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President Bush, Tony Blair and other NATO leaders | 0:00:20 | 0:00:24 | |
are arriving today at all different hours for a crucial NATO summit. | 0:00:24 | 0:00:28 | |
The President, of course, coming just from Ankara across to Istanbul. | 0:00:28 | 0:00:33 | |
One key issue is, of course, Iraq. | 0:00:33 | 0:00:35 | |
So far, British and American troops have been the primary force | 0:00:35 | 0:00:38 | |
trying to establish security ahead of the handover | 0:00:38 | 0:00:40 | |
to the interim government this week. | 0:00:40 | 0:00:42 | |
The US Defense Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, | 0:00:42 | 0:00:45 | |
is the man in charge of all American military operations, | 0:00:45 | 0:00:48 | |
therefore military operations in Iraq. | 0:00:48 | 0:00:51 | |
And he has just arrived in Istanbul. | 0:00:51 | 0:00:53 | |
I spoke to him just a few minutes ago for a rare interview, | 0:00:53 | 0:00:57 | |
and I began asking him whether the NATO alliance | 0:00:57 | 0:01:00 | |
remained as important as it was during the Cold War. | 0:01:00 | 0:01:04 | |
Well, I think it is. | 0:01:05 | 0:01:07 | |
It's a different role and a different time in our world's history, | 0:01:07 | 0:01:11 | |
but NATO remains the most outstanding military alliance | 0:01:11 | 0:01:17 | |
on the face of the Earth. | 0:01:17 | 0:01:19 | |
It serves as the critical linkage between Europe and North America. | 0:01:19 | 0:01:24 | |
And it fulfils a function and has the potential to, prospectively, | 0:01:24 | 0:01:29 | |
that really can't be filled by any other institution. | 0:01:29 | 0:01:33 | |
It could, of course, do more on some issues, like Iraq, | 0:01:33 | 0:01:37 | |
but for the fact, obviously, that you have that... | 0:01:37 | 0:01:40 | |
the three members of old Europe there - France, Germany and Belgium. | 0:01:40 | 0:01:43 | |
It would be difficult to have anything other than | 0:01:43 | 0:01:46 | |
a coalition of the willing if you're going into a new crisis. | 0:01:46 | 0:01:51 | |
It does hold back what NATO can do a bit. | 0:01:51 | 0:01:54 | |
Well, when you have an organisation with that many members, now 26, | 0:01:55 | 0:02:00 | |
and you have an operation that's based on consensus, | 0:02:00 | 0:02:04 | |
it's understandable that it will take some time to discuss and debate | 0:02:04 | 0:02:09 | |
and consider and make sure everyone is working off the same fact pattern. | 0:02:09 | 0:02:13 | |
To the extent people have the same threat assessment, | 0:02:13 | 0:02:17 | |
they tend to do the same things and react the same way. | 0:02:17 | 0:02:21 | |
To the extent people look at things from a different perspective | 0:02:21 | 0:02:24 | |
and they're not working off the same sheet of music, | 0:02:24 | 0:02:26 | |
it's not surprising when they go off in different directions. | 0:02:26 | 0:02:30 | |
With the case of Iraq, we anticipate that at this summit, | 0:02:30 | 0:02:33 | |
the heads of state will end up agreeing that NATO, | 0:02:33 | 0:02:38 | |
the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, | 0:02:38 | 0:02:40 | |
will, in fact, have a role in training and equipping | 0:02:40 | 0:02:44 | |
the Iraqi security forces, which is a very good thing, if that happens. | 0:02:44 | 0:02:48 | |
Tell me, Mr Secretary, are you where you hoped to be 14 months ago | 0:02:48 | 0:02:55 | |
when the war came to an end, | 0:02:55 | 0:02:57 | |
or not? | 0:02:57 | 0:02:58 | |
Oh, no. | 0:03:00 | 0:03:02 | |
One would always hope for better. | 0:03:02 | 0:03:04 | |
You know, you... Wars are unpredictable | 0:03:04 | 0:03:07 | |
and postwar recoveries are unpredictable. | 0:03:07 | 0:03:11 | |
Most countries have a very difficult time. | 0:03:11 | 0:03:14 | |
