QUESTION: You're going to Maastricht, as we say in Holland. Is it a regular visit or is it also mending fences with the part of Europe that needs fences to be mended?

SECRETARY POWELL: No, it's a regular visit -- regular meeting of the OSCE -- and it will give me a chance to congratulate my Dutch colleague, Jaap, for the manner in which he has served as chairman and chief, as they say --I guess it is -- of OSCE. And the last time I will see him in this capacity before -- well, one more time perhaps, and then he will go off to become NATO Secretary General.

But OSCE is a very important organization and I think we will have some issues, serious issues, to discuss with respect to what's happened in Georgia recently and what we might do to help the new leadership in Georgia get ready for new elections, which will be held in just 42 days' time. And I'm sure that will be a subject of discussion.

We'll also have discussion, I am confident, about the recent Russian proposal, Russian-sponsored proposal on Moldova. And I'm sure that will be a subject of discussion, and the other areas responsibility of the OSCE. So I'm looking forward to it. I wasn't able to get to last year's meeting.

QUESTION: It's a different Europe, or a different U.S.-European relationship, compared to the year and a half ago when we met and you said, basically, it's all in the family, here and there a little problem, but we share the same values.

SECRETARY POWELL: Mm-hmm.

QUESTION: Would you still repeat that?

SECRETARY POWELL: Mm-hmm. I sure would. In fact --

QUESTION: With any amendments?

SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah, we've had one heck of a row over Iraq earlier this year. I never shrink from that. It was a major disagreement within Europe, and between some parts of Europe and the United States. It wasn't all of Europe against the United States. In fact, if you take in a count of the nations of Europe and do your scorecard, you would find, I think, more leaders were supporting the United States in its efforts than were opposing the United States in its efforts.

But as I said when I went to my first NATO meeting after the invasion early in the year, we had a big disagreement about whether or not we should go to war. We went to war. We now must come together and help build the peace. And that's what we are doing. It's the message I gave at NATO in the spring. It's the message I gave to my EU colleagues last week when I met them in Brussels. And it's the message I will give to my OSCE colleagues on Tuesday, and then again to my NATO colleagues next Friday.

And it's the message that I think the President took to the United Kingdom last week, and it was the message that, in his speech at Whitehall, he gave to all of Europe: That America believes in partnerships; we believe in the great alliances that we are a part of; we do not do what we do for the purpose of seeking to offend anyone, but because we have strong principles we believe in, and we will defend those principles and we will defend our interests. We prefer doing it in the context of international organizations and our great partnerships, but it is not always possible to do it that way. But we will defend our interests.

I think that the President made it clear in his "Three Pillars," that pillar number one was the important role of international organizations; pillar number two is that it's sometimes necessary to use force. The Europeans, more than anyone else, it seems to me, should understand that sometimes it is necessary to use force in the interests of peace and freedom. And then the third pillar, of course, has to do with democracy and how to promote democracy throughout the world, even in places where people say it won't take root.

So I think that message of the President, and what I do on my trips, and what Secretary Rumsfeld will do when he goes to his NAC-D meeting next week, shows that the United States is engaging with our partners.

Now, we have a different kind of problem in Europe and in other parts of the world in that public sentiment is more negatively inclined toward the United States than I would like to see it, and more negatively inclined than the leaders of those publics -- Prime Minister Blair and Mr. Berlusconi and Mr. Aznar and so many others. But I also believe that that is something that can be turned around. Public opinion changes as issues come and go and as time passes.

QUESTION: Are you going to implement some policies to try to improve this public sentiment in Europe?

SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah, we are, I think, trying to communicate a message of partnership, a message of working with our friends and allies. The President did that last week. I do it when I go to Europe, and I will continue to do it as I go to Europe. I met with my Belgian colleagues in addition to my European Union colleagues last week. I spend an enormous amount of time on the phone with my European colleagues. I have to also, now, work more assiduously now that these kinds of issues are sort of, in context, to take the message in a public way to European audiences -- one reason you four are sitting here.

