tv International Programming CSPAN December 23, 2009 7:00am-7:30am EST
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>> in the terms of the threats that each has seem to pose to all 6 and then yemen which is on the peninsula you and then after that, not before, after that, to the arab-israeli conflict and some of the issues pertaining to india and pakistan and that's how they are focused at that time. with regard to iraq, one would be surprised that they speak about iraq less at these summits than one might imagine. or expect. or believe. and a reason has to do -- going back to 1976 and their memories of iraq's view towards all six of these countries, their forms
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of government. their lesser degree of development. their lacking in agricultural sector, their lacking in industrial sector and their lacking the driving force of the baath party, they are not having thought in a war like iraq did in iran and suffered as many casualties. so this suspicion about iraq's ultimate intentions not just towards kuwait but all the others there is one suspect with it and the same with regard to iran. but it also has to do with march, 1975 and if i had to say one single agreement that is the strategic glue of all six of them it's the algiers accord of march, 1975. now, this took place in the ecos and the wakes and the shadows of person and increasingly american talk about doing the unthinkable. of utilizing force and mobilizing and deploying force
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to the oil fields and the gas fields of the gulf. because of the world economic situation and the oil embargo that had preceded it until march of 1974. the first article of what they agreed to in algiers in march, '75 was noninterference in one another's domestic affairs. if you can believe it, looking in the rear view mirror, the shah of iran and saddam hussein signed that agreement. and they honored it. they held to it solemnly for the first four years until khomeini returned to iran from paris in early february, '79 and broke it every day for next 19 months before the irani and iraqi war. that principle is as valid in their minds as no division that i think discern until today as it was reaffirmed on march 6th,
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1991. perhaps coincidentally but in a nice kind of complementary way, the same evening that george h.w. bush spoke before a joint session of congress and called for a new world order be the six dcc countries plus syria and egypt called for a new order because the one that was shattered to smithereens because of the iraqi one there. the bottom line here is noninterference in iraq's affairs lest they open the door and leave them exposed and vulnerable at any point in iraq's interference in their affairs. and the same thing with regard to iran. there's no discussion about iran's elections. there's no discussions about fraud or free and fair or open and transparent electoral processes.
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there's no discussion about mahmoud ahmadinejad prospects or that faction or this faction for the same exact reasons that i gave before, about not giving iran any pretext to interfere in their societies to any greater degree than iran already has over the last 30 years. with regard to yemen this time, yes, they did address yemen but in a unanimous support for saudi arabia's position as well as the yemen government's position and going over and beyond what has passed for conventional wisdom or established thought or informed opinion regarding what has been happening and has not been happening in yemen, you have something profoundly different and profoundly less than what the media has made out to be. the words "crisis" are individually used but this
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particular crisis thus for yemen pales in insignificance by comparison and contrast to five previous crises that yemen has dealt with over the last 80 years. the first being from the late 1930s and the early 1941 when they had three years of drought, the home of bin laden and his family. and when the japanese invaded indonesia and they dried up all the remittances from indonesia and malaya to the people of south yemen, nothing has happened quite like that since. or the 1962'1962, '67 war in northern yemen which has created the official limbs factory that i went to. or the war in the south between '64, '67 if south yemen where the british had more troops tied into the field at any time they
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left burma or fast forward to the civil war from april of '94 to july of 1994, when the south seceded or tried to secede and every single dccc country backed it. so this one is no comparison to any of those five. and the old timers know this but newcomers forgiven if they don't see things in that context or background or perspective. with regard to palestine, it's the issue that's most emotionally of the cause of pain if people's heart. and it is also the issue with regard to the united states that protect their first and last resort is judged more in an indicted way than on any of the other issues outstanding in the region. one, because, it's the oldest issue. two, it's because it's seen as the largest issue impacting so
