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CNN Live Event/Special
Bush Addresses Nation on Iraq
Aired October 07, 2002 - 19:58 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.
CONNIE CHUNG, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening. In just a few minutes, just after 8:01 p.m. Eastern time, President Bush is scheduled to address the nation and to address questions about the urgency he's placed on confronting Iraq and its dictator, Saddam Hussein.
Coming on the first anniversary of the start of the U.S. liberation of Afghanistan, tonight's speech is targeted at the U.N. and members of Congress, all of whom are debating President Bush's claims about Iraq and what must be done about Iraq.
After the speech, which the president is delivering in Cincinnati, Ohio, we'll talk to members of Congress and gauge international reaction.
As for the American public, a new CNN-"USA Today" Gallup poll has mixed news for the president. Seventy-four percent of those polled said they will support the U.S. invasion if Mr. Bush decides to invade. However, when asked who should actually have the authority to make that decision, more of those polled, 54 percent, said Congress than President Bush.
We have CNN senior political analyst Bill Schneider with us from Washington. Bill, was there any bad news for the president in the polls today?
WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, the bad news is that while most Americans say they would support the president once he decided to go into Iraq, the question was asked, do you support him right now? Now, for the last month, the president has been staging a full court press to convince the public that we're right to go into Iraq. In early September, as you can see on the screen, 57 percent favored going into Iraq. Now the number is 53 percent. It's still a majority, but look what's happened.
In the past month, the White House has been losing ground, not gaining ground. That's why the president is making this speech tonight.
CHUNG: All right. Bill Schneider, thank you.
Now, the president is about to begin, so we are going to go now to my CNN colleague, Aaron Brown, who will then introduce the president's speech.
AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening. I'm Aaron Brown. In just about a minute, the president will walk into the Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal, one of those beautiful, old, renovated rail stations to lay out, in the most detail so far, his case for disarming Iraq, which of course could mean the possibility of war.
Our senior White House correspondent John King is at the White House tonight. John, in 20 seconds or so, a preview?
JOHN KING, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: ... in October, President Kennedy, during the Cuban missile crisis, said the United States and the world could not ignore a threat. The threat at that time, of course, in Cuba, Russian missiles, Soviet missiles on the American door step. President Bush tonight will say Saddam Hussein poses a similar threat to U.S. interests and to the world's interest. Mr. Bush will say there is -- are many dangerous regimes around the world but that Iraq, because of its weapons programs and because of a quote, "murderous tyrant," stands unique.
BROWN: John, thank you. And we'll check with you right after the president's speech.
The president, over the last week or so has gone to great pains to say that war is not the first option. We would expect him to make a similar argument today, while laying out the case for Iraq and disarming Iraq. The president entering now the Cincinnati Museum Center, 500 or so invited guests there for a speech that's expected to run about a half an hour.
The president of the United States.
(APPLAUSE)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Thank you for that very gracious and warm Cincinnati welcome. I'm honored to be here tonight. I appreciate you all coming.
Tonight, I want to take a few minutes to discuss a grave threat to peace and America's determination to lead the world in confronting that threat.
The threat comes from Iraq. It arises directly from the Iraqi regime's own actions, its history of aggression and its drive toward an arsenal of terror.
Eleven years ago, as a condition for ending the Persian Gulf War, the Iraqi regime was required to destroy its weapons of mass destruction, to cease all development of such weapons and to stop all support for terrorist groups.
The Iraqi regime has violated all of those obligations. It possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons. It has given shelter and support to terrorism and practices terror against its own people.
The entire world has witnessed Iraq's 11-year history of defiance, deception and bad faith. We must also never forget the most vivid events of recent history. On September the 11th, 2001, America felt its vulnerability even to threats that gather on the other side of the Earth. We resolved then, and we are resolved today, to confront every threat from any source that could bring sudden terror and suffering to America.
Members of Congress of both political parties, and members of the United Nations Security Council, agree that Saddam Hussein is a threat to peace and must disarm. We agree that the Iraqi dictator must not be permitted to threaten America and the world with horrible poisons and diseases and gasses and atomic weapons.
Since we all agree on this goal, the issue is how best can we achieve it?
Many Americans have raised legitimate questions about the nature of the threat, about the urgency of action; why be concerned now? About the length between Iraq developing weapons of terror and the wider war on terror.
These are all issues we've discussed broadly and fully within my administration, and tonight I want to share those discussions with you.
First, some ask why Iraq is different from other countries or regimes that also have terrible weapons? While there are many dangers in the world, the threat from Iraq stands alone because it gathers the most serious dangers of our age in one place.
Iraq's weapons of mass destruction are controlled by a murderous tyrant who has already used chemical weapons to kill thousands of people. This same tyrant has tried to dominate the Middle East, has invaded and brutally occupied a small neighbor, has struck other nations without warning and holds an unrelenting hostility toward the United States.
By its past and present actions, by its technological capabilities, by the merciless nature of its regime, Iraq is unique.
As a former chief weapons inspector of the U.N. has said, "The fundamental problem with Iraq remains the nature of the regime itself." Saddam Hussein is a homicidal dictator who is addicted to weapons of mass destruction.
Some ask how urgent this danger is to America and the world. The danger is already significant, and it only grows worse with time. If we know Saddam Hussein has dangerous weapons today -- and we do -- does it make any sense for the world to wait to confront him as he grows even stronger and develops even more dangerous weapons?
