Interview on the Sean Hannity Radio Show (Condoleezza Rice)

SECRETARY RICE: ... First of all, this decision, this tactical decision to send Bill Burns one time to receive the reply that the Iranians are supposed to give to the offer that the United States, Russia, China, and three European states made – he’s going to go receive the reply, and he’s going to tell the Iranians, in no uncertain terms, that if they want to negotiate, the condition for doing that is to suspend verifiably their enrichment and reprocessing. So this is really to reinforce the policy that we’ve set up. It’s to reinforce our unity with the other five countries that are doing this. And its, frankly, to say to the Iranian people, “Your government has a way out of this, and instead, they continue isolating themselves and isolating you.”

QUESTION: So this is a very, very specific, one-time meeting. This is not a negotiation. Would that be fair?

SECRETARY RICE: This is not a negotiation. We sent the letter to the Iranians with an offer. They’re coming back to give the response. Bill will listen to the response. He will explain to them the conditions under which the United States will negotiate, which have not changed. And in doing so, we believe we reinforce our policy and we reinforce our allies.

QUESTION: Yeah, well, you know, it’s being played up in the media as a shift in position. Does that bother you or frustrate you?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, what’s frustrating about that is that if people were – if people are just listening, they will hear very clearly that we are not going to negotiate on this – negotiate with the Iranians until they suspend their enrichment and reprocessing. That has been the bottom line always. And there’s a sense somehow that because we’re making this tactical decision that we’re changing policy. But our policy is as firm as ever. We think, if anything, this is an opportunity to reinforce it with the Iranians.

QUESTION: Let me ask you a little bit about some news that came out of Iraq last week. Some were referring to it as bombshell news that the U.S. had completed the removal of 500 tons of uranium from Baghdad, which had been stored at Saddam Hussein’s former nuclear weapons development plant. Now, I’ve discussed this on the program, this issue of uranium there, for years. Most people who learned about this, they were hearing it for the first time and saw it and viewed it as confirmation that Saddam did, indeed, have the potential for weapons of mass destruction or a key component to make them. My only question is: Why didn’t the Bush Administration ever highlight the fact that Saddam did have this huge stockpile of uranium, especially when Joe Wilson was running around saying that the guy didn’t have any?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, they – not only did they have these stockpiles of uranium, yellow cake, which we’ve now secured and moved out of the country, but you know, every report made clear that the Iraqis were keeping infrastructure, they were making it possible for themselves to have weapons of mass destruction. They were waiting for the world to have turned a blind eye. They were waiting for the sanctions to be lifted.

But it’s been a little hard to get the point through that Iraq was a country that had used weapons of mass destruction against their neighbors and against their own people, that we had had sanctions, the world had had sanctions – some of the toughest sanctions ever, Sean, on this country because of their weapons of mass destruction programs – that in 1998 the United States had actually used military force because of their weapons of mass destruction. And so the idea that somehow – which now seems to be in vogue – that this was a country that was no threat in terms of this issue of weapons of mass destruction – maybe we just haven’t done a good enough job of getting the word out.

QUESTION: Let me ask you to go back to Iran for one second here. Iran and Ahmadinejad continue to threaten Israel, wipe it off the map, et cetera. Israel now has publicly stated that they are prepared to take out Iranian nuclear facilities. And it seems to be escalating in terms of the rhetoric. But if I’m Israel and I’m being threatened on a regular basis, and we see these missiles being fired by Iran on top of the pursuit of nuclear weapons, could anybody really blame Israel for taking out those facilities?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, we keep in very close contact with the Israelis. And I think everybody understands that a diplomatic solution to this is far preferable to anything else we can do. And we’ve got a chance at it. And often when we say diplomacy, people think we just mean talking. That’s not how I define diplomacy. I define diplomacy as giving countries the right incentives and disincentives to come to an agreement. And with the Iranians, we’ve got plenty of disincentives now on the table, plenty of sticks, if you will: the financial measures that we’ve been taking, the recent EU sanctions of Iranian banks; you may have noticed that Total has pulled out of Iran; the Iranians are having trouble in terms of inflation; they’re having trouble getting investment. And so, I believe we’re on a good diplomatic course here, and we’re still waiting to see if there are reasonable people in Iran.

