The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

MR. LEHRER: Good evening. Leading the news this Friday, a UN inspection team was again denied access to an Iraqi nuclear site. Pres. Bush called it a violation of the Gulf War cease-fire. And in Yugoslavia, a cease-fire was declared in the break-away republic of Slovenia. We'll have the details in our News Summary in a moment. Judy Woodruff is in Washington tonight. Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: On the NewsHour tonight charges that Iraq has violated the cease-fire agreement are where we go first. We'll ask just what sort of nuclear threat the Iraqis pose and what the U.S. and the rest of the world can do about it. Next, a report in India's Gulf War refugees. Then our regular political analysis team of Gergen & Shields, and finally a report on the Teamsters, have they changed?NEWS SUMMARY

MR. LEHRER: Pres. Bush today accused Iraq of violating the Gulf War cease-fire agreement. He did so after Iraqi officials for a second time kept a UN inspection team from an army base believed to house nuclear materials. UN officials said the Iraqis fired shots into the air to prevent the team from taking pictures at the site. Iraq is required to destroy nuclear materials and allow international inspections under the terms of the cease-fire. Mr. Bush met with his national security staff today to discuss the situation. Later, aboard Air Force One headed for Kenneybunkport, Maine, he spoke about Iraqi Pres. Saddam Hussein.

PRES. BUSH: We can't from the U.S. standpoint permit this brutal bully to go back on what was a solemn agreement and to threaten people that are there under UN jurisdiction. And that's exactly what he appears to have done. The man has no shame.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Bush would not discuss actions he might take against Iraq, but he said the cease-fire agreement allows all means necessary to get Iraqi compliance. At the United Nations in New York, Secretary General Perez DeCuellar said there was not enough evidence against Iraq to take military action. Reuters News Agency reported the UN Security Council was considering a 48 hour ultimatum. It would require Iraq to produce materials removed from the base that went uninspected. The inspector saw those materials taken away in trucks. Iraq's UN ambassador had this reaction.

ABDUL AMIR AL-ANBARI, U.N. Ambassador, Iraq: Well, frankly, I believe some members seem to be deliberately trying to create a crisis in order to provoke either a military aggression against Iraq or not. I really am surprised. I'm not a scientist or a nuclear specialist, but I'm surprised that they needed to recognize that some of the trucks have some nuclear materials. How they deduct that I don't know, but to me, to my knowledge, it is not that easy.

MR. LEHRER: Late today the Iraqi news agency said Saddam Hussein has ordered Iraqi officials to cooperate with the UN inspection team. We'll have more on this story right after the News Summary. Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: The central government of Yugoslavia and the break- away republic of Slovenia agreed to a cease-fire today. The agreement came after federal government officials said they had secured all 27 of Slovenia's border posts in a second day of fighting. We have a report from Yugoslavia by Jeremy Thompson of Independent Television News.

MR. THOMPSON: MiG warplanes of the Yugoslav air force streamed over our heads as they dived in to attack Slovenian defenses, their target a blockade of lorries on the road to Ljubljana. Drivers ran for cover. The planes were clearly trying to blast a way through the barricades. Some rose from the wooded hills just beyond a column of their own armored vehicles which had been trapped by Slovenian defense forces for 24 hours. But the main damage inflicted by the air strike was on the lorries and their civilian drivers, several writhing in agony on the road. We counted seven dead, Albanians, Turks and Yugoslavs. Nearby, a farmhouse and livestock have been destroyed. The farmer lay dead beside his smoldering barn.

SPOKESMAN: They anger against all Yugoslavia, you know. This is the biggest problem. Now that the bridges are broken, destroyed, there is no way back.

MR. THOMPSON: The sound of shootouts across Slovenia confirmed that the new republic's defense force was now fighting for its independence. It was beginning to look like civil war, with both sides taking casualties. While some federal troops surrounded, the Slovenian president claimed the majority were fighting on without central government orders. But despite obvious setbacks, the Yugoslav army boasted that it had achieved its objectives and all military activity had ceased. The people were waiting for the proof.

MS. WOODRUFF: This evening Slovenia's defense minister said despite the cease-fire he is receiving information that the fighting is still going on. Fourteen people are confirmed dead in the two day conflict. There are reports that more than 100 may have been killed or wounded on both sides. Before the cease- fire was declared, the European community sent a three man mission to Yugoslavia to try to stop the fighting. At the same time, meeting in Luxembourg European community leaders threatened to freeze $1 billion in aid to the country. The leaders said it was up to Europe, not America, to solve the crisis on its continent.

MR. LEHRER: The Commerce Department reported today its index of leading economic indicators rose .8 percent in May. It was the fourth straight monthly rise. The index is the government's chief economic forecasting gauge. Seven army bases were saved from closure today. The Military Base Closing Commission struck them from a list of about 60 installations it is considering shutting down. The seven are Fort McCoy in Wisconsin, Camp Pickett, and Fort A.P. Hill in Virginia, Fort Buchanan in Puerto Rico, Fort Indian Town in Pennsylvania, and Forts Hamilton and Potten in New York. The commission will release its final list of "to be closed" bases on Sunday. The President must approve. It would then go into effect in 45 days if Congress does not vote to reject it.

MS. WOODRUFF: An earthquake measuring an estimated 6.0 on the Richter Scale shook Southern California this morning. One person was killed and at least 46 others were injured in the trembler which could be felt for 200 miles away from its epicenter. The greatest damage occurred to about a hundred buildings and homes Northeast of Los Angeles, in Pasadena, and other foothill communities of the San Gabriel mountains. The quake also caused power outages and triggered rock slides on some canyon roads.

MR. LEHRER: Pres. Bush said today he was considering a handful of candidates to succeed Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. He said he would pick someone representative of all Americans. At a farewell news conference today Justice Marshall was asked whether Mr. Bush had an obligation to name a minority to replace him.