In 1995, after several years of deceit by the Iraqi regime, the head of Iraq's military industries defected.
It was then that the regime was forced to admit that it had produced more than 30,000 liters of anthrax and other deadly biological agents. The inspectors, however, concluded that Iraq had likely produced two to four times that amount. This is a massive stockpile of biological weapons that has never been accounted for and is capable of killing millions.
We know that the regime has produced thousands of tons of chemical agents, including mustard gas, sarin nerve gas, VX nerve gas. Saddam Hussein also has experience in using chemical weapons. He's ordered chemical attacks on Iran and on more than 40 villages in his own country. These actions killed or injured at least 20,000 people: more than six times the number of people who died in the attacks of September the 11th.
And surveillance photos reveal that the regime is rebuilding facilities that it had used to produce chemical and biological weapons. Every chemical and biological weapon that Iraq has or makes is a direct violation of the truce that ended the Persian Gulf War in 1991.
Yet Saddam Hussein has chosen to build and keep these weapons, despite international sanctions, U.N. demands and isolation from the civilized world.
Iraq possesses ballistic missiles with a likely range of hundreds of miles; far enough to strike Saudi Arabia, Israel, Turkey and other nations in region where more than 135,000 American civilians and service members live and work.
We've also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical and biological weapons across broad areas. We're concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVs for missions targeting the United States.
And, of course, sophisticated delivery systems aren't required for a chemical or biological attack. All that might be required are a small container and one terrorist or Iraqi intelligence operative to deliver it.
And that is the source of our urgent concern about Saddam Hussein's links to international terrorist groups.
Over the years Iraq has provided safe haven to terrorists such as Abu Nidal, whose terror organization carried out more than 90 terrorist attacks in 20 countries that killed or injured nearly 900 people, including 12 Americans.
Iraq has also provided safe haven to Abu Abbas who is responsible for seizing the Achille Lauro and killing an American passenger. And we know that Iraq is continuing to finance terror and gives assistance to groups that use terrorism to undermine Middle East peace.
We know that Iraq and the Al Qaida terrorist network share a common enemy: the United States of America. We know that Iraq and Al Qaida have had high-level contacts that go back a decade.
Some Al Qaida leaders who fled Afghanistan went to Iraq. These include one very senior Al Qaida leader who received medical treatment in Baghdad this year and who has been associated with planning for chemical and biological attacks.
We've learned that Iraq has trained Al Qaida members in bomb- making and poisons and deadly gasses. And we know that after September the 11th Saddam Hussein's regime gleefully celebrated the terrorist attacks on America.
Iraq could decide on any given day to provide a biological or chemical weapon to a terrorist group or individual terrorists.
Alliance with terrorists could allow the Iraqi regime to attack America without leaving any fingerprints.
Some have argued that confronting the threat from Iraq could detract from the war against terror. To the contrary, confronting the threat posed by Iraq is crucial to winning the war on terror.
When I spoke to Congress more than year ago, I said that those who harbor terrorists are as guilty as the terrorists themselves. Saddam Hussein is harboring terrorists and the instruments of terror, the instruments of mass death and destruction, and he cannot be trusted. The risk is simply too great that he will use them or provide them to a terror network.
Terror cells and outlaw regimes building weapons of mass destruction are different faces of the same evil. Our security requires that we confront both, and the United States military is capable of confronting both.
Many people have asked how close Saddam Hussein is to developing a nuclear weapon. Well, we don't know exactly, and that's the problem. Before the Gulf War, the best intelligence indicated that Iraq was eight to 10 years away from developing a nuclear weapon. After the war, international inspectors learned that the regime had been much closer. The regime in Iraq would likely have possessed a nuclear weapon no later than 1993.
The inspectors discovered that Iraq had an advanced nuclear weapons development program, had a design for a workable nuclear weapon and was pursuing several different methods of enriching uranium for a bomb.
Before being barred from Iraq in 1998, the International Atomic Energy Agency dismantled extensive nuclear weapons-related facilities, including three uranium enrichment sites.
That same year, information from a high-ranking Iraqi nuclear engineer who had defected revealed that, despite his public promises, Saddam Hussein had ordered his nuclear program to continue.
The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Saddam Hussein has held numerous meetings with Iraqi nuclear scientists, a group his "nuclear mujahedeen," his nuclear holy warriors.
Satellite photographs reveal that Iraq is rebuilding facilities at sites that have been part of his nuclear program in the past.
Iraq has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment needed for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons.
If the Iraqi regime is able to produce, buy or steal an amount of highly enriched uranium a little larger than a single softball, he could have a nuclear weapon in less than a year.
And if we allow that to happen, a terrible line would be crossed. Saddam Hussein would be in a position to blackmail anyone who opposes his aggression. He would be in a position to dominate the Middle East. He would be in a position to threaten America. And Saddam Hussein would be in a position to pass nuclear technology to terrorists.
Some citizens wonder, "After 11 years of living with this problem, why do we need to confront it now?"
And there's a reason. We have experienced the horror of September the 11th. We have seen that those who hate America are willing to crash airplanes into buildings full of innocent people. Our enemies would be no less willing, in fact they would be eager, to use biological or chemical or a nuclear weapon.
Knowing these realities, America must not ignore the threat gathering against us. Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof, the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.
As President Kennedy said in October of 1962, "Neither the United States of America nor the world community of nations can tolerate deliberate deception and offensive threats on the part of any nation, large or small. We no longer live in a world," he said, "where only the actual firing of weapons represents a sufficient challenge to a nation's security to constitute maximum peril."
