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CNN Novak, Hunt & Shields

Congressman Hyde Discusses U.S.-China Standoff

Aired April 07, 2001 - 17:30   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.
ROBERT NOVAK, CO-HOST: I'm Robert Novak. Mark Shields and I will question the chairman of the House International Relations Committee.

MARK SHIELDS, CO-HOST: He is Republican Congressman Henry Hyde of Illinois.

In Beijing and Washington, U.S.-Chinese talks continue over the fate of 24 naval personnel and their surveillance aircraft held for a week by the Chinese.

After President Bush expressed regret about the incident that apparently cost a Chinese pilot his own life, the American side sounded optimistic on Friday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COLIN POWELL, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: I'm encouraged because there has been movement and because we are exchanging rather precise ideas as to how to bring this to a conclusion.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SHIELDS: But on Saturday, China insisted on an apology that the U.S. is unwilling to make.

The Chinese vice premier, in a letter to Secretary of State Colin Powell, said, quote, "Regrettably, the Untied States' statement on this incident so far is unacceptable to the Chinese side, and the Chinese have found it most dissatisfying," end quote.

Henry Hyde is in his first year heading the House International Relations Committee after six years as Judiciary Committee chairman. He has extensive experience in national security issues, and he formerly was the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee.

Chairman Henry Hyde, welcome.

And I want to ask you right at the beginning: Five days ago, you said this crisis with China will only come to an end with the immediate return of the U.S. crew and the return of all U.S. equipment. Here we are, five days later. When does a detainee become a hostage? REP. HENRY HYDE (R), ILLINOIS: Well, that's, of course, an interesting question. I would call them hostages. They are being held against their will, and five days is a rather long time, especially if you're the one being held in detention. So as time goes on, this situation will intensify, will get more difficult. And I should think the Chinese would be as anxious to bring it to finality as we are.

SHIELDS: Republicans pollster John McLaughlin said the following, and we'll put it up on the screen. He said, "Americans are not going to understand why their military jet hit an unarmed plane and why China is holding our crew and ripping the plane apart like a bunch of vandals in the South Bronx."

Isn't that a pretty candid but fair assessment of what's going on?

HYDE: Yes, it is. I think the aircraft is being examined, cannibalized in great detail, because it had a lot of sensitive communication and surveillance gear aboard. How much of that was jettisoned by the crew before it had to land, we really don't know. We hope most of it.

SHIELDS: OK. And finally, Chairman Hyde, how much time do we really have before this does cease to be just an event and become a true crisis?

HYDE: Well, I think if we get into the middle of next week and the personnel are still being held, the intensity of this and the danger escalates.

And I just hope the Chinese understand that by having our president and our secretary of state express regrets at the death of their pilot, that isn't a demonstration of weakness at all. Some think it is; I do not. I think it was the right thing to do. I think if you have the responsibility of 24 lives and trying to get them their freedom, you can be diplomatic.

But there will come a point where counter-pressure will have to be brought.

NOVAK: Mr. Chairman, a somewhat different view from the one you just expressed about expressing regret is taken in the issue of the Weekly Standard, which will go out to subscribers this weekend, a very prominent conservative publication.

And in an editorial by Robert Kagan and William Kristol, its publisher and editor, it says this, and we're going to put that on the screen: "President Bush has revealed weakness, and he has revealed fear -- fear of the political, strategic and economic consequences of meeting a Chinese challenge. Having exposed this weakness and fear, the Chinese will try to exploit it again and again, most likely in a future confrontation over Taiwan. The American capitulation will also embolden others around the world who have watched this crisis carefully to see the new administration's mettle tested."

Do you share in any part this conservative attack on the way President Bush has handled the incident?

HYDE: I do not. That editorial was faxed to me very graciously by the magazine ahead of time, so I have read it. I have the highest respect for Bill Kristol and Mr. Kagan, but I just don't agree with their perspective. I don't think expressing regret over the death of the Chinese pilot shows weakness; it shows humanity.

I think we have many ways to show that we're not weak. One of them is the weapons that we're going to provide Taiwan with in a couple of weeks. The Chinese are very sensitive about the caliber of those weapons. They don't want the Aegis system sold and other weapons. We can do that.

We can slow down the process whereby China wants to be admitted to the World Trade Organization. China wants the Olympic Games in 2008. There are resolutions in Congress now objecting to that. There are lots of things we can do if we are driven to do it.

I just think that China ought to calm down and end this. They don't seem to be getting the message, however.

