National Secuirty
Richie was awarded the Bronze Star for his military service with the U.S. Army as a military intelligence officer in Vietnam. He and Senator Robert C. Byrd were the only two elected officials in West Virginia who publicly opposed the invasion of Iraq.
As mayor, Richie led the South Charleston City Council in the fall of 2005 to endorse an expedient U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, the only West Virginia community to do so.
Richie believes the importance of the U.S. Military is to protect the nation and its citizens. Present policies are wasting this resource and endangering our future security. The military is underpaid, under-equipped and ill-treated. The federal
government has been treating our military and veterans in a disgraceful manner.
The United States is compromising its own future security by its reliance on foreign energy sources and its shouldering the burdens of the rest of the world in the struggle against terrorism.
There is no question elements in the world wish to do us harm. However, our present energy reliance helps fund these elements and causes America to support repressive regimes. Other nations to help share the security burden with us.
A major first step would be for America to reduce dramatically, if not totally, its military
commitment to Iraq. The Bush administration duped the American people into supporting that invasion and then woefully mismanaged the occupation of that country.
Notwithstanding the so-called success of the present "surge strategy," this commitment is bleeding our economy and putting our nation at greater risk in other places including here at home. Our mission in Iraq must end and we must turn that nation back over to the people of that country.