QUESTION: During the visit to Britain, the British public were looking at -- for some concrete gain, some give from the point of view of Washington, particularly over the issue of Guantanamo Bay, and he mentioned that from several European countries.

SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah.

QUESTION: And the question of steel tariffs and also the question of contracts when it came to reconstruction. There didn't seem to be any give when the President was there. What were the prospects?

SECRETARY POWELL: Just a matter of timing. We released some 20 detainees, as you know, in the last couple of days -- not the British detainees, but detainees from Guantanamo. Although there is still a supply of them in Afghanistan who are flowing through the Guantanamo process, the specific cases of two detainees that are before our military tribunal, the British detainees, those particular two, is a difficult one. There are some very complex legal issues that our lawyers are still working out. But the President is anxious to do what he can to resolve that one. And we're trying to be very sensitive to the needs of Tony Blair's government, Prime Minister Blair's government.

And on steel, the President is waiting for some more information and reports. And I think as he said when he was in London -- he expects to make a decision on that in the near future as well. So it isn't a matter of ignoring the concerns expressed by our friends, it's a matter of timing before those decisions are ready.

QUESTION: Talking about international organizations now, if a new UN resolution on Iraq is to be proposed, what is the role of the UN going to be, given the fact that the security environment is insecure, that the UN cannot provide security at this point and it hardly can even provide reconstruction help in that security. So what is your assessment as to what that role is going to be?

SECRETARY POWELL: Well, we haven't asked for a new resolution. It may well be that a new resolution is appropriate at some point, but it's premature right now, it seems to me, to talk about a new UN resolution on a plan that has just arrived. I had good conversations with Secretary General Annan over the weekend. We had a long lunch and I encouraged him to quickly appoint a new special representative, either on an interim basis or some other, you know, more permanent basis -- whatever he thinks is appropriate -- because we're really in a transitional period until we get to the interim government next spring and the CPA ends. So he's looking at how best to cover that.

But he also, as I do, has to be concerned about the security of anybody you put in there, any team you put in there. So he's looking at different ways to perform the UN mission: Performance from neighboring countries; performing offsite at more distant locations and people going in and out; and also putting a presence in Baghdad. And Ambassador Bremer will be working with the UN security people to see whether or not we can create conditions that will permit the Secretary General to put the presence back in, as he has to meet his own standards. They're still going through the trauma of what happened to Sergio de Mello, and I hope there will be a UN representative soon.

I have made it clear, and I hope you've noticed in the statements I've been making for the last couple of weeks, since we announced this revised plan, that I want the UN to play an active role. We want the UN to play an active role. Certainly the President wants the UN to play an active role. And we'll structure that role in accordance, initially, with UN Resolution 1511, but we have to have a representative appointed so that we can work with somebody.

QUESTION: What is the political role going to be?

SECRETARY POWELL: It's laid out in 1511. And if more authority is needed, then we can look at another resolution. I would like to see the UN special -- Secretary General's special representative in the country now working with the Governing Council, working with Ambassador Bremer, as they put together the fundamental law that they have said they would have ready by February, and as they prepare for elections to select a transitional assembly and, from that, a transitional government.

I think this is a period over the next six months where the UN can play a role. They bring skill and they bring a capability to these kinds of efforts. It was a role, really, that I always thought they would play at an appropriate time, and I think Sergio de Mello was moving rapidly in that direction, and he had just about reached the point where we were going to need another resolution to expand his range of authority.

Since his untimely and tragic death, we have passed 1511. And 1500, I can't remember if it came before or after Sergio died, but 1511 certainly. And we're open to more resolutions, additional resolution or resolutions as appropriate. But I don't think we need one right now until we have had a chance to watch the Governing Council do some more work.

