The MacNeil/Lehrer Report; Interview with Jeane Kirkpatrick

[Tease]

ROBERT MacNEIL [voice-over]: At the United Nations as black African countries force a test of U.S. attitudes, Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick explains Reagan administration policy towards southern Africa.

[Titles]

U.N. INTERPRETER [voice-over]: Meet on 20 April, or 16 April, rather to the President from the --

MacNEIL: Good evening. A few minutes ago, the United Nations Security Council began a debate in which black African nations hope to smoke out Reagan administration policy on southern Africa. They believe President Reagan has tilted U.S. policy towards friendlier relations with white-ruled South Africa. The test as they see it will come if they demand mandatory sanctions against South Africa to force a resolution on Namibia. Namibia, or Southwest Africa, is the former German colony still ruled by South Africa despite prolonged international efforts to secure its independence. The United States opposes economic sanctions and would probably veto any resolution demanding them.

Tonight, Mr. Reagan`s new United Nations Ambassador, Jeane Kirkpatrick, discusses emerging American policy. Jim Lehrer and I talked with the Ambassador at the United Nations shortly before the debate began.

JIM LEHRER: Ambassador Kirkpatrick, welcome. The United States does not support the black African call for sanctions against South Africa, is that correct?

JEANE KIRKPATRICK: I think what is correct as of now is that our policy towards southern Africa generally is still under review, and we would very much like not to be forced to make any sort of significant decisions about any aspect of that policy until our review is completed. That`s really where we are right now.

LEHRER: But isn`t there a likelihood that the Security Council is going to vote this week, and the United States is going to have to make a decision?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: I don`t think that`s certain yet, actually. If I had to guess right now, I would say that the chances are, perhaps, a bit better than 50-50 that that may be the case, although I don`t think the decision has been made. In fact, I think that -- my understanding is that negotiations are still underway among the African leadership, and between the African leadership and other people at the U.N. -- including the Secretariat -- and the debate will definitely be opened, presumably be joined, but that it is not at all certain that the push will be made for action here and now.

LEHRER: Is the United States actively trying to keep that from happening - - actively trying to prevent a vote from coming about?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Not really. We have made clear our position -- where we are in our review of our Africa policy. And where we are. of course, in that policy is that we have completed what we consider Phase I of our review of the policy, and Chet Crocker, who is our Assistant Secretary of State-designate for Africa, is conducting consultations, and he`s right now nearing the end of those consultations in Africa and with our Western allies in London. [He] will return to Washington, and will consider the results of all of his findings and the reactions of those people; then we will continue to proceed to try to make some decisions. Now. that`s where we are, and what we would like to do is to be able to complete that process. We are not really working to prevent anybody from doing anything, however. We are simply making clear where we are.

LEHRER: But if there is a vote this week, is it correct -- what everything that has been written up to this point says -- that the United States would exercise a veto this week if such a sanction thing came off? Is that correct?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: I`m not trying to be difficult, but I just never answer a question like that in the abstract. I think -- I don`t think it`s really possible, or prudent, or desirable, to try to think about what we would do when it`s not very likely that we`re going to be confronted with the necessity, and we don`t know what the terms of the resolution would be. We have taken the position -- that is "we" the United States, the United States government has in the past, and under previous administrations taken the position that sanctions are not a very useful approach to this process. I think that is certainly our position -- that sanctions are not a useful approach, that sanctions are not likely to produce the desired results. But now, that`s our general position. So far as a more specific response, I think we have to wait and see a specific text.

MacNEIL: Before going into the Namibian situation -- the subject of this week`s debate -- in more detail, why is it taking the administration so long to come up with its Africa policy when it came into office so swiftly sure of its position everywhere else in the world? At least it seemed that way.

