another provision would restrict our 

interrogation activities to those techniques that are permitted under the 

Army Field Manual. In effect, it would 

end our embrace of enhanced interrogation techniques—indeed, torture. 

In support of this notion, I would cite 

GEN David Petraeus, the Commander 

of the Multi-National Force in Iraq in 

2007, who at the time wrote a letter to 

all U.S. military forces in Iraq. In that 

letter, he said this: 

Some may argue that we would be more effective if we sanctioned torture or other expedient methods to obtain information from 

the enemy. They would be wrong. Beyond 

the basic fact that such actions are illegal, 

history shows that they also are frequently 

neither useful nor necessary. Certainly, extreme physical action can make someone 

‘‘talk;’’ however, what the individual says 

may be of questionable value. In fact, our experience in applying the interrogation standards laid out in the Army Field Manual . . . 

shows that the techniques in the manual 

work effectively and humanely in eliciting 

information from detainees. 

We have heard arguments that, well, 

you can’t really rely on military interrogators. They don’t really know what 

they are doing. They are amateurish. 

They need the limitations of the Army 

Field Manual. By contrast, the interrogators of the CIA and of our intelligence community are experts and 

much more sophisticated and adept and 

don’t need to have the Army Field 

Manual restricting them, as if it is 

some sort of a learner’s permit for interrogation. 

If you look at the facts, the reverse is 

actually true. It is the military that 

has officers with literally decades of 

experience interrogating enemy prisoners, interrogating enemy prisoners 

in situations where their fellow soldiers’ lives are on the line, where men 

and women will die or live because of 

the information they are able to elicit. 

Notwithstanding those high stakes, 

they live by the terms of the Army 

Field Manual. By contrast, we know 

that the CIA really did not know much 

about interrogations, that when they 

got into the business, they had to learn 

about it. The place they chose to learn 

was from the SERE Program, a program designed to train American soldiers, airmen, sailors and marines who 

are likely to be captured by enemies 

that engage in torture how to be prepared for that, how to withstand it. So 

for training purposes, to prepare them 

for these ordeals, they used the interrogation techniques of despot, tyrant 

nations—North Korea, Communist 

China, Soviet Russia. For some reason, 

that was where our intelligence community thought it needed to go for expertise in how you interrogate prisoners, never minding the fact that the 

purpose of those despot regimes was 

not to interrogate prisoners and get actionable intelligence information; it 

was to torture those prisoners so they 

would say things and produce propaganda for those tyrant regimes. 

So the notion that the military is a 

bunch of amateurs in intelligence who 

need the constraint of the Army Field 

Manual to prevent them from making 

amateur errors and the CIA is a bunch 

of clever, crafty experts who can operate at a graduate level for all of this is 

absolutely backward. 

The damage that has been done to 

our country by this decision is, in my 

opinion, incalculable. When I think of 

the choice that was made to go this 

road, I am reminded of a phrase of Winston Churchill’s. He describes a bad and 

dangerous decision that leads to worsening consequences in this way. He describes it as going down ‘‘the stairway 

which leads to a dark gulf. It is a fine 

broad stairway at the beginning, but 

after a bit the carpet ends. A little farther on, there are only flagstones, and 

a little farther on still these break beneath your feet.’’ That is where we 

stand now, in this dark, descending 

stairway, with flagstones crumbling 

beneath our feet and the world looking 

on in horror at our departure from our 

core principles. I believe this legislation will help turn us back away from 

that dark and descending stairway, 

back into the light of our own best 

principles and the good will of our fellow nations. 

America has not only suffered grievous and lasting harm from this administration’s embrace of torture but also 

from this administration’s embrace of 

torture’s handmaiden. Torture’s 

handmaiden, of course, is secret detention. 

The bill Senator FEINSTEIN and Senator WYDEN are proposing would require the International Committee for 

the Red Cross to have access to any 

prisoners held by the intelligence agencies. The ICRC has been visiting detainees in connection with armed conflict since 1915, nearly a century. In 

2007, the ICRC visited over half a million detainees in 77 different countries 

to ensure respect for their life, dignity, 

and fundamental right to judicial guarantees. All of those notions are enshrined in our own Constitution. They 

are our national bedrock. 

Thirty-eight retired military leaders, 

distinguished generals and admirals, 

have concluded that the ICRC access to 

prisoners held by our Government is a 

‘‘critical measure to ensure continuing 

respect for the norm that [ICRC] access 

must be provided to all captives in wartime.’’ This letter comes from battlefield warriors and intelligence officers 

who participated in every major American conflict from World War II until 

today. One of them, less than 3 years 

ago, was a member of our Joint Chiefs 

of Staff. They understand that this is 

important, and they understand why. 