QUESTION: The President has said -- has reiterated democracy as sort of as the threshold for a success in Iraq, though some people contend that, given that goal, the handover of power is too fast. Iraqis aren't ready. The Americans are ceding control over the process of democratization.

SECRETARY POWELL: Some people also contend that we're not ceding it over fast enough, and we have had to make an informed judgment on that matter. Some of my European colleagues say, "You don't understand. Just turn it over and leave." Well, we will not turn it over and just create a situation of total chaos.

What we will do, though, is turn it over to a group of leaders who bear some legitimacy. One way of gaining legitimacy is with a full constitution and full elections of the kind we'd all like to see. But in the interest of time and moving this process along, we elected to work with the Governing Council and come up with a transitional arrangement. But what makes this transitional arrangement different than just ceding authority is that there will be some elective base to it. The transitional assembly will be elected -- not in a full referendum fashion -- but in the manner that the Governing Council and Ambassador Bremer worked out last week.

And so we will transition it to some executive and assembly that rests on the basis of elect legitimacy, as opposed to just a group of individuals who are self-appointed or appointed by the CPA. I don't think it would have the kind of legitimacy that people are looking for.

QUESTION: Could we also follow up on Guantanamo Bay? You said that apart from those two Brits, they were special cases that need some looking at. Will the fates of the rest of the other seven Brits wait on the resolution of those two?

SECRETARY POWELL: No, they're on a -- they're in a separate track. These two are identified for potential trial before a tribunal, a military tribunal. And the British Government was interested in the due process associated with that. The other seven are in a different track and they have not yet gone through the entire intelligence and interrogation process that exists in Guantanamo to determine whether or not they have done something wrong and therefore should be subject to some judicial process, or whether they should be released, and what danger they present. And so they are in a separate track.

QUESTION: May I quickly come back to the --

MR. BOUCHER: We're going to have to finish up.

SECRETARY POWELL: Go ahead.

QUESTION: You said that the European publics, alas, do not all of them agree that the United States was right in pursuing the course.

SECRETARY POWELL: Some do, some don't. But, I mean, there is --

QUESTION: I want to --

SECRETARY POWELL: There is -- I don't want to -- there is a higher level of anti-American feeling in Europe than I would like to see, but I also --

QUESTION: Would you be able to name a symbol that might mend fences in that respect? For instance, would the United States tend to soften its ICC policy, as borne out by the six countries that were sort of let off the hook recently?

SECRETARY POWELL: No. We're not going to yield on our ICC policy. We believe in certain things and we have taken what, to us, are principled positions.

When I was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, I didn't approve of the initial work moving toward what became the Rome statute and the ICC. It is simply inconsistent with our own constitutional way of dealing with misdeeds or for offenses that might have been committed by our people in uniform. We will take care of that, and they will not be subject to an ICC. So we will not yield on that, and that's why we made it clear that we would not be any longer bound by any of the terms of the ICC, even though President Clinton signed it just before he left office, knowing at the time he signed it, it would never go to our Senate for ratification. So, no, we're not going to change our position.

And, in fact, what we have been doing is talking to our friends around the world and say, "Look, you believe in the ICC, you have signed onto the Rome statute and you are in the process of ratifying it. Fine, that's your position. That's good." We choose not to do that, and in order for us to have the ability to have our troops work in your country or other diplomats serve without any risk in your country, we invite you to enter into Article 98 agreements. Article 98 agreements are provided for by the Rome statute, and we have entered into some 72 such agreements in the last year or so.

And so we are not telling anybody else that they should abandon the Rome statute, but we, ourselves, are not going to become a party to the Rome statute and we're finding ways to protect our people so that we can continue with our partnership activities. And, as you know, we have waived some of the Servicemen Protection Act restrictions on six countries.

QUESTION: Okay. Regarding the peace process in the Middle East, first, do you think it's possible to revive the roadmap, especially during your NATO tour in Europe?

