U.S Foreign Policy Issues (Condoleezza Rice)

here's a picture of the George Herbert Walker Bush Presidential Library at Texas A&M where today National Security adviser condalisa rice spoke at the library about the future of US foreign policy that speech is next and in about an hour remarks by prime minister Ariel Chiron of Israel before the knesset now condalisa rice during her speech she talks about events in the Middle East including Saddam Hussein's recent announcement of an oil embargo she's roduced by former President Bush at this 1-hour event good afternoon good afternoon welcome to the William Waldo Cameron Forum sponsored by the George Bush Presidential Library Foundation I would like to thank Flo kraton who is the proud sponsor of this program she sponsored it in memory of her father I'd like to thank her publicly for her generosity and supporting this program and delighted that she and her husband John can join us this afternoon Flo John can you please stand the Forum has been able to sponsor a number of very important speakers in the past but I am doubly delighted that we can have the current national security adviser Kanda Lisa rice with us this afternoon Miss rice will speak for approximately 20 to 25 minutes after which you'll be able to take a number of questions those of you who would like to address a question to miss rice can do so by using the microphones that will be available at either end of the auditorium uh at this time I'd like to call upon the 41st president of the United States ladies and Gentlemen please join me in a warm welcome for President George Bush thank you very much thank you please be [Music] seated thank you thank you very [Applause] much well thank you for that warm Aggie welcome and let me um say how privileged I feel today to be able to introduce our very special guest on the campus and a very special speaker uh some of you may think of her as a figure skater some of you may think of her as a cultured um concert pianist which she is and some of you may remember her as the Provost of Stanford University but I think of her as a very seasoned experienced hand in foreign affairs uh she worked with my dear friend General scorro when he headed the National Security Council for me and incidentally Brent skof is with us today I don't know did he get introduced here he is over here General stand up and [Music] uh and I think I think both Dr Rice and I learned from General skoof that the role of the National Security advisor is to be an honest broker and yet in private to give the president your innermost feelings on whatever the issues might be uh General scorro set that pattern and uh I know the president of the United States pretty well and he told me he's told me of his great confidence uh in our speaker for exactly those same reason she's knowledgeable she is strong uh she works with very strong a very strong team of leaders not only holds her holds her own but saves the president from having to make many decisions uh that would come about if they didn't work together as a team and she's a catalyst on that team and so with no further Ado except to say that Barbara and I treasure our friendship with this wonderful woman Dr conesa Rice [Music] thank you thank you very much for that uh warm Aggie welcome I've uh not heard anything that loud since uh the Texas A&M Texas game so uh thank you very very much it's a great honor to be here at Texas ANM before returning to government last year I was spending a good bit of time here because I had the privilege of serving on The Advisory Board of the George Bush School of government and public service and I learned quickly why president and Mrs Bush had chosen to bring the library and the school here to Texas A&M this is a place that is dedicated not just to scholarship and to learning but also to promoting character and Leadership and your ethic of Public Service embodied in annual Traditions like the big event and the replant is a model for colleges and universities across the country and I congratulate you on it I want to thank very much Flo kryon and her husband John for endowing this lecture and to others who as a part of the William walone Cameron lecture series make it possible for people like me to come and spend some time with you I'd like to thank uh Ray Bowen the president of Texas A&M for whom I have great admiration in his Le leadership of this great University and his wife Sally who not only helped make this event possible but I know something about University Administration and I know it's a team effort and so Ry and Sally thank you I'd like to thank my good friends uh Roman papuk and Brent skor coft Associated now with the bush project here but we were colleagues and close friends during a pretty extraordinary time in uh the late 18 1980s and early 1990s and I want to thank them for being here and of course to president and Mrs Bush for your friendship and your guidance over all the years I have very fond memories of an earlier visit here to College Station it was a sunny November day in 1997 very cold as I remember when nearly 20,000 people turned out for the dedication of the bush library and President Bush your speech that day with its trademark Grace and modesty was a potent reminder of the transformation of the world that had taken place on your watch and I want you to know Mr President all of us who worked for you were transformed too we learned the true meaning of the words public service and service to Country it's an experience that I will never forget and it's why I so treasured my time in President Bush's Administration sweeping change has continued since I left that Administration in 1991 to return to Stanford University back then the internet was being used only by a small band of computer enthusiasts