REP. KING: No, we—no, a lot more has to be done. The fact is you don’t just throw money at it, you do it in a way that works. Well, half this technology the people are talking about doesn’t work that well, and the idea is how do you do it? You can’t be examining every piece of cargo that comes in, it’s to do it effectively and also to do it in a way that doesn’t stop world commerce. Having said that, we realize more has to be done. But their idea, in all due respect, often is throw money into it. And you—again, the idea is to do it in an effective, smart way. I think more should be done, and I’ve said that all along. I had hearings last year as subcommittee chairman, having hearings now that I’m full chairman, and we are going to move forward. I think Susan Collins is really moving the right direction.

MR. RUSSERT: Senator...

SEN. WARNER: If there’s one good thing that can come out of this, it is compelling us to go back and review this whole question about port security and the funding levels, and I...

MR. RUSSERT: It may take more money.

SEN. WARNER: It’s going to take a lot more money.

MR. RUSSERT: Let me turn to Iraq, Senator. You are the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, this is the cover of Time magazine coming out on the newsstands tomorrow: Breaking Point. Do you believe that Iraq is on the verge of civil war?

SEN. WARNER: I don’t think I or anyone else could make a definitive response to that question. I believe that there is not at this time the civil war that one would envision that meets the traditional definitions. Clearly, there’s a very high level of conflict, secular conflict, but the good news in the last 48 hours is that the—there are really three levels of influence of the people: There’s now the elected representatives, only a prime minister at the moment, temporarily there. Then there’s the religious people, and they’ve all come together and said, “Let’s take a grip on our situation and not let it get out of hand.” The third level is your tribal leaders, and they’re strong influence, they’ve joined. So across the board in Iraq in the past day, and our president telephoned these various leaders, becoming the realization we could slip into a civil war unless we act decisively to bring this government into being and put it in operation, and secondly, to continue at an accelerated rate to train and equip the forces needed to stop any civil war if it were to start.

MR. RUSSERT: If there is a civil war, what happens to the U.S. troops?

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What do they do?

SEN. WARNER: The U.S. troops, in my judgment, just speaking for myself, should not be involved in that type of secular conflict. We have trained 200-some odd thousand of these forces today. There’s a hundred battalions of Iraqi military. Over 50 of those battalions are able to take the lead in a fight with minimal U.S. support. So there’s in place today, I think, sufficient military under the control of the Iraqis with certain limited support from us. But I do not think we should get involved in the civil war other than to give support to the Iraqi forces as they begin to put it down.

MR. RUSSERT: Congressman King, you supported the war. We are now three years into it. And there were four fundamental judgments made by the administration. One: There would be weapons of mass destruction found. That is not the case. Two: We would not need large numbers of troops to occupy Iraq for years on end. Three years in, we still have 130-some thousand troops. Three: We’d be greeted as liberators. And four: That the Shiites, the Sunnis and Kurds would all come together...

REP. KING: Uh-hmm.

MR. RUSSERT: ... and unite as Iraqis and not break down into tribal or sectarian warfare.

REP. KING: Uh-hmm.

MR. RUSSERT: Was the administration wrong on all four counts? Were there four fundamental misjudgments?

REP. KING: No, I think—and I still think it was the right thing to go in. You cannot allow a dictator to continue to defy U.N. resolutions, with people believing you had WMD and having the capacity to have WMD. And I believe the situation—we are at a very defining moment right now in Iraq.

What Senator Warner said, I think, is very significant, that you have had the parties come back together for the purpose of talks. And the Sunnis realize that if this does turn into a civil war, they will be slaughtered. So they need an American presence there, and they have to end any possibility of going toward a civil war. I think Ayatollah Sistani is still doing a very good job of trying to keep the Shiites from retaliating completely against the Sunnis. So I’m still—listen, this is a defining moment, and Senator Warner said, you know, it’s up to them, ultimately. But I do think the Iraqi Army is much better trained. Seventy percent of the operations in Baghdad are carried out by Iraqis, the Iraqis being in the lead. So no, I think that this is a tough time, it’s a very difficult time. My heart goes out to anyone who’s lost anybody in Iraq. But having been there several times, I think we’ve made enormous progress. And if they can hold it together now, this can—having looked into the abyss, the Iraqi people may realize it’s time now to not go to a civil war but instead form a government.

MR. RUSSERT: And the people on Long Island, in your district, aren’t concerned about this war and they’re patient and supportive the way you are?

REP. KING: No, they are very concerned and every, every death is tragic. But my district also lost well over 100 people on September 11. And realizing you cannot defeat radical Islamic terrorism unless the Middle East is stabilized, and you cannot stabilize it so long as Saddam Hussein was in power.

MR. RUSSERT: But you’re not connecting Iraq to September 11?

REP. KING: I’m saying that in war against terrorism it’s essential to have a stable Middle East, and you cannot have done that so long as Saddam Hussein was in power.

MR. RUSSERT: Senator, if the situation in Iraq is the same as it is today at the end of this year, what do you say?

SEN. WARNER: Well, I’m going to say it won’t be the same. I still have a high degree of confidence that this government will come together and be responsible and perceived by the Iraqi people as representing their best interests in a unified way. And if that takes place, I think the president can continue, on the advice of his military commanders, to bring down the level of our forces there.

We have liberated that country. We have turned it over to them. The key is to keep the pressure on these elected leaders, 275 of them now. When they come together with the first meeting of their congress, if we should call it, assembly, and tell them, “You’ve got to get your act together.” We cannot let it be perceived, we’ve given them an open ticket to sit there and dither around, as the previous government did, for a long period of time. You saw what happened in the streets in the last few weeks as a consequence of a tragic incident of blowing up the Golden Dome Mosque. You do not want to see that happen elsewhere in this country. Take charge. But we’ve got to send that message and remind them every day as our able ambassador, I think, is doing.

CONTINUED

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