If we go down the corridors of history 

and survey the evil practices of tyrant 

regimes, we find one of their most notorious methods of coercion and subjugation is holding prisoners secretly 

and incommunicado. From the 

oubliettes of the Bourbon Kings of 

France to Calcutta’s Black Hole, from 

the Gestapo’s secret prisons to the Soviet gulags, from medieval dungeons to 

the bamboo cages of the Cambodian 

killing fields, secret and anonymous 

imprisonment has always been the 

hallmark of the despot. And now the 

Bush administration has stamped 

America with this shameful mark. 

Our military leaders who are in the 

best position to judge are pushing back 

and saying ‘‘enough.’’ Why do they do 

that? I think they do that because they 

are not beguiled by the force of arms. 

They live with the likelihood of armed 

conflict, of injuries, of fatalities. They 

understand that we engage in that to 

defend principles, and to give away 

those principles without a shot fired 

accomplishes the very harm that we 

have a military, that we have intelligence services to protect us from. 

What is it, we ask ourselves, that 

makes our country great? Whence cometh our strength? For centuries, America has been called a ‘‘shining city on a 

hill.’’ We are a lamp in the darkness to 

other nations. One of our greatest Senators, our friend TED KENNEDY, on the 

occasion of I believe his 15,000th vote in 

this institution said America is not a 

land, it is a promise. Torture, anonymous detention, and secret cells break 

that promise, extinguish that lamp, 

and darken that city on a hill. 

Our strength as Americans comes 

from the fact that we stand for something. Our strength comes from the aspirations of millions of people around 

the globe who want to be like us, who 

want their country to be like ours, who 

want to believe in what we believe in. 

Our strength comes when we embody 

the hopes and dreams of mankind. Our 

strength comes, as President Clinton 

said, not from the example of our 

power but from the power of our example. 

I believe Senator FEINSTEIN’s legislation will restore across this darkening 

world the power of America’s example, 

turn us back from that dark and descending stairway, and restore us to 

the place where America belongs as an 

ideal and an example for other nations. 

I appreciate Senator FEINSTEIN’s hard 

work in putting this legislation together. I appreciate the support of Senator WYDEN. 


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January 7, 2009 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — SENATE S161 

Many months ago, I offered the first 

amendment in the Intelligence Committee that would apply the Army 

Field Manual to interrogation techniques used by our intelligence agencies, and Senator FEINSTEIN was kind 

enough to cosponsor that amendment. 

We worked together in conference to 

get that amendment passed into legislation that was subsequently vetoed. I 

submitted the International Committee of the Red Cross access provision last year. 

I cannot find words strong enough to 

explain the strength of my view about 

the things we sacrifice for whatever 

small, short-term, tactical intelligence 

advantage we may achieve from torture and secret cells, assuming there 

even are any. Most intelligence professionals believe that what you get from 

torture is people who will say anything 

to get away from the pain. But let’s assume there is some value to it for the 

sake of argument. I cannot find words 

strong enough to explain how overwhelmed that small tactical value is by 

the loss of our reputation and our 

standing and the confidence and trust 

of our friends and allies when we engage in behaviors that have been associated with despots and tyrants and the 

worst of history’s regimes. 

Let’s put this behind us. Let’s support this bill. As we go through this 

time of transition in American Government, let’s also go through a time of 

transition in America’s reputation in 

the world. 

I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. 

PRYOR). The clerk will call the roll. 

The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll. 

Mr. HARKIN. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call 

be rescinded. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. 

CANTWELL). Without objection, it is so 

ordered. 

f 

TRIBUTE TO SENATOR ROBERT 

BYRD 

Mr. HARKIN. Madam President, I 

want to join my colleagues today in 

honoring the extraordinary service and 

accomplishments of the senior Senator 

from West Virginia, the Honorable 

ROBERT C. BYRD. It was exactly 50 

years ago today, on January 7, 1958, 

that he was first sworn into the Senate. Senator BYRD is the longest serving Senator in U.S. history, and he 

truly is a living legend in this institution that he loves so dearly and defends 

so fiercely. 

The Almanac of American Politics 

says: ROBERT BYRD ‘‘may come closer 

to the kind of Senator the Founding 

Fathers had in mind than any other.’’ 

I couldn’t agree more. He is a person 

of wise and mature judgment, a patriot 

with a deep love of his country. He is 

passionately loyal to the Constitution 

and a fierce defender of the role and 

prerogatives of Congress and the Senate in particular. 

Senator BYRD was once asked how 

many Presidents he had served under. 

