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Transcript for June 13 Guests: Secretary of State Colin Powell; president of the Iraqi interim government Ghazi al-Yawar; Afghan President Hamid Karzai NBC News Updated: 11:06 am ET June 13, 2004 Copyright 2004, National Broadcasting Company, Inc.
PLEASE CREDIT ANY QUOTES OR EXCERPTS FROM THIS NBC TELEVISION PROGRAM TO "NBC NEWS' MEET THE PRESS." In case of doubt, please check with: MEET THE PRESS - NBC NEWS (202) 885-4598, Sundays: (202) 885-4200 Meet the Press (NBC News) - Sunday, June 13, 2004 MR RUSSERT: Our issues this Sunday: Iraq and Afghanistan, two major trouble spots for America. And in our MEET THE PRESS Minute, George Herbert Walker Bush turned 80 yesterday. And with us now is the secretary of state, Colin Powell. They say it is Paul Johnson, and there's his business card. Mr Johnson's son has confirmed that his dad has been kidnapped in Saudi Arabia. Your department, the State Department, has suggested Americans not travel to Saudi Arabia. SEC'Y POWELL: It's not unraveling, but it's certainly a dangerous situation right now. They're trying to make the country unstable and I know that the Saudis are treating it with utmost seriousness and they're counterattacking. They've done some rolling up of these terrorist organizations, but clearly, this is a dangerous time for Saudi Arabia and we are working with them and cooperating with them in every way that we can to defeat these terrorists. MR RUSSERT: If they can affect the world's oil market by driving American workers out of Saudi Arabia, what will that do to our economy? SEC'Y POWELL: Well, it would not be a good thing for them to be able to do this, and that's why we have to do everything we can to help the Saudis keep that from happening. We have to put back a sense of security in the society so that people will not leave. We don't like the situation we're in right now in Saudi Arabia, and I know that the Saudis see this in the same serious manner that we do and they're going to go after these terrorists, but it's a tough situation. MR RUSSERT: Now that Mr Johnson has confirmed his dad was kidnapped, can you confirm it? SEC'Y POWELL: For Privacy Act reasons, I cannot yet confirm it but I accept what I see on television. MR RUSSERT: Let me turn to the situation in Iraq and discussions the president and you have had with leaders of European nations. This is how Charles Kupchan, who works for the Council on Foreign Relations, put it the other day.
generally feel that their assessment of the war going into the conflict was accurate." There is a new Iraqi interim government that is about to take over. There is a new UN resolution that was approved unanimously that approves the way going forward, and so while we do have challenges ahead--and the principle challenge is one of security, stopping these attacks, stopping this insurgency in Iraq, and once we can get that security situation under control, the combination of our troops, coalition troops and Iraqi forces being built up, then you will see reconstruction take off. You will see a better life for the Iraqi people being created. You will see a new constitution, and you will see something far better than the regime that is no longer there. MR RUSSERT: But the second-ranking Iraqi official was killed yesterday. The insurgency seems to be picking off the Iraqi leadership. SEC'Y POWELL: They are going after these courageous leaders who have stepped forward, but that's not something to give them credit for. They're murderers and they're trying to murder people who are trying to serve the Iraqi people and they cannot be allowed to succeed. What kind of world would we have, what kind of region would we have if these kinds of terrorists were allowed to proceed or allowed to succeed and we gave up and said we're not going to do anything about it? We're going to continue to keep our coalition troops there, do everything we can to build up Iraqi forces. We're going to support the new Iraqi government that is rapidly taking over. Fifteen ministries have already been transferred to full Iraqi control, and the president, that you will be interviewing later, as well as the prime minister will be taking office with their leadership at the end of the month and we will support them. They must be given everything they need to prevail over these former regime elements and terrorists. MR RUSSERT: Must the Iraqis not take control of their own destiny? Must they be willing to kill fellow Iraqis if need be to put down the insurgency? We don't want to go back to the past and we're not going to go back to the past. And that's why we're so pleased that the United Nations Security Council spoke clearly about this with a 15-0 resolution. Even those nations that did not think it was wise for us to go into Iraq last year--France and Germany I will mention--have now come together on this resolution, recognizing that the international community must not fail. Whatever the disagreements were over the past year, they have to be behind us and we have to come together now to defeat this insurgency and to move forward. I'm sure that the NATO summit later this month will also do likewise. We're not expecting major additional contributions of troops from our NATO allies beyond the 16 nations that are already involved, but there may be other things that NATO can do with respect to police training, with respect to headquarters involvement, and we'll be pursuing this with our NATO colleagues. MR RUSSERT: There was an article in The Financial Times the other day which suggested that failure, in fact, may be an option, and let me show it to you. "Simon Serfaty, an analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, was recently commissioned by someone in the administration--he does not say who--to write a paper on the effect of failure in Iraq on Europe and trans-Atlantic relations. He defines failure as an abrupt withdrawal of most US troops while Iraq dissolves into internecine strife." The president's made it clear that we're going to stay and help this new sovereign government. The international community, with its unanimous vote in the Security Council, has said the same thing. It is not an option to essentially walk away from this problem and allow these terrorists to prevail, or these former regime elements to take the Iraqi people back into the past. MR RUSSERT: The cost of the war--this was on the Associated Press wire the other day. While Americans are shelling out record prices for fuel, Iraqis pay 5 cents a gallon for gasoline, a benefit of hundreds of millions of dollar subsidies bankrolled by American taxpayers. A three-month supply costs American taxpayers more than $500 million, not including the cost of military escorts to fend off attacks." SEC'Y POWELL: This is the nature of the economy that we inherited from this regime, a regime that was bankrupting itself by providing these kinds of subsidies for gas, for food, and for other necessities which they control. As the new government takes over and as the economy settles down and it becomes more market-based, you will start to see all of these prices start to go up to market level conditions or certainly not at the current subsidized level. Even electricity was free and we have to change all of that as we bring this country along and bring it into the 21st century and into an integrated economic world. MR RUSSERT: But psychologically the American people see their gasoline over $2 a gallon and they see the Iraqis paying a nickel and they say what is this about? SEC'Y POWELL: Well, what it's about is a broken system that we are trying to fix. I want to ask you about it because your involvement as a heroic military man and as secretary of state. This is Specialist Danielle Green, and here's her picture. Smooth" when she played basketball for Notre Dame, and she said this: "They just don't want us there. I personally don't think we should have gone into Iraq, not the way things have turned out. SEC'Y POWELL: Well, I'm terribly sorry that she lost her hand. We regret all losses of that kind, loss of life, the injuries that our young men and women have suffered and those of the coalition forces a...
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