MR. RUSSERT: First, this man, Mahmoud Abbas, has resigned as Palestinian Prime Minister; and this man, the President of the United States, will address the nation tonight about the war in Iraq; and here to talk about both those events, and more, is the Secretary of State Colin Powell. Welcome. SECRETARY POWELL: Good morning, Tim. MR. RUSSERT: Mahmoud Abbas has resigned. Did Yasser Arafat do him in? SECRETARY POWELL: I think a number of things caused Prime Minister Abbas to offer his resignation. He wasn't getting the support he needed from other leaders in the Palestinian community to put all the security forces of the Palestinian Authority under his control so he could go after terrorism. The problem here is Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other terrorist organizations who do not want to see a Palestinian state living side by side with Israel. They want to destroy Israel, and terror is their weapon, and that has to be dealt with. And whoever the new Palestinian Prime Minister is, if there is going to be a process to peace, if the roadmap is going to continue to unfold -- and I believe it can continue to unfold -- then there has to be a concerted effort against Hamas and other terrorist organizations and terror activity. And I hope that as the Palestinian Legislative Council considers this issue over the next several days they will give the new Prime Minister the political power he needs, the political authority he needs, and the resources that he needs to go after Hamas. I am encouraged that over the weekend the European Union came together and made a political decision that Hamas has to be seen as a terrorist organization and not a militant wing and a political wing and a social wing, that the whole thing is a terrorist organization. Let there be no doubt that it is Hamas and PIJ that is causing this difficulty on the way down the roadmap. MR. RUSSERT: Do we support Israel's policy of assassinating Hamas leadership? SECRETARY POWELL: We don't support that policy. It has never been our policy to support that kind of action. Israel feels it's necessary to take those actions. We are always saying to our Israeli colleagues, "You have to consider the long-term consequences of such actions," and, "Are you creating more Hamas killers in the future by actions such as this," which injures innocent people as well as going after somebody that they believe is guilty. MR. RUSSERT: The resignation of Abbas clearly puts some major obstacles on the roadmap to peace. SECRETARY POWELL: Yes, it does. But the roadmap is still there. I mean, what is the alternative to the roadmap? The roadmap is there. Both sides had obligations. And in the first few weeks after Aqaba, the Aqaba summit where the roadmap was blessed by all the parties, we saw progress. Gaza and Bethlehem were turned over the Palestinians. The Israelis had started to remove some of the unauthorized outposts. So we had some halting, but nevertheless steady, steps forward. We were making some small progress. And you could even sense it in the streets of Israel as the violence ended and there was less concern about a terrorist attack. And then Hamas started striking again and terrorism returned, and now they have caused us to have to stop and pause once again while the Palestinian Legislative Council and Palestinian leadership decide what they're going to do. They have to decide on a cause of peace. They have to decide that, once and for all, all weapons inside the Palestinian Authority, any form of power inside the Palestinian Authority, has to be under legal control. You cannot be a responsible government if you have terrorist organizations operating within your areas of responsibility that go after innocent people and, frankly, destroy the dreams of your own people. MR. RUSSERT: Some Israelis are now suggesting now is the time to put Yasser Arafat into permanent exile. SECRETARY POWELL: I don't know that that would accomplish much to put him on the world stage, as opposed to the stage he's currently occupying. I know that the Foreign Minister of Israel has suggested that this morning, and I will wait and see what reaction it gets inside the Israeli cabinet and from the Prime Minister. MR. RUSSERT: Would you support it? SECRETARY POWELL: I would not support it at this time. MR. RUSSERT: Will you negotiate with Yasser Arafat? SECRETARY POWELL: No. MR. RUSSERT: Period? SECRETARY POWELL: Period. He is not an interlocutor for peace. He has demonstrated it over the years. He has demonstrated it to me personally over a period of a year and a half until we stopped dealing with him last summer, and he certainly demonstrated that as well to the previous administration. MR. RUSSERT: So, who do we negotiate with? SECRETARY POWELL: We negotiate with the Prime Minister of the Palestinian people. It was the Palestinian Legislative Council that created this position. It was Mr. Arafat who nominated Prime Minister Abbas for the position. And now it is up to the Palestinian Legislative Council to come up with a new Prime Minister. And I don't know who that person might be, but that person will run into the same problems Mr. Abbas ran into unless that person has the political authority to get the job done and is given the resources, especially the security resources and the financial resources, available to the Palestinian Authority. It has to be under the Prime Minister. And we hope that that individual, whoever that individual is, is someone who is committed to peace, committed to the roadmap, committed to going after terror with all the resources at his disposal. That will be somebody we can work with and somebody the Israelis can work with. MR. RUSSERT: Before we turn to Iraq, on Afghanistan, al-Qaida has released a new tape this morning saying that there will be more attacks inside and outside of the United States, but also that they shot down two helicopters, killing 38 passengers, and that American casualties in Afghanistan over the last few weeks have been quite severe but not reported. SECRETARY POWELL: No, I don't pay any attention to that kind of reporting. We report our casualties, report incidents, in an honest and open and candid way. This is the usual propaganda. MR. RUSSERT: But it seems that the Taliban, al-Qaida, have reconstituted in Afghanistan and are posing a serious threat. SECRETARY POWELL: There are still Taliban and al-Qaida elements operating in Afghanistan and going across the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan. We are working closely with the Pakistani authorities to try to seal that very, very rugged, difficult border to seal. And there have been successes in recent weeks as we have taken the fight to them, and they have sustained quite a few losses. We have also sustained losses. This is a continuing conflict. It is not over. But while we look at the conflict that is continuing in Afghanistan and in Iraq, let's not overlook the good things that have happened in Afghanistan and Iraq. And I'm sure you will ask me a question that will allow me to expand upon that. MR. RUSSERT: Let's turn to the subject of Iraq. The President will address the nation tonight. What can we expect? SECRETARY POWELL: I think you will hear the President reflect on our two-year campaign against terror. He will make sure there is no doubt in the minds of the American people, or people around the world, that we are totally committed to this campaign, that terror must be eliminated. He will take note of the successes that we have had in Iraq and Afghanistan. People talk about casualties, and we regret them, but let's also talk about the fact that a rotten regime is no longer in power in Baghdad or in Kabul, that in both of those places we see the emergence of new political leaders and new forms of government that are democratically based. In Iraq, the schools are open, the hospitals are open, there is a free press, the utilities are coming back on, the infrastructure is being repaired, there are no more mass graves being created. This is all to the good. And we have created a council, a Governing Council of 25 individuals who have now appointed 25 cabinet ministers, and who are also now about to start a constitutional writing process. So we are doing what everybody wants us to do and what we said we would do. We have started the process of creating a representative form of government in a country that has never had it before. And it's going to be a difficult task, but the task is underway. And that's why the President is very thankful of all the nations who have joined us in this effort so far. Standing alongside us in Iraq today with troops are some 28, 29 nations with over 20,000 troops, two multinational divisions -- one led by the British, one led by the Poles -- Spaniards, Czechs, all sorts of nations there. And we hope with this new resolution, once we get it worked out with the Security Council, that more nations will see fit to join that effort, but, beyond just military presence, will join the reconstruction effort and will give us the political support, the international political support that we need, to carry this process forward. It is in the interests of the world, and it is certainly the goal of the United States, to turn sovereignty back to the Iraqi people for their country and for their destiny as quickly as possible. The President has said this all along. He will reaffirm that tonight. Tonight, he will say we are going after terrorists, we are going to create the security needed in Iraq that will encourage more nations to join us in this effort, and he will also say that there are challenges ahead and there will be fiscal requirements, and he will talk about the need for supplemental funding. MR. RUSSERT: I want to talk about the UN resolution, the need for international troops, but one point on the rationale for the war. The President said repeatedly we must disarm Saddam Hussein of weapons of mass destruction. You went to the United Nations, told the country and the world that Saddam Hussein had sizeable quantities of weapons of mass destruction; we would find them. Where are they? Will we ever find them? SECRETARY POWELL: We put forward to the world, and in my presentation on the 5th of February, the best intelligence information that we had, that he had weapons and that he had programs. David Kay is in charge of our effort now, with some 1,500 inspectors and analysts and experts. He will provide an interim report later this month, and I am confident when people see what David Kay puts forward they will see that there was no question that such weapons exist, existed, and so did the programs to develop one. MR. RUSSERT: Was our intelligence overstated? Did we miss this? SECRETARY POWELL: I don't think so, Tim, and I don't think that charge is an accurate one. I can tell you that I sat for a period of four days with the analysts, and there was no blowing up or overdoing what they were telling me. We did not hype it. I did not put forward a presentation on the 5th of February before the world at the United Nations Security Council that wasn't solidly supported by the best analysis that we were able to bring to the effort. If there was anything that looked the least bit, you know, not supportable, we didn't use it. And these are the most dedicated people in the intelligence community who put that presentation