JOURNAL DEC 06 '90 17:54 ABC NEWS NIGHTLINE WASH DC

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ABC NEWS

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Press contact: Laura Wessner (212) 887-4995

November 30, 1990
Show #2485

## Nightline
Bush Announces Baker Trip to Baghdad

In Washington
TED KOPPEL.................................................. Host

Guests
In New York
ABDALLA AL-ASH'TAL......... Yemeni Ambassador to the U.N.

In Kent, Connecticut
HENRY KISSINGER.................. former Secretary of State

Report From ABC News Correspondent:
JEFF GREENFIELD

DORRANCE SMITH................................................ Executive Producer

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not, for that reason, be guaranteed as to accuracy of speakers and
spelling. (JPM)

ABC NEWS NIGHTLINE Show #2485 Air Date: November 30, 1990

## Bush Announces Baker Trip to Baghdad

**TED KOPPEL:** [voice-over] The President, encouraged by yesterday's U.N. vote, takes a bold step and says to Iraq, "Let's talk."

**Pres. GEORGE BUSH:** To go the extra mile for peace, I will issue an invitation to foreign minister Tariq Aziz to come to Washington. In addition, I am asking Secretary Jim Baker to go to Baghdad to see Saddam Hussein.

**KOPPEL:** [voice-over] But at the same time, the warning from Washington is clear and unequivocal.

**Pres. BUSH:** Time is running out. You must leave Kuwait, and we've given you time to do just exactly that.

**KOPPEL:** [voice-over] Have the winds of war died down, or is it the calm before the storm?

**ANNOUNCER:** This is ABC News Nightline. Reporting from Washington with the latest on the gulf crisis, Ted Koppel.

**KOPPEL:** It was back during the height of the Vietnam war that a U.S. senator from Vermont, George Aiken, suggested that the United States declare victory and get out. Most people thought he was joking. He wasn't. What Senator Aiken understood that most people don't is that a government's posture and what is says is almost as important as what it does.

What President Bush said this morning sounded tough and uncompromising. Iraq must withdraw, unconditionally, from Kuwait. Kuwait's legitimate government must be restored. All foreign hostages must be released. There will be no face-saving gestures for Saddam Hussein, said Mr. Bush. And then he invited Iraq's foreign minister to come to Washington and said that, subsequently, Secretary of State Baker would be ready to meet with Saddam in Baghdad.

And tonight, Iraq is claiming victory. Senior government sources in Baghdad are quoted as saying that the Americans have realized that this is the only way forward.

So who, if anyone, has gained what? That's our focus tonight. We begin with this report from Nightline correspondent Jeff Greenfield.

**Pres. BUSH:** To go the extra mile for peace, I will issue an invitation to foreign minister Tariq Aziz to come to Washington at a mutually convenient time. In addition, I am asking Secretary Jim Baker to go to Baghdad to see Saddam Hussein.

**JEFF GREENFIELD, ABC News:** You might have thought the eagle on the presidential seal had come to life today, brandishing the olive branches of peace. Even though Baghdad had no immediate response, President Bush's proposal for face-to-face meetings with Iraqi officials had people talking as if peace might be about to break out.

From the United Nations, where the Security Council only yes-

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terday authorized the use of force against Iraq, came wurrs of
hope.

ABDALLA AL-ASHTAL, Yemeni Ambassador to the U.N.: I think it's the best news I've heard for a long time. It's very promising. Everybody must be excited in the area.

ALI TREIKI, Libyan Ambassador to the U.N.: The fact that the United States now has agreed to talk to Iraq, it is a good step forward.

JAVIER PEREZ de CUELLAR, Secretary General to the U.N.: It is a decision which goes in the sense of peace.

GREENFIELD: [voice-over] From Capitol Hill, where words of caution and dissent have been heard all week, came words of praise.

Sen. SAM NUNN, (D), Chairman, Armed Services Committee: I welcome this change in the administration's policy. I think that direct contact and dialogue is very important.

Rep. HENRY HYDE, (R), Illinois: I think it's brilliant. I think it's a graphic example of his willingness to go the last mile.

GREENFIELD: [voice-over] Stocks rose nearly 41 points, the biggest jump in three weeks. The benchmark price of oil dropped more than $4.00 a barrel. Gold, which rises in times of crisis, fell by $5.00 an ounce.

