Sen. Lindsey Graham Changes His Tune On Tying War Funding To Benchmarks

Sen. Graham Will Vote Against War Funding That Doesn't Include Benchmarks

Sen. Lindsey Graham:

I will not vote for money for Afghanistan or more troops unless we have benchmarks pushing the Afghan government to deliver for their people. [Fox News, 9/15/09]

Yet Just A Few Short Years Ago, Sen. Graham Adamantly Opposed Such Efforts

Sen. Graham: What I hope we can do is find benchmarks that will not undermine the mission. We've got to win in Iraq.

And this whole idea of a new mission of where our troops can just fight Al Qaida and no one else -- I've been a military lawyer for 25 years. What you're trying to do is impossible to implement.

We have to fight extremists who are trying to topple this infant democracy. Benchmarks, holding the Iraqi government accountable, but not by empowering our money -- they need the money. They're running out of the money.

 We need to give the troops the money without ensuring their defeat. We're at 29 percent because we can't fund troops at war, and we're trying to do something in the back door which we won't do in the front door, which is cut off funding, bring them home. That's an honorable path.

This idea of trying to have benchmarks and time lines that ensure their defeat is unacceptable to me. And this is a war we can't lose.

So I hope we'll be smart enough and wise enough as a Congress to give our troops what they need without ensuring their defeat and empowering their enemy. [Fox News Sunday, 5/20/07; emphasis added]

Sen. Graham: Well, I think there will be some benchmarks in any supplemental. We had benchmarks in the McCain-Lieberman-Graham bill, but we don't want to tie it to deadlines, timelines or assistance. We want to put in writing what we expect the Iraqi government to try to achieve and let that be the solution to the problem because if you get too cute with this and you start tying things up too tightly, you undercut political progress in Iraq. So I think some benchmarks in a non-binding way will be the way to go.

Mr. Jarrett: Now, some House Democrats -- I'm sure you know this -- are beginning to coalesce around a $19 billion bill, enough to fund the war for only about 60 days. It, too, would have benchmarks, but without penalties, no withdrawal dates. What do you think of that?

Sen. Graham: Lousy idea. You know, the folks over fighting this war need the money. If we don't give them the amount of the supplemental, it will affect training and readiness and deployments, and we're too cute by half. Congress cannot take over the commander in chief role. Congress cannot bleed the military dry or restrict the president's ability to engage in military operations based on the needs of the military, not the polling of the moment. So I want to fund the military adequately without strings attached, put benchmarks on the Iraqi government not in a way to undercut their ability to reach political reconciliation. [Fox News, 5/1/07; emphasis added]

Wallace: Senator, you and John McCain have introduced your own resolution that would set benchmarks for the Iraqi government.

Graham: Right.

Wallace: Including one of which is that they would keep their share of their commitment to send more troops into Baghdad. But Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, or Gates, rather, said Friday that Iraqi units are arriving in Baghdad at only 55 percent of the manpower that they were supposed to have. Haven't the Iraqis already started to break their promises to us on keeping their commitments?

Graham: Well, what we've got to do is judge them across the board. The resolution says that we have confidence in General Petraeus, that he will never be denied what he needs to implement this new strategy. [Fox News Sunday, 2/4/07; emphasis added]