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30 March 2003

U.S. Committed to Iraq's Freedom, Middle East Peace

(Secretary Powell March 30 interview with New York Times) (6430)
Public attitudes toward the United States will change as the
"dynamics" change in Iraq and in the Middle East peace process,
Secretary of State Colin Powell said in a March 30 interview with the
New York Times.
"One, success in Iraq and people realize that war is over, a despotic
dictator is gone, and there is a brighter future for the people of
Iraq even though it will take quite a while to rebuild what he has
destroyed," Powell said. The second factor that will improve public
attitudes, he predicted, is when "people see we're moving out
aggressively on the Middle East peace process with a new [Palestinian]
prime minister and a new Israeli Government."
"As the President has said, we do plan to get deeply involved in the
Middle East peace process now that a new Palestinian Prime Minister is
on the verge of being confirmed," Powell noted. "That fundamentally
changes the dynamic there."
Powell pointed out that, once the regime of Saddam Hussein is
eliminated, the military commander has an obligation to stabilize the
situation and establish mechanisms for civil administration as quickly
as possible, and plan on putting an interim authority into place. "Now
we are discussing what that interim authority should look like,"
Powell said, with "Iraqis from outside, Iraqis from inside."
He also said that the United States will work hard to define the role
of the United Nations in a post-Saddam Iraq.
In the interview, Powell emphasized that, by changing the Iraqi and
Middle East "dynamics," the U.S. could then reengage in a broad and
ambitious range of foreign policy initiatives. These include
strengthening democracy and free trade, expanded assistance through
the Millennium Challenge Account, new ideas for dealing with climate
change, wider care and treatment for HIV/AIDS, trade and assistance
for Africa through an expanded Africa Growth and Opportunity Act
(AGOA), and finding a diplomatic solution to the North Korean nuclear
issue.
"So there's a broad agenda out," Powell said. We will be "focusing on
democracy -- democracy building and institution building around the
world through the Millennium Challenge Account and through free trade
agreements."
Powell denied that the United States was in any way neglecting the
North Korean issue, stating that the United States has been working
intensively with nations in the region for months to achieve the goal
of a denuclearized Korean peninsula.
Regarding Korea, Powell said, the United States and all the nations in
the region "have an interest and an equity in finding a peaceful
diplomatic solution."
Looking back at diplomatic efforts concerning Iraq in the United
Nations, Powell said that allies such as the United Kingdom,
Australia, Italy, and Spain felt that a second United Nations
resolution would be helpful as a follow-up to the unanimous Security
Council support for Resolution 1441.
"Notwithstanding reports to the contrary, we were doing rather well in
lining up support," Powell said. However, the threat of a French veto,
regardless of the language in the resolution, forced abandonment of
the effort to secure passage, according to Powell.
Following is a transcript of the interview, as released by the
Department of State:
(begin transcript)
Interview by the New York Times 
Department of State 
Secretary Colin L. Powell 
Washington, DC 
March 29, 2003
QUESTION: I thought I would begin by asking about the view of America
around the world at this moment and the attitudes towards the war.
Obviously, it's a difficult time. But let's look forward and let me
ask you, first, your assessment about how much of a challenge that
poses to you and the administration, and what are you going to do
about it?
SECRETARY POWELL: I think it does pose a challenge, to us. Even though
we have 49 nations in a willing coalition, big and small nations, and
a number of others who are supportive but would prefer that their
support remain quiet, most of these nations are doing it in the direct
face -- in the face of direct opposition among their populations of
people.
But nevertheless, the leaders of these nations see the merit of the
cause. And I think once we have been successful and we have prevailed
and people realize that we have come to provide a better life for the
people of Iraq, and that's certainly what we're intending to do -- to
put in place a better government for the people of Iraq, I think you
can turn this rather quickly.
And I think, as the President has said, we do plan to get deeply
involved in the Middle East peace process now that a new Palestinian
Prime Minister is on the verge of being confirmed. That fundamentally
changes the dynamic there. We have somebody we can work with in a
different way than we were -- might have been able to work with
Chairman Arafat. And it's something that we have been calling for ever
since the President's speech last June 24th.
