tv Charlie Rose PBS January 12, 2012 11:00pm-12:00am PST
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>> rose: welcome to our progra tonit we look at covert action in iran, with david ignatius of the "washington post" and columnist in and novelist, also john miller, formerly with the f.b.i. and the l.a.p.d. and a correspondent at cbs ns. and gary sick, former governmen official and now columbia university professor. >> i really think that what's happened and what's really different right now that both iran and the united states have been pursuing a track of pressure and negotiation it's all been pressure for the most part and little negotiation. i think both parts have been spiraling up to where we finally got to the brink and we're looking into the abyss and both
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sides have said that's not a very attractive proposition. if we actuay end up going to war, the costs are going to be incal claable. let's think about an exit ramp. how do we get out of. this. >> rose: we conclude with damien hirst, a british artist, who has a series of exhibitions at galleries around the world. >> it's simple structure or grid but once you put the colors in there, it never keeps still, all the greatest ideas are simple aren't they? >> rose: iran and damien hirst when we continue.
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from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. >> rose: tonight we begin with iran. as you have noted, i have a bad voice and a bit of a cold. this week another iranian nuclear scientist was assassinated. this is the fourth incident in two years targeting a scientist linked to iran's nuclear program. iran has blized israel and the united states. israel has not officially responded to the accusatio. secretary of state hillary clinton denied any u.s. involvement. >> i want to categorically deny any united states involvement in any kind of actf violence inside iran. we believe that there has to be an understanding between iran, its neighbors and the international community that finds a way forward for it to end its provocative behavior and its search for nuclear weapons
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and we join the international community to be a productive member of it. >> rose: increased sanctions against tehran followeby the iranian threat to shut down the strait of hormuz has escalated tensions in recent weeks. despite the growing economic pressure, iran announced over the weekend the production at its second uranium enrichment plant is imminent. join me from washington, d.c. is david ignatius from the "washington post" and in new york gary sick of columbia university and john miller, former official at the f.b.i., senior correspondent for cbs news and my colleague on "this morning." let me begin with david ignatius. david, how do you explain this covert action and what are the limits to it? >> well, we're seeing, it appears, a wave of covert action operations against iran intended to raise the cost to them of continuing with their nuclear program obviously it's in the nature of covert action that you
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can't be sure exactly who's doing what. these are actionthat are undertaken by intelligence services and are denied on an official level. this week we had the kilng of another iranian scientist in their nuclear program, a young chemical engineer who on wednesday was killed by a bomb, two men on a motorcycle attached to his car sped off and the bomb exploded and the young man was killed. the iranian ambassador to the united nations called this a malicious act of terrorism and in effect asked for an investigation. at the same time, other waves of difficult tri coming at iran in the nuclear program and it's impossible for us to know exactly where they're coming from but the suspicion is israel is seeking to derail the iranian nuclear program in any way it can. the u.s. is obviously conducting activities, although i think the
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u.s. in terms of lethal covert actions, actions specifically intended to kill iranians, i don't pick up that's evidence of any american program. >> rose: not only that, the secretary of sta was rather emphaticn her condemnation, was she not? >> sheas. and my own inquies about this yesterday led me to think the denials should be taken seriously in this case. among other things, in the common sense terms, for the u.s. to have the resources to puten on motorcycles in north tehran and ha them get away undetected even for an aggressive c.i.a., that would be a reach. i tend to think it was not a u.s. operation. >> rose: would it be a reach for the mossad? >> it's a reach for any external service. the israelis have more resources in iran, it's believed, but some of them are iranian jews.