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Oh, that`s not true. There are quite a few areas in the world which we have policies that are under review, let me say. The reason it`s taking us so long is that the problems are so hard, and I mean that quite seriously, that the problems are so hard because they`re very complicated, and they involve a lot of different actors, they involve a lot of different countries fulfilling quite different goals; they`re very important. We`re trying right now, for example, to reach some sort of conclusion about whether initiatives might not be undertaken that would produce a settlement, for example, in Namibia. But that settlement -- anything that`s going to be a real solution will have to have the acqui- escence of all of the parties to the conflict, and that means all the front-line states, the other neighboring states in black Africa, South Africa, the Western contact group, a majority in the Security Council in the U.N. -- this is a very -- the Soviet Union, you know, so forth -- it`s very complicated.

MacNEIL: There`s been a certain amount of commentary written recently to the effect that now, three months in office, virtually, you all have found the African situation a good deal more complicated, involving many more conflicting interests, than the pre-election rhetoric suggested it was going to appear to the administration, and that given those conflicting interests -- U.S. business, oil from Nigeria, and the whole list of them -- you have had to make the policy a good deal more nuanced and moderate than the election rhetoric suggested it was going to be. What is your comment on that?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: I can say that, one, I didn`t engage in any pre-election rhetoric. That question. Two, I haven`t read anybody else`s recently -- I think it`s a very hard problem. I think that certainly all of our early examination demonstrated that it was very tough, very complicated. We don`t think that quicker is necessarily better. We want to get it right. And now, I think a lot of problems are tougher when you`re confronted with them than they may seem in the abstract. I certainly find that true about a good many problems that I did consider in more detail before I was in this office. So I wouldn`t be surprised; I don`t know that what you`ve suggested is the case, but I shouldn`t be surprised if it were the case. Nor would I think that it was particularly unusual or in any sense reprehensible.

MacNEIL: Let me just ask one follow-up on that. Would it be fair to say that it has been a lot harder for the Reagan administration to tilt towards South Africa -- a bit -- than it wanted to do? That in the event, it`s just been a lot more difficult to do that?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: I don`t know and, you know, I wouldn`t say that at all because I don`t think it`s -- I don`t think it`s clear anybody ever attempted to tilt towards South Africa. And I don`t think it`s clear that whatever it was we intended to do, we`re not going to do. You know, I don`t think either part of the assumption there is in fact correct. I think what we would like to do towards South Africa is arrive at a policy which protects our strategic interest, promotes peaceful change in South Africa -- peaceful change aiming at, you know, an end to the racial discrimination which is practiced in that society, which we frankly abhor - - which does not, on the other hand, strengthen Soviet presence in southern Africa, and which certainly contributes toward finding a solution to the Namibia problem which will permit the establishment of an independent, stable, democratic Namibia. That`s, I think -- those are our goals toward South Africa. It`s a tough set of goals to try to pursue all at once.

LEHRER: As you know, many leaders in black Africa say they perceive this chill -- whether it`s real or not -- they say it`s there. Is the perception of that along those lines causing new problems?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: No, I think that there has been such a perception, and that there may be such a perception -- it may still persist. I think that -- I think it causes problems to everybody insofar as it exists, actually, because it creates misunderstanding, and misunderstanding complicates the process of arriving at solutions. I did a good deal of talking to African leaders when I was in Geneva heading our delegation to the African Refugee Conference. And in those conversations, let me say, without exception the people with whom I spoke told me that they felt greatly reassured in hearing a face-to-face description of our orientation than they had feared, based on media impressions. Now, I think reports coming in from Chet Crocker and his Africa tour indicate that he`s finding the same thing. I think --

MacNEIL: He`s the -- excuse me, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Africa-designate.

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Right. And I -- you know, I think that as African leaders understand what our orientations actually are, and what sort of solutions we`re aiming at, that those misunderstandings will be dissipated, but sure, they -- you know, they`re unfortunate, and we would like to have them dissipated.

LEHRER: Secretary of State Haig said yesterday in a speech about human rights that human rights violations by an authoritarian state are not as bad as those committed by a totalitarian state. Which category does South Africa fall into? And apartheid?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: You know, that`s a real political science question. First of all, that whole business -- you know, what South Africa really truly is, is an oligarchy with limited participation and contestation, and a kind of limited -- it`s a constitutional state with limited participation and contestation. And it has authoritarian elements, and it -- like a lot of the nations in Africa -- it is by no means a democracy. It has democratic elements, and important democratic elements, but limited. I don`t think Secretary of State Haig said that, by the way. I read that speech before it was delivered, and I didn`t hear that said.

