Specter Questions Sec. Gates on Talks with Iran

May 20, 2008 - Senator Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) today questioned Secretary of Defense Robert Gates at the Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense hearing on the Department of Defense Fiscal Year 2009 budget request. Senator Specter used the opportunity to question Secretary Gates on the issue of talks with Iran.

During his opening remarks, Senator Specter also spoke in regards to the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen that killed 17 U.S. sailors. Many of the terrorists convicted in the attack have since escaped from prison or been freed by Yemeni officials. “I’d like to explore the reasons for that and whether we couldn’t have some leverage to see to it that those terrorists are brought to justice,” said Senator Specter.

A full transcript of the exchange, as well as the Senator’s opening and closing remarks are below:

SENATOR SPECTER:

Mr. Secretary and Admiral Mullen and Ms. Jonas, I join my colleagues in welcoming you here. You have a very tough job and in the few moments that I have today I would like to focus on the future and, most specifically, on Iran and on the critical issue of talks with Iran and whether talking with Iran is really appeasement.

We have seen our talks with North Korea bear fruition. We have seen the talks with Libya, Gadhafi, bear fruition. Gadhafi, arguably one of the worst terrorist in the history of the world in very tough competition with Pan-Am 103 and the bombing of the Berlin discothèque, and yet he has given up his nuclear weapons and has reentered the family of nations. And we have seen the President’s comment on appeasement with terrorists, if we do not have dialogue with Iran, at least in one man’s opinion; we’re missing a great opportunity to avoid future conflict. These are views which I have held over a long period of time from my service on this committee, chairing the Intelligence Committee and the Foreign Operations Subcommittee, extensive floor statements and an article in the Washington Quarterly in December of ‘06 and ‘07. I think that your statements on this issue in encouraging talks have been extremely productive, and I think we really need to focus on that issue.

Very briefly I’ll ask you about the situation with Yemen. I’m concerned about what’s happening with Yemen after the killing of 17 sailors on the USS Cole. Al Qaeda, the worst terrorists in the world, funded by the Defense Department, $150 million from FY ’03 through FY ’08 and $28 plus million more on the agenda now. I’d like to explore the reasons for that and whether we couldn’t have some leverage to see to it that those terrorists are brought to justice, or at least not to finance those who are accomplices after the fact.

SPECTER:

Ambassador Gates, we have seen that President Reagan identified the Soviet Union as the ‘evil empire’ and shortly thereafter engaged in direct bilateral negotiations and very, very successfully. As noted before, we have seen President Bush authorize bilateral talks with North Korea, as well as multilateral talks, which produced results. As noted with Libya, on Gadhafi, the talks have produced very positive results. I note that there have been three rounds of bilateral talks where United States Ambassador Crocker has had direct contact with Iranian Ambassador Qomi. So we are not really saying, in practice, that we will not talk to them. The question is to what extent will we talk? I’m very much encouraged, Mr. Secretary, by the statement you made on May 14th of this year that, “We need to figure out a way to develop some leverage and then sit down and talk with them. If there is to be a discussion then they need something too. We can’t go to a discussion and be completely the demander with them not feeling that they need anything from us.”

Now the position taken by the Secretary of State has been ‘we won’t talk to Iran unless, as a precondition, they stop enriching Uranium.’ It seems to me that it is unrealistic to try to have discussions but to say to the opposite party, ‘as a precondition to discussions we want the principal concession that we’re after.’ Do you think it made sense to insist on a concession like stopping enriching Uranium, which is what our ultimate objective is, before we even sit down and talk to them on a broader range of issues?

GATES:

Well, Senator I’m not going to disagree with the Secretary of State. I would say this, though. In all three of the instances, examples that you used the United States either developed or had significant leverage when the talks began. President Reagan did not sit down with the Soviet leadership almost entirely through his first term. His first meeting with Gorbachev was in November 1985, after the United States had embarked on a major arms buildup and strengthening of the United States position vis-à-vis the Soviet Union.

In the case of Libya, Gadhafi wanted to get the sanctions lifted that were a result of Pan-Am 103 and the international sanctions that were applied after that. The financial sanctions applied against North Korea created significant leverage which helped prompt them to come to the negotiating table. So, as I said in the statement that you read, I think the key here is developing leverage, either through economic or diplomatic or military pressures, on the Iranian government so that they believe they must have talks with the United States because there is something they want from us, and that is the relief of pressure.

SPECTER:

Mr. Secretary, we had leverage in 2003 when we were successful in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the record is pretty clear that we wasted an opportunity to respond to their initiatives. So the question is, how do we find the leverage? How do we find economic, political or military leverage? Isn’t it sensible to engage in discussion with somebody to try to find out what it is they are after? We sit apart from them and we speculate. We have all of these learned op-ed pieces and speeches made and we’re searching for leverage. But wouldn’t it make sense to talk to the Iranians and try to find out what they need as at least one step on the process?

GATES:

Senator, I was involved in the very first contacts between the United States and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard in October 1979. What has happened in Iran since then is, most revolutions tend to lose their sharp edge over time. It’s one of the reasons that Mao launched the Cultural Revolution in the ‘60’s because he saw that happening in China. We saw that happen, I think, beginning to happen with the Khatami government, when Khatami was President of Iran. I think it was one of the things that created perhaps an opportunity that may or may not have been lost in 2003 and 2004. But what we have now is a resurgence of the original hard-line views of the Islamic revolutionaries that, with the accession to power of President Ahmadinejad, who was one of the students that occupied our embassy in November of 1979. And, I might add, that happened two weeks after the first talks between the United States and the Iranian government in Algiers where I was a participant. So the question is do you have the kind of government in Iran now with whom there can be productive discussions on substantive issues? I think that’s an open question. This is a different kind of government.

SPECTER:

So what’s the answer? We only have one government to deal with. Let me put it to you very bluntly, Mr. Secretary: is President Bush correct when he says that it is appeasement to talk to Iran?

GATES:

Well, I don’t know – I don’t know exactly what the president said. I believe he said it was appeasement to talk to terrorists, to negotiate with terrorists…

SPECTER:

He said in May 15th address to the members of the Knesset he said, “some seem to believe that we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals.” He does not say specifically Iran, but I think the inference is unmistakable in light of the entire policy of the administration.

I have twelve seconds left, Mr. Secretary. Let me thank you for your service. Let me note our personal relationship – went to the same grade school, College Hill in Wichita, Kansas. And let me commend you for what I think is a very forthright statement you made – really gutsy. I know you don’t want to disagree with the Secretary of State, and I know you don’t want to even more disagree with the President. But I’ve had an opportunity to talk to the President about it directly, and I believe he needs to hear more from people like you than people like me, but from both of us and that it’s not appeasement and that the analogy to Neville Chamberlain is wrong. We’ve only got one government to deal with there, and they were receptive in 2003. I’ve had a chance to talk to the last three Iranian ambassadors to the U.N. and I think there is an opportunity for dialogue. I think we have to be a little courageous about it and take a chance because the alternatives are very, very, very bleak.

Thank you Mr. Secretary, thank you Mr. Chairman.

Source: Senator Arlen Specter