JUSTICE MARSHALL: I don't think that that should be a ploy and I don't think it should be used as an excuse one way or the other.

REPORTER: An excuse for what, Justice?

JUSTICE MARSHALL: Doing wrong. I mean for picking the wrong Negro and say I'm picking him because he's a Negro. I'm opposed to that.

REPORTER: Well, what --

JUSTICE MARSHALL: I don't see -- my dad told me way back that you can't use race. For example, there's no difference between a white snake and a black snake; they'll both bite. So I don't want to use race as an excuse.

MR. LEHRER: A jury in St. Paul, Minnesota today convicted Walter Leroy Moody, Jr. He was charged in the 1989 mail bombing deaths of a federal judge and a civil rights attorney. One killed U.S. Circuit Judge Robert Vance at his home in Mountainbrook, Alabama. The other killed Robert Robinson, a civil rights lawyer, at his office in Savannah, Georgia. The Senate today passed a modified version of the so-called "Brady gun control bill." It requires a nationwide five day waiting period before handgun purchases. The vote was 67 to 32.

MS. WOODRUFF: Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher said today that she will not run again for a seat in the House of Commons. Mrs. Thatcher's decision will end the 32 year career in elected office. She told reporters she will begin a new career as a world statesman and said making the change will let her more freely express her views. That's it for our News Summary. Just ahead on the NewsHour, handling Iraq's nuclear development, a report on forgotten victims of the Gulf War, Gergen & Shields, and the Teamsters move toward elections. FOCUS - TRUCE FALLOUT

MS. WOODRUFF: First tonight the Iraq nuclear story. How that country has apparently managed to maintain a nuclear weapons program despite the bombing of its nuclear facilities during the Gulf War. Three days into the war, the allied commander, Gen. Schwarzkopf, said he was confident that Iraq's nuclear research reactors "had been thoroughly damaged and will not be effective for quite some number of years." But an Iraqi defector revealed recently that Iraq had managed to keep a supply of weapons grade uranium at a secret site. Those reports first broadcast on National Public Radio were corroborated by the U.S. government. Further corroboration came last Sunday when Iraq refused to admit a United Nations inspection team to a military base near Baghdad. UN inspectors were forced away from another base today and Iraqi soldiers fired their guns into the air. At the UN Security Council talks are underway now on how to force Iraq to comply with resolutions calling for an end to the nuclear program and allowing UN inspections. Today Pres. Bush met with his top advisers to develop a response. On the flight to his vacation home in Maine, the President said he was reviewing several options in this newest test of wills with Iraq's Saddam Hussein.

PRES. BUSH: I think world opinion will mount fast against him on this issue. I mean, shooting in the air to scare off people sanctioned by the United Nations who were there to expose what this man has done. I mean, I don't think the world will support this at all, anybody, and the United States certainly won't. So now the question is what do you do about it, deliberately take time to work the diplomacy, and this is under the auspices of two United Nations resolutions, and I think we need to be sure that we start immediate consultation at the U.S., and don't press me what I'll do beyond that because I'm not prepared to say, not prepared to say what we'll do.

REPORTER: -- the coalition might -- [inaudible due to airplane noise]

PRES. BUSH: I think some would argue the UN resolutions give, have already spoken on all means necessary, 678 having been incorporated into a more recent resolution, so that's the way I'd answer that one.

REPORTER: Well, are you satisfied that, in fact, he has violated the cease-fire --

PRES. BUSH: Yes. I'm totally satisfied of that and I've seen incontrovertible evidence to this effect, incontrovertible, unarguable.

REPORTER: Beyond just simply not letting people inside --

PRES. BUSH: Oh, yes, absolutely.

MS. WOODRUFF: We get more now on Iraq's nuclear program and the dilemma it poses for the U.S. government. Paul Leventhal is president of the Nuclear Control Institute, a Washington based research organization specializing in nuclear proliferation issues. Lt. Gen. William Odom is a former director of the National Security Agency and is now with the Hudson Institute, a think tank. Frank Gaffney is director of the Center for Security Policy, a policy research organization in Washington. He's a former assistant secretary of defense. And Bruce Van Voorst is a senior correspondent covering national security for Time Magazine. Paul Leventhal, what exactly do the Iraqis have? Do we know what they have first of all?

MR. LEVENTHAL: Well, it's becoming clearer what they have, and I think U.S. intelligence even picked it up as early as November. And I'm referring to the secret enrichment facility in the North, possibly located inside a mountain where the Iraqis used an old World War II vintage enrichment technology, one that was de- classified after the second world war, and not controlled as far as export was concerned, and apparently were able to acquire at least 25 machines that could produce a few kilograms of bomb grade fuel a year.

MS. WOODRUFF: All right. What does that mean? And also if we found this out in November and this was a facility and then we were told in March that we had destroyed or Gen. Schwarzkopf said we've damaged their nuclear capability. We didn't damage it is what you're saying.

MR. LEVENTHAL: That's a very good question. The clue was traces of enriched uranium compounds that were found on the clothes of some of the hostages and they were able to fingerprint this material, so to speak, and determine that it was made with calutron. And this apparently was known back then.

MS. WOODRUFF: This is this device that you were describing earlier?

MR. LEVENTHAL: That's right. And I think what the present situation shows is that once nuclear capability is acquired, it's very difficult to make it go away. And while we're concentrating now on getting rid of the machines -- and I think that's important that that be done -- there is the concern about the materials, themselves, that were produced with these machines and we don't know really how much there is or what level of enrichment it's been brought to.

MS. WOODRUFF: Well, that's my question. How much do they have and how much of a threat is this? I mean, do they actually have a weapon or do they have a capability to make a weapon? Was it exactly?

