Talking truth to power
The name's Richardson, and when there's trouble afoot, he's often the guy to see
Three weeks ago, with the blessing of the Bush administration, Gov. Bill Richardson was in North Korea to discuss its contentious nuclear weapons program. It was classic Richardson, a Democrat who has crossed party lines when he thought it was the right thing to do and whose public life over three decades has included seven terms in Congress, high-wire negotiations with some of the world's biggest thugs, two cabinet posts under President Clinton, and now the Statehouse of New Mexico, his adopted home state.
Richardson may be America's most prominent Hispanic politician. The son of an American businessman and a Mexican mother, he grew up in Mexico City, attended prep school, college, and graduate school in New England, and flirted with a professional baseball career before choosing the contact sport of politics. In his new book, Between Worlds--The Making of an American Life, Richardson lays out his rough rules for negotiation with some of the world's worst bad guys, like Saddam Hussein, and speaks to his vision for the United States. Excerpt:
William Barloon and David Daliberti were oil mechanics working in Kuwait for U.S. defense contractors when they decided to hook up with some friends manning a United Nations observation station near the Kuwait-Iraq border. They took a wrong turn and soon found themselves in Iraq and under arrest by Saddam Hussein' s border guards. There were hints in Iraq's state-controlled press of spying and potential sabotage. Not true: These guys had had a couple of beers, set off in search of their buddies, and lost their way. For that, they were sentenced to eight years in Abu Ghraib Prison, where Saddam had locked up and tortured enemies real and imagined over the decades. The Clinton administration, not contesting the official charge of entering the country illegally, said it would press for the release of Barloon, 39, and Daliberti, 41, but would make no concessions to Iraq. There would be no quid pro quo.
About a month later, I got a call from Peter Bourne, who had worked for former President Jimmy Carter as his drug czar and who was then active in international relief efforts. The Iraqis had called Bourne, apparently to express their unhappiness with the negotiations over the fate of Barloon and Daliberti. As he told it, both Carter and the Rev. Jesse Jackson had talked to Iraq's representatives, but there was no movement and no prospect of it in the foreseeable future.
The Iraqis clearly were seeking a way out of what was an embarrassing episode at a particularly sensitive time. Saddam's people wanted to talk to someone they thought they could trust. That someone, Bourne insisted, was me. The Iraqis knew of my connections to the Clinton White House and the work I had done in North Korea and other trouble spots, Bourne said, and they considered me an honest broker. This was something of a backhanded compliment, considering the source. I was leery about getting involved with the Iraqis on any level, not least as a freelance diplomat. But in the end, I figured, there was nothing to be lost in taking a first step. I contacted Clinton's national security adviser, Tony Lake, to let him know about the overture and seek guidance.
Bourne arranged for me to meet in New York with Nizar Hamdoon, Iraq's ambassador to the United Nations. A first step led to subsequent steps. Over the next three months, Hamdoon and I met 10 times at his official residence in New York, usually over a sumptuous Iraqi lunch.
Hamdoon, an elegant rail of a man with a black mustache and a seemingly permanent smile, made plain what we already knew--that the Iraqis wanted to free Barloon and Daliberti. By this time, the oil workers' wives were waging an effective international media campaign for the release of their husbands. Even the White House was feeling some heat.
Still, in our first nine meetings, Nizar had asked for everything from the end of the U.N.'s economic sanctions on Iraq to medical equipment to be delivered by a third country. Not a chance, said the White House. Saddam also wanted something else: a letter from Clinton expressing the American president's appreciation for the Iraqi dictator's gesture and a formal thank-you from the United States government for turning over the oil workers. No way, I told Hamdoon. Near the end of the ninth meeting, he insisted, once more, on the Clinton letter and the public thank-you from the government. "Nizar, this just is not going to happen, and I'm out of here," I told him. This is sometimes a useful technique in negotiations with autocrats or their minions because if talks are to be broken off, they want to be the ones to do it. Sure enough, Hamdoon called a week later and said I had to come back to talk.
"Screw you, Nizar, we're done."
Hamdoon's grasp of the English vernacular was excellent. "Really, Bill, we can do this. Let's meet one more time." We did and he tried, yet again, to play his losing hand. I said no. But I did say I would make an appropriate statement, as a United States congressman, if the oil workers were released to me. We agreed, finally, that there would be no Clinton letter and no U.S. government thank-you note, but that any communique or statement by me would have to be negotiated with Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz. The decision on whether to release the prisoners ultimately would fall to Saddam.
