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Bush Trying to Rally International Support

Aired September 09, 2002 - 14:00   ET

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

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: We begin this hour on the U.S.- Canadian border. The Canadian prime minister is said to be on the fence today regarding U.S. plans to force change in Iraq, though President Bush tried hard to win him over.
CNN's John King live from the White House now with the latest from there -- hi, John.

JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hello to you, Kyra. And Mr. Bush making the case directly to Prime Minister Chretien to open the week of critical diplomacy for the president. He spoke to the prime minister earlier today. He made several phone calls, including to the United Nations secretary-general, making the case that the world must rally to confront Saddam Hussein and his weapons programs. Mr. Bush meeting with Mr. Chretien in Detroit. The prime minister said just last week, he sees no evidence as yet to justify any military confrontation with Iraq.

Mr. Bush making his case in private. The president due back here at the White House in just a few moments. In his public remarks out in Detroit, no mention of Iraq by President Bush, but he did make clear, he thanked Canada for its support so far in the war on terrorism, and made clear his determination to see this war through to the finish.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Mr. Prime Minister, this country is doing everything we can to address a common problem, and you need to know, sir, that we are determined, and we are patient, and we are resolved to win this war against these terrorists because like you, we love freedom. We value our freedoms. We want to leave a legacy of freedom behind for our children and our grandchildren.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: The Bush team making the case that the United States is prepared now to confront Saddam Hussein and wants international support, but an urgency to this now as the president prepares to go to the United Nations later this week.

Vice President Dick Cheney telling CNN that the United States has irrefutable evidence that Saddam Hussein, once again, is trying to rebuild and resupply his chemical, his biological, and his nuclear weapons program.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DICK CHENEY, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We know he has this capability. We know he is developing it. We know he sits on top of 10 percent of the world's oil reserves. He has a significant cash flow coming in to finance these acquisitions and procurement projects, and the world has sort of gotten relaxed about it, if you will, and a lot of people are doing business with him now, and so we find ourselves in a situation where there is a growing threat. It needs to be addressed, it is not just a U.S. problem, it is also a problem for the United Nations.

KING: You have captured the world's attention again, the administration, by focusing on this. The president will go to the United Nations, and one of the debates now that is back again is, Let's get the inspectors back in. You have voiced great skepticism, that A, Saddam Hussein would let them in in the first place, but that if he did, that in your view, it would most likely be a fraud. That he would try to block that -- politically, in trying to build international support, is it your belief today that you will have to go through this exercise again, despite your skepticism, that inspectors will have to go back into Iraq?

CHENEY: The president will speak to the United Nations this week, and lay out the case, and also his recommendations for how to proceed. Those are presidential decisions, and I don't want to preempt that approach. Now I, obviously, based on the past history, am a skeptic, and the inspectors were in there for seven years, and worked for seven years and they did a lot of good work, but they didn't get everything. What we found was, oftentimes, that even with a very robust and aggressive inspection regime, he was still able to go forward and hide some of these weapons capabilities that we were never able to account for. So that is the concern. If you are going to have any kind of an inspection regime, it obviously needs to be better and more effective than the last one.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: You heard the vice president there say an inspections regime that has to be better and more effective than the last one.

President Bush arriving back at the White House now as we speak. That is Marine One you hear coming in. We are told in that speech to the United Nations, the president will say that if United Nations weapons inspectors do go back into Iraq, they must have unfettered access. Any time, anywhere, any place, to suspected weapons sites, and if they are turned away just once, he will consider that grounds for U.S. military strikes -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: John, as we see the president coming in in Marine One, I have got to ask you a question. That is former chief U.N. inspector -- weapons inspector, Scott Ritter -- I interviewed him not long ago -- and he is really strong and passionate about weapons inspectors going back into Iraq, and he is making or, I guess, criticizing the Bush administration, saying there is so much rhetoric going on, there is no evidence. There is no proof. I mean, he really reamed me. So I want to hear from you, how does the Bush administration, and how do people there, including the president, feel about Scott Ritter, and what he is saying, and who he is as a person and a former weapons inspector?

KING: Well, this administration gives no merit, no credence to what Scott Ritter is saying right now, and what this administration says is that Scott Ritter should know better. This administration arguing that Mr. Ritter was part of an inspections team that had to negotiate its access to sites even though Saddam Hussein had signed agreements with the United Nations, saying those inspectors would have unfettered access, that Scott Ritter was part of an inspections regime that did not get to see everything it wanted to do, and at times was kept out of the front of a building while Iraqis were sneaking out the back with documents, presumably documents about those weapons programs.

So this administration says it cannot explain what Scott Ritter says now. Like Scott Ritter, this administration dealing with the fact, even though it is quite skeptical, as you heard the vice president, that perhaps inspectors will go back in as part of this drama, this confrontation with Saddam Hussein.

But a very different view, this administration and the president will make the case directly later this week that if those inspectors go back in, this White House will say it will have no patience at all. If there is any haggling. The inspectors must have free reign, must be able to go anywhere they want, and if Saddam tries to impose conditions, that this president will urge the United Nations to pull those inspectors out, and will say that that alone is justification for military strikes.

PHILLIPS: Meanwhile, John, how is the Bush administration handling all the criticism that it is receiving about how many believe he is mishandling this debate about whether U.S. should go into Iraq or not.

KING: Well, some had talked publicly about a tug of war between the secretary of state, the vice president, and others. The Bush White House says much of that has been over-exaggerated, and they focus on the bottom line, Kyra. They say this, that months ago, the world was not paying attention to the president when he talked about Iraq, when he talked about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein. Now you have the world's attention focused on this.

It is a major focus of this week's upcoming meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. There are efforts by the United Nations and world leaders around the world to get those inspectors back in, so the Bush White House would say, perhaps if you missed steps along the way, they would say some media exaggeration of those differences, but they believe they have captured the world's attention, and they say this president is committed to following through, and they say here that at the end of this week, and as the evidence is presented in the weeks and months ahead, there will be more and more international support for this president's position.

That is the big test, as we watch the president go up to New York to visit the United Nations later this week. PHILLIPS: Our John King at the White House. John, thanks a lot.

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