NOVAK: But their leaders, sir, are demanding an apology saying regrets are not enough. Would you make an apology to the Chinese in order to get these -- you said the lives of these 24 Americans are precious. In order to get them back safe and sound, would you apologize?

HYDE: I would not. I think an apology implies responsibility and guilt.

I don't know why they're demanding we apologize. We ought to be demanding that they apologize for surveilling our planes and flying so closely to them. You've got a lot of space out there over the South China Sea. What is their aircraft doing so close to ours? We had a slow, lumbering, relatively unmaneuverable aircraft; they had a fighter plane.

No, I don't think we should give them an apology, and I would resist that.

NOVAK: You sound, sir, as though you're willing to abandon seven years of constructive engagement with China, which has had some good -- I don't mean seven years -- policy under seven presidents -- of constructive engagement with China, which has had some good results. Are you willing to abandon it over this incident and over refusal to say a single word?

HYDE: I'm not willing to abandon anything. I'm not sure what we've had. The balance of trade between China and ourselves is heavily in favor of China. China ought to consider that. China wants to trade with the United States. We don't get access to their markets. They are not cooperating on intellectual property issues. China needs us more than we need China.

And I think if we lower the rhetoric and don't pound the table, there ought to be a way out of this. But the Chinese have to use common sense, too, and right now I don't see much of that on their side.

SHIELDS: Mr. Hyde, you became a Republican some 40 years ago in large part because of the anti-communist posture and position of that party, which you thought the Democrats weren't as strong. Yet, the criticism of China in the Congress among your colleagues has essentially come from the left of the Democratic Party and the conservative side of the Republican Party -- Chris Smith, Frank Wolf, Nancy Pelosi.

And yet, they've told us time and again that this is an administration, or regime, that brutalizes its own people, that persecutes Catholics, that terrorizes its own neighbors and it sells nuclear weaponry to the worst elements on the face of the earth.

Should we be surprised? And isn't it time to really come face to face with the reality that we're dealing with a Stalinist regime in China?

HYDE: Well, I don't think we should have any illusions about the character of the Chinese government, but it's out there. It's the largest country in the world in terms of population, and it's a reality, and we have to deal with it.

Now, we can deal with it, at least attempt to deal with it, by engagement, by flooding the country with American marketeers and servicemen. That's what most-favored-nation status is supposed to be about. It's called engagement. I haven't seen an awful lot of results from that, and how long we should continue that is another question. But I'm not for heating up another Cold War that could well turn into a hot war.

But I think Americans have to realize China is not a strategic partner of ours; it's an adversary. And we ought to stop transferring high-tech equipment, duel-use technology to them and take a harder line. But I don't think we need to declare war or anything close to it.

NOVAK: We're going to have to take a break. And when we come back, we'll continue talking about the China stand-off with the United States with the top Republican foreign policy spokesman in the House of Representatives.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SHIELDS: Chairman Henry Hyde, there have been published reports that your fellow land-of-Lincoln Republican, Don Rumsfeld, secretary of defense, has objected rather strenuously inside the administration to what he sees as the passive approach, sort of the non- confrontational approach the White House and the State Department has carried on so far toward China. Your own reaction, from what you've said today, you seem to be a Rumsfeld kindred soul.

HYDE: Well, I'll tell you, you have to look at this from the perspective of the president and his administration. They have the responsibility, and it is a high responsibility, of getting our crewmen, 24 of them, free. And it's easy to pound the table and to raise the level of rhetoric if you don't really care how long our people are held over there or if they are going to be released.

I think how it's being handled is appropriate. Once our personnel are free, I think we can be a lot more candid about he brutality of what is going on by the Chinese. But let's get our people free; let's get them home.

I don't think we have to show weakness or backing down or apologize. But at the same time, I think we have to have an order of priority, and one ought to be to release our personnel.

SHIELDS: Mr. Hyde, you are one of the most respected and one of the most astute observers of the Congress. Tell us right now, do you think what has happened over the last week tilts the sale of U.S. arms to Taiwan in favor of those sales going forward?

HYDE: Very much so.

NOVAK: Now, let me follow that up, Mr. Chairman. We're talking about the Aegis destroyers to China. Are you saying that if the Chinese withdraw those -- if they return our personnel promptly, you would not sell the Aegis destroyers to Taiwan? Or that you would sell them to Taiwan rather they are cooperative or not in releasing the naval personnel?

