General Wesley Clark on The Colbert Report

October 10, 2007
Transcription by Melange

Stephen Colbert: My guest tonight says we should never have gone into Iraq. I guess he's here tonight to promote the concept of hindsight. Please welcome General Wesley Clark.

General, thank you so much. At ease.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Thank you.

Stephen Colbert: Is it tough when you get to be a general and no one gets to say that to you, you have to say that to other people?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: There's always someone in charge no matter how big a general you are, there's always someone up there.

Stephen Colbert: Really? You're a 4-star general, right?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: That's right. I was a 4-star general. I'm retired now.

Stephen Colbert: You were a 4-star general.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I'm a retired 4-star general.

Stephen Colbert: A retired 4-star general. Do you think if you'd put a little more effort into your career, you could have made 5-stars and really made something of yourself?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Every young cadet sees those statues of Eisenhower and MacArthur at West Point, but they don't make 5-stars anymore.

Stephen Colbert: They don't?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: They don't. No, they don't do it.

Stephen Colbert: Can't they make an exception?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: It was a mistake, I think, in hindsight. You were talking about hindsight. You know, the thing about a 5-star was they stayed on duty forever.

Stephen Colbert: Are you saying 5-stars is inflation? That we've got to keep it at 4-stars to keep the value of each star up?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Actually, that's exactly what happened.

Stephen Colbert: Really?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: It did. Because we went to 5-stars because the Europeans went to 5-stars and we have to keep up

Stephen Colbert: We don't care what they do.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Really. This started in World War I.

Stephen Colbert: They went to 5-étoiles.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Exactly. It was the French.

Stephen Colbert: It's always the French!

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: It is. That's the way it works.

Stephen Colbert: Um, you also have a book – A Time to Lead: For Duty, Honor and Country. What motivated you to write a biography of President Bush?

<laughter>

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Actually, you know President Bush gets a lot of credit for this book.

Stephen Colbert: I ... I ... I like this book then?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: He does. I wouldn't have written this book if it hadn't been for President Bush and his bad leadership.

Stephen Colbert: He inspired you to do so?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: He did.

Stephen Colbert: What leadership? I'm sorry?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: His bad leadership.

<applause>

Stephen Colbert: Hey, sir, with all due respect, bad leadership is better than no leadership at all.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I mean we got that. We have it. And so, I wrote the book because I think it's a time for America to really step out and lead in the world. And I think that's a function of who we are as Americans.

<applause>

Stephen Colbert: Are we not already ... are we not already leading in the world? I mean, everybody looks to us to see what we're doing. Whether or not they agree, they still look to us.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: We're mostly stuck in the mindset of Iraq. Washington is mostly a kind of a one-issue town. And when it's Iraq, it's Iraq, and Iraq, and Iraq. And we're so much bigger than that as a nation and so what I

Stephen Colbert: So let's talk about something else. What about Iraq?

<laughter>

Stephen Colbert: What um, what do you think we should do? You've got some specific policy positions in here on Iraq. What do you think the answer is?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well I don't think you can fix Iraq just by focusing on Iraq. I think it's about the region so I think you really have to reach out

Stephen Colbert: You have to go into Iran. We need to go into Iran, right?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Diplomatically. Diplomatically.

Stephen Colbert: Okay, should we back up our diplomacy with bombing or a ground war? Because we have two different options there.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Yeah. I'm very concerned about this.

Stephen Colbert: We're going to go in, right?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I think that you should use force ... and this is a retired general talking now, as a last, last, last resort. I'm not saying

<applause>

Stephen Colbert: But why? If we know it works ... (to the audience) Wait until I finish my point.

Okay um, we know military action changes things. Okay so ... I mean, and you're a general and we're a military power. If we've got a military hammer, why isn't everything a war nail?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I know ... I know it must look like that, but when you're in the military, what you see is you see all the complexities and all the difficulties and the fact that force doesn't really solve these problems. What I found in a very personal sense is that when you drop bombs and people die, their relatives don't like it and they don't forgive you for it. And what we found in Iraq is that we make an awful lot of enemies so it's better not to start the killing. The way we stopped the killing in the Balkans in the 1990s was with really strong diplomacy, backed by the threat of force. One of the problems with diplomacy, when I go on some of these other programs

Stephen Colbert: It's boring. Diplomacy is boring, sir.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I know.

Stephen Colbert: Snooze-fest.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: You see Christiane Amanpour out there asking tough questions of diplomats and diplomats saying sort of "no comment."

Stephen Colbert: Speaking of diplomatic answers um, putting out a book like this, a lot of people would say this is testing the waters for your own presidential run.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well thanks.

Stephen Colbert: You're welcome. Is there um, are you considering running for president?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well actually not this time, no. I did run for president.

Stephen Colbert: I remember.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I had a good time and I didn't write a book like this, but I wanted to talk really

Stephen Colbert: Maybe you should have written the book the first time.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Probably so, but

Stephen Colbert: You know I have a book too.

<applause>

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I got to read some of it tonight.

Stephen Colbert: Would you like to ... do you want to ask me if maybe my book is a precursor to a presidential run?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Is your book a precursor for a presidential run?

Stephen Colbert: I can't answer that question. That's um ... I have to talk to my family first, I really do.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: That's a very diplomatic answer.

Stephen Colbert: Thank you very much. General Clark, thank you so much.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Great to be with you, Stephen.

Stephen Colbert: The book is A Time to Lead. My guest, almost 5-star general Wesley Clark. We'll be right back.