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Senator JOHN WARNER (Republican, Virginia; Chairman, Armed Services Committee): My reaction is they've taken the right course. I think the president, President Bush, and his team of Rice and Bolton did a wonderful job here. First place, it's unanimous. All came together. That has enormous symbolism all through Asia that everybody came together on this and stood. Now, as to the provisions, she's going over to work them out.

But that question you asked about China and its reluctance on the border, and here's my reaction to it: China is seeking world recognition, trying to emerge as a power and a strong voice. This is their test. China supplies over 60 percent of the energy and food to North Korea, they have got tremendous leverage through that. South Korea itself is got a program called Open Sunshine and support their trading. Those two nations should be out in the lead, and I think the president and the secretary have struck the correct balance.

Mr. SANGER: Senator, the Chinese have this enormous leverage, but they've been very reluctant to use it. And they've been reluctant to use it because they're more concerned about North Korea imploding.

Sen. WARNER: That massive exodus into their country, people bearing arms and all types of things.

Mr. SANGER: Given that piece of leverage that the North Koreans have--basically, the threat of--of self-destruction--what can we do to convince the Chinese, at this point, that they really need to crack down using this set of sanctions?

Sen. WARNER: You know, I've got a suggestion, and I made it not long ago in the context of Iran. And by the way, how we deal with this situation impacts the serious question with regard to Iran and its desire for--to become a nuclear power. But I said then it's time for that part of the world in the Middle East and now in this part of the world to look at the framework of NATO and how NATO came into being primarily to contain the Soviet Union and its ability to utilize nuclear weapons. It worked. And I think we should transition now from the nonproliferation, trying its best to stop it, into an area of deterrents and containment and downright defense if it's necessary. And bring in all the nations to share. I like the idea that the president has that we're not going to be out there driving the equation, the neighbors themselves should be the principle ones responsible, China and South Korea.

SCHIEFFER: Well, let me go to Senator Nunn and get his take on all this.

Senator, you said this week, I think, that it was more important to get imperfect sanctions quickly than to wait and linger until we could get perfect sanctions. What's your reaction to what's happened and where do we go from here?

Former Senator SAM NUNN (Democrat, Georgia; Co-chairman, Nuclear Threat Initiative): I think the sanctions are timely and I believe they're substantive, and I believe the fact that it was unanimous agreement here is enormously important and, as Senator Warner has said, I think it sends very strong signals. I also think we ought to continue to have a goal of getting rid of all nuclear weapons on the Korean peninsula. I believe that China is the key, as has already been observed here.

I think it would be real breakthrough if the United States and China and South Korea all got on the same wavelength for a change. We have not been approaching this with any kind of unity for the last three or four years. And that has been, I think, a very detrimental aspect of trying to deal with North Korea.

This is a defeat for China in terms of their policy--the tests that North Korea conducted. It's certainly a defeat for the United States policy and also a defeat for the South Korean policy. So getting on the same sheet of music here with our allies is enormously important, and that certainly includes Japan and hopefully Russia and Europe.

Now what can be done? One thing is you don't get a country to give up its nuclear weapons while you're talking about regime change. And I think it's also important to recognize that you don't get China and South Korea on the same sheet of music if they think our policy is to cause a collapse of the North Korean regime, which is going to cause them tremendous economic and humanitarian problems. So we've got to be willing to talk. We've got to be willing to talk about security assurances for North Korea, and we've got to do that not only because North Korea is going to be important in terms of its decision-making, and its security is very important to North Korea, but also because it's important to our allies.

So I agree with strong sanctions. I think we have to reassure Japan and South Korea that they are part of American defense and an attack on them is an attack on us, and I think we have to be willing to talk. All are necessary as a parallel course.

SCHIEFFER: Senator Nunn, back at the beginning of all this, I remember that the North Koreans were saying they wanted a treaty of some sort with the United States guaranteeing that we would not attack them. I don't know anybody in the world who thinks the United States is going to attack North Korea unless they attack somebody else. Should we be willing to talk about something like that?

Sen. NUNN: Well, the one country that may believe we are going to attack is North Korea.

SCHIEFFER: Yes.

Sen. NUNN: Which is a pretty important exception. Most countries do not. And I don't think--I think, as Secretary Rice said this morning--I don't think we have any intention to attack, but when you're paranoid and when you're developing nuclear weapons and when you see the United States has invaded Iraq, and they didn't have nuclear weapons, then it's pretty natural that you are going to develop your own program. And if you're going to give up those weapons, you have to have some security assurances, not just from the United States. And that's the value of the six-party talks. Those assurances have got to be with Japan and China as well as the United States and probably even Russia. But we have to be willing to have those kind of direct discussions. And we also have to precede that by having firm understanding with South Korea who doesn't want a North Korean collapse. And China, who doesn't want a North Korean collapse.