If those two dynamics change: one, success in Iraq and people realize
that war is over, a despotic dictator is gone, and there is a brighter
future for the people of Iraq even though it will take quite a while
to rebuild what he has destroyed and to put in place a form of
government that will be seen as representative, even though it will
take time. People see we're doing that, and people see we're moving
out aggressively on the Middle East peace process with a new prime
minister and a new Israeli Government, I think those two changed
dynamics will assist us greatly in starting to reverse some of the
public attitudes that are out there.
What we will do beyond that is to fully engage again on the
President's agenda, which has many pieces to it besides Iraq. Iraq
tends to be all the time right now that's -- we're going to move
beyond that and go back to his emphasis on free trade agreements, his
emphasis on creating communities and democracies around the world,
continuing to build the relationship that we have with Russia and
China, the two big accounts that I would like to talk about that are
in good shape now, but continue expanding.
HIV/AIDS, famine, climate, obviously, we're not going to join Kyoto,
but we have some ideas that we think we can present to the world that
they would find attractive, expanding AGOA, working with African
nations not only on HIV/AIDS and infectious diseases, but economic
development, the Millennium Challenge Account. We will continue to
deal with those nations in the world that still are pursuing rogue
policies: North Korea -- try to find a diplomatic solution there and I
think we're chipping away at this one despite some of the criticism
that is leveled at us that we won't simply, why won't you simply just
get in the room with the North Koreans? But there are other ways to
handle it and we're chipping away at that one.
And so there's a broad agenda out there that will be focusing on
democracy; that will boost democracy building and institution building
around the world for democracies through the Millennium Challenge
Account and through free trade agreements. And so there's a lot for us
to do and I think as we come out of this crisis and get fully engaged
again on the President's agenda, which has been out there for the last
two plus years, but has sort of been overtaken by the war against
terrorism and by Iraq.
We'll have great opportunity to change the perception and the message.
Also, I think you will see that we will be spending a lot more time
reaching out and reaching back to our friends with whom we may have
been having some difficulties recently.
It's been a difficult time and as I said at a hearing the other day,
particularly with respect to France -- it's one of my great lines of
the decade -- we've been in marriage counseling for 225 years, and the
marriage is still there. And it will be there, I hope, 225 years from
now.
QUESTION: It was a great line.
SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah. But we have to reach out. We have to spend
more time. You know, everybody's been, "Well, how have you been
spending your time?" Mostly in New York dealing with our friends and
allies. This now frees us up with this issue to, about -- you know,
going to be resolved, it frees us up to engage in ways that we haven't
been able to in say, the last six to eight months.
QUESTION: Is, aside from going back to marriage counseling, what about
-- what can you tell us in defining the role of the UN and Iraq, which
seems to be a point of some contention now. Can you be a little bit
more specific than you have been about the role -- I gather the
decisions haven't been fully made -- but what can you -- push that one
forward a little bit for us.
SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah. Let me touch on two others and I will come to
that as
-- in terms of the broader agenda we'll go back to. Work to cement the
expansion of NATO; even though we're not in the EU, do everything we
can to assist the EU and its expansion; and get back to more than I'm
doing now on, been speaking to the parties in the region all week
long: India, Pakistan and the whole Sub-Continent problem and make
sure we don't find ourselves in the same situation we were in a year
ago.
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: When everybody was predicting nuclear war, but we
managed to solve that. People forget. If we had had a nuclear war,
they wouldn't have forgotten it, but we didn't have one so they forgot
it. A hell of a lot of work went into that.
But in any event, to your question, the best description of what we're
thinking about is in the Azores declaration that the President signed
onto during that brief summit that they had Sunday before last.
There must be a role for the United Nations. It will be an important
role. We are in contact with Secretary General Annan. I've talked to
him four times, at least, this week, and Condi went up and visited
with him on Tuesday. And we want to structure that role. The United
Nations has made it clear through the Secretary General. They do not
want to become the new governing authority.
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: Of Iraq. But they have a role to play in many
different ways providing humanitarian assistance and providing a level
of endorsement for the manner in which we move forward by providing
international legitimacy for the interim authority and the government
that will rise up out of the interim authority, and providing a vessel
into which nations can provide support to the rebuilding efforts.