together. So we did not try to hyper it or blow it out of proportion. MR. RUSSERT: Let me turn to the resolution that we'll submit to the United Nations. This has been the response of two key countries, France and Germany. They rejected as insufficient the Bush Administration's proposal to give the UN a greater role in Iraq's security and reconstruction. They said the proposed U.S. resolution failed to meet their primary concerns, that political authority in Iraq be transferred to Iraqis as quickly as possible, and the United Nations, not the United States, take over the main role in rebuilding Iraq. Would we allow the UN to take over the main role in rebuilding Iraq in order to satisfy the Russians, the Germans, the French? SECRETARY POWELL: No. Look, there is enough work here for everyone, but the lead role has to be played by the United States. We are the ones who are there now. We are the ones who took over the country. We have governing responsibility. And we believe that there is no need for a contest over this. The President has always said that the United Nations should play a vital role. Sergio de Mello, who lost his life tragically in helping to play this vital role, was filling that vital role function. He was working closely with Ambassador Bremer. We were making it clear what the UN could do and should do with respect to electoral reform, with respect to reconstruction activities, with respect to working with Ambassador Bremer and the creation of the political entity that the Iraqi people could be proud of, of a Governing Council. And so we have a good, cooperative effort. But to think that somehow you could suddenly bring in the UN and say, "It's all yours," and expect them to be able to do the job under the current set of circumstances is not appropriate. Now, the other part of the statement that you've just read, or the press report you just read, said that we want to move to sovereignty as quickly as possible. So do we. But to think that somehow you could, tomorrow, wake up and say, "Okay, fine, give sovereignty back to the Iraqi people," before you have a constitution, before you've had elections, before you've had the institutions of democracy put in place, is not a reasonable statement to make. I have been in touch with my French and German colleagues, as well as a number of my other colleagues around the world, and I have asked them for specific suggestions they might have with respect to the resolution, as opposed to broad statements. They should study it a little longer and come forward with specific ideas before giving it a grade. MR. RUSSERT: Here's the problem. This is how the Congressional Budget Office warned the Congress and the country: that the Army lacks sufficient active duty forces to maintain its current level of nearly 150,000 troops in Iraq beyond next spring. In a report that underscores the stress being placed on the military by the occupation of Iraq, the Congressional Budget Office said the Army's goal of keeping the same number of troops in Iraq and limiting tours of duty there to a year, while maintaining its current presence elsewhere in the world, will be impossible to sustain without activating more National Guard or Reserve units; the Army does not have enough active duty component forces to simultaneously maintain the occupation at its current size, limit deployments to a year, and sustain all its other commitments, in the first detailed analysis of the likely future costs of the Iraqi occupation. The Europeans know that. Don't they have us over a barrel? The French, the Germans can say: "You called us `Old Europe,' you dissed us, and now you're asking for our help. Well, then you have to turn this over to the UN or we're not sending troops, and you can stay there as long as you want, but you can't afford to." SECRETARY POWELL: I'm not sure the French and the Germans are prepared to send troops under any set of circumstances. The Germans have sort of made that rather clear, and the French are rather stressed. With respect to how many troops are going to be required a year from now, that's a judgment that will have to be made by the Pentagon and will be a function of how the situation has changed. We are not expecting this new resolution to cause a large number of additional troops to be added to the international community. I would guess that perhaps there are 10- to 15,000 more who might be available. There are a lot of demands on the international community -- in the Congo, in Liberia, in Bosnia, Kosovo, many other places. What we are really interested in in this resolution, though, is to get the international community to come together and participate in the political reconstruction of Iraq. But we've got a plan. Ambassador Bremer has a plan. And you have to have a single leader, and that single leader right now is Ambassador Bremer. And the UN has a vital role to play and we can work out arrangements where the UN is more than represented and plays those roles that it is best able to play without, in any way, causing any confusing between the responsibilities of the Governing Council or Ambassador Bremer as the Coalition Provisional Authority leader. We will be able to work all of these out, I am quite sure, and I want to hear specific suggestions from my Security Council colleagues as to how we might do this. MR. RUSSERT: Mr. Secretary, as you know, before the war, you warned about the difficulties of winning the peace. Brent Scowcroft, the former National Security Advisor to President Bush, said that you couldn't attain it in a reasonable period of time. Anthony Zinni, Marine General, a man that you know and respect, has this to say, that the -- and he still consults for the State Department. He blasted the Bush Administration's handling of the postwar Iraq, saying it lacked a coherent strategy, a serious plan and sufficient resources: "There's no strategy or mechanism for putting the pieces together. We're in danger of failing." Zinni invoked the U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War in the '60s and '70s: "My contemporaries, our feelings and sensitivities, were forged on the battlefields of Vietnam, where we heard the garbage and the lies and we saw the sacrifice. I ask you, is it happening again?" SECRETARY POWELL: Well, we have many consultants at the State Department. General Zinni was a consultant and still does some important work for the Institute of Peace with respect to Indonesia. I don't think it's happening again. We have very, very competent commanders who were also officers who served in Vietnam, people like Lieutenant General Rick Sanchez on the ground, John Abizaid, Dave Petrais, the Commander of the 101st Airborne Division up in the north who is doing a brilliant job, and you've been reading about it in the papers, of bringing stability to the northern part of Iraq in a way where the governing councils of the various towns are able to take more responsibility. We do have a strategy, and Ambassador Bremer, on Friday, laid that strategy out to the Iraqi people. And it goes from establishing security and increasingly giving the security responsibilities over to Iraqis as the national army is trained, as police are trained, as border patrols are trained; and then, slowly but surely, giving more and more authority to the Governing Council, to the new cabinet ministers; and then putting in place a constitution that will lead to free elections, and those elections will result in a government of Iraq, and at that point it will be transferred to Iraq. And so while we find lots of things to criticize -- yes, we're taking casualties, we regret every one and I wish there were no casualties, but sometimes that's what conflict requires, most often that's what conflict requires -- let's not overlook the successes that we have had, let's not overlook the new sense of hope that we are giving to the Iraqi people, with schools opened, free press, all the other things that we take for granted but which were never seen in Iraq before. All that is now happening. The President will talk to this tonight and let the American people know that they can be proud of what we accomplished, proud of what our youngsters are doing. But it is still a war, it is a war that we have to fight, and it's a war that we will win. MR. RUSSERT: General Zinni had one other comment, and that was questioning the Bush Administration's decision in January to have the Pentagon oversee postwar efforts in Iraq: "Why the hell would the Department of Defense be the organization in our government that deals with reconstruction of Iraq. It doesn't make sense." SECRETARY POWELL: Yes, it does, and there's quite a bit of precedent for it. I mean, General Douglas MacArthur was not a State Department or Department of Commerce official in Japan. And when you are looking at a problem like a mission like this and you are about to take over a country of 25 million people through the use of military force, and in the aftermath of that conflict you have to establish security throughout the country, then the military is uniquely suited for this. MR. RUSSERT: Would we be willing to say -- SECRETARY POWELL: You know, but it's not just the Pentagon. I mean, I have a considerable number of State Department officers who are working for Ambassador Bremer. Ambassador Bremer is a former Foreign Service Officer of great distinction doing a great job. And we are all now working this is a team effort. MR. RUSSERT: Would the United States be willing to say to the United Nations, to the French and the Germans and others, "All right, the Pentagon will not be the lead organization in the reconstruction, it will be shifted to the State Department, if that will help encourage you to join us in this effort"? SECRETARY POWELL: Neither the French nor the Germans have questioned the manner in which the United States organizes. It is now being run by an interagency group, but there has to be a lead, and the lead -- appropriately -- is the Pentagon because of the resources and assets that the Pentagon can bring to bear on the problem. And all of the other institutions of government, all the other ministries of our government, are supporting and assisting the Pentagon. MR. RUSSERT: Madeleine Albright, one of your predecessors as Secretary of State, was on the Today program the other day talking about terrorism and Iraq, and had this to say. Let's watch: "I do think that what has happened is that whereas the link with al-Qaida was very tenuous, at best, when proposed by the Bush Administration, now, in fact, Iraq is going to become a breeding ground for terrorism or a gathering ground, as Afghanistan had." A breeding ground? SECRETARY POWELL: I think it is certainly, for the moment, starting to look like there are terrorists who are being drawn to Baghdad. I am not sure how large these numbers are, how significant the threat it. But we will deal with it in Iraq. And two-thirds of al-Qaida's senior leadership has been destroyed over the last two years since the war on terror began right after 9/11, and we are concerned about the fact that some al-Qaida elements or terrorists may be heading toward Iraq, and they will be dealt with there. And they will be dealt with not just by the U.S. forces, but by the coalition forces, and increasingly, I think, will be dealt with by Iraq indigenous security