EDITED TRANSCRIPT OF INTERVIEW GIVEN BY THE FOREIGN SECRETARY, MR ROBIN COOK, FOR BBC TV, LONDON, THURSDAY, 17 DECEMBER 1998
INTERVIEWER:
Mr Cook, first of all, would you regard the night's operation as successful?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
My colleagues at the Ministry of Defence will be giving a report very shortly on the operation so far. We have no reason to believe that we have not achieved our objectives.INTERVIEWER:
Have British forces been involved?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
No, not last night because last night was mainly Cruise missiles and were there to suppress the air defence structures of Saddam Hussein. But Britain has been wholly involved in the preparation of this operation and the British aircraft will be heavily involved in the future phases, they will be providing about one-fifth of all the manned aircraft sorties.INTERVIEWER:
Future phases, how long will it go on?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
I can't answer that because Saddam wants to hear the answer and I am not going to give him the answer to that.INTERVIEWER:
Do you know the answer?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
Oh yes, I know the answer.INTERVIEWER:
And you know the precise point at which we say we have achieved our objective?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
We have prepared targeting plans that are very clearly targeted on military installations and designed to achieve our two clear objectives: first of all to stop his programme to develop weapons of mass terror, chemical, biological weapons with which he could threaten whole cities in the region; and secondly, to sharply diminish the military war machine he maintains, both to threaten his neighbours and also of course to suppress his own people. He stays in power by his military power.INTERVIEWER:
The Prime Minister talked about degrading his ability to produce weapons of mass destruction, that is not the same as destroy, is it?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
You cannot guarantee that you are going to completely eliminate such a programme.INTERVIEWER:
So the problem will still be there?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
The problem will undoubtedly be severely diminished by this, it will heavily set back those programmes. But nobody is going to heave a sigh when this is all over and say well that's the end of the Saddam Hussein problem. We must remain vigilant and determined that he is not going to acquire the capacity to use these weapons against cities to threaten humanity. He is a man who has used them in the past and will use them again. Now I very much hope that the lesson he will draw from this action is that he is not going to be allowed to carry out his ambition to develop these weapons, it would be far better if he let in the UN inspectors and let them really do their job.INTERVIEWER:
But the point is that earlier this morning, Edward Peck, former American Ambassador to Iraq, was saying it is impossible to target a ten pound bag of anthrax. That is true isn't it, and we are still going to leave those biological weapons intact?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
You can certainly make it much more difficult for him to turn the chemicals that he has into effective chemical or biological weapons. The bag itself is not in itself a major threat, what makes it a major threat is the capacity to develop it into a weapon in a warhead that can be fired, and you do know where many of those installations are and you can target them.INTERVIEWER:
Again Mr Peck talking earlier said the west has not engaged in diplomacy with Saddam and that, in his words, is dumb?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
I have to say I just cannot comprehend such a statement. This whole year has been involved in attempts at diplomacy with Saddam, going right back to February when the Secretary General of the United Nations himself went to Baghdad and personally negotiated an agreement with Saddam which he broke within months. Only last month we ourselves achieved an agreement with Saddam in which he promised that he would allow unconditional, unrestricted access to the inspectors who now tell us that they can't do their job and there are even more restrictions than before. We have attempted diplomacy with Saddam Hussein throughout the whole of the year, the problem is that diplomatic negotiations are very difficult to succeed when you are dealing with a man like Saddam who lightly enters into undertakings with no intention of sticking to them.INTERVIEWER:
How then do you react to President Yeltsin's response this morning when he said it was fraught with the most dramatic consequences and the United States and Britain have violated the United Nations Charter. He spoke of his deep dismay and concern.FOREIGN SECRETARY:
We are all concerned and full of regret that we have been obliged to take this action.INTERVIEWER:
But are you worried about dramatic consequences?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
We are all dismayed that we have had to take this action. We would much rather have been able to stop the weapons of mass destruction through the inspections regime, it is Saddam that has made that impossible. As to the United Nations, we are absolutely clear that we have thorough clear backing in UN resolutions in which Russia itself participated. Last February Saddam was warned in the Security Council resolution that there would be the severest consequences if he broke his undertakings. Russia itself accepted a resolution two months ago recognising that Saddam had now committed flagrant violations of those undertakings, so Russia itself has participated in the resolutions that give us clear United Nations authority.INTERVIEWER:
We did know about Russia's opposition, but isn't it true this morning that we don't have the support of any other nation apart from the United States?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
No, that is not the case.INTERVIEWER:
Where do we have support from?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
Most of our NATO colleagues have expressed understanding of what we are doing.INTERVIEWER:
Understanding but not support?FOREIGN SECRETARY:
No, understanding of what we are doing and determination that Saddam's weapons programme must be stopped. There is a lot of support for us among our allies and it is interesting that the Arab world has been muted in its response and I think there would be a lot of reluctance among Arab governments to condemn what has happened because they know that they themselves are the people who will be the next victims of Saddam if he was allowed to develop these programmes which give him weapons of terror.
Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list