I've been reading statements about how long it took | 0:03:14 | 0:03:18 | |
the United States to move towards a democracy, | 0:03:18 | 0:03:22 | |
and history books on Japan and Germany | 0:03:22 | 0:03:25 | |
and some of the Eastern European countries. | 0:03:25 | 0:03:28 | |
It's never been easy, it's always difficult, | 0:03:28 | 0:03:30 | |
it's frequently violent and sometimes it's even ugly. | 0:03:30 | 0:03:34 | |
Um, it was Jefferson who said | 0:03:34 | 0:03:36 | |
that one ought not to expect to be transported towards democracy | 0:03:36 | 0:03:40 | |
on a feather bed. | 0:03:40 | 0:03:42 | |
It is a tough path, | 0:03:42 | 0:03:44 | |
and the Iraqis are going to go through a tough period. | 0:03:44 | 0:03:47 | |
But they're doing pretty well. | 0:03:47 | 0:03:49 | |
The schools are open, the hospitals are open, | 0:03:49 | 0:03:52 | |
the people are coming back in, | 0:03:52 | 0:03:54 | |
refugees are returning, internally displaced people, there. | 0:03:54 | 0:03:58 | |
They have food, they have electricity, | 0:03:58 | 0:04:00 | |
they're selling oil, they have a budget. | 0:04:00 | 0:04:03 | |
They also have a lot of Iraqis being killed by, | 0:04:03 | 0:04:06 | |
in some cases violent Iraqis, extremists, | 0:04:06 | 0:04:09 | |
in some cases by foreign terrorists. | 0:04:09 | 0:04:12 | |
But they are on a path. | 0:04:12 | 0:04:14 | |
The new government is a good thing | 0:04:14 | 0:04:17 | |
and it'll take responsibility in two or three days. | 0:04:17 | 0:04:21 | |
I have a lot of confidence that they'll be able to find their way | 0:04:21 | 0:04:25 | |
towards a truly Iraqi solution. | 0:04:25 | 0:04:27 | |
It won't look like your country and it won't look like our country | 0:04:27 | 0:04:30 | |
but it will certainly look an awful lot better than | 0:04:30 | 0:04:33 | |
the Saddam Hussein killing fields and mass graves | 0:04:33 | 0:04:37 | |
and shoving people off the tops of buildings to kill them | 0:04:37 | 0:04:41 | |
and cutting off their hands | 0:04:41 | 0:04:42 | |
and pulling out their tongues with pliers and chopping them off, | 0:04:42 | 0:04:46 | |
which is what that repressive regime did. | 0:04:46 | 0:04:48 | |
But people do all say, Mr Secretary, at the same time, | 0:04:48 | 0:04:51 | |
that we were responsible, partially, for the security situation. | 0:04:51 | 0:04:55 | |
We clearly completely underestimated the degree of violence, | 0:04:55 | 0:05:00 | |
lack of security that there would have been. | 0:05:00 | 0:05:03 | |
We would have had more soldiers there, | 0:05:03 | 0:05:05 | |
we would have done something different | 0:05:05 | 0:05:06 | |
if we hadn't underestimated the danger on security. | 0:05:06 | 0:05:10 | |
Well, there are people who say that. | 0:05:12 | 0:05:13 | |
There are also people who argue the other side - | 0:05:13 | 0:05:16 | |
that the real task of security is not to flood a country | 0:05:16 | 0:05:20 | |
with more and more troops and become a foreign occupier. | 0:05:20 | 0:05:24 | |
If you think about it, the Soviet Union had 300,000 troops | 0:05:24 | 0:05:28 | |
in Afghanistan and lost the war. | 0:05:28 | 0:05:30 | |
So victory and success is not inversely proportional | 0:05:30 | 0:05:35 | |
to the number of people you have in the country. | 0:05:35 | 0:05:39 | |
We don't want to be an occupying power. | 0:05:39 | 0:05:41 | |
In the last analysis, governance and essential services | 0:05:41 | 0:05:45 | |
and progress economically go hand-in-hand | 0:05:45 | 0:05:48 | |
with successful security. | 0:05:48 | 0:05:50 | |
The Iraqi people are going to have to provide | 0:05:50 | 0:05:53 | |
for the security of that country, and they are well on the way to doing it. | 0:05:53 | 0:05:57 | |
