|
  |
|
 |
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Eagleburger discusses Iraq
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- National security adviser Condoleezza Rice said Sunday on both "Fox News Sunday" and NBC's "Meet the Press" that President Bush would not back down on Iraq, despite pleas last week from most members of the U.N. Security Council that he give weapons inspectors more time. But is force really an option at the United Nations when countries like France, Germany and Russia are opposing a U.S.-led war in Iraq? Lawrence Eagleburger, Secretary of State in the first Bush administration, joined hosts Robert Novak and James Carville on Friday to discuss situation in Iraq and the diplomatic ramifications of Friday's U.N. presentation. NOVAK: Mr. Secretary, thanks for joining us. Now, you're a former diplomat. You spent most of your life as a diplomat. Surely you're not as cavalier as [Secretary of Defense] Don Rumsfeld and [Vice President] Dick Cheney, as those boys are, about this tremendous breach we had with our longtime allies, the French. EAGLEBURGER: What do you want me to say there, Mr. Novak? NOVAK: Are you as cavalier as they are? EAGLEBURGER: Look, I guess I'm not as cavalier, but I must tell you, I didn't think that the administration started this whole exercise the right way. I thought that the vice president, the way he came on at the beginning, made some serious mistakes in talking about this whole exercise in the chest-thumping way he did. I was very nervous about that. I was nervous about the way in which he started out so much as if this was a unilateral exercise. I thought the president later on, when he went to the U.N., was excellent. And I thought it went on the right track thereafter. After listening to the U.N. today, first of all, I think the U.N. is well on the way to becoming the League of Nations. I have to tell you, and I'm sorry to say it, of course I'm upset by the fact that we aren't getting along with what I guess we should call our allies. But at the same time, when I see the way the French and the Germans and so forth have conducted themselves, I have to tell you that [Secretary of State] Colin Powell was right today. The issue isn't over inspections, it's over the question of disarmament. And the way these people think, particularly the French, when they talk about this as an inspection problem, it's not. It's whether [Iraqi President] Saddam Hussein has disarmed, and that's the issue. And I'm sorry, I have to tell you, much as I am upset by the way in which we've had a breach with our allies, I also have to tell you I think that the United States is right, and they're wrong. And if that's the case, then whether we are not in sync with them or not has to take second place to the issue of whether Saddam Hussein has disarmed. And he hasn't. CARVILLE: Mr. Secretary, [former U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency Director Ken] Adelman was on here, and he made Bob's point. He said that it was a mistake to go to the U.N. to try to build support. That we should have gone in immediately. And that [going to the United Nations] ... has [done] nothing but cost us support around the world. You were an advocate of going to the U.N. early. Why is Mr. Adelman wrong and your approach proven to be right, when so many people in the world now hate us? EAGLEBURGER: Well, I'll tell you. First of all, because I am never wrong. But that aside -- seriously -- the fact ... CARVILLE: You have something in common with me, Mr. Secretary. EAGLEBURGER: I know. That's why I said it. Because I knew we'd agree on this. No, but seriously, if you're going to have an alliance -- and we have one -- it seemed to me implicit in that you had to start by trying to deal with the alliance. And then if it doesn't work, then you have to say, "Look, we've done our best to try to get our allies to agree with us on the wisdom of our course. And we couldn't convince them, and therefore we're going to have to go our own way." But if we had done it the other way, that is, done what the vice president was talking about early on and simply gone in there like gangbusters, I will tell you, I think the world reaction would have been far worse. It hasn't worked so far. I must tell you, given the attitude of the French and the Germans, I don't think there's anything we can do that will convince them because I don't think they want to be convinced. NOVAK: Well, disagreeing with you, Mr. Eagleburger, is your longtime friend, colleague and business associate, Henry Kissinger, former secretary of state. EAGLEBURGER: I've met him, yes. NOVAK: Yes. I'm going to read something he said this week: "In the end," he said, "French realism will not permit France to stand aside while its strongest ally, which has stood by us through two world wars and the Cold War, pursues its vital interests with a coalition of the willing." Do you agree with that, or do you disagree with that? EAGLEBURGER: I hope he's right. I pray that he's right. All I can tell you at this stage is it doesn't seem to be the case. And the more that the French act the way they have been acting and acted today, the harder it's going to be for them to climb off this high horse they're on and get with the program. The only thing I can think of that may bring them around is ... because they want some of that oil. And they may decide that they have to come in because they want some of that Iraqi oil. The French greed may well lead them to be more reasonable at some point. The only thing I can tell you is this war is not about oil. CARVILLE: I understand your utter contempt for the French, but the Germans, the Russians and the Chinese have the same position they do. Do you have the same contempt for the Germans, Russians and the Chinese that you do the French? EAGLEBURGER: Well, certainly you can put the Germans in on the same list. No, wait a minute. The Chinese and the Russians obviously come from a different position. They have never, for example, been as close allies to us as the Germans and the French. Beyond which, if you take a look at the way the French and the Germans have acted in NATO ... they won't even let NATO plan on how you would defend Turkey [in the event of a war in Iraq]. Now, as far as I'm concerned, that is a real slap at the whole concept of NATO. And it puts France and Germany in a totally different category. I disagree with the Russians and the Chinese, and I think they're wrong. But I don't think that I can put them in the same category with old allies such as the French and the Germans.
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
AIRS: Weekdays 4:30 p.m. ET / 1:30 p.m. PT