The way I describe it to my colleagues in the Department, "We hope the
United Nations will provide, you re going to love this one, Steve,
both a chapeau and a vessel." Jill, come on. This is poetic.
(Laughter.)
QUESTION: What's a chapeau? I'm joking. The answer I gave is brief
(inaudible) asked me.
SECRETARY POWELL: No, well not really. It's more than a hat, but in
diplomatic terms, help me here, Boucher, you're the FSO, I'm the
infantryman, but a chapeau is a cover. It's a, but I don't want to say
cover in the sense we're covering something. It essentially provides
an endorsement, an international recognition for what's being done, an
umbrella. An international umbrella for what's being done -- chapeau.
It's a vessel into which you can put resources from which you can then
draw; vessel, like glass. And the reason I call it a vessel is if I go
to one of the governments, I may not pick a particular government, but
if I go to a particular government and say, "What can you do?" And
they say, "We'll go to our Diet, we'll go to our Diet and we'll try to
get so much money." That Diet is not going to appropriate that money
to give to Colin Powell or to Tommy Franks, but it will give it to a
vessel that has the underpinning of the United Nations.
When you think about the oil, we're going to protect the oil for the
Iraqi people, we're going to find a way to start the oil system
functioning again but without some kind of international chapeau, then
is the oil free and clear to be entered into the international market,
or is just the United States pumping oil?
So these kinds of issues, the financial system, if we want to bring --
and this is a real practical problem. If we want to introduce a new
currency, and you have had the currency printed somewhere, what is the
legal basis upon which the currency gets put into the international
financial system?
All of these kinds of issues can be solved if you have the presence of
the United Nations giving endorsement and giving legitimization -- oh,
God, that's awful -- to what we are all about. And so, there is an
important role for the United Nations to play. But as I also said in
the hearing the other day, we are the ones who are doing the fighting
and the liberating with our friends in the coalition. And so, we
believe we have an important role to play, and to some extent drive
this process until such time as there is an Iraqi Government that is
up, functioning and running.
So what we can't do is just say, "Fine, the war is over. Baghdad is
liberated. Here, turn it over to somebody."
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: We don t work that way. Now the debate always comes
up, "Well, do you want a military government?" And the answer to that
question is very simple. There will be a military commander in charge
initially. There is one in charge now, as Iraq is being opened up in
the south, Iraqi authorities broken in the south, there are pockets of
resistance and fighting taking place.
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: But General Franks is now responsible for the south.
So there is no other way for this to occur, but for there to be
military control initially, and as I was suggesting to someone from an
old infantry expression is, "First general order." I don t know if you
were in the Army or not, Steve
-- but the first general order was, "Take charge of this post and all
government property in view."
There is an obligation on the part of the military commander going in
there to stabilize the situation, put down the fighting, deal with
pockets of resistance, secure the people, protect the assets of the
nation, put in place elements of administrative control and civil
administration to start to get the place up and running. You can't do
that by committee. And so, you have a military force in there with
assets, with capability, and the military commander does that. But,
very quickly, we want to shift a lot of that to --
QUESTION: How quickly?
SECRETARY POWELL: As quickly as one can. I mean there is no way to
answer it. I can't get trapped with an answer because it is so -- it
is so event and situationally dependent.
QUESTION: Yeah.
SECRETARY POWELL: If resistance, you know, is not a continuing problem
and you can stabilize --
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: -- you can do what I said quickly and get rid of the
weapons of mass destruction, item number one. So if you can do that
quickly, then you can get out of there quickly. If it takes more time,
then it takes more time.
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: That shouldn't be the test. The test is, is it clear
that we have no intention of keeping a military government in place?
But our intention is to shift from a military government to a -- to
more and more civilians coming into it, so that you show a civilian
face to our presence; and then stand up as quickly as you can.
QUESTION: You mean American civilians?
SECRETARY POWELL: American and others, coalition.
QUESTION: Yeah.
SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah, and that's what Jay Garner's group is all
about.