and books lamenting America's decline were actually rocketing up the bestseller list and my first book titled the Soviet Union and the czechoslovak Army uh maybe still had some relevance but of course neither of those countries exist anymore uh the book is out of print and I can assure you it was out of print even before Oprah decided to start pairing her list for the book club all of the changes that have taken place in just a little more than a decade remind us that even though change is always with us there are some fundamental facts that are unchanging the United States still faces grave security threats and just as no one predicted September 11th 2001 no one predicted August 2nd 1990 the date that Saddam Hussein's Iraqi troops invaded Kuwait but in both cases a great nation set its sights on great causes deploying our troops Halfway Around the World on a moment's notice to defend Liberty and thwart the for the forces of murder and Mayhem there's another enduring parallel between 1991 and today America continues to be the world's Guardian defending freedom and advancing democracy helping to make the world safer but also better a place for all of us and our children to have pride and Liberty and just as a decade ago we are striving to enable the maximum number of men and women in the world to experience the exhilaration exhilaration and indeed the challenges of Freedom since September 11th this Mission has assumed new significance that is one of those days that none of us will forget where we were when we heard the news I myself was standing at my desk it was about 8:45 in the morning and my executive assistant assistant came in and he said a plane has hit the World Trade Center and the first reports which are always wrong were that it was perhaps a twin engine plane of some kind that had hit the World Trade Center and I called the president and I said Mr President there's been a terrible accident a plane has hit the World Trade Center and he said well keep in touch uh let me know what is happening and I went downstairs to The Situation Room to hold my staff meeting that I hold every morning with my senior people and I go around the room and I ask what's going on here and what's going on here and I got about three people in and my executive assistant handed me a piece of paper that said a second plane had hit the World Trade Center and I thought my God it's a terrorist life has never been the same since that day I went on to try to reach the National Security Council principles and I couldn't reach secretary rville and I looked behind me on television and a plane had hit the Pentagon and just about that time someone came and said you have to go to the bunker the vice president is already there and we headed for the bunker and we began the process of trying to sort out what was happening to the United States of America and beginning to try to make order of the chaos once there the vice president and I talked to the president and later the National Security Council met in a video conference and I'll never forget the words of the president we'll get whoever did this but he was already focused he was focused on the broad outlines of a strategy to deal with what had befallen the United States very early on the president was focused on trying to restore a sense of normal noraly in what was clearly an abnormal situation ensuring that New York and the Pentagon were getting all the assistance that they needed and working to get our critical infrastructure ranking from from Banks to airports to the New York Stock Exchange up and running again the president was determined to show what Americans were determined to show that the forces of Terror could not disable the United States from that very first meeting the President also made clear that we needed to think about terrorism in global terms thus we focused on the central role of Afghanistan but also of Pakistan and the other countries in the region as critical allies and we received the almost immediate support of our oldest friends and allies around the world Britain other members of NATO a Australia Japan but also of our good friend a new friend Russia the president ordered the Pentagon to qu quickly develop military strategy for Afghanistan it was a plan that was daring in conception and it was difficult in execution because I can tell you it was truly outside the box uh there weren't plans on the Shelf at the Pentagon for using 21st Century Air power with men on horseback indeed it took a little while to figure out exactly how to marry those forces if you had said to one of the generals let me show you what this is going to look like and then showed The Charge of the Light Brigade as we saw it uh with the Afghan opposition I think no one would have believed it possible but quickly the American Military adopted adapted to those new conditions and America's military went on to act forcefully and deliberately the results speak for themselves Al-Qaeda has been deprived of its home base in Afghanistan its leadership is on the run and many of its operatives have been either captured or killed the Taliban regime has been routed and the effect has been the transformation of Afghanistan from a terrorist sponsored State into a country led by people who are trying to create a better future now to be sure there is much work to be done the victory even in Afghanistan is not yet complete but the military's power and professionalism a president who set clear objectives and has been focused and patient and the support of an International Coalition that understands that this is a struggle between good and evil has brought us this far and it will carry us on to Victory September 11th will have long-term effects in American policy there are effects that cannot be clearly seen from