I recently returned from a trip to Afghanistan, where I was joined by my colleagues Senators Jack Reed and Ted Kaufman. The situation in Afghanistan is serious. Security has deteriorated. But if we take the right steps, we can ensure that Afghanistan does not revert to a Taliban-friendly government that could once again provide a safe haven for al Qaeda to terrorize us and the world.

The Obama administration’s new strategy, focusing on securing the Afghan population’s safety and partnering with the Afghan security forces in that effort, is an important start at reversing the situation in Afghanistan. The change in strategy has led our forces, in the words of General McChrystal’s Counterinsurgency Guidance, to “live, eat and train together [with the Afghan security forces], plan and operate together, depend on one another, and hold each other accountable….and treat them as equal partners in success.” The Guidance goes on to say that the success of the Afghan security forces “is our goal.”

To achieve that goal we should increase and accelerate our efforts to support the Afghan security forces in their efforts to become self-sufficient in delivering security to their nation - before we consider whether to increase U.S. combat forces above the levels already planned for the next few months. These steps include increasing the size of the Afghan Army and police much faster than presently planned; providing more trainers for the Afghan Army and police than presently planned; providing them more equipment than presently planned; and working to separate local Taliban fighters from their leaders and attract them to the side of the government as we did in Iraq.

While the security situation in Afghanistan has worsened, we still have important advantages there. The Afghan people hate the Taliban. Public opinion polls show support for the Taliban at about 5%. In addition, the Afghan army is highly motivated and its troops are proven fighters.

Despite those advantages, we face significant challenges. General McChrystal believes, and I agree, that we need to regain the initiative and create a momentum towards success. General McChrystal worries, and rightly so, about the perception that we have lost that initiative, and the impact of that perception on the Afghan people, their government, al Qaeda and the Taliban. By contrast, if we can dispel that perception, we have a chance to convince local and lower-level Taliban fighters to lay down their arms and rejoin Afghan society.

I believe the most effective way to retake the initiative in Afghanistan is with a series of steps to ensure that Afghanistan’s army and police have the manpower, equipment and support to secure their own nation.

First, we should increase troop levels for the Afghan army and police faster than currently planned. There are approximately 90,000 troops in the Afghan army now, and that number is scheduled to go up to 134,000 by October of 2010. The Afghan police are scheduled to reach a level of 82,000 by the same time. For a long time, many of us have urged the establishment of a goal of 240,000 Afghan troops and 160,000 Afghan police by 2013. The Afghan Minister of Defense has strongly supported those numbers. It now appears that our government and the Afghan government are prepared to accept those goals. But the need for additional Afghan forces is urgent. I believe it both possible and essential to advance those goals by a year, to 2012.

Our own military in Afghanistan has repeatedly pointed to a need for more Afghan forces. In one sector of Helmand province we visited last week, our Marines outnumbered Afghan soldiers by 5 to one. A Marine Company commander in Helmand province told the New York Times in July that a lack of Afghan troops “is absolutely our Achilles heel.”

What do we need to do to increase the size of the Afghan army and police? According to Afghan Defense Minister Wardak, there is no lack of Afghan manpower; we’ve been assured it is available.

But we will need significantly more trainers. We asked General Formica, who is in charge of the American effort to train Afghan security forces, whether such an increase is possible. He indicated he would make an assessment of what would be necessary in order to meet the earlier timetable. In the meantime, we should also press our NATO allies with much greater forcefulness to provide more trainers. If our NATO allies are not going to come through with the combat forces they have pledged, at least they could provide additional trainers.

Larger Afghan security forces will also require more mid-level Afghan officers. In addition to supporting efforts to graduate more Afghan officers from army academies, we should consider the recommendation of Defense Minister Wardak that previous mid-level officers who fought the war against the Soviets return to service on an interim basis. Minister Wardak emphasized that those men are well qualified and well motivated, and while they may not be trained in the most current tactics, they nonetheless could temporarily meet the need of the enlarged army while the new group of officers is trained. A larger Afghan force will need supporting infrastructure, such a barracks. While the available infrastructure may not be the most modern, it is adequate and exists in sufficient amounts.

Larger Afghan security forces will require additional equipment. There must be a major effort to transfer a significant amount of the equipment that is coming out of Iraq to the Afghan army and police. Such a significant commitment to equip the Afghan security forces would also help demonstrate U.S. determination to take the initiative and create momentum in the right direction. There is an enormous amount of equipment coming out of Iraq; our military is calling it one of the greatest transfers of military goods in the world’s history. A significant part of it could be transferred to the Afghan forces, increasing their capability without weakening our own readiness. And yet there does not seem to be that kind of a crash effort in place to do that. We need to obtain on an urgent basis a list of the basic equipment needs of the Afghan forces and a list of how those needs could be met in a major program to transfer equipment leaving Iraq.

Rapidly expanding Afghanistan’s military and police forces would address one of the major problems and risks we now face there. General McChrystal told us he worries that waiting until 2013 for a larger Afghan force creates a gap in capabilities that brings significant risk of failure. But by accelerating the training and equipping of Afghan forces by a year, we address his concern. Depending on additional capability from Afghan, rather than U.S., forces, also addresses a major problem of public perception in Afghanistan. The larger our own military footprint there, the more our enemies can seek to drive a wedge between us and the Afghan population, spreading the falsehood that we seek to dominate a Muslim nation.

