Copyright Democracy in Action/Eric M. Appleman
 

JOHN HOOK: Alan Keyes.  I want to shift gears a little bit, talk about international policy for a minute.  Should the United States have forces deployed in regions and countries where we have no immediate security interest?

ALAN KEYES: Well I'd want to be careful about what you mean by that.  Because I think that we obviously are a global power; we have interests all over the world.  And I think that in many regions of the world we do have forces deployed where their deployment makes a definite contribution to regional peace and stability and to the defense of our own interests.  So I wouldn't want to carelessly suggest that we ought to be withdrawing those forces be it from Korea or from Europe or elsewhere where I think that they do serve a useful purpose in both maintaining our presence and defending our interests.

On the other hand, I think our principle ought to be very clear.  It ought to be that when we are using those forces, deploying them, it serves our interest, not some abstract agenda of globalism, global sovereignty, global left-wing interventionism.  That's what we've gotten from the Clinton administration, including what it seems to me was a clearly unconstitutional undeclared war in Kosovo in violation of fundamental principles against international aggression, in which we were in fact not serving our national interest, but serving abstract ideas of globalism for which American people should not be asked to die. 

And I think that's very clear and that would be the premise of a Keyes administration.  It would be based on an understanding that we serve the national interest of our people.  Part of that interest is our leadership in the world, it is our defense of human rights around the world.  It is our maintenance and sustenance of people's commitment to self-government around the world.  But it ought to be a clear commitment to our national interest first, not to globalism and internationalism.

JOHN HOOK: Senator Hatch.

SEN. ORRIN HATCH: Well it's very important that we stop being the global 9-1-1 call for everybody in the world.  It seems to me that even though at the end of the Cold War, we now have 400 percent more deployment of troops that we had at that particular time.  And some of this is ridiculous.  What we have to do is we have to consider what are our vital interests--those are the most important interests to us; what are our critical interests.  A vital interest is one in which we might have to send our own young men and women, if we have to stand alone to take care of our vital interest.  A critical interest would be an interest that would affect a vital interest.  And we have to stop worrying so much about peripheral interests, although we do have an obligation to try and carry freedom throughout the rest of the world.

But it is very important that we have a president, it seems to me, who understands those matters and who doesn't commit our troops everywhere in the world just at a whim.  This president believe that you solve conflicts by an absence of conflict.  Actually we solve problems by managing conflict.  And we've got to do that in a way that affects our interests and affects our vital and our critical interests.

You know in many respects we have a more dangerous world today than we had when we had just a bipolar--two countries who basically were nuclear countries.  Mostly in the form of having the CIA said that we have 50 poisonous snakes out there developing biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.  We've got to have a president who really understands all of the ins and outs of all of these problems.

JOHN HOOK: Steve Forbes.

STEVE FORBES: Thank you.  We do need a real foreign policy in America and we haven't gotten it from the Clinton-Gore administration.  They can't think beyond the next news cycle.  This administration's been very promiscuous in making commitments of American troops around the world [laughter]--you get it, you understand it.  And then, and then they go and undermine our armed forces--not giving them adequate pay, running down the ordinance, not doing proper R&D, not moving ahead with proper weapons systems.  They're running our people down and it's a national and international disgrace.  We're going to pay a price for it as they have to cannibalize equipment to get spare parts.

We do have interests in Asia, we do have interests in Europe; we don't have interests in Haiti to put in our troops, or Somalia or elsewhere.  I was disappointed that George Bush in his speech on China did not take a forthright attitude concerning human rights abuses in China.  I would have taken a different approach.  I'd have used Taiwan as the model and said that China this is a state that has done it right improving human rights, in improving democracy, lowering trade barriers.  We should have let Taiwan into the World Trade Organization before we let in Beijing.

In short we need a long term foreign policy.  We have long term problems and this crowd in Washington and the White House haven't a clue about it.  Thank you. [applause].

JOHN HOOK: Finally, Senator McCain.

SEN. JOHN McCAIN: This administration, as I've said on many occasions, has conducted a feckless, photo op foreign policy for which we may pay a very heavy price in American blood and treasure in the future.  They don't have a concept of what they want the world to look like in the next century and where our interests and our values lie.  Yes we're a nation not only driven by real politick, but also by Wilsonian principles, those that are dedicated to the furtherance of democracy and freedom throughout the world. 

Rather than deal in generalities let me remind you of the latest Kosovo crisis and the way it was conducted.  First of all we stumbled into it.  We didn't have to get into it.  The Secretary of State presented Mr. Milosovic with an offer that he could not accept.  Then once we were into it, it was conducted in the most immoral fashion because the president, because of poll-driven policies, refused to prepare even for ground operations.  Mr. Milosovic was then able to ethnically cleanse, rape and murder thousands of people.  We had our pilots flying around at 15,000 feet, again because the president was told that we couldn't--the American people wouldn't take casualties.  And the fact is they killed innocent civilians unnecessarily because of that. 

Harry Truman was told by Dean Acheson that North Korea attacked South Korea--he didn't take a poll.  Ladies and Gentlemen, I won't take a poll.  I will act on principle and I will act in the United States of America's best interest, and I will do that in an enlightened fashion, in a bi-partisan fashion as well, which is missing from the conduct of American national security policy today.  [applause].