Understanding the threats of our time, knowing the designs and deceptions of the Iraqi regime, we have every reason to assume the worst, and we have an urgent duty to prevent the worst from occurring.
Some believe we can address this danger by simply resuming the old approach to inspections and applying diplomatic and economic pressure. Yet this is precisely what the world has tried to do since 1991.
The U.N. inspections program was met with systematic deception. The Iraqi regime bugged hotel rooms and offices of inspectors to find where they were going next. They forged documents, destroyed evidence and developed mobile weapons facilities to keep a step ahead of inspectors.
Eight so-called presidential palaces were declared off- limits to unfettered inspections. These sites actually encompass 12 square miles, with hundreds of structures both above and below the ground where sensitive materials could be hidden. The world has also tried economic sanctions and watched Iraqi's billions of dollars in illegal oil revenues to fund more weapons purchases rather than provide for the needs of the Iraqi people.
The world has tried limited military strikes to destroy Iraq's weapons of mass destruction capabilities, only to see them openly rebuilt while the regime again denies they even exist.
The world has tried no-fly zones to keep Saddam from terrorizing his own people, and in the last year alone the Iraqi military has fired upon American and British pilots more than 750 times.
After 11 years during which we've tried containment, sanctions, inspections, even selected military action, the end result is that Saddam Hussein still has chemical and biological weapons and is increasing his capabilities to make more. And he is moving ever closer to developing a nuclear weapon.
Clearly to actually work any new inspections, sanctions or enforcement mechanisms will have to be very different. America wants the U.N. to be an effective organization that helps keep the peace. And that is why we are urging the Security Council to adopt a new resolution setting out tough, immediate requirements.
Among those requirements the Iraqi regime must reveal and destroy, under U.N. supervision, all existing weapons of mass destruction. To ensure that we learn the truth, the regime must allow witnesses to its illegal activities to be interviewed outside the country.
And these witnesses must be free to bring their families with them, so they are all beyond the reach of Saddam Hussein's terror and murder.
And inspectors must have access to any site, at any time without pre-clearance, without delay, without exceptions.
The time denying, deceiving and delaying has come to an end. Saddam Hussein must disarm himself, or, for the sake of peace, we will lead a coalition to disarm him.
Many nations are joining us and insisting us that Saddam Hussein's regime be held accountable. They are committed to defending the international security that protects the lives of both our citizens and theirs.
And that's why America is challenging all nations to take the resolutions of the U.N. Security Council seriously. These resolutions are very clear. In addition to declaring and destroying all of its weapons of mass destruction, Iraq must end its support for terrorism. It must cease the persecution of its civilian population. It must stop all illicit trade outside the oil-for-food program. It must release or account for all Gulf War personnel, including an American pilot whose fate is still unknown.
By taking these steps and by only (sic) taking these steps, the Iraqi regime has an opportunity to avoid conflict.
These steps would also change the nature of the Iraqi regime itself. America hopes the regime will make that choice.
Unfortunately, at least so far, we have little reason to expect it. And that's why two administrations -- mine and President Clinton's -- have stated that regime change in Iraq is the only certain means of removing a great danger to our nation.
I hope this will not require military action, but it may. And military conflict could be difficult. An Iraqi regime faced with its own demise may attempt cruel and desperate measures. If Saddam Hussein orders such measures, his generals would be well advised to refuse those orders. If they do not refuse, they must understand that all war criminals will be pursued and punished.
If we have to act, we will take every precaution that is possible. We will plan carefully. We will act with the full power of the United States military. We will act with allies at our side and we will prevail.
(APPLAUSE)
There is no easy or risk-free course of action. Some have argued we should wait, and that's an option. In my view, it's the riskiest of all options, because the longer we wait, the stronger and bolder Saddam Hussein will become. We could wait and hope that Saddam does not give weapons to terrorists or develop a nuclear weapon to blackmail the world. But I'm convinced that is a hope against all evidence.
As Americans, we want peace. We work and sacrifice for peace. But there can be no peace if our security depends on the will and whims of a ruthless and aggressive dictator. I'm not willing to stake one American life on trusting Saddam Hussein.
Failure to act would embolden other tyrants, allow terrorists access to new weapons and new resources, and make blackmail a permanent feature of world events.
The United Nations would betray the purpose of its founding and prove irrelevant to the problems of our time. And through its inaction, the United States would resign itself to a future of fear.
That is not the America I know. That is not the America I serve. We refuse to live in fear.
(APPLAUSE)
This nation, in world war and in cold war, has never permitted the brutal and lawless to set history's course. Now, as before, we will secure our nation, protect our freedom and help others to find freedom of their own.
Some worry that a change of leadership in Iraq could create instability and make the situation worse. The situation could hardly get worse for world security and for the people of Iraq.
The lives of Iraqi citizens would improve dramatically if Saddam Hussein were no longer in power, just as the lives of Afghanistan's citizens improved after the Taliban.
The dictator of Iraq is a student of Stalin, using murder as a tool of terror and control, within his own cabinet, within his own army and even within his own family.
On Saddam Hussein's orders, opponents had been decapitated, wives and mothers of political opponents had been systematically raped as a method of intimidation, and political prisoners had been forced to watch their own children being tortured.
America believes that all people are entitled to hope and human rights, to the non-negotiable demands of human dignity.