Finally, we should make a concerted effort to separate the local Taliban from their leaders. In Iraq, large numbers of young Iraqis who had been attacking us switched over to our side and became the “Sons of Iraq.” They were drawn in part by the promise of jobs and amnesty for past attacks, and in part by the recognition that the status quo was creating horrific violence in their own communities. In their own interests and the interests of their nation, they switched sides and became a positive force.

That same prospect exists in Afghanistan. Afghan leaders and our military say that local Taliban fighters are motivated largely by the need for a job or loyalty to the local leader who pays them and not by ideology or religious zeal. They believe an effort to attract these fighters to the government’s side could succeed, if they are offered security for themselves and their families, and if there is no penalty for previous activity against us.

General McChrystal himself has emphasized the potential of such re-integration to accomplish the same result as was achieved in Iraq. Here is what General McChrystal said on July 28th:

“Most of the fighters we see in Afghanistan are Afghans, some with foreign cadre with them. But most we don’t see are deeply ideological or even politically motivated; most are operating for pay; some are under a commander’s charismatic leadership; some are frustrated with local leaders. So I believe there is significant potential to go after what I would call mid- and low-level Taliban fighters and leaders and offer them re-integration into Afghanistan under the constitution.”

But this “game changing” possibility was apparently not factored into General McChrystal’s assessment. There is no plan yet to put in place a Sons of Iraq approach in Afghanistan. It is urgent that we lay out the steps that need to be taken to involve local and national Afghan leaders in that effort. They alone can accomplish this crucial job, but first we and our Afghan allies must draft such a plan on an urgent basis. And the potential positive impact of such a plan should be taken into account as we consider the need for any additional U.S. military resources.

Afghanistan’s people are grateful for our aid, but also eager to assume responsibility for their future. In a tiny village in Helmand Province, we were invited to meet with the village elders at their council meeting, their shura. One hundred or so men sat on the floor and chatted with us about their future and their country’s future. When asked how long the United States should stay, one elder said: “Until the moment that you make our security forces self-sufficient. Then you will be welcome to visit us, not as soldiers but as guests.”

Helping Afghanistan achieve self-sufficiency in their security is everybody’s goal. On that there is little difference of opinion, in Afghanistan’s village councils or in the corridors of this Capitol.

Can we help Afghanistan reach self-sufficiency in security fast enough? Can we get there in a way that regains the initiative and creates the momentum we need? Can we encourage those lower level Taliban to abandon an insurgency headed by terrorists whose fanaticism they don’t share?

I believe we can, by supporting a far more rapid growth in the Afghan Army and police; by providing more trainers more quickly; by a rapid infusion to Afghan units of equipment no longer needed in Iraq; and by rapidly adopting a plan for the re-integration of lower level Taliban fighters into Afghan society. In other words, we need a surge of Afghan security forces.

Our support of their surge will show our commitment to the success of a mission that is clearly in our national security interest, without creating a bigger U.S. military footprint that provides propaganda fodder for the Taliban.

I believe that taking those steps on an urgent basis, while completing the previously planned and announced increase in U.S. combat forces, provides the best chance of success for our mission: preventing Afghanistan from again being run by a Taliban government which harbors and supports Al-Qaeda, whose goal is to inflict additional catastrophic attacks on the United States and the world. And we should implement these steps before considering an increase in U.S. ground combat forces beyond what is already planned by the end of this year.

By LeAnne Rogers
OBSERVER STAFF WRITER

Not surprisingly, Sen. Carl Levin is working full time on issues relating to the biggest problem facing Michigan.

“The thing that is going on 24/7 is the auto industry. Everyone in the Michigan, Ohio and Indiana delegations — the auto states, we call them — is so involved, I can’t say,” said the Michigan Democrat, who spoke at a luncheon hosted by the Garden City Kiwanis Club.

The most important accomplishment of the delegation has been giving President Barack Obama and his administration a better understanding on the importance of the auto industry and manufacturing overall, Levin said.

“My brother and I worked in auto plants. We take it personally when colleagues have a negative stereotype about the auto industry,” said Levin. “No other country in the world would allow its auto industry to go down. In Japan, auto workers are literally on the government payroll — they won’t let the industry go with this worldwide economic slump.”

Working with the White House automotive task force, Levin said he hopes and believes their feelings toward the auto industry have changed.

“At a press conference, the president encouraged people to buy American cars — you never heard that before,” said Levin, adding manufacturing has been the basis for the existence of the middle class.

Levin was concerned about the public perception of an anticipated bankruptcy filing by General Motors, an effort at reorganization that would follow the recent filing by Chrysler.

“The trouble is because of the word bankruptcy. It’s a devastating word that suggests an end to the average person,” said Levin. “There are many parts of bankruptcy law. Chapter 11 is restructuring — a new beginning. Instead of an end, it can be a rebirth. General Motors will be smaller. There will be a lot of pain — the bondholders will take a bath — but there will be a company.”

Levin mentioned two recent bills signed by the president in which he had been very involved — credit card reform and ending military cost overruns.

“I was deeply involved with the credit card bill that will stop practices like unilateral interest increases that were applied retroactively to an existing balance,” said Levin.

As chair of the Senate Armed Forces Committee, Levin and the senior Republican member Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., co-sponsored the bill aimed at controlling overpaying for military projects.

“We have to give our troops all they need. We’ll fight over policy but give to the troops and their families all that we can,” said Levin. “We learned from Vietnam. We support our troops. We don’t want to overpay for weapons systems, that takes money away from needed programs.”

Levin took questions from audience members which included members of the Garden City Rotary Club. One man asked whether the United States might be drawn into a war with North Korea.