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their resources... the israelis would really want to protect them. so however this was done, it was done at some considerable risk. i talked to an iranian student organization in the s. today that was arguing that these attacks are not the work of outsiders but the work of iranians going after people they have their own reasons for being against. >> rose: because they... the argument is made that they... some of these people are being killed-- albeit nuclear scientists-- maybe favorable to some kind of reform movement or regime change >> the iranian student confederation that i spoke to him today said at least one of those who had been killed in the last two years was associated with the green movement and, again, the argument-- and there's no way for us outside to know-- is that these are targets the iranians have and they're seeking to blame others. >> rose: two questions, one for gary and one for john... for
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you. can they stop t nuclear progm by these kinds of covert actions? >> no, one simple answer. basically you can... there are two things. one that the iranians would get scared and say "gee wiz, we can't keep this up, it's threatening our own people." two, that it would simply empty the bank of people who know how the do these things so you eliminate the knowledge base that goes with it. and i think in both cases iran is a big country, it's not going to bowe to that. and i think, actually... you know, this one came just at the point when there were talks about talks goin in istanbul of getting the iranians and the americans and the p5+1 together and th hit just at the moment wh that was coming to a head and if you want conspiracy theories i think it's more likely that this was actlly intended to help upset that... >> rose: who has the motivation
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to dohat? >> well, i must say, israel has the motivation. they don really want us to get together with iran and work out an arrangement. >> rose: because? >> because basically they think the iranians will te us far ride, that the iranians will stall for time, that they will go ahead and build a bomb and that the only way to stop them is literally by coming down hard on them wit massive force. >> rose: the way they did in iraq? >> that's right. >> so the other question about this, is it smart policy and is it legal policy whoever's doing it? especially if it is... the united states is helping in evading this. is it, therefor, are we... are we equally guilty? >> well, one of the principle arguments that's been twirling around is if the iranians put a bomb on an american's car it would be called terrorism, or an israeli's car. when another foreign service does that n iran it's called espionage. so i have to take the david
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ignatius track, though. i also spoke to somebody who could only be referred to as a "u.s. official" who said "look, if you're asking us was that our operation or not, that was not our operation." and in this case, given that contact, i don't have a lot of reason to doubt that. if you look at other potential suspect, the world of covert action is meant to be a hall of mirrors but your question was is it legal, is i proper? that depends what country and what set of laws. if you look at the israelis as an example-- and i'm not taging the israelis with this, but that's certainly a part ofthe scussion on the part of iran-- they did the munich operaon where they tcked down the munich terrorists one at a time and killed them. a number of people have suggested they were behind the assassination of the man in syriae ice.
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>> rose: can we stop the sanctions and covert means the iranian nuclear sfloj >> i'd agree with gary that thesefforts by the u.s., israel, and others can't stop the program. they can certainly raise the cost and it's been my impression charlie, that the tightening of economicanctions has really begun to have some effect in iran.
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it's very hard, now, to get dollars, if people want to convert their iranian rials into dollars it's tougher. it is getting tougher for iranian businesses to do transactions. a new wave of sanctions, perhaps including an embargo on oil sales to europe appears to be on the way. and at some point i think iran looks at all these things taken together and says we are facing an undeclared state of war. and it's going to react. i thk the question of how iran reacts and whether the united states and its allies are fully prepared to deal with the ways in which iran might react, it's an urgent question for the u.s. i also think it's urgent for us to find some way through some back channel as we did in the cuban missile crisis to convey resolve and al to explore whether there's a way to get a negotiated resolution to this. gary sick referred to the return of this idea of some negotiated way to get uranium enriched
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outside of iran. if that's for real that the time for that to move forward is pretty urgent. >> a lot people have been prepared to help us. turkey or other countries. >> i think the turks and brilliance tried to do that... brazilians tri to do that in materially 2010 and rejekted it after having proposed the idea. but i think first of all i do trust the secretary of state's comment about the denial. iteems to me we... we've never said that before. usually on covert actions you don't make public statements saying "we had nothing to do with this" unequivocal, unquestionable. and, two, really condemning it as an actions which something that i thought if it was israeli, that's a gutsy thing to say in an election year and various other things going on. the second thing is really think what is different right now at both iran and the united states have been pursuing a track of pressure and negotiation and it's all been
