<http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/01/world/europe/01france.html> February 1, 2007 Chirac Unfazed by Nuclear Iran, Then Backtracks By ELAINE SCIOLINO and KATRIN BENNHOLD
PARIS, Jan. 31 — President Jacques Chirac said this week that if Iran had one or two nuclear weapons, it would not pose a big danger, and that if Iran were to launch a nuclear weapon against a country like Israel, it would lead to the immediate destruction of Tehran.
The remarks, made in an interview on Monday with The New York Times, The International Herald Tribune and Le Nouvel Observateur, a weekly magazine, were vastly different from stated French policy and what Mr. Chirac has often said.
On Tuesday, Mr. Chirac summoned the same journalists back to Élysée Palace to retract many of his remarks.
Mr. Chirac said repeatedly during the second interview that he had spoken casually and quickly the day before because he believed he had been talking about Iran off the record.
"I should rather have paid attention to what I was saying and understood that perhaps I was on the record," he said.
The tape-recorded, on-the-record interview was conducted under an agreement that it would not be published until Thursday, when Le Nouvel Observateur appears on newsstands.
On Monday, Mr. Chirac began by describing as "very dangerous" Iran's refusal to stop producing enriched uranium, which can be used to produce electricity or to make nuclear weapons. Then he made his remarks about a nuclear-armed Iran.
"I would say that what is dangerous about this situation is not the fact of having a nuclear bomb," he said. "Having one or perhaps a second bomb a little later, well, that's not very dangerous.
"But what is very dangerous is proliferation. This means that if Iran continues in the direction it has taken and totally masters nuclear-generated electricity, the danger does not lie in the bomb it will have, and which will be of no use to it."
Mr. Chirac said it would be an act of self-destruction for Iran to use a nuclear weapon against another country.
"Where will it drop it, this bomb? On Israel?" Mr. Chirac asked. "It would not have gone 200 meters into the atmosphere before Tehran would be razed."
It was unclear whether Mr. Chirac's initial remarks reflected what he truly believes. If so, it suggests a growing divide with American policy, which places the highest priority on stopping Iran from gaining the capacity to produce nuclear weapons.
Mr. Chirac has privately expressed the view occasionally in the past year that a nuclear-armed Iran might be inevitable and that it could try to sell the technology to other countries. But publicly the policy has been very different. In fact, Élysée Palace prepared a heavily edited 19-page transcript of the Monday interview that excluded Mr. Chirac's assessment of a nuclear-armed Iran.
The transcript even inserted a line that Mr. Chirac had not said that read, "I do not see what type of scenario could justify Iran's recourse to an atomic bomb."
There are divisions within the French government — and between Europe and the United States — about how much Iran should be punished for behavior that the outside world might not be able to change. Some French officials worry that the more aggressive course of action by the United States toward Iran will lead to a confrontation like the Iraq war, which France opposed.
In noting the sanctions against Iran that were imposed last month by the Security Council, Mr. Chirac warned Tuesday that escalation of the conflict by both sides was unwise. "Of course we can go further and further, or higher and higher up the scale in the reactions from both sides," he said. "This is certainly not our thinking nor our intention."
Mr. Chirac argued that Iran's possession of a nuclear weapon was less important than the arms race that would ensue.
"It is really very tempting for other countries in the region that have large financial resources to say: 'Well, we too are going to do that; we're going to help others do it,' " he said. "Why wouldn't Saudi Arabia do it? Why wouldn't it help Egypt to do so as well? That is the real danger."
Earlier this month, Mr. Chirac had planned to send his foreign minister to Iran to help resolve the crisis in Lebanon. The venture collapsed after Saudi Arabia and Egypt opposed the trip and members of his own government said it would fail.
Mr. Chirac, who is 74 and months away from ending his second term as president, suffered a neurological episode in 2005 and is said by French officials to have become much less precise in conversation.
In the second interview, Mr. Chirac retracted his comment that Tehran would be destroyed if Iran launched a nuclear weapon. "I retract it, of course, when I said, 'One is going to raze Tehran,' " he said.
He added that any number of third countries would stop an Iranian bomb from ever reaching its target. "It is obvious that this bomb, at the moment it was launched, obviously would be destroyed immediately," Mr. Chirac said. "We have the means — several countries have the means to destroy a bomb."
Mr. Chirac also retracted his prediction that a nuclear Iran could encourage Saudi Arabia and Egypt to follow suit.