He answered that he had not served 

under any President, that he had 

served with 10 Presidents as a proud 

member of a separate and coequal 

branch of Government. During his five 

decades in this body, Senator BYRD has 

witnessed many changes our country 

has gone through. Think about it. Our 

population since 1958 has grown by 125 

million people. There have been new 

technologies. 

I was thinking about this. In 1958, I 

graduated from high school in Des 

Moines, IA. The year before the Russians had launched Sputnik, and we 

were trying to catch up. We had not established ourselves in space. I was out 

of high school that summer, getting 

ready to go to college. I found a job 

working on this new construction 

project called the interstate highway 

system which was just beginning at 

that time. Jet air travel was just starting. I remember my first flight. The 

airplane was propeller driven. We 

didn’t have jet aircraft. There were 

some in the military, but it hadn’t 

started for commercial air travel at 

that time. We had no computers, no 

cell phones, and nine out of ten TV sets 

were black and white. That was 1958, 

the year ROBERT BYRD came to the 

Senate. There have been many changes 

that have happened over the last 50 

years. 

Across this half century of rapid 

change, there has been one constant— 

Senator BYRD’s tireless service to this 

country, his passion for helping bring 

new opportunities to the people of West 

Virginia, and his dedication to this institution, the Senate of the United 

States. 

Senator BYRD is a person of many accomplishments and a rich legacy. But 

above all, I will mention his commitment to improving public education 

and expanding access to higher education, especially for kids from poorer 

families. As many of my colleagues 

know, ROBERT C. BYRD was raised in 

the hardscrabble coalfields of southern 

West Virginia. That is one thing he and 

I have always talked about. My father 

was a coal miner also in the State of 

Iowa. His family was poor but rich in 

values and faith. His parents nurtured 

in ROBERT BYRD a lifelong passion for 

education and learning. He was valedictorian of his high school class but too 

poor to go to college right away. Those 

were the days before Pell grants and 

Byrd scholarships. So he worked as a 

welder in a shipyard, later as a butcher 

in a coal company town. It took him 12 

years to save enough money to start 

college. He was a U.S. Senator when he 

earned his law degree. 

No other Member of Congress before 

or since has started and completed law 

school while serving in the Congress. 

But degrees don’t begin to tell the 

story of the education of ROBERT C. 

BYRD. He is the ultimate lifetime 

learner. It is as though for the last 50 

years he has been enrolled in the Robert C. Byrd school of continuing education. You won’t get a better, more 

thorough education at any school, Harvard, Yale, or anywhere else. 

Senator BYRD’s erudition has borne 

fruit in no less than nine books he has 

written and published over the last two 

decades. He literally wrote the book on 

the Senate, a masterful four-volume 

history of the institution that has become a classic. What my colleagues 

may not know is that he also authored 

a highly respected history of the 

Roman Senate. For those of us who 

have been here—in my case 24 years— 

we have listened, either here on the 

floor or later when we got television, 

on closed circuit in our offices, to the 

many speeches ROBERT BYRD gave 

about the Roman Senate, wonderful descriptions of the Roman Senate and 

how it operated. We could hear how he 

weaved in the operations of our own 

Senate. There are some who think ROBERT C. BYRD actually served in the 

Roman Senate. But that part of the 

BYRD legend I can absolutely say is not 

true. 

I have talked at length about Senator BYRD’s education because it explains why he is so passionate about 

ensuring that every American has access to quality public education, both 

K–12 and higher. The one thing Senator 

BYRD and I have in common is our fathers were coal miners with very little 

formal education. Coming from a poor 

background, Senator BYRD believes, as 

do I, that a cardinal responsibility of 

Government is to provide a ladder of 

opportunity so that everyone, no matter how humble their background, has 

a shot at the American dream. I said 

ladder of opportunity; I didn’t say an 

escalator. On an escalator, you get a 

free ride. You get on and you get a free 

ride. But with a ladder of opportunity, 

you still have to exert energy and effort and responsibility to get to the 

top. But with that ladder there have to 

be rungs so you can actually climb. 

The most important rungs on that 

ladder of opportunity involve education, early childhood education, 

Head Start programs, quality K–12 public schools, access to college and other 

forms of higher education. During my 

24 years in the Senate, no one has 

fought harder for public education than 

Senator ROBERT BYRD. As chairman of 

the Appropriations Committee, he has 

been the champion of education at 

every turn, fighting to reduce class 

size, improving teacher training, bringing new technologies into the classroom, boosting access to higher education. 

In 1985, my first year in the Senate, 

he created the only national merit 

based college scholarship program 

funded through the U.S. Department of 

Education. Congress later named them 

in his honor. Originally, the Byrd 

scholarships consisted of a 1-year $1,500 

award to outstanding students. Today, 

Byrd scholarships provide grants of up 

to $6,000 over 4 years. How many kids 


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