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CNN Live At Daybreak
What President Bush Accomplished at APEC Summit
Aired October 21, 2003 - 05:30 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: We are awaiting President Bush's arrival in Singapore this morning. He was able to push security issues at the Asia-Pacific economic summit in Thailand. The meeting typically focuses on trade, but the president used a series of meetings to lobby Asian leaders for money and troops in Iraq. He also pressed them for support in efforts to convince North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons program.
We want to get some more perspective on what President Bush accomplished at the APEC summit.
And for that we turn to David Leheny, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin. He's also worked at the State Department in counter-terrorism.
And he joins us live on the phone from Tokyo, where he is studying.
Good morning.
PROF. DAVID LEHENY, POLITICAL SCIENCE, UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN: Thanks.
Good morning.
It's nice to be here.
COSTELLO: It's nice to have you, believe me.
How would you rate the president's efforts on this trip?
LEHENY: Well, I think he went maybe two for five, which in baseball terms isn't a bad batting average. He managed to focus attention on North Korea and also showed some surprising flexibility, which I think was good. He also managed to get some limited financial support from, especially from Japan, for the Iraqi reconstruction effort.
But he didn't do so well in trying to deal with currency rate questions. And I think he was also on fairly shaky ground when dealing with terrorism in East and Southeast Asia. But...
COSTELLO: Yes, let's talk about his --
LEHENY: ... you know, not so bad.
COSTELLO: I just wanted to talk a little bit more about America's agenda. Its agenda at this summit is fighting terrorism. APEC's agenda is economic. And it did seem, as you said, that America dominated what was talked about.
Would that be harmful to relations in the end?
LEHENY: I'm not sure. APEC is a pretty strange organization in that they meet every once in a -- they meet every year and it's largely a talk shop. They try to make decisions based on consensus. So critics often say that nothing really gets accomplished there.
I look at it differently. I think their just talking about issues and raising them at least helps the country see what others are up to and tries to -- and it also helps to instill some transparency.
So I think that by bringing up the security issues, putting them on the table and at least getting people to acknowledge them, it's probably the best way for him to go at this time.
COSTELLO: You know, North Korea was certainly the specter throughout this whole thing. Supposedly some sort of written agreement that the U.S. won't attack the country is now in the works.
Will North Korea bite?
LEHENY: My guess is that it's going to be a bit of a dog fight. The question is going to be over how much the United States is willing to give on that written statement versus how verifiable the North Koreans are going to allow an inspection regime to be. The United States doesn't want to go too far in saying we won't attack, because that would undermine the president's other foreign policy priorities and would also look like the U.S. is caving into North Korean pressure.
By the same token, the North Korean government might be willing to give a little bit on that, as long as they can control a bit which inspectors come into North Korea and under what circumstances.
But it's going to be a negotiation. It's going to be a tough fight.
COSTELLO: Well, you know, North Korea fired a test missile after this agreement was announced.
LEHENY: Yes, that was pretty weird.
COSTELLO: It was. Was it a big deal?
LEHENY: It's a little bit hard to know. I mean we North Korea we're never quite sure what the goal of a given attack might be. In this case, some people are speculating that they just wanted to remind the participants of the APEC conference that North Korea is still there, as if people had forgotten.
But I suspect that this decision might have been made before the conference and it might have been made at a time that North Korea wasn't sure if America was going to take conciliatory steps. So I almost wonder if the firing of the missile was a bit of a mistake, that they planned this before they knew how far America was willing to go in terms of a compromise.
They may have actually done themselves a lot more harm than good in that, but it's just hard to know.
COSTELLO: Yes, it's hard to know anything that comes out of North Korea.
LEHENY: Yes.
COSTELLO: You know, the Asian countries that make up APEC are so different from one another. Is this a problem for the United States?
LEHENY: Well, it's not a problem for the United States any more than it is for any other country. It's just that with regard to the United States, I think there's not nearly enough attention paid in the U.S. and in the U.S. government to how its actions around the world affect the Asian region. I mean right now the war with Iraq, which came up only a little bit in the discussions, has been a huge topic of conversation in Asia, not just because Japan and North Korea are sending assistance, but also because of the majority Muslim populations of Malaysia and Indonesia, where the war is extremely unpopular.
This is the sort of thing that I think the White House has to think about a little bit more before it sends President Bush off on one of these trips.
But, again, I think that given the difficulty of this particular situation, he ended up doing OK.
COSTELLO: One last question for you, since you're living in Tokyo now. We always consider Japan our friends. How is the United States and President Bush perceived there?
LEHENY: Well, Japan is still our friend. I mean we're still very strong allies. But I don't want to be melodramatic and I don't want to overstate the case, but President Bush is certainly the least popular president that I've seen in the time that I've been involved with Japan, which goes back about 15, 16 years. People see him, the liberals see him as a bit of a warmonger and the conservatives feel that he's been ungrateful to Japan for its support and that the United States has not paid enough attention to Japanese requests with regard to North Korea and some of Japan's other concerns.
COSTELLO: Interesting.
Thank you so much for joining us this morning and giving us some perspective on the situation.
It really helped.