And in terms of Mr Allawi, the prime minister, | 0:05:57 | 0:06:00 | |
when he was with us back in December and again just a few weeks ago, | 0:06:00 | 0:06:03 | |
said on both occasions that he thought that one of the big mistakes | 0:06:03 | 0:06:07 | |
was to disband the Iraqi army. | 0:06:07 | 0:06:09 | |
He could see why it might have been seen as a good idea at the time, | 0:06:09 | 0:06:12 | |
but putting all of those people out of jobs, | 0:06:12 | 0:06:15 | |
that was a really serious error | 0:06:15 | 0:06:17 | |
and affected our inability to patrol the borders and all of those things. | 0:06:17 | 0:06:22 | |
I've read that and I've heard him say it. | 0:06:24 | 0:06:26 | |
In fact, I've visited with him about it. | 0:06:26 | 0:06:28 | |
His hope is to reconstitute some aspects of the Iraqi army. | 0:06:28 | 0:06:32 | |
And I think that's a good thing. | 0:06:32 | 0:06:34 | |
The reality is that we did not, in effect, disband the Iraqi army. | 0:06:34 | 0:06:38 | |
The Iraqi army disbanded itself. | 0:06:38 | 0:06:40 | |
It stopped fighting, it left, it disappeared into its villagers | 0:06:40 | 0:06:46 | |
and took their weapons with them. | 0:06:46 | 0:06:49 | |
And now the task - I think Mr Allawi is exactly correct - | 0:06:49 | 0:06:53 | |
is to try to keep recruiting those people back. | 0:06:53 | 0:06:56 | |
We've already recruited back some 206,000 Iraqis | 0:06:56 | 0:07:00 | |
into the security forces - | 0:07:00 | 0:07:01 | |
the police, the army, the Civil Defence Corps, | 0:07:01 | 0:07:04 | |
site protection and border patrol. | 0:07:04 | 0:07:06 | |
And his goal is to increase that number above the current 206,000 | 0:07:06 | 0:07:10 | |
by some significant margin, and I think that's a good thing. | 0:07:10 | 0:07:15 | |
But do you think... | 0:07:15 | 0:07:16 | |
I mean, Tony Blair was saying here on the programme | 0:07:16 | 0:07:19 | |
that he was hoping very much that the number of British troops in Iraq | 0:07:19 | 0:07:23 | |
by the end of next year would be greatly reduced. | 0:07:23 | 0:07:27 | |
And the President, on the other hand, | 0:07:27 | 0:07:29 | |
said you're there for as long as it takes. | 0:07:29 | 0:07:31 | |
But it actually is possible, isn't it, that you will need | 0:07:31 | 0:07:34 | |
in this current crisis of the handover | 0:07:34 | 0:07:36 | |
maybe to increase the number of troops? | 0:07:36 | 0:07:38 | |
There are reports that your nominee for the next commander | 0:07:38 | 0:07:41 | |
wants 25,000 more troops. | 0:07:41 | 0:07:43 | |
Is it possible in the short term you'll have to put in more troops? | 0:07:43 | 0:07:46 | |
Well, what the new commander, General Casey, | 0:07:48 | 0:07:52 | |
said in his confirmation hearing was that if he needed more troops, | 0:07:52 | 0:07:57 | |
he would ask for them - number one. | 0:07:57 | 0:07:59 | |
Number two - that we were already doing the planning | 0:07:59 | 0:08:02 | |
in the event that that requirement became necessary. | 0:08:02 | 0:08:07 | |
And that's only prudent planning. | 0:08:07 | 0:08:09 | |
I initiated that some months ago - that we would take a look. | 0:08:09 | 0:08:12 | |
And I said to General Myers, | 0:08:12 | 0:08:14 | |
the Chairman of our Joint Chiefs of Staff, | 0:08:14 | 0:08:17 | |
"Get the work done now. In case General Abizaid or General Casey | 0:08:17 | 0:08:21 | |
"decide they need more troops, | 0:08:21 | 0:08:23 | |
"I need to know where we would get them, what they would look like | 0:08:23 | 0:08:26 | |
"and where they would be located, how they'd be deployed." | 0:08:26 | 0:08:29 | |
That does not mean we will need them, | 0:08:29 | 0:08:31 | |
it means that we're doing the prudent planning to need them. | 0:08:31 | 0:08:34 | |