forces that are being raised and created right now. MR. RUSSERT: How are we going to know we've won in Iraq? SECRETARY POWELL: We'll know we have won when the security situation is under control, when the political process is well underway and a constitution is in place, elections are taking place and we're preparing for the turnover of the government to the Iraqi people, and they have put in place the institutions of government so that we can leave, if that's what they wish us to do, and we will see a responsible government that will live in peace with its neighbors, not abuse its people, and not develop weapons of mass destruction. MR. RUSSERT: That'll be years. SECRETARY POWELL: I don't know how long it will take, but the process has begun. MR. RUSSERT: Let me turn to North Korea. One of your staff members, an Under Secretary of State, John Bolton, gave a speech, and this is how it was reported, that Kim Jong-il and his grip on the nation, the speech entitled, "Dictatorship at the Crossroads," described life in North Korea as a "hellish nightmare" and called Kim a "tyrannical rogue." Is that helpful? SECRETARY POWELL: It's accurate. And John's speech was cleared within the Department, so there was nothing that was inconsistent with policy. John happened to give it in Seoul at a time when were undergoing some delicate discussions with our friends and it got a great deal of attention, and it got a great deal of attention especially from the North Koreans. But notwithstanding all of the attention it got, the North Koreans and all of our other neighbors in that part of the world came together in Beijing a few days after the speech to begin a six-party discussion about this problem. MR. RUSSERT: Also this from The New York Times, however. In an interview last year with The New York Time, John Bolton was asked about conflicting signals from the administration on North Korea. He strode over to a bookshelf, pulled off a volume and slapped it on the table. It was called The End of North Korea by an American Enterprise Institute colleague. "That," he said, "is our policy." Is that our policy? SECRETARY POWELL: Our policy is the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. It's also the policy of all of those participating in the six-party talks. But if you think that I am any more of a fan of the North Korean regime than John Bolton is, that's wrong. We know this regime. We know the kind of regime it is. We know about the prison camps that it keeps. We know about its trafficking in drugs, its trafficking in counterfeit currency. This is not a regime to be admired in any way. But our policy right now is not to invade it or to overthrow it, but right now our policy is the denuclearization of the peninsula. And then there are many other issues we have that we want to engage our friends on with respect to North Korea: these criminal activities that it participates in, as well as a large army it maintains at the expense of taking care of its people, and its proliferation of missiles and other technologies that could be used to develop weapons of mass destruction. So there's quite an agenda we have with the North Korean regime, and I think the success that we have had in recent months is making it not just an agenda between us and the North Koreans, but between us, the Russians, the Chinese, the South Koreans, the Japanese and the North Koreans. Six parties, not just two. MR. RUSSERT: The cover of Time Magazine tomorrow headlined, "The Saudis: Whose Side Are They On in the War on Terror?" And this release from Vanity Fair Magazine: "Former White House Counterterrorism Czar Richard Clark said that the Bush Administration decided to allow a group of Saudis to fly out of the U.S. just after September 11th at a time when access to U.S. airspace was still restricted. It required special government approval. According to other sources, at least four flights with 140 Saudis, including roughly two dozen members of the bin Laden family, flew to Saudi Arabia that week without even being interviewed or interrogated by the FBI. Why was that allowed? SECRETARY POWELL: Well, I don't know that that's accurate. I don't know the details of what happened. But my understanding is that there was no sneaking out of the country, that the flights were well known and it was coordinated within the government. But I don't have the details about what the FBI's role in it might or might not have been. MR. RUSSERT: How about the Saudis? Do you believe they are on our side in the war on terror? SECRETARY POWELL: Yes, I do. And if you see what the Saudis have done, look at what they have in recent months in terms of going after terrorists within the Kingdom, they have become far more active since the bombings that took place in the Kingdom in May, and the level of cooperation has gone up. I think the Saudis have a clear understanding that they have a major role, more of a role than they have playing in the past, and they have been aggressively pursuing terrorists. They have pulled up a number of cells, found a lot of explosives and other devices within Saudi Arabia, and we are going to continue to encourage them to do that. We are encouraging them to cut off all funding for any organization that might have a terrorist connection anywhere in the world, to include places like Hamas, and we're getting good reception from them. We have sent teams over to talk to Crown Prince Abdullah on all of the issues that we think we need to be focusing on, and we have found a new spirit of cooperation. MR. RUSSERT: Colin Powell, we thank you for sharing your views. SECRETARY POWELL: Thank you, Tim.
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