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CNN Sunday Morning
Interview with William Triplett
Aired February 17, 2002 - 11:36 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.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Let's get more on President Bush's East Asia trip. He's in Tokyo right now. Later, he'll travel to South Korea and China, where he'll be pushing his defense plan. For some analysis on the Washington-Beijing relations we're joined by William Triplett who is in Savannah, Georgia, and he's an expert on Chinese policy. Thanks for joining us this morning.
WILLIAM TRIPLETT, ANALYST: Thank you very much for having me.
WHITFIELD: Well Bush will no doubt be concentrating his efforts while in China to try to open their markets to American agricultural products, that being one of the items on his agenda. What are the chances of getting some success on that?
TRIPLETT: Well certainly, you're looking at 1.3 billion potential customers, and I think agricultural products have some good opportunities in China.
WHITFIELD: Given the fact that in recent years, the U.S.-Chinese relations have been somewhat strained, particularly because of the midair collision that took place just over a year ago. How much time is going to be spent on really trying to smooth out the ruffled feathers? Are you having a problem hearing me at this point right now, Mr. Triplett? Can you hear me?
TRIPLETT: I can hear you fine.
WHITFIELD: OK, very good. We got somebody else's countdown there. Given the fact that the U.S.-Chinese relations have been somewhat strained, particularly because of the midair collision that took place just over a year ago, how much time is actually going to be spend do you think during this meeting on trying to smooth out the ruffled feathers?
TRIPLETT: Well the President's only going to be in country about 36 hours, and so some of that will be ceremonial and some of it will be business. I think defense is going to be at the top of the list, along with economics, of course.
WHITFIELD: The "axis of evil" remarks made by President Bush during his State of the Union Address, has certainly caused a lot of waves all over, particularly among the allies. Even the Chinese have said that they believe that that statement will bring on some serious repercussions, particularly because of the association of the countries and naming of the countries in this "axis of evil." What might this be doing to kind of set the stage for Bush and what he's up against during this meeting?
TRIPLETT: Well, I think the President made those statements pretty deliberately. He knows that North Korea, of course, is very close to China. He also knows that Iran and Iraq have both been recipients of Chinese weapons of mass destruction programs in the past. So I think he wanted to put everyone on notice.
On the other hand, I think also he's going to want to talk about Chinese purchases of weapons from Russia, which may ultimately be used potentially against American servicemen. I think that will be high on the list also.
WHITFIELD: Well you said yourself, he's not going to be spending a whole lot of time on the ground there though. That sounds like an awful lot of stuff to try and cover in such a short trip.
TRIPLETT: Well certainly that's true, but I think there's been a lot of preliminary work done on this, and I think everybody's ready to be pretty well businesslike.
But again, one of the things they're going to want to talk about are these two new destroyers that the Chinese have bought from Russia for $1.4 billion, and these ships were designed in the old Cold War days to attack American aircraft carriers. And, I think the President's going to want an explanation from the Chinese Government on why they want to buy these weapons systems.
WHITFIELD: All right, thanks very much William Triplett for joining us, and we're going to be watching this, of course, all week. The President just has embarked on his six-day tour of East Asia and he's right now in Tokyo, and will be making his way to China and South Korea as well. Thanks very much for joining us.
TRIPLETT: Thank you very much.
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