...As a member of Congress, (click here) I have supported the use of force only when it
was a last resort and America’s vital interests were at stake. I opposed
the first Gulf War, as did many other Members of Congress, because I
believed that there was a way to achieve our goals without bloodshed,
through sanctions and concerted diplomatic action. I supported the use
of force to stop the ethnic cleansing in the Balkans. And, in the wake
of the attacks on September 11, 2001, I supported the use of force in
Afghanistan to hunt down the terrorists who attacked us. I regret that
President Bush did not use that authority properly, and that American
combat troops remained there too long. I voted against the war in Iraq,
and knew it was the right vote then, and most people recognize it was
the right vote today. The only mission President Bush and his
neo-conservative friends accomplished was to destabilize an entire
region, and create the environment for al-Qaeda and ISIS to flourish....