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: And Jay Garner is assembling the groups of people
now, who will come in and help to rebuild the ministries, make sure
the ministries are purged of people who do not mean the country well,
and start to rebuild the civil administration. And then, at the same
-- hopefully, this is -- this will be sequenced very closely together.
You put in place an interim authority. Now we are discussing what that
interim authority should look like, Iraqis from outside, Iraqis from
inside. How do you do that? This is a source of considerable
discussion.
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: But what we want to see is some Iraqi interim
authority up and functioning, even if it's in the most limited sense,
as quickly as possible so that the Iraqi people can see that what we
are all about is working ourselves out of this business, and
ultimately turning over all of the responsibilities of government to
the Iraqi authority, which, hopefully, grows into -- it will be an
embryonic Iraqi Government.
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, before the war started would you have
anticipated that that could have been begun more quickly than it has
been, getting the interim authority up and running? And if the war
timetable is longer does that complicate the plan?
SECRETARY POWELL: I don't know that we could have -- we have been
thinking about this and working on this for a long time, ever since we
came in office. But the one thing that you have to complete the
picture yet for an interim authority is what individuals and people
within the country now should be made a part of that, so that it just
isn't seen as an external, you know, placement. And I am not sure we
could have done it any faster, Jill.
I do know that we are committed to getting it done as quickly as we
can. And I can't quite give you a timetable. And it also does reflect
how long the war will take to when you can actually start doing it.
But Garner, as you know, is over there now. And so, we have put --
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: -- people there. And so, we are ready to do it, but
we are not yet ready to stand up something, even though some people
are standing themselves up.
QUESTION: Could we ask a question about something you said recently
which is that the so-called "doctrine" that you embrace and some give
your name to is "decisive force." But even some commanders feel that
there are not yet decisive forces there to do everything that needs to
be done. Do you agree with that, and is that -- is there any way that
you can -- you were surprised by that?
SECRETARY POWELL: I am sure that these generals and admirals, all of
whom I know and I'm ashamed to acknowledge my advancing age by saying
we were all captains just -- Vince Brooks, I remember when he was
commissioned, and now he's standing there as a Brigadier General. It's
scary. His father and I are contemporaries -- Major General Brooks,
Leo Brooks.
I think that they will bring decisive force to bear. There is no doubt
in my mind. These guys were trained the same place I was. But what I
don't want to do is start commenting on the ups and downs, the ins and
outs of the daily battles. And so, I will leave that to my colleagues
in the field who bear the responsibility, and my colleagues in the
Pentagon who bear the responsibility.
QUESTION: Still can you shed some light on what all -- by all accounts
was, if not a debate, at least a normal decision making process about
-- about the tactics and the size of the initial force, about your own
participation?
And I would also be curious to know what you could tell us about how
these options were presented to President Bush, as the decisions were
made leading up to the war?
SECRETARY POWELL: As a member of the National Security Council, and as
a member of the Principals Group of the National Security Council, I
was present, if not during all of the discussions, among the
principals and with the President and was able to make my input as
Secretary of State, on the diplomatic aspects of the military plan
that was being developed. And since I am an infantry officer and a
former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff that has been there
before in Desert Storm, I was also able to contribute from that
perspective, as well.
But, in terms of the various options, and when they decided what level
to put the force at, or not put the force at, I don't feel that I am
able to comment because I was not part of that internal process within
the Pentagon. And that's the story you have to write from your
Pentagon sources.
QUESTION: What though, can you -- how much can you tell us about these
various options being presented to the President? We are sort of
interested --
SECRETARY POWELL: I don't discuss options that were presented to the
President; which were accepted, which were discarded.
QUESTION: Yes.
SECRETARY POWELL: I defend the President's position and decisions.
QUESTION: Do you think as a political analysis question in a pre-war
op planning period that parts of the administration may have adopted
too optimistic or rosy view about the fragility of the Iraqi regime,
about the expectation that there might be more defectors, that the
government might crack more easily than it has in this first week?
I know you have talked about sort of the fear of the people, fear of
Saddam being an explanation for that. But do you think there was a
miscalculation there in looking out?