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pressure, for the most part, and little negotiation. i think both sides have been spiraling up to a point where we finally got to the brink and we're looking into the abyss and both sides have said "that's not an attctive proposition. if we end up going to war, the costs are going to be incalculable." let's think about an exit ramp, how do we get out of this. and it means that the talks about talks that are going on right now... >> rose: so the iranians, there is a point in which the price is too high for having nuclear weapons? >> actually, the iran i can't bes have been suggesting now for a number of months various possible things that could be talked about. >> rose: but do you take that at face value rather than just a way to delay? >> you never know until you try. basically in this case if we... we say we're putting pressure on irano get them to the table and they say "we're going to the table" and then we say "we don't believe you so we're not going
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to go to the table." that's a pretty funny strategy. >> rose:d%m it your impression, john, that the iranians have been dwlag a purpose in mind. they say we want to change, yes we know we did this but this is a new game, we're opening ourselves up and then in the process begins they close down again? >> i think we're seeing a familiar game of rope a dope which we've seen in other middle east negotiations involving related parties. but i think the thing we're kind of talking around here is the doomsday scenario. which is it goes a step too far and at some point a count-- be it the united states or just as likely israel-- say "i'm going to identify those facilities, i'm going to take them out with air strikes." and then you watch how quickly the world can change in ten days. th there is counterattacks. let's say if we're projecting that would be not necessarily iranian military action but hazard launching hundreds of missiles from beirutinto israel
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then the israeli counterstrike in lebanon then whatever the u.s. does and then you're deep into well, they're not going to go to war with the united states at that point buthat terrorist attacks will iranian surrogates, al quds, hazard carry out in places like bahrain or even south america against u.s., israeli, and jewish targets. and all that that could happen within a couple weeks so i think to pick up on professor sick here, there's a lot of good reason... high motivation to get to talks about talking. >> rose: david negotiation could work? >> well, i think... yes. it's... negotiation is always possible in any conflict. i think one problem that the administration is really struggling withs what is the address for the iranian
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counterparty? in the fall of 2009, as john and gary know, president ahmadinejad was prepared to make a deal in govern, it appeared... geneva, it appeared, for enrichment of uranium for the tehran research reactor. and then the supreme leader, ayatollah khamenei and his supporters began trashing that deal, the deal that the iranians had signaled they were willing to do. and that's one reason that the u.s. was so wary last year of getting back into the same situation. so i think one question, i talks are going to goorward, the u.s. has to have some confidence that it's talking to somedy who's actually prepared to make a deal if you could get to that point. >> rose: so if you're talking to ahmadinejad, he may not have the power to do the deal? >> precisely. ahmadinejad, it's clear, cannot speak for the supreme leader. there has to be some other address or joint address for
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anybody-- the u.s., israel, anybody-- to be confident this is a real negotiating process. >> rose: david, i know you have to go, thank you for joinings. >> thank you, charlie. >> rose: turning back to gary. tell me what you think is the power of regime change on the opportunity for regime change in iran? >> well, actually, david's point actually, raises this because, in fact, finding an address in iran today is actually the question of figuring out who's on top. >> rose: right. >> and ahmadejad has always had a lot of swagger and his brash statements and rhetoric have attracted a lot of attention but the reality is he's never been in control of the situation. and what's hapned, especially the last year or so, is a breakdown between the hard conservatives of basically ahmadinejad stripe and then the supreme leader basically and the revolutionary guard which is right around the supreme leader. they've brokwithin ahmadinejad totally. i was stck by the fact in terms of talking about address
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that the person who showed up in istanbul right after bill burns was there talking about talks was the speaker of the among lists and a personal representative basically of a guy who's really close to khamenei. that's as close as you'reoing to get to an address. >> rose: why do the iranians continue to pick up americans and say they're engaging in spying and do these very public kinds of denunciations of them? >> well, i think that the iranians in the search for dignity... i mean, here is a season where one of their nuclear plants was invaded by a computer virus that was able to ange the settings and nipulate the dials so the ability to say we've caught this guy and he's a spy and we've sentenced him to death. or we were able to compromise the system on this drone which if you were actually able to do it you would just keep doing it,
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you would in never say that to anybody. you just keep doing it and people would wonder where do these things keep falling? so i think these brash statements are justhat: a lot of swagger. but if you look at this week, you've got the soldier, an ex-u.s. soldiersentenced to death there as a spy. you have to sailors, we've rescued two boats of iranian sailors captured by somali pirates. >> the government thanked us but some of the more radical elements said it was theater. >> it was theater. and then you have to scientist and the former f.b.i. agent robert levin son who in all likelihood has been held there prisoner for a number of years now. so it's a front burner issue. it's all over the place. >> rose: everybody is trying to get him out, including you, haven't you? >> yes, i think when ahmadinejad was here sitting in this chair, it's always the subject i ask you to bring up. >> rose: and he always says "well..."
