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AMB. BILL RICHARDSON
Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and Secretary of Energy
OPENING PLENARY SESSION
“How to View 9/ll One Year After”
Thank you very much. That introduction reminds me of the American author Mark Twain, who after being introduced so gallantly said to his introducer, “Sir, after that introduction, may you go to heaven for your generosity, or elsewhere for your exaggeration.” But thank you very much.
I am going to offer my perspective as an American—I know this is an international audience—on 9/11 one year later. Then, since I have such a great opportunity to lecture to the media about your role, I will conclude with just a little bit of an observation on that. Let me say what a privilege it is to be on this panel. I think one of the very important elements of what Dr. Kwak said is that perhaps we can get along better as a world community through religion, because our international institutions, like the United Nations—yes, there have been successes, but somehow I think the biggest challenge that any of us is going to have in the future is how can the Muslim and non-Muslim world get along together. Of all the major challenges that all of us face, I believe that is the principal one. Dr. Kwak is suggesting that [this can be done] through religion, through religious blocs possibly, and this is something that I believe needs to be developed further. I can’t do that because I’m in another profession now, but I do think that this is something that you as analysts and leaders of public opinion might consider doing.
September 11 one year later—how does it affect U.S. foreign policy? The tragedy on 9/11 dramatically shifted the focus of American foreign policy on the war on terrorism. In terms of resources, the time of our policymakers, the thinking of the electorate, the U.S. Congress, it was dramatic. Now what were the casualties in our U.S. foreign policy? By casualties I mean the problems that we were looking at, dealing with, but that somehow got shelved? That's how I’d like to organize at least part of my talk, and this is a perspective that obviously can be challenged.
First, the American relationship with Latin America at the beginning of the Bush administration. There were a lot of promising signs: a special relationship with Mexico, a relationship based on perhaps granting amnesty to almost two million immigrants from Mexico. Because of the war on terrorism, because of concern about those who cross the border, somehow that issue is being shelved, and now some tension exists between the United States and its southernmost neighbor, Mexico, which right now has dramatic political implications. On the border, the Hispanic population in the United States is growing dramatically.
Second is the U.S.-Russia relationship: Putin and Bush having a special tie, arms control agreements, trade agreements, commercial agreements. Somehow they’re moving forward, but there was a little bit of a lowering of the relationship in terms of the prominence that it used to hold. The American effort to deal with crises like AIDS, poverty in Africa, and refugee issues were all definitely shelved because of the war on terrorism. Yes, efforts are continuing, but somehow the very promising signs that were out there have been muted quite a bit.
In the U.S.-Middle East relationship, for a while the Bush administration did not adopt the Clinton administration policy of almost micro-management engagement, which I happen to think was good. But with the war on terrorism, while there is a connection with the Middle East, I do think that at least the role of the United States as an arbiter, as a negotiator, as a broker in the Middle East diminished. Arnaud I know will speak to all of these. Let me just say what a privilege it is to be with Arnaud here on the panel because he’s the one journalist who is also a policymaker by virtue of his involvement in many crises around the world.
What else languished? Trade talks. The president was given trade authority by the U.S. Congress, a great victory for the Bush administration. But somehow trade talks, not just in the Western Hemisphere but also relating to the World Trade Organization, involving some difficulties on the steel issue, have been held back.
With regard to the U.S. relationship with China and Japan, I recall in the Clinton years we would always try to focus on those two key countries and send the message that we were going to have new trade talks and new strategic relationships. Somehow those have diminished. Our relationship with North Korea has gone back and forth. I would probably place that in the inconsistent category. The United States and North Korea are sometimes talking to each other, at other times are hostile. The last version I saw yesterday was that we’re talking again, so maybe I should have stayed away from that one.
On international treaties—the biological convention, the Kyoto protocol, the International Court—discussions on those issues were either shelved or put aside, with not much movement.
In the domestic arena in the United States, what else happened? Well, pretty much the whole year has been concentrated on the war on terrorism, not just from a foreign policy side but with debate in Congress as to whether the United States should have a Homeland Security Department, bringing in all the various agencies like Immigration, the Border Patrol, the CIA, and others, to have a U.S. response that is more effective and more coherent. That debate is about to conclude now with Congress leaving for the elections, and most likely a new Homeland Security Department will happen, but the big issue is would the president have full powers and not give employees of those departments certain civil protections, union rights. Right now it is, I think, 50-50 whether the president will have full authority to consolidate those departments without any restrictions. This is the debate that is going on at this moment.