MR. LEVENTHAL: I think it's unlikely that they have a weapon today and truly their weapons program has been put into disarray by what's happening right now. We're chasing them all over the countryside and trying to seize their machinery. But these various reports that have come out since the cease-fire resolution has come into effect indicates that we missed a lot in our bombing raids, perhaps getting only three out of seven or so facilities, and there's also ample evidence that they moved both materials and equipment from these facilities before they were bombed.

MS. WOODRUFF: So they may have the capability, they may very well have the capability to make a weapon.

MR. LEVENTHAL: Over the long-term I would say.

MS. WOODRUFF: And what does long-term mean, how long a time it would take?

MR. LEVENTHAL: Meaning that when the heat is off, the question is can they put together their infrastructure again, how many of the original scientists are still there? How much of the components and equipment have they been able to salvage and conceal from the UN inspection team? We now are hot on the trail of these calutron machines, and this is quite important.

MS. WOODRUFF: Again, this is the World War II vintage or pre- World War II vintage?

MR. LEVENTHAL: Right. And this is something that was a surprise to the public, because everyone was thinking that the Iraqis were using centrifuges as their principal means.

MS. WOODRUFF: Which is a newer technology?

MR. LEVENTHAL: That's right. A newer technology. And it turned out that they were going along the path of least resistance, in other words, a technology had been de-classified, was not controlled, and we were not on the lookout for.

MS. WOODRUFF: General Odom, why do they still have this technology? We were told that the technology, we just reported this again a moment ago, we were told that it was damaged and they couldn't do anything for a couple of years.

GEN. ODOM: Well, I can't give you a technical answer to that, but I don't see how even in our initial damage assessments that we could have been absolutely certain that all of it was gone. In a way I'm not surprised at all that a residual capability is there. They've had the experience of the Israeli raid and, therefore, I think they've been sensitized to have, to diversify the basing, the location.

MS. WOODRUFF: Well, you mentioned the Israeli raid. This is when the Israelis came and found an Iraqi reactor.

GEN. ODOM: Several years ago when they pulled a surprise bombing raid against that capability and I guess it was much more centrally located then, and since that time, they've worked to make the targeting problem very, very hard. And I think we're seeing the consequences of that effort to diversify and to make it difficult to find and destroy.

MS. WOODRUFF: Is it, is it possible then in any way for us to be sure at any point that we've destroyed all their capability?

GEN. ODOM: Well, I like to think of it as a bit like cancer. You can use certain kinds of chemotherapy and radiation and put it in remission, but it seems to come back from time to time. It strikes me that while we may get longer periods of remission from some kinds of actions that eventually when you have a leadership and a regime so disposed as the Iraqis are that there's likely to be a continuing problem.

MS. WOODRUFF: Bruce Van Voorst, you talked to these folks at the Pentagon. Why were they -- do they think they were fooled? What's their attitude --

MR. VAN VOORST: Well, as Gen. Odom points out, the bomb damage assessment is a very arcane art and you can drop a bomb on a building but not know exactly what you've destroyed inside, and these are specific machines and it's also difficult to tell when you hit machinery how much has been destroyed. So there was a great deal of uncertainty as to what exactly we had hit with these bombing attacks during the war. The feeling was then that this capability perhaps persists to produce some enriched uranium, but I would be very cautious about saying what they could actually build because first of all they're in total disarray right now, of course. What we're talking about probably is calutron machines on transport trucks being moved around and being followed by us.

MS. WOODRUFF: But if there's uncertainty, then why does the administration seem to be so upset about it? I mean, the President said today we have incontrovertible evidence and, you know, we're not going to --

MR. VAN VOORST: Well, I see this in a broader context, that is, we are very concerned about this specific thing, the possibility that they will continue to produce nuclear weapons and materials, but it's also within the context of the whole issue of Resolution 687 and how --

MS. WOODRUFF: This is the cease-fire resolution.

MR. VAN VOORST: This is the cease-fire resolution -- and what authority we have, the UN has to monitor and survey and make sure that not just nuclear, for example, but the chemical weapons as well are not being built.

MS. WOODRUFF: Well, Frank Gaffney, what sort of authority does the United States have, and what sort of authority does the United Nations, does anybody in the world have at this point to go in there and make sure that they are complying with the terms of this resolution?

MR. GAFFNEY: Well, I'd like to come back to Bill Odom's analogy to cancer, Judy, and it seems to me that if we get too wrapped up in symptoms of the cancer, does he have nuclear weapons making capabilities at this site or at that site, does he have ballistic missile capabilities or chemical weapons capabilities or biological weapons capabilities, all of which he is not permitted to have under the UN Resolution 687, we will lose sight of the fact that the underlying cancer, real disease here, is Saddam and his ruling clique, and my view is that the logic of 687, the logical of the President's position, as he expressed it today, if taken to its logical conclusion is that you have to address the root cause of the cancer, not simply try to scamper around the Iraqi countryside, looking under this tent or in that shed, or destroying it for that matter.

MS. WOODRUFF: So what are you suggesting that the United States should do?

MR. GAFFNEY: Well, my own view is and has been frankly since August 2nd, that the liberation of Iraq, not just the liberation of Kuwait, is the only prospect that we have for --

MS. WOODRUFF: So you're saying the United States should go back in there with military force.

MR. GAFFNEY: Well, I hope that there are other ways to do it, Judy. Unfortunately, one of the things that is a sure reality here is that with each passing day our option to use military force, if that is required, whether for surgical strikes against specific targets or for a more sustained campaign which may be required, is going away because we're withdrawing our forces precipitously.

MS. WOODRUFF: Do you agree with Frank Gaffney's analysis, Gen. Odom?

