General Wesley Clark on Fox News Dayside

August 1, 2006

transcript by Reg NYC

Juliet Huddy: The Israeli troops met heavy resistance as they pushed deeper into Lebanon today.

Mike Jerrick: Yeah. Now the Syrian president has told his army to increase readiness and a member of the Syrian Parliament says they will defend themselves if they are dragged into the war with Israel.

Joining us now is former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO and Fox News military analyst, General Wesley Clark. General, great to have you here in the studio.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Thank you, Mike.

Mike Jerrick: You know, the, the fighting has been intense today, and sometimes when I think of a terrorist organization, I don't think they have an organized militia, an organized army. Who trains them? Because they do- it seems like they're putting up a really good fight.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, they've been in existence for over twenty years. They're getting a of of assistance from the Syrian military, the Iranian military. They send their leaders to Iran to get trained, but basically, this is a homegrown organization that's been fertilized by outside ideas and support. Military training's pretty well understood, and they're pretty good at it, apparently.

Mike Jerrick: When Israeli soldiers, though, go into these towns, though, how can they tell who's Hizbullah and not?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, that's a real problem, because there are still women and children, apparently, in there, and frankly, this is a political movement, not just a military movement. So, the Hizbullah have been providing education and healthcare in the towns. So, maybe the teachers are Hizbullah. The doctors are Hizbullah. Local authorities are Hizbullah. They're all affiliated, and then some of them have weapons.

Juliet Huddy: Hm. General, you ran for President last go-round. Had you won, what would you, as U.S. President, do today in the Middle East?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, if I'd won, we wouldn't be where we are in the Middles East today, in the sense that-

Juliet Huddy: Why? What would you have done to stop it?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Because we would have been talking to people.

(Applause)

You see the basic problem that you have here - and since you're asking a political question, I'll give you a political answer.

Juliet Huddy: Oh, or, or just an honest answer. (laughs)

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: A strategic answer. Look, you cannot solve these problems with military force alone, and you cannot limit talking to people that you already know you're going to agree with. You can't say, 'If I don't agree with you, I'm not going to talk to you.' This administration has not talked to Iran on repeated occasions since they- since the Iranians tried in 2002 to really deepen the relationship. We had an opening with Ha Kazaz, with, with Basher Assad in Syria back in 2004, 2005. We didn't take it. We shut him down. We pulled our ambassador back. That leaves us without the diplomatic wherewithal to go in and work the problem.

Juliet Huddy: Okay, but today, as U.S. President, would you meet with Hizbullah and talk to them?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: No, I wouldn't be meeting with Hizbullah. Not at all. But what I would've done is, as soon as this started, I would've gone to the government of Lebanon and given my support to the government of Lebanon and made sure that we got humanitarian assistance and humanitarian arrangements worked out right away. Israel had a right to defend itself, and Hizbullah is an organization that had no business being armed or attacking into Israel. That was absolutely wrong, but the people of Lebanon, the civilians, the other 60% who aren't Shia and the 90% who aren't affiliated with Hizbullah, They shouldn't be punished for this. And this is a matter, now, that's got to be settled through diplomacy. It's not going to be settled by force, and the fighting that we're seeing right now is the jockeying to set the terms of the settlement on the battlefield, and then the, the, the settlement that comes afterwards, the cease-fire, whatever will, it will basically validate what's been achieved by force of arms.

Mike Jerrick: Condolezza Rice's first stop Beirut. Doesn't that show support-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Too late.

Mike Jerrick: For the Lebanese government?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Too late and wrong message. What she should've done and what- at the G-8 summit, the President should have immediately issued a statement to the President of Lebanon, and he should have sent her there immediately to Lebanon as first stop.

Mike Jerrick: Questions here.

Audience member: Mr. Clark, I do admire your courage for coming to the Fox territory, but I would- What I wanted to-

Mike Jerrick: He is a Fox contributor.

Audience member: What I wanted to ask you (inaudible), what I wanted to ask you, where would a potential international group of soldiers be trained for, for-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, the all have to at their home, by their home countries. The international soldiers have to be trained at home, and then they're pooled together. And the only training they get together is they get some rules of engagement training, and they get command and control training. But there's not, normally there's not established a separate international training center for the soldiers. It's expected that the armies that they come from have trained them.

Juliet Huddy: Alright, General. Stay right where you are. The audience has a lot more questions for you.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Okay.

Juliet Huddy: We'll have more with General Wesley Clark in just a moment...

(station break)

Juliet Huddy: And we're back with General Wesley Clark, and General, the audience has tons of questions for you.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Great.

Juliet Huddy: Are you ready for them?

Mike Jerrick: Let's start with this woman right here.

Audience member: Yes, General Clark, in all due respect, we're dealing with a fanatical ideology, who are pursuing it fanatically. You cannot sit at a table that wants to blow you and the table up. These people want to convert the world, the world to Islam. I, speaking for myself, I'm out of that. Okay, how do you handle that type of mentality? What do you do?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, first of all, you know, I have some experience in handling diplomacy, because back in the 1990's when I was in NATO and before that when I was in the Pentagon, I did the negotiations in the Balkans that with Ambassador Holbrooke and others, we helped end that war there. So, no matter how fanatical people are, they still have interests and objectives. Now, I don't recommend we talk to Hizbullah, but there's nothing whatsoever wrong with the United States talking to Syria and Iran, and we should be very clear about talking, talking with these countries. What are your interests, and we should tell them what our interests are. And then we should see if there's anything that is there in common. Maybe there isn't. Maybe there's nothing to do but go to total war. But remember, war is the last resort, because once it starts, and you start killing people, the feelings harden, and it's so difficult at that point to back off. And the United States, we're not going to conquer the world. We can't occupy Syria and Iran and Iraq and change those people and they're their countries. What we want to do is help people advance the cause of freedom and find ways to live together.