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many of the other conflicts and three, it's the most pervasive issue at the levels of the youth and those who are literate and watch the television in algiers who have read what has and what happens not. as last year's summit convened right when the operation was launched by the israelis for some 23 days in the gaza strip. and commentary largely off to the sidelines about how is it that a country of 303 million, the united states, cannot get basic humanitarian supplies into gaza with its 1.5 million people in a stretch of land 5 miles wide by 25 miles long? no one has the easy answers for these. but they make people uneasy in not having any easy answers for these especially when people speak about the rule of law and
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establishment and respect for the rule of law. and the fact that there's some 300,000 people in the dccc countries who have graduated from american universities, maybe half in the social sciences, arts and humanities, the other in the hard sciences where there's no americans as of yet who have graduated from any of the six dccc universities. so there's an imbalance of knowledge and understanding of one or the other. there's an imbalance of empathy and sensitivity and appreciation for the situation of the other. pondering the following in saudi arabia's cabinet, every day since 1975, there have been more american-trained ph.d.s in its cabinet than there have been ph.d.s of any kind in the u.s. cabinet the senate and the supreme court and the house of representatives combined so this aspect of it, they are able to see the constraints under which an american government, congress as well as executive branch,
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live and must operate. but do not see a comparable degree of empathy and understanding towards their options, which are far fewer than ours being a country with mountains and valleys and rivers and streams and green things and growing things and renewable things, we trade 1,128 categories of goods and services. these countries trade in only seven. so there's a massive imbalance in terms of strategic economic resources and opportunities, too. more specifically, now, what did they agree to on this time? what did they push the envelope further on this time? one was to deal with the issue of a monetary union. a currency common currency in ways that perhaps amounted to spin or finesse but at least there was an agreement that saudi arabia would be tasked with this point forward dealing with the technical procedures,
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the rules, the regulations, the policies, the administrative systems that would be required when and if a common currency comes in to pass. they were able to lighten the seriousness of this by comparing themselves again with the european union, which now has, correct me if i'm wrong, 29 million members and only 17 of them, the most recent, i think, being slovokia having signed on to the euro. and countries like great britain wanting to have both. and accept the euro. questions of dignity, pride, national honor, emblematic, symbolic traditions and institutions and beliefs and practices are sometimes the last and the hardest and the slowest things to die. so there's comparable reservation on some. omar has a similar degree of pride in its independence and its national sovereignty and its
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territorial integrity hard cost, harder than others in the last 40 years and in oman has perhaps the closest most intimate, most intensive relationship with the british than of the six dccc countries. it's also a matter of principle. this is the degree to which a country's indebtedness can be an acceptable percentage of its gross national product. and the european union countries focus on this as well. oman found this unacceptable constrictive and curbing to be the last to develop of the six, it recognizes it may have to borrow more than any of the others in order to catch up faster than it would otherwise be the case. and the uae has also shown its reluctance in part because it
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fancied as did bahrain and kuwait and saudi arabia that they would be the headquarters for this new monetary authority and not everybody can be a headquarters as such. bahrain and kuwait found it easier to side with saudi arabia. not least because they're tighter than the three at the southern end of the gulf. not least because they are all from the same extended tribal confederation. not least because they've longe% cooperated and collaborated on these kind of prickly geopolitical issues but the uae and oman are themselves tight as can be. we can come back on the q & e -- q & a. the elect has been switched on twice since the summer. this has been coming since 1986. 23 years it took to bring this particular project to completion.