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>> and they always say "we don't quite know what you're talking about." just quite. >> rose: how deep and strong is the reform movement? there are those who say what happened in the last election reflects a deep-seeded inspiration on the part of millions of iranian citizens to change. >> i think there are millions of iranian citizens who are very unhappy with their present system. are they going to get up and go out in the streets and challenge those people? >> rose: well, they did. >> they did and they quit. you've got to ask yourself, after they saw egypt, did they go back to their files and say "what did we do wrong? what did wmiss? if we did it again what could we actor into"? >> i think when they went back to their files is when they saw assad in syria. this is a regime that they like... that the iranians like and it's under deep trouble a assad went out and started shooting people. the iranians were a little more dignified about the thing or more subtle and the syrians kept
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coming. i think the iranians keep asking themselves... >> did we fold too quickly. >> yeah. let me come back to what happened with the covert action and the bombing of iran iranian scientists. it seems to me that the passion of the secretary of state's condemnation suggests that the united states knows that if it is, in fact, israel they're not going to come and ask permission or even tell them before they do it. do you think that's a fair reading? >> i think that's a perfectly fair reading. >> i do. and i think also she was quite annoyed by the timing of this thing because they were... bill burns was in istanbul. he was trying to actually work out something with the iranians and bingo, you've got this attack going on which if it is israel, they had to know that we would paying for it as well. i think the iranians have in the
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last 24 hours backed away and they've just talked about the zionists now. >> and if you accept that you realize that the secretary of state's strong message had two intended audiences. one was to iran "dot breakoff talks about talking beuse that wasn't us." >> rose: and the otr is tel aviv or jerusalem. >> exactly. >> can i make one other point, charlie, really quick >> rose: please. >> that is i think we haven't thought so much about how this looks on the iranian side. and i'm thinking particularly about the actions that are coming down the road here which, in fact, are intended to stop iran from selling its oil. that's the equivalent of a blockade. it's an act of r. >> rose: economic war. >> economic waare. then cyber warfare is going on, then you have this covert warfare going on. how would we feel as a country if somebody was actually threatening to take away 50% of our national revenues and was conducting these kinds of operations on our soil? my guess is we wouldn't just
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throw up our hands and say "gee, we better give up." we would really double down and get tough. and basically if faced with an act of war and their oil gets cut off they have no incentive to keep the straits open. that's when things get really... >> rose: i agree. >> and it's not so much they're going to send ships outo attack the u.s. navy, they're just going to be flooded minds floating around in t persian gulf all of a sudden which nobody's claiming credit for this at all? and people can't use the straits because they don't know what's safe. >> rose: i am not a historian-- as everybody knows. you knew that, didn't you? (laughter) but it seems to me that war so often starts because people don't see things through the other's eyes and some gross miscalculation. saddam hussein never thought in the end that we would attack. >> that's right. >> rose: he made... his limited understanding of america and how he saw it said "i can get away
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with this." >> well, what saddam hussein told george pirro, the f.b.i. agent who interviewed him for six months was "i knew you would never attack." and he was probably right. and when pirro said "you're sitting here in an orange jump suit about et-to-get hung, how do you think aut that calculation now?" saddam said "there was no way victim anticipated 9/11. which totally changed the calculus." >> rose: what intrigued you most about what he told the f.b.i. interrogator? >> i think... his life story was fascinating but when he got down to what was the main bullet they said where was the w.m.d. and he said we had a program but we discontinued it. >> rose: in 2003. >> earlier. but he said we had to givehe inspectors the runaround because my other audience was iran and i had to have them think we had a w.m.d. program to keep them at by a and if i said it they would think it was first thumping but if the americans said it you would have believed that. he said i would have started up the program later but then 9/11 happened then i was like you
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want to inspect, come look. but by then it was too late. which out of all the twisted and tortured explanations we've heard about w.m.d. in iraq, saddam's is the one that has the ring of truth. >> the people really believed saddam who said he had w.m.d.s were the iranians. and if you look at the i.a.e.a. reports, when iran was thinking about weaponizing, of building a nuclear weapon, it was before saddam fell. once he fell, 2003, iran quit its weaponization program. >> rose: some people... back to this interrogation by the f.b.i. my friend tom friedman has said this and others have said it. was iraq the way it was because saddam the way he was or was saddam the way he was because iraq was the way it was? >> i go iraq was the way it was because of saddam. >> rose: right. >> personal opinion based on reading a couple thousands of pages of interrogation, the force of personality can be a
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terrible force with a bad personality. >> rose: so he w a baduy but smart. >> smart, cagey, savvy. but ultimately one of those handful of most self-involved people. >> rose: megathat nigh cal killer. >> yes. >> rose: and how did he view that? >> he viewed himself... he viewed everything he did-- including the mass murder of kurds-- as necessary. but he doesn't think of himself the way a western leader thinkover himself "i'm elected i have a job to do." he thought of himself on the level of world history, saladin. and that was where he put himself. so he believed his gestures were grander, more historic and therefore forgivable. >> rose: what did you learn from your experience at the f.b.i., reading these transcripts and everything else you had access to, about what kind of interrogation gets the most information? >> the position of every
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experienced interrogator, interviewer, investigator that i've spoken to who's been trained in that for their career is that you get more by develop a rapport. what you do on this show to get people to say things that they shouldn't. (laughter) and that over time it all comes out. that you can trick them into believing you know things you don't, that you can get admiions against self-interest and i have spoken to others-- good colleagues, people that i would trust with my life in other agencies that also have three letters-- who say that's if you have time. but using har interrogation tactics can speed that up. there's a big argument as to whether if it goes faster the information is any good. >> rose: you have n doubt waterboarding is torture? >> if you're asking my persona opinion in the context of interrogation i would put it up there with torture. >> rose: and do you have a
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position o the interrogation that the c.i.a. did or others did for the c.i.a. that we got a huge amount of information from muhammad? >> from khalid sheikh mohammed? i would question the theory that we got a huge amount of information because if we had to waterboard somebody 73 times, was it really working? >> yeah. >> rose: and that's a question that investigators who wereot using those tools and got admissions from other people, extensive admissions, would disagree with but the hardest part is i talked to colleagues at the c.i.a. who i truly respect for their courage, their heroism, where they've been d what they've done who swear by this stuff and i've talked to colleagues at the f.b.i. who say these guys don't know what they're doing and we've been interrogating people to get tm to admit thehings they shouldn't for a hundred years.
