At a House Armed Services Committee hearing in June, Giffords asked Gen. David Petraeus about the military’s policy of reducing fuel consumption in war zones. Why did she ask about that? Because reducing fuel consumption and maintaining a stable electrical supply are part of the military’s plan to protect our troops from the dangerous work of guarding fuel supply convoys.

But Giffords’ opponents are smearing this hearing to score political points. They are pretending that she questioned Gen. Petreaus about bayoneting the enemy to reduce carbon emissions putting solar panels on Humvees. These false accusations are beneath contempt. They disrespect our brave servicemen and women who are putting their lives on the line for our country.

Here are the facts:

Fact: Fuel consumption and transportation are major security threats for our troops. One hundred and seventy servicemembers lost their lives in 2007 alone guarding and transporting fuel.

Fact: Our enemy, Osama bin Laden, has called oil our military’s “umbilical cord” and tells his terrorist followers to “focus your operations on oil, especially in Iraq and the Gulf area, since this will cause the [Americans] to die off.”

Fact: Military leaders agree: The more fuel our military consumes, the more vulnerable we are to attacks on fuel convoys and to roadside IEDs. When we reduce our dependence on fuel, we reduce the number of troops killed delivering gas.

Fact: Rep. Giffords did NOT ask General Petraeus about carbon emissions, global warming or the environment. She asked him about his policy on fuel consumption and maintaining a stable electrical supply, which he called for in his 2006 Counterinsurgency Strategy.

For more information, here is what the nonpartisan Snopes.com has to say about this smear campaign:http://www.snopes.com/politics/quotes/giffords.asp.

GIFFORDS:

Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman.

General Petraeus, welcome back to committee.

And, Madam Secretary, thank you, as well.

Hailing from southern Arizona, I’m glad you’re staying hydrated. It’s very important, something that we know out in the desert. And on behalf of the men and women of Fort Huachuca and Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, we just want to thank both of you for your service.

And, unfortunately, we lost two of our airmen, actually, associated with Davis-Monthan, Senior Airman Benjamin White, who was 24, and also Tech Sergeant Michael Paul Flores, 31, were both based at Davis-Monthan and were part of the Rescue Command. Very sad. Very much brings home, you know, what we’re asking of our men and women.

There’s been a lot of attention back here in the United States on what’s happening with the BP oil spill. And as we all know, the largest user of energy on the planet is actually the United States Air Force. And the DOD is the largest user of energy in the United States.

And I really want to commend the work done on behalf of DOD and also what’s happening in the field with our energy. But it’s an area that I just really want to focus on, and I know a lot of questions have been asked, but during the last three years, supply lines have increasingly threatened — have been threatened either by enemy action or through international places.

And in places like Kandahar, where we have a large presence, we have been plugged into a very unsustainable and really incapable grid system. We know that a major part of the upcoming Kandahar offensive will include some serious repairs and upgrades to the energy system, which will include small-scale solar and hydropower systems, and also some solar-powered streetlights.

I’m just curious whether or not there’s plans to utilize any of those same technologies at our bases around Afghanistan. And wouldn’t that greatly reduce our need for fuel?

PETRAEUS:

I pause, because there are a couple of different components to what we’re trying to do with respect to energy reduction, if you will, and that’s really what it is about. And there’s, again, a fairly comprehensive effort in that regard.

We don’t have hydropower, obviously, access to that on the bases, but there has been a significant effort which has reduced very substantially, actually, what we’ve needed for the cooling and heating of our workplaces and living places. And that is sometimes as simple as pumping extra insulation into the roof and walls of these fairly rudimentary temporary buildings that we have, sometimes even the tents.

And it’s interesting, because we were exchanging e-mails today with an individual who’s involved in that effort, and we believe there have been actually billions of dollars of savings in this effort, if you look at what we did in Iraq first in that regard, and have now been pursuing in Afghanistan.

If I could, I might note that the supply lines actually have worked well — the lines of communication through Pakistan. Yes, there periodically are attacks, and there was one a week ago, but that followed a period of months and months, if not a year or so, since the last significant attacks. And it’s much less than 1 percent of all of the cargo that goes in through Pakistan that is affected by these various attacks.

And we’re up now to some 70 percent of all supplies, not necessarily all materiel, but all supplies coming through the north through this carefully constructed northern distribution network that we’ve been able to establish over the course of the last year, in close partnership with U.S. Transportation Command and the State Department, that enables us to bring items through Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and into Afghanistan, and then even through some of the other countries, there are other routes, including one that comes out of Iraq through Turkey and then turns east.

And we do use solar power in some cases, again, where that provides a benefit to us. We did that in Iraq, as well, by the way, I might point out, quite considerable use of that. And, again, that’s the case in Afghanistan, as well.

If I could add one final item, we’re about to send you the new commander of Fort Huachuca, Brigadier General, promotable, Steve Fogarty, has been a stellar military intelligence chief at Central Command over the last two years, has time in Afghanistan, former special mission unit, intel chief, and so forth, and I think you will really enjoy him and his wife, by the way, once they get out there.

GIFFORDS:

And we’re looking forward to it.