[on camera] After nearly four months of military mobilization and constant talk of war, it's understandable that even a hint of negotiation could trigger a sense of optimism. But if you listened to the President's speech today, you heard not just the rustling of those olive branches, but the rang of steel as well.

[voice-over] The coming talks, the President said flatly, were not about negotiations. They were designed to deliver a message.

Pres. BUSH: I am not suggesting discussions that will result in anything less than Iraq's complete withdrawal from Kuwait, restoration of Kuwait's legitimate government and freedom for all hostages. And I don't see that there's room for concession, there's room for giving something to save face. That's not the way you treat with aggression.

GREENFIELD: [voice-over] And listen to the stark terms in which the President described the kind of war the United States would wage.

Pres. BUSH: Let me assure you, should military action be required, this will not be another Vietnam. This will not be a protracted, drawn-out war. I want peace, not war, but if there must be war, we will not permit our troops to have their hands tied behind their backs and I pledge to you there will not be any murky ending.

GREENFIELD: [voice-over] In fact, while the world began to wonder what Tariq Aziz and Jim Baker might say and hear, President Bush was doubting the chances of the proposal he had just made.

Pres. BUSH: I'm not all that hopeful that what— that we'll get big results out of all of this. It's going the extra mile, it's taking

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JOURNAL DECE 06 '90 17:55 ABC NEWS' NIGHTLINE WASH DC

the extra step

ANTHONY CORDESMAN, ABC News Consultant: Those negotiations will have to be a presentation of the fact that the United States is ready to use force and that the use of force is becoming more likely, not a reliance on diplomatic options to the exclusion of the military one.

GREENFIELD: [voice-over] In part, President Bush's words were addressed to the home front, where dissent has been growing.

Adm. WILLIAM CROWE, (Ret.), ABC News Consultant: He's got to worry about Congress now, he's got to worry about the American public, and he is going to tend the garden, domestically, and that this was the first effort in that regard.

GREENFIELD: [voice-over] Those who have been skeptical about the resort to force remain so.

Sen. NUNN: There needs to be a case made before we got to war that the embargo and what I call the Bush strategy number one is not working and not likely to work, and that case has not been made.

Sen. EDWARD KENNEDY, (D), Massachusetts: Going the true extra mile means giving sanctions adequate time to work. The January 15th fuse for war is still lit, and the current peace initiative must not be permitted to divert the nation's attention from that fact.

GREENFIELD: If George Bush's words are to be taken literally, this peace gesture amounts to an invitation to Iraq's president and foreign minister to listen to a non-negotiable ultimatum. But the optimistic response to the President's words suggests that, in the world of international politics, symbolic gestures can sometimes take on a life of their own. I'm Jeff Greenfield for Nightline, in New York.

KOPPEL: When we come back, we'll talk with one of the two ambassadors who voted against yesterday's Security Council use of force resolution, Yemen's Abdalla Al-Ashtal and later, former secretary of state Henry Kissinger, who testified earlier this week before the Senate hearings on the gulf.

[Commercial break]

KOPPEL: Abdalla Al-Ashtal is Yemen's representative to the United Nations. Because of the rotation system, Ambassador Al-Ashtal becomes the president of the Security Council at midnight tonight, and will hold that position for the month of December. He joins us tonight from New York.

You expressed some optimism today when you heard the President's speech. Why?

ABDALLA AL-ASHTAL, Yemeni Ambassador to the U.N.: Well, after four months of talk of war, for the first time there is a big signal that things are changing towards a peaceful approach. It's quite a change.

KOPPEL: Why do you think it's a change? One could, for example, read the President's remarks today as saying: "I don't think the message has been getting through to you, President Saddam. I want to make sure you understand exactly what I've been saying, and that

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just want to make sure you get it clear."

Amb. AL-ASHAT: Well, first of all I don't think you send an emissary just to give an ultimatum. The other point is, to—in order to implement the resolutions of the council, a number of steps have to be taken that are not covered by the resolution, and these have to be negotiated with the other party. Therefore, it's important for the President to send the emissary in order to talk on how a solution would come about.

KOPPEL: Was this exchange of emissaries, Mr. Ambassador, something that was behind the scenes, a part of the vote on the Security Council resolution yesterday? In other words, was there some U.S. assurance that this would happen if only people would vote for the resolution?

Amb. AL-ASHAT: That's why I say it was a surprise, really. I can't say how things developed, but I must say that it's a big change and as far as we can see from the council, things will be moving in a different direction now.

