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American Morning

Iraq's Deputy Foreign Minister Said Iraq Anticipating and Preparing for U.S. Assault

Aired March 07, 2002 - 07:33   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.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: On to the issue of Iraq. Iraq's deputy foreign minister, Tariq Aziz, today said that Iraq is anticipating and preparing for a U.S. assault. But this morning, that same country is sending its foreign minister to New York to meet face to face with United Nations officials for the first time in over a year. But is all of this simply a diversion to hold off any possible U.S. military action?

Well, joining us now is a man that knows an awful lot about all of this, Richard Butler, a former U.N. weapons inspector himself in Iraq, our ambassador-in-residence, though today he is not quite in residence. He is in his hometown of Sydney, Australia -- good morning, Richard. Do you miss us?

RICHARD BUTLER, FORMER U.N. CHIEF WEAPONS INSPECTOR: Good morning, Paula. I sure do. I don't miss those reports of snow that's coming down the pike, especially as I was surfing this afternoon, but I sure do miss you guys. And you've got a lot of interesting stories on your hands right now.

ZAHN: Yes, we do. Let's have you walk us through this dance that is expected to happen later...

BUTLER: Right.

ZAHN: ... today at the U.N. This happens at a time, when the U.S. government now has satellite pictures showing the Iraqis have turned trucks that were meant for humanitarian use into military trucks.

BUTLER: Well, Paula, the Iraqis have had three years to do such things, three years without inspections, and throughout that period, they have claimed that they have no weapons of mass destruction. I want to say very simply that's a lie. And as Colin Powell has said very often, if that is the truth, why not have inspectors come back and look and see and prove to the world that you don't have any of those weapons?

Well, here they are today at the U.N. talking about having inspectors come back. That's a real wrench for them, because Saddam's deepest interest is in keeping weapons of mass destruction and, therefore, not having inspectors. So why are they doing this? Paula, they are doing it, because they are scared stiff of U.S. military action, and this is a ploy to try to head off that action by saying, hey, wait a minute. We are going to come back under the law. We are going to have inspectors come into our country. That's what it's about.

ZAHN: But, Richard, realistically how much time can the Iraqis buy here?

BUTLER: I don't think very much, and the devil will be in the detail. You see, Kofi Annan, the secretary general, has made clear that there is only one subject on the agenda, which is that you come back -- you, Iraq, come back into conformity with the law, and the law says they must be inspected and those weapons of mass destruction removed.

What Iraq will do is say, OK, we are prepared to do that, but we want to know exactly what those inspections will look like, what will be the rules. In other words, they will start, I think, that same game they have played with my team in the past, a sort of shell game, where through procedural and other devices, they will seek to prevent the inspections from being effective.

That's what the U.S. has to watch out for, because if it looks like the secretary general or the international community is going to allow Iraq to have inspections, but inspections which are useless, some would say worse than useless, then that will be a serious problem. I don't think they'll get away with it. They are going to try it, but the short answer to your question is that, no, I don't think it will work.

ZAHN: All right. But how much does it hurt the Iraqis' case that this information has become public now, 24 hours in advance of these important high-level meetings, that they have converted these trucks into trucks of wartime use potentially?

BUTLER: Well, I think it does hurt their case, but let's not be too sanguine about that. This sort of information has been around for a very long time, but Iraq has had sufficient supporters -- political supporters to try to water it down or dismiss its significance. Some will argue that this information has come to light on the eve of these talks and is therefore in some way an attempt to prejudice the, you know, the outcome of those talks.

The politics of this are very complex. Now, they had clarified somewhat since September 11, and certainly in the Iraqi mind, the president got their attention with his State of the Union speech, when he made very clear that the U.S. is not going to sit back and wait for countries like Iraq, declared to be part of the so-called axis of evil, to develop weapons of mass destruction. That if it's seen that they have them, the U.S. will take action first.

Now, in the meantime, it has been made clear that before that action takes place, there will be one more attempt to get serious inspections back into Iraq. This is what we are seeing unfold today. Will it work? Will it result in serious inspections? Will it hold off U.S. action? I strongly doubt it, because Saddam's first and basic interest is in keeping his weapons of mass destruction, and frankly I think whatever inspections are agreed to, it probably won't be real.

ZAHN: Well, we are going to be watching this very closely from here at CNN -- Richard, good to see you again. We are very jealous that you have been surfing, but we can't complain too badly about the weather here.

BUTLER: Well, I'll be back with you soon, I hope.

ZAHN: Travel well. Thank you, Ambassador Richard Butler...

BUTLER: Thank you.

ZAHN: ... for your preview of what might happen at the U.N. later today.

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