David Leheny from the University of Wisconsin, joining us live on the phone from Tokyo this morning.
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 October 21, 2003 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: We are awaiting President Bush's arrival in Singapore this morning. He was able to push security issues at the Asia-Pacific economic summit in Thailand. The meeting typically focuses on trade, but the president used a series of meetings to lobby Asian leaders for money and troops in Iraq. He also pressed them for support in efforts to convince North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons program.
We want to get some more perspective on what President Bush accomplished at the APEC summit.
And for that we turn to David Leheny, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin. He's also worked at the State Department in counter-terrorism.
And he joins us live on the phone from Tokyo, where he is studying.
Good morning.
PROF. DAVID LEHENY, POLITICAL SCIENCE, UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN: Thanks.
Good morning.
It's nice to be here.
COSTELLO: It's nice to have you, believe me.
How would you rate the president's efforts on this trip?
LEHENY: Well, I think he went maybe two for five, which in baseball terms isn't a bad batting average. He managed to focus attention on North Korea and also showed some surprising flexibility, which I think was good. He also managed to get some limited financial support from, especially from Japan, for the Iraqi reconstruction effort.
But he didn't do so well in trying to deal with currency rate questions. And I think he was also on fairly shaky ground when dealing with terrorism in East and Southeast Asia. But...
COSTELLO: Yes, let's talk about his --
LEHENY: ... you know, not so bad.
COSTELLO: I just wanted to talk a little bit more about America's agenda. Its agenda at this summit is fighting terrorism. APEC's agenda is economic. And it did seem, as you said, that America dominated what was talked about.
Would that be harmful to relations in the end?
LEHENY: I'm not sure. APEC is a pretty strange organization in that they meet every once in a -- they meet every year and it's largely a talk shop. They try to make decisions based on consensus. So critics often say that nothing really gets accomplished there.
I look at it differently. I think their just talking about issues and raising them at least helps the country see what others are up to and tries to -- and it also helps to instill some transparency.
So I think that by bringing up the security issues, putting them on the table and at least getting people to acknowledge them, it's probably the best way for him to go at this time.
COSTELLO: You know, North Korea was certainly the specter throughout this whole thing. Supposedly some sort of written agreement that the U.S. won't attack the country is now in the works.
Will North Korea bite?
LEHENY: My guess is that it's going to be a bit of a dog fight. The question is going to be over how much the United States is willing to give on that written statement versus how verifiable the North Koreans are going to allow an inspection regime to be. The United States doesn't want to go too far in saying we won't attack, because that would undermine the president's other foreign policy priorities and would also look like the U.S. is caving into North Korean pressure.
By the same token, the North Korean government might be willing to give a little bit on that, as long as they can control a bit which inspectors come into North Korea and under what circumstances.
But it's going to be a negotiation. It's going to be a tough fight.
COSTELLO: Well, you know, North Korea fired a test missile after this agreement was announced.
LEHENY: Yes, that was pretty weird.
COSTELLO: It was. Was it a big deal?
LEHENY: It's a little bit hard to know. I mean we North Korea we're never quite sure what the goal of a given attack might be. In this case, some people are speculating that they just wanted to remind the participants of the APEC conference that North Korea is still there, as if people had forgotten.
But I suspect that this decision might have been made before the conference and it might have been made at a time that North Korea wasn't sure if America was going to take conciliatory steps. So I almost wonder if the firing of the missile was a bit of a mistake, that they planned this before they knew how far America was willing to go in terms of a compromise.
They may have actually done themselves a lot more harm than good in that, but it's just hard to know.
COSTELLO: Yes, it's hard to know anything that comes out of North Korea.
LEHENY: Yes.
COSTELLO: You know, the Asian countries that make up APEC are so different from one another. Is this a problem for the United States?
LEHENY: Well, it's not a problem for the United States any more than it is for any other country. It's just that with regard to the United States, I think there's not nearly enough attention paid in the U.S. and in the U.S. government to how its actions around the world affect the Asian region. I mean right now the war with Iraq, which came up only a little bit in the discussions, has been a huge topic of conversation in Asia, not just because Japan and North Korea are sending assistance, but also because of the majority Muslim populations of Malaysia and Indonesia, where the war is extremely unpopular.
This is the sort of thing that I think the White House has to think about a little bit more before it sends President Bush off on one of these trips.
But, again, I think that given the difficulty of this particular situation, he ended up doing OK.
COSTELLO: One last question for you, since you're living in Tokyo now. We always consider Japan our friends. How is the United States and President Bush perceived there?
LEHENY: Well, Japan is still our friend. I mean we're still very strong allies. But I don't want to be melodramatic and I don't want to overstate the case, but President Bush is certainly the least popular president that I've seen in the time that I've been involved with Japan, which goes back about 15, 16 years. People see him, the liberals see him as a bit of a warmonger and the conservatives feel that he's been ungrateful to Japan for its support and that the United States has not paid enough attention to Japanese requests with regard to North Korea and some of Japan's other concerns.
COSTELLO: Interesting.
Thank you so much for joining us this morning and giving us some perspective on the situation.
It really helped.
David Leheny from the University of Wisconsin, joining us live on the phone from Tokyo this morning.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