“The only goal of the people in charge in North Korea is to stay in power. In Iran, you have religious fanatics who might do something that they think will get them into heaven,” Levin responded. “I would bet a lot of money there will be no war in Korea. It’s blackmail. They want to be given a lot of food and money. The Middle East and Afghanistan are a lot more complicated.”

Responding to a question about what making American workers live at Third World levels to be competitive in the world, Levin said he had worked to fight tariffs and other practices that keep U.S. companies from selling products in other countries.

“Our companies are competing with other countries that support their industries. Look at the number of cars Korea sells here but try to sell U.S. cars in Korea,” said Levin. “Are we going to be real aggressive in partnering with manufacturers?”

In introducing Levin, Rotarian Wilma Healy noted she had first met Levin in 1978 when as a Harper Woods City Council member she volunteered to work on the senatorial campaign of Levin, then a Detroit City Council member.

Healy had a picture of the two with a group that Levin noted included former governor G. Mennen Williams and then-gubernatorial candidate Bill Fitzgerald.

“Forget the color of my hair (in the photo) — I had hair. Wilma has been trying to get me here for a long time and I was finally able to do it,” said Levin.

Ken Hines didn’t get a chance to ask his questions before time ran out.

“I wanted to ask why the government was dictating the Fiat partnership with Chrysler,” he said. “Also a question about universal health care. We’ve got it in Medicare. If the government worked on it, we could just expand that.”

“He was all right. I liked they way if someone asked a question, he would give a dissertation but comes back to the person to give an answer to the question,” said Norah Fix. “He was very straightforward.”

My thanks to the Foreign Policy Association for inviting me to be here tonight. It is an honor to speak to the members of an organization who have added so much to our nation’s foreign policy debate over the years.

In thinking about how I might try to live up to that tradition, I set out to sum up lessons learned from the war in Iraq and how we’re back on track, focusing on the right enemy – al Qaeda and the Taliban – in the right place – Afghanistan and Pakistan. I had planned to lay before you tonight a vision of a world inspired by a young American president who summons us to look beyond party and politics, to work together here at home, and to engage our allies around the world to confront the threat of religious extremists preaching fanatic intolerance. The power of President Obama’s message – dramatized in Prague and Berlin when multitudes showed up to cheer him – holds the promise of regaining the good will of people around the world. The President’s decision to end torture, to close Guantanamo, to talk to our enemies, and to reduce the threat of nuclear annihilation shows the world that America is willing not only to lead – but to listen.

But then last week, a voice from the recent past reemerged, claiming that America can do what we please, preaching unilateralism again, and embracing the arrogance that for too many years alienated our friends and set back efforts to achieve common goals. Former Vice President Cheney’s world view, which so dominated the Bush years and which so dishonored our nation, gained a little traction last week – enough to persuade me to address it head on here tonight.

I do so as Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which recently completed an eighteen month investigation into the abuse of detainees in U.S. custody and produced a 200 page bipartisan report which gives the lie to Mr. Cheney’s claims. I do so because if the abusive interrogation techniques that he champions – the face of which were the pictures of abuse at Abu Ghraib – if they are once more seen as representative of America, our security will be severely set back.

When former Vice President Cheney said last week that what happened at Abu Ghraib was the work of “a few sadistic prison guards” acting on their own, he bore false witness. And when he said last week there was no link between the techniques used at Abu Ghraib and those approved for use in the CIA’s secret prisons, he again strayed from the truth. The seeds of Abu Ghraib’s rotten fruit were sown by civilians at the highest levels of our government.

On September 16, 2001, Vice President Cheney suggested that the United States turn to the “dark side,” his words, in our response to 9/11. Not long after that, White House Counsel Gonzales called provisions of the Geneva Conventions “quaint,” and President Bush determined that provisions of the Conventions did not apply to detainees captured in the Afghanistan war. Senior administration officials followed the President and Vice President’s lead. Our recent bipartisan Senate Armed Services Committee report determined the following: “Senior officials in the United States government solicited information on how to use aggressive [interrogation] techniques, redefined the law to create the appearance of legality, and authorized their use against detainees.”

The aggressive interrogation techniques which our government authorized for both the CIA and the military were derived from a Defense Department training program called SERE – which stands for Survival Evasion Resistance Escape. This program was developed to train our troops how to resist abusive interrogations (torture) by enemies who refuse to follow the Geneva Conventions. Many techniques used in the SERE training program are based on abusive tactics which were used by the Chinese Communists during the Korean War. For them, their purpose was not to elicit accurate information – it was to force confessions out of U.S. soldiers to be used for propaganda purposes.

Under highly controlled settings, U.S military personnel in SERE training are subjected to techniques like waterboarding, being slammed against a wall, confinement in small boxes, stress positions, forced nudity, and sleep deprivation. SERE training techniques are legitimate tools for training our people. They prepare our forces, who might fall into the hands of an abusive enemy, to survive by giving them just a small taste of what might confront them. The techniques were never intended to be used against detainees in our custody. But they were used – and it was officials at the highest level of our government who authorized them.

In 2002, with Mr. Cheney’s and the National Security Council’s (NSC) blessing, SERE techniques were approved for use by the CIA in interrogating detainees. Our bipartisan Committee report found that on December 2, 2002, techniques that we saw in photos at Abu Ghraib – including nudity, stress positions, and dogs – were formally approved by Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld for use by Department of Defense personnel against detainees at Guantanamo. Our report showed, in about 20 pages of detail, how the Secretary of Defense’s 2002 authorization of the aggressive techniques at Guantanamo led to their use in Afghanistan and in Iraq, including at Abu Ghraib.

