Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)

DATE=8/6/03

TYPE=INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT

TITLE=PAUL BREMER

NUMBER=3-755

BYLINE=MARY TILLOTSON

DATELINE=WASHINGTON

CONTENT=

/// EDITORS: THIS INTERVIEW IS AVAILABLE IN DALET UNDER SOD/ENGLISH NEWS NOW INTERVIEWS IN THE FOLDER FOR TODAY OR YESTERDAY ///

HOST: U-S soldiers say Iraqi informants and local police are helping them round up Saddam Hussein loyalists in northern Iraq. An American officer says Wednesday coalition forces raided seven locations overnight, in and near Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit. The Americans arrested 18 loyalists of the ousted regime and seized what they described as large amounts of weapons. Coalition forces say Iraqi police also turned over a man suspected of organizing attacks against U-S soldiers. The man is the brother of one Saddam Hussein's top bodyguards. Meanwhile, U-S soldiers in Tikrit are soon to begin training 35 Iraqis as the first members of a civil defense force.

Paul Bremer is the U-S Administrator for Iraq. Mary Tillotson, host of VOA's international call in talk show "Talk to America spoke with Ambassador Bremer today about the current situation in Iraq and reconstruction efforts:

MS. TILLOTSON: Thank you so much for your time.

There is talk at the United Nations, Ambassador Bremer, about a resolution to encourage broader participation internationally in reconstruction in Iraq. Do you believe it's possible to craft a resolution that would satisfy such countries as Germany and France without diminishing your authority to the extent that it would not be acceptable to the United States?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: Well, it may be possible. It is a question that is under discussion, as the Secretary of State pointed out I think two weeks ago. And it really is sort of a tactical and rather technical question that the people in New York need to look at. It's difficult for me to reach a judgment on it at this distance. I think the U.S. Government is looking at the question and at some point will reach a judgment as to whether or not it makes sense to go ahead.

MS. TILLOTSON: From your vantage point in Baghdad, do you believe it is important, necessary, crucial, to get that sort of greater international participation?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: There is a lot of international participation already. We have the troops from 19 different countries already on the ground here, and we're in discussions with another dozen or so. We have something like 37 countries that have made pledges to give economic assistance to Iraq's reconstruction. So there's already a very substantial international face to our efforts here. And so it isn't a question of whether we need to do something to make it international; it already is.

MS. TILLOTSON: And you're suggesting that it does not need to be broadened, the international participation?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: We of course would welcome more countries providing troops and more countries providing money. We do intend to hold a donors conference to see if we can broaden the participation from other countries to Iraq's reconstruction. That will happen sometime in October.

MS. TILLOTSON: There was a U.S. civilian killed in Tikrit yesterday (Tuesday). I'm confident you are familiar with that. And of course we're all in the United States familiar with the continuing deaths of U.S. troops there. Were those levels of hostilities and opposition to the occupation expected?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: Well, I think we certainly expected there would be opposition. What we did not expect was how quickly the Iraqi Army collapsed. And indeed the area where we are having problems, where 80 percent of the attacks have happened, including the one in Tikrit, is the area where we never fought a war.

And what happened there was there were two divisions of the Republican Guard, very substantial elements of the Special Security offices that Saddam had set up, a number of the Fedayeen Saddam units, and a number of Baathists, who simply faded away. We never fought the war there. They were never defeated. They just faded away. And that's I think the reason that we see the various attacks that are taking place. They are all focused in this one area.

MS. TILLOTSON: Do you find the killing of a civilian particularly ominous?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: No. We've had attacks on civilians here before, including on members of the CPA.

MS. TILLOTSON: So this was just the first successful killing?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: That's right.

MS. TILLOTSON: A question about Saddam Hussein. Presumably he is still alive, presumably somewhere in Iraq. How important is finding him if you wish to stop these sorts of attacks against the occupation forces and Americans there to take part in the reconstruction?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: I think it would be useful to have Saddam killed or captured, not because he's directing these attacks, because as far as we can tell these attacks are not subject to central direction, but because of the symbolism, wanting to draw a final curtain down on the Saddam tyranny.

We've seen since we killed the two sons a much better situation developing. We've had now an increase in the number of Iraqis coming in and giving us information about where Baathists and Fedayeen Saddam and other killers are. And we've had, interestingly also, an increase in the number of bad guys turning themselves in to our tactical units, including people from Fedayeen Saddam last night for example.

So I think if we can kill Saddam or capture him, it will continue that dynamic, the dynamic that says to all the Iraqis that the Baathist days are finished here forever.

MS. TILLOTSON: Do you think the U.S. is any closer to that than the period before the two sons were discovered and killed?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: Well, it's a little bit hard to tell. You won't know if you're close until you actually get him. It's an unanswerable question. We certainly are paying a lot of attention. We've got a lot of people working on it all the time, as we did before we killed the sons. I'm confident we'll get him, but I don't know exactly when that will happen.