Now, to be sure, when the missile test took place, I said – I was in Europe at the time, and I said that it said two things to me. The first is that people who want to pretend that this is an imaginary threat of missiles from Iran and, therefore, don’t think we need missile defense are making a grave mistake. This is why missile defense needs to be pursued, and pursued aggressively. And secondly, the United States has plenty of power to defend the interest – its interest and the interest of its allies, and I don’t think the Iranians are confused. They know that we will do what we need to do to defend ourselves and to defend our allies.

Question: ...Senator Barack Obama has said. He accused the U.S. of air raiding villages and killing civilians in Afghanistan. He once said it would be a profound mistake to use nuclear weapons under any circumstances. He referred to Iran, Cuba and Venezuela as tiny countries that don’t pose a serious threat. How do you respond to those comments, you know, taking Barack Obama or the political equation out of it?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, first of all, I know a lot of things gets said in campaigns, but let’s just look at the facts. And it’s the Taliban that’s killing innocent civilians in Afghanistan and killing them – trying to kill them with impunity. You know, when – no one tries harder than the American forces and our coalition partners to avoid civilian casualties. When you have terrorists who very often use villages as human shields, unfortunately, sometimes, if you’re going after terrorists, some innocents will be killed. But it’s by no means the policy or the intention of coalition forces or American forces who are there trying to secure Afghanistan – they are trying to improve the lives of Afghans – to kill innocent civilians. And this is – unfortunately, the line about killing civilians, I believe, is an unfortunate one. We sometimes hear it in Europe. We should not fall prey to that argument that somehow we’re killing innocent civilians. It is the Taliban that is doing that.

And as to Iran, Venezuela, Cuba – look, Iran is a dangerous country. It’s got a revolutionary ideology. It uses its tentacles through Hezbollah and Hamas and special militias in Iraq to not just try – not just endanger our troops, but endanger the hopes and dreams of Palestinians and Lebanese and Iraqis. It’s a dangerous country. It has its vulnerabilities. But it’s dangerous, and we need to treat it as such.

And as to Cuba, the Cuban people deserve better. They deserve their liberty. It’s been too long. And the Venezuelans certainly deserve – especially living in a hemisphere as they do that is moving closer and closer, and has moved over time to freedom, the Venezuelans also deserve better.

I clearly recall many on this forum claiming our sending an emissary to receive the answer from Iran to out latest proposal was a cave in and change of policy.

Sometimes it makes more sense to actually get the information, all of it, the nuts and bolts, before making a determination. Most especially when what we originally had was filtered through the lame stream press.

“Sometimes it makes more sense to actually get the information,...Most especially when what we originally had was filtered through the lame stream press.”

Agree. That’s what I said here....

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2046263/posts?page=17#17

This is not a negotiation.

OK.

We sent the letter to the Iranians with an offer. They’re coming back to give the response. Bill will listen to the response. He will explain to them the conditions under which the United States will negotiate, which have not changed.

Hmmm. One side makes an offer. The other side gives a response. The offerer responds to the response. Isn't there a word for this process?

Well boy howdy there is!

negotiation: the act or process of conferring or discussing to reach agreement in matters of business or state.

What a bunch of doublespeak crapola coming from Condi. And what a shocker that isn't.

Well, you're just wrong. It was clearly stated that the emissary is there to receive the response. This probably the diplomatic way things are done. In essence he holds his hand out, takes the response, says thank you and leaves. According to what I read should the Iranian Representative begin any attempt at discussion the answer from our guy is as stated. “You know what you have to do before anyhting further is discussed. WE are NOT doing this alone anyway but as part of a 6 Nation (I believe it is 6) group.

Just another big lie from Eice! With all the crap Rice has been slinging around...no one trust her...her pandsey with the Paleos; PLO & Hamas and then Hezzbo in Lebanon were the last straw for me...she is nothing more than a fraud....I still want to see a serious background investigation of this AA hire! Why doesn’t her sojourn to USSR show up in her Vita?

With democrats I expect them to suck up to Palestinians, considering they hate Jews, hate America and have billboards and posters of suicide bombers lining their streets and painted Israeli and American flags for their children to step on at the entrances of their classrooms. Palestinians and Democrats have a common enemy, America.

When supposed Republicans show support for a Palestinian “state” I scratch my head. There is no appeasing these lunatics, they break every treaty they sign within a week. Do they just want Israel to surrender to avoid war in the Middle East? That would mean terrorism is an effective tool.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.