today's vantage point but even so if we are to take advantage of the opportunities before us we must begin to act now to work with the International Coalition and with others to seize the moment the long-term implications are several first there has been an end to innocence both about International politics and about our own vulnerability over the past decade some have argued that Wars of consequence were relics of the past there were even those who predicted that the primary energies of America's armed forces would be devoted to what militaries call Operations other than war Civil conflict ethnic conflict and humanitarian missions on September 11th with this most aggressive attack on the most powerful country in the world everybody looked around and said there really is a threat there really is evil and it has to be confronted and this reinforced one of the rediscovered truths about the world today power matters military power matters it matters in International Security and it matters in the pursuit of Peace second the events of September 11th underscored the need for the United States to devote more of our time and energy to securing our homeland it had been a very very long time since the United States had faced an actual threat to our homeland we are now engaged in trying to harden and protect the country that means that we've had to think about airport security in different ways and unfortunately anybody who's traveled knows that we've had to work very differently about Visa requirements and the protection of nuclear power plants and other physical and cyber infrastructure on the good side it is meant that we have new levels of cooperation with our neighbors in Mexico and Canada and we are working with them in unprecedented ways to construct smart borders and modern borders that protect us from those who would harm us but still can facilitate the trade and human interchange that enriches we have enormous opportunities to work in partnership with Mexico's new Democratic Leadership under President Fox for common welfare and the president is determined to seize those opportunities here at home Tom Ridge who resigned as governor of Pennsylvania to take this call to service is doing a magnificent job of changing the way that we think about our vulnerability and in responding to it but everyone understands that if we are to to remain who we are open open and trusting and free we cannot Harden the country enough to fully protect ourselves and therefore since his first address to the nation on September 11th President Bush has conveyed that we would make no distinction between terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbored them the best defense is a good offense and we are going to take the fight to the terrorists wherever they [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] live in addition to pursuing Al-Qaeda we also pursued the Taliban and the government of Afghanistan because we knew that they shared responsibility for the attacks and with the Taliban eliminated and Al-Qaeda Al-Qaeda badly damaged we've moved now into a second stage of our war on terror this war is a sustained campaign to deny Sanctuary to the terrorists anywhere in the world regardless of where they are from regardless of where they commit their crimes regardless of where they try to hide it requires maximum cooperation in law enforcement maximum cooperation in intelligence sharing cooperation on a scale that the world has not known but we are determined that there will be no Sanctuary for terrorists any place in the world we have taken this step because if terrorists are going to be stopped they have to be treated as fugitives everywhere they have to have no place to hide they have to have no place to sleep we have been pleased with the efforts of Pakistan with the efforts of the Central Asian governments with the efforts of our allies around the world as governments provide critical assistance most recently as the Pakistani government did in the capture of abuaba one of Osama bin Laden's Chief lieutenants indeed we have made clear to leaders on every continent that there is no such thing as a good terrorist and a bad terrorist you cannot condemn Al-Qaeda and hug Hamas our me our message is very clear that terrorism can support no cause it is never never legitimate It Is by its very nature evil let us be very clear terrorists have no positive agenda terrorists are not fighting for anything terrorists are against peace they are against Freedom they are against life [Applause] [Music] itself recent events in the Middle East illustrate the Terri terrible damage that can be done by terrorism as innocent lives are being lost people who could be living together in peace are being driven apart by death and destruction this is a time for leadership in that region and the president said last Thursday that all in the Middle East must moveed decisively in word and deed against terrorist act it was a call for all parties to act responsibly the president reiterated our firm commitment to our friend Israel but to lay the foundation for peace peace he has asked Israel to Halt incursions into Palestinian controlled areas and begin withdrawing from the cities it has recently occupied the path to peace will remain difficult but our determination to work on behalf of Peace will not waver the fourth observation I would make about the long-term implications of September 11th is that the attacks underscored the most dramatic in the most dramatic fashion the need to deny terrorists the opportunity to acquire weapons of mass destruction the world's most dangerous people simply cannot be permitted to hold the world's most dangerous weapons we recoil from the thought of 19 people as evil as the hijackers entering our country with nuclear