People everywhere prefer freedom to slavery, prosperity to squalor, self-government to the rule of terror and torture.
America is a friend to the people of Iraq. Our demands are directed only at the regime that enslaves them and threatens us. When these demands are met, the first and greatest benefit will come to Iraqi men, women and children. The oppression of Kurds, Assyrians, Turkomen, Shia, Sunnis and others will be lifted, the long captivity of Iraq will end, and an era of new hope will begin.
Iraq is a land rich in culture and resources and talent. Freed from the weight of oppression, Iraq's people will be able to share in the progress and prosperity of our time.
If military action is necessary, the United States and our allies will help the Iraqi people rebuild their economy and create the institutions of liberty in a unified Iraq, at peace with its neighbors.
Later this week, the United States Congress will vote on this matter. I have asked Congress to authorize the use of America's military if it proves necessary to enforce U.N. Security Council demands.
Approving this resolution does not mean that military action is imminent or unavoidable. The resolution will tell the United Nations, and all nations, that America speaks with one voice and it is determined to make the demands of the civilized world mean something.
Congress will also be sending a message to the dictator in Iraq that his only chance -- his only choice is full compliance, and the time remaining for that choice is limited.
Members of Congress are nearing an historic vote.
I'm confident they will fully consider the facts and their duties.
The attacks of September the 11th showed our country that vast oceans no longer protect us from danger. Before that tragic date, we had only hints of Al Qaida's plans and designs. Today, in Iraq, we see a threat whose outlines are far more clearly defined and whose consequences could be far more deadly.
Saddam Hussein's actions have put us on notice, and there's no refuge from our responsibilities.
We did not ask for this present challenge, but we accept it. Like other generations of Americans, we will meet the responsibility of defending human liberty against violence and aggression. By our resolve, we will give strength to others. By our courage, we will give hope to others. And by our actions, we will secure the peace and lead the world to a better day.
May God bless America.
BROWN: President Bush in Cincinnati, Ohio, tonight, a speech running almost exactly 30 minutes.
The president said, "I am not willing to stake one American life on trusting Saddam Hussein." The speech low key but quite stern and in many ways very personal.
In regards to the Iraqi leader, the president described the Iraqi leader as a murderous tyrant, a homicidal dictator, addicted, rather, to weapons of mass destruction.
And the president, in terms he has not before nor has the administration before, to our ear, at least, tied the possibility of military action against Iraq directly to the events of September 11. "We refuse to live in fear," said the president. "September 11 showed the attack -- the country as vulnerable."
Our senior White House correspondent, John King, is at the White House tonight, where he's been following the speech.
John, did you hear much that was new in the speech tonight, or was it in many ways tying together a variety of themes that the president and other members of the administration have been making for the last, I guess, three or four weeks?
KING: Very much, Aaron, as promised by the White House. Essentially they said the president tonight would try to deliver what a prosecutor would do as a trial, a closing argument, if you will, just as Congress prepares to vote, just as the U.N. Security Council begins the deliberations over whether to adopt that tough new resolution the president is demanding.
The president, as promised by the White House, methodically, calmly going through every question that he could think of, anyway, that the American people might ask.
You were just discussing one. One question that comes up frequently is, why, one year to the day after the first air strikes in Afghanistan with Osama bin Laden's whereabouts still unknown, why turn now to Iraq? The president saying that it would not be a distraction from the war on terrorism. Indeed, in his view, an urgent continuation of the war on terrorism.
No blockbuster headlines out of this, no major new information. The White House is tonight releasing two previously classified satellite photographs showing, the administration says, some reconstruction work at Iraqi nuclear sites. You heard the president say a senior al Qaeda official getting medical treatment in Baghdad within the past year.
But no new blockbuster evidence. The president trying to pull together everything the administration knows, trying to influence first and foremost the vote in Congress. He's hoping for a big win in Congress. Then comes the much more difficult fight, the United Nations Security Council debate.
But the president also noting, trying to make the case that war is not inevitable, that Saddam Hussein has a chance to save himself, the president said. That was noteworthy tonight. But the president said he did not think that would happen. And if the U.N. does not act, the president made clear that he will.
BROWN: John, just picking up on one thing you mentioned. That is one of the audiences here is clearly the members of the U.N. Security Council, the president has yet to persuade the French and the Russians to go along with his idea.
What is the White House saying about progress there and timeliness? When will a vote come?
KING: Privately, the administration insists it is making some progress. The president spoke to President Putin of Russia earlier today. The administration says there is a consensus forming that there must be a new resolution. The debate now is over how strong that should be, how explicit it should be in putting forward the unfettered access or else, "or else" being military strikes.
The administration is a bit worried about the timetable. It wants a vote in the next week or two. Some indications from the United Nations that key members would like this to go on perhaps another three or four weeks. The administration does not like that.
But they do believe they are making progress in that diplomacy. One of the ways the president is trying to nudge that along is by making it clear to the United Nations, If you want to have influence over a military campaign, if there is one, if you want to have influence over rebuilding Iraq, if that is what becomes necessary, get on the train now, if you will, because the United States will act outside of the United Nations' blessing if the U.N. does not pass a new resolution that meets the president's demands.
BROWN: John, thank you. Senior White House correspondent John King. We'll see you again at 10:00 on "NEWSNIGHT." Much of the rest of the night here devoted to reactions to the president's speech. "LARRY KING LIVE" coming up at the top of the hour. And our coverage of the president's speech continues now with "CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT." We'll see you at 10:00 Eastern time.