Now, the Chinese Communists during the Korean War may not have cared if the confessions that they elicited for propaganda purposes were false, but it should matter to us. If American troops are going to risk their lives acting on leads gained from these interrogations, we better be certain that the information is accurate and reliable.

We cannot have that level of confidence from information obtained from abusive interrogation practices. In a May 2007 letter to his troops in Iraq, General Petraeus said the following: “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” he said. “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.”

And before the interrogation techniques were approved for Guantanamo in December 2002, a senior Army psychologist warned against their use. And this is what he said: “If individuals are put under enough discomfort, i.e. pain, they will eventually do whatever it takes to stop the pain. This will increase the amount of information they tell the interrogator, but it does not mean the information is accurate. In fact, it usually decreases the reliability of the information because the person will say whatever he believes will stop the pain.”

The risks of relying on information obtained from the use of harsh techniques cannot be overstated. We went to war based on false information. In February 2003, former Secretary of State Powell stood before the United Nations and made the case for war with Iraq. Secretary Powell described intelligence claiming that Iraq had provided “chemical or biological weapons training” for al-Qaeda. The claim was an ominous one. Where did it come from?

The statements were based on what turned out to be the false claims of a detainee named Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi. And it has since been reliably reported that al-Libi made his claims only after he was subjected to the harshest interrogation techniques. What made it even worse, by the way, is that at the same time Bush administration officials were trumpeting al Libi’s claims to the world, our own Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) believed that he was lying.

Not only does harsh or abusive treatment decrease the reliability of the information obtained, it actually can increase the resistance to cooperation. When I visited Afghanistan last year, a senior intelligence officer told me that treating detainees harshly is actually a “roadblock” to getting intelligence from detainees. Here’s why. Al Qaeda, he said, and Taliban terrorists are taught to expect Americans to abuse them. They’re recruited based on false propaganda that says that the United States is out to destroy Islam. Treating detainees harshly only reinforces their distorted view and increases their resistance to cooperation.

President Obama has taken important steps to reverse the previous administration’s ill-advised policies. He ordered an end to abusive interrogations. He closed the CIA’s secret prisons. And he has committed to shutting down Guantanamo prison.

Now Mr. Cheney claimed last week that President Obama’s decisions have made us less secure and that abusive interrogation techniques worked. Mr. Cheney has said that the use of abusive techniques “prevented the violent death of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of innocent lives.” Mr. Cheney’s claims are directly contrary to the judgment of our FBI Director, Robert Mueller, that no attacks on America were disrupted due to intelligence obtained through the use of those techniques.

Mr. Cheney has also claimed that the release of classified documents would prove his view that the techniques worked. But those classified documents say nothing about numbers of lives saved, nor do the documents connect acquisition of valuable intelligence to the use of the abusive techniques. I hope that the documents are declassified so that people can judge for themselves what is fact and what is fiction.

Mr. Cheney has made other false statements. For instance, his claim that the techniques used on detainees were the “same exact procedures” used on our own people in the SERE training regime. That could not be farther from the truth. A report by the CIA Inspector General said that the CIA’s Office of Medical Services judged that the SERE waterboard experience is totally different from the CIA’s usage. And the reason is absolutely clear. SERE training is administered to our own people in highly controlled settings and can be terminated at any time by the student during the training. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded 183 times in one month.

Waterboarding one of our own personnel even once over their objection would be a felony. It is a colossal misrepresentation for Mr. Cheney to claim that the techniques we use in SERE training are exactly the same, his words, as those used against detainees. The abuse of detainees in our custody has alienated our allies. It has fueled al Qaeda’s propaganda. And it has served as a recruitment tool for terrorists. At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing last year, former Navy General Counsel Alberto Mora testified that “there are serving U.S. flag-rank officers who maintain that the first and second identifiable causes of U.S. combat deaths in Iraq – as judged by their effectiveness in recruiting insurgent fighters into combat – are, respectively the symbols of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo.”

The vivid reports of U.S. personnel abusing detainees have also contributed to the decline of America’s standing in the world. Since the world embraced us after 9/11, its support for us has been dramatically diminished. And that should set off alarm bells for all of us, because we need the good will of people around the world for our own security and to deal with the greatest threats that we face.

The bottom line in this debate was articulated by the Director of National Intelligence, Dennis Blair, who said recently that, “the damage [that coercive techniques] have done to our interests far outweighed whatever benefit they gave us.”

Mr. Cheney’s support of abusive techniques dishonors our nation and the men and women who wear our nation’s uniform. Listen to what a Captain in the 82nd Airborne Division wrote about the abuse of detainees that he had witnessed in Iraq and Afghanistan. In a letter to Senator McCain, he posed what he called “the most important question that this generation will answer,” – “Do we sacrifice our ideals in order to preserve security?” That Army Captain said in his extraordinarily eloquent words and in his own way that he would “rather die fighting than give up even the smallest part of that idea that is ‘America.’”

Finally, the assertion by Mr. Cheney that the abuse of detainees in U.S. custody at Abu Ghraib were the actions of “a few sadistic prison guards” acting on their own is not only false, it is a shameful attempt to avoid accountability for those who were the most responsible – those senior civilian officials who, in the words of our bipartisan Armed Services Committee report “solicited information on how to use aggressive techniques, redefined the law to create the appearance of legality, and authorized their use against detainees.”

Until now, mainly lower ranking military personnel have been left to take the rap for the abuses at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere. I believe it is dishonorable and a failure of leadership to lay the sins of Abu Ghraib solely at their doorstep. The buck, to date, has stopped far below where it belongs.

