Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Live At Daybreak

Bush Has Lot of Ground to Cover Before He Gets to Summit

Aired May 30, 2003 - 05:09   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: President Bush has a lot of ground to cover before he gets to that Mideast summit. In just a couple of hours the president leaves on a seven day, six nation trip. His first visits, Poland and Russia. Then it's on to France for the G8 summit and finally Middle East peace takes focus. The president will have a meeting with Arab leaders in Egypt and the Palestinian-Israeli summit in Jordan.
The trip wraps up in Qatar, where the president will get an update on Iraqi reconstruction.

And there's much more riding on this president's visit to France than just the G8 summit.

CNN's White House correspondent Chris Burns now on a turning point in the tangled spaghetti that is the U.S.-French relations.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRIS BURNS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): U.S.-French relations have hit their lowest point in decades. Beyond the boycotts and the wisecracks...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All running around with Germany and Belgium acting like you too fine for NATO. France, what's up?

BURNS: Observers fear long-term damage to the Atlantic alliance, even global stability unless tensions subside between the White House and President Jacques Chirac, as well as German Chancellor Gerhardt Schroeder, two leaders who drew strong support at home as peaceniks.

The upcoming G8 summit could be decisive, the first face to face between President Bush and the two leaders since the war. Will they at least share a bottle of Evian?

PHIL GORDON, BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: We are at a turning point in the direction these relations go. But it's much more important in a symbolic sense. Is the president of the United States willing to go there, interested in going there and saying let's put this behind us?

BURNS: Washington has taken some steps to punish France and isolate Germany. Though contacts continue at the ministerial level, Mr. Bush has given Mr. Chirac and Mr. Schroeder a cold, or at least businesslike shoulder. The Pentagon is scaling back U.S. presence at the coming Paris Air Show. Official sources say neo-conservatives in the government no longer consider France an ally.

But there are some positive signs.

COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: You know, the United States and France, we've been in marriage counseling for 225 years. But guess what? The marriage is there.

JEAN-DAVID LEVITTE, FRENCH AMBASSADOR TO THE U.S.: We should turn the bitter page of the past few weeks and look to the future together.

BURNS: Trying to block Gulf War 2 and then sitting it out were only the latest French slaps at Washington. In the '60s, President Charles DeGaulle kicked NATO headquarters out of France, rejecting U.S.-led NATO control of his nuclear arsenal. The French criticized the Vietnam War, after losing it themselves. In 1986, the French and other Europeans rejected U.S. over flights to bomb Libya in retaliation for a terror bombing at a Berlin disco that killed two U.S. soldiers.

But Paris did side with Washington in other crunch times. It backed Gulf War 1, even sent troops. It backed U.S. nuclear missiles in Europe during the cold war. It's cooperating in the Balkans, as well as Afghanistan. After September 11, President Chirac said, "We are all Americans."

Despite U.S. moves to punish the French, a senior Bush administration official says the White House is thinking of common goals. France agrees.

LEVITTE: The war is over. Now let's look at the broad spectrum of the areas in which we cooperate in the best way, the fight against terrorists, number one.

BURNS: Many believe the U.S. and Europe have too much to lose from economic retaliation, with millions of jobs dependent on a billion dollars of cross Atlantic trade daily. But emotions run deep. Americans grumble the French aren't grateful for being saved in two world wars. The French say what about their help during the American Revolution?

(on camera): Help from General Hoshon Bulles (ph), the Marquis de Lafayette and the German General Von Steuben, all who still stand proudly in this park named after Lafayette and across from the White House, perhaps offering hope that despite Freedom Fries, Freedom Toast and lingering bitterness, there's still a chance for rapprochement and not schadenfreude.

Chris Burns, CNN, the White House.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Maybe so.

You can check out President Bush's itinerary on our Web site and find an interactive map on his travel plans. Our address, cnn.com, AOL keyword: CNN.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired May 30, 2003 - 05:09   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: President Bush has a lot of ground to cover before he gets to that Mideast summit. In just a couple of hours the president leaves on a seven day, six nation trip. His first visits, Poland and Russia. Then it's on to France for the G8 summit and finally Middle East peace takes focus. The president will have a meeting with Arab leaders in Egypt and the Palestinian-Israeli summit in Jordan.
The trip wraps up in Qatar, where the president will get an update on Iraqi reconstruction.

And there's much more riding on this president's visit to France than just the G8 summit.

CNN's White House correspondent Chris Burns now on a turning point in the tangled spaghetti that is the U.S.-French relations.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRIS BURNS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): U.S.-French relations have hit their lowest point in decades. Beyond the boycotts and the wisecracks...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All running around with Germany and Belgium acting like you too fine for NATO. France, what's up?

BURNS: Observers fear long-term damage to the Atlantic alliance, even global stability unless tensions subside between the White House and President Jacques Chirac, as well as German Chancellor Gerhardt Schroeder, two leaders who drew strong support at home as peaceniks.

The upcoming G8 summit could be decisive, the first face to face between President Bush and the two leaders since the war. Will they at least share a bottle of Evian?

PHIL GORDON, BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: We are at a turning point in the direction these relations go. But it's much more important in a symbolic sense. Is the president of the United States willing to go there, interested in going there and saying let's put this behind us?

BURNS: Washington has taken some steps to punish France and isolate Germany. Though contacts continue at the ministerial level, Mr. Bush has given Mr. Chirac and Mr. Schroeder a cold, or at least businesslike shoulder. The Pentagon is scaling back U.S. presence at the coming Paris Air Show. Official sources say neo-conservatives in the government no longer consider France an ally.

But there are some positive signs.

COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: You know, the United States and France, we've been in marriage counseling for 225 years. But guess what? The marriage is there.

JEAN-DAVID LEVITTE, FRENCH AMBASSADOR TO THE U.S.: We should turn the bitter page of the past few weeks and look to the future together.

BURNS: Trying to block Gulf War 2 and then sitting it out were only the latest French slaps at Washington. In the '60s, President Charles DeGaulle kicked NATO headquarters out of France, rejecting U.S.-led NATO control of his nuclear arsenal. The French criticized the Vietnam War, after losing it themselves. In 1986, the French and other Europeans rejected U.S. over flights to bomb Libya in retaliation for a terror bombing at a Berlin disco that killed two U.S. soldiers.

But Paris did side with Washington in other crunch times. It backed Gulf War 1, even sent troops. It backed U.S. nuclear missiles in Europe during the cold war. It's cooperating in the Balkans, as well as Afghanistan. After September 11, President Chirac said, "We are all Americans."

Despite U.S. moves to punish the French, a senior Bush administration official says the White House is thinking of common goals. France agrees.

LEVITTE: The war is over. Now let's look at the broad spectrum of the areas in which we cooperate in the best way, the fight against terrorists, number one.

BURNS: Many believe the U.S. and Europe have too much to lose from economic retaliation, with millions of jobs dependent on a billion dollars of cross Atlantic trade daily. But emotions run deep. Americans grumble the French aren't grateful for being saved in two world wars. The French say what about their help during the American Revolution?

(on camera): Help from General Hoshon Bulles (ph), the Marquis de Lafayette and the German General Von Steuben, all who still stand proudly in this park named after Lafayette and across from the White House, perhaps offering hope that despite Freedom Fries, Freedom Toast and lingering bitterness, there's still a chance for rapprochement and not schadenfreude.

Chris Burns, CNN, the White House.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Maybe so.

You can check out President Bush's itinerary on our Web site and find an interactive map on his travel plans. Our address, cnn.com, AOL keyword: CNN.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com