IV 
109TH CONGRESS 
2D SESSION 
H. CON. RES. 470 
Expressing the sense of Congress that the President should immediately 
replace the Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
SEPTEMBER 13, 2006 
Mr. MURTHA submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was 
referred to the Committee on Armed Services 
CONCURRENT RESOLUTION 
Expressing the sense of Congress that the President should 
immediately replace the Secretary of Defense, Donald 
Rumsfeld. 
Whereas after 9/11, the United States Government had un-
precedented support from international allies as well as 
the American people for military action against al Qaeda 
and the Taliban in Afghanistan; 
Whereas the initial phase of the war in Afghanistan was suc-
cessful in dismantling al Qaeda operations, removing the 
Taliban authority which was harboring al Qaeda, and al-
lowing for the Afghani people to establish a representa-
tive government; 
Whereas the Secretary of Defense imposed a cap on the num-
ber of ground forces in Afghanistan prior to the war in 
Iraq; 
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HCON 470 IH 
Whereas the Bush administration concluded in April 2002 
that Osama bin Laden was in Tora Bora, Afghanistan 
during the battle for Tora Bora in December of 2001 
and that the failure to commit the sufficient number of 
ground forces directly resulted in the failure to capture 
him; 
Whereas a resurgence of Taliban influence and violence is 
now occurring in Afghanistan; 
Whereas in the months prior to the war in Iraq, the Sec-
retary of Defense repeatedly and forcefully asserted to 
Congress and the American people that there was no 
question that there were weapons of mass destruction in 
Iraq and that they were a threat to the United States, 
which is now known to be false; 
Whereas the Secretary of Defense rejected estimates from top 
military commanders regarding the troop strength that 
would be required to secure Iraq, failed to anticipate the 
level of violent opposition among Iraqis to U.S. occupa-
tion, and publicly doubted the war in Iraq would take 
[longer than] six months; 
Whereas the Secretary of Defense expressly forbade his staff 
to develop a plan for post-war Iraq and threatened to fire 
anyone who raised the issue; 
Whereas the Secretary of Defense failed to ensure that U.S. 
troops had adequate protective gear for their mission at 
the start of the Iraq war, including a shortage of 40,000 
protective body armor units, radio frequency jammers to 
thwart remote detonation of improvised explosive devices, 
and up-armored high mobility multi-purpose wheeled ve-
hicles (HMMWVs); 
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HCON 470 IH 
Whereas failure of the Secretary of Defense to anticipate the 
troop strength needed to secure Iraq or to develop a post- 
war plan resulted in foreign fighters entering the country 
who have incited attacks against U.S. soldiers and fo-
mented sectarian violence, the latter of which has precip-
itated a civil war between Sunni and Shia Iraqis; 
Whereas the Secretary of Defense asserted at the start of the 
Iraq war that Iraqi oil production would pay for the war 
yet U.S. expenditures in Iraq now exceed $8 billion per 
month and Iraqi oil production is still below prewar lev-
els; 
Whereas the Secretary of Defense failed to provide the nec-
essary training, supervision, personnel and guidelines for 
the management of prisoners and detainees which di-
rectly led to the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison, severely 
undermining U.S. efforts to win hearts and minds of the 
Iraqi people critical to securing Iraq; 
Whereas the Secretary of Defense has failed to address the 
flagging readiness of U.S. ground forces, in particular 
the U.S. Army, whose preparedness for war has eroded 
to levels not witnessed by our country in decades, thus 
hindering the ability of the U.S. to respond to other po-
tential threats to national security; 
Whereas U.S. armed forces cannot sustain the current oper-
ational tempo in Iraq and a large percentage of U.S. 
troops have done over three tours in Iraq; 
Whereas with 130,000 troops, key measures of success in 
Iraq have not been met and in some cases are worsening, 
including: the level of employment; the level of oil produc-
tion; the level of electricity production; the training of 
Iraqi security forces; and the number of violent incidents, 
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HCON 470 IH 
which have increased from an average of 400 per week 
before the establishment of an interim Iraqi government 
in the spring of 2004 to almost 800 per week this year; 
Whereas the Secretary of Defense has failed to ensure ade-
quate accounting of billions of dollars of expenditures of 
the Coalition Provisional Authority; 
Whereas at the time of the introduction of this resolution, 
2,672 U.S. service members have died in Iraq and 337 
have died in Afghanistan, exceeding the number of people 
who died on 9/11; in addition, over 20,000 U.S. service 
members have been wounded; 
Whereas terrorism incidents around the world have increased 
since the U.S. entered Iraq; 
Whereas a survey of 116 top national security experts indi-
cates that eighty-seven percent of them believe the Iraq 
war has had a negative impact on the war on terrorism 
while ninety-three percent of them believe that the war 
in Afghanistan has had a positive impact on the war on 
terrorism; and 
Whereas Democrats and Republicans are united against ter-
rorism; Democrats and Republicans are united for a 
strong military; Democrats and Republicans are united 
for a strong America: Now, therefore, be it 
Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate 
concurring), That it is the sense of the Congress that, for 
the good of the country, the United States of America 
must restore credibility both at home and abroad and that 
the first step toward restoring that credibility must be to 
demonstrate accountability for the mistakes that have 
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HCON 470 IH 
been made in prosecuting the wars in Afghanistan and 
Iraq by immediately effecting the resignation of Secretary 
of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and replacing him with some-
one capable of leading the Nation’s military in a strategy 
to resolve our deployment in Iraq, prevent regression in 
Afghanistan, reconstitute our military readiness, and 
refocus on the threats to national security posed by diffuse 
and proliferating terrorist cells as well as belligerent 
states. 
Æ 
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