chemical or biological weapons and it is a stubborn and extremely troubling fact fact that the list of states that sponsor Terror and the list of states that are trying to acquire weapons of mass destruction happens to overlap considerably the president was crystal clear in his State of the Union Address about the growing dangers posed by States like North Korea and Iran and Iraq these are brutally repressive regimes that are determined to acquire weapons of mass destruction the United States and our Coalition Partners must work together to prevent them from doing so indeed we will use every tool at our disposal to meet this grave Global threat we should work to strengthen non-proliferation regimes and Export controls and we will develop a full range of counter proliferation capabilities to protect ourselves we will use our new and budding relationship with Russia to redouble our efforts to make certain that there is no leakage of dangerous materials and Technologies and we will move ahead with missile defense our Coalition must act deliberately but inaction is not an option as the president has said we must not and we will not wait on events while dangers gather then there are really long-term term implications of September 11th if you think back to the last great earthquake in international Politics the end of World War II the world was reshaped fundamentally by the fact that the United States is a power that believed not only in leaving the world world safer but also in leaving it better when you have an earthquake of the magnitude of World War II or the magnitude of September 11th the tectonic plates in international politics tend to shift as new dangers present themselves so do new opportunities and age-old problems can be seen in a new light we have found new areas of cooperation in our relations with many nations September 11th has hastened the transformation of our relationship with Russia I took the phone call from President Putin that said that the Russians knew that the United States was increasing the defense condition of its forces in response to the attack but that in response to what the United States was doing Russia would stand down its forces would not exercise them so that there could be no chance of a mistake between these two great arsenals I cannot tell you what that meant at that moment because in the Cold War you would have been into a spiral of alerts the US changing its defense condition and the Russians changing theirs and the US changing again and so forth until we were at the brink of war the Russian president understood something very important that day and that was that the Cold War was not only over but it had been buried by a common security threat and we intend to pursue the opening that that realization has brought we've also been able to work cooperatively with India on a range of issues even as we work closely with Pakistan and Germany and Japan have begun to take on new security roles that correspond with their status as leading economic powers and democracies September 11th underscores that we must leave the world safer and better therefore the president has put forward a new compact to promote economic development in the world's poorest Nations he proposed that within three budget years we increase America's core development assistance by 50% the new funds will be devoted to projects in Nations that govern justly invest in their people and encourage economic freedom there is perhaps no better example of a place that has a new lease on life and a new chance than Afghanistan in Afghanistan we are pressing to bring the country new opportunity and New Hope the American Military will soon begin in training troops who have enlisted in Afghanistan's New National Army on the humanitarian side we are working with Aid groups to vaccinate 2.2 million Afghan children against measles and to establish Primary Care Community clinics and we're helping to rebuild Afghanistan's roads and bridges but I am particularly proud as an educator myself of what we are doing with Afghanistan's educational system we've printed and distributed more than 4 million Primary School textbooks and nearly 5 million more are underway we are also providing basic training for 4,000 teachers at least half of whom are women March 23rd was a pretty special day in this regard that was when Afghan girls returned to school for the first time in nearly six [Applause] [Music] years we know one thing a country cannot progress if half of its population is left in darkness and ignorance and so the pictures and words from Afghanistan perhaps capture the significance of this achievement better than any one news account told the story of a 35-year-old Afghan woman whose daughter was anxious to begin going to class for the first time in her life the mother said my daughter woke up this morning and said wash my face and my hands I want to go to school she didn't even want breakfast she just wanted to go to school now stories like that are a reminder that the fight against terror is everyone's fight not just every Americans but every Afghans and every person on this planet who values hope and opportunity and human dignity throughout the world and particularly in places like Pakistan and many other Muslim countries the role of Education to Enlighten people and give them skills rather than to fuel their hatred and grievances has become a key concern president mushara made this point forcefully a few months ago and it is a point that we Americans understand fully because we are a country of many heritages many ethnicities Many religious beliefs but we come together to understand each other not just to tolerate each other by learning about each other other and knowing each other there is one remarkable thing about education it