Mike Jerrick: So, but over the last ten years, it seems like we've met with the Syrians 50, 60 times. I think President Clinton even met face to face. At what point do you say w- we, we just can't accept, in many cases, lies from them?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well look, nations don't always tell the truth, but you can't educate nations like they're third graders, and you can't treat them like they're third graders. We got very close in the 1990s to a peace agreement that would've ended fighting between the Palestinians, the Syrians and the Israelis, very close. So, there's no reason why we can't keep talking. You don't draw a line and say, 'Okay, that's it. I'm not going to talk to you. We'll see you on the battlefield,' unless there's a direct threat to the United States. Neither Syria nor Iran is directly threatening the United States right now.

Audience member: Sir, I have a question about the United Nations. They seem to be very good at coming up with resolutions to create peace throughout the world.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Right.

Audience member: Why do you think the United Nations is so ineffective, because they seem to copy the same resolution over and over and over again, as we saw in Iraq?

Mike Jerrick: Sometimes it seems like these resolutions-

Audience member: And now, again, they want to do it in Israel.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, you-

Audience member: So, what, what-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: You have to understand what the United Nations is. The United Nations is not a government. It's just a collection of governments' representatives who work together to agree on things. So, then they depend on the governments to put the money and the troops behind it to implement it. And when it comes right down to it, governments don't totally agree on a lot of things. So, they don't give the troops the authorities they need, and other governments don't provide the required numbers of troops. So, it, it, it, it dribbles off. It's not as effective as many people would like. On the other hand, we don't believe in world government, not in the United States of America that I believe in. So, we have to have a way of communicating with other nations, and that's what the United Nations is, and if we can work together and shield America from having to do everything itself, and have others share some of the burden and some of the blame, we'll all be much better off. And that's why there's a United Nations. We have to work to make it a little more effective.

Mike Jerrick: General, up here.

Audience member: General Clark, why can't the Israelis just use all the tools they have right now?

Mike Jerrick: Overwhelming force, what you're talking about?

Audience member: Yeah.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: You mean, why didn't the Israelis do that?

Audience member: Yeah.

Mike Jerrick: Right from the beginning.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, that, that's their tactical decision, and there's a lot of speculation about why they didn't do it. I think we'll find out six weeks or six months from now that it was a combination of political reasons and military reasons, and, but for what ever reason. I mean, I'm a military guy, and I believe that you should use force as the last resort, but when you use it, you must use it overwhelmingly, and you must accomplish the objective as quickly as possible.

Juliet Huddy: And the facts have been held back, is that giving the world the impression that Hizbullah is winning?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think it's a very dangerous moment, because Hizbullah has actually survived thus far. They sunk an Israeli ship. They're probably- probably recruits and money are pouring into Hizbullah, because they look like they can stand up to Israel. So, this is a moment of danger for Israel. It, it's why when you use military force, even though you may be going after targets or trying to kill people, it is ultimately a political act. And what you must always aim for is the right political outcome.

Audience member: The Iranians are being held responsible, and if they are responsible for creating all the foment in that area, why aren't the other countries in that region getting on their case and trying to stop them?

Mike Jerrick: Like the Saudi Arabians, the Egyptians-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, the other countries have been on Iran's case. There's been a lot of dialog. There's been a lot of discussion, and there's a lot of push-back against Iran. But when it becomes so visible and so painful, and the Arab media is filled with pictures of these dead women and children from Qana as a result of the Israeli air strike, it makes it impossible for these governments in the region to stand against Hizbullah.

Mike Jerrick: Right here.

Audience member: I noticed that in you answers, you frame the, the discussion always mostly in terms of the United States. Nonetheless, this is a, a, a dispute between Hizbullah and, and Israel, and Hizbullah as a proxy of Iran and Syria.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Right.

Audience member: Nonetheless, the fact is, it seems obvious to me that this is really a beginning, a proxy of Israel representing the United States and the entire free world, and therefore this is not just a skirmish between these two groups of people, but something that represents the vanguard of something that is going to be extended to the rest of all of us.

Mike Jerrick: So, what you say, may be down to the U.S. versus Iran. So, maybe why isn't that a direct threat to the United States that we need to take action against.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think that you have to, you have to work through these problems. You know, in most of human history people don't agree, and it's a question of how you resolve the disagreements. We've got long-standing disagreements with Iran. I've been one of those who advocated talking to Iran, and I've said it publicly for the last four years. The administration hasn't. As a result, now when it comes into the fight, it's very difficult to go to Iran. But yes, Israel represents a standard of freedom, a standard of literacy, a standard of Democracy which is unique in the region. But what the United States can do to advance our ideals - and I'm speaking as an American now, because that's who I am. What we can do is, we have to stand for what we believe in and our values. We don't believe in reckless bombing. We believe in humanitarian assistance. We believe in ending quarrels by the peaceful settlements of disputes, and we believe in the use of war only as a last resort. So, we have to follow our own principles, and in the process we should help Israel, but we should also be helping the government of Lebanon and the innocent civilians all through the area.

Juliet Huddy: Alright. General Wesley Clark, thanks for fielding all these questions and being here.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Thank you.

(Applause)