Bill Clinton: “First of all, I have to correct your premise. I was very clear all during the campaign of 1992 that I did not think we…”

“First of all, I have to correct your premise. I was very clear all during the campaign of 1992 that I did not think we should send our ground forces in to get in the middle of a civil war in Yugoslavia but that I would support using American forces as part of a NATO force if there could be a peace agreement and that I would make our air power available to support the United Nations mission there. The United States took the lead in getting NATO to agree to do that last August, and as you know, the United States and NATO flights shot some planes down in Yugoslavia recently. And nearly everybody I know, sir, believes that it was the leadership, the aggressive leadership of the United States, which led to the cease-fire around Sarajevo, which helped to get the agreement between the Bosnian Muslims and the Croatians and which has made the progress that we've made. So I don't believe that we have been vacillating at all. There were some planes that were shot down in the former Yugoslavia as the result of the strength that we showed there, as we did in Iraq. When I received concrete evidence that there was an assassination attempt on former President Bush, we took military action there. Now, the question is: What should we do with North Korea? This is a very serious thing. North Korea has said they want a nonnuclear Korean Peninsula. North Korea has said they want to get along with South Korea. It is the most isolated regime in the world today. Nobody wants them to develop nuclear weapons, not China, their old ally. China doesn't want them to become a nuclear power. Japan doesn't want them to become a nuclear power because they don't want to have to think about developing nuclear weapons. South Korea certainly doesn't. Seoul, South Korea, by far the biggest city in South Korea, is very close to the North Korean border. The question, sir, is: What is the proper way to try to get North Korea to comply? And what we have done is to try to work very closely first with the South Koreans--whatever we do, we have to do in partnership with them--and with the Japanese and the Chinese, pushing firmly, firmly, firmly, to get the inspections. We got more inspections. They didn't do everything they promised to do, and so now we've got the United Nations to make a very strong statement that they have to do it. If they don't do it, we'll continue to go forward. But this is a very delicate thing. It's easy to talk about and difficult to do. North Korea and South Korea are right there together; their armies are facing each other. Seoul is a very big city on the border of North Korea. And we've got to work closely with the South Koreans and the others, and we're going to be very, very firm about it. But if I say we're going to do something, we're going to do it. I'm not going to threaten something that we're not prepared to do. I think what we should do is say less and do more in international politics. Ms. Hindrew. Mr. President, several months ago, in November of last year, you said we will not allow North Korea to build a nuclear weapon. We now believe that there are at least two nuclear weapons and possibly a third. When you say we will not allow them to build it, what are you willing to do to stop them? And what are you willing to do now that we believe they have them?”