GEN. ODOM: Well, I think he's right about what the root cause is and what the real problem is. Ithink he also is right about going back earlier and looking at the context and the structure of the situation. Once we decided to go to war against Iraq we really had abandoned a traditional strategy we'd had at least since 1980 of balancing the various powers in that region, none of which were very nice to deal with. We tilted to Iraq to make sure that Iran could not win that war. We weren't really for Iraq. We just wanted to make sure that no one could win decisively. When we went to war, we risked de-stabilizing that balance of power. And it had the logic, I've always thought, that Frank wants out, that eventually we would have to, if we wanted to carry out that strategy, take down the Iraqi regime and take political responsibility for the development of a new regime with a different political attitude there. Now, since the war, it seems to me, the President has tried to move back to the old strategy of balancing the power, moving our forces out, being less and less involved, shifting more to the UN, but he's caught at one of these points where he has to go back and face that old issue again, do I want to go back in and make sure I deal with this nuclear problem in a more firm way now, or do I want to risk trying to get back, let set Saddam re-stabilize that area and try to work out some modis vivendi, and that is a very cruel dilemma.

MS. WOODRUFF: Well, faced with that choice, Bruce Van Voorst, what's the thinking?

MR. VAN VOORST: Well, we all agree with Frank's basic assumption that it would be very nice if Saddam Hussein could be removed from power. The question is how to do that. We fought a war. We're not able to achieve it, so the administration is backed in a position where it has to deal with the realities and the potentials that we have before us now. One of these is at least as a minimum to keep the pressure on the Iraqi government, to keep the pressure on Saddam Hussein, to maintain these commitments under the UN resolution, and that includes allowing us to inspect these facilities and to destroy them where possible.

MR. GAFFNEY: But let's be clear. We didn't fail to displace Saddam Hussein. We didn't try to displace Saddam Hussein. And I think what ultimately is determinative for the administration in the case of Iraq, just as with Yugoslavia, just as with the Soviet Union, just as with the Soviet Union, just as with China, for that matter, is the notion that we need to deal with the central authorities in these states whether we like them or not, whether they follow policies we like or not. We're keen on preserving the territorial integrity of these places and the risk, fundamentally the risk here, in my view, was not that we would be charged with taking responsibility for bringing a new government to power. I think we would simply have the opportunity and had the opportunity and could still have the opportunity to help bring a democratic government to power there.

MR. VAN VOORST: You're dreaming, Frank. You're dreaming.

MR. GAFFNEY: I don't think so.

MR. VAN VOORST: There's no international support at all for any sort of program which would overthrow Saddam Hussein. We went through that. We fought the war. It'd be delightful if we could, but the fact is he's there, he's in control, he's got a fairly effective military, and what we have to do is to deal with that reality.

MR. LEVENTHAL: And we have to think about the significance of his nuclear capabilities right now.

MS. WOODRUFF: Well, that's what I want to ask you. I mean, how much of a threat are we really dealing with?

MR. LEVENTHAL: Well, I think if we permit him to ultimately get away with keeping and concealing so that we are not able to get direct non-military access to these machines, I think it's quite serious. But even more serious perhaps over the long-term is the continued custody over weapons usable nuclear material. We now know that Saddam Hussein has enough highly rich uranium for two Nagasaki type weapons and depending on how much he produced in his secret facility, he might have enough for two more even. This material lasts forever. This material has a half life that extends into hundreds of thousands of years. And we have to realize that not only in Iraq, but in other parts of the world -- I mean, Yugoslavia right now has three research reactors with highly enriched uranium, and who's watching the store there? We have a system that legitimates the custody and the use of bomb grade nuclear materials in civil programs, and that's a problem not only in Iraq, but it's a problem worldwide.

MS. WOODRUFF: But clearly, Gen. Odom, that's not something that we can just take out or fix in an instant.

GEN. ODOM: No, I don't think we can. And I think the real significance of today's event is not that Saddam won't back down in this particular case. I think he probably will. But it shows that he is --

MS. WOODRUFF: You do think he'll back down?

GEN. ODOM: I think on this incident he will. But --

MR. GAFFNEY: He's indicated today that he --

MS. WOODRUFF: He said that --

GEN. ODOM: But what the episode has showed us is that he really is not going to cooperate if he can evade that regime and it means that the whole UN approach to a control of the materials there is going to run up against more and more resistance. And he will attempt to use a salami tactic of a little here and a little there and trying to divide us and go far enough to provoke us but not far enough to provoke a real reaction and it means that you have a longer-term dilemma here. I don't think we're up against a nuclear bomb being usable in the next year in Iraq. It's the larger problem of where this is going politically. And it's showing the UN approach probably won't be very effective.

MR. GAFFNEY: But we don't know.

MS. WOODRUFF: And just quickly, I gather none of you thinks the administration is about to launch some sort of military --

GEN. ODOM: I wouldn't rule that out.

MS. WOODRUFF: You would not rule that out.

GEN. ODOM: I would not rule that out.

MR. VAN VOORST: George Bush has done very well with military action in the past.

GEN. ODOM: That's right.

MR. VAN VOORST: The fact is that the U.S. has to take a strong position on this and actually rattle some diplomatic sabers in order to keep our allies and the UN honest in enforcing the UN position.

MS. WOODRUFF: But if I understand Paul Leventhal correctly, if this material's on the back of trucks and it's being moved around, can we really take military action that would be effective?

MR. LEVENTHAL: Oh, I think we could.

MR. GAFFNEY: We can take action that will be effective with respect to what we know. But as Gen. Odom from the intelligence community side knows, the real problem here is what you don't know, the unknown unknowns. And frankly as important as the nuclear question is, and as sexy as it is politically, I got to tell you that the problem of determining what Saddam Hussein has in the way of nuclear weapons and where he's got them is nothing compared to the problem of finding his chemical weapons capability, his biological weapons capability, which may be nearer at hand.

MR. VAN VOORST: But we need the legal authority to go in. The UN resolution provides for that. These responsibilities have to be enforced and that's what the administration is doing.