Now, the question of whether, and if so, how, to hold senior-level officials accountable for policies utilizing abuse of detainees is not for me, or Mr. Cheney, or even President Obama to answer. It is a legal matter for the Department of Justice to review, away from partisanship and politics. And that’s why I have urged our new Attorney General to appoint independent experts – such as a few retired federal judges – to review the mass of material which exists and to make recommendations about whether and if so, how, officials should be held accountable. This approach would take the question out of politics and help assure a thorough and sober assessment of this chapter in our history.

Completing such an assessment is necessary if we are to regain what we have lost. For only then can we credibly object to the use of abusive tactics on our own troops when they are captured and to violations of human rights in other countries. Only then can we stem the tide of propaganda that our enemies use to recruit followers to their terrorist cause. Only then can we restore America’s image as a country that not only espouses ideals of human rights, but lives by them. That is how we win back hearts and minds and rally the people of the world to the great causes that face mankind.

Thank you.

Original story

Ask most lawmakers and they will tell you that the political elements are aligned this Congress for military acquisition reform.

This year, both chambers rolled out legislation to overhaul how the Pentagon buys major weapons, and that is due in large part to Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), who has emerged as a key ally to President Barack Obama on military matters.

It has been a fast-moving legislative calendar for Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee. He has called for partnering with Russia on missile defense, investigating the role of private security contractors in Iraq and re-evaluating the U.S.’s strategic reliance on Pakistan in the Middle East. And through it all, he has gained bipartisan backing, especially from ranking member John McCain (R-Ariz.), as he lays out the committee’s priorities.

Levin teamed up with McCain to introduce the Weapon Systems Acquisition Reform Act (S. 454), which calls for terminating some Pentagon programs with 25 percent or more in cost overruns. It also increases the degree of oversight in the process (though the House version has more oversight provisions).

The committee approved the Levin-McCain bill in April, and it will reach the Senate floor sometime in May.

The legislation is significant because it cemented Levin’s reputation as a staunch ally of the new administration, which has put acquisition reform at the Pentagon and other agencies at the top of its agenda.

The most resounding endorsement on Levin’s bipartisan approach to his job came from Obama during his prime-time White House news conference on March 24, when he said “there is uniform acknowledgement that the procurement system right now
doesn’t work. That’s not just my opinion. That’s John McCain’s opinion. That’s Carl Levin’s opinion.”

Levin, who is the longest-serving Senator in Michigan history, said he appreciates the attention, as long as it helps get things done.

“What we hope to do is very simple — bring down our cost overruns and put much-needed oversight into the process,” he said.

However, Levin also has not shied away from confronting the popular Democratic president, particularly when it comes to war strategy. Although he supports the new approach to Iraq and Afghanistan, Levin criticized the administration for its plans to rely heavily on Pakistan in the fight against the Taliban and other extremist groups along that country’s western border.

“I thought [Levin’s] Pakistan comments were going to hurt him,” one Republican Senator said. “Now look at what has happened. His concerns have proven to be correct, and now everybody realizes how big of a problem Pakistan is.”

Throughout it all, the 74-year-old lawmaker has tried to appear cordial in handling his disagreements with the Obama White House.

“I respect the president and the team he has put together,” Levin told reporters recently. “Pakistan was an issue I needed to raise, and the administration has been receptive to my comments.”

Ultimately, Senate leaders acknowledged Levin’s input and appeared to be in agreement.

“Pakistan did present a problem, and we have to look at it carefully,” Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said. Levin “had raised valuable points on the issue.”

“He was right. Pakistan has always been a major concern,” said Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee.

The administration looks like it got the message. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who worked alongside Levin during her stint on Armed Services, validated the chairman’s concerns.

“We can’t expect Pakistan to just become a partner overnight. It’s going to take time,” Clinton told a House panel in April.

Other Senators say Levin’s message got across because he is experienced at communicating with colleagues.

“He has the seniority and has earned the respect from Members across the aisle,” Sen. Joe Lieberman (ID-Conn.) said. “He is a strong voice on the committee.”

Since the people of Michigan elected him to the Senate in 1978, Levin has risen to become one of the sharpest Members of Congress on issues of oversight, reform and military matters. Many say his command of key issues is admirable.

“We know we can count on him,” Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) said. “He is a terrific chairman and commands the respect from witnesses.”

During their recent testimony before the committee, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, U.S. Central Command chief Gen. David Petraeus and Gates’ senior staff also praised Levin.

The chairman has persuaded Senate Republicans to back the pending Levin-McCain bill because he teamed up with Obama’s political rival. Now many observers expect the Senate debate on the bill to remain muted because there’s bipartisan support for the bill.

One Democratic aide on the committee explained that Levin had to work with Obama on major reform legislation when he became president.

“We knew [Obama] meant what he said when he spoke of change,” the Democratic aide said, adding: “However, we didn’t think we could get McCain on board so soon. Levin deserves a lot of credit for that.”

Levin enjoys a degree of respect from his GOP colleagues, largely because he has been willing to listen to their concerns and lay out compromises on policy and budgetary matters.

Armed Services Subcommittee on Strategic Forces ranking member Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said he is pleased at how knowledgeable Levin has been during his questioning of witnesses this year.

“I think he has done an outstanding job as committee chairman,” Sessions said. “We work very closely; I’m a subcommittee ranking member and serve on other subcommittees as well. I think he’s moved forward. We’ve had hearings. We’ve had nominations. We are having Gates here to testify. I think he’s done a really good job.”