SECRETARY POWELL: Yeah, yeah.

QUESTION: And, second, what do you with this unofficial Geneva plan prepared by Yossi Beilin and Yasser --

MR. BOUCHER: Yeah, Rabbo.

SECRETARY POWELL: We -- I have written to them, to both groups, and welcomed the contribution they have made with these plans. The roadmap, however, is still alive and well and there. It's waiting there. What it requires is the performance on the part of the Palestinians and on the part of the Israelis.

On the part of the Palestinians, we now have a new prime minister with a new cabinet. And as I have said to the prime minister, ‘What we need to see now is performance -- action taken against terrorist elements that are within the Palestinian community. They are killing innocent people and they are killing your dreams for a Palestinian state. And before we can get the roadmap moving again and place demands on Israel for it to meet its obligations -- and it's met some of its obligations, but there are many more things for Israel to do -- we have to make sure that we are taking action against terrorists.’

Now, a lot has been happening in recent weeks: a new Palestinian Prime Minister, a new cabinet, two ideas that have surfaced: Yossi Beilin and the other one. And statements are being made by various former officials in Israel and some current officials in Israel that suggest we have to see some movement here. We can't stay where we are. Prime Minister Sharon has said some interesting things this week about what he might be willing to do.

And so I think, I think that we should not say the roadmap is dead. It's there. We just had a pause. We had to stop when Abu Mazen resigned. And now I hope that Prime Minister Qureia and the Palestinian cabinet will take action against terrorists. And if they do that -- I'm not saying go start a civil war within the Palestinian community, but there are things they can do, I believe. If they do that, they will find the United States, President Bush and the Quartet members and many other people standing by waiting to help them.

And I sense on the Israeli side certain movement based on what Prime Minister Sharon has said, based on what General Ayalon has said, and with the statements of the four Shin Bet leaders over the last 20 years, as well as the two peace proposals that you mentioned. There is some movement here, and hopefully we can take advantage of this movement and get going on the roadmap.

QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. Secretary.

QUESTION: One last personal sort of question. What claim --

SECRETARY POWELL: Personal? (Laughter.) Okay.

QUESTION: It's not really personal. What claim in your February 5th declaration in front of the UN Security -- at the UN Assembly do you regret to have made?

SECRETARY POWELL: None. What I presented on the 5th of February was not something that I made up here in the State Department. And it was not something that was given to me by people who are not competent to provide such information. It represented the best work of our intelligence community, and I spent several days -- I think from Thursday through Monday -- with the Director of Central Intelligence, with the Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, well into the night -- almost midnight every night -- and all of the analysts who have responsibility, the senior analysts, and we went over every single item that I spoke about and presented.

And it represented not guesses, but their best judgment based on the information they had, their holdings. And it also reflected a body of intelligence that had been concurred in by a number of nations over the years -- the same body of intelligence upon which President Clinton acted to go after weapons of mass destruction facilities in 1998 in Operation Desert Fox, and the same broad body of intelligence that the United Nations relied upon for many years to pass resolutions condemning Iraq for its behavior. And so that's what I presented on the 5th of February. It wasn't -- it wasn't --

QUESTION: So why was the best -- why was the best information not good enough? And what consequences does that have for a strategy of preemption?

SECRETARY POWELL: But you don't know if it was good enough or not good enough. It was good enough, in my judgment, to form a basis for political and policy decisions to be taken.

Now, in the seven months or six months since the war, there are certain things that are clear to me. One, we have not found huge warehouses of this material. Was that an incorrect judgment, or we just haven't found it yet remains to be seen.

Item two: There is no doubt in my mind whatsoever that Saddam Hussein had programs for weapons of mass destruction. We can't tell you what inventories he had, but anybody who thinks that this guy was not going to develop nuclear weapons or he wouldn't restart and bring all of his commercial, chemical apparatus and chemical facilities back into the production of chemical weapons, and he was not going to develop biological weapons once freed from UN inspectors, that would be the height of naiveté. This is a man who's used this stuff before. He isn't an unknown quantity. He was a known quantity.

