General Wesley Clark on Your World with Neil Cavuto
November 13, 2006
Transcript by RegNYC
Neil Cavuto: Alright, you're listening to British Prime Minister Tony Blair. In a few months he'll be out of work. But reaction now from General Wesley Clark, the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander and Fox News military analyst. General, thank you for indulging us there.
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Thank you Neil.
Nail Cavuto: What do you, what do you make of that, General that "We still need the United States. We still need a, a vocal, supportive role in Iraq. We still need the United States and Britain together providing it," what do you make of it?
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, Prime Minster Blair's been under intense criticism at home for being too closely aligned with the United States, but he's also been under criticism for being too closely aligned with Europe. And he's trying to, in this speech, assert the imperatives of British foreign policy, namely that they're a small, relatively small country, and they've got to be aligned with other countries. I'm very pleased to hear him say he wants to maintain alliances with the United States and with Europe. I think it's, on balance, it, it's a very balanced speech, very effective.
Neil Cavuto: Let me ask you, General, about this view that the United States and Britain maybe fractured that relationship over the course of this war and that simply a switch in Washington isn't going to repair that?
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I don't think that's the case. I think, first of all, there's still a strong relationship. I mean, I think there's a special relationship between the people of the United States and the people of Britain, and I think that the government's have worked together very closely, and I think they'll continue to do so. There are always frictions and areas of difficulty in any bilateral relationship, but this one's been particularly durable and particularly strong.
Neil Cavuto: What did you make, General, of a lot of Al Qaeda types and, and, and top commanders reacting positively to the elections results last week?
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I didn't make anything out of it. I think that's just their spin. They're watching our media. They're trying to just do things to infuriate us. Their strategy's pretty clear, Neil. They want us overextended and involved on the ground. They'd love it if we'd take down the governments of Syria and Iran, because their strategy is for us to do that and then them to come in and create zones of savagery and chaos where we can't police up the battlefield and put in place a new government. And then they will step in after we leave. So, this is why so many of us have said that we must deal with this as, as a regional problem, that we've got to work to fix Iraq, but we've got to do it in the context of the region as a whole.
Neil Cavuto: Yeah, but the, they're apparently saying, General, 'Whoop it up now, because the Democrats have all but set a timeline to get out of there. So, we won.' What do you make of that?
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I don't think that's true. First of all, the Democrats haven't all but set a timeline. Democratic position's been very consistent-
Neil Cavuto: Well, Carl Levin, you know, Carl Levin, General, all but did. So, I'm wondering wha-, what-
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I, I-
Neil Cavuto: -who is saying what for the Democratic Party?
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, Neil, We've been very consistent since at least March, saying this was the year that we wanted the Iraqi government to take greater responsibility, and we wanted to begin some kind of redeployment of U.S. forces. And essentially, that's what Carl Levin has said. He'd like to see some redeployment begin. Look, the Iraqi government is going to-
Neil Cavuto: Well, he said it within, within six months. So-
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: But that's not a timeline for a withdrawal. That's a timeline to begin to do something, and what we've got to do is we've got to get the Iraqi government to take greater responsibility. There's only so much the united States can do. This is a political problem with a military dimension. It's not a war. It's a political problem first, and it's got to be solved politically inside Iraq.
Neil Cavuto: Alright. General, thank you very much. Good seeing you again.
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Thank you, Neil.