The issue of the excesses of U.S. corporations, the Enron scandals, corporate problems in trade, are reducing a little bit in importance in the eyes of the electorate, again because of the terrorism issue and now the big debate on Iraq. By the way, you are better off sitting here than if you were in the city of Washington. You’re missing demonstrations and tear gas, so you’re very well where you are. Believe me, because I got here late and had to face that.
Let me also say that the three most questioned issues, I would say, today in Washington, and I think Arnaud can answer these or supplement them a lot better than I can because I just arrived from my home state of New Mexico last night, are these. One is the role of the United Nations, with a pending resolution on Iraq in the Security Council. Will the United Nations remain relevant, or will it deadlock on a non-resolution, not pass anything? Or pass something that is so watered down that it will not have any relevance? Whatever side you’re on on the Iraq issue, I think this is the supreme test. There is no issue I spent more time on as U.S. ambassador—about 70 percent of my time. There have been 16 resolutions on Iraqi compliance, and 16 resolutions have not been complied with. I think it’s a major credibility issue going on right now.
The second is, if you read the U.S. papers, President Bush has had pretty much bipartisan support on the war on terrorism, getting almost everything he’s asked for. In my judgment, he’s done a good job in getting an international coalition together, speaking out against terrorism, dealing with the Afghanistan situation. I think more nation-building needs to take place. Arnaud was reminding me that all these commitments to Afghanistan by the world community are somehow not there yet, and it’s getting a little bit late there.
What I’m looking at now is, on the Iraq issue, the potential of a split between the two parties going into the election. Looking at the whole war on terrorism in the longer range, will that have an effect on our ability in the United States to stay together as a political system backing the president? You’ve seen reports that some of the Senate leaders are questioning whether too much politics is being brought into this Iraqi question right before our congressional and gubernatorial elections. You usually know how that goes. You have to give it about a week or so, but I’ve noticed the very strong intensity of the talks.
The third question out there is, is there a connection between al-Qaeda and Iraq? When I was at the UN and the Department of Energy, I didn’t see anything to that effect, but maybe there is now. I wonder. Maybe someone like Arnaud can speak more to it.
Let me turn to what did move forward in terms of U.S. foreign policy after the war on terrorism. In other words, what did come to the top of U.S. foreign policy interests? One: the importance of India and Pakistan. For years we’ve neglected South Asia, but now I think for the first time, especially because of the role of Pakistan and because of the huge increasing power of India, this region of the world took more prominence in U.S. foreign policy apart from the Kashmir dispute, and I think that is healthy.
Second: the issue of nation-building in Afghanistan. The Bush administration came in against nation-building but realized after a dramatic situation in Afghanistan that the United States and the international community had to play a role in rebuilding that country, and there’s quite a bit of activity going on there across the board, both bilateral and multilateral. Many of your countries are participating in it, too.
Third, the U.S.-Saudi relationship was questioned, really for the first time in the media, because of the Saudi citizenship of those who were involved in 9/11. The whole energy relationship was questioned a bit. Are we depending too much on Persian Gulf oil in the United States? And the result today in the U.S. Congress is that we may have an energy bill for the first time in 25 years that emphasizes more conservation, more energy efficiency, but also more drilling in the United States, more drilling and more of an energy relationship with countries like Russia that have not been members of OPEC, as well as Mexico and Norway, that are seen perhaps as more reliable suppliers as a result of potential tension in the Middle East, although I must say OPEC has kept the price at about $28 to $30 a barrel. It’s kept that relatively stable, despite production cuts. But I do think that one of the direct results in American economic policy has been the need for an energy policy. It hasn’t passed yet, but it is very close to passing.
I mentioned that Pakistan assumed a new role and importance in American foreign policy because of its help with al-Qaeda, with Afghanistan, and so this relationship is emerging and you see more interest, more activity, more understanding of what is happening there. But perhaps not as much attention as we should be focusing on it.
The U.S.-Israel relationship was strengthened, I believe, after 9/11. There was more interaction, more of a sense of solidarity, with a curious phenomenon happening in the United States: the Republican Party’s right wing perhaps becoming Israel's staunchest defender in the American policy process. For years it had been mainly Democrats, although Republicans too. It’s very bipartisan. But an element in the right wing of the American political system, which I am not an expert on, is becoming vocal in supporting Israel. That is just an observation. You might question somebody else on that, but I did see it.