KOPPEL: You have spoken of an Arab solution that was actually suggested back in August already, in early August. Could you spell out for us how you would see such a solution taking form?

Amb. AL-ASHAT: At one point during the process of resolving the issue, there must be an Arab summit, I must say, or a gathering, in which the whole solution will be [unintelligible]. It's difficult to imagine that there will be a solution outside of the Arab halls.

KOPPEL: Well— I'm not quite sure I understand what role the other Arab states would play. Can you sort of sketch it out for me?

Amb. AL-ASHAT: Well, an Arab solution would be the one which would make the concessions acceptable. In other words, trying to resolve the issue within the Arab league and within an Arab summit would be the best way in order to come back from a position and also it would be a sort of a way out which would not become possible if it was only through the United Nations.

KOPPEL: Well, you heard what President Bush had to say today. There will have to be unconditional withdrawal from Kuwait, there will have to be a restoration of the legitimate government, all the hostages will have to be released. Let's set aside the hostages for a moment, that's easy, their release. But how does Saddam Hussein pull out of Kuwait and permit the restoration of a legitimate government without losing face?

Amb. AL-ASHAT: Well, in order to pull out from Kuwait in the first place, there has to be some kind of process. There has to be either a peacekeeping force or some third party which would take up the territory. After that, there should be some kind of arrangement for the lifting of the sanctions. So there will have to be some kind of negotiation in the process.

KOPPEL: And would you see at some point down the road, after the restoration of a legitimate government in Kuwait, negotiations between Kuwait and Iraq, then, perhaps for some of that territory that Saddam has wanted in Kuwait?

Amb. AL-ASHAT: Eventually there will have to be an agreement on

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the dispute, whether it's the territorial dispute or the financial dispute which is arising now, and also an arrangement has to be made for the security of the whole region.

**KOPPEL:** So eventually it is possible that Saddam might get what he wants even if initially he looks as though he's caved in?

**Amb. AL-ASHAT:** Well, in order to have a political solution, one has to come halfway, and I believe that it would be impossible to think of a political solution with one party feeling that he's giving everything altogether. So I suppose that any negotiated political solution, although it might look like one is not giving a lot, but it would be quite possible to withdraw and make it look like, because of the Arab meeting, make it look like the withdrawal was part of a larger compromise.

**KOPPEL:** Ambassador Al-Ashtal, thank you very much indeed for being with us.

When we come back, we'll talk with former secretary of state Henry Kissinger.

[Commercial break]

**KOPPEL:** Joining us now from his home in Connecticut is former secretary of state Henry Kissinger. Earlier this week Dr. Kissinger appeared before the Senate Armed Services Committee hearings to testify on the gulf crisis.

Dr. Kissinger, I remember a former secretary of state telling me once, many years ago, that in order for any negotiated settlement to last, there has to be something in it for both sides. You see the outlines of that?

**HENRY KISSINGER, former Secretary of State:** No, no, I don't. I must say, watching television and hearing so many comments, I feel extremely lonely. I have not been this worried in decades as I am tonight. I recognize the President's good faith. I have totally supported him throughout his administration. I called the secretary of state this morning to congratulate him on his extraordinary diplomacy that produced the Security Council resolution, but this act today fills me with foreboding.

**KOPPEL:** Why?

**Sec. KISSINGER:** Because I do not see how the President can achieve the objectives he has set himself by the methods he has chosen. The arrival of an American secretary of state in a country that is holding 1,000 hostages, a country that has been compared to Nazi Germany and been threatened with war crimes trials, will send—the very picture will create an atmosphere in the Middle East and among those countries that have supported us which I believe will make it very difficult to achieve the objectives which the President so adamantly reiterated today and which, in fact, I support. And I believe this is a very grave step and the fact that it is so widely applauded—I hate to say this, comparisons have been made to the '30s—this is what happened in the '30s, too, when avoidance of war became the only objective.

**KOPPEL:** And yet the President has made it clear that he would not accept for anything less than an unconditional withdrawal from Kuwait, the restoration of the Kuwaiti government. Isn't that what he went there for in the first place?

