Excerpts from Senate Approriations Committee Hearing on FY09 Supplemental Request

April 30, 2009

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton – Opening Statement

Importance of Funding for the International Affairs Budget

“The 2009 supplemental budget request for the Department of State and the U.S. Agency for International Development is a significant sum, yet our investment in diplomacy and development is only about 6 percent of our total national security budget. For Secretary Gates and myself, it is critically important that we give our civilian workers, as well as our military, the resources they need to do their jobs well.”

Commitment to the Three D’s: Defense, Diplomacy and Development

“The foreign policy of the United States is built on the three Ds: defense, diplomacy, and development. The men and women in our armed forces perform their duties with courage and skill, putting their lives on the line time and time again on behalf of our nation. And in many regions, they serve alongside civilians from the State Department and USAID, as well as other government agencies, like USDA.”
“But of equal importance are diplomacy and development, to work with the Pakistani Government, Pakistani civil society, to try to provide more economic stability and diminish the conditions that feed extremism.”

Importance of Civilian-Military Cooperation

“We work with the military in two important ways. First, civilians complement and build upon our military’s efforts in conflict areas like Iraq and Afghanistan. Second, they use diplomatic and development tools to build more stable and peaceful societies, hopefully to avert or end conflict that is far less costly in lives and dollars than military action.”

Commitment to Rebalancing Authorities between State and Defense

“Secretary Gates and I are also looking at how our departments can collaborate even more effectively. That includes identifying pieces of our shared mission that are now housed at Defense that should move to State.”
“Secretary Gates and I are committed to working closely together, in an almost unprecedented way, to sort out what the individual responsibilities and missions of Defense and State and USAID should be, but committed to the overall goal of promoting stability and long-term progress, which we believe is in the interest of the United States and which we are prepared to address and take on the challenges and seize the opportunities that confront us at this moment in history.”

Defense Secretary Robert Gates – Opening Statement

Importance of Funding for the International Affairs Budget

“As I have said for the last two years, I believe that the challenges confronting our nation cannot be dealt with by military means alone. They require instead whole-of-government approaches – but that can only be done if the State Department is given resources befitting the scope of its mission across the globe.”

Commitment to our International Affairs Capacity

“Secretary Clinton and I are also dedicated to figuring out how best to bring to bear the full force of our entire government on the pressing issues of the day. So I ask you to continue supporting not just our men and women in uniform, but the men and women at the State Department who are just as committed to the safety and security of the United States.”

Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-HI) – Opening Statement

Support for Funding for the International Affairs Budget

“In general, it is my belief that the Senate is likely to be supportive of this request. Funding contained in the proposal will provide very necessary funds to support our troops in harm’s way and, almost as critical, provide funding to assist our allies and support the governments of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.”