Now, in answer to your other question, | 0:08:34 | 0:08:36 | |
we've actually gone from 113,000 troops up to 141,000 troops | 0:08:36 | 0:08:42 | |
over the past three or four months already, | 0:08:42 | 0:08:44 | |
so we've had a fairly significant increase. | 0:08:44 | 0:08:46 | |
Coming on for a moment to the awesome subject, really, | 0:08:48 | 0:08:52 | |
of the abuse of prisoners and so on. | 0:08:52 | 0:08:55 | |
The headlines about that, | 0:08:55 | 0:08:57 | |
probably in every country in the world, | 0:08:57 | 0:08:59 | |
have been there all this week, of course, | 0:08:59 | 0:09:01 | |
because of the administration's release of the documents | 0:09:01 | 0:09:04 | |
regarding prisoner abuse and so on. | 0:09:04 | 0:09:06 | |
And reading through them, Mr Secretary, | 0:09:06 | 0:09:09 | |
there's one that says about how in December 2002 | 0:09:09 | 0:09:12 | |
you approved a list of new interrogation techniques | 0:09:12 | 0:09:16 | |
to be used at Guantanamo Bay, which included dogs, nudity, | 0:09:16 | 0:09:21 | |
hooding of prisoners, fear of dogs, use of stress positions, | 0:09:21 | 0:09:25 | |
er, isolation for up to 30 days, 20-hour interrogations, | 0:09:25 | 0:09:29 | |
forced shaving and so on. | 0:09:29 | 0:09:31 | |
Now... | 0:09:31 | 0:09:32 | |
Instantly, one would say, that six weeks later you retracted that. | 0:09:32 | 0:09:36 | |
But what changed your mind? | 0:09:36 | 0:09:38 | |
Well, the sequence went like this. | 0:09:40 | 0:09:43 | |
I received a proposal | 0:09:43 | 0:09:44 | |
from the commander in charge of Guantanamo Bay | 0:09:44 | 0:09:48 | |
to permit a series of techniques to be used for interrogation. | 0:09:48 | 0:09:53 | |
They were checked with the lawyers, they were determined to be | 0:09:53 | 0:09:56 | |
within the President's order that the treatment be humane. | 0:09:56 | 0:10:00 | |
And I ended up looking at the list | 0:10:00 | 0:10:03 | |
and rejected a number of them | 0:10:03 | 0:10:06 | |
and accepted some and approved it. | 0:10:06 | 0:10:09 | |
Shortly after I approved it, in a matter of weeks, | 0:10:09 | 0:10:12 | |
there was some discussion that took place among some lawyers | 0:10:12 | 0:10:16 | |
that they were concerned about some of those techniques. | 0:10:16 | 0:10:19 | |
So I said, "Fine." | 0:10:19 | 0:10:20 | |
I orally discontinued the use of those techniques, | 0:10:20 | 0:10:24 | |
said, "Get the lawyers' group together. | 0:10:24 | 0:10:26 | |
"Let's have another discussion over this | 0:10:26 | 0:10:28 | |
"and come back and tell me what we think is the appropriate way, | 0:10:28 | 0:10:32 | |
"consistent with Geneva Conventions and consistent with humane treatment, | 0:10:32 | 0:10:36 | |
"that they ought to be treated." | 0:10:36 | 0:10:38 | |
So, that first tranche of techniques | 0:10:38 | 0:10:41 | |
were in place, I believe, for a matter or five or six weeks | 0:10:41 | 0:10:45 | |
and then they were discontinued, | 0:10:45 | 0:10:47 | |
and about a month later we issued a new order | 0:10:47 | 0:10:51 | |
indicating what the procedures and techniques would be permitted. | 0:10:51 | 0:10:56 | |
You asked how it happened. | 0:10:56 | 0:10:58 | |
It happened because there was a single detainee | 0:10:58 | 0:11:02 | |
that was being interrogated - | 0:11:02 | 0:11:05 | |
his name was Qahtani, al-Qahtani - | 0:11:05 | 0:11:08 | |
who was considered to be the 20th hijacker | 0:11:08 | 0:11:11 | |
in connection with the 9/11 attack on the United States, | 0:11:11 | 0:11:16 | |
where 3,000 people were killed - | 0:11:16 | 0:11:18 | |
men, women and children from dozens of different countries. | 0:11:18 | 0:11:22 | |
And he was not being cooperative | 0:11:22 | 0:11:24 | |