LEHRER: That`s how it`s been widely interpreted.

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Yeah. I don`t think that`s what he said, and I don`t think it`s correctly stated, as a matter of fact. I think he said something rather different, but maybe we shouldn`t go into it here because it would probably take us far afield from Africa.

LEHRER: Well, the -- in terms of apartheid, what is the United States going to do? You called it a reprehensible policy a moment ago. What is the United States going to do - -- the Reagan administration going to do -- to try to change that policy?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: You know. well, we`re going to make clear how we feel about it. That`s all.

LEHRER: Publicly? Privately? Both?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Both. I`m sure. Basically, we believe, as I`m sure you know, that the chance of influencing governments is better if we have reasonably good relations with them than if we publicly denounce them. We tend to believe that public denunciations of other governments` policies may make us feel good about ourselves, but probably hardens the resistance of the government in question to our suggestion. We are therefore committed to trying the tack of private diplomacy, if you will, quiet diplomacy, as a matter of preference in tactics to trying to work out such solutions. On the other hand, we have none of us made any secret at all about where we stand on racial discrimination in societies and practices based on racial discrimination. Neither do we make any secret about our powerful preference for democratic government -- not only in South Africa, but everyplace.

MacNEIL: Ms. Ambassador, in what way is a settlement in Namibia connected in your mind with the presence of Cuban troops in Angola which borders Namibia ?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: It`s not really connected in my mind except insofar as one thinks about the whole of southern Africa. Angola is, after all, a neighbor which borders Namibia, and there are problems in Angola: there`s a civil war which continues in Angola: there are 20,000 Cuban troops in Angola, and that`s problem enough for one nation, and problem enough for us in dealing with that nation, if I may say so. I think Namibia poses quite a different set of problems. We`d like to see all those problems worked out.

MacNEIL: Is the removal of Cuban troops from Angola a precondition in the United States` mind -- the mind of the Reagan administration -- for a settlement in Namibia?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: I`ve never heard any such view, you know, expressed, and I couldn`t conceive that anybody would adopt that view. Certainly, we`d like to see those troops removed. We take them seriously. We would like to see a genuinely independent, autonomous Namibia, and a genuinely independent, autonomous Angola. We think that`s difficult with 20.000 Cuban troops there.

MacNEIL: Is the United States going to do anything to assist the forces which oppose the present Angolan government, the forces of Mr. Savimbi?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: We certainly have no present plans to do so. And as I`m sure you know, that we have in our review of our Africa policy let those problems that seem most urgent, I suppose, dominate the forefront of our attention. It`s very difficult to organize a government. And trying to organize a government and deal with the most urgent problems at the same time has been quite enough to keep us fully occupied. We have been focusing more heavily on the Namibian situation because it seemed more urgent.

MacNEIL: Just in that connection, is it no longer the intention of the Reagan administration to seek repeal of the Clark Amendment which would preclude or forbid any overt military aid to the Savimbi forces?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: I don`t -- I`m interested in the way you phrased the question. If there`s been any decision to abandon seeking the repeal of the Clark Amendment. I am unaware of it. My understanding is that the administration will seek the repeal of the Clark Amendment, and it will seek the repeal of the Clark Amendment as it will seek the repeal of the Humphrey-Kennedy Amendment and the Symington Amendments as -- all as constraints --

MacNEIL: What do they do, briefly?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Okay. Well, you just said what -- the Clark Amendment forbids the United States to offer aid to Savimbi`s forces in Angola without prior consent of Congress. The Humphrey-Kennedy and the Symington Amendments concern our capacity to offer -- sell -- arms to Argentina in the first case, or our capacity to offer military assistance of any kind to nations not meeting certain kinds of standards for nonproliferation of nuclear materials, uh, weapons.

MacNEIL: So you`re going to seek repeal -- continue to seek repeal -- of all of those?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: What we would like to do is seek repeal of all of these. We regard all of them as very undesirable restrictions on the President`s capacity to conduct foreign policy.