MS. TILLOTSON: The other thing that's still missing in addition to Saddam Hussein is the kind of hard, concrete evidence of weapons of mass destruction that the administration presumably would hope to find. Are you confident that such evidence will be found?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: Yes. I've talked to the team that arrived out here last month, about 1,300-1,400 of them, under David Kay, and I meet regularly with Mr. Kay. And I'm confident that they will find evidence of the programs of biological and chemical programs. And again, I think it's a question of time.

MS. TILLOTSON: There are many people, I think many of them in France and perhaps some in England, who would say, well, look, the fact that the allies haven't found them is just proof that the U.N. inspectors were doing the best they could and shouldn't have been faulted for not having found this evidence either. What would you say to that?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: Well, I'd say you could make the same argument about Saddam Hussein. We haven't found him either; is anybody telling us he doesn't exist?

MS. TILLOTSON: Can you tell me how the efforts are going to get utilities, basic utilities, electricity, up and running on a regular and consistent basis in Iraq?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: Yes, we've got a pretty good plan there, and we're carrying it out. We've now got electricity at about 75 percent of prewar levels, which is by the way 10 times as much electricity as existed the day I arrived here. This allows us to provide most of the country with 18 to 20 hours of electricity a day. We hope to be back to prewar levels by the end of September.

That unfortunately is not going to help us very much, because -- it helps a bit, but it leaves us about 2,000 megawatts short of what we need. That is to say, Saddam Hussein, because of the comprehensive mismanagement of this economy, never built enough electricity power in the country. He built only about 4,000 megawatts. So we'll get back to that level we hope by the end of September, but that will leave us 2,000 short of demand, which we think is about 6,000. This was the case before the war. And we're going to have to, therefore, continue a rather extended and time-consuming and very expensive program of building additional power for the Iraqi economy. And of course we have a plan to do that, but it will take time.

MS. TILLOTSON: Are saboteurs still at work?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: Yes, we still have some political sabotage going on, particularly in the south. And there is also some organized criminal activity particularly against the power lines in the Basra area. We think we're making progress against that. There seems to be less of it now than there was, say, a month ago, though it isn't quantified, but it certainly is our impression.

MS. TILLOTSON: The Arab League yesterday refused to seat a representative of Iraq, saying that the Governing Council was appointed and not elected. Was that a disappointment to you and other American officials in Baghdad?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: Yes, I think it is a bit disappointing. I think the Arab League is taking a rather shortsighted view of the interests of the region. We have the most representative government in Iraq's history here, representing all of the various strands within Iraqi society and, one could argue at least in the case of some members of the Arab League, a government that's more representative than the ones who are criticizing this one for not being representative. So there is I think a disappointment. Certainly the Governing Council feels that Iraq's Arab neighbors ought to be welcoming them, and I'm sure that there will be plenty of diplomacy in that direction by both the American government and by the Governing Council in the weeks ahead.

MS. TILLOTSON: You have said that the Iraqis may elect their first post-Saddam government within a year's time. Can you tell us, Ambassador Bremer, what you think that first elected Iraqi Government may look like? Will it be Islamic? Will it be a GOP?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: There's really no way to know because I don't even know what the form of government will be. But they're going to have obviously a very vigorous political debate when the constitutional conference is convened, we hope in the next two months. They will have a very vigorous political debate about the form of government. Are they going to have a presidency, a republic? Is it going to be a parliamentary system? There are some people who want a constitutional monarchy. There are lots and lots of issues that they're going to have to face. And I think anybody today who tells you he knows what the government will look like is -- well, he's a lot smarter than I am.

MS. TILLOTSON: So you're not going to make any bets about whether this would tend toward a theocracy versus a democracy?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: I don't think it is likely to be a theocracy. I don't find broad support here among the Iraqis for a theocracy. The Governing Council has clearly committed itself to a democracy in its political statements, both statements by the various groups who are represented there before the Governing Council and the Governing Council itself in its political statements that it issued two weeks ago. So I think it will be a democracy. The role of Islam will obviously be one of the key issues that they will debate at the constitutional conference, but that's really something for the Iraqis to decide.

MS. TILLOTSON: Can you tell me when you think your job there will be finished and you'll be able to come home?

AMBASSADOR BREMER: Well, I wish I knew. I really don't know when it will be done. In many ways, as I've said before, it's in the hands of the Iraqis. It depends really on them getting elections, and they can't have elections until they do have a new constitution. So the question really boils down to how long will it take them to write a constitution. And that's really something that they're going to have to work on themselves.

HOST: Ambassador Paul Bremer is the U-S Administrator for Iraq. He spoke to VOA's Talk to America Host Mary Tillotson.

NEB/