"I drifted — because I thought we were off the record — to say that, for example, Saudi Arabia or Egypt could be tempted to follow this example," he said. "I retract it, of course, since neither Saudi Arabia nor Egypt has made the slightest declaration on these subjects, so it is not up to me to make them."
As for his suggestion in the first interview that Israel could be a target of an Iranian attack and could retaliate, Mr. Chirac said: "I don't think I spoke about Israel yesterday. Maybe I did so but I don't think so. I have no recollection of that."
There were other clarifications. In the initial interview, for example, Mr. Chirac referred to the Iranian Islamic Republic as "a bit fragile." In the subsequent interview, he called Iran "a great country" with a "very old culture" that "has an important role to play in the region" as a force for stability.
Mr. Chirac's initial comments contradicted the long-held French policy of deterrence, which holds that Iran must not go nuclear. The thinking is that a nuclear-armed Iran would give Iran the ability to project power throughout the region and threaten its neighbors — as well as encourage others in the region to seek the bomb.
Under Mr. Chirac's presidency, France has joined the United States and other countries in moving to punish Iran for refusing to stop enriching uranium, as demanded by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the United Nations Security Council.
Iran insists that the purpose of its uranium enrichment program is to produce energy; France, along with many other countries, including the United States, is convinced that the program is part of a nuclear weapons project.
The purpose of the initial interview was for Mr. Chirac to talk about climate change and an international conference in Paris later this week that parallels a United Nations conference on the global environment.
The question about Iran followed a comment by Mr. Chirac on the importance of developing nuclear energy programs that are transparent, safe and secure.
In the midst of his initial remarks on Iran, Mr. Chirac's spokesman passed him a handwritten note, which Mr. Chirac read aloud. "Yes, he's telling me that we have to go back to the environment," Mr. Chirac said. He then continued a discussion of Shiite Muslims, who are by far the majority in Iran but a minority in the Muslim world.
"Shiites do not have the reaction of the Sunnis or of Europeans," said Mr. Chirac, who over the years in private meetings has expressed distrust of Shiite Muslims.
The president had a different demeanor during the two encounters.
In the first interview, which took place in the late morning, he appeared distracted at times, grasping for names and dates and relying on advisers to fill in the blanks. His hands shook slightly. When he spoke about climate change, he read from prepared talking points printed in large letters and highlighted in yellow and pink.
By contrast, in the second interview, which came just after lunch, he appeared both confident and comfortable with the subject matter.
The attempt by Élysée Palace to change the president's remarks in a formal text is not unusual. It is a long-held tradition in French journalism for interview subjects — from the president to business and cultural figures — to be given the opportunity to edit the texts of question-and-answer interviews before publication.
<http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/01/world/europe/01france-text1.html> February 1, 2007 Text Chirac's First Interview on Iran
Following are excerpts from an interview by President Jacques Chirac of France with The New York Times, The International Herald Tribune and Le Nouvel Observateur on Jan. 29, 2007. The interview was conducted in French and recorded and translated by The New York Times.
Q: Mr. President, you spoke earlier about nuclear energy. What are the possibilities for nuclear energy in the future, especially for emerging countries, a country like Iran, for example?
A: I would like to tell you there are first of all two different problems: nuclear power for electricity and nuclear technology for military purposes. What worries us in Iran, it's not electro-nuclear (nuclear energy) as such but uranium enrichment. That's what worries us. It is the refusal of Iran to accept the constraints of the I.A.E.A. [International Atomic Energy Agency] and so to stop enriching uranium. It's very dangerous. It's very dangerous. One has to pay careful attention to that.
I would say that what is dangerous about this situation is not the fact of having a nuclear bomb — having one, maybe a second one a little later, well, that's not very dangerous. But what is very dangerous is proliferation. This means that if Iran continues in the direction it has taken and totally masters nuclear generated electricity, the danger does not lie in the bomb it will have, and which will be of no use to it.
Where will it drop it, this bomb? On Israel? It would not have gone 200 meters into the atmosphere before Tehran would be razed to the ground.
What is dangerous is proliferation. It is really very tempting for other countries in the region that have large financial resources, to say: "Well, we too, we're going to do it. We're going to help out others to do it." Why wouldn't Saudi Arabia do it? Why wouldn't it help Egypt to do so as well? That is the danger. So one has to find a way to settle this problem. That, then, is the military nuclear issue.
Q: How far can the West go in threatening sanctions against Iran without risking reprisals, in particular on Lebanon?
