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16 December 1998

TRANSCRIPT: ALBRIGHT BRIEFING ON IRAQ AIR STRIKES DEC. 16

(Says "our quarrel is not with the Iraqi people")  (2990)
Washington -- Secretary of State Albright defended the US air strikes
against Iraq in a December 16 briefing, but also stressed that "our
quarrel is not with the Iraqi people.
"On the contrary," she said, "we recognize that Iraqis have been the
primary victims of Saddam Hussein's failure to cooperate
internationally and his reign of terror domestically."
Albright noted that the United States "took the lead in establishing a
UN program to meet the humanitarian needs of Iraqi civilians and
supported the expansion of that program earlier this year.
"In carrying out military action, we will do all we can to minimize
civilian casualties," she said. "And we will support Iraqis who are
working for the day when the people of their country will be free to
choose their own leaders and shape their own destiny."
Following is the State Department transcript:
(begin transcript)
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Office of the Spokesman
December 16, 1998
REMARKS BY SECRETARY OF STATE MADELEINE K. ALBRIGHT ON AIR STRIKES
AGAINST IRAQ
Washington, D.C.
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: Good evening. You have all heard the President,
Secretary Cohen and General Shelton. This is a moment of grave
determination. We have decided to use force because other means simply
have not worked.
Before taking questions, I want to emphasize the extent to which the
United States sought a diplomatic outcome to the confrontation between
Iraq and the UN Security Council. Show-downs last fall, last winter
and last month were all concluded without air strikes, after Iraq
promised to cooperate fully with UN weapons inspectors.
Throughout, we worked hard to maintain Security Council unity by
allowing time and then more time for Iraq to live up to those
promises. We agreed to Iraq's request for a comprehensive review of
compliance issues, provided cooperation was forthcoming. We encouraged
allies and friends, such as Russia and many in the Arab world, to do
all they could to persuade the leaders in Baghdad to act in accordance
with Security Council resolutions. Both we and the Security Council
were explicit in our warnings that a continued failure by Iraq to
cooperate with UN weapons inspectors would have severe consequences.
Although we were criticized by some for persevering in our diplomatic
efforts for so long, the truth is that these efforts were both
necessary and successful. They helped to preserve Council unity and
isolate Iraq internationally. They were not successful, however, in
gaining full Iraqi compliance with its obligations. This is not
because the requests the Security Council made were unreasonable or
unachievable or unjustified, but because compliance would have
required something Saddam Hussein is simply unwilling to do, which is
to come fully clean about his weapons of mass destruction programs.
US policy is based on principles established by the Security Council
in the aftermath of the Gulf War more than seven and a half years ago.
These principles have been reaffirmed on literally dozens of
occasions, and they are designed to ensure that Saddam Hussein's Iraq
does not again threaten its neighbors or the world with weapons of
mass destruction. This is a deadly serious objective, given Saddam's
demonstrated willingness to use such weapons both against foreign
adversaries and his own people.
Saddam's capacity to develop and brandish such armaments poses a
threat to international security and peace that cannot be ignored. One
way or another, it must be countered; and degrading that capacity is
the purpose of the strikes on military targets in Iraq that the
President has ordered today.
Let me also echo the President by stressing that our quarrel is not
with the Iraqi people. On the contrary, we recognize that Iraqis have
been the primary victims of Saddam Hussein's failure to cooperate
internationally and his reign of terror domestically.
The United States took the lead in establishing a UN program to meet
the humanitarian needs of Iraqi civilians and supported the expansion
of that program earlier this year. In carrying out military action, we
will do all we can to minimize civilian casualties, and we will
support Iraqis who are working for the day when the people of their
country will be free to choose their own leaders and shape their own
destiny.
During the course of the day, I have consulted by phone with more than
a dozen of my counterparts; and I found broad understanding about the
goals of our action, because those goals have long had widespread
support within the international community.
In closing, let me emphasize again that the United States did not go
looking for this fight. As the United States' chief diplomat, I can
tell you that we exhausted every diplomatic approach and every
possibility. Month after month we have given Iraq chance after chance
to move from confrontation to cooperation. We have explored and
exhausted every diplomatic option. We will see now whether force can
persuade Iraq's misguided leaders to reverse course and to accept at
long last the need to abide by the rule of law and the will of the
world.
I'd be happy to take your questions.