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we didn't just get into this business. and it doesn't work. >> rose: what does your experience aa diplomat tell you and a national security expert tell you about the art of interviewing and how you get information? >> i've never done an interrogation. >> rose: ever been there when one was doing? >> i was not. so i don't have any experti. i do think... the stuff that was gotten out of saddam is extraordinary. it really is extraordinary stuff. and he gets io his own background, his own deepest thoughts and so forth and you learn something about this guy. >> rose: about saddam? >> yeah. and there's a huge amount of information that is there and available. you would have never gotten that stuff by waterboarding. you might have gotten one piece of information that you happened to be looking for but what you were giving up with the waterboarding is things you weren't thinking to ask and didn't pursue so you didn't get all of that other stuff, the richness.
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the completion. so as a non-expert, there's a huge price to pay when you throw somebody into that waterboarding situation. >> also, the government has figured this out. they wouldn't have started the high value detainee interrogation teams which made up of f.b.i. agents, military intelligence people, c.i.a. people, too, to respo to these captures and do this interrogation if ty thought that any one had the patent on how this was done. it's got to be a collaborative affair. your queions are going to be driven by your intelligence. your intelligence can fill in the gaps. the answers then needo be run backwards. i think we t approach we're taking at the back end of 9/11 is more well thought out than the approach we took at the beginning which is we're going to take contractors, we're going to take soldiers in their 20s and pit them against committed terrorists and see how they do.
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especially when you had hundreds of cops and f.b.i. agents who are skille interviewers and have been trained for this and get people to routinely admit to thing like murder. this wasn't their first rodeo and i think we probably underused that. >> i do, too. >> rose: the other interesting thing for me is that after the 9/11 commission, did we see a significant increasingly significant collaboration and communication between c.i.a. and f.b.i. and the sharing of information across the board? >> we did. but we're not there yet. one of the problems we still have is eve if we get the agencies to institutionally share more information-- and even that leaves a little to be desid between the intelligence agencies the systems, the supercomputers that have tremendous amounts of data in them don't talk to each other. so how do you get an underwear bombern christmas day, 2009,
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on u.s. air flight 252 over detroit who, but for the grace of god,roke the detonator. otherwise that pla would have been blown up with everybody on it. how do you get a guy like that on an airplane when the n.s.a. had certain holdings that would have led to hisidentity. the c.i.a. had a report waiting to be entered into the system from a station overseas. the british had information they had shared with us. the f.b.i. had an old file where his came name up. that data when you rub it against more data becomes richer and if the data pieces can't find each other we're not there yet. and that needs to be fixed. >> rose: the idea is whether with american troops witrawing finallfrom iraq that there will be some effort on the part of the iranians to try to mettle in iraq on behalf of the people they feel an affinity with. >> yeah, they're going to try. and i don't think there's anything surprising or unusual about that. the question is whether they'll
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succeed. and i made a trip... i was in najaf and i made a pilgrimage of my own there about a year and a half ago and spent two days talking to senior ayatollahs, one after another, and it was a fascinating experience because in each case i asked the same question. what role do you see for islam in the emerging iraqi body politic? and their answers uniformly and without skipping a beat were, you know, we think we have things to say. we the clergy have things to say that should be listened to but we have no desire to run a government. and one after another they basely said in so many wordz "we don't want to be another iran. that is not our intention." that is really important. and i don' think that americans understand... i mean, this
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country run by a shi'a monopoly and we hope the install that. you can't expect them to be the same kind of enemy ofiran as you would have in saddam hussein's case but at the same time they are not ready to play the iranian game and i asked one guy... he had, he was running in a school basically in najaf and i said would you let your students go to iran and study and he said "yeah, we have the same curriculum." i said... he said the first year in gom they have a training school for new people going into the government. he said that's not what i do. i teach religion. i don't teach politics an i don't teach bureaucracy. which i thought was... and these were the guiding lights ofhe e ya faith. so i think iran is going to try to involve itself in a positive
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way in iraq for its own purposes. but their ability... it's one thing for them to be involved. they're going to be involved. they are there, there's no question about it. they have relations with the kurds as well. but are they going to be able to give iran orders? go do this even though you don't think it's in your interest. and i think the answer is absolutely no. the iraqis will push back the iraqis regard themselves as arabs and not as persians and that goes very, very deep. and all of those shi'a young guys who went out and fought for saddam hussein on the front down there against shi'a enemy are pretty good evidence of the fact this they are not dying to become iranians. they really are not. >> rose: thank you. >> good to be here. thanks. newspapethe newspaper "the guardian"'s jonathan jones
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writes "the whole of recent british art is a footnote to damien hirst's brilliance." he emerged 20 years ago as one of the young british artists. since then, he has shocked and challenged and thrilled audiences with his work's bold themes and ironic it with, his new exhibition, complete spot paintings 1986 to 2011 features 300 paintings from his famed spot series. it will take place simultaneously in all of gagosian's galleries in london and new york and hong kong. here is damien hirst speaking about the exit as it was being install. >> in any one painting are never the same. the first painting i did the black spot and i never did it again. i only used colors. and there's no two color iis me in any painting.
