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Analysis: Former Secretaries of State Weigh in on Prospect of War With Iraq
All Things Considered: September 26, 2002
 Secretaries of State on Iraq
JOHN YDSTIE, host:
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm John Ydstie.
ROBERT SIEGEL, host:
And I'm Robert Siegel.
US and British officials say that they have reached an agreement on a new United Nations resolution outlining demands that Iraq's Saddam Hussein disarm. Today Secretary of State Colin Powell told a Senate committee that he's dispatched top aides to Russia and to France to work out details of that resolution. Powell's comments come on a day when two of his predecessors weighed in on the prospect of war with Iraq. NPR's Eric Westervelt reports.
ERIC WESTERVELT reporting:
Secretary Powell told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the Bush administration has moved fast to expand the circle of consultation with other members of the Security Council on specific wording of a UN resolution.
Secretary COLIN POWELL (State Department): We have come into agreement with the United Kingdom on what the elements of a resolution should look like, and I am sending a senior official from my department to Paris this evening and then on to Moscow to discuss with the French and the Russians what we believe should be in such a resolution.
WESTERVELT: Powell said the White House is briefing Chinese officials, the other permanent Security Council member, in Washington. He said the US is insisting a new resolution lay out what Iraq must do and the consequences Iraq would face if it again fails to comply with UN demands. And the secretary asked Congress to move quickly on its own Iraq resolution. Some senators voiced concern that a military move against Iraq could undermine the fledgling rebuilding of Afghanistan and the continuing war effort against al-Qaeda. But Dr. Henry Kissinger, secretary of State under presidents Nixon and Ford, told the committee that the fight to take on al-Qaeda and Iraq are linked.
Former Secretary HENRY KISSINGER (State Department): The two issues are so closely related that they cannot be separated, and the attempt to separate them will make it difficult to achieve both. The war against terrorism will take many years. Dealing with weapons of mass destruction in Iraq cannot wait.
WESTERVELT: Indeed, this week, the Bush administration has made the strongest case yet that significant ties exist between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda. No officials have connected Hussein to the September 11th attacks, and the White House has yet to document those ties for Congress or the public. But national security adviser Condoleezza Rice told PBS' "NewsHour with Jim Lehrer" that strong evidence came from al-Qaeda members captured in the war on terrorism.
Dr. CONDOLEEZZA RICE (National Security Adviser): In particular, some high-ranking detainees have said that Iraq provided some training to al-Qaeda in chemical weapons development. So, yes, there are contacts between Iraq and al-Qaeda, and there some al-Qaeda personnel who found refuge in Baghdad.
WESTERVELT: Meantime, former Clinton Secretary of State Madeleine Albright told senators the administration needs to better plan for the complex political and economic reconstruction of Iraq if and when Saddam is overthrown.
Former Secretary MADELEINE ALBRIGHT (State Department): It is naive to think that a peaceful and democratic Iraq will automatically emerge from the ashes of our invasion, it is crazy to believe we can run post-war Iraq alone, and it is essential the administration think through the consequences of all this in advance, which it is not evident to me that they have done.
WESTERVELT: Albright was more optimistic than Kissinger that new UN inspectors might work to disarm Iraq. Albright remarked that some in Washington seemed to have, quote, "an irrational exuberance for war." Delaware Democrat Joseph Biden said the Bush administration has yet to make a compelling case not just on the threat Saddam poses, but on the true costs of war.
Senator JOSEPH BIDEN (Democrat, Delaware): If we go, forget your permanent tax cut. There ain't enough money. If we go, forget the idea that we're going to have a massive new health care program. I'm prepared to make those choices, but let's not kid the American people because I ain't in for a guns-and-butter routine here. I'm not going down that route again.
WESTERVELT: California Democrat Barbara Boxer concurred, saying constituents were flooding her office with calls to halt the US march to war with Iraq. Eric Westervelt, NPR News, Washington.
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