opens you up to the full possibilities of what you can be and who you can be it says that it does not matter where you came from it only matters where you're going I was always hardened when I taught a Stanford class to look into the front row and to see that sitting side by side were students who were fourth generation Stanford legates and students whose parents were migrant farmers and who were not just the first in their families to go to college but maybe the first in their families to be formally educated at all it reinforced the fact that education is the great equalizer and the great common experience education provides hope and terrorism terrorism will not stand in a place where people have hope Texas A&M like America itself is committed to advancing opportunity through education this commitment to education was critical in our hour of need as we found a country that has been renewed in its common values and a country that has been sustained by relying on honor and family and faith we still have a lot to do ahead of us but we are renewed in who we are we are renewed in our common purpose in our values we are renewed in the fact that we are succeeding and as a result we will succeed America stands for compassion and Hope America stands for Hope opportunity and a future we stand for rights that are inali and truths that are self-evident these Universal truths have been under siege from the purveyors of death and destruction the terrorists who do not believe in them and wish to destroy them September 11th reintroduced America to a part part of itself that some of us had forgotten I'm quite certain that it surprised the terrorist how strong those views strongly those views were held I'm reminded of driving to the memorial service on Massachusetts Avenue and seeing a sign that I will never quite forget God Bless America we will not be terrorized thank you very [Applause] [Music] [Applause] much thank you thank you very much [Music] thank you I'm very happy to take a few questions now if I can find the mics let's see all right up here good afternoon Dr Rice my name is arpet dve I'm a student at A&M Consolidated High School um thank you for the lecture today my question to you is with the Iraqi 30-day oil stopage taking effect this morning and it's being supported by Libya uh and the Ayatollah and Iran um what implications will that have on the United States in order for it to prevent another energy crisis and also this is a two-part question um with its only contention being uh the removal of Israel from Palestinian territories what effect will that have on the US's ability to broker peace in the Middle East thank you for the questions uh in terms of the Iraqis U I've only seen the reports that they've said that they're going to withhold for a month uh look oil is a commodity and um I think that um there should be Supply uh there are those who will need to step up and make certain that there is Supply but ultimately oil is the commodity and uh the Iraqis need Revenue as well and I think we probably ought to remind them uh that they're going to have a hard time eating their oil so um and so I think the most important thing that we can do is uh to be very clear that uh the United States and uh the rest of the world will uh not be set off course by such such tactics the president does have a very important energy plan that uh has been introduced and is being voted on in the Congress because we are concerned in the long term about our energy uh dependence on foreign sour sources and there is a lot that we could be doing not only with alternative uh fuels but also in the exploration and development of our own resources uh so that we are not subject to such blackmail so those are some of the things that uh that we can do on the on the energy side on the Middle East um president gave an extremely important speech on Thursday because it was a speech that called all parties to account it is hard to get peace in the Middle East because people have to do things that are hard and allowing one side or another side to blame everybody else for why we don't have peace is uh is not useful and so the president set out a set of principles we know how to get to peace in the Middle East uh but everybody is going to have to make some tough choices the Israelis are going to have to make some uh tough decisions about ending the incursions and withdrawing from the the uh territories they've recently occupied the Palestinian leadership which has not lived up to the needs of its people is going to have to do something about terrorism and the uh Arab states in the region Israel's neighbors are will have to come to terms with as Egypt and Jordan have and as Saudi Arabia has suggested that it might will have to come to terms with the fact that Israel is there to stay it is going to exist it should exist in peace and it should exist side by side with a Palestinian state that is economically viable and politically viable and that's what we need so the president um thank you the president has sent uh secretary Powell to the region to Rally the world around these uh principles and to to try to get some movement but it is absolutely necessary that we get leadership and statesmanship from all parties in the region thank you Dr Rice if Saddam Hussein continues to stall or prohibit inspect un inspectors from uh going into his country to check for weapons of mass destruction should the United States rely on deterrence to prevent their use or should we look at some other options well all options are on the table what is clear is that the world cannot continue to sweep under the rug that for the last three almost three years now there have been no weapons inspectors in Iraq and we have to assume that there are no weapons inspectors in irck because