Bill Clinton: “Well, I think they are two different issues. I think on the human rights issue, I think it only undermines human rights…”

“Well, I think they are two different issues. I think on the human rights issue, I think it only undermines human rights if you basically just do it with a wink and a nod and it's obvious that you don't care about human rights or other issues of liberty or human decency. This is not just with China but generally. I think on balance the evidence is that greater economic prosperity and greater economic openness leads to more open societies and to greater freedom and to a higher quality of life across the board. So I think that--I don't see them as fundamentally in conflict. I just think that as long as you recognize that there is--as long as we in the United States and the Government recognize that we have an obligation to pursue a coherent and full policy, that everything we do to open a country economically and to bring in new ideas, new information, and new people and to bring people from those countries out of their own environs, that that's a good thing, and it advances the cause of human rights and liberty over the long run--and sometimes over the very short run. Now, on the national security issues, very often these questions require a lot of careful judgment by people who know all the facts, and even there it's not always clear what should be done because technology is becoming more universally available in so many areas. I think we have very clear rules and guidelines on nonproliferation, and we've made a lot of progress with the Chinese on nonproliferation. On the question of the satellites--if you just want to take the satellites. The issue there, we have a system now where in every decision all the relevant agencies, including the national security agencies, are all involved; if the satellites are purely commercial, the initiative comes out of the State Department, the initial approval, but everybody else gets a say in almost a de facto veto. If there can be some interconnection between the satellite and rocket that goes up, then it initiates out of State, but everybody else gets a say. And I think the system has worked quite well for the United States and has advanced our interests without undermining our security. I've not seen any evidence of any case where there's been a national security interest that's been compromised.”