MS. WOODRUFF: Well, gentlemen, we're going to have to leave it there. Paul Leventhal, thank you, Bruce Van Voorst, Frank Gaffney, Gen. Odom, thank you all. Jim.

MR. LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, refugees from the Gulf War, Gergen & Shields, and the Teamsters Union. FOCUS - HOME TO HARDSHIP

MR. LEHRER: Now a story of some forgotten victims of the Gulf War, migrant workers from India who were forced to flee from Kuwait. We have a report by Fred De Sam Lazaro of public station KTCA, Minneapolis-St. Paul. He visited some Gulf refugees who had returned to the South Indian state of Kerala.

MR. LAZARO: India's Mulabar Coast is among the world's oldest trading regions. As far back as 2000 B.C., Arabs from the Persian Gulf, the ancient Romans, and in the 15th century, Portuguese seafarers came across the Arabian Sea to buy spices, coconuts, and teak. Some things in India's Kerala region have changed very little since those old days. There are modern roads, but they are built by medieval methods, by people living in medieval poverty. From dusk to dawn, laborers with crude tools pound granite to gravel that will eventually go to expand this road. They earn about 1 U.S. dollar per day. Kerala has one of India's highest unemployment rates and paradoxically also the country's highest literacy rate, 100 percent in some regions. Arab traders came back here about three decades ago with pockets full of petro dollars. The natural resource they thought this time was Kerala's people.

DR. K.N. RAJ, Economist: People here are generally outward looking, possibly because it's a maritime state, always been open to the rest of the world. This has promoted their mobility.

MR. LAZARO: Economist Dr. K.N. Raj says thousands of Keralites from doctors and engineers to plumbers and laborers left to build modern nations out of the newly independent, newly wealthy Emirates.

DR. K.N. RAJ: The Gulf has provided an opportunity for many Kerala households to create some capital for themselves and this has spread through the entire society. All around here I know any number of families.

MR. LAZARO: Gulf dollars have fueled up to a third of all economic activity in Kerala, much of it in construction. Amid the thatched roofs of small huts and houses are the new dream homes of Gulf emigres. For their neighbors until recently, they were a constant reminder that the Gulf offered a rare ticket out of poverty.

JOSEPH SOARES, Banker: Everything was hunky dory till the first of August you can say, 1990.

MR. LAZARO: Joseph Soares heads a major regional bank. He says thousands of unskilled or semi-skilled men saw their life long aspirations disappear with the Iraqi invasion.

MR. SOARES: All his dreams were shattered. Now what happens to such a person who had sold all his belongings, thinking that he was going to not just a safe haven but to heaven?

MR. LAZARO: It's a question thousands of Keralites from Kuwait are asking themselves. Early in 1990, Radha Krishnan sold his family's chief source of subsistence, two milk cows, to buy a ticket to Kuwait. For a fee, a private employment broker promised him work as a manual laborer.

RADHA KRISHNAN: [Speaking through Interpreter] I had to pay the visa agent my whole first month's salary and a quarter of my salary for six months after that.

MR. LAZARO: Radha Krishnan had just paid off his visa broker when Iraq invaded Kuwait. After two weeks in Jordanian refugee camps, he caught an Indian government-sponsored evacuation flight home. He returned to his wife and two children with little more than the clothes he was wearing.

RADHA KRISHNAN: [Speaking through Interpreter] I just hoped to earn some money so that my family could lead a decent life. There is no work to be had here.

MR. LAZARO: Radha Krishnan says he cannot afford the additional debt it would take to return to Kuwait. He works part-time as a plumber's assistant and hopes eventually to drive a scooter rick shaw, the ubiquitous conveyance on India's roads. It will probably mean putting off big dreams for his children, even little ones like a second badminton racket. But Radha Krishnan says the nightmarish experience has made him philosophical.

RADHA KRISHNAN: [Speaking through Interpreter] From 6 in the morning to 11 the next morning we were on a bus in the desert without any water. We were given tents to stay in the desert. After what happened there, I spent 16 days with hardly any water, I feel I can handle anything now. I can somehow manage. I am home in this country.

MR. LAZARO: The harshness of India's poverty where one water faucet serves a whole neighborhood, for example, would seem to add to the nightmare for Gulf returnees, but many India laborers say pre-war Kuwait was no paradise lost. Douglas Gomez, who returned after six years in Kuwait, says he worked 14 hours a day as a domestic servant for a Kuwaiti businessman. Most of the time, he says, he was hungry.

DOUGLAS GOMEZ: I eat very less. Today I prepare something, day after tomorrow I will put in the fridge, day after tomorrow, I will eat it again. Otherwise I cannot eat it fresh everyday, no, because I am getting salary very less. So if I eat preparing food every day, no money, I cannot send anything here.

MR. LAZARO: Did you ask them for more money when you --

MR. GOMEZ: Yeah. I asked him so many times.

MR. LAZARO: What did they say?

MR. GOMEZ: He say my problem, if you want to, you work here, otherwise, go back.

MR. LAZARO: The sacrifice and the long separation from his wife, Girlie, and children fetched Gomez a salary three to four times what he'd typically earn in India. The difference has so far meant an education for his three children, a chance to escape the poverty this family has endured for generations. Gomez is anxious to return.

MR. GOMEZ: If I can get job in Kuwait or Saudi, I will go.

MR. LAZARO: However, with Kuwaiti citizens being encouraged to lead a more self-sufficient, less opulent lifestyle, the number of jobs available to people like Gomez isn't likely to reach pre war levels. Many of them are expected to go to nations allied in Kuwait's liberation. Ironically, the Gulf emigres more likely to be called back are those most ambivalent about returning to Kuwait. A.P. Abraham worked eight years as an engineer for Kuwait's electric utility. Life for him, wife, Mini, and young son, was comfortable until even after the Iraqi invasion.

