GOP Was Aware of Problems at Walter Reed and Did Nothing

March 7, 2007
GOP Was Aware of Problems at Walter Reed and Did Nothing

Senior Republicans who knew about problems at Walter Reed Army Medical Center while their party controlled Congress insist they did all they could to prod the Pentagon to fix them.

But C.W. Bill Young, R-Fla., former chairman of the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, said he stopped short of going public with the hospital's problems to avoid embarrassing the Army while it was fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

John P. Murtha of Pennsylvania, who was the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations
Defense Subcommittee, said he sought appropriations to address problems he found during visits to
military hospitals. For example, he obtained money for air conditioners for the Landstuhl Regional
Medical Center in Germany and modern stretchers for a Baghdad field hospital.

Murtha focused blame for the Walter Reed scandal on the Bush administration and said the
Pentagon discouraged patients from talking to lawmakers in both parties.

"My impression is that the military was constrained, even intimidated, from telling me and
other congressional members about the real problems and the real needs," Murtha said.