And so how much he actually had, we'll let Dr. Kay work that out in the way of actual weapons or programs, or programs waiting to be restarted. But the intention was never lost, the infrastructure was never lost, the people who knew how to do it were never shipped out of the country --

QUESTION: But the imminence wasn't there.

SECRETARY POWELL: Well, look at my 5 February statement.

QUESTION: You didn't say it was imminent.

SECRETARY POWELL: You were asking me about my 5 February statement.

QUESTION: Okay.

SECRETARY POWELL: But is imminence the judge? I mean, is imminence the trigger? I don't think so. I think the real trigger was the fact that we were dealing with a dangerous individual who had no reservations about having such weapons or using such weapons, and who had used them in the past. And I've been to Halabja where he killed 5,000 people on a Friday morning in 1988 in March. And so I have no doubt about whether or not this, this gentleman would not use or would develop such weapons.

And so whether the imminence is to one's satisfaction or not, the fact that that capability was there, there is no doubt in my mind, and it was no doubt in the mind of those who voted for those resolutions for a bunch of years. And it could have been resolved very easily if Saddam Hussein had said, "Okay, fine. I'm showing you everything. I'm telling you everything. I'm giving you a full, honest declaration, and I'm not hiding and I'm going to give you everybody you want to talk to. And you will find that there's nothing there." He didn't do that. He had a chance to do that. We worked. We went to the United Nations on September 12th, 2002 to give him a chance to do that. He chose not to do it and he suffered the consequences as a result.

Okay? Was this 30?

QUESTION: Okay.

SECRETARY POWELL: It was 30.

QUESTION: Thanks a lot, Mr. Secretary.

SECRETARY POWELL: Good to see you again. Happy Thanksgiving.

2003/1211 [End]
Released on November 27, 2003

MR. HEMMER: When you go to Europe, what's your message, not just to European leaders, but to the people on that continent?

SECRETARY POWELL: That the transatlantic relationship is strong, it's vital, and that the United States wants the people of Europe to know that even though we may have had disagreements in the past over Iraq, this is the time to move forward. Let's join together and help the Iraqi people build a better future for themselves. Let’s join together once again to talk about that which pulls us together: a common value system.

The United States and other nations in the Western Hemisphere share with Europe a common belief in democracy, in human rights, in openness, in market economics. There are so many things that pull us together and have pulled us together over all these years that we have to remember these and refresh our memory from time to time, when we think things are coming apart over a particular issue.

MR. HEMMER: It appears it's a bit of a hornet's nest. You saw the polling out a few weeks ago. A majority of Europeans, 57 percent, believe the Bush Administration has made the world a more dangerous place to live. How do you defend that when you're hearing results like that?

SECRETARY POWELL: Because what I will say to them is that it's not us who have made the world a more dangerous place to live. It's terrorists. It's those people who are determined to use terror as a weapon against all civilized nations. The Bush Administration is working hard to make this a more peaceful world, a more democratic world. When the President talks about democracy, he talks about freedom.

Yes, people -- some people in Europe anyway -- some nations in Europe, thought we shouldn't have gone into Iraq, but we did. And we are very pleased that that dictator is now gone, no more mass graves will be filled, and that we are helping the Iraqi people reach a better place in life where they can live in peace and freedom and not be seen as a pariah of the world.

Is it going to be difficult to get there? Yes. Are we taking casualties? Yes. Freedom sometimes requires that, doing the right thing sometimes requires that; and we're not shrinking back from the decision we made. The President is absolutely convinced, as are all of us, that the right decision was made; Tony Blair feels so, Mr. Berlusconi feels so, Prime Minister Asnar feels so, so many other leaders in Europe feel so.