MacNEIL: Would it not be considered --

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: We believe the Constitution, by the way. vests in the President --

MacNEIL: If there is a -- make the question more simple. Why pursue the repeal of the Clark Amendment now -- continue to pursue repeal of the Clark Amendment -- if there is no intention to help the Savimbi forces?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: There`s an answer to that, and the answer to that is. that that is dictated as much by the legislative calendar, the calendar of the Congress, as by the Reagan administration. In fact, anything that was not -- repeal was not put on the calendar, submitted to the calendar, by the first of February, is not going to go on this year`s calendar. Now, the President feels, and the Secretary of State feels, that there are a range of Consti -- restraints on the President`s power in foreign affairs which are really -- infringe his constitutional powers which are very undesirable. By the way. President Carter felt exactly the same way, and his Secretaries of State felt that way. They think that the administration has the best chance of seeking and getting the repeal of those at the beginning of its tenure when it`s strongest, and that`s the reason they decided to go for it this year.

LEHRER: Is that, though, not another small step which has led toward the perception on the part of black Africa that the United States is in the process of changing its policy? I mean that you are supposedly in a game of nuance --

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Sure. It`s been -- it`s, you know, a game of perception, too, you know, and that`s a -- probably is -- certainly that is a factor which is mentioned by African representatives from time to time, talking about our policy. You know, again. I think that`s too bad, but I don`t think that we can let, or should let, the possibility of being mis- understood or misperceived by someone else dictate the substance of our policy. I think ultimately we have to do what we think is right, and reasonable for our own national interests.

LEHRER: On Namibia specifically. SWAPO [South-West African People`s Organization], rebel forces there who have been involved in guerrilla warfare against South Africa and Namibia for 14 years now: the South Africans say it`s a Marxist-led organization fueled and funded and armed by the Cubans and the Russians, and that sort of thing. Is that how the United States -- the Reagan administration views SWAPO?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: I think we have a more complicated picture of SWAPO. actually. I have. I don`t know everybody else`s picture, but I can tell you what my view is. and what the people whom I talk to. and it is that SWAPO is one of those coalitions of which we have seen a good many in our times which includes some rather heterogeneous elements.

some sort of purely nationalist elements, and some not very well-defined elements, and some Communist elements, and some Marxist-Leninist elements that are explicitly oriented toward the Soviet Union, and were trained there. So. it`s a coalition.

LEHRER: The South Africans say that that is the basis, apparently, of their reluctance to go along with this proposed settlement on Namibia, is that they`re afraid that those folks might get in charge over there. Is that --

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Well, Jim. It`s a legitimate fear. I think. It actually - - in the sense that it so far does include in its leadership some significant portion of persons tied to the Soviets by training and by predilection. And its principal source of arms is. of course, the Soviet Union or surrogates thereof, and we have seen in our times a good many such coalitions come to power only to have the most well-organized unit -- which usually turns out to be the Soviet-oriented. Marxist-Leninist -- seize control of the coalition. Therefore, that`s a legitimate concern. I think, and a legitimate worry. I think it`s an oversimplification of the case, however.

MacNEIL: Let`s come back to Angola for a moment. We were talking earlier about ways in which the complicating realities may have moderated emerging policy towards Africa of this administration; you didn`t agree with me.

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: I didn`t admit it --

MacNEIL: I know you didn`t. May I just come back at you on that? Isn`t it true that U.S. businesses -- including some oil companies which do business in Angola and find it quite comfortable and reasonable and profitable to do business in Angola -- have said to the administration, "Don`t go and support the Savimbi forces, and try and change the regime in Angola because it works satisfactorily for us"?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Yes, I suppose you could say that proves we`re not a tool of big business, doesn`t it, insofar as we`re not prepared simply to embrace that policy out of hand? It is certainly the case that there are American -- there are corporations -- American corporations, multinationals in which Americans hold large shares -- which do -- are very satisfied with their dealings with the Angolan government.

MacNEIL: Even though it`s a Marxist government.