McCain also is optimistic: “The chairman and I know that acquisition needs to see improvements. We agree on key issues, and I know he wants to see the best for our troops just like I do.”

Think about what the Bush administration left us:

• They left skyrocketing unemployment.
• They left more Americans without health insurance, including uninsured children.
• They left record home foreclosures.
• They left sky high national debt.
• They left a foreign policy in shambles.
• And they left a world America was no longer a moral leader.

Well, because of your work last year, we’ve been able to start to clean up that mess. Look what Congress and the President have accomplished just in the first 100 days of the Obama administration.

• We enacted a recovery plan to create millions of jobs.
• We expanded the Children’s Health Insurance Program - an expansion that George Bush vetoed twice! And President Obama overturned the Bush era rules restricting stem cell research!
• Working with President Obama, we provided tax cuts for the middle class, and we’re ending the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest 1%.
• We made sure that people like Lily Ledbetter can sue for pay discrimination - the Republicans blocked our efforts last year.
• We enacted a national service bill, named after Senator Ted Kennedy, to triple the number of Americans who participate in the national service program Americorps. Thank you Governor Patrick and people of Massachusetts for giving us Ted Kennedy for all these years.

But Job #1, #2 and #3 for the Michigan Congressional Delegation’s is fighting for our auto industry. Our auto industry and auto workers don’t want a bailout…but they should not be sold out.

We and the UAW are fighting like hell to drive that message home - to protect hard-earned pensions and benefits and to help our workers and retirees weather this economic storm.

While our auto manufacturers and their suppliers need a boost, just as the manufacturers in every other auto producing country do, other sectors of the economy need to be reined in. We need to put the cop back on Wall Street and regulate the financial institutions that have run wild, crack down on credit card companies that take unfair advantage of consumers, and eliminate tax loopholes that some use to avoid paying their taxes by hiding assets and income in tax havens overseas.

And we’ve got a lot of other work to do overseas as well.

We have a President who is ready to lead, and we are leading once again. President Obama is closing Guantanamo, and he banned torture of detainees. President Obama is strengthening our bonds with our allies, and he’s reaching out to nations that we need to work with to improve our security and make the world a safer place.

President Obama has put an end to an era of arrogance and began a new era of partnership, pragmatism and, once we right this economy, prosperity.

Thank you Michigan Democrats for helping bring all these changes about. And, by the way, thanks also for all your help reelecting me to my 6^th term. You made it look easy!

Fresh off a U.S. victory over Swiss bank UBS AG, which admitted in a recent plea deal with the Justice Department that it aided tax evasion by wealthy American clients, Congress and the White House are trying to press a wider crackdown on the lucrative tax haven business.

UBS last month agreed to pay $780 million in fines as part of a deferred prosecution agreement with federal prosecutors. The bank is outing clients attached to about 250 accounts that the Justice Department alleges were set up as shell entities in tax avoidance schemes. The bank admitted to violating regulations set under a treaty that requires banks to submit information about their U.S. clients’ tax obligations.

Sen. Carl Levin, (D., Mich.), chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, which has delved into alleged tax haven abuse for years, said he hopes a bill he is sponsoring, and similar legislation in the House, will stop banks from doing what UBS has admitted.

Mr. Levin’s committee is set to hear testimony Wednesday from Mark Branson, a senior UBS wealth management executive, as well as senior IRS and Justice officials overseeing the tax haven investigations. The hearing is expected to focus on details of the bank’s deal with prosecutors, including documents that investigators say show how UBS trained its bankers to avoid detection by U.S. investigators.

At a House hearing Tuesday, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said the Obama administration supports the tax haven legislation, which is similar to a bill Mr. Obama co-sponsored as a senator.

Among other things, the proposed legislation would close certain tax loopholes and give U.S. regulators the authority to take special measures against foreign jurisdictions and financial institutions that impede U.S. tax enforcement. The proposal also would treat foreign corporations managed and controlled in the U.S. as domestic corporations for income tax purposes.

Mr. Levin said the administration’s support for the bill “sends a strong signal to tax havens that this Administration is not going to tolerate the kind of offshore tax abuses that have been draining $100 billion a year from the U.S. Treasury and that, as a result, offload the tax burden onto the backs of honest taxpayers.”

The U.S. investigation of UBS was aided by cooperation of a former UBS banker who turned over information about UBS’s activities as part of a plea deal to settle charges of aiding tax evasion. U.S. officials last year also brought charges against a former senior UBS private banker in Switzerland who since has been declared a fugitive by a U.S. judge.

Under the deal with U.S. authorities UBS is allowed to fight U.S. efforts to obtain the names of another 52,000 accounts. That is a key issue for Swiss officials, who say they are preserving the lucrative Swiss banking secrecy tradition even though they allowed UBS to share some information with U.S. authorities.

In a briefing with reporters on Tuesday, Mr. Levin expressed frustration that despite treaty obligations Swiss authorities and UBS continue to hold out against U.S. demands.

“We cannot rely on the Swiss; that’s the bottom line,” he said. He said the 2001 treaty served as a “shield” to protect tax dodgers, instead of being a “sword to go after tax evasion.”

Among the documents set to be released by Mr. Levin’s committee is an investigative report issued by the Swiss Federal Banking Commission, known as EBK, that largely disputes the allegations by U.S. prosecutors that top UBS executives directed their bankers to assist clients in defrauding the U.S. government.