and the request came up in connection with that person. | 0:11:24 | 0:11:29 | |
The techniques that you described were not used, I'm told, | 0:11:30 | 0:11:34 | |
on anyone other than Qahtani. | 0:11:34 | 0:11:37 | |
We may find out that's not correct at some point in the future, | 0:11:37 | 0:11:41 | |
but at least my information thus far is that that's the case. | 0:11:41 | 0:11:46 | |
And that's kind of the background for that. | 0:11:46 | 0:11:49 | |
This was a very bad person, a person who clearly had information | 0:11:49 | 0:11:53 | |
about attacks against the United States, | 0:11:53 | 0:11:55 | |
and the techniques had all been approved by the legal community | 0:11:55 | 0:12:01 | |
and the Joint Staff and in the Department of Defense | 0:12:01 | 0:12:05 | |
and at the Combatant Command. | 0:12:05 | 0:12:08 | |
And it was after some concern came up | 0:12:08 | 0:12:11 | |
that we decided to rescind them and relook at them. | 0:12:11 | 0:12:14 | |
And... But, of course you're very close to these things, | 0:12:14 | 0:12:17 | |
but when one reads things in these documents about lawyers | 0:12:17 | 0:12:22 | |
in the Justice Department or other departments | 0:12:22 | 0:12:24 | |
coming up with judgements like, | 0:12:24 | 0:12:26 | |
"Certain acts may be cruel, inhuman or degrading, | 0:12:26 | 0:12:29 | |
"but still not produce pain and suffering | 0:12:29 | 0:12:31 | |
"within the requisite intensity | 0:12:31 | 0:12:33 | |
"to fall within the law's proscription against torture." | 0:12:33 | 0:12:37 | |
You can probably understand that's shocking, | 0:12:37 | 0:12:40 | |
to think of people trying to widen the definition | 0:12:40 | 0:12:43 | |
of what they can do that isn't torture. | 0:12:43 | 0:12:46 | |
It just seems bizarre. Or worse. | 0:12:46 | 0:12:50 | |
It... It... Well, it seems like | 0:12:50 | 0:12:52 | |
a bunch of lawyers debating legal points. | 0:12:52 | 0:12:56 | |
In fact, that set of debates took place | 0:12:56 | 0:12:59 | |
not in the Department of Defense, as I recall, | 0:12:59 | 0:13:02 | |
- but in the Department of Justice... - Right. | 0:13:02 | 0:13:05 | |
..and didn't really have any bearing on the procedures | 0:13:05 | 0:13:09 | |
and techniques that ended up being used by the Department of Defense. | 0:13:09 | 0:13:14 | |
And in terms of the famous Major General Miller, | 0:13:15 | 0:13:19 | |
the hard man of Guantanamo, who was sent to improve the record, | 0:13:19 | 0:13:25 | |
or the flow of information, on his first trip just for a few days, | 0:13:25 | 0:13:29 | |
people say that in those few days he affected the whole climate, | 0:13:29 | 0:13:33 | |
that he sent lists of what he did in Guantanamo | 0:13:33 | 0:13:36 | |
to battalion commanders and so on, and your Brigadier General, | 0:13:36 | 0:13:42 | |
or then Brigadier General, Janis Karpinski, | 0:13:42 | 0:13:44 | |
said that Major General Miller insisted | 0:13:44 | 0:13:46 | |
that prisoners should be treated like dogs. | 0:13:46 | 0:13:49 | |
Now the FT say this, and I don't know... This is the FT, | 0:13:49 | 0:13:54 | |
the Financial Times, said, "One fact remains undisputed. | 0:13:54 | 0:13:57 | |
"Less than two months after his departure from Iraq, | 0:13:57 | 0:14:00 | |
"the first of the shocking photographs were taken. | 0:14:00 | 0:14:02 | |
"Whether one event helped cause the other is the question that | 0:14:02 | 0:14:06 | |
"could decide the fate of an administration." | 0:14:06 | 0:14:09 | |
Well, I've not seen the article you are referring to. | 0:14:11 | 0:14:14 | |
I think the reality is that the administration | 0:14:14 | 0:14:18 | |
has seen those photographs, | 0:14:18 | 0:14:20 | |
the photographs were released by the government | 0:14:20 | 0:14:23 | |
of the United States, by the military in Baghdad. | 0:14:23 | 0:14:25 | |
