Interviewer
Prime Minister, Saddam Hussein does not seem to be the sort of man who could just be persuaded to leave Kuwait. Is military force the only solution?
Prime Minister
Now, we are on a clear strategy. First we put in military force into all of the other states to deter anyone from having similar aggression against the other Arab states, and then we have strict enforcement of the sanctions resolution so you have strong defence of all the other states and strict enforcement of sanctions and we hope that will be enough as you gradually get a stronger and stronger strangle-hold over the economy of Iraq. And we hope that will be enough to implement the United Nations Resolution.
Interviewer
Is there a danger of hostilities breaking out by mistake almost? [end p1]
Prime Minister
No I do not think so, I think we are all very much aware of that.
Interviewer
Who is in fact making the military decisions in the area of the allied forces?
Prime Minister
The normal rules prevail that you make quite clear to your military the latitude within which they can work.
Interviewer
How does the hostage situation influence your decision-making in the Gulf crisis?
Prime Minister
If I might put it this way, I think it has influenced everyone in one way by showing the brutality and ruthlessness of the country we are dealing with. It is totally uncivilised to take hostages, totally uncivilised, and it just adds to one's determination to deal with this matter in accordance with the United Nations resolution.
Interviewer
Have you had regular consultations on a personal level with President Bush and Mr Gorbachev during the crisis? [end p2]
Prime Minister
I have seen President Bush twice and spoken to him on the telephone. I have not spoken to Mr Gorbachev on the telephone but I think he has come out with some splendid statements.
Interviewer
To go to the European problems, European integration, away from the war situation in the Gulf. The British line in European integration has been a more careful one than that of the French and possibly the Germans as well. How has the changing situation in Eastern European influenced this difference of approach to European integration?
Prime Minister
I think one of the problems when you are dealing with the Community is that words are used without ever being defined, words like integration and political union, they are never defined and therefore they mean different things to different people and part of my task has been to see that words are not used unless we make quite clear what we mean. And when of course the phrase political union was used one tackled them immediately - “What do you mean?” - and they did not quite know. So the word integration, if it means what most people here would think it means - a common market, a single market - then I think we would all agree with it.
That was one of the main reasons why we joined the Community, to get the benefit of a big single market, and therefore to have more influence in the world as a trading unit. We have no difficulty with that and I think that when the Single Market comes in at the end of 1992 it will be the largest thing that has happened [end p3] to the Community since the Treaty of Rome was signed.
When you start to get to political union and other such things then we are in a very different world because to some it means a complete federal state, to others it means carrying on as we are but making the institutions of the Community work better together. I would take the latter course and say the institutions should work better but the real fundamental structure of the Community is twelve sovereign nations meeting together with their own powers, doing together those things which they can do best together, but still cooperating as sovereign nations.
And that seems to me both as honourable and worthy a course of action as those who try to dissolve differences. You cannot dissolve certain differences of national identity and I think it would be wrong and not putting things ahead as fast as they would otherwise go. Better if we negotiate as separate sovereign states.
Interviewer
How would you like to see the neutrals and Eastern European ex-socialist countries brought together in this European process?
Prime Minister
I think, as I indicated in a speech in Aspen, that although it will take a time for the East European countries to come to the free market economy, which is the necessary back-up to political freedom, that we should make it quite clear that when they do that membership will be open to them so that they have something to work for. And I think it will be easier to do that if we do not get ourselves too tied closely together with too much bureaucracy and saying that we are all the same when we are all very different. [end p4] So I think we should make it clear that membership is open.
We already of course have one neutral country - the Republic of Ireland. To some extent that might hinder some of the things we can do. But on the whole we deal with defence through NATO and not through the European Community and I think that is right.
Interviewer
This brings me to the next question. The consensus seems to be the operative word for the CSCE side of European integration and the possibility of a new security system which has been discussed in some European capitals. Am I correct in assuming that consensus is not to you personally the ideal way of making foreign policy decisions?
Prime Minister
I think it depends on the way in which you use the word. If you say that I have no principles, no objectives save that which I can find by discussion, then I would disagree with you totally. I do have certain strong principles, they are peace with freedom and justice, and the way to have that freedom is to limit the powers of government and to have a strong rule of law and you make it quite clear that you have a framework of law within which your industry can operate to keep them competitive, rules on pollution, rules on safety and certain basic standards.
So we have certain very strong principles on which we do not compromise. We have certain very strong principles on defence on which we do not compromise. There would be no great philosophy, there would be no freedom in the world if people had gone out and said: “Brothers, I believe in consensus and compromise.” They did [end p5] not, they went out and said: “Brothers, I believe in freedom and justice.” That is very different.
So do not talk about consensus in the sense that you have no objectives, no principles, no standards except consensus or compromise. Consensus or compromise is not to me an objective. I have clear objectives and then I try to convince others, by discussion, that is the way to go and in discussing these things with some nations with perhaps different objectives you have to come to some kind of agreement.
I remember very vividly being in one international forum and they were talking about reaching consensus and I said: “Now tell me, I do not understand what you mean about consensus. I reach agreement and I understand agreement, it is specific and we know what we want to do and where we are going.” “Oh”, said this statesman “you talk about consensus when you cannot reach agreement.” So I said: “Well, I would rather reach agreement, then I know where I am.”
Interviewer
Am I wrong in supposing that somehow you would describe part of the CSCE process as being more willing to reach a consensus than agreement?
Prime Minister
You have to reach an agreement when you have to have action. We reached agreement on United Nations resolutions, they are the prelude to action. The question now is how are those resolutions implemented. When you are making statements then obviously you have quite a lot in the statements that is not precisely what any of us [end p6] would have wished but in fact you do come to some kind of arrangement where you can all agree to a certain statement and that way you call it consensus, we reach a consensus because we will all accept that statement made on behalf of all of us.
Interviewer
I am a bit surprised that during these pressing times of the Gulf crisis and all that is going on you still have time to visit Finland and you have not cut your visit short in any way?
Prime Minister
But Finland is a very important country and we have great admiration for the way in which she has handled matters over the last decades. My generation remembers very well the struggle of the early 1940s and the struggle and skill with which Finland has had to keep her identity and she must be very pleased now at the way things have turned out in East-West.
She is a very important part of what we would call the Helsinki Accords but which you call CSCE, and it is going to be very important that as a forum for discussion. Because NATO is our forum for defence, the European Community is our forum for many economic affairs and trade, but we do need this other one which is the Helsinki Process - CSCE - because that includes the United States and Canada and the Soviet Union. And that is the only forum we have which actually includes all of those and many of us feel very strongly indeed that it will continue to be important and get more important because that is where we discuss things with the United States and with the Soviet Union and that is the way in which we will be able to extend the real values of democracy, freedom and [end p7] justice right across from the United States, right across Europe, right across the Soviet Union to the Pacific. And that is a vital forum.
So yes it is important that I go to Finland and I am very much looking forward to it and a bit a guilty that I have not been before now.
Interviewer
Will you be visiting the Conservative Party's Union meeting there as well?
Prime Minister
Yes, we have the European Democratic Union meeting there which is a meeting of the centre-right parties. Some of us way back in the mid-1970s thought that they had an international socialist group, that mind you, of course socialism is waning as a political philosophy because it does not give you the requisite degree of freedom, and we thought that as we have the best beliefs, with the freedom and justice and limitation of government and increasing the liberties of the people, that we too should have a forum in which we spoke about our fundamental philosophy. It is very interesting that the world is very different now than when we started that, and we started it in Austria, and we have seen the collapse of communism because it gives neither human dignity nor prosperity. So Finland asked us to hold it there this time and we shall and I hope it will be a very successful conference.