What we have to do is convey to our population, those here in the United States and the population in Europe, that a decision was made that we believe was the right decision, others think it was not. But let's move forward now. Let's not debate that decision.

Let's come together, as we did in Madrid a few weeks ago. We got $13.3 billion in loans and grants added to the $20 billion that the United States Congress provided to help the people of Iraq, as we did with UN Resolution 1511: all 15 nations on the Security Council coming together in a unanimous decision to bless the approach we are now taking.

MR. HEMMER: It might seem like a pretty easy thing to say that on this side of the Atlantic. It appears to me that's a pretty tough sell today in most of these European countries, how you can only a few months down the road, after such contentious debates were held in New York at the UN Security Council, to now put that behind and move forward.

When you arrive in Europe, are you going to ask Germany, are you going to ask France for help? And if so, what do you think is the right contribution?

SECRETARY POWELL: They have helped in the sense that they have helped us with the passage of three UN Resolutions in a row on a unanimous basis: 1483, 1500 and 1511. Now, Germany and France have made it clear that they are not in a position to send troops to Iraq, and they have made it clear that they have done all they are able to do at the moment with respect to humanitarian aid and other kinds of financial contributions.

So I'm not going to spend a lot of time debating that, although I will make the case that the need is still great, and they ought to consider it as we go into the future. But, you know, what I don't want to do, and I'm not going to do, and frankly, they don't expect me to do, is re-fight this battle, because it is behind us. What we are all striving to do now is to come together to help the Iraqi people to achieve the better life that we have made available to them.

And what we have to do is defeat the terrorists, defeat the remnants of the old regime. The remnants of the old regime are not just fighting against coalition presence, they're fighting against a new Iraq. They want the old days back. The old days are not coming back. They're never coming back. We need the international community to come together again. We want the UN to be involved. We want everybody to realize that there is a stake now for all of us in a free, democratic, non-threatening Iraq, and that is achievable.

MR. HEMMER: The President last week called it a "power grab" right now, on both sides essentially, with the new authority trying to come in, and with the Baathist remnants still fighting for power in Fallujah and Tikrit and Baghdad.

For someone who is watching this interview who has a son or daughter in Iraq, why is that country worth dying for?

SECRETARY POWELL: The country is worth serving in, and perhaps sacrificing for, because we have come to the rescue, frankly, of 24 million people who have been suffering for decades. We were coming to remove a regime, and we did it, that was developing weapons of mass destruction that it was using against other human beings. I've been to Halabja where Saddam Hussein in 1988 gassed 3-5,000 people in one single day and put them in their graves.

Now to say to a family at Fort Campbell that just lost one of their loved ones in a recent helicopter crash or in other combat action that has taken place, or Fort Hood, or all of our other posts, serving in the military is a risky profession, and we regret the loss of any single life. It pains me, it pains the President, not like the pain that the family feels, but the family has to know that these young men and women are giving their lives in a good cause: the cause of freedom, the cause of democracy, the cause of a better world that their children will enjoy, the ones they left behind will enjoy in due course.

We will prevail over terrorism. We will prevail over these remnants that are not interested in democracy, not interested in freedom, only want power back. Power to do what? Power to waste the wealth of the country, power to put people within mass graves, power to oppress people and power to threaten other nations in the region. We're not going to allow that to happen, nor are our coalition partners.

We're not in this alone. There are 30 other nations that have troops there standing alongside of ours. The Poles have lost troops. The Italians have lost troops. The Spanish have taken casualties. And we're all standing together. We're all standing solidly behind the policy that we are executing because it's the right thing to do.

As I will convey to my European Union colleagues in Brussels tomorrow, most of whom are part of the coalition, and as the President will convey to the people of the United Kingdom, and I think to the rest of Europe during his visit with Prime Minister Blair and her Majesty the Queen later this week, the United States and Britain have stood tall on this issue, and we are the right side of history on this issue.