SECRETARY POWELL: I don't think so. I think we looked at the range of
possibilities that you could have immediate shattering, or it could be
a more prolonged thing. In my opinion, and my contribution to it
throughout, was that you had to be prepared for the whole thing. And
that's why, as the plan was developed -- and that's the only thing
I'll say about it -- they queued up lots of forces in anticipation
that you may not know in the first week or so what the total
requirement would be. And that's why there are forces that are still
now flowing into the theater.
But we all would have liked to have seen in the media a crystal glass
break and it's over. But I don't think anybody is stunned, shocked, or
surprised to find that this is a resilient dictatorship that's had 30
years to keep itself in place. I bombed it for 39 days and invaded for
four, and they never lost control. And Desert Fox in the Clinton
administration was another four years of bombing. So we all knew that.
We all saw that.
We saw eight years of an Iran-Iraq war. I don't think anybody was
unmindful of the capacity of this regime and the control they have
exercised over this country in a very dictatorial, hateful way for all
of these years. So, you know, you may have to go take a census of
everybody, but I had no illusions. We all hoped for the best, but you
plan for not the best.
QUESTION: You did not expect a cakewalk?
SECRETARY POWELL: Well, I saw something in the paper that we were
trying to figure out who did say cakewalk, and poor Kenny Adelman took
the dive.
QUESTION: Cakewalk Ken.
QUESTION: Yeah.
SECRETARY POWELL: You can search my speakings and writings for years
and you will find I never use expressions or terms, or words like
that. War is not -- it is not a game; it is not a slogan. These are
young men and women who are being sent to their fate.
QUESTION: But a prolonged war creates diplomatic and political
problems, in terms of the world's support for the war. As small as it
may be now, it could get worse. What can you say?
SECRETARY POWELL: We all would like to see it completed as rapidly as
possible. But as the President said when pressed on the question
yesterday, the answer is, "We will prevail, and it will take as long
as it takes."
Obviously, with time passing there are different diplomatic issues
that I have to deal with and there are different dimensions to the
resistance that exists in the Arab world and elsewhere, and that just
has to be dealt with and managed. But the war will move at its own
pace, as dictated by the actions of the enemy and the actions of our
forces. But I mean to listen to the Chief of Staff of the British
General Staff this morning, and he was quite good at this one.
You know, strategically we have taken the initiative. We are moving
freely about most of the country. There are still difficult areas in
Basra and Nasiriyah and other places. There are difficulties with the
line of communication, but General Franks is responding to that by
bringing in more troops to protect those lines. And slowly it's
shredding away the enemy. And I am not -- I am not taken aback by any
of this. This is a battle, and one always has to understand.
And one of the generals put it very well this morning. It's not a
quote I have used previously, but I will now, and it's a good one.
"The enemy gets a vote." The way I have always said it is, "No plan
survives first contact with an enemy." Plans are great, but I always
have gone into battle with the clear understanding in my mind that
there is a thinking, breathing human being on the other side who is
trying to beat me. And you have to attribute capability to them. And
you have to contribute a smart mind to your enemy.
QUESTION: He is going to have to go in a minute.
SECRETARY POWELL: I want to talk about resolutions. I wanted to talk
about 1441. (Laughter)
QUESTION: We are talking about the future. We never look back.
SECRETARY POWELL: We don't get a chance to do reruns here? You'll give
me a chance at the end, but go ahead.
QUESTION: Is there something you want to get off your chest?
SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah, there's one. I do. But are you finished? You
got your time in. You did it anyway.
QUESTION: We wanted to ask about North Korea and Iran.
SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah.
QUESTION: And you told my colleague, the one who is in the career
counseling business, not to expect that this model would work for
North Korea or Iran. And you just talked about diplomacy in the
context of North Korea. What can you tell us about the diplomatic
approaches on both of those problems and assure people that that's the
approach people who think, "Well, this is one notch on the belt, and
next we're going -- "
SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah, I think, as I said to Bill, "Give me -- give
me the evidence for this point of view. Give me the evidence that says
President Bush --"
I mean what he has said clearly with respect to North Korea is that we
are doing everything we can to find a diplomatic solution. And I am
very hard at work on that, and let me leave it there. We are very hard
at work on that. And we have a position, they have a position, and we
are trying to find a way forward.