he's got something to hide and uh the world should not continue to allow him to flaunt his International obligations taken when he lost the War in 1991 uh this is a man who I thought prime minister Blair was really quite eloquent about this yesterday this is a man who gasses his own people who threatens his neighbors uh who we know has tried for 20 years to get weapons of mass destruction and he's going to keep trying and eventually he's going to succeed so uh the status quo is not acceptable now I want to be very clear the president has taken no decision to use Force against Iraq he is weighing all of his options we are Consulting with our allies and friends around the world we believe that there are a lot of means that can be used uh against him but we're also taking no options off the table because sooner or later the world is going to have to deal with the fact that this dangerous man is acquiring dangerous weapons and uh we will we will have to uh to deal with that and we will see what means uh our best uh to to deal with the problem but the status quo is simply not acceptable good afternoon Miss rice my name is Kevin anderholm a senior ATM consolid high school and my question for you is in an interview last October you claimed that the Bush Administration wanted to change Iraqi sanctions to aim them more at the husin regime rather than the Iraqi civilians what kind of changes is the administration current Curr ly pursuing and when can we expect to see their implementation thank you very much we have been for almost um a year now certainly for for eight or nine months involved with the other members of the permanent five of the security Council in restructuring what is called the Goods review list which is the way that we decide uh that the the security Council decides what can get into Iraq and what cannot and uh we have real progress to report we already had agreement with the other members of the permanent five and general agreement was reached with the Russians just last week on what should be on the Goods review list it is a list that tries to take some of the pressure off of Iraqi civilians taking off of the uh list some things that perhaps while they could have some dual use really seem to be more for civilian goods and focusing and honing in very very carefully on uh making certain that Saddam Hussein cannot get certain military goods and certainly certain things that could be used to make weapons of mass destruction though so there has been considerable progress over the last uh few weeks and uh we hope that in May when the security Council again votes on the Goods review list that will have consensus in the perm five about that list I want to be very clear that Saddam Hussein was using the fact of sanctions as a um as a kind of excuse for saying and saying that the sanctions were causing problems for the Iraqi people uh the fact of the matter is that if you go to the north where the oil for food program which is how food gets into Iraq they use oil revenues to pay for food getting into Iraq that those revenues used in the north and administered by the UN are being used for the Iraqi population and the iraqy population in the north has been better fed and better taken care of where Saddam Hussein has administered the program he sometimes diverted those funds to uh his regime and to his armed forces and I assume to his uh his cronies so the fact is there is a lot of money to buy food and supplies for and medicine for the Iraqi people but we have even gone further in making certain that the list is now concentrating on things against the regime because we want to be very clear that we have absolutely no problem with the Iraqi people this is about the Saddam Hussein uh regime the Iraqi people deserve better than they have in that regime it is not their fault that they live under this horrible regime and so we want to do nothing to hurt the Iraqi people thank [Music] you uh good afternoon Dr Rice my name is Jonathan yerrick uh I am a senior also at an consolidate high school here and uh my question is pertaining to what I saw on on the news a few days ago um former National Security adviser uh brazinski was on uh the newsour and he pointed out something which I found very interesting which is that there seem to be a lot of similarities between um Israeli and certainly recently with Israeli incursions into Palestine um seem to be a lot of similarities between the is is Israel Israel situation and um apartheid South Africa and um so my question is uh how can we as the United States claim to be supporting uh Liberty and freedom around the world when we continue to provide military and economic support to basically an apartheid regime in Israel well let me question the premise of the question uh Israel is a democracy it's the only democracy in the region let's not forget that it is a democracy born of fire and it is a democracy that uh lives in a very very tough neighborhood now the Israeli people and the people of Palestine have a process that will get them to peace and to the creation of a Palestinian State alongside an Israeli state in 1993 in the Oslo process chairman arett signed on to this process he signed on to it with a promise to stop supporting terrorism to give up that weapon and to come to the peace table there have been times when there have been Pro there's been progress between the Israelis and the Palestinians um there have been times when they were very very close to really amazing agreements as was the case with uh Camp David and the fall on taba agreement and for some reason the Palestinian leadership could not bring itself to take that deal that said every American president since the first Camp David has worked tirelessly every American Secretary of State to try to bring the parties