World Tibet Network News Friday, June 26, 1998

(Believes China trip will make progress in many areas)

Washington -- President Clinton told reporters June 24 he believes his trip to China will result in progress in a number of areas, including non-proliferation and human rights. Here an excerpt of the interview concerning Tibet.

Q: Mr. President, another issue which has sort of been a losing issue is the issue of Tibet and the Chinese government meeting with the Dalai Lama and negotiating greater autonomy with the Dalai Lama. The US government has in the past put pressure on the Chinese government to do that. They have so far not done that. You have assured the people in this country and in Tibet that you are taking a message to the Chinese. What is new about this message? What in this message is going to make the Chinese listen and actually sitdown at the table with the Dalai Lama?

PRESIDENT CLINTON: Well, I think it is -- first of all, let me say at this particular moment I don't feel free to say everything I'm going to say to President Jiang because of some of the sensitive work I've been doing on this issue for the last several weeks. But again I would say my general point is -- not just to President Jiang but to the other influential members of the Chinese government -- forget about our difference over what's right and wrong. We think it's wrong to deny the Dalai Lama access to his people in Tibet. We think it's wrong for the people of Tibet to be subject to any sort of religious, cultural or economic discrimination. We have not advocated independence for Tibet, separation, civil war, anything disruptive. We have advocated, if you will, autonomy with integrity. It's supposed to be an autonomous region anyway. It is our understanding that that is the position that the Dalai Lama has taken.

So my argument to them - the larger message will be -- let's lay to the side for the moment the fact that I believe what is happening is wrong and they don't. I do not believe it is in China's interest. China has been very -- was a droit in trying to find a balance between taking back Hong Kong without destroying what was special about Hong Kong. Now I know Hong Kong is an economic engine but a country is made great by more than its economic engines. And the Tibetan Buddhism as a religious faith, as a culture and a way of life, the ability of the Tibetan people to be free of any kind of economic or other handicaps, and the signal it would send to the rest of the world about China's attitude about human dignity, and diversity and difference of religion, race and opinion -- the gains to China from doing this would far outweigh any marginal extra tension they might feel about the long-term future of Tibet in this context. So my argument is going to be, you know, from the point of view of the pure self interest

of the Chinese government. This is an easy issue. This is not a difficult issue. Doing the right thing here is plainly in the interests of China. That's the argument I'm going to make.

Q: But they don't see it that way, Mr. President. This argument has been made in the past. They obviously don't -

PRESIDENT CLINTON: They don't see it that way because they continue to believe that the only -- that it's just one step to losing part of China. I think it's important for Americans to understand that -- this is something that I've learned not just in dealing with China but in dealing with all other countries -- countries are like people, they have a collective memory. And in order to deal with nations effectively when you have differences with them, it's important to understand what their worst nightmare is. Because if we're dominated by our nightmares we make decisions that are not rational in the eyes of other people.

For example, when dealing with Russia in trying to expand NATO, we had tore member that the Russians were invaded by Hitler and by Napoleon. And that even though no one is now alive who was alive when Napoleon invaded Russia,it is something that is deeply embedded in the psyche, in the consciousness of the Russian people. So that if territorial changes are made along the border of Russia you have to be sensitive to that and work it out. China is -- the government of China, the leaders of China, their worst nightmare is disintegration, you know, because they have these memories of when China was weakened and vulnerable to foreign attack, vulnerable to government by war lords, vulnerable to the opium trade, vulnerable to everything because of the disintegration of the central authority. Therefore, to an outsider who knows nothing of China's history the importance to China,which is so large, and so big, of the one China policy vis-a-vis Taiwan, of getting back Hong Kong, of making sure that nothing could ever h

appen and Tibet -- to promote any separatism.

To us, we see only the downsides of those things. To them, a lot of the things they do which to us are unacceptable they do, I believe, because they're too much in the grip of the historic memory of disintegration. And one of the things I have to do is to not lose my patience or mydetermination, to work until I help to create for them a new and different historic reality so that they feel more confident in doing what I believe is the morally right thing to do, as well as what is in their own self interest. But I think it's important to recognize that -- you can't assume that - none of these people would be in positions of influence in the largest country in the world if they were without intellectual ability, without sensitivity, without the capacity to be effective. So when they do things that the rest of us think are completely irrational we have to try to understand what it is that makes them do that.

I just think they could get more goodwill in the rest of the world, for less effort, by doing the right thing on Tibet than nearly any other issue. And I think that getting them to the point where they will see it that way depends upon their having a clear understanding of what a resumed dialogue with the Dalai Lama would lead to, not just in a year or two years but in 10, or 20,or 30 years. And I'm not sure the United States has ever had the kind of systematic effort on this that I have been expending for the last few years and that I will continue to expend as long as I am in office with the fond hope of being successful. I intend to continue to work on this very, very hard. It's obvious that we have no power to compel them to do this. There is no tool, no incentive, no anything because nothing is as important to the Chinese as the territorial integrity of their country, nothing; because of their history. So I have to find a way to argue my case and prevail and I will keep doing this. I care very, very muc

h about this and I have been working on this hard for the last couple of years and I will continue to doit as long as I'm President.

Q: How high is it on the agenda for this trip?

PRESIDENT CLINTON: Well, for me it's a big thing. It's a big thing because I think countries -- I think all countries -- I think the United States has done this, too. None of us are -- you know, we all make our mistakes and weall have our memories but I think when a great country, because of an inaccurate reading of the facts of a situation, or being in the grip of a historical nightmare makes an error the consequences can be quite severe.

For example, it took us two years and a few months to get the American public to the point, and our allies to the point, that we could go in and end the Bosnian War. Now, a lot of people looking from the outside in said, "Look at this terrible situation in Bosnia, why don't they just go and do something about it, why are they taking two years?" Well, the people who say that didn't live through the experience that our military and our people did in Vietnam. Bosnia was not Vietnam for a lot of different reasons. An outsider could say to all of us, "America, why don't you understand this is not Vietnam." But it took us a while to work through, as a people, and with our allies, why it wasn't, what it was, and what we had to do, what our clear moral responsibility was, what was in our national interest. We did the right thing. And in the lifetime of a country two years is not very long to take to do that but it took -- it was a lot of hard work. And you would be amazed in the debates and the discussions, if you j

ust go back and read things that were in the public in the beginning there were a lot of people who were afraid, "Oh, this is Vietnam all over again." So I am -- I've developed some patience in working on this. I'm impatient to get the results but I understand what it's like to try to change the mind set of a nation, the psychology of a nation, when it has deeply embedded historical experiences that become a part of the way the leaders of a nation look at everything that happens there after.

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