QUESTION: Madame Secretary, if this operation doesn't succeed in
getting rid of Saddam Hussein, how can you expect that an Iraq that
has been hit before, after all, will not continue to defy UN weapons
inspections? And by the way, what about the notion of getting rid of
him? We've just got a note from Helms and Lugar and a fairly broad
range of Senators saying that the US policy should be to get rid of
him. But mainly I'm asking, if you hit him again, how does that
somehow enhance the prospects of him finally cooperating with the UN?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: Well, I think that clearly it is a very strong
message. What our main desire here is, is to get compliance from him.
As the President has said, however, we are very concerned about his
ability to reconstitute and deliver his weapons of mass destruction
and to have an ability to continue to threaten his neighbors.
So this serious and sustained military action is not designed to get
Saddam Hussein, but to degrade his abilities in the areas of weapons
of mass destruction and his ability to threaten his neighbors. You've
heard from Secretary Cohen.
But I think that the point here is that we want Saddam Hussein to
comply, and it is important that he get the message. We tried it
through diplomatic means, and perhaps this other means will be
recorded more easily by him.
But I think that the point here is compliance, and the international
community has demanded such compliance for the last seven and a half
years.
Q: If I could just go with Barry's question a little bit differently,
do you hold out any hope that Saddam will, in fact, let the
inspections resume; or has bombing now become sort of the only policy
you can employ if you feel he's rebuilding his weapons programs?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: Well, I think that obviously it would be better if
he complied and then after this strike that he would let UNSCOM get
back in and work again, because compliance is the only way forward.
But as the President said, because we do consider the danger that he
poses by his ability to reconstitute the weapons of mass destruction
and his record of having used it, that it is important for us to make
clear to him that if he cannot comply peacefully, the targets are the
kind that help to degrade his capabilities.
Q: Madame Secretary, in recent weeks the Administration has put a new
stress on trying to support the Iraqi opposition. Could you tell us a
little bit about where that program stands right now and how does this
bombing effort affect that goal, that program?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: I think that clearly we have been talking more
with the variety of opposition groups. We are looking at ways, as
provided by the Iraqi Liberation Act, of how we can carry that out. We
are generally working in a more active way with these groups.
I think that they need to know that we are willing to work with them
-- that is something that we have now made very clear -- and also that
we believe that the Iraqi people deserve a better regime than the one
they have. I think that, as the President said, having a change in
regime could take a long time. But we are prepared to work with them
in a sustained way.
Q: Do you see this military action as somehow weakening Saddam and
thereby making their job easier?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: I think that, as I've said, the purpose of the
military strikes is really to degrade his weapons of mass destruction
capability and his command and control of military security. To the
extent that it weakens his regime, fine. But as the Secretary of
Defense and the Chairman have described the targets, I'm not going to
go into that. But the purpose of the use of force is for degrading
those items that I mentioned.
Q: Madame Secretary, you've said that you talked to more than a dozen
of your counterparts today. France, since these strikes have started,
has issued a statement saying that it disassociated itself from the
military action. My question is, what are they telling you about the
reasons that, in effect, the US and Britain are acting alone?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: Well, I think that basically they have felt that
Saddam Hussein needs to comply, and they have approached it from a
different way. But the truth is they have no answers as to how to make
them comply. I think that we have support from a number of countries.
I feel very satisfied with the overall support -- not only for
diplomatic purposes, but I think that Secretary Cohen has also
indicated that we have the kind of support we need in order to carry
out our mission.
The bottom line is that it would be very nice if those who do not
support our approach had an approach that worked. We have not been
able -- either they, through their diplomatic efforts, or we through
ours -- to persuade Saddam Hussein to comply. I think we've been at
this, as I've said -- in the last year there have been over four
crises with Saddam Hussein. I think the important point that I have
made as I've made my calls is that we have to break this cycle. Unless
people have an answer that works, I think they can go their way. But
the bottom line here is I feel quite comfortable with the support we
have. And if I might say, as I said in my opening statement,
diplomatically the Security Council, which had been divided a year
ago, had come together recently with a 15 to nothing vote in support
of having Saddam Hussein comply. So I think that basically we've got
the support we need.
Q: Madame Secretary, is there anything that Iraq can do now to lessen
the severity of these strikes? Is there anything that they can say or
do that would make these strikes end prematurely?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: No. I think that they've had their chance. I'm not
going to talk about the military details of this or the length or
anything like that; I refer you to the Defense Department. But the
bottom line here is we gave Saddam Hussein the extra chance -- and
there were a lot of people that were critical for that extra chance --
and Saddam Hussein blew it. Frankly, I thought that he would comply,
and he would have been in the middle of a comprehensive review. He had
every opportunity and he has systematically, if you read Chairman
Butler's report, undermined the work of UNSCOM.