They weren't found by the press, there was | 0:14:25 | 0:14:27 | |
no investigative reporting or anything, discovering anything. | 0:14:27 | 0:14:32 | |
The minute it was determined that those photographs existed, | 0:14:32 | 0:14:34 | |
the military went out to the press | 0:14:34 | 0:14:37 | |
and said there are allegations of abuse and there's an investigation. | 0:14:37 | 0:14:40 | |
Within a short period of time, they announced that there | 0:14:40 | 0:14:43 | |
are criminal prosecutions under way with respect to those photographs. | 0:14:43 | 0:14:47 | |
Every thing we know, thus far, | 0:14:47 | 0:14:50 | |
suggests that the...what was taking place in the photographs was abuse. | 0:14:50 | 0:14:56 | |
We have not yet determined in any connection at all | 0:14:56 | 0:14:59 | |
between that abuse and an interrogation process. | 0:14:59 | 0:15:03 | |
Indeed, the majority of the people in those pictures | 0:15:03 | 0:15:07 | |
engaged in that abuse | 0:15:07 | 0:15:09 | |
were individuals who were not even security detainees - | 0:15:09 | 0:15:13 | |
that is to say they were not people | 0:15:13 | 0:15:15 | |
that were even being interrogated, for the most part. | 0:15:15 | 0:15:19 | |
Some may very well have been being interrogated, | 0:15:19 | 0:15:23 | |
but not necessarily in those photographs. | 0:15:23 | 0:15:25 | |
They may have been detainees that people wanted information from, | 0:15:25 | 0:15:29 | |
but those activities, I think, it would be | 0:15:29 | 0:15:33 | |
a mistake to suggest, er, represented interrogation techniques. | 0:15:33 | 0:15:39 | |
Now, we're going to know as the trials proceed precisely what | 0:15:39 | 0:15:44 | |
happened and I'm in an awkward position because I'm not allowed to | 0:15:44 | 0:15:48 | |
talk about these things for fear of being accused of command influence. | 0:15:48 | 0:15:52 | |
What one can say is that the acts depicted | 0:15:52 | 0:15:55 | |
in the pictures were abusive. | 0:15:55 | 0:15:57 | |
We now have to complete the investigations to determine | 0:15:57 | 0:16:02 | |
exactly how they occurred, why they occurred, | 0:16:02 | 0:16:05 | |
and to see that the individuals engaged in them receive a punishment | 0:16:05 | 0:16:11 | |
that's appropriate with whatever may have been done that was incorrect. | 0:16:11 | 0:16:15 | |
Well, we've mentioned Guantanamo | 0:16:15 | 0:16:18 | |
and moving on to, in fact, | 0:16:18 | 0:16:19 | |
this week, Mr Secretary, | 0:16:19 | 0:16:21 | |
on Guantanamo that, as you will have read, | 0:16:21 | 0:16:24 | |
Lord Goldsmith, who's the Attorney General here, said that | 0:16:24 | 0:16:27 | |
that there are certain principles which there can be no compromise, | 0:16:27 | 0:16:32 | |
a fair trial is one of those, | 0:16:32 | 0:16:34 | |
and the reason why we in the UK have been unable to accept that | 0:16:34 | 0:16:37 | |
the US military terms proposed for those at Guantanamo Bay | 0:16:37 | 0:16:41 | |
offer sufficient guarantee of a fair trial and so on. | 0:16:41 | 0:16:44 | |
What's your response to that? | 0:16:44 | 0:16:45 | |
Well, I'm not a lawyer and I'm familiar with his views | 0:16:47 | 0:16:50 | |
and, of course, there are other views by other individuals | 0:16:50 | 0:16:54 | |
who are considered to be fine attorneys. | 0:16:54 | 0:16:56 | |
The circumstance at the present time | 0:16:58 | 0:17:00 | |
is there is a process in Guantanamo Bay to review the detainees. | 0:17:00 | 0:17:06 | |
They currently have still, I believe, about 595. | 0:17:06 | 0:17:10 | |
Some 150 to 200 have already been released - | 0:17:10 | 0:17:13 | |
some have been released to the UK, I think four or five. | 0:17:13 | 0:17:17 | |
