CNN The Situation Room-Transcript

Interview

KING: Carol Costello, thank you very much, in New York.

And my next guest is often critical of what President Bush has to say about the Iraq war and his handling of it. But Democratic presidential candidate Democrat Joe Biden -- Senator Joe Biden -- recently voted for the supplemental Iraq spending bill.

Senator Biden joins us now from Dubuque, Iowa.

Senator, good to see you on this Memorial Day.

I want to start by...

(CROSSTALK)

SEN. JOSEPH BIDEN (D-DE), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Hey, John. How are you?

KING: I'm great, sir. Thank you very much.

We looked at some video of a campaign event a bit earlier. And you obviously had some anti-war activists at your event.

How do you answer those critics on the left who say Joe Biden sold them out by voting for a bill that funds the war, without a timeline to bring home the troops?

BIDEN: Well, the very language the president vetoed was the Biden-Levin language that had us -- a time set. He vetoed it.

We don't have the votes to overcome the veto. In the meantime, I'm not going to play games with the safety of the troops. There's money in that bill to provide for these mine-resistant vehicles that will save two-thirds of the lives being lost. And I'm not about to push that back another two months, and that impact on tens or hundreds of American lives in casualties.

And we just got to keep pushing. We have got to keep pushing it. Every single time we send him a bill, we have got to have those end dates that Carl Levin and I put in there, and keep the pressure on him, so we can turn some Republican votes. We need 17 Republican votes, John, to override the president's veto. That's -- they are the facts. That's the reality.

KING: So, let me take your words then, Senator. You don't want to play games when you don't have the votes to stop the war with a firm timeline. And you want to get the money there, so that the troops are not denied those armored vehicles that would make them more safe. - So, when Senator Obama and Senator Clinton vote no, are they playing games, Senator? And are they -- is their position something that would have delayed the necessary funding for the troops who need to be kept safe with more armor?

BIDEN: I'm not going to second-guess their vote, John.

All I can tell you is what is a fact. If we had been able to -- we didn't even have the votes, by -- there are only 14 people that voted against it. People like John Murtha and I and others who have been leading the fight against the war voted for it.

But those folks who voted against it, I respect their frustration, and -- but, if there were 51 votes to vote for it, it would have meant that it would have gone back to the president again. We would have been in the same spot.

We would have been another six -- two weeks to six weeks. And that would mean that six more weeks delayed building the 2,500 mine- resistant vehicles that we can have for those troops by the end of August.

And, to me, that was not worth -- was not worth it. We have other ways to continue to go at the president to get him to change his mind and to change the view of Republicans.

But I -- I respect my colleagues in their vote. I respect their frustration, and let them answer why they voted the way they did. But I'm telling you why I voted the way I did.

KING: Well, let me ask you to answer this -- answer this.

Do you think the left, the anti-war activists who say, stop the war, lay down the road to stop the war, deny the funding, do whatever it takes, don't give the president another dime for this war, is making that a litmus test in the Democratic primary something that could hurt the party, both in a general election in 2008, and perhaps even beyond?

BIDEN: By the way, they're -- they're not going to make that the litmus test.

I -- I was at the University of Iowa yesterday. There were a couple hundred people there in a pavilion in a park. There were anti- war protesters there, about a half-a-dozen to a dozen of them. I invited them in. We talked about it.

And I think all of them walked away. And one young man who was leading it said: Senator, do you understand? It's just our frustration. You -- when we won the election, we thought maybe we could actually stop it. We're just so disappointed.

But they know the reality. The reality is, votes matter. The reality is, we have got to get 67 votes, 17 Republicans, to change this war. I'm going to do -- continue to do everything in my power to do that.

KING: You are often very critical of this president and his handling of the war. Today, the U.S. ambassador in Baghdad sat down with an Iranian ambassador. No breakthroughs, but they did have a first meeting in nearly three decades. There apparently will be a second meeting.

Is this a day to give the president some credit?

BIDEN: Yes.

It's -- it's about four years late, but the truth is, it's better late than never. And I think we should be doing even more. I met with the Security Council privately on Monday, the permanent five of the Security Council, up in New York City.