The report “admonished the bank” for violating requirements of the tax treaty. But it added that the investigation “did not find any indications that the bank’s top management had any knowledge of violations of duties under the treaty….Quite to the contrary, UBS AG undertook great efforts between 2001 and 2002 to ensure that it meets its obligations under the QIA in its entirely.”

By Ellen Nakashima
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, March 4, 2009; Page D02

A bill to end cost overruns in major weapons systems would create a powerful new Pentagon position — director of independent cost assessments — to review cost analyses and estimates, separately from the military branch requesting the program.

Those reviews, unlike in the current process, would take place at key points in the acquisition process before a weapons program can proceed, according to legislation sponsored by Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.)

Last year, the Government Accountability Office reported that cost overruns on the Pentagon’s 95 largest weapons acquisitions system totaled about $300 billion, even though the government cut quantities and reduced performance expectations.

“A train wreck is coming,” McCain said at a hearing yesterday on the bill.

The bipartisan legislation would also enable the Pentagon to pull the plug on a weapons project that has a critical cost overrun unless the Defense Secretary certifies, with reasons and documentation, that the program is essential to the national security and can be made cost-effective.

If the Weapon Systems Acquisition Reform Act of 2009 becomes law, current big-ticket programs such as the U.S. Army’s Future Combat System, the Air Force’s F-22 Raptor fighter jet, and the Pentagon’s Joint Strike Fighter strike aircraft weapon system, could face new scrutiny. All three have come under fire for their expense and the slow development.

The Joint Strike Fighter and Future Combat System account for almost $80 billion in cost overruns, and were begun with insufficiently mature technologies and rosy assumptions about performance, Levin said. Twelve years after Joint Strike Fighter program was started, three of eight critical technologies are still not mature, he said. Eight years after Future Combat System was launched, only three of 44 critical technologies are mature.

“Particularly at this time, when the federal budget is under immense strain . . . we simply cannot continue this kind of waste and inefficiency,” Levin said.
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Currently, the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, the Pentagon’s senior acquisitions officer, receives cost estimates on weapons programs from two sources — the program office in the relevant service branch, and the Pentagon’s Cost Analysis Improvement Group.

Under the proposed legislation, the group’s 30-person staff would fall under the new independent cost assessment director. That new office would have significant authority to obtain data from the contractor and to ensure costs are justified. The director would also have to submit an annual report to Congress.

At the hearing, four defense experts testified that it was key to have accurate cost estimates at the beginning of the acquisition process. They also emphasized the need to rebuild an acquisitions workforce decimated by two decades of government downsizing.

Jacques S. Gansler, a former Pentagon senior acquisition officer, told lawmakers that the Defense Contract Management Agency is down to 10,000 staff from 25,000 in 1990. The Army had five general officers with contract backgrounds then. By 2007, it had none.

“Everything about the bill is going in the right direction,” said Danielle Brian, executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, a watchdog group. “The part that worries me most is that it assumes Congress is going to do its job of serious oversight,” she said, “and in general, we’re pretty disappointed with Congress in that regard.”

By JENNY STRASBURG

A bill proposed last week to regulate hedge funds in the U.S. could require them to start talking more — including about their investors.

The Hedge Fund Transparency Act was introduced by Sen. Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat, and Sen. Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican. One part of the bill that caused a buzz among hedge-fund managers and lawyers over the weekend is a new requirement that hedge-fund investors’ names be routinely and publicly disclosed.

The broader bill would require hedge funds with at least $50 million in assets to register with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The senators and others are calling for increased public disclosure of hedge funds’ assets and trading strategies to help prevent market catastrophes and investor fraud. Currently, hedge-fund registration is voluntary for most of the industry.

The proposed legislation calls for hedge funds to provide names and addresses of “each natural person who is a beneficial owner,” which lawyers say includes outside investors. It also would require disclosure of a fund’s size and the names of its prime brokers, which are the banks that lend funds money and clear their trades. Registration also would open funds to random audits by regulators.

Disclosing investor identities would uncloak thousands of clients, from wealthy individuals to pension funds and endowments, who generally want their investments private, said Stephen Vine, head of the investment-funds practice at law firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP. Such a mandate would take one aspect of disclosure beyond what is required of mutual funds, which are much more strictly regulated. Hedge-fund investors must meet minimum wealth standards that don’t apply to mutual-fund clients, and hedge funds have fewer trading restrictions and can amplify their bets, and therefore their losses, with borrowed money.

“It’s hard to see why having that investor information broadcast to the public helps a risk regulator,” says Mr. Vine, adding that his hedge-fund clients were caught offguard by the provision and worry that it would scare off investors.

The potential change comes at a time of dramatic shrinkage for hedge funds, whose assets have plummeted in value and whose clients have bailed out.

Sen. Grassley in a statement last week called for “some sunlight” to be shed on hedge funds and their investors, adding that both groups have fought hard to retain secrecy. The bill he and Sen. Levin introduced also seeks stricter controls to prevent money-laundering through hedge funds.

It is too early to say whether the SEC would exercise the authority granted by the bill, if it even passes, to require such a deep level of disclosure involving clients’ names, says Jay Gould, a former SEC investment-management attorney who now runs the hedge-fund practice at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw and Pittman LLP in San Francisco. The SEC could dial back such a directive by setting minimum “materiality standards,” such as requiring that only the biggest, most influential investors’ names be disclosed, Mr. Gould says.

By STEPHEN LABATON

Two senior senators introduced legislation on Thursday to impose government oversight of hedge funds.

The legislation by Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan, and Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, was filed as the Obama administration was preparing a broader legislative overhaul of the regulatory system, including an effort to more tightly regulate hedge funds.

