California Republican debate transcript

Moderator: Governor Huckabee, I'd like to get your views about how you balance loyalty and accountability. Would you have fired Don Rumsfeld before last November?

Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee: I think I would've done that before the election. I certainly wouldn't have said that we are not going to do it and then, right after the election, done so. But that's the president's call.

Clearly there was a real error in judgment, and that primarily had to do with listening to a lot of folks who were civilians in suits and silk ties and not listening enough to the generals with mud and blood on their boots and medals on their chest.

Those generals told us, early on, it would take 300,000 troops to successfully go in and stabilize Iraq. Instead we gave them a limited number of troops and a budget and said, you have to do it with this.

I think that's something, now, we understand was a mistake. But rather than simply walking away and leaving the Middle East in a complete disastrous chaos that will spread to the region and to the rest of the world, it's important that we finish the job, that we do it right, rather than have to go back and some day do it over.

Moderator: Why don't we start with Governor Gilmore there, and ask you a general question, as people who are political and know the mood of the country, starting with you -- you've been a military man. You were in Army intelligence.

But on this general question, the Rumsfeld removal was perhaps timed to the election. Do you think a general shake-up in this administration's Cabinet, right now, would be good for the administration?

Former Virginia Governor James Gilmore (R-Va.): I think there have been a lot of changes in the administration over the last number of years.

We've seen those changes.

But the fundamental point that we have to remember is this has been coming on for quite a long time. Decades this has been coming on. And I think we got distracted at the end of the Cold War, when we were thinking about the end of the Soviet Union and the fall of the Berlin Wall, thanks to the president in whose name this library is named. And, instead, we didn't pay attention sufficiently to the entire Middle East.

And I see this Iraq problem as part of an entire Middle East issue, and it's sort of a fundamental problem that we're going to have an honest conversation with the American people about. We're going to have to engage in the Middle East, and we're going to have to do it for an extended and a long period of time.

It isn't just an Iraq issue. This is an issue of the challenges that we're facing between the Palestinians and the Israelis, the challenge between Sunnis and Shiites -- the problem with people on the street not even agreeing with their own regimes.

There is a great deal that has to be done, and the president is going to have to bring the American people forward into a major commitment in many areas -- one is foreign policy -- and there will have to be a new commitment to the Middle East.

Moderator: Congressman Paul, you voted against the war. Why are all your fellow Republicans up here wrong?

Representative Ron Paul (R-Texas): That's a very good question. And you might ask the question, why are 70 percent of the American people now wanting us out of there, and why did the Republicans do so poorly last year?

So I would suggest that we should look at foreign policy. I'm suggesting very strongly that we should have a foreign policy of non- intervention, the traditional American foreign policy and the Republican foreign policy.

Throughout the 20th century, the Republican Party benefited from a non-interventionist foreign policy. Think of how Eisenhower came in to stop the Korean War. Think of how Nixon was elected to stop the mess in Vietnam.

How did we win the election in the year 2000? We talked about a humble foreign policy: No nation-building; don't police the world. That's conservative, it's Republican, it's pro-American -- it follows the founding fathers. And, besides, it follows the Constitution.

I tried very hard to solve this problem before we went to war by saying, "Declare war if you want to go to war. Go to war, fight it and win it, but don't get into it for political reasons or to enforce U.N. resolutions or pretend the Iraqis were a national threat to us.

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