And I raised the question with them. I said, if the president came to you and said, we want to make this the world's problem, we want you to call an international conference on Iraq, and bring in the parties, so we can be -- come up with a political solution, would you do it? They all said, yes, their countries would.

That's what the president should be doing now.

KING: I want to ask you, Senator, about something that is back in the news because of one of the books written about Senator Clinton. And it's the whole question of, did those who voted, whether it was for or against the war in Iraq, fully read the intelligence available to them?

The question, of course, is, when the national intelligence estimate was available to lawmakers, back at the beginning of the war, did they fully read it, everything in it, not just the assess -- not just the summary, but the complete assessment, some of the dissenting opinions in there from the others?

We are asking all the candidates about this. And your office said that you were at a closed Foreign Relations Committee meeting on the NIE in September 2002 by George Tenet, Bob Walpole, who was the intelligence officer. It says you viewed the NIE at this time and provided a forum for his colleagues to view it as well. I want to ask you, did you read every word of it, sir, including the dissenting opinions at the time, before you cast your vote?

BIDEN: I not only read the dissenting opinions. I spoke to those who dissented.

And you may remember, John, on one of your programs, you asked me whether or not I thought that the intelligence community was wrong. And I said, the president was misusing the intelligence data available to him.

Remember what that resolution said. The resolution wasn't a resolution voting to go to war. The resolution was a resolution voting to avoid a war, to demonstrate that the United States was united in insisting that the -- that the inspectors get back in.

The president made a commitment he was not going to use that force. The president indicated that he was going to abide by what was requested. And what was requested was that we get the inspectors back in and let them do their job. The president did not keep the commitment he made.

I was meeting once a week with Colin Powell, who was telling me at the time he was confident he could get a resolution out of the Security Council, et cetera.

So, everybody looks at it now, everybody looks at it now, and says, we voted to go to war. It was not a vote to go to war. It was a vote to give the authority to the president to avoid war by keeping the pressure on Saddam Hussein. The president misused the power we gave him under that resolution.

KING: Point taken, Senator, but I want to ask you one more if you will make a contrast, then.

BIDEN: Sure.

KING: You say you read the report. You read all the dissenting opinions.

Anyone else who cast that vote, Democrat or Republican, if they cast that vote without reading the entire NIE to get the full scope of the intelligence, that that supported the president's case, the dissenting opinions that might have questioned the president's case, if anyone cast a vote without reading the entire volume available to them, is that irresponsible?

BIDEN: Well, in context, you might say it is, but I don't think so, for one reason, although I read it.

The only reason why I say it's not is because, remember, when the vote was cast, it was not cast as a vote to go to war. It was cast as a vote to avoid war.

Remember the speech the president made at the United Nations. Remember the speech that the secretary of state made. Remember, it was cast in the context of, "I need this moral authority to demonstrate to the world that they have to step up and keep the pressure on Saddam," because, John, what you were reporting back then was, the choice wasn't the status quo ante or war.

The choice was, do we lift the embargo, which the French and others were arguing against? Do we lift the no-fly zone, which many were arguing? Why were they doing it? Remember all that talk about we're killing innocent Iraqis by this embargo?

And, so, what we wanted to demonstrate was that the world had a responsibility to keep this embargo on and keep the no-fly zone. That was the context. And we did not go to war. We did not go to war for six months after that. We did not -- the president did -- initially kept his commitment.

And, John, you remember, I wrote a report, and from the Foreign Relations Committee, in that summer, saying, we should not go to war. It would be a decade we would be at war. We would take hundreds of thousands of troops needed if we went to war, et cetera.

So, what is -- everybody is losing in this. The context of when that vote was cast, it was not a vote for war. It was a vote for the president having the authority to demonstrate to the world that we were going to insist that the United Nations keep and increase the -- the pressure on Saddam, and get the inspectors back in. That was the context in which the vote took place.

KING: Democratic Senator Joe Biden of Delaware, campaigning in Iowa on this Memorial Day...

BIDEN: Thank you.

KING: ... and diplomatically kind to his rivals, and even the president, on this day.

We will make note of that, Senator. Have fun campaigning. We will talk to you soon.

BIDEN: That won't help me much, but thank you.

(LAUGHTER)

KING: Take care, Senator. Thank you very much.

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