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having to do no end of technical details, bidding, kuwait institute for science and research, saudi arabia's university petroleum and minerals, canadian consulting firms judging the technical feasibility and viability and economic merits of it and finally it exists for four of the dccc countries. the fourth in the north kuwait, bahrain saudi arabia and qatar. they are two overland, 400 mega watt cables that go from kuwait to doha. and there are two that go from saudi arabia under the sea into bahrain. and the switching station or the monitoring or the switching station are the three relay stations in saudi arabia. and why do they do this? they did this so as to project an image of being forward-looking, long-term looking, infrastructure-looking
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trying to find additional ways to intergrate themselves economically and trying to avoid powerouts and trying to chair what they had with each other and the reduce the economic outlay for having spare capacity because all six would have had to do that. whereas now they can reduce their spare capacity by 50%. and they projected some $4 billion in savings as a result of just making this even though it's taken them this long. related to that was the agreement on a pan-dccc railway that go from kuwait to northern oman. perhaps i could be corrected if i'm in error on this but not to is salalia oman, the southern most province as such. it will not necessarily hug the coast but it will parallel the coast, it will be inland in southeastern arabia from kuwait
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all the way from amman. and here they're thinking in ways that i don't read or hear of americans thinking in terms of the revival of railway use. there are at least four separate railway products in saudi arabia that are further down the road than this one. but this one has a long-term objective of linking up with africa and the southwest and linking up with the e.u. through arab north africa. and much of the inspiration is coming from the talks between the chinese and the russians in the past several months where vladimir, the russian railroad transportation minister has met with his chinese counterparts where the russians want to develop northeastern russia which is under tundra but rich and strategic minerals, but russia doesn't have the
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financing and the capitalization ability to underwrite that strategic shift in its economic strategic objectives. china is offering to finance it with uncle sam's and aunt samantha's dollars into the american unit for which the chinese have a trillion accumulated in terms of u.s. treasury debt. instruments as such. and lastly is a commitment it off explore the possibilities of not repeating what they did with a joint command in the northwest part of saudi arabia inside from kuwait. but rather a rapid deployment force of their own with double-headed soldiers and sailors and air personnel in the six armed forces that will include a special operations component. theoretically and strategically to begin to match the special operations component that iran has.
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i'll answer any questions including the dccc or any of its member countries to the best of my ability. [applause] >> excuse us while we do this for a moment so we can use the microphone. dr. anthony, iran was included in last year's meetings or invited but not this year. why? >> it was not included in last year's it was included in the year before last. the only two times that oman has -- iran has been included has been when qatar was the host.
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and qatar has an image of pushing the envelope and being innovative and on the two occasions, i was there on both of them, it was qatar that extended the invitation. it has not been extended on any other occasion. >> how are the dccc countries using their economic and political capital to pressure the united states to be an honest broker in the arab-israeli conflict and champion the cause of palestinian statehood strongly? >> if everyone heard the question, i'm not -- i'm not aware of there being any efforts to pressure the u.s. without exception, there are degrees of difference among the six. their investments have been traditional and they've been conservative. largely they've been risk-averse. and this would even apply to kuwait's seemingly more risky investments.
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robert somewhat can correct me on this who knows more than i. but the investments and early in british petroleum and kuwait, which used to be the gulf oil companies, oil installations, property in atlanta, et cetera, even though he were seemed to be conservative and traditionally risk-free in contrast to some of saudi arabia's which were even more traditional and conservative. the total amount that they have invested abroad is roughly $1 trillion. half of that is in the united states. and there has been no economic pressure that comes to my mind since march 19th, 1974, which when the last oil embargo was terminated. and there's been an interlocking of financial and economic and increasingly commercial linkages through a degree of interdependence and a mutuality of benefit and a reciprocity of reward that was probably not even dreamed of two decades ago.