I think the overall situation has improved. Stabilized is another way
to put it in that the tension has been lowered, the rhetoric has been
lowered. And we're trying to find a way forward, and I'm hard at work
on that. And the President has repeatedly said, almost to the
distraction of people, "What do you mean you don't want to go to war?
This is what you're supposed to do." But he is saying I want to find a
peaceful diplomatic solution.
In the case of North Korea, we have friends in the region who also are
committed to a denuclearized Korean peninsula and who have an interest
and an equity in finding a peaceful diplomatic solution. And we are
working with them intensively. And we have been at this now since
October when the thing, you know, broke open. What's that, four
months, five months? You know, the Agreed Framework took over a year.
And so, we are hard at work, and we are not neglecting this. The
reason I have to leave you is that the Korean Foreign Minister is
arriving. We are not neglecting this account. With respect to Iran,
there is a process underway in Iran. There is a yearning among the
young people, which constitutes such a large percentage of their
overall population. There is a conflict taking place between the
political leadership and the religious leadership.
And we are going to continue encouraging young people to speak out for
their desires, for their desire to become, I believe, part of a larger
world beyond the world that has been provided to them by their
religious and political leaders. And we are also going to speak out
about Iranian terrorist support, and Iranian nuclear weapons, and
nuclear weapons and other kind of proliferation activities. But that
doesn't mean we are going on a war footing as soon as Iraq is dealt
with.
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: And the same thing -- I would put Syria and Libya
into that same category. It doesn't mean we have taken any of our
options off the table. It's just to remind everybody that when you
read the National Security Strategy again -- and I'm sure you will
this weekend, Steve -- it has a lot more in it than just preemption.
Preemption, you know that, it's two lines I think. It's a broader
strategy in there, and the President has available to him lots of
tools. And the tool you use is not always a hammer.
QUESTION: But when you're writing about something, you always need to
leave.
SECRETARY POWELL: I know.
QUESTION: Jill has one quick  -- 
SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah.
QUESTION: -- involving you have been doing some work and have had
pieces about Richard Perle and some of the controversy involving his
private client work vis-à-vis heading the Defense Policy Board. And
one matter he worked on did land here. You did some work for Loral --
the Loral case. Some of our sources have said that from on high --
maybe from you directly, that people were told to be careful and not
discuss the Loral case with Mr. Perle. I wondered if that rings any
kind of bell with you or if you were --
SECRETARY POWELL: It did last night when the reporter called. No, your
reporter sent an e-mail query last night. And that's the first I'd
heard of it at all ever. And what -- I think we responded. I think we
sent an e-mail response.
QUESTION: They were going to I think.
SECRETARY POWELL: Another Steve.
QUESTION: Labaton.
SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah, you guys've got Steves all over the place over
there. But I think we e-mailed back to Steve's and Bill's.
QUESTION: He covers the SEC, too, so you'd better watch out.
SECRETARY POWELL: Oh, God. I'm undone. I think the e-mail we sent back
essentially confirmed the facts. And that is that we have an office,
our Political-Military office, run by Assistant Secretary Linc
Bloomfield, who did receive queries from Richard Perle. And it's quite
appropriate since Richard was, I guess, authorized for Loral to ask.
And in conducting our regular business, I know that Linc, and maybe
members of Linc's staff did have conversations with Mr. Perle. We will
do that with anybody who is authorized to call in and ask about such
matters in an administrative -- we have the administrative
responsibility to deal with these kinds of cases. But I did not -- I
did not know anything about any of this until last night when suddenly
a New York Times e-mail came in.
QUESTION: Well, thank you, sir. Since it's your time, we're going to
--
SECRETARY POWELL: No, fortunately -- yeah. I want to say -- I just
want to tell you -- let me say a couple of things about 1441. The
story has already been written. But I just --
QUESTION: Please.
SECRETARY POWELL: -- just want to make a couple of points. 1441 was a
remarkable diplomatic achievement on the part of the 15 members of the
Security Council who could come together and agree that this regime
was in continuing material breach of its obligations, had to give us a
declaration in 30 days. And you know the rest of it, Steve. I won't
bore you. And if they failed once again to meet their obligations,
they did not take this last chance, then serious consequences would
flow.