SCHIEFFER: All right. We'll talk about this a little bit more. And we're also going to talk about Iraq. But right now, let's take a break.
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SCHIEFFER: We're back again with Senator John Warner and former Senator Sam Nunn. And before we go to Iraq, Senator Warner, I just want to ask you, is China going to have to enforce that border? Are they going to have to crack down there to make sure that the North Koreans don't import stuff that could--they could use to build nuclear weapons?

Sen. WARNER: Well, it's the old adage, "A chain is no stronger than its weakest link." If that's left as an open border, then all of the rest of the containment and security measures could easily fail.

But there's another extremely aspect about this that I'm worried about. The current group of nations that have nuclear weapons are ones with established governments, and we have confidence in how their military and their civilian officials review all decision-making. Not so with Iran. We have seen nothing by way of its president in trying to encourage the world that he has any real strength. Same with North Korea. So these weapons now moving into hands of countries quite different than the earlier framework. And that concerns me and why I'm pushing to open up the concept of establishing a NATO-type situation both in the Korean environment as well as Tehran.

SCHIEFFER: OK. All right, let's go quickly now to Iraq. You came back from Iraq, Senator Warner, and said `We're going sideways there.'

Sen. WARNER: Mm-hmm.

SCHIEFFER: `And if things don't improve we're going to have to rethink our policy.' What does that mean?

Sen. WARNER: It means just exactly what that statement is, and I stand by it. You cannot see--you can see some movement forward, but a lot of movement back. As we are sitting here today one week out of my trip there, the exponential increase in the killings and the savagery that's going on over there. But bear in mind the morale of our troops is good. They're performing their missions. But we're trying to take a conventional type of military thinking and curtailing an insurgency. And history have shown that's the toughest.

But the bottom line is we cannot--and I said this in my transcript of that press conference--we cannot allow that country to implode and the government fail and those oil wells become a source of revenue for worldwide terrorism.

SCHIEFFER: All right, but, David.

Mr. SANGER: Secretary Baker said--of course he's running the Iraq study group.

Sen. WARNER: Yes, I knew that.

Mr. SANGER: And shortly after you made your statement, Secretary Baker said that we need to find a middle course between "stay the course" and "cut and run." What would that middle course look like and how could you do that consistent with the mission that the president has laid out, which is a fully democratized Iraq?

Sen. WARNER: Well, we--as I said, we have to rethink all the options, except any option which says we precipitously pull out, which would let that country fall into a certain civil war at that time, and all of the neighboring countries would be destabilized. It would be wrong to do that and unfair to the Iraqi people to let their oil become the cash cow for international terrorism. So we're forced, David, to look at what options exist between those two poles. And I think Baker, with whom I speak frequently, put it very clearly. What...

Mr. SANGER: Could that include some deadlines that make it clear...

Sen. WARNER: Well...

Mr. SANGER: ...to the Iraqis when it is that we may have to leave.

Sen. WARNER: I remember in my visits over there--many times I've been--an old Arab told me one time, `Look, the Western world has all the clocks, but we've got all the time.' They'll wait us out.

SCHIEFFER: All right. Well, let's see what Senator Nunn thinks about that.

Where do we go from here in Iraq, Senator Nunn?

Sen. NUNN: Well, I think the Baker-Hamilton report will be very important, and it'll come after the election. I believe that Senator Warner has given us a very sobering assessment in certainly the 60 to 90 day count of timeline he sees for the Iraqi government to get its house in order. I'm outside, and don't get briefed on these matters these days, but from the outside it appears to me that some type phase withdrawal that is negotiated with the Iraqi government, with some timelines for them to comply with what they've got to do to get a federation, and to give assurances to both the Sunnis and the Shiites and the Kurds, particularly on the revenue sharing from their oil money.

Also, I think we need to understand, this is a regional threat now. It was not to begin with, it is now. It is a regional threat with possible Shiite-Sunni conflict, not just in Iraq, but around the region.

SCHIEFFER: All right. All right.

Sen. NUNN: And I think we've got to negotiate and talk directly with the neighbors. That's very important.

SCHIEFFER: All right. Senator Nunn, we are out of time. Thank you, sir.

Sen. NUNN: OK.

SCHIEFFER: We'll be back with a final word in just a minute.
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