A.P. ABRAHAM: As soon as we know the Iraqi invasion is on and almost all Kuwait is in their hands, then we started buying things and stocking them up for about one month, two months.

MR. LAZARO: The Abrahams consider themselves lucky aside from a personal tragedy. The sudden death of a relative got them special permission to return quickly to India. They were able to skip the long line in refugee camps for evacuation flights home. Like many upper bracket refugees, the Abrahams invested their money in India, notably in the large home they share with his parents in the extended family tradition. This family lost little more than furniture in Kuwait, are already well set financially, and in no hurry to return.

A.P. ABRAHAM: What I read from the newspapers shows pictures of what is happening, there is too much pollution and things like that.

MINI ABRAHAM: We like to remember. Now if we go -- because of the pollution --

MR. LAZARO: Bankers like Soares, however, are more anxious to see people like the Abrahams return quickly to Kuwait.

JOSEPH SOARES, Banker: They were remitting a fair measure of, a fair amount of their earnings. The remittances have now come down to absolutely levels which are talking about, abysmal levels.

MR. LAZARO: No one is more anxious than the government of India to see trade across the Arabian Sea resume at full volume. The loss of some 100,000 hard currency paychecks since the war has plunged India's foreign exchange reserves to dangerously low levels. It is foreign exchange that ironically goes right back to the Gulf to pay India's bill for imported oil. FOCUS - GERGEN & SHIELDS

MR. LEHRER: Now some Friday night analysis of events far and wide from Gergen & Shields, David Gergen, editor at large of U.S. News & World Report, Mark Shields, syndicated columnist for the Washington Post. First on this Iraqi nuclear question, Mark, the President seemed to be saying today that if it becomes necessary to take military action to destroy those nukes that the public opinion here in the United States or the American people would support that. Do you agree?

MR. SHIELDS: I think the American people have to be prepared for it, Jim, but certainly George Bush is not to be under estimated in his intentions. I think those who had questions and doubts about his resolve earlier to go to combat now, now look upon his words quite seriously. But I think -- I really do think the nation would have to be prepared and persuaded politically and publicly that it was a wise and necessary act.

MR. LEHRER: David, your feel for it?

MR. GERGEN: Mark's last point for it I think was very much on target, Jim. The President needs to go to the country and explain why this has suddenly arisen. You know, it's like it's suddenly on a periscope and I think most people understand it very well. Your discussion here a little earlier, I think you have to clarify all the issues. It made it seem quite a somber prospect that we might go in militarily, but, Jim, I think fundamentally if the President does explain it well, the country will support him. You know, to the extent that the country has been disappointed by what happened in Iraq, it is because we didn't go far enough. You know, 65 percent of the people in this country according to recent polls would support leaving troops and support the Kurds. Over half think we didn't stay in long enough to get rid of Saddam Hussein. So I think they would support strong action by the President.

MR. LEHRER: All right. Let's go to Thurgood Marshall, the retirement of Thurgood Marshall. Is President Bush likely to replace him with another black Justice, Mark?

MR. SHIELDS: I couldn't believe that he would, Jim, although as soon as the Marshall retirement was announced, immediately the White House began floating names. Names came from high Republican circles. It included two blacks, two Hispanics, a woman. But this, of course, is a party and an administration that is so fiercely and passionately against quotas so that would not be the case. The President would look at it just in a color blind fashion. And 90 percent of the federal judiciary is composed of white males. GeorgeBush would not pick someone solely on subjective methods. He only believes in merit. That's how he chose his Vice President.

MR. LEHRER: Okay. David --

MR. GERGEN: I know Mark doesn't really believe all of what he just said --

MR. LEHRER: I know, but it sounded really terrific.

MR. GERGEN: But it wasn't until he winked and gave away the game.

MR. LEHRER: Right. David, what are the pressures on the President to -- let's put it this way -- if he doesn't choose a black or a minority, what kind of heat is he going to take, if any?

MR. GERGEN: He will take heat. I think that there is a feeling in the country that quotas is not the same thing as cultural diversity and that the court, like other public institutions, ought to be somewhat reflective and have people on it who understand different lives and different lifestyles. And one of the great things of Justice Marshall, whether you agree with him or disagree with him, with his opinions, he did understand what it was to be oppressed. And I think that to have a minority person on there makes a lot of sense. After all, in this country we used to have what many people thought was a Jewish seat on the court, and starting with 1916 with Louis Brandeis, and we went right up to 1968 with at least one Jewish member of the court, right through then. We had very distinguished jurists like Cardoza and Brandeis and Frankfurter, and it was a good tradition. I think people understand that that represented part of the cultural heritage and diversity of the country.

MR. LEHRER: To follow up on your wink a moment ago, Mark, are you suggesting that the President would take even more heat from his main constituency if he did, in fact, select a black if it appeared to be the only reason he was doing it was for "affirmative action quota reasons?"

MR. SHIELDS: Well, I don't think he's going to take an awful lot of heat. David made the point earlier that he's at 75 or 80 percent among Republicans. He's at wherever, 90. He doesn't have a core constituency among Republicans but he has a concern about conservatives which he's demonstrated over the past, but the conservatives have no place to go on this. They might hold a couple of press conferences, send out a couple of direct mail pieces, but the liberals will be filling the posts, the letter carriers' bags with direct mail pieces in the next couple of months, rather than the conservatives.

MR. LEHRER: So he can -- in other words --

MR. SHIELDS: I think --

MR. LEHRER: He's clean to do anything he wants to, clean to do anything he wants to?

MR. SHIELDS: I think he does -- in that sense, Jim, I would just say this. I think if he's going to appoint a first that all Presidents, that's something they like to do, they feel it entitles them at least to an opsed or an ibid in the history books to have some sort of a first. Ronald Reagan, of course, did break the gender barrier. Lyndon Johnson did in an historic moment appoint Thurgood Marshall to the Supreme Court. I would, I would bet that if George Bush were going to move in that direction, it would be toward an Hispanic. And I think there's no question when somebody from any group is appointed for the first time, there is a great sense of group elation, of achievement, of a sense of arriving, that we are finally fully American citizens.