HYDE: I think our responsibility under the Taiwan relations act is to provide Taiwan with adequate and appropriate assets to defend itself against a possible attack from mainland China. And that obligation persists whether or not our 24 crewmen get returned or not. I think that decision should be made independently of what's going on in Hainan right now.

NOVAK: Do you think the decision should be positive, as far as selling the destroyers to Taiwan?

HYDE: I do, but I would leave that to the technical people. I would leave that to Don Rumsfeld and others who know the state of play over there as to whether or not Taiwan needs these types of systems. There may be others less sensitive that are just as useful, given their present situation.

But we're obliged to do that, and I don't think what's going on in Hainan right now is very encouraging in terms of discouraging us from selling them the more sensitive equipment. I think there is an impact, but our obligation is there whether or not this incident occurred or not.

NOVAK: Mr. Chairman, because the Chinese failed to meet the requirements for entrance into the World Trade Organization, the question of permanent, normal trading relations with China will come up in the House of Representatives again, I believe, this year. You have supported that in the past. Would you again support it? Or because of this incident, would you oppose maintaining and continuing those relations with China?

HYDE: My inclination is to oppose it now. I have supported it in the past in the expectation that China would loosen its human rights abuses, would reduce them, and that things would improve. I don't see that happening at all. On the contrary, I see them exacerbated. Therefore, I would need some persuasive arguments to move me to support again most-favored-nation status for China.

SHIELDS: Mr. Chairman, do you think that is a view held by others on your side of the aisle?

HYDE: Well, I don't think the People's Republic of China is the most popular regime in the world and in Congress. I don't know how many firmly committed to most-favored-nation status for China would change their mind. There are economic and commercial reasons for doing that. And the great argument is that, by isolating China, you don't move them toward a more civilized regime.

But there are some, I suppose, that are switchable. I'm one of them. And I have voted for it in the past. I'm not inclined to do it now, although I would certainly listen to arguments.

SHIELDS: And finally, Mr. Chairman, on a domestic issue, you have been one of the most outspoken foes of the process known as partial-birth abortion. It passed the Congress under Bill Clinton. He vetoed it when he was president. You have the votes now, you've got a pro-life president, who ran a pro-life platform, in the White House. Why the delay? Why is Congress not moving on a repeal of partial- birth abortion?

HYDE: Because the Supreme Court's decision on this issue, very sensitive and important issue, has presented us with a quandary, how to draft the bill that will withstand constitutional muster. They confuse health with life, and it's very difficult to draw a bill in conformity with the Supreme Court's decision. That is being worked on. A lot of legal scholars are doing their best.

It's really outrageous that Congress can't get a bill that will withstand constitutional scrutiny that forbids a barbaric practice of exterminating an unborn child that's 4/5 born.

NOVAK: We have to take another break, Mr. Chairman.

And when we come back, we'll have "The Big Question" for Henry Hyde of Illinois.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

NOVAK: "The Big Question" for Chairman Henry Hyde.

Mr. Chairman, do you believe that the new Republican administration would be well-advised to back away all over the world from the interventions of the past Democratic administration -- in the Balkans, in Korea, in the Middle East, in Ireland -- attempting to find peace in all those troubled areas?

HYDE: If I have to answer it with one word, I would say yes, but on a selective basis. I think each situation should be determined on its own terms. I don't think we should become isolationist and pull the blanket over our head, but at the same time, we aren't a universal 911. There are other military forces, political forces in the world that ought to be utilized and mobilized. But I do think there are circumstances where we would have to intervene.

SHIELDS: Mr. Chairman, on China, there's been a strange, mutinous silence on the part of out European allies, and that's been attributed by some observers to the fact that we are going it alone, going it alone on CO2, on pulling out of Bosnia with consultation, on Kyoto. Isn't there a risk here that we're going to be isolate?

HYDE: Well, you know the old saying, Mark, "If you want to have a friend in Washington, buy a dog." I think that applies internationally just as well as domestically.

SHIELDS: OK. Henry Hyde, thank you so much for being with us.

HYDE: My partner, Robert Novak, and I will be back in a moment with a comment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

NOVAK: I'm Robert Novak.

SHIELDS: I'm Mark Shields.

Coming up next on Reliable Sources, how is the media handling the stand-off between China and the United States?

And coming up at noon Eastern on Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, more on the U.S.-China stand-off, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice and Senators John Warner and Carl Levin.

NOVAK: That's all for now. Thanks for joining us.

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