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then i just chose the colors randomly but randoms are complicating because i remember in an argument with an assistant of mine who did six or seven yellows in a row and i said "that's not random." and he said "yes, it is." and in the end i avoided that. i think you would get six or seven yellows in a row if you were making truly random. but i just mix things up and write it on the floor and my assistances transfer it ono canvass. but it's a kind of retro old 50s idea. i love making decisions about color and putting colors next to each other. whenever i look at a painting i look at four colors together and choose my favorite four colors or nine colors. so i think secretly i like to make those decisions. in the paintings it looks like i'm a scientist, not an artist. >> rose: that was done by our producer. the complete spot paintings
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opens worldwide on january 12. m pleased to have damien hirst back at this table. welcome. you're becoming a regular you know that. you said when you walk in you qualify to be a regular. >> it's been a long time. >> rose: how are you? >> very good. >> rose: you said this is the combination of the huge mammoth ego of you andlarry gagosian. >> lara gagosian's megalo mein ya combined with mine. i was thinking probably for the first time i came on the show with you lar probably had two galleries, maybe. and when i did the spot show there were nine a by the time i did this show there was 11. >> rose: and you had a billion dollars already. >> (laughs) >> rose: let's talk about these. it begin with one painting. what was it? you love color. what is it that got you to do a spot? >> i always like to throw paint around and kind of mess in it. i was into... i suppose i was taught by '50s painters. not in england but kind of
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gestural painters who believe that you paint how you feel and if you're feelg happy you do orange and if you're sad you do a brown orurple paint. and i believed in that and believed it was the truth. then i got into conceptual art when i went to school in england and i realized it wasn't the truth. i loved color so i created a grid where i can make those decisions but in the end result it was never not... you're not going to get... it's denied anyway. >> rose: how many are there of these? >> we worked it out. in total about 24 years i think it's a thousand five hundred approximate lift. >> rose: you did the first five yourself? >> looking in the gallery i think i did the first 25. i noticed. >> rose: can you tell? >> well, through the years... when i first made them i thought okay i'm going to do these paintings and i want them to look for from a distance leek
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they've been made by a crazy machine buclose up i thought i wanted holes where i used a compass to draw a circle. but then over the years it got more and more perfect so now you just can'tell that they're the man made. it's important they're man made but i nt tm to look machine made. >> rose: you've always said that. the idea that everything is not done by you is something that you have been totally transparent about cause you believe what? >> the best way to look at is architects don't build their own houses, do they? in my mind when i first did the first spot i said i want this to be an endless series. when i do a show i like to see about 30 works or something like that. so show after show you want to do all these paintings and if you do them all yourselves it's not enough hours in the day. >> rose: the fact that this is a obal exhibition, areou going to go from town to town to town to town? >> yeah, we're all over the place. i'm going to l.a. for the opening. we've had them open all over
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simultaneously. we're going to have a closing in london. i'll make sure i go to all the shows and do a small dinner. i started off wh small dinners but th i got phoned up and said they there's going to be a d.j. >> rose: i know, i know. (laughs) >> nuts. >> rose: what does it mean to you, these pieces? >> you try to do many things when you're making a painting. i always think paintings are mean meaningful things. we've come a long way since we were living in caves. even in caves you want something on the walls but for me spot paintings never get boring i've been doing itfor 24 years and i always think if they put this outside a bar when it was closing would it be there in the morning? if it is it's not a good painting. >> rose: do you call them deceptively similar? >> they are simple. it's a simple structure, a grid. but once you put the colors in there they never keep still. all the greatest ideas are simple aren't they? >> rose: sure they are. simple and if you can make them