A: This is not quite the topic of our interview. You know about my feelings about Lebanon, and there is no mystery about them. The question is, how can we impose sufficiently strong constraints on Iran. This is a difficult issue. One has to know what Iran can withstand or not. Iran has a regime that is still a bit fragile, a bit fragile. The last elections proved in particular that the president did not have all the authority one could have expected. This somewhat fragile regime is afraid. Afraid of what? Afraid of being contested.
What does it want? It wants to maintain the regime of the mullahs. To maintain the regime of the mullahs, it needs to not be contested or threatened by the international community, and the international community. Who is it? It's the United States. So how much of Iran's reaction is about wanting to control military nuclear technology, and how much is a desire to be recognized and respected by the international community and in particular the United States so as to avoid bad surprises that could at one moment or another destabilize the regime of the mullahs? This is a difficult question, because the Shiites are very particular people. The Shiites, since the beginning, are people who have a culture of minorities. They are minorities, they have a culture of minorities. They do not react like the Sunnis or the Europeans.
[...]
Q: But is there a fundamental dilemma in this world where we are at a moment where we, at a moment where we have to reduce carbon emissions, so electro-nuclear energy is very important especially for such powers such as India or China, but at the same time we live in a world where terrorism and proliferation are a major worry.
A: ...No expert will claim there is a connection between electro-nuclear technology and the nuclear bomb. These are two things, two completely different technologies. Our entire problem with Iran that we evoked earlier, it is because Iran wants, through the enrichment of uranium, to make a nuclear bomb. But with electro-nuclear (nuclear energy), you have no way to get to a bomb. There is no risk. There is the I.A.E.A. that monitors this. There is control. There is no risk.
Q: There is no risk?
A: None, absolutely none. You cannot take an electrical nuclear plant and make a bomb. It just doesn't work.
Q: So the question the technology of uranium enrichment...
A: It is uranium enrichment, in fact under very special conditions that are controlled by the I.A.E.A. The I.A.E.A. checks all the time to verify that they are not doing secret enrichment. But enrichment is of no use for electro-nuclear technology. No, there is no link between the two.
<http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/01/world/europe/01france-text2.html> February 1, 2007 Text Chirac's Second Interview on Iran
Following are excerpts from an interview by President Jacques Chirac of France with The New York Times, The International Herald Tribune and Le Nouvel Observateur on Jan. 30, 2007. The interview was conducted in French and recorded and translated by The New York Times.
President Chirac: I wanted to say a little about how I really see the Iran problem. Iran has started a process that the I.A.E.A. [International Atomic Energy Agency] thinks could lead to control over military nuclear technology, which as you know is against Iran's commitments as a signatory of the N.P.T. The N.P.T. is the Non-Proliferation Treaty and Iran has signed it. So Iran is going back on its commitments, which is why the I.A.E.A. has been working on this and observed that uranium enrichment was likely to lead to military nuclear technology. As a consequence, this was neither normal nor acceptable.
>From this point on, major countries consulted, especially the six
comprising the three European countries — France, Germany and the
United Kingdom — and the United States, and then Russia and China. The
aim was to explain to Iran that it was putting itself in a situation
in which it was breaking international law and that it should
therefore stop nuclear enrichment and everything to do with
nuclear-based military technology.
Iran is still a great nation and an important nation that matters.... We explained to Iran that it could not put itself into this situation, and that therefore we had to discuss, negotiate to obtain the suspension of uranium enrichment, which is the symbol in a way, the core of military nuclear technology. What we thought would happen is that we would be able to discuss this. I would remind you that France also made an open proposal to Iran that did not criticize Iran's authority but said, "You yourselves are going to take a decision in your own way to provisionally stop enriching uranium, and the six countries will in exchange agree to stop the sanction procedure in the U.N. Security Council." I honestly believe that this was an acceptable position, in the sense that we were telling Iran, "The day you decide to start up again, you resume and we will resume the sanction procedures. We shall start implementing the sanction procedures."
Each side was taking a step towards the other, and we thought that we had an acceptable process given Iran's demands. In fact actually the Iranians did not accept this process. They did not agree to interrupt their uranium enrichment work, and as a consequence the six continued their action in the Security Council.... This led to sanctions that initially involve in fact the supply, import or export of military nuclear equipment to Iran, so these sanctions were imposed in Security Council Resolution 1737.
