Impeachment Hearings. House Judiciary Committee, July 30, 1974. Cambodia Bombing Article of Impeachment. Lawrence Hogan
Impeachment Hearings. House Judiciary Committee, July 30, 1974. Cambodia Bombing Article of Impeachment. Lawrence Hogan
Impeachment Hearings. House Judiciary Committee, July 30, 1974. Cambodia Bombing Article of Impeachment. Lawrence Hogan (R - Maryland).
Impeachment Hearings. House Judiciary Committee, July 30, 1974. Cambodia Bombing Article of Impeachment. Lawrence Hogan
Harold D. Donohue (D Massachusetts). The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Maryland, Mr. Hogan for 3 3/4 minutes. Lawrence Hogan (R Maryland). Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I oppose this Article and I might say it is comfortable being back in the bosom of my friends. My friend from Michigan, Mr. Conyers, said that whoever heard of anyone approving getting bombed? Now, implicit in this statement is that the bombs were dropped on Cambodian citizens and that is not the case. Some of us have been there to see the jungle areas sometimes triple canopy jungle, and there is no way to really see where the Vietnam border and the Cambodian border and the Laos border end or begin. Now we should not lose sight of the fact that for 5 years the Communists, both the North Vietnamese soldiers and the Viet Cong, were using these Cambodian sanctuaries to attack the allied troops in Vietnam. For five years we let them get away with it. Now there is no testimony from any source indicating that Prince Sihanouk did not approve these bombings. They weren't bombing his civilians. They weren't bombing his villages. They were bombing Cambodian jungles just over the border from Vietnam where Communist soldiers were using launching bases to further the war. If the Cambodian Government had opposed this, they had every right to go to the United Nations and protest it.
Impeachment Hearings. House Judiciary Committee, July 30, 1974. Cambodia Bombing Article of Impeachment. Lawrence Hogan
Members of Congress, as has been indicated by my friend from Virginia, knew about this from the beginning. But let's recall that virtually every single President has engaged in military activities without the prior consent of Congress. The Korean War was called a "Police Action." There never was a declaration of war. And I don't think it would have been justifiable to impeach President Truman on that basis. All the military experts agree that the Cambodian bombing helped to accelerate the end of the war and the return of the prisoners of war. But even if we do conclude that the President's actions in this instance did exceed his constitutional authority, no one can say that he did not act except in what he perceived to be the best interests of his country. There was no gain. There was no coverup. There was no effort to evade responsibility for actions of he and his associates as we have seen in some of the other material coming before us. He was doing his duty as be saw it to protect American troops, to end the war, and to use bargaining power to get our prisoners of war home. I think it would be an American tragedy if he were impeached on this basis.