U.S. Department of State

Roundtable with Print Journalists

Secretary Colin L. Powell
Washington, DC
May 26, 2004
(4:35 p.m. EDT)

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QUESTION: The Bob Woodward book and the GQ article portray you as being somewhat apart from the war planners in the Administration on the plan to go to war, and as being somewhat at least at odds with them about it all. Can you talk a little bit about your relations with Secretary Rumsfeld, with Wolfowitz, some of the others, and sort of how — whether those portrayals in the Woodward book and the GQ article are accurate?

SECRETARY POWELL: I can’t talk about the GQ article; I haven’t read it yet. I’ll get to it someday.

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HIV/AIDS and the $15 billion the President has allocated to that with the Congress is important. It won’t get as much attention as Iraq, but — and we all did that together. Millennium Challenge Account, $5 billion a year beginning in ’06 — ramping up to ’06, to help developing nations onto a path of democracy and freedom. Won’t get a lot of ink, but it’s the most significant foreign assistance program since the Marshall Plan. And while we’re doing that, we also doubled our AID budget — almost doubled, about 80 percent — our AID budget, the funding we normally get for development assistance.

The best relationship with China. We stopped a war between India and Pakistan. Helped Liberia get rid of a tyrant. We helped the Haitians get rid of a tyrant. My budget problem right now, it’s how to find money for all the peacekeeping operations that are breaking out because peace has been brought to a number of regional crises.

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QUESTION: How bad? Okay.

SECRETARY POWELL: When I was Chairman at the end of the Cold War and I was testifying one day, I said, well, you know, the Soviet Union is gone, the Warsaw Pact is gone, you know, I’m running out of enemies. And it was a whimsical way of saying that I have to redesign the Army and the whole Armed Forces of the United States because everything we had been focused on for 30, 40 years was going away. And I said I’m down to Kim Il-Song and Castro.

And as a result of that, I reduced, with Secretary Cheney and, of course, President Bush 41, we reduced the military by 500,000 troops — 250,000 civilians and 250,000 reservists — because our enemy had changed. And so if you look at the column of those who are our enemy, there is really nobody — you know, it’s — well, there are a couple, but they barely qualify. We’re not threatened by world war anymore.

But if you look at the column of those who used to be on the other side of an Iron Curtain or the other side of the Bamboo Curtain, where they are now standing now that both of those curtains are gone, many of them are now our allies — not just friends, they’re our allies in NATO. Or we have such a good economic relationship with them that it trumps any other problems that have come along, within reason — China, Russia. These are two nations with whom we have super relations, the best in years.

Nobody worries about conflict between the United States and Russia now, or the United States and China. There’s a caution that I have to put in here because Taiwan is an issue, but, you know, we’re not — we’re working with them peacefully to solve regional problems. We’re working with Russia and China to improve trading relations and economic relations. We have security interests in Asia that we talk to the Chinese about. We don’t want to see any conflict in Asia. We don’t want to see any conflict in the world that can be avoided. And working with people that used to be considered adversaries of ours, or competitors of ours, is a fundamental difference over the last 10 or 12 years.

When India and Pakistan mobilized their armies — 18 months ago, or was it two years ago?

QUESTION: Two years.

SECRETARY POWELL: Almost two years ago. A million Indians marched to the border, and everybody was writing about the possibility of war between India and Pakistan the summer of 2002. There was a great deal of discussion and commentary about these two nuclear powers that were this far apart along the international border and the line of control of Kashmir. There was a great deal of concern. It was international diplomacy led by the United States that went to the task of talking to these two nations. I went there several times. My French colleague went there several times. My British colleague went there several times. My European Union colleague, Javier Solana, went there several times. The Canadians went there. We were in constant touch with the Chinese Foreign Minister and Chinese leadership about this danger.

As a result of all of those efforts, we were able to bring caution and prudence to the equation and found a way for that situation to be defused. And after more diplomacy on our part and the part of our friends and colleagues, working with them internationally, in an international framework, we were able to persuade the Indians and the Pakistanis that they should start talking to one another again. In January of this year, they produced a framework agreement. And then bus travel started and air travel started and the two leaders got together recently. And they have a plan as to how to go forward and deal with all their outstanding issues. But it takes time and it isn’t always a breakthrough. It’s just sort of steady; it’s a steady ground game. Others get to do the air game. I have to play the — I play the ground game.

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** The meeting took place May 12, 2004.

[End]

Released on May 27, 2004

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