together the Israelis um are constantly told by the United States and asked by the United States as President Bush did just recently to be aware of the fact that the Palestinians will be their neighbors and to therefore for instance show compassion at checkpoints but you know hope is still alive in this region despite the difficulties I was very struck by the story of that Israeli family that donated the organs of their uh murdered family member to the Palestinian so that the Palestinian could live that means that hope is still alive in that region and what the United States is trying to do is to pick up that hope and to recognize that even though it's difficult we've seen old grievances Swept Away in a lot of the world and we can sweep them away here too with good leaders leadership on all sides but let's never forget that much of why we are uh friends with Israel is that it is a democracy and we share its values and those values will come to the four those values can be brought to the for in the Palestinian people as well and so we all look forward to a middle east in which there are two states two states that are peacefully existing and hopefully states that are also Democratic thank you thank [Music] you good afternoon Dr Rice my name is John Robert scanic I'm also a senior ATM Consolidated my goodness now you mentioned some in your speech about uh America's new relationship with Russia um President Bush recently made an agreement with Russia to decrease our nuclear Arsenal by several thousand Warheads however only a small percentage of the American public is aware that these weapons won't really be disarmed they'll only instead just be hedged for deterrence purposes um my question for you is why didn't the administration agree to really get rid of the nuclear weapons and how do you answer critics claims that your actions only breed resentment by Russia and will eventually collapse the current testing moratorium we have to maintain the nuclear stockpile well on the last Point um I would just point people to the uh way that President Putin and the Russians have uh talked about the new relationship with the United States this is a relationship that is in very good shape just very recently President Putin said and his defense minister said that he thought they thought we were making a lot of progress toward a legally binding agreement which could be uh signed soon we will see but uh the relationship actually could not be better as a matter of fact I'll tell you that interestingly um for two countries that used to be faced off against each other across the nuclear divide I spent most of my time uh the last couple of weeks in US Russian relations worrying about a dispute over chicken and uh that says something uh the Russians were Banning American chicken exports and uh we seem to have gotten uh that underway too but it says something about the nature of the relationship when trade disputes are taking up a lot of the time this is a this is a relationship that is actually in very good shape now as to the offer that the president uh made and that uh President Putin accepted and we're now working into a legally binding agreement the president has always said that we were going to go to the number of weapons that the United States needs for deterrence and that number is somewhere between 1700 and 2200 operationally deployed Warheads the fact of the matter is unless it's on a launcher it really can't be fired so when you talk about operationally deployed Warheads you're talking about the ones that can actually be used what happens to the other Warheads that are taken off or new ones that are created or whatever um is first of all a matter for discussion with the Russians and secondly it's not actually possible for safety reasons and reasons of capacity to destroy every weapon within a few uh a few days it takes a quite long time to destroy Warheads one thing that has not been noted by the uh those who've been writing about this is that there has actually never been an arms control agreement to destroy Warheads never it has always been about destroying the launchers or the platforms on which those Warheads would sit because people recognized that the issue is what is there and ready to fire so uh we take exception to the argument that some have made that somehow these are not real reductions if they're not operationally deployed they're not usable so the uh questions about what we will actually do with the WarHeads how many will be destroyed how many will be stored sometimes you want to keep Warheads around for reliability purposes if others are not reliable to be able to replace them we're working this all out with the Russians and we're working it out in the most a Cooperative spirit and I think that we will we will come to some agreement but I just want to underscore when you hear people saying why aren't you destroying the WarHeads there has never been an arms control agreement that required the destruction of warheads hits thank [Music] you thank you Dr Rice it's a privilege and honor to have you with us today my name is Ethan cagi I'm an actual student here at Texas A&M and um uh I have a quick question um when we were harmed by terrorists we aggressively pursued those who do us harm the administration's now made a decision to ask prime minister sh to back down and to not aggressively pursue the terrorists uh who live among his people it just seems like a little bit of a double Stander could you describe the um the thought process of course of course um the president took the decision to ask the Israelis to to stop the incursions and to withdraw very uh did not take it lightly took it very seriously and he took it from the position of a friend of Israel and as a matter of fact uh the United States is Israel's