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Aired October 7, 2002 - 19:58 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CONNIE CHUNG, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening. In just a few minutes, just after 8:01 p.m. Eastern time, President Bush is scheduled to address the nation and to address questions about the urgency he's placed on confronting Iraq and its dictator, Saddam Hussein.
Coming on the first anniversary of the start of the U.S. liberation of Afghanistan, tonight's speech is targeted at the U.N. and members of Congress, all of whom are debating President Bush's claims about Iraq and what must be done about Iraq.
After the speech, which the president is delivering in Cincinnati, Ohio, we'll talk to members of Congress and gauge international reaction.
As for the American public, a new CNN-"USA Today" Gallup poll has mixed news for the president. Seventy-four percent of those polled said they will support the U.S. invasion if Mr. Bush decides to invade. However, when asked who should actually have the authority to make that decision, more of those polled, 54 percent, said Congress than President Bush.
We have CNN senior political analyst Bill Schneider with us from Washington. Bill, was there any bad news for the president in the polls today?
WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, the bad news is that while most Americans say they would support the president once he decided to go into Iraq, the question was asked, do you support him right now? Now, for the last month, the president has been staging a full court press to convince the public that we're right to go into Iraq. In early September, as you can see on the screen, 57 percent favored going into Iraq. Now the number is 53 percent. It's still a majority, but look what's happened.
In the past month, the White House has been losing ground, not gaining ground. That's why the president is making this speech tonight.
CHUNG: All right. Bill Schneider, thank you.
Now, the president is about to begin, so we are going to go now to my CNN colleague, Aaron Brown, who will then introduce the president's speech.
AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening. I'm Aaron Brown. In just about a minute, the president will walk into the Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal, one of those beautiful, old, renovated rail stations to lay out, in the most detail so far, his case for disarming Iraq, which of course could mean the possibility of war.
Our senior White House correspondent John King is at the White House tonight. John, in 20 seconds or so, a preview?
JOHN KING, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: ... in October, President Kennedy, during the Cuban missile crisis, said the United States and the world could not ignore a threat. The threat at that time, of course, in Cuba, Russian missiles, Soviet missiles on the American door step. President Bush tonight will say Saddam Hussein poses a similar threat to U.S. interests and to the world's interest. Mr. Bush will say there is -- are many dangerous regimes around the world but that Iraq, because of its weapons programs and because of a quote, "murderous tyrant," stands unique.
BROWN: John, thank you. And we'll check with you right after the president's speech.
The president, over the last week or so has gone to great pains to say that war is not the first option. We would expect him to make a similar argument today, while laying out the case for Iraq and disarming Iraq. The president entering now the Cincinnati Museum Center, 500 or so invited guests there for a speech that's expected to run about a half an hour.
The president of the United States.
(APPLAUSE)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Thank you for that very gracious and warm Cincinnati welcome. I'm honored to be here tonight. I appreciate you all coming.
Tonight, I want to take a few minutes to discuss a grave threat to peace and America's determination to lead the world in confronting that threat.
The threat comes from Iraq. It arises directly from the Iraqi regime's own actions, its history of aggression and its drive toward an arsenal of terror.
Eleven years ago, as a condition for ending the Persian Gulf War, the Iraqi regime was required to destroy its weapons of mass destruction, to cease all development of such weapons and to stop all support for terrorist groups.
The Iraqi regime has violated all of those obligations. It possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons. It has given shelter and support to terrorism and practices terror against its own people.
The entire world has witnessed Iraq's 11-year history of defiance, deception and bad faith. We must also never forget the most vivid events of recent history. On September the 11th, 2001, America felt its vulnerability even to threats that gather on the other side of the Earth. We resolved then, and we are resolved today, to confront every threat from any source that could bring sudden terror and suffering to America.
Members of Congress of both political parties, and members of the United Nations Security Council, agree that Saddam Hussein is a threat to peace and must disarm. We agree that the Iraqi dictator must not be permitted to threaten America and the world with horrible poisons and diseases and gasses and atomic weapons.
Since we all agree on this goal, the issue is how best can we achieve it?
Many Americans have raised legitimate questions about the nature of the threat, about the urgency of action; why be concerned now? About the length between Iraq developing weapons of terror and the wider war on terror.
These are all issues we've discussed broadly and fully within my administration, and tonight I want to share those discussions with you.
First, some ask why Iraq is different from other countries or regimes that also have terrible weapons? While there are many dangers in the world, the threat from Iraq stands alone because it gathers the most serious dangers of our age in one place.
Iraq's weapons of mass destruction are controlled by a murderous tyrant who has already used chemical weapons to kill thousands of people. This same tyrant has tried to dominate the Middle East, has invaded and brutally occupied a small neighbor, has struck other nations without warning and holds an unrelenting hostility toward the United States.
By its past and present actions, by its technological capabilities, by the merciless nature of its regime, Iraq is unique.
As a former chief weapons inspector of the U.N. has said, "The fundamental problem with Iraq remains the nature of the regime itself." Saddam Hussein is a homicidal dictator who is addicted to weapons of mass destruction.
Some ask how urgent this danger is to America and the world. The danger is already significant, and it only grows worse with time. If we know Saddam Hussein has dangerous weapons today -- and we do -- does it make any sense for the world to wait to confront him as he grows even stronger and develops even more dangerous weapons?
In 1995, after several years of deceit by the Iraqi regime, the head of Iraq's military industries defected.