Er, there is an annual review process where each individual | 0:17:17 | 0:17:21 | |
is reviewed to determine whether or not | 0:17:21 | 0:17:24 | |
their continued detention is appropriate. | 0:17:24 | 0:17:28 | |
The... If you think about it, in every war, | 0:17:28 | 0:17:32 | |
people who have been captured have been captured for various reasons. | 0:17:32 | 0:17:37 | |
One reason might be to try them for having done something wrong. | 0:17:37 | 0:17:42 | |
Another reason might be to interrogate them | 0:17:44 | 0:17:47 | |
to see what one can learn that could save additional lives. | 0:17:47 | 0:17:51 | |
And a third reason is to keep them | 0:17:51 | 0:17:53 | |
off the battlefield during the continuation of the conflict, | 0:17:53 | 0:17:57 | |
even though you may not learn any information more from them | 0:17:57 | 0:18:02 | |
and even though you may not end up trying them. | 0:18:02 | 0:18:04 | |
You simply don't want them going back on the battlefield | 0:18:04 | 0:18:08 | |
and killing more of your people. | 0:18:08 | 0:18:10 | |
We've let loose thousands and thousands of people | 0:18:10 | 0:18:14 | |
that have been captured. | 0:18:14 | 0:18:15 | |
It's the case, I think, that a few weeks ago the Prime Minister | 0:18:15 | 0:18:20 | |
asked whether the four Brits out there could be sent back to Britain | 0:18:20 | 0:18:26 | |
and then another suggestion was | 0:18:26 | 0:18:28 | |
could they be tried under American trial rules in America, | 0:18:28 | 0:18:32 | |
but is that now no longer negotiable? | 0:18:32 | 0:18:35 | |
I mean, they are going to be tried in Guantanamo or is it still negotiable? | 0:18:35 | 0:18:41 | |
I just don't know. | 0:18:43 | 0:18:44 | |
My recollection is that there were nine Brits involved | 0:18:44 | 0:18:47 | |
and four or five have already been released... | 0:18:47 | 0:18:49 | |
- That's right. - ..back to the UK, | 0:18:49 | 0:18:51 | |
and that there are four or five left | 0:18:51 | 0:18:54 | |
and what ultimately will be done, | 0:18:54 | 0:18:56 | |
whether they'll be tried in a military commission or eventually | 0:18:56 | 0:19:01 | |
returned to the UK for their handling, I just don't know. | 0:19:01 | 0:19:05 | |
That's all being dealt with... I don't make those decisions. | 0:19:05 | 0:19:08 | |
It's been dealt with in an orderly process. | 0:19:08 | 0:19:11 | |
Well, I guess the Prime Minister and the President can sort it out | 0:19:11 | 0:19:14 | |
- over the soup today or something. - Exactly. | 0:19:14 | 0:19:18 | |
What about Iran, Mr Secretary? | 0:19:18 | 0:19:20 | |
I would have asked you about this anyway | 0:19:20 | 0:19:23 | |
but we had that announcement on Friday that they are resuming | 0:19:23 | 0:19:27 | |
their nuclear programme, at least for the centrifuges and so on. | 0:19:27 | 0:19:30 | |
- That's a bad sign, isn't it? - Well, it is. | 0:19:30 | 0:19:35 | |
You have a country that's ruled by a handful of clerics | 0:19:35 | 0:19:40 | |
that is repressing the Iranian people, | 0:19:40 | 0:19:43 | |
that is causing harm in Afghanistan, | 0:19:43 | 0:19:47 | |
causing harm in Iraq, is actively working with Hezbollah | 0:19:47 | 0:19:52 | |
and Syria to spread terrorism down through Lebanon into Israel. | 0:19:52 | 0:19:58 | |
Er, it's a government that has been not telling the truth | 0:19:58 | 0:20:04 | |
about its role in its nuclear development. It's a country | 0:20:04 | 0:20:09 | |
that has been harbouring senior al-Qaeda leadership for some time, | 0:20:09 | 0:20:15 | |
and most recently we've seen them resisting the UN process | 0:20:15 | 0:20:20 | |
that they previously seemed to have agreed to, | 0:20:20 | 0:20:24 | |
but are obviously not adhering to. | 0:20:24 | 0:20:27 | |
Are we winning the battle with al-Qaeda? I mean, we see the... | 0:20:27 | 0:20:31 | |