State regulators and a panel created by Congress to oversee the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program issued separate but similar regulatory proposals on Thursday. The proposals also seemed to closely mirror many of the provisions that administration officials say will be part of their plan.

The regulatory overhaul is one piece of the administration’s effort to restore confidence in the financial system.

Other pieces include a stimulus bill that the House passed on Wednesday and that is moving through the Senate, and an overhaul of the financial assistance program for the nation’s largest banks.

Senior administration officials have been in discussions this week with Wall Street executives over proposals for managing the remaining $350 billion in the troubled assets program. A new plan is expected to be announced soon.

At the same time, the administration is preparing to propose tighter regulation of credit rating agencies, new federal oversight of mortgage brokers and greater supervision of credit-default swaps, the unregulated financial instruments that experts say contributed to the economic crisis.

Lawmakers have also signaled that they intend to take up legislation to more tightly regulate the markets. Meeting with reporters on Thursday afternoon, Senator Christopher J. Dodd, the Connecticut Democrat who heads the Senate banking committee, outlined an ambitious schedule for hearings next month on regulatory issues.

They will feature testimony from Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and Paul A. Volcker, a former Fed chairman who is an adviser to President Obama.

Mr. Dodd acknowledged that the administration was hoping to complete many of its proposals before a meeting of the Group of 20 nations in London on April 2.

Administration officials have expressed a particular interest in tightening regulation over hedge funds, a move that was opposed by the Bush administration even though William H. Donaldson, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission under President Bush, tried to force the funds to register as investment advisers.

His effort was successfully challenged in 2006 when the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that the commission’s regulation had exceeded its authority.

The Levin-Grassley legislation would correct that problem by giving the commission the unambiguous authority to regulate hedge fund advisers.

“If the events of the last year have taught us anything, it’s that we need to regulate firms that are big enough to destabilize our economy if they fail,” Mr. Levin said. “It’s time to subject financial heavyweights like hedge funds to federal regulation and oversight to protect our investors, markets and financial system.”

Mr. Grassley said he believed the political winds had shifted since he made a similar proposal two years ago. It was never considered by Congress.

“The wizards on Wall Street figured out a million clever ways to avoid the transparency sought by the securities regulations adopted during the 1930s,” Mr. Grassley said. “Instead of the free flow of reliable information that markets need to function properly, today we have confusion and uncertainty fueling an economic crisis.”

Nearly two centuries later, the Great Lakes remain one of the most extraordinary spectacles in the world. The sheer size of the Great Lakes is impressed upon anyone who has stood on their shores, or who has seen the outline of the Michigan mitten, which the Great Lakes make one of the most distinctive shapes and recognizable shapes on maps or satellite photographs of the earth. Beyond their awe-inspiring appearance and enormity, the Great Lakes help fuel an economic engine that stretches from Minnesota to New York, producing some of our nations most celebrated and relied-upon goods and agricultural products.

This morning, my colleagues and I are introducing a joint resolution to ratify an historic agreement to manage Great Lakes water, the Great Lakes Water Resources Compact. While the existing Water Resources Development Act law provides protection and authority to prevent diversions, the Great Lakes Compact will provide an effective means for Great Lakes states jointly to safeguard water for future generations. The Compact will ban new diversions from the Basin with certain limited exceptions, and those exceptions would be regulated. Further, the Compact keeps the authority to govern our water in the hands of the Great Lakes states.

The Compact states that “the protection of the integrity of the Great Lakes Ecosystem shall be the overarching principle for reviewing proposals.” For the first time, water conservation goals will be developed to deal with any water diversion proposals.

Beyond that, the Compact would specifically address withdrawals and diversions of both ground and surface water. This would represent an improvement over existing law because there are differing opinions on whether the current law addresses ground water diversions.

Additionally, because the Compact would provide a scientific method for determining whether to allow a proposal to divert water from the Great Lakes, it makes our efforts to protect the lakes more clearly compliant with international trade agreements.

This agreement has been in the making for close to decade, following the mistaken issuance of a permit for bulk water diversion by the Province of Ontario. In the 2000 WRDA, Congress directed the governors to negotiate a water management policy, and in 2005, the eight Great Lakes Governors and two Canadian Premiers came to an agreement.

I have heard that some people believe that there is a water bottle “loophole.” The Compact prohibits water in a container larger than 5.7 gallons to be diverted outside the Great Lakes basin. Though the Compact would not prohibit water withdrawals in containers less than 5.7 gallons, individual states would retain their authority to regulate bottled water in any size container. Again current WRDA arguably has no constraints over groundwater diversions.

I believe that the Great Lakes Compact is beneficial and will provide greater protections for the Great Lakes than the status quo. However, as is explicitly stated in this joint resolution, the Great Lakes Water Compact does not imply that it is necessary for Congress to pass the Compact in order for the Lakes to be protected from diversions. WRDA gives each Great Lakes governor veto power over certain types of diversions of surface water by any Great Lakes state. While this authority is clear, additional safeguards and standards will be helpful in the years ahead to give us a solid defense against WTO challenges and a solid basis to regulate groundwater.

Tocqueville further observed during his journey in Lake Huron, “Nature has done everything here. A fertile soil, and outlets like to which there are no others in the world.” Nature has, indeed, given us so much in the Great Lakes. We need to take this important step to pass the Great Lakes Water Compact so as to make sure that we conserve this precious resource, ensuring sensible use now so that future generations can benefit from the Great Lakes as we do.

Thank you Mr. President, and I ask Unanimous Consent that the Joint Resolution be printed in the Record.