Bill Clinton: “Sometimes the United States has to act alone, or at least has to act first. Sometimes we cannot let other countries have…”

“Sometimes the United States has to act alone, or at least has to act first. Sometimes we cannot let other countries have a veto on our foreign policy. I could not send soldiers into the north of Iraq; that would have been wrong. I could reduce Saddam Hussein's ability to threaten Kuwait and his other neighbors again. That's what I did. I still believe it was the right thing to do. Middle East Peace Process Mr. Lehrer. Senator Dole, on your photo-op foreign policy charge against the President---- Senator Dole. Not mine. Mr. Lehrer. No, no, I mean your charge against the President that he has a photo-op foreign policy; does the Middle East summit last week fall into that category? Senator Dole. Well, there were some good pictures, but does it fall into that category? I don't know. I want to be very serious. I have supported the President when I thought he was right on Bosnia; I supported him on NAFTA and GATT. So it's not that we always disagree; others disagreed with us. The Mideast is very difficult. But it seemed to me just as an observer that before you would call somebody to America, you would have some notion what the end result might be. Now, maybe it's better just to get together and sit down and talk; maybe that was the purpose. And I know talks have--[inaudible]--started again today. But again, it's almost like an ad hoc foreign policy. It's ad hoc. It's sort of, ``Well, we get up in the morning and read the papers and what country's in trouble; we'll have a meeting.'' To me, that's not the strategy that I think that people expect from America. I think we have lost credibility. And I say this very honestly, without any partisanship. We've lost credibility around the world. Our allies don't--they're not certain what we're going to do, what our reaction, what our response is going to be. Nobody suggested sending troops to Iraq, if that was the hint there from the President. But I do think that Saddam Hussein is stronger than he was, and I do believe that we didn't gain a great deal in the Mideast by bringing three of the four leaders--one refused to come--to Washington, DC.”