It was then that the regime was forced to admit that it had produced more than 30,000 liters of anthrax and other deadly biological agents. The inspectors, however, concluded that Iraq had likely produced two to four times that amount. This is a massive stockpile of biological weapons that has never been accounted for and is capable of killing millions.
We know that the regime has produced thousands of tons of chemical agents, including mustard gas, sarin nerve gas, VX nerve gas. Saddam Hussein also has experience in using chemical weapons. He's ordered chemical attacks on Iran and on more than 40 villages in his own country. These actions killed or injured at least 20,000 people: more than six times the number of people who died in the attacks of September the 11th.
And surveillance photos reveal that the regime is rebuilding facilities that it had used to produce chemical and biological weapons. Every chemical and biological weapon that Iraq has or makes is a direct violation of the truce that ended the Persian Gulf War in 1991.
Yet Saddam Hussein has chosen to build and keep these weapons, despite international sanctions, U.N. demands and isolation from the civilized world.
Iraq possesses ballistic missiles with a likely range of hundreds of miles; far enough to strike Saudi Arabia, Israel, Turkey and other nations in region where more than 135,000 American civilians and service members live and work.
We've also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical and biological weapons across broad areas. We're concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVs for missions targeting the United States.
And, of course, sophisticated delivery systems aren't required for a chemical or biological attack. All that might be required are a small container and one terrorist or Iraqi intelligence operative to deliver it.
And that is the source of our urgent concern about Saddam Hussein's links to international terrorist groups.
Over the years Iraq has provided safe haven to terrorists such as Abu Nidal, whose terror organization carried out more than 90 terrorist attacks in 20 countries that killed or injured nearly 900 people, including 12 Americans.
Iraq has also provided safe haven to Abu Abbas who is responsible for seizing the Achille Lauro and killing an American passenger. And we know that Iraq is continuing to finance terror and gives assistance to groups that use terrorism to undermine Middle East peace.
We know that Iraq and the Al Qaida terrorist network share a common enemy: the United States of America. We know that Iraq and Al Qaida have had high-level contacts that go back a decade.
Some Al Qaida leaders who fled Afghanistan went to Iraq. These include one very senior Al Qaida leader who received medical treatment in Baghdad this year and who has been associated with planning for chemical and biological attacks.
We've learned that Iraq has trained Al Qaida members in bomb- making and poisons and deadly gasses. And we know that after September the 11th Saddam Hussein's regime gleefully celebrated the terrorist attacks on America.
Iraq could decide on any given day to provide a biological or chemical weapon to a terrorist group or individual terrorists.
Alliance with terrorists could allow the Iraqi regime to attack America without leaving any fingerprints.
Some have argued that confronting the threat from Iraq could detract from the war against terror. To the contrary, confronting the threat posed by Iraq is crucial to winning the war on terror.
When I spoke to Congress more than year ago, I said that those who harbor terrorists are as guilty as the terrorists themselves. Saddam Hussein is harboring terrorists and the instruments of terror, the instruments of mass death and destruction, and he cannot be trusted. The risk is simply too great that he will use them or provide them to a terror network.
Terror cells and outlaw regimes building weapons of mass destruction are different faces of the same evil. Our security requires that we confront both, and the United States military is capable of confronting both.
Many people have asked how close Saddam Hussein is to developing a nuclear weapon. Well, we don't know exactly, and that's the problem. Before the Gulf War, the best intelligence indicated that Iraq was eight to 10 years away from developing a nuclear weapon. After the war, international inspectors learned that the regime had been much closer. The regime in Iraq would likely have possessed a nuclear weapon no later than 1993.
The inspectors discovered that Iraq had an advanced nuclear weapons development program, had a design for a workable nuclear weapon and was pursuing several different methods of enriching uranium for a bomb.
Before being barred from Iraq in 1998, the International Atomic Energy Agency dismantled extensive nuclear weapons-related facilities, including three uranium enrichment sites.
That same year, information from a high-ranking Iraqi nuclear engineer who had defected revealed that, despite his public promises, Saddam Hussein had ordered his nuclear program to continue.
The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Saddam Hussein has held numerous meetings with Iraqi nuclear scientists, a group his "nuclear mujahedeen," his nuclear holy warriors.
Satellite photographs reveal that Iraq is rebuilding facilities at sites that have been part of his nuclear program in the past.
Iraq has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment needed for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons.
If the Iraqi regime is able to produce, buy or steal an amount of highly enriched uranium a little larger than a single softball, he could have a nuclear weapon in less than a year.
And if we allow that to happen, a terrible line would be crossed. Saddam Hussein would be in a position to blackmail anyone who opposes his aggression. He would be in a position to dominate the Middle East. He would be in a position to threaten America. And Saddam Hussein would be in a position to pass nuclear technology to terrorists.
Some citizens wonder, "After 11 years of living with this problem, why do we need to confront it now?"
And there's a reason. We have experienced the horror of September the 11th. We have seen that those who hate America are willing to crash airplanes into buildings full of innocent people. Our enemies would be no less willing, in fact they would be eager, to use biological or chemical or a nuclear weapon.
Knowing these realities, America must not ignore the threat gathering against us. Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof, the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.
As President Kennedy said in October of 1962, "Neither the United States of America nor the world community of nations can tolerate deliberate deception and offensive threats on the part of any nation, large or small. We no longer live in a world," he said, "where only the actual firing of weapons represents a sufficient challenge to a nation's security to constitute maximum peril."