MR. GERGEN: Jim, can I just say something? I think our conversation is tilting this a little bit away from the kind of reasoning I would expect to take place within the inner circle of the White House and that is I think the President will first insist upon having someone who shares his judicial philosophy. That's what he campaigned on, he's been very consistent on that, and to that extent, I think he's under a lot of pressure to select someone who shares that philosophy. Having said that, what he'll then do is reach out and see who within the minority community, whether it be a black or Hispanic or woman or otherwise fits that description. And clearly the White House has already started to come up with some names. There are names floating around Washington we all know. I do share Mark's view that I think he's - - while there is a black that many in the administration like very much and have pushed before, Clarence Thomas, who's now here on the Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., that he was a favorite of many Republicans, their word coming out of the White House is they are looking very hard at a couple of Hispanics. I think that might very well happen. I think the politics, if you look at it from a raw political standpoint, I could see why Bush might be, find that appealing.

MR. LEHRER: All right. Let's talk about the Democrats for a moment. Some signs of life maybe, Sen. Jay Rockefeller probable Presidential candidate chaired a commission on children, urged a thousand dollar tax credit for each child. Is that going to go anywhere, Mark, as a Presidential issue, a Democratic issue?

MR. SHIELDS: I think it is, Jim. I think that Jay Rockefeller did a superb job in putting that commission together, in winning a consensus, and in highlighting an issue that no American can look at and walk away from and ignore. It is an immensely important issue. There is no question of generational or inter-generational justice that Americans have tilted generously and justly toward the elderly at the expense, one could say, certainly over the last generation of America's children. The Rockefeller Commission did a superb job in highlighting just the plight of American children and by pointing out that children born into a single parent family are seven times more likely to be poor, their chances of growing up, and by asserting certain moral and ethical values that are terribly important, that it's better for a child to be born into and to grow up into a stable, two parent environment. We aren't value neutral on a question like that. So I think, I think it was important. Will it go somewhere? If it becomes an issue in a political campaign, where there's a response and a reaction, that's a wonderful thing about political campaigns, it will. There is a great cynicism on the part of the administration. It's too early. Six months said one top spokesman, this isn't a real campaign issue at this point. And I think, I think Jay Rockefeller's touched something important.

MR. LEHRER: Do you agree, David?

MR. GERGEN: I think he's begun to define the national agenda for the Democratic Party, and that is not only through this commission, of course, but through the Pepper Commission that he took over after Mr. Pepper died on health care. He had that last year and now this one. I think he's begun to lay out some issues that the Democrats might find a basis for a serious domestic agenda for the future and I think to that extent he's not only helped his party but I think Mark's right. I think he's catapulted himself up within the Democratic ranks. He's at the forefront of all the potential candidates now who are talking about issues. Now that doesn't necessarily mean he can go all the way and win the nomination. We all remember how much Bruce Babbitt a few years ago --

MR. LEHRER: Did the same thing.

MR. GERGEN: -- was at the forefront on the issues.

MR. LEHRER: Yeah.

MR. GERGEN: And didn't go anywhere politically. But I think that Jay Rockefeller has come a long way and he's helped both himself and his party.

MR. LEHRER: A Sununu update. Yesterday he had to deny that he had said American Jews were in a conspiracy to get him, along with unhappy conservative Republicans and the liberal press. And yet, the Evans & Novak column, in fact, said it pretty straight, that he believed that. Is he bleeding even worse, and is it likely to be terminal this time, Mark?

MR. SHIELDS: Well, I think it's a long fall, Jim, from a shield of indispensability, an arrogant assumption of indispensability, where John Sununu was just a couple of months ago to the point where he's searching almost for any public reassurance on the part of the President. George Bush's ringing endorsement was not heard, at least wasn't picked up by the seismograph at Georgetown University. Nobody I know heard it. And I think that had to be so he, Sununu, and his supporters organized sort of a conservative reinforcement rally to his side. He's a chastened man and I think John Sununu's there. I don't think it would serve either his purpose or the President for him to walk at this point, but it's a changed role.

MR. LEHRER: David.

MR. GERGEN: Jim, about every time you think he's managed to staunch the flow of blood, a new wound pops open and there's more blood. And you keep wondering how long he can survive. My hunch has been all along he would survive. I'll tell you, our correspondent at the magazine, Ken Walsh, who has very good pipelines into the White House is reporting this week that the President has lost faith in him and that people in the White House and that people around the President think he may be gone by the end of the summer.

MR. LEHRER: By the end of the summer?

MR. GERGEN: By the end of the summer.

MR. LEHRER: And if people start saying, oh, the President's lost faith in him and then you say it, and then we, everybody hears this and gets up from the TV set and says, oh, the President's lost faith, and it just begins to, begins to be a reality, does it not?

MR. GERGEN: Well, I think that's one of the problems that John Sununu has faced and that is that he has not had much support from within the staff. And I think he's -- I think some of the wounds he's been suffering have come from people going to the press and saying the guy's out of here, the President's lost faith or something. It's hard for John Sununu to put down those stories simply because they are flowing so often from people right around the President.

MR. LEHRER: Mark, do you agree?

MR. SHIELDS: I think there's a certain Murder on the Orient Express flavor to this. I mean, there's a lot of people who plunged a knife in. I mean, there are --

MR. GERGEN: That's right.

MR. SHIELDS: -- people in the White House. There certainly are people in interest groups. There are people on Capitol Hill. There's all kinds of people.

MR. LEHRER: I've just been told to say thank you when I can. I can now, gentlemen, so I'm going to say thank you very much.