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JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN BANKERS ASSOCIATION, NEW YORK, NEW YORK

SEC. KISSINGER: But I— I absolutely— no question about his objectives. I have admired the President's policy and have strongly supported it. I believe that since I have the impression that none of our allies were informed of this, much less consulted, that— especially the Arab allies, that it will now be impossible to prevent others from starting their own negotiation with Baghdad. I believe also that if Saddam Hussein is even halfway skillful he will present us with a number of propositions that will narrow the issue to a point where the military option will disappear and therefore our bargaining position will erode.

KOPPEL: Give me a sense of—

Sec. KISSINGER: And—

KOPPEL: —give me a sense of what kinds of options he could propose that would so narrow the issues.

Sec. KISSINGER: —well, if he, for example, proposed that he would leave Kuwait except for the two islands and some disputed issues in the— on the northern oilfields, that already would narrow the issue. If he insisted on an election in Kuwait while the government is restored, that would be another trap, because by now half of the Kuwaiti population has— of the Kuwaiti citizens have been expelled, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have been brought in and all identity documents have been collected, so it would be almost impossible to determine— to determine who is who. Or there could be the solution which I believe that the ambassador from Yemen ended at, in which he agrees to the principle of total withdrawal and then some Arab summit now intimidated by the certainty of the continuation of preponderant Iraqi strength hands him the concessions so that we can say we did not do it. All of these dangers, which incidentally I pointed out for months, now become very real—

KOPPEL: But—

Sec. KISSINGER: —and I think our negotiators will be in an extremely difficult position to maintain the goals that the President has put forward and which I repeat, I'm supporting what the President has said for months, and what the U.N. has endorsed.

KOPPEL: —what— I—

Sec. KISSINGER: And if we can get it by these means, I will be the first to congratulate the administration to whose success I am personally committed.

KOPPEL: But Dr. Kissinger, what you seem to be saying is that there is absolutely no point in negotiating anything or in settling for anything else but a result that is imposed by force. Because under any other circumstances, the modality of how something occurs has to be negotiated anyway, doesn't it?

Sec. KISSINGER: No, the modality— about that, there's no dispute, but Iraq has occupied Kuwait, it has expelled half the population, it has looted the country, it has taken 10,000 hostages from all over the world, including 1,000 Americans. And if then this process concludes with everybody announcing that some middle ground has to be found between the aggressor and the victim, then, in a deep sense, not only is aggression rewarded, but 400,000 Americans have appeared in an area and have left again without having achieved something that

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Probably have been achieved without such a huge display of military force. And I am deeply worried what this will do to the moderate governments in the region if it comes out this way.

If, on the other hand, we really are delivering an ultimatum, then we are sending a very high-level official with a great capacity to produce confusion by the symbolism of the act to deliver something that may well lead to war and then start our domestic debate all over again.

**KOPPEL:** Dr. Kissinger, we've got about 40 seconds left. The one alternative that you have not permitted is the one that the President stated, it seems to me, most clearly, and that is, he wanted to make absolutely sure that Saddam Hussein did not misunderstand, and that therefore to that end, and to that end only, he was sending Secretary Bush [sic] to Baghdad to make it clear that Saddam understood what the stakes were.

**Sec. KISSINGER:** For once, I hope that I am wrong. But I am—I think that the President has to balance the symbolism of sending the second-highest official of the government against the greater certitude of delivering the message, and I just wonder whether there wasn't somebody else in all of the United States that cannot—could deliver a presidential message in a neutral place, other than Baghdad, that would be believed. And if it isn't believed, maybe we're dealing with a paranoid.

**KOPPEL:** There is one other aspect of this that I'd like to raise with you, and that is precisely because he is sending a man of such seniority, is that not going to put the President, whom Secretary Bush [sic] comes back—assuming that the mission is a failure—is that not going to put the President in a far stronger position domestically to argue against his critics that he has indeed gone the last mile and done everything that could possibly have been expected of him?

**Sec. KISSINGER:** What I feel will happen now is that the European community, for example, which we convinced only a week ago to announce that no longer would high-level representatives be sent, that that whole process would stop, with all kinds of negotiations going on, and I believe we will—it is unlikely that we will come to the clearcut determination, but if we do, I will congratulate the President and the secretary of state, and I really hope that my fears are unjustified. I would like a peaceful outcome, but I am deeply worried.

**KOPPEL:** Dr. Kissinger, thank you very much.

We'll be back in a moment.

[Commercial break]

**KOPPEL:** That's our report for tonight. I'm Ted Koppel in Washington. For all of us here at ABC News, good night.

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