Understanding the threats of our time, knowing the designs and deceptions of the Iraqi regime, we have every reason to assume the worst, and we have an urgent duty to prevent the worst from occurring.
Some believe we can address this danger by simply resuming the old approach to inspections and applying diplomatic and economic pressure. Yet this is precisely what the world has tried to do since 1991.
The U.N. inspections program was met with systematic deception. The Iraqi regime bugged hotel rooms and offices of inspectors to find where they were going next. They forged documents, destroyed evidence and developed mobile weapons facilities to keep a step ahead of inspectors.
Eight so-called presidential palaces were declared off- limits to unfettered inspections. These sites actually encompass 12 square miles, with hundreds of structures both above and below the ground where sensitive materials could be hidden. The world has also tried economic sanctions and watched Iraqi's billions of dollars in illegal oil revenues to fund more weapons purchases rather than provide for the needs of the Iraqi people.
The world has tried limited military strikes to destroy Iraq's weapons of mass destruction capabilities, only to see them openly rebuilt while the regime again denies they even exist.
The world has tried no-fly zones to keep Saddam from terrorizing his own people, and in the last year alone the Iraqi military has fired upon American and British pilots more than 750 times.
After 11 years during which we've tried containment, sanctions, inspections, even selected military action, the end result is that Saddam Hussein still has chemical and biological weapons and is increasing his capabilities to make more. And he is moving ever closer to developing a nuclear weapon.
Clearly to actually work any new inspections, sanctions or enforcement mechanisms will have to be very different. America wants the U.N. to be an effective organization that helps keep the peace. And that is why we are urging the Security Council to adopt a new resolution setting out tough, immediate requirements.
Among those requirements the Iraqi regime must reveal and destroy, under U.N. supervision, all existing weapons of mass destruction. To ensure that we learn the truth, the regime must allow witnesses to its illegal activities to be interviewed outside the country.
And these witnesses must be free to bring their families with them, so they are all beyond the reach of Saddam Hussein's terror and murder.
And inspectors must have access to any site, at any time without pre-clearance, without delay, without exceptions.
The time denying, deceiving and delaying has come to an end. Saddam Hussein must disarm himself, or, for the sake of peace, we will lead a coalition to disarm him.
Many nations are joining us and insisting us that Saddam Hussein's regime be held accountable. They are committed to defending the international security that protects the lives of both our citizens and theirs.
And that's why America is challenging all nations to take the resolutions of the U.N. Security Council seriously. These resolutions are very clear. In addition to declaring and destroying all of its weapons of mass destruction, Iraq must end its support for terrorism. It must cease the persecution of its civilian population. It must stop all illicit trade outside the oil-for-food program. It must release or account for all Gulf War personnel, including an American pilot whose fate is still unknown.
By taking these steps and by only (sic) taking these steps, the Iraqi regime has an opportunity to avoid conflict.
These steps would also change the nature of the Iraqi regime itself. America hopes the regime will make that choice.
Unfortunately, at least so far, we have little reason to expect it. And that's why two administrations -- mine and President Clinton's -- have stated that regime change in Iraq is the only certain means of removing a great danger to our nation.
I hope this will not require military action, but it may. And military conflict could be difficult. An Iraqi regime faced with its own demise may attempt cruel and desperate measures. If Saddam Hussein orders such measures, his generals would be well advised to refuse those orders. If they do not refuse, they must understand that all war criminals will be pursued and punished.
If we have to act, we will take every precaution that is possible. We will plan carefully. We will act with the full power of the United States military. We will act with allies at our side and we will prevail.
(APPLAUSE)
There is no easy or risk-free course of action. Some have argued we should wait, and that's an option. In my view, it's the riskiest of all options, because the longer we wait, the stronger and bolder Saddam Hussein will become. We could wait and hope that Saddam does not give weapons to terrorists or develop a nuclear weapon to blackmail the world. But I'm convinced that is a hope against all evidence.
As Americans, we want peace. We work and sacrifice for peace. But there can be no peace if our security depends on the will and whims of a ruthless and aggressive dictator. I'm not willing to stake one American life on trusting Saddam Hussein.
Failure to act would embolden other tyrants, allow terrorists access to new weapons and new resources, and make blackmail a permanent feature of world events.
The United Nations would betray the purpose of its founding and prove irrelevant to the problems of our time. And through its inaction, the United States would resign itself to a future of fear.
That is not the America I know. That is not the America I serve. We refuse to live in fear.
(APPLAUSE)
This nation, in world war and in cold war, has never permitted the brutal and lawless to set history's course. Now, as before, we will secure our nation, protect our freedom and help others to find freedom of their own.
Some worry that a change of leadership in Iraq could create instability and make the situation worse. The situation could hardly get worse for world security and for the people of Iraq.
The lives of Iraqi citizens would improve dramatically if Saddam Hussein were no longer in power, just as the lives of Afghanistan's citizens improved after the Taliban.
The dictator of Iraq is a student of Stalin, using murder as a tool of terror and control, within his own cabinet, within his own army and even within his own family.
On Saddam Hussein's orders, opponents had been decapitated, wives and mothers of political opponents had been systematically raped as a method of intimidation, and political prisoners had been forced to watch their own children being tortured.
America believes that all people are entitled to hope and human rights, to the non-negotiable demands of human dignity.
People everywhere prefer freedom to slavery, prosperity to squalor, self-government to the rule of terror and torture.