MR. HEMMER: To those who say that the process is now under way of cutting and running, of getting out of Iraq as quickly as possible, whether that's next summer or maybe the year after that -- even strong supporters of this Bush Administration have seen that right now, and they talk about it publicly and write about it almost every day. What do you say to that?

SECRETARY POWELL: Well, they can talk and write about it all they want. It's just not accurate. The President has made it clear, and Secretary Rumsfeld underscored the other day, as did Ambassador Bremer and as I do now, that we want to move the political process along so we can give sovereignty back to the Iraqi people as quickly as possible. We think next June is as quickly as possible. We've said this from the very beginning. But even after sovereignty is returned, we expect that there will be a need for U.S. troops for a period of time after that, and we'll be there at the invitation of the new Iraqi government. We're not cutting and running.

MR. HEMMER: You say next June and some people say, "Okay, that's great.” Right now, you're moving up the timetable. Are there risks in moving too fast right now with the timetable?"

SECRETARY POWELL: There's always a risk of moving too fast. There's always a risk of not moving fast enough. Those of our critics who say, "You're not moving fast enough. You ought to turn over sovereignty tomorrow," my answer is, to who? To what? To what institution? To what legitimacy? And are you not setting them up for failure? That is moving too fast. Taking forever to get it done, where it looks like we don't want to leave, we want to stay, that's moving too slow.

So we have been trying to find the right schedule. I believe that the plan that the Governing Council came to a conclusion on this past weekend, with consultation with Ambassador Bremer and the rest of us back here in Washington, is a solid plan that says, let's move as quickly as we can over the next six months to put in place a government that will be seen as legitimate. It will reflect the will of the Iraqi people acting on the basis of a basic law, fundamental law -- interim constitution is another way to characterize it -- and then take the longer time necessary to complete a full constitution and have full elections that will arrive at a permanent government, not unlike the Afghanistan model.

MR. HEMMER: When you look at the leadership that right now is trying to take Baghdad into the future, do you see leaders emerge? I read some comments recently where you did not think that there was one person who was truly taking that leadership position. Most Americans know Ahmed Chalabi. I don't know if you consider him a founding father of the new Iraq. I don't know if you would even come close to putting him in the category of Thomas Jefferson. But is there a person right now who you believe can truly take that country forward in the way United States wants to see it go?

SECRETARY POWELL: This is going to be up to the Iraqi people to determine. The Iraqi people have started the process of rebuilding their political system with this Governing Council. Twenty-five people are on this Governing Council. Some are very, very prominent leaders in parts of the country. We're waiting to see, as they do their work, and as the cabinet ministers do their work, and as other leaders surface, we will see who emerges to win the game --

MR. HEMMER: There isn't one name that you --

SECRETARY POWELL: No. And even if there was one name that I had in the back of my mind, the last thing I would do right now is say, "That's who the United States says should become the head of this new country." This is for the Iraqis to decide.

MR. HEMMER: But it's okay to support that person, right?

SECRETARY POWELL: Well, I want to support anybody who, in Iraq political circles, who is prepared to commit himself or herself to the values that we believe are the right values, and the Iraqi people have said are the right values. The Governing Council laid out over the weekend the basic principles they're going to be looking at with respect to democracy, with respect to human rights. But the President has made clear from the beginning that we're not going to handicap the Iraqi people who their leader should be.

Now, democracy is not a simple system where you suddenly say, "You're in charge." It tends to be noisy. It tends to be confused. There tend to be power struggles. There tends to be debate. This confusion, this noise has a name: it's called democracy. We will see leaders emerge. Politics cannot stand a vacuum. In time, the right kinds of leaders will emerge.

What is important right now is to put a basic law in place that enshrine the principles of democracy, human rights, freedom, openness, free media, an independent judiciary, so that will be the basis upon which leaders will present themselves to the country and not just, "I got here first," or "I have more power than this guy does." Power has to derive from the people.

