MSNBC Hardball - Transcript

MSNBC  
SHOW: HARDBALL

HEADLINE: HARDBALL For August 26, 2003

BYLINE: Chris Matthews; David Shuster; David Gregory

GUESTS: Jerry Brown; David Dreier; Jim Warren; Martha Zoller; Joseph Biden; John Sununu; James Cramer

HIGHLIGHT:
HARDBALL debate: Will turning negative hurt Arnold's gubernatorial chances? In the "Political Buzz," will more casualties in Iraq hurt Bush's reelection chances?

MATTHEWS: Senator Joseph Biden is a Democrat from Delaware. He is ranking member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Senator Biden, do you think we need more troops in Iraq and will that do the job that needs doing?

SENATOR JOSEPH BIDEN (D)-DELAWARE: I don't know that it will do the job that needs doing alone, but everyone, including the administration, acknowledges we need more troops because they're trying like the deaf to convince the Indians, the Turks, and the Pakistanis to send somewhere between 30,000 and 40,000 troops. So obviously notwithstanding the fact they say we need more American troops, they acknowledge we need more troops.

MATTHEWS: Who would pay for those foreign troops, those Indians and Pakistanis?

BIDEN: Well, based on the way we've operated so far, because we've been unable to convince NATO or even ask NATO to participate, we'd probably end up paying a big chunk of that like we are for the Poles, for example. And it's about time, Chris, that we go to the United Nations, not to have them run the military operation but to have them provide the rationale, sanctify, if you will, this operation"

MATTHEWS: Right.

BIDEN: ... there by allowing all those other countries who want to get in to be able to get in when their publics are saying, whoa, whoa, what are you doing, you didn't go in the first place. Now they're getting killed, you want to go in there and you want to spend my money there? Because they know, the French, the Germans, the Bulgarians, the Brits, everyone knows that it's very much in their interest that Iraq not end up a failed state.

So they're ready to go, in my view. In my private discussions with them, with some NATO leaders and some of my counterparts, they're just waiting for this administration to ask. But if you heard the president today in his speech to the United Nations, he said he's challenging other nations to send troops. What's the challenge? Just ask. Ask.

MATTHEWS: Right. Well, isn't there already a pretty high level of challenge to those countries? I mean, you've got the Jordanian embassy blown up, the U.N. blown up, the top U.N. guy, the hero of the world blown up, and earmarked for it and almost assassinated. Why—if you were a French leader right now, if you were Valapon (ph) , would you - or Villepin - would you be saying, let's send our troops to Iraq after the war is over?

BIDEN: I tell you that I'd be asking myself, if the Americans don't get it right, we, France, are in real trouble because if Iraq ends up a failed state, our oil and access to oil, which is the place we need it from, we the French, the middle east is in real difficulty. Also what happens is, there's going to be migrations, they're going to come my way, they're not going to go towards the United States, et cetera, et cetera.

So—but what's happening here - there used to be an old song by a guy who sells sausages now, Jimmy Dean, who said pride is the ultimate demise of husbands and wives. Well, pride seems to be the demise of great nations sometimes, and this is time to put aside all of that. We are in a position here where—look, I am perfectly willing, were I—you president and I your adviser, I'd say look, let everybody else in on the deal, on the contracts to fix the oil fields. Share. Share that.

In return, that gives us the right to make sure that there are Frenchmen dying there, not just Americans, and there are Europeans and there's others, because look, we acting like this is a prize that we won.

MATTHEWS: Let me ask you the question I asked you at first, which is, we put an extra amount of 40,000 troops, and they are foreign troops, in that country. Will that do the job. You hesitated to say yes.

BIDEN: I did.

MATTHEWS: Why?

BIDEN: Well, first of all, as I've said before on your show and you said before we went in, if the Lord Almighty came down and told Bremer the exact right answer to the next 20 important questions he has to respond to, we still only have a 65 or 70 percent chance of getting it right because we're doing something that's never been done before.

We're taking a country that did not exist as a country prior to World War II, that is divided geographically, ethnically, and religiously, and trying to put it together for the first time ever other than under an authoritarian rule. That is a difficult task by any stretch of the imagination.

MATTHEWS: Well - well look at what Brits tried to do back after World War I. They went into those countries...

BIDEN: That's right.

MATTHEWS: ...They created Jordan out of nothing - out of part of Palestine. They created Iraq out of, as you say, out of those three provinces. They installed what they thought was a good form of government, a monarchy, the Hashemite brothers, Abdullah and Faisal. They said, well, our best bet is monarchy - or constitutional monarchy. Now we're saying our best bet is constitutional government—republican form of government. Are we any wiser than the Brits to try to impose a western solution to an eastern situation?

BIDEN: Well, I think we are wiser because what we're really talking about is the establishment of a republic, basically. If you notice, the president - even the president, is not using the term "democracy" as much anymore. What I'm looking for is a stable republic where there is representation and division of power within Iraq, that in fact—look, what I'm looking for—people said the same thing about Turkey, that Turkey could never be a stable, secular, Islamic state—that sounds incongruous—secular Islamic, but it's an Islamic nation that is secular.

We have a chance here, if we get it right, and this is—the neo cons are right about. If we do this the right way and we add from Turkey and right next to it another secular state that's Islamic, we have a chance to really begin to transform the region.

MATTHEWS: Right. A majority of the country is Shi'ite.

BIDEN: It's true. Sixty percent is Shi'ite.

MATTHEWS: Isn't that—if you have a democracy, the majority rules, it's like.

BIDEN: Well, that's if you notice...

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: South Africa, black South Africa is a majority, it's black rule. Why wouldn't it be Shi'ite rule?

BIDEN: You notice I didn't say democracy. I said republic. A republican form of government, a representative form of government, where you essentially have three semi autonomous republics that are part of one nation. That is the only formula I think in the near term is likely to work. But most of all, Chris, the president has to explain to the American people, in my view, and he didn't do it, God love him, as my mother would say, in this speech.

He has to explain why it's so important we succeed. If this becomes a failed state, forget terror for a moment. Assume terror were erased from the face of the earth tomorrow. We still have a country called Iran whose influence will be significantly increased in the region. We still have the prospect, if it becomes a failed state, of at least two of the Arab states in the region failing and becoming chaotic. This is a prescription for disaster if we do not succeed. And we've not told the American people why it's so important that we commit resources there.

MATTHEWS: Senator, you have decided not to run for president. How do you respond to the latest "Newsweek" poll that shows that a plurality of Americans, 48 to 47 percent, thinks we should just pull out of Iraq right now, pull our troops out?

BIDEN: The way I respond is, I fully expected that and I predicted that a month ago. Senator Hagel and others predicted it, because we haven't told them. Look, you've heard me say this phrase a thousand times on your show - not -- 20 times. The American people know foreign policy can be sustained in America without the informed consent of the American people. We have yet to inform them why this is so critical, other than the banner, terror. I'm not belittling the terror as a problem, but it's beyond terror.

MATTHEWS: It's great to have you on, Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware. The ranking Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee. Thank you, sir.

BIDEN: Thank you.