closest friend and it was because the long-term consequences of what was is beginning to happen looks as if you will no longer have some of the basis for peace Israel needs uh good relations with its Arab neighbors it needs to be able to live with the Palestinians in its midst and some of the things that were being done um are starting to threaten those pillars the other point is that the president president defends Israel's right to self-defense he said so uh in his speech on Thursday he said so the Saturday before fighting terrorism though has to be done broadly it isn't just military action that takes care of terrorism and as a matter of fact the American approach to fighting terrorism has not just been a military response but rather what we have done in freezing terrorist assets around the world so that they cannot have financing that's why when the president spoke on Thursday he talked about the importance of the Arab states freezing terrorist financing and not allowing the terrorists to have the means to fund themselves we have used law enforcement efforts with people around the world and intelligent sharing with people around the world to disable terrorist networks the Israelis have relationships with Palestinian Security Forces to do some of the same things so while military power may be a part of the solution on fighting terrorism the president has been very clear from the very beginning if you go back and look at his earliest speeches on on September after September 11th he talks about the importance of a broad war on terrorism that includes stopping their financing sharing intelligence doing law enforcement actions and indeed yes using military power to clean out terrorist Nets we believe that uh we and others should be working with the Israelis on the terrorism problem the most important in this regard is that the Arab Nations around Israel renounce terrorism tell suicide bombers you are not Martyrs you're just murdering people this is not [Music] martyrdom and if we can get a more Cooperative atmosphere then we can really go after terrorism in a way that will be sustainable and will root it out for a long the Israelis not don't defend yourselves but when things start to unravel to the point that the pillars and the foundations for this cooperation are being unraveled it's time to step back I want to be very clear though the president said to Israel step back but he also said to the Arab states and to the Palestinians step up and do your part of this bargain as well thank you [Applause] all right I'm told by Roman this is the last question you have it thank you hi I'm mcre alhassen from uh senior at Anum Consolidated and I have a amazing three uh small questions uh the first being is don't you think that we're being uh hypocritical when we talk about value politics such as Liberty emancipation and freedom of the oppressed um let me explain uh are we not using one of the most tragic events to bolster and further political agenda and secure our or bolster our uh American hegemony whenever as our president said uh labeled these countries and demonize them as axes of evil do you think this type of rhetoric is moving us back or is it moving us forward in our relation with them okay that's the only question I'm going to be able to take because it's going to take a while to answer it okay thank you all right thank you um look those who say that the values that we're talking about are not Universal only have to flip back and look at what the people of Afghanistan did when they were released from tyranny the fact of the matter is if you give people a choice between tyranny and freedom I don't care what culture they're in I don't care what part of the world they're in I don't care what religion they come from they will choose [Applause] Freedom now the United States has been through more than 200 years of struggling to come to terms with the tremendously uplifting language that founded this country and there is no doubt that we haven't always gotten it right there is no doubt that when the founding fathers said we the people they didn't mean me my my ancestors were three- fifths of a man but what is remarkable about the United States is that we continue to struggle with it we continue to work at it we recognize that human dignity and human Freedom comes day by day Brick by Brick step by step that it's not easy to build a great multi-ethnic democracy but we work at it and if you look around today you look at your classmates and you look at your Administration and you look at America you see the faces of the world and you see the accents of Los Angeles and New York and all kinds of places because this is a great multiethnic democracy we get nowhere by pretending that it's not hard or by pretending that we've already gotten it right always gotten it right but we also get nowhere by diminishing what it is that we've done because I will tell you that when you go around the world people who are still toiling for freedom and still living in tyranny look to the United States to hope that it can work and so you're right we have no right to be arrogant about it we have every reason given our history to be humble about it but we also have a tremendous responsibility as the great multiethnic democracy to speak out about it and to speak out about it without reservation uh throughout the world and thank you very much for your attention this concludes the formal part of our program this afternoon I'd like to thank everyone for joining us in particular I'd like to thank Dr Rice for taking time from her busy schedule to be with us for her wonderful presentation and for making this a very special occasion for everyone here once again thank you very much and have a good day earlier in this event you heard Kisa rice speak