Democracy Now!
With Amy Goodman
".....AMY GOODMAN: Although the Bush administration never got the Security Council resolutions they needed, they did try their best to pressure undecided Security Council members to support the Iraq invasion. Chile, along with Mexico, Pakistan, Cameroon, Angola and Guinea, were the six undecided members of the Security Council during the lead-up to the war.
Heraldo Muñoz, the Chilean Ambassador to the United Nations, has written an insider’s account of that period, revealing new details of how the United States bullied its allies and threatened reprisals against those withholding support. His book is called A Solitary War: A Diplomat’s Chronicle of the Iraq War and Its Lessons. Ambassador Heraldo Muñoz joins us in our firehouse studio here in New York, just down the road from the United Nations......
JUAN GONZALEZ: What about the pressure that those undecided members of the Security Council were under in those months, those early months of 2003? What kind of efforts did the United States make, other than obviously these phone calls, to try to get the votes of those members?
AMBASSADOR HERALDO MUÑOZ: Well, there were abundant phone calls, of course. My president, President Lagos, was called by President Bush on several occasions. He talked to Prime Minister Blair, looking for an intermediary solution that was at a moment, between the British and Chile and the other undecided, the possibility of an outcome that never was. And in addition to that, by the way, there were pressures from those that were fully opposed, without a doubt, to the invasion, meaning France. President Jacques Chirac talked to Lagos and to other world leaders in the Security Council.
But the pressure, I think, is, as I say it in the book, expressed itself in nuanced warnings, like, for example, a memorandum has emerged in the Spanish ministry showing that President Bush mentioned that the free trade agreement between Chile and the United States hadn’t been finished, and that could be endangered if Chile did not go along the way that the United States thought we should in Iraq. And a warning was made as regards Angola, that perhaps the Millennium Account that benefited development goals of Angola could be also in danger if there was not—if Angola didn’t follow the US or the US-British posture. So there were veiled, I would say, warnings.
But nevertheless, here was a fundamental principle at stake for countries like Chile, and that was a respect for multilateralism, respect for the Security Council and the Charter of the United Nations, that you use force as a last resort once all diplomatic efforts have been exhausted, and then you make sure that there are weapons of mass destruction. Evidence and history has shown that we were right. And the costs, in terms of lives, in terms of treasure, have been tremendous. And that, I think, leaves us quite satisfied about what we did: even though relatively small countries, we stood up our ground on questions of principle......."
With Amy Goodman
".....AMY GOODMAN: Although the Bush administration never got the Security Council resolutions they needed, they did try their best to pressure undecided Security Council members to support the Iraq invasion. Chile, along with Mexico, Pakistan, Cameroon, Angola and Guinea, were the six undecided members of the Security Council during the lead-up to the war.
Heraldo Muñoz, the Chilean Ambassador to the United Nations, has written an insider’s account of that period, revealing new details of how the United States bullied its allies and threatened reprisals against those withholding support. His book is called A Solitary War: A Diplomat’s Chronicle of the Iraq War and Its Lessons. Ambassador Heraldo Muñoz joins us in our firehouse studio here in New York, just down the road from the United Nations......
JUAN GONZALEZ: What about the pressure that those undecided members of the Security Council were under in those months, those early months of 2003? What kind of efforts did the United States make, other than obviously these phone calls, to try to get the votes of those members?
AMBASSADOR HERALDO MUÑOZ: Well, there were abundant phone calls, of course. My president, President Lagos, was called by President Bush on several occasions. He talked to Prime Minister Blair, looking for an intermediary solution that was at a moment, between the British and Chile and the other undecided, the possibility of an outcome that never was. And in addition to that, by the way, there were pressures from those that were fully opposed, without a doubt, to the invasion, meaning France. President Jacques Chirac talked to Lagos and to other world leaders in the Security Council.
But the pressure, I think, is, as I say it in the book, expressed itself in nuanced warnings, like, for example, a memorandum has emerged in the Spanish ministry showing that President Bush mentioned that the free trade agreement between Chile and the United States hadn’t been finished, and that could be endangered if Chile did not go along the way that the United States thought we should in Iraq. And a warning was made as regards Angola, that perhaps the Millennium Account that benefited development goals of Angola could be also in danger if there was not—if Angola didn’t follow the US or the US-British posture. So there were veiled, I would say, warnings.
But nevertheless, here was a fundamental principle at stake for countries like Chile, and that was a respect for multilateralism, respect for the Security Council and the Charter of the United Nations, that you use force as a last resort once all diplomatic efforts have been exhausted, and then you make sure that there are weapons of mass destruction. Evidence and history has shown that we were right. And the costs, in terms of lives, in terms of treasure, have been tremendous. And that, I think, leaves us quite satisfied about what we did: even though relatively small countries, we stood up our ground on questions of principle......."
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