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simpler the better they are and the more widely... >> it's like one plus one equals three. you try to make something that is... amounts to more than its ingredients. >> rose: my friend robert hughes... >> oh, yeah, my friend, too. maybe not my friend. >> rose: (laughs) well, you'd like him. he said they were silly abstractions. >> yeah, it's funny. when ias a kid i remember growing up on the shock of the new and thinking wow. so to come full circle and go through all that and get to the point where robert hughes doesn't like that paintings you think that's just nuts. >> rose: (laug) >> maybe they're too shocking and new. >> rose: does it bother you at small a little bit? maybe? >> it's like succe. you've got to go well, how do you measure success? you can't measure in the other people's terms. you have to measure in the your own. >> rose: howo you measure it? >> like i said, at the pub, put on the floor outside the pub and you'll know if it's
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succesul. i read a goya book when i was on holiday on the bch and i thought i'm not working now, no painting,'m reading a book on goya by robert hughes. >> rose: who wrote e book about goya. >> five pages in he says "goya wasn't like damien hirst" or something. i couldn't read the book. i don't like him for that. >> rose: (laughs) >> he spoiled my reading. that's the only bad thing. >> rose: do you read a lot about other artists? >> if it's good. when i started... i remember when i was young i went to leads art gallery d looked at the books. >> rose: this is where you were born, leads. >> you can only read so much, can't you? >> rose: you can only read so much. >> i never dreamed i'd have book with my name ont. >> rose: how many books are in the leads library? >> more than one. >> dave: so what is it... tell me where you are in the evolution of life in art? >> in start >> yeah. >> rose: i don't know, i feel very lucky, you know. i've got a lot of freedom.
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i've made a lot of work. >> rose: made a lot of money. >> made a lot of ney. >> rose: but interestingly you and andy warhol have made that sort of acptable. >> i think without andy warhol i would have felt so gung-ho. a lot of people say oh, my god, you've got factory. you always think well factory cans make dog food, they can make great cars or something like that. so it' not... the choice is not... and i think it doesn't matter how you get where you're going as long as you get what you want as an artist. >> rose: you want what? >> sometimes i go to my udio and i think look at all this uff, this is insane. one minute i want spot painting and the other ain't spin painting. i kind of imagine that there's a lot of eyes. >> rose: what do you thin people don't get about the spot paintings? >> probably the simplicity or... you know, i think... it's funny. there's a big difference between art and craft as well. i get asked a lot where people say "you don't paint your own
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paintings." that's never been a problem to me in the same way that i've said architects don't build their own houses. the ones that i did paint myself sell for me money so i think it's just a strange quirk of the market for me. >> rose: serving two markets? >> i don't always go for rfection. the ones i paint are awkward. >> rose: what about posters. >> what about posters. newspaper what do you think of posters. >> i love them. i have this thing where... i'm... people go which do you prefer as an artist, the mona lisa paintings? would you like to be the guy who made the mona lisa or do you like the postrds and t-shirts? >> rose: you said postcards. >> i like both. >> rose: would you say postcards if it's posed that way or not? >> i suppose. you know, the postcard has the biggest impact. there's something amazing about the unique wonderful painting even though you can't see it because it's behind bulletproof glass. >> rose: you are... tell me about this jacket you have on.
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>> i don'tnow. it's a japanese designer called mat mastermind. i found it after i did diamond skull and i thought "yeah, that's me." >> rose: is that your biggest creation, the diamond skull? >> i said recently an interview i could pick my top four, what to take from the burning building. >> rose: what would they be? >> shark. >> you couldn't take that. >> diamond skull... well, i guess where it t fire started. the diamond skull, a thousand years and a spot painting. >> rose: those would be the five >> rose: so what might you be doing ten years from now? >> i have no idea. >> rose: you're constantly experiments? >> lots of things don't make it into the gallery. i'm toying with the idea of primate paintings, i get monkeys in the studio. >> rose: live monkeys?
