U.S. Rep. Ron Paul | AWACS |
AWACS
Statement on International Relations committee hearing featuring Secretary of State Colin Powell
October 17, 2001 2001 Ron Paul 89:7
Our interventionist policies have not only made enemies around the globe. Our own troops are spread so thin defending foreign peoples and foreign lands, that when a crisis hit our own shores we were forced to bring in foreign AWACs surveillance planes to defend our country. That, more than anything else, underscores the folly of our interventionist foreign policy: our own defense establishment is unable to protect our citizens because it is too busy defending foreign lands. We must focus our efforts on capturing and punishing those who committed this outrageous act against the United States. Then, if we are to be truly safe, we need a national debate on our foreign policy; we need to look at interventionism and the enmity it produces. We need to return to the sadly long-lost policy of peaceful commerce and normal relations with all nations and entangling alliances with none.
AWACS
A SAD STATE OF AFFAIRS --
October 25, 2001 2001 Ron Paul 90:20
It is aggravating to listen to the daily rhetoric regarding liberty and the Constitution while the same people participate in their destruction. It is aggravating to see all the money spent and civil liberties abused while the pilot’s right to carry guns in self-defense is denied. It is even more aggravating to see our government rely on foreign AWACS aircraft to provide security to U.S. territory. A $325 billion military budget, and we cannot even patrol our own shores. This, of course, is just another sign of how little we are concerned about U.S. sovereignty and how willing we are to submit to international government.
AWACS
Expansion of NATO is a Bad Idea
November 7, 2001 2001 Ron Paul 95:11
But overall I oppose this because I support a position of a foreign policy of noninterventionism, foreign noninterventionism out of interest of the United States. I know the other side of the argument, that United States interests are best protected by foreign intervention and many, many entangling alliances. I disagree with that because I think what eventually happens is that a country like ours gets spread too thin and finally we get too poor. I think we are starting to see signs of this. We have 250,000 troops around the world in 241 different countries. When the crisis hit with the New York disaster, it turned out that our planes were so spread out around the world that it was necessary for our allies to come in and help us. This is used by those who disagree with me as a positive, to say, “See, it works. NATO is wonderful. They’ll even come and help us out.” I see it as sad and tragic that we spent last year, I think it was over $325 billion for national defense, and we did not even have an AWACS plane to protect us.
AWACS
Saddam Hussein
19 December 2001 2001 Ron Paul 107:7
My idea of national defense is minding our own business, being strong, and making sure our borders are secure. After 9/11, we had to go to Germany and ask them for help for AWACS airplanes to patrol our shores. I understand our ports are not necessarily secure, and yet we have Coast Guard cutters down in Colombia and in the Mediterranean Sea. I think if we learn anything it is that we ought to work harder to protect our country and not make us so vulnerable, yet we continue along this way.
AWACS
The Case For Defending America
24 January 2002 2002 Ron Paul 1:67
I am certain that national security and defense of our own cities can never be adequately provided unless we reconsider our policy of foreign interventionism. Conventional wisdom in Washington today is that we have no choice but to play the role of the world’s only superpower. Recently we had to cancel flights of our own Air Force over our cities because of spending restraints, and we rely on foreign AWACS to fly over to protect our air spaces.
AWACS
Stimulating The Economy
February 7, 2002 2002 Ron Paul 5:60
6. Limits exist on how extensive our foreign commitments should be. We have our military limits. It’s difficult to be everyplace at one time, especially if significant hostilities break out in more than one place. For instance, if we were to commit massive troops to the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, and Iran were to decide to help Iraq, and at the same time the North Koreans were to decide to make a move, our capacity to wage war in both places would be limited. Already we’re short of bombs from the current Afghanistan war. We had to quit flying sorties over our own cities due to cost, while depending on NATO planes to provide us AWACs cover over U.S. territory. In addition, our financial resources are not unlimited, and any significant change in the value of the dollar, as well as our rapidly growing deficits, could play a significant role in our ability to pay our bills.
AWACS
U.S. Armed Forces Should Protect American Soil
22 October 2001 Texas Straight Talk 22 October 2001 verse 6 ... Cached
Examples of the ill effects of our misguided policies are not hard to find. Consider the Coast Guard, whose seemingly obvious mission is to secure America's coastlines. So why are Coast Guard vessels busy patrolling Mediterranean waters and the shoreline of Colombia? Similarly, why do we need the help of German NATO AWACS planes to patrol American skies when we have 33 of our own? Are all 33 being used overseas?
AWACS
Expansion of NATO is a Bad Idea
12 November 2001 Texas Straight Talk 12 November 2001 verse 4 ... Cached
Consider our participation in NATO, which commits American military forces to conflicts that serve no national interest. Congress voted last week to expand NATO and increase the number of countries we are obligated to defend, even while our own military forces are stretched far to thin around the globe. Department of Defense figures show that 250,000 American troops are deployed on 6 continents and 141 nations. When we suffered the September 11th attack on our own shores, we were forced to call on foreign nations to supply AWACS planes and defend our domestic airspace! Our military entanglements, especially NATO, have left us relying on foreigners to defend us- yet this is exactly what the globalists want. They want us to lose our sense of national sovereignty, so that America's national defense becomes a matter of international consensus. Only by removing ourselves from NATO and the UN can we reassert our fundamental right to defend our borders without the approval or participation of any international coalition.
Texas Straight Talk from 20 December 1996 to 23 June 2008 (573 editions) are included in this Concordance. Texas Straight Talk after 23 June 2008 is in blog form on Rep. Paul’s Congressional website and is not included in this Concordance.
Remember, not everything in the concordance is Ron Paul’s words. Some things he quoted, and he added some newspaper and magazine articles to the Congressional Record. Check the original speech to see.