The U.S.-German relationship is fraying, not necessarily because of the war on terrorism but over whether the U.S. should get involved in Iraq and over Germany’s role. I think this is serious. I hope this relationship is repaired because Germany is a leader in Europe. NATO is critical, Germany is critically important in any war on terrorism. I think it also brings into question whether Germany would not be supported for a seat on the UN Security Council. The American position has been Germany and Japan and one country in each of the Third World regions. That is something that I think is going to play out and hopefully will be concluded soon.
I will conclude with just a couple of words about the media. I’ll give you two minutes on the media. I’ll do the good and not the bad. I think you guys in the media have done a very good job since 9/11 to educate, to comfort, to soothe. I think there’s been some very good international reporting to help people understand Islam, very good reporting to untangle the history of Afghanistan. I think very important reporting has been done to shine the spotlight on countries like Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, Yemen, Sudan. I think that’s good, because it’s very important that this be understood better by the American public; I don’t know about the European public. I think in the world community this is very important.
On the negative side, I guess from a policymaker’s standpoint I think you have the same problem policymakers do. You cover wars that are sexy: the Gulf War, the Balkans, Kosovo, but what about Rwanda? There was a huge genocide there. If policymakers fail to go in and do the right thing, that doesn’t mean the media stays away. I think you could do a tremendous amount. I recall the Gulf War in 1991. That was covered enormously, but that spring 140,000 Bangladeshis died during flooding, and the story wasn’t even reported. Rwanda is as meaningful a story as Kosovo. It’s human tragedy. Maybe now that the wire services, UPI and AP, are back, and Reuters, you guys will do that. I hope so.
My last point is on technology. I think because of the proliferation of satellite and cable that the print folks—and I hope you rally and become more relevant and important—are being dwarfed by television. That’s all right, but there are some of us that are still old-fashioned and like to get dirty with newspaper ink and read it without getting it through the Internet. I do think that technology has caused the media to devolve. In other words, I worry that the media sometimes forgets its role as a chronicler of events, a teller of stories, that somehow it’s more focused on filling airtime, covering anything that moves it seems.
There is a difference between media and technology. We seem to be relying on feeding the beast with multiple 24-hour news services: Reuters, Bloomberg, AP, BBC, MSNBC, CNBC, Fox. Somehow I hope that the old print types like yourselves come back. Thank you.
Mr. Marshall: Thank you very much, Ambassador Richardson. One advantage of getting your news online is you don’t have to wash your hands afterward.
I appreciate very much the ambassador’s remarks for focusing on all the areas that have risen in importance in American foreign policy, and also I think it was very timely to remind us of many areas both internationally and domestically that have really fallen out of focus because of the tremendous focus on the war on terrorism and the possibility of war in Iraq.
Our final speaker, who was almost introduced by the ambassador there in his speech, is Mr. Arnaud de Borchgrave, a good colleague and friend. You know the expression “pack journalism.” As journalists, you all know that this is a thing that is bad and to be avoided, but at times we’re all tempted to follow the herd and report what everybody else is reporting. Arnaud could never be accused of having done that. He was never a journalist who simply followed the herd. In many ways he’s a journalist’s journalist, both in his resourcefulness as a journalist in getting stories and in his imagination in the type of stories he’s pursued.
I remember him telling me some years ago—he’s also a fount of the most marvelous stories—that he and some colleagues were on the India side of a conflict, trying to get to the border to report on the fighting firsthand. The Indian army was anxious to keep reporters several miles away from the frontline. Arnaud and his colleagues hired this rather nice black, sleek-looking limousine. They stuck a little flag on the front and sat there, with one guy looking kind of humble as the driver and the rest all sitting very stiffly in the car, and they drove up to the checkpoint, slowed down, but didn’t stop. The driver saluted, and the sentry thought they were generals coming to review the troops, so he waved them through and they got their story. That’s typical of his resourcefulness in getting stories.
He’s also pioneered types of foreign reporting and foreign coverage, notably doing back-to-back interviews with international leaders in world hotspots, starting off with interviewing Gamal Abdel Nasser when he was president of Egypt and then the prime minister of Israel, Levi Eshkol. In that way he’s contributed to the development of foreign reporting as Newsweek’s chief foreign correspondent for many years, covering 90 countries, 17 wars, including seven stints in Vietnam, where he got so close to the action he was wounded.
Currently he’s editor-at-large of United Press International and the Washington Times. From 1985 to 1991 he was editor-in-chief of the Washington Times and really made that newspaper a powerful voice in telling the truth about the character of communism. We’re extremely honored to have him here to talk about our topic from the perspective of an experienced media professional. Please welcome Arnaud de Borchgrave.