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>> i'm thinking about it but i might make some... i tnk i might make the paintings and work with the monkeys. it's not just straightforward but i want to make the paintings that look like... better thank monkey paintings and you go are they better than monkey or not? the whole idea isall the time i'm thinking is this nuts or a good idea? >> rose: finish this sentence for me. without charles sach chi, damien hirst woul be... >> charlie rose. (laughs) >> rose: does that mean charlie rose with charles sach chi would have been damien hirst? >> i've probably been making work that was a lot smaller. when i came into the art world there were paintings like pizza blake and richard were making small painting and sacci, i was blown away by the scale and i think that's what... for me and my generation, i think that's what made this work globally. >> rose: i'm trying to get him on the show. would you weigh him for he? >> he doesn't like t.v. though,
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do he? last time i saw him... >> rose: he likes me but not t.v. >> yeah, i don't know what you can do. i'll dress up as him. >> come in and be charles sacchi impression? >> i don't know. last time i saw he was he was so disappointed that i stopped smoking. i let him down. >> rose: he was disappointed? you have re discipline? >> it's brand loyalty, isn't it? >> rose: look at these a tell me exactly what you see. 1991. >> so en i first started they all began with a for the first year. so this is late 1991. >> rose: let's look at number two. this is controlled substance key painting. >> i did a series which were controlled substances all of these were named for drugs from this book.
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>> these are the drugs i need from my cold. >> yeah, you don't sound good. >> rose: what's number three? >> very few squaresment kind of an odd one. >> i was dealing with nine by ten spots, ten by 11. >> and the next one is 1995, right? >> that's a controlled substance painting and the key painting that will go with us. >> this is five. let's see it. you like that? why do you liking that that? >> i like them all. >> rose: i know you do. >> wn i look at any painting i'm always picking out four spots, nine spots. >> rose: what'sn your wall at your house? >> i did have a spot painting. i have a tendency to sort of tu. i got bored with them soy turn them so they never have an upr down.
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>> rose: didn't yo sell one at one time for, like, 300 pounds then have to buy it back and pay twice as much. >> i did that with saatchi. >> he... you once as an exhibit in which you sold everything at auction >> oh, yeah. >> rose: do you remeer that? >> 2008, yeah. >> charles actually came up and shook my hand and said i love that. >> rose: you didn't put in the a gallery. >> so many people through my career say you canno go to the auction houses. a lot of the things i've done people have said... i've said why can't you do that? they said you can't be an artist. i'm the curator. i guess it's childish, ally. >> rose: how much did you make out of that auction? >> like $200 million or something. it was the day that lehman brothers collapsed. that morning i woke up and the newspaper said "black monday." and i thought oh, we're done. and people said to me you're so
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smart. and i'm like it's not smart i was so close chlgtd it could have been so wrong. >> rose: what do you do with the money? >> i've bought a lot of art. >> rose: have you reay? >> i've bought. >> rose: what do you correct? >> there's a museum in londo and francis baconis a great friend of mi. >> rose: you knew him well. >> i was around him but i never spoke to him. >> rose: did you know lucien freud well? >> lucien fre was a friend. >> rose: what's lunch with lucien and talking about bacon? it was the most amazing convsation i've ever had with an artist. >> he's such a great guy, cien >> rose: he's a friend? >> when first met him i did the fly piece and he said damien i think you may have started with the finalct. >> rose: (laughs) >> rose: there's something about you... you honor death. >> i've got house in mexico. i don't know if honor is the right word. >> rose: what's the right world?
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>> i was taught my my parents to come front things you can't avoid. and it's something... >> rose: can you point death? >> i think painting's all about life, really. i mean, death's... >> rose: celebration. >> rose: painting is celebration? >> i think painting is... i think deatis not painting. >> rose: life is painting system? >> there's a great quote by beckett where he says death doesn't require you to make a day for it. i love that. >> rose: you like beckett, too? >> yeah, of course. >> rose: let's look at eight. >> rose: in the beginning i always made. >> rose: 2005 >> i made all the decisions of... big decisions about what it was going to the spots are equal to the gap between the spots, no two colors are the same on the painting and then i
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think this was the first one where i turn the grid 90 degrees and the grid's off center. >> rose: speak to this idea that an artist needs to get the public'sttention. i always think you have to get people listening to you before you can change your minds en i came into art my idea originally was just i'm going to paint and i'm going to put the paintings at the corn over the studio and if i get discovered, great, if not i get discovered after i'm dead. >> rose: a kind of van gogh thing? >> i suppose. then you look at the world and you think that's not what the world is about. at a art school in london they said said get a building painting and buy t anyone can get an audience. once you do you say what am i going to tell them. >> rose: look at this. this is the complete spot paintings, 1986 to 2011.
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exhibition takes place at one all across the ga goesian galleries, 11 locations in new york, london, paris, los angeles rome, athens, geneva and hong kong. it runs from juary 12 which is tomorrow until february 182012. gagosian. great to see you. >>ose: damien hirst. captioning sponsored by rose communications captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org
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