MR. GERGEN: Thank you.

MR. SHIELDS: Thank you, James. FOCUS - PRESERVING THE UNION

MS. WOODRUFF: Finally tonight the Teamsters. Federal officials forced the union to make internal changes after a racketeering lawsuit. Many of the Teamsters attending the union's convention in Florida have found it hard to adjust. We have a report from Betty Ann Bowser of public station KUHT-Houston.

TEAMSTER: Point of order! Point of order! I didn't nominate the man. Would you please have patience! Please have patience! Don't be political! Don't be political! Don't be political!

SPOKESMAN: Wait a minute! Wait a minute!

TEAMSTER: Don't be political!

SPOKESMAN: I'm going to ask you that.

MS. BOWSER: There's never been an International Brotherhood of Teamsters Convention like this one. For five days, 3,000 delegates argued, debated, and voted up or down on a wide range of issues that will affect the future of the union. And for the first time ever, these delegates were elected by the rank and file, not by union machine politicians. For the first time in the union's 88 year history, the delegates voted last night by a secret ballot in a kind of Presidential primary. They determined who would be on a December ballot when five to six hundred thousand Teamsters vote nationwide for their first democratically elected president. R.V. Durham will be one of the three names on that ballot.

MR. DURHAM: Well, I think clearly the Teamsters Union will never be the same.

MS. BOWSER: Is that good or bad?

R.V. DURHAM, Teamsters Presidential Candidate: It's good. It's good. I think we're -- we've gone through a lot of heartburn.

MS. BOWSER: Durham has been a Teamster for 41 years. He lived through those days when union leaders were picked by an elite group of powerful insiders, men who frequently had ties to the mob. Of the last eight Teamsters Presidents, four have been indicted, three were convicted and served time in prison. Former union President Jimmy Hoffa is believed to have been murdered by mob elements who turned against him.

RUDOLPH GIULIANI, Former U.S. Attorney: [1988] Today the United States government is bringing a lawsuit to attack and to reverse once and for all a major American scandal.

MS. BOWSER: Three years ago today, the federal government filed a racketeering suit against the Teamsters, charging union leaders with making a devil's pact with the mob. The suit alleged organized crime had deprived Teamster members of their rights through a pattern of racketeering that includes 20 murders, shootings, bombings, beatings, a campaign of fear, extortion and theft. At the last Teamsters convention in Las Vegas in 1986, the late Jackie Presser ran unopposed. He was carried into the convention hall on a chariot in what almost amounted to a coronation.

RICHARD THORNBURGH, Attorney General: [March 14, 1989] This settlement which union leaders agreed to earlier today culminates 30 years of efforts by the Department of Justice to remove the influence of organized crime within the Teamsters Union.

MS. BOWSER: Three years later, the Teamsters signed a consent decree with the federal government to avoid a trial over the lawsuit. The union agreed to purge its mob connections and hold democratic elections. So at this convention court-appointed monitors controlled just about everything from media access to the convention floor to the length of nominating speeches. When delegates go to vote, they are carefully monitored by court- appointed election officials. All this has many rank and file grumbling that the union no longer belongs to them. California Teamster Chuck Mack is typical.

CHUCK MACK, Teamster: They're second guessing every internal decision that we make with regards to finance this, who gets appointed jobs, how many people get appointed to jobs, what local unions will get loans and what local unions will get grants, expenditures for organizing. They have the right to approve or veto all of those expenditures. That's the position that government's taken. It's almost like we want to eliminate democracy to ensure democracy.

MS. BOWSER: Union Presidential Candidate Ron Carey, a reformer, agrees but says the Teamsters have no one to blame but themselves.

MR. CAREY: Sure, there's corruption in the Teamster Union and what we've lacked is the guts and the courage to get it out. There are all sorts of things that could have been done through the years. You look at the track record. The fact that four past vice presidents have been indicted, I mean, that's some real serious signals we sent to our members. Michael Holland is the court- appointed official overseeing the elections this week and on balance, he is pleased.

MICHAEL HOLLAND, Election Observer: I think that the delegates and the members of this union and the candidates and there have been almost 70 of them down here, as well as the union as an institution have every right to be proud of their collective effort. It's been contentious. There's been a lot of debate. There's been great discussions about the union policy and there's a horse race among a lot of candidates for union office here.

MS. BOWSER: Federal officials have convinced a number of Teamsters they believe corrupt to step down. Federal District Judge Frederick Lacey banned 30 Teamsters from attending this convention because of ties to organized crime. Reform advocates say all of this change is not only good for the Teamsters, it's good for all unions. Susan Jennik belongs to a union watchdog organization.

SUSAN JENNIK, Association for Union Democracy: I think it can do nothing but help the labor movement. Every union organizer I talked to tells me the first thing they're confronted with is that the employers say union officials are corrupt, and the epitome of that corrupt union officer is a Teamster official. If the Teamsters Union cleans up its act, it will help every union organizer do a better job of convincing the members that unions will be good for them.

MS. BOWSER: Perhaps the strongest statement the Teamsters made about change this week was symbolic. Instead of meeting in Las Vegas again, the union went, instead, to Walt Disney World. And although some Teamsters want to go back to the old days --

TEAMSTER: I hope the next convention will be in Las Vegas.

MS. BOWSER: -- government monitors say the old days and the old ways are gone forever. RECAP

MR. LEHRER: Again the major stories of this Friday, a United Nations inspection team was again denied access to an Iraqi nuclear materials site. Pres. Bush said it was a clear violation of the Gulf War cease-fire agreement. And the Yugoslav army declared a truce in its two day battle with the break-away republic of Slovenia. Good night, Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: Good night, Jim. That's our NewsHour for tonight. We'll be back tomorrow night with a look at fiscal belt tightening in U.S. cities. I'm Judy Woodruff. Thank you and have a good weekend.