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as well as the number of american companies based in the dccc region have not doubled but they've increased themselves by 50% in the last five years. they are up from 500 companies to 750 companies in the dccc region. so at the corporate level and also at the intergovernmental level, there's a greater degree of us-ness and strategic similarity and complementary in front had adversarial relationship that was there before. notwithstanding there is palpable pan-dccc concern about the way in which arabs and muslims are treated in the united states. had they written about, had they are joked about, had they cursed, and negatively about on the pundits and talk shows. the 400 american films all of
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which show arabs and muslims in a backward, untrustworthy manner, despite all of that, they perceive their interests to be more with the united states amongst the great powers than any other collection of competing powers. at the present for some time past, and likely for the immediately foreseeable future. if only because at the defense level there's no comparable coalition or internationally concerted group of countries that one could imagine providing the requisite deterrence and defense capabilities until the situations in iraq and iran are more stable, secure and predictable than has been the case. >> let me pose a double-barrelled question following up on that. one question we have is, ask what do the dccc states want the u.s. to do vis-a-vis iran seven
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are there private views more pointed than their public statements. do the dccc states differ among themselves on this? and how do they communicate their views to the u.s. government? >> well, that's a very good question, very timely, very relevant in terms of what transpired at the summit. again, going back to the nondefense and domestic affairs of the country, the accent was on iran complying with, abiding by all international instruments, treaties and agreements to which it is signatory. so they put this in the international as opposed to iran must stop doing this, that, and the other on the inside. they reiterated, of course, their belief that iran is thus far within its legal rights within terms of the nonproliferation treaty. and that all countries have the right to peaceful nuclear development for civilian purposes. now, as to the differences, one
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of the foreign ministers there said, we find the american and the european as well as the russian and chinese process thus far to be flawed because it does not include us. if there is an attack on iran's military or infrastructure or both facilities, we do not see iran striking back at china, russia, the united states or the european union. we see ourselves as the easy targets. we're just minutes away. and so we are opposed to anything that would accentuate a scenario whereby we will be the victims of any use of arm force by israel or the united states or the two combined. more than a few have that same analysis so at least two foreign ministers shared this with me. but one said we come at it differently. and it's because of where we sit
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in our own historically different strategic relationship with iran, geopolitical relationship with iran. oman has a different view of this. and one needs to understand the reasons why oman's view is different. it sits directly across from the straits from iran. iran on its side of the straits has the straits reamed with antiaircraft and missile batteries. oman is far more exposed to iran than this geostrategic vital aspect than any other gulf countries there. secondly, oman is the beneficiary, 30 years ago, of iran sending a total of around 30,000 iranians to oman. never more than 3,000 at a time, usually for three months at a time to help quell what was arab's longest civil insurrection in the past 100
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years. there are no territorial disagreements between iran and oman. comparable to the claims of iran towards bahrain. comparable to the potential claims of iran vis-a-vis qatar regarding their offshore oil field, comparable to iran vis-a-vis debate. comparable to iran vis-a-vis kuwait and saudi arabia. so oman has a special niche and it needs to be seen as exceptional in the aberration but with reason for its own strategic national interest as it formulates them. and so oman is for not interfering any further than the dccc countries have with the language they used in their communique. >> another question from the audience.
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please tell us about the dccc's decision to form a regional security force is in front real rhetoric who's going to finance it? who's going to pay for it? >> that's a good question. i think like a number of other wishes, the expectations exceed the likely near term achievements. at the end of the liberation of kuwait in 1991, one of the dccc countries proposed that there should be a pan-dccc force built on top of the other one that existed in northwestern saudi arabia to 100,000. and people -- i met with these and the question was why 100,000? well, it's the same size as one of the iraqi republican guards. and we think that if we had something that big that this would give iraq or iran cause and pause to try to threaten us.
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but then when they put it under the microscope, three countries said, look, it's all we can do to build our national armed forces and defense national posture and we're not doing it that well and fast enough or effectively or economically. to add another burden that simultaneously we tried to build and train and equip and maintain and sustain a multinational force is just too much. i know we will build first and national establishments and from that strengthened national defense establishments we can then think of having more ambitious. but on the rapid deployment force, beyond the rhetoric because it is difficult in the short run to see where that's coming from, certainly the uae and saudi arabia both have mounted training and special operations in the last decade. it takes a while. but you have to begin somewhere.
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>> you mentioned yemen's special relationship and yet its continued exclusion from the dccc. could you elaborate on the agenda items on yemen. was a representative government present? if so what did that role-play and is there any movement in the participation and the functional committees of the dccc, health, sports, for example, and is there any discussion of economic assistance to yemen or direct investment to yemen? >> good questions all. i did not see a yemen representative at the summit. i have seen some at previous ones but i looked and asked and i saw none. and no one said there she is. there he is. the former prime minister of
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south yemen was supposed to come but he was nowhere to be seen. and he's no longer in yemen. he's in vienna. other representatives of various groups in yemen were certainly not present. but as to the kinds of assistance, reactions and responses by the dccc, there are the following. they were the core members of three to four years ago at a meeting in london where $4.3 billion was pledged to alleviate yemen's widespread economic difficulties. that has yet to make its way through to the end user. and each has their own reason, the lack of feasibility studies, lack of institutions, lack of transparency, too much
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