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Even though it`s a Marxist government. Certainly. Certainly, that`s -- of course, there are a good many examples of the capacity of U.S. and other businesses doing profitable business with communist governments, and this is one more.

MacNEIL: Isn`t it also true that Nigeria, which supplies a very large amount of our imported oil -- I think second only to Saudi Arabia -- has also publicly, from their President`s speech in London, warned the Reagan administration off trying to help the Savimbi forces in Angola, with the implication that there might be some interruption in oil supplies?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Well, they`ve made it clear that they take a dim view of it. They`ve made it clear that they think we should not do that, that they hope we will not do that; they would like to persuade us not to do that. And let me say, we have in no sense committed ourselves to any such policy at all. We have, you know -- there is no plan to do so. We have not even seriously broached that problem, much less resolved it.

MacNEIL: Now how did the impression get about, then, that one of the things the Reagan administration wanted quickly to do was to repeal the Clark Amendment so that it could help the Savimbi forces so that it could at least bring some strong pressure on the Angolan government to get rid of the Cubans?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Well, I think one would have to do a content analysis of the media over the late summer. The President, in fact, as candidate, expressed a good deal of admiration for Jonas Savimbi who is. indeed, a very powerful, charismatic leader of the dissident group UNITA in Angola, and I think he`s a very attractive leader, too. Let me say most people who have met Jonas Savimbi do think that he is a very attractive, persuasive leader: he might make a good show for you sometime. I think that the President also expressed his very great unhappiness about the presence of 20,000 Cuban troops in Angola, and believed then, as I guess all of us believe in the administration, that it is very undesirable for there to be large numbers of foreign troops present in African countries, or in any other countries, for that matter. Now. from those propositions people who want to oversimplify the whole process of policy-making may simply leap to the conclusion therefore that we would come to office determined, in fact, to move immediately to strengthen Savimbi. I think that -- that there`s a, you know -- between the idea and the policy, or between the impulse and the policy, there is a kind of painstaking process which -- of translation and consultation that a government must go through.

LEHRER: When you were appointed ambassador, and you said that, "Look, my job is going to be to articulate the foreign policy of the Reagan administration, not formulate it." That gave you absolutely no problems. Does it really give you- -- after three months, now, does it give you a problem, like sitting down here in an interview and have to grapple with these questions that three months ago, you could have -- as Jeane Kirkpatrick, political scientist, expert, etc. -- you could have said anything you wanted to, but you had to be very, very careful what you said.

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: Personally. I don`t like it much. Personally, I don`t like the constraints on my freedom to formulate my own statements. I find it personally uncomfortable. I`d much rather speak as a private individual than as a representative of my government. That`s what I`m accustomed to doing, after all. I said what I would do. by the way, is represent the policies of the Reagan administration at the United Nations, and that I would hope to participate in formulating them through the Cabinet and various other channels, and I do do that, let me say, and that makes me feel better about --

LEHRER: And then the Namibia situation, specifically, which you say at this stage -- ? you said at the beginning you hoped, at least, that you did not have to vote on behalf of the United States this week, is that right?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: I`d rather not

LEHRER: Cast a veto

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: I`d rather not.

LEHRER: The Ugandan delegate, the man who also heads the African delegation here, said earlier today, "We have waited too long as it is. We can wait no longer for a solution in Namibia." What are you going to say to him when you get up to make your speech?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: You know, he must make his decisions, and we must make ours. That`s what I`ll say.

LEHRER: You think the time -- it has been too long?

Amb. KIRKPATRICK: No. I don`t think so at all. You know. I think that this administration was elected for four years. Four years is a long lime. We`re not yet through our third month in office. That`s a short time. These are hard problems, and I think we are moving with all deliberate speed. I think we`ve made a lot of progress, in fact, and I really -- as a political scientist, by the way. and as private individual and professor and all that which I`m not now, but I would approve of the pace of the review and the decision-making of this administration on this question.

MacNEIL: I`m very sorry, but our time is up. and we have to end it there. Thank you very much for joining us. Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick at the United Nations this afternoon. That`s all for tonight. We will be back tomorrow night. I`m Robert MacNeil. Good night.