America is a friend to the people of Iraq. Our demands are directed only at the regime that enslaves them and threatens us. When these demands are met, the first and greatest benefit will come to Iraqi men, women and children. The oppression of Kurds, Assyrians, Turkomen, Shia, Sunnis and others will be lifted, the long captivity of Iraq will end, and an era of new hope will begin.
Iraq is a land rich in culture and resources and talent. Freed from the weight of oppression, Iraq's people will be able to share in the progress and prosperity of our time.
If military action is necessary, the United States and our allies will help the Iraqi people rebuild their economy and create the institutions of liberty in a unified Iraq, at peace with its neighbors.
Later this week, the United States Congress will vote on this matter. I have asked Congress to authorize the use of America's military if it proves necessary to enforce U.N. Security Council demands.
Approving this resolution does not mean that military action is imminent or unavoidable. The resolution will tell the United Nations, and all nations, that America speaks with one voice and it is determined to make the demands of the civilized world mean something.
Congress will also be sending a message to the dictator in Iraq that his only chance -- his only choice is full compliance, and the time remaining for that choice is limited.
Members of Congress are nearing an historic vote.
I'm confident they will fully consider the facts and their duties.
The attacks of September the 11th showed our country that vast oceans no longer protect us from danger. Before that tragic date, we had only hints of Al Qaida's plans and designs. Today, in Iraq, we see a threat whose outlines are far more clearly defined and whose consequences could be far more deadly.
Saddam Hussein's actions have put us on notice, and there's no refuge from our responsibilities.
We did not ask for this present challenge, but we accept it. Like other generations of Americans, we will meet the responsibility of defending human liberty against violence and aggression. By our resolve, we will give strength to others. By our courage, we will give hope to others. And by our actions, we will secure the peace and lead the world to a better day.
May God bless America.
BROWN: President Bush in Cincinnati, Ohio, tonight, a speech running almost exactly 30 minutes.
The president said, "I am not willing to stake one American life on trusting Saddam Hussein." The speech low key but quite stern and in many ways very personal.
In regards to the Iraqi leader, the president described the Iraqi leader as a murderous tyrant, a homicidal dictator, addicted, rather, to weapons of mass destruction.
And the president, in terms he has not before nor has the administration before, to our ear, at least, tied the possibility of military action against Iraq directly to the events of September 11. "We refuse to live in fear," said the president. "September 11 showed the attack -- the country as vulnerable."
Our senior White House correspondent, John King, is at the White House tonight, where he's been following the speech.
John, did you hear much that was new in the speech tonight, or was it in many ways tying together a variety of themes that the president and other members of the administration have been making for the last, I guess, three or four weeks?
KING: Very much, Aaron, as promised by the White House. Essentially they said the president tonight would try to deliver what a prosecutor would do as a trial, a closing argument, if you will, just as Congress prepares to vote, just as the U.N. Security Council begins the deliberations over whether to adopt that tough new resolution the president is demanding.
The president, as promised by the White House, methodically, calmly going through every question that he could think of, anyway, that the American people might ask.
You were just discussing one. One question that comes up frequently is, why, one year to the day after the first air strikes in Afghanistan with Osama bin Laden's whereabouts still unknown, why turn now to Iraq? The president saying that it would not be a distraction from the war on terrorism. Indeed, in his view, an urgent continuation of the war on terrorism.
No blockbuster headlines out of this, no major new information. The White House is tonight releasing two previously classified satellite photographs showing, the administration says, some reconstruction work at Iraqi nuclear sites. You heard the president say a senior al Qaeda official getting medical treatment in Baghdad within the past year.
But no new blockbuster evidence. The president trying to pull together everything the administration knows, trying to influence first and foremost the vote in Congress. He's hoping for a big win in Congress. Then comes the much more difficult fight, the United Nations Security Council debate.
But the president also noting, trying to make the case that war is not inevitable, that Saddam Hussein has a chance to save himself, the president said. That was noteworthy tonight. But the president said he did not think that would happen. And if the U.N. does not act, the president made clear that he will.
BROWN: John, just picking up on one thing you mentioned. That is one of the audiences here is clearly the members of the U.N. Security Council, the president has yet to persuade the French and the Russians to go along with his idea.
What is the White House saying about progress there and timeliness? When will a vote come?
KING: Privately, the administration insists it is making some progress. The president spoke to President Putin of Russia earlier today. The administration says there is a consensus forming that there must be a new resolution. The debate now is over how strong that should be, how explicit it should be in putting forward the unfettered access or else, "or else" being military strikes.
The administration is a bit worried about the timetable. It wants a vote in the next week or two. Some indications from the United Nations that key members would like this to go on perhaps another three or four weeks. The administration does not like that.
But they do believe they are making progress in that diplomacy. One of the ways the president is trying to nudge that along is by making it clear to the United Nations, If you want to have influence over a military campaign, if there is one, if you want to have influence over rebuilding Iraq, if that is what becomes necessary, get on the train now, if you will, because the United States will act outside of the United Nations' blessing if the U.N. does not pass a new resolution that meets the president's demands.
BROWN: John, thank you. Senior White House correspondent John King. We'll see you again at 10:00 on "NEWSNIGHT." Much of the rest of the night here devoted to reactions to the president's speech. "LARRY KING LIVE" coming up at the top of the hour. And our coverage of the president's speech continues now with "CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT." We'll see you at 10:00 Eastern time.
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