We believe that that was straightforward and there was a way to take
it to the -- to conclusion once they demonstrated that they hadn't
taken the last chance; passed 15-0 on the 8th of November, and we
started the inspections on the 27th of November. Through the late
winter and into the early part of this year, we listened to report
after report from Dr. Blix and Dr. El Baradei.
And I presented my presentation on the 5th of February. And we
essentially came to a point of major disagreement within the Council
as to whether there was compliance or lack of compliance. That's what
the whole fight was about all through January and February and into
early March. We made a determination with other of our friends that it
wasn't in compliance, and therefore serious consequences should flow.
Some of our friends, the United Kingdom, Australia, Italy, Spain said
the second resolution would be very helpful for us politically, and we
ought to try to get that. And that brought all of the issues back on
the table, and we fought hard for that resolution. We were doing
rather well. But, notwithstanding reports to the contrary, we were
doing rather well in lining up support.
I didn't have to go to Africa because I knew what every African vote
was. I didn't tell what they were. I just said I knew what they were.
And so, we didn't get the resolution because we couldn't get what was
needed. Plus we couldn't rid of the French veto and, perhaps, Russian
veto. Here is the bottom line of the story. That resolution went down,
and it was seen as a defeat, and it was a defeat.
But it wasn't something we needed in the first place. We are resting
everything we are doing now on 1441 and 687 and 678. What was
interesting, and nobody has really touched this yet, is that even
without the second resolution, Tony Blair went to his parliament and
-- tough fight -- but he got the vote. And now public opinion is
strongly behind him.
QUESTION: It was worth doing, in other words, even though you  -- 
SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah, it was worth -- it was worth the effort. Tony
Blair made the effort.
QUESTION: Yeah.
SECRETARY POWELL: And that having made the effort  -- 
QUESTION: Yeah.
SECRETARY POWELL: -- he was strengthened. With his party really in
disarray about this, he was strengthened enough to go to his
parliament, make the case, and public opinion is behind him. And he
went from, you know, here, he's back up.
QUESTION: This is history  -- 
SECRETARY POWELL: All of the others -- all of the others as well,
Aznar [Spain], Berlusconi [Italy], Howard [Australia], they all wanted
it, but we didn't get it. We could have used it for our own public
opinion.
QUESTION: Sure.
SECRETARY POWELL: I mean I would have loved to have had a second
resolution. But even in the absence of that resolution, Italy, Spain,
were with us. Prime Minister Howard took a deep breath, he is with us,
took it to his people in parliament. The only country that might have
given some support that they weren't able to give is -- off the top of
my head, big one -- Canada. They would have done something with the
resolution. Without the resolution is was not (inaudible). That s the
only point I wanted to make.
QUESTION: It sounded to me like a six-corner pool shot that what
you're saying is that you have the nine votes.
SECRETARY POWELL: Not quite.
QUESTION: Well, let me ask you this.
SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah.
QUESTION: But if -- but with the French saying that they were going to
veto it anyway, that crumbled because some of them then said, "Well,
why should we vote for something that's going to be vetoed?"
SECRETARY POWELL: Right.
QUESTION: Whereas, if you have them, then maybe you could have
convinced them not to veto.
SECRETARY POWELL: Well, that's the (inaudible) -- well, for all of
these countries except for the -- well, for all of us, it was a tough
vote to take. And there were only four of us that declared initially.
QUESTION: Yes.
SECRETARY POWELL: And so, we needed five more, minimum, to declare
publicly, ought to be able to show their hands, you know, "We were for
you." We were really climbing the ladder. But when the French kept
saying, "We will veto anything," and they did.
QUESTION: Right.
SECRETARY POWELL: Dominique said it, Chirac said it repeatedly, "There
is nothing you can put before us we won't veto." And when we looked at
that and realized the position that this was putting some of our
friends in, the difficult position this would put them in, to take to
a vote and have them show their hand and still lose, at that point it
was sensible not to do it. That's diplomacy sometimes.
QUESTION: Okay.
SECRETARY POWELL: Okay.
(end transcript)
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