MR. HEMMER: One more question, if I could, please. I know I'm almost out of time here. Last February, you made a very strong argument before the UN Security Council about weapons of mass destruction. To date, the weapons have not been found, although there have been many mentions about a weapons program that's been discovered in Iraq. How concerned are you today that the trust of the American public has been fractured because of the lack of discovery of the weapons themselves, between the American public and the U.S. Government?

SECRETARY POWELL: I think everybody was hoping that suddenly a warehouse door would be opened and there it all was. It didn't turn out that way. But the information that we had provided to the American people, to the international community, to Congress, was the best information that the intelligence community had, not cooked intelligence. Before I made my presentation on the fifth of February, I sat out at the CIA with the Director, Mr. Tenet; the Deputy Director, Mr. McLaughlin; and all their analysts. We went over the best information they had. What I presented on the fifth of February represented that, and George Tenet was sitting there right with me. We were confident in it.

It's the same sort of information that President Clinton used in 1998 when he determined it was necessary to execute Operation Desert Fox, the bombing of these facilities. He didn't just bomb in the open desert. He bombed facilities that were associated with this program. Many other intelligence agencies and foreign governments that have credible intelligence agencies came to the same conclusion. For 12 years Iraq was given the opportunity to prove we were wrong. "All of your intelligence is a fraud." Well, they didn't take that opportunity, and they had to pay the consequences.

I'm confident when Dr. Kay finishes his work -- the head of the support group, the group that's looking for this material -- when he examines all the documentation that he has in his possession now, completes all the interviews that he will be conducting about people who have knowledge of these programs, you will see that there was a program to develop weapons of mass destruction.

MR. HEMMER: You're still confident of that?

SECRETARY POWELL: We will see how many of these dual use commercial facilities really were "just-in-time" chemical or biological facilities.

MR. HEMMER: Which means?

SECRETARY POWELL: Which means that they were all ready to get into the development of these kinds of weapons from whatever commercial applications they had once the sanctions had been relieved and once the UN had gone away. I can assure you that Saddam Hussein never lost the intention to have these kinds of weapons. He had them before.

The state of his program at the time we invaded, people can debate that while Dr. Kay does his work, but never believe that he gave up the intention. If we had ever just turned away and said, "Well, forget about it. Let's let the sanctions off. Let's leave him alone. The inspectors can go away," I can assure you that he would have gone right back in the track he had been on for all those years to have these weapons, and he would have been a threat to the region, a threat to the world, a threat especially if those weapons got in the hands of terrorists, and a direct threat to us as a result.

MR. HEMMER: Just to be clear, Mr. Secretary, I was not calling into question your own veracity. It was more a reflection of how you felt about how you convinced the American public, who still calls into question.

SECRETARY POWELL: I think the American public understand that this is a difficult analytical effort. I don't think there's any question in their mind that such programs existed. What we're really debating is how real and present a danger was it in the form of stockpiles waiting to be used, and we didn't find those stockpiles waiting to be used, but we certainly found evidence that he was working on all three of these programs at differing, you know, levels of intensity and sophistication.

And I think the American people understand that we've got to give Dr. Kay the time necessary to root it all out, examine it, and give us his final report. His interim report certainly indicated that there were programs of a kind that we were talking about, that should have been of great concern to the world, and were of great concern to the President of the United States. President Bush acted on that concern, and he acted in accordance with UN Resolution 1441, which held Iraq to be in material breach for all of its past misbehavior, and said unless it cooperated fully, gave a full declaration of what it was doing now, it would be in continued and new material breach. As far as we're concerned, that was a sufficient basis for the action that the President and other coalition members took. The President of the United States, boldly standing alongside the Prime Minister of Great Britain and many other European leaders, and took action that I think history will certainly justify.

MR. HEMMER: Have a safe trip, and a successful trip, and thank you for your time. I hope we do it again, okay? I very much appreciate it.

2003/1179
[End]