ROBERT NOVAK: In his recent meeting with Boris Yeltsin, President Clinton was unable to influence the Russian assault on Chechnya.  If you were president of the United States, what would you do about that?  In general what would you do about Russian policy? 

Senator Hatch.

SEN. ORRIN HATCH: Well first of all I'd let the Russians know that there'll be a lot of discontinuation of monetary help to Russia.  I would do everything I could to push democratic principles as much as I could, and I'd make it very clear that they have got to stop bombing and killing innocent people.  I also would work with our NATO allies and with every other ally throughout the world, and certainly even with the United Nations to bring as much pressure as I could to stop that war in Chechnya.

I'll tell you one thing I really believe that we've got to realize that the Soviets are run by ultra nationalists in the Duma who basically are eclipsing Yeltsin, and are basically doing a lot of things that Yeltsin then has to turn around and do some bizarre things like bombing Chechnya and innocent civilians in order to accomplish what he thinks he's got to accomplish to offset the ultra nationalists in the Duma, in other words the former communists.

I don't know that there's any real solid thing we can do, because we can't get into a war with them, but we can bring a lot of pressure--diplomatic pressure, economic pressure, democratic pressure, organizational pressure, UN pressure, ally pressure--and it seems to me that's basically what we should do.

ROBERT NOVAK: Mr. Forbes.

STEVE FORBES: Unfortunately, the Clinton-Gore administration has taken a typically weak, wimpy approach to Russia.  It's been clear for years that Russia does not have a typical European or democratic government.  These are gangsters.  Al Capone, the Godfather-- would be right at home in the Kremlin today.  They've not only stolen tens of billions of your taxpayer dollars--and this government turned a blind eye to it--but also too they've allowed the good name of America to be attached to the most criminal elements in Russia. 

Russia today is undergoing a new system of serfdom.  Four out of ten Russian workers now go unpaid each month.  Government doesn't pay its workers.  Coal miners go unpaid.  They get food; they get place to sleep, but they don't get money.  And our government turns a blind eye to that.  A typical 16-year old male in Russia today is less likely to reach the age of 60 than a 16-year old was in Russia 100 years ago.

What can we do now?  The first thing we should do is tell the kleptocrats in the Kremlin 
"Not a penny more in aid and don't even knock on our door until you get current in paying your workers.  That is the first thing we should do.  Get on the side of the people instead of the gangsters in the Kremlin.  Also too, we should tell the Russians they're going into Chechnya for the sole purpose of winning an election, whipping up national hate and winning an election next year.  We can't deal with a government like that.  We've got to say no more.  No more money.

ROBERT NOVAK: Senator McCain.

SEN. JOHN McCAIN: The Chechnyan people now are being subjected to a level of slaughter and massacre that we have not seen in Europe perhaps since World War II.  The mindless slaughter is being conducted by a Russian military that seeks to reassert itself not only in the former Soviet Union, but also to extend its reach throughout what used to be the former Soviet Union in an attempt to fold back into the Russian empire those countries that have broken away from it.  Most notably Georgia, which is headed by one of the great men in the history of the world, Mr. Shevardnadze.  Also, this obviously has great effect on the next election in Russia.  The Russian prime minister now is playing this to a great political gain. 

The Russians must be told that there will not only not be any more IMF funding, there will no be any more Export-Import funding and the United States will gauge its relations on the treatment of the Chechens.  Because what is happening right now is an unconscionable set of circumstances, which if allowed to continue will then encourage Russia and the military to continue this kind of expansion into the region and overthrow the embryonic nations that are there.  The Russians have to understand that this is not something that we can turn a blind eye to, and we must have it stopped otherwise it will have severe implications for our relations for years to come.

ROBERT NOVAK: Ambassador Keyes.

ALAN KEYES: I think it's very important that we send a strong and unequivocal message to the Russian government that we are not going to tolerate idly the abuses that are taking place in Chechnya.  No business as usual.  No trade business as usual.  No aid business as usual.  No loans that are going to go through the government.  I think we ought to be taking the same policy toward the Russians on account of their abuses in Chechnya that I believe we should be taking toward the communist Chinese dictators on account of their abuses in communist China.  We should be willing not to dictate what other people do, but to control our own actions and relationships in a way that is compatible with our principles.

Second point, though, that we shouldn't miss.  Let us not pretend that we can afford to step back from this situation and just let Russia go any way it pleases.  It still, as it has always been the case in Europe, constitutes a very important element.  If it goes very bad, it could prove very dangerous to the rest of Europe and to our interests.  That means that we should be working to open up avenues of cooperation and support so that we can work with the decent Russian people in order to begin to replace the regime of gangsterism and kleptocracy.  We understood how to do this years ago when we had to work around and through governments that were oppressing their people, but we did not wish to abandon those people to the not-so-tender mercies of their government.  It is that kind of creative work with the people of Russia that we need now to re-develop in our policy so that we will develop an alternative to the gangsterism and not let Russia go in a direction that could destabilize the whole of Europe.
 

[transcript continues] >> Gun violence/gun control, what if Bush were present, role models and closing statements.