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CNN Live Sunday

Former Secretary of State Baker Weighs In on War With Iraq

Aired August 25, 2002 - 17:06   ET

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

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: More rumbling today over whether the U.S. should attack Iraq. Former Secretary of State James Baker is proposing U.N. inspectors return to Baghdad and, if not allowed in, Baker says it would give the U.S. the moral high ground for a strike against Iraq. CNN White House Correspondent Kelly Wallace joins us with more from Crawford, Texas. Hi there Kelly. How's the White House responding to all this?
KELLY WALLACE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hello. Well aides are welcoming this really, Fredricka. They say this is part of a constructive debate about how to deal with Saddam Hussein. You could say the president is certainly getting a lot of advice and James Baker is really the latest member of the president's father's administration to speak out publicly.

You'll recall, of course, he served as secretary of state during the Persian Gulf War, and Mr. Baker in an op-ed in Sunday's New York Times, he says that the only realistic way to bring about regime change in Iraq is through military force. But at the same time, he is urging this White House to get international support for any military campaign, just as he and the former president did a decade ago.

In that op-ed, Mr. Baker writes: "Although the United States could certainly succeed, we should try our best not to have to go it alone, and the president should reject the advice of those who counsel doing so. The cost in all areas will be much greater, as will the political risks, both domestic and international, if we end up going it alone or with only one or two other countries."

But other Republicans are saying something else. They are saying the president must act even if he can't get an international coalition together to topple Saddam Hussein.

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SEN. JAMES INHOFE (R) OKLAHOMA: We could sit around here again talking this thing to death and wringing our hands and finding out that he has something ready to go. Would he use it? You bet he would use it.

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WALLACE: Now aides continue to say that President Bush has not made any decision, that he's considering all options and that when he has made up his mind, he will go before the American people. Now in an effort to deal with growing opposition in the Arab world, this administration is really turning into a media trainer.

Seventeen Iraqi exiles from North America and Europe will head to the State Department this week. They will be trained in how to write opinion pieces, how to give speeches, how to do television interviews. The president and his aides say the goal here encouraging these Iraqi exiles to speak out in Arabic and make the case that the Iraqi people and Iraq's neighbors would be better off if Saddam Hussein no longer is in power. Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right, thanks very much Kelly Wallace.

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