How much of what you were saying earlier about the two forces | 0:20:31 | 0:20:34 | |
that are causing death in Iraq, do you think we are winning | 0:20:34 | 0:20:37 | |
the battle or is it a draw at the moment, a tie? | 0:20:37 | 0:20:42 | |
Well, in Iraq, I think | 0:20:44 | 0:20:46 | |
that, over time, we'll see that despite the difficulties, | 0:20:46 | 0:20:49 | |
despite the deaths and despite the problems that we see, | 0:20:49 | 0:20:54 | |
that the Iraqi people will end up recapturing their country | 0:20:54 | 0:20:59 | |
and fashioning an approach to government that will be | 0:20:59 | 0:21:03 | |
a peaceful one for its neighbours | 0:21:03 | 0:21:05 | |
and ultimately provide much greater prosperity for the region. | 0:21:05 | 0:21:09 | |
Separate out the global war on terror, | 0:21:11 | 0:21:14 | |
or the struggle that's taking place between extremists and radicals | 0:21:14 | 0:21:19 | |
against moderates, both within that religion | 0:21:19 | 0:21:23 | |
and out of that religion... Answering the question | 0:21:23 | 0:21:26 | |
as to whether we're winning that is a very difficult one. | 0:21:26 | 0:21:30 | |
I wrote a memorandum that ended up, leaking its...finding its way | 0:21:30 | 0:21:36 | |
into the newspaper unintentionally where I described it as, | 0:21:36 | 0:21:39 | |
"It'll be a long, hard slog" and the reason I say that is | 0:21:39 | 0:21:42 | |
because we're being very successful, with a 90-nation coalition, | 0:21:42 | 0:21:46 | |
we're being very successful in exchanging intelligence information, | 0:21:46 | 0:21:50 | |
in freezing bank accounts, in capturing and killing | 0:21:50 | 0:21:54 | |
senior members of these organisations. | 0:21:54 | 0:21:57 | |
On the other hand, we don't have a good visibility | 0:21:57 | 0:22:00 | |
into how many new recruits are coming in, the intake, | 0:22:00 | 0:22:04 | |
and going to these radical madrasah schools | 0:22:04 | 0:22:07 | |
and learning how to go out and kill people and being encouraged | 0:22:07 | 0:22:12 | |
and equipped and trained and deployed to do those suicide missions. | 0:22:12 | 0:22:17 | |
We don't know that and unless one knows that, you can't answer | 0:22:17 | 0:22:21 | |
the question, "Are you winning or losing?" | 0:22:21 | 0:22:24 | |
I think the struggle is not so much a global war on terror. | 0:22:24 | 0:22:29 | |
Terror is really the weapon of choice, | 0:22:29 | 0:22:32 | |
it's the technique they're using - | 0:22:32 | 0:22:34 | |
what the struggle really is... It's a... | 0:22:34 | 0:22:37 | |
almost a global insurgency | 0:22:37 | 0:22:40 | |
by a very small number of extremists and radicals | 0:22:40 | 0:22:44 | |
that are determined to attack the state system - | 0:22:44 | 0:22:47 | |
countries, civilised societies, in an attempt to terrorise them | 0:22:47 | 0:22:52 | |
and intimidate them and alter their behaviour. | 0:22:52 | 0:22:55 | |
And one final question, just briefly, Mr Secretary, | 0:22:55 | 0:23:00 | |
if President Bush wins the election | 0:23:00 | 0:23:02 | |
and invites you to return to the Pentagon, would you do a second term? | 0:23:02 | 0:23:07 | |
I'm already doing my second term, David. | 0:23:09 | 0:23:12 | |
Oh, yes, you were | 0:23:12 | 0:23:13 | |
- the 13th Defense Secretary as well. - That's right. | 0:23:13 | 0:23:17 | |
As Adlai Stevenson said, "I'll jump off that bridge | 0:23:17 | 0:23:20 | |
"when I get to it." FROST LAUGHS | 0:23:20 | 0:23:23 | |
Well, thank you very much for joining us today | 0:23:23 | 0:23:25 | |
for a wide-ranging discussion and we hope to do it again soon. | 0:23:25 | 0:23:29 | |
I look forward to it. | 0:23:30 | 0:23:31 | |
- Thank you very much. - Thank you. | 0:23:31 | 0:23:33 |