I thought the President stated it very well -- that rather than UNSCOM
being able to disarm Saddam Hussein, he has systematically worked to
disarm them. In this last series of inspections, he blocked them; he
created new safe havens; he decided Friday was not a day to inspect;
he interfered with helicopters; he blocked photography; he cleaned out
rooms. We know that he ordered the destruction of documents; we now
know that. So everything he did was contrary to the interests of
complying.
Q: Madame Secretary, if in 1991 our military campaign did not succeed
in completely eliminating Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction
program, why are we now simply going after degrading his WMDs and not
using a more extensive military strike?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: Well, let me say, first of all, this is a serious
and sustained strike. We have reserved the right to continue it if he
does not comply.
I think that we have set ourselves a do-able goal; and it is
important, I think, to state what we can do, which is to degrade his
weapons of mass destruction -- his ability to reconstitute and deliver
-- and to reconstitute his ability to threaten his neighbors. The Gulf
War had 500,000 troops there and a variety of other methods and we
have chosen this very strong message to Saddam that he needs to
comply.
Q: Madame Secretary, you mentioned several times that France and
others don't seem to have an answer to get him to comply. I'm not
quite clear what our answer is. If you assume that it will be very
difficult at best to get UNSCOM back into the country, what exactly is
our post-UNSCOM policy towards Iraq? Do we continue to bomb until --
towards what end, basically; how are we prepared to do it?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: Basically we do want him to comply. Getting UNSCOM
back in would be, obviously, the best way. But as I said, the purpose
of this is to degrade. Because the purpose of UNSCOM is to be the eyes
and ears so that he does not have the capability of using these
weapons, if he does not allow UNSCOM to do its work then we have to
take a different approach.
But in the long run, we want compliance; and in the longer run, we
have now made quite clear that we are prepared to work with these
opposition groups for a regime change. Saddam Hussein may not only be
a slow learner, but also may not have it even in his capability to
comply. We have talked about the fact that he needs to comply with all
the Security Council resolutions, and I think that is why we have come
to the decision that we need to work more actively with these
opposition groups in order to give the Iraqi people the kind of
government that they deserve.
Q: As our chief diplomat, does it damage your ability to conduct
foreign policy to have Republican leaders who have called for us to
use force in the past, having them criticize the decision to use force
now?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: Well, I'll tell you what upset me particularly is
that somehow the rules that have existed for many years about
criticizing the President when he's abroad seem to have been broken. I
found that very unseemly and unbecoming to members of Congress.
I do think that it would be very nice if we had complete support from
members of Congress; but that doesn't happen. So I think that it's the
Commander in Chief who made this decision. We do have support, by the
way. I spoke with Chairman Helms a little while ago, and he supports
this action. In fact, his only criticism was that we hadn't done it
sooner.
Q: Have you heard from any of the Republican leaders that criticized
in the beginning, saying they have now amended their criticism?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: I have not personally; but I think that it is very
helpful when the United States can act all together in a matter of
national security importance.
Q: Madame Secretary, after the stand-off in November, the President
was quoted as saying that if there had been strikes, UNSCOM would not
have been allowed back in. You're referring now to the possibility of
compliance and UNSCOM going back in. Has there been a reassessment of
the impact of strikes between then and now? And also, you've referred
a couple times to doing strikes and then seeing how Saddam reacts. Are
you suggesting that there will be a pause in a sustained series of
strikes which will allow Saddam to comply?
SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: First of all, let me say that it is much desired
that UNSCOM be able to go back in, but I'm not sure that is going to
happen. We did not undertake this strike with the idea that that might
be the result. The purpose of this strike, as I have now said a number
of times, was to do what we could to degrade the threat. I think that
the best result would be if he did let UNSCOM back in.
I am not going to go further into what our military plans are. I think
that we have made clear that this is a serious and sustained strike,
and we will see what happens. The important point here is that Saddam
Hussein get the message that the international community, through its
Security Council resolutions, wants him to comply. I think the very
important part here is that this crisis was created by Saddam Hussein.
He is solely responsible for this crisis. I think a very important
part of the discussions that I've had with the countries that I've
called today -- and which was very evident in the declaration in
Damascus the last time -- is that countries hold him solely
responsible for what is happening. He is the one that can end this by
complying with Security Council resolutions.
Thank you.
(end transcript)