>From this point on, we find ourselves in a situation that is rather
confused. So of course we can go further and further, higher and
higher up the scale in our reactions on both sides. This is certainly
not our thinking and our intention. What we wanted was to reach a
result, as I mentioned earlier, that would comply with both N.P.T.
obligations and I.A.E.A. controls.
In the present state of affairs, we have not received any positive responses from Iran, so I said — in a rather short-hand way — that "In the end when you think about Iran, what use would it have for a bomb?" If indeed their real goal is to build a nuclear capacity — in other words a nuclear bomb — it is obvious that that this bomb, the moment it was launched, obviously would be destroyed immediately. We have the means, several countries have the means to destroy a bomb, once they see a bomb-carrying rocket launch. So it is hard to see what advantage Iran could find for dropping a bomb. The bomb would naturally be destroyed as soon as the rocket was launched. This is to me an important aspect of the issue.
Q: It would be destroyed, the bomb?
A: The bomb would be destroyed, yes.
Q: And what would the repercussions be for Iran?
A: Well the repercussions for Iran would have to be examined, naturally. I spoke quickly and I retract it, of course, when I said, "One is going to raze Tehran." It was of course a manner of speaking in my mind. I don't imagine that we could raze Tehran. But it is obvious that if an undeniably aggressive act, which is to say sending a bomb payload on a launch rocket, took place and this bomb would be — I repeat — automatically destroyed without even having left the Iranian soil or at least the Iranian airspace, it is obvious there would be without a doubt measures of coercion, measures of retaliation, of course. It is part of nuclear deterrence....
Saying one would destroy Tehran is meaningless but what is meaningful is that in nuclear deterrence, there are initiatives taken in case of a nuclear attack which are to be examined, to be negotiated and which are up to the authority of the countries that consider themselves, with good reason or not, attacked.
Q: Including a retaliation of a nuclear type?
A: Everything is possible.... It is deterrence that allows attacking, counter-attacking a nuclear attacker that would have manifested itself. So that's the first problem.
The second problem of course concerns proliferation. The great danger of this plan of Iran is proliferation. Everyone knows that some countries have already reached the nuclear level and that have undeniably taken part in the development of proliferation. I won't name any country. It's useless but we know it, even Iran benefited from the expertise, the knowledge of the technology of some countries in the nuclear sector. So proliferation is a dangerous thing, starting from the moment when Iran would be able to access military nuclear technology, it would become ipso facto a potential center of proliferation that would be extremely dangerous for the entire region.
I drifted, because I thought we were "off the record," to say that, for example, Saudi Arabia or Egypt could be tempted to follow this example, I retract it of course since neither Saudi Arabia nor Egypt have made the slightest declaration on these subjects so it is not up to me to make them....What is certain is that such a process leads to an arm race that could lead a number of countries to participate in this arm race. I don't want to name any countries naturally, even though I did so yesterday, I shouldn't have done so....
Q: In the region?
A: In the region and maybe beyond it....There is a second risk that is also extremely serious which is the risk of proliferation because even without using a bomb they would have made, they can transfer to other countries for political reasons technologies that would allow these other countries to gain access to military nuclear technology....
Iran is still a great country. It's a country with a tradition. It's a complex country, which has a very old culture.... Iran has necessarily an important role to play in the Middle East region.
This region was traumatized by the Iraq affair. The Iraq affair shifted red lines, in fact, in the region and it has created a new situation. It has become dangerous, this region, more vulnerable, and therefore, Iran undeniably has an important role — taking into account its history, its tradition, its philosophy — an important role to play in the region under the condition of course to do so in a peaceful and cordial way.
I was a bit quick yesterday.... The current problem, in my view, is the environment. About Iran, we unfortunately will most likely have many more occasions to talk about it....
Q: Yesterday, frankly, you could have given the impression, at least it could have led to confusion, in that you were also saying that Iran could possess its first bomb, and maybe a second one. For you it was a way of saying that the problem is proliferation. You have evoked the possibility that it [Iran] may attack Israel, which seemed almost a bit secondary.
A: I cannot imagine this. I cannot imagine this. I repeat, the means of protection that exist around the world, in particular with the Americans but also with the Europeans, with a certain number of Europeans, are such that I don't imagine that a bomb, that a rocket carrying a [nuclear] bomb could be launched from Iran without our detecting it. And as a result, it would necessarily be destroyed. So I don't think I spoke about Israel yesterday. Maybe I did so but I don't think so. I have no recollection of that....
-- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>