It was sometime around noon when our Iraqi drivers escorted us from our Baghdad hotel across town to a compound of palaces, outbuildings, ponds, and gardens. We went through several checkpoints, manned by uniformed armed guards and buttressed by sandbags, and pulled up to the entrance of a particularly impressive palace. Amazingly, there was no security at the gate. But as we drove through, we looked directly at an armored personnel carrier, its gun lined up perfectly with the front entrance. The building was huge, with what seemed to be dozens of ornate, empty rooms. Where was everyone? We were taken to one of these rooms, dominated by a portrait of Saddam, and told to wait. An interpreter joined us and, five minutes later, someone else arrived and escorted us to another room, one big enough to accommodate eight or nine entrances. There were floor-to-ceiling curtains, and beneath them I could see a half-dozen pairs of shoes. From North Korea to Angola, I'd seen a lot of strange and unsettling things, but the sight of these feet sticking out from under a curtain in Saddam Hussein's palace was the most bizarre.
We sat down. Moments later, a door opened and eight military officers, all ramrod-straight Republican Guardsmen, each with a sidearm and a carbon-copy Saddam mustache, marched in and lined up along one wall. The show was getting better by the second.
Two minutes later, another door opened and Saddam Hussein walked in, trim and broad-shouldered in his uniform. I am a big man, and Saddam, in his shiny black boots, appeared even taller. He seemed relaxed, but he had a twitch on the right side of his face that caused one eye to blink rapidly. As he entered, we stood. He sat and motioned us to do the same. I sat beside him, and we stared at each other for a few moments.
I began to speak and Calvin, my invaluable aide, took notes on 3-by-5 index cards. My hands were sweating. I started by noting all the help provided by Iraq's ambassador to the United Nations and told him how appreciative we were that he had decided to see us. We hoped our differences could be resolved diplomatically and peacefully.
"Iraq has not received an American in a long period of time," Saddam said. "We are thus required to talk about a great number of issues."
Suddenly, the Iraqi dictator slammed his hand hard on the table, stood up, and walked out of the room.
"What the hell's going on?" I asked the interpreter.
"You crossed your legs," he said.
"So?"
"You showed the dirty bottom of your shoe," he said. "That's an insult in Arab culture. You must apologize."
Aziz, Iraq's influential deputy prime minister, speaks fluent English. He came over and repeated what would be required of me.
"He left, Tariq," I said. "What do you want me to do--apologize to an empty chair? Is he coming back?"
Aziz shrugged. Fifteen minutes later, Saddam returned, sat down, and played the staring game again. Now I was really sweating. Should I grovel and apologize or keep on talking as if nothing happened? If I do, maybe he'll respect me for that. Option B seemed best. I kept both feet on the floor and plowed ahead.
"On behalf of the American people and President Clinton, I would like to request the release of the two Americans in your custody. The release would be viewed as an important humanitarian gesture. I am just one politician in a government with many pockets of power. Congress has a lot of power and influence in the international relations field. We do not always agree with the president; in fact, I did not vote for the war because I believed further diplomatic activity should have been pursued. (Later, when I became United Nations ambassa-dor and had to deal with Saddam again, I realized that my congressional vote on the war was a mistake.)
Nervously, I pressed on. "I am a close friend of President Clinton," I said, "and I have taken a number of diplomatic initiatives such as this . . . I am not an official envoy. I don't work for President Clinton, and I cannot negotiate for him or for the United States. . . . The current relationship is not helpful for Iraqi citizens or the United States, and it has potentially drastic implications for the entire region, including the Israeli-Palestinian problem. Should you release the two Americans, I believe the American people would appreciate this humanitarian gesture."
I'd made my case. The meeting was now into the second hour. Now what? There was a silence of about two minutes, with Saddam staring at me with his small, beady eyes; then he spoke.
Saddam said he appreciated my comments and gave us his word that the entire matter would be treated confidentially. Then he got to the point: "Based on the principles that you have appealed to me, and on the respect that you have shown me, and the request of Bill Clinton, and the long journey you have taken without any reassurances, I will use the constitutional powers vested in me in the Iraqi Constitution and release the two individuals to your custody. You will be able to take them with you." I immediately said that he was doing the right thing and instinctively put a hand on his arm in a gesture of goodwill. Saddam started, the only emotion he'd shown the entire time except for his bolting over the display of my heel, and along the wall, eight hands suddenly touched sidearms. But Saddam composed himself, the Republican Guard relaxed, and Iraq's dictator in chief continued.
"However, I want to be certain, in regard to the two individuals, that the Iraqi courts have acted in a just and honorable manner. The court has issued harsher sentences for non-Americans accused of illegally crossing the border. And this includes Arabs as well. In accordance with the law, courts pass sentences, but I can't deny that the courts, when considering a case involving Americans, [may] be influenced by the state of relations between Iraq and the United States. But I am not accusing them of that. The courts acted appropriately." This homage to Iraqi justice and the rule of law was touching, but I knew it was bulls- - -, and somehow I sensed that he knew I knew it was bulls- - -. We both knew the only law that mattered in Iraq was Saddam's law.
We were nearing the end of our conversation when Saddam brought in the Iraqi-controlled media for a photo op. While they were taking pictures and rolling tape, Saddam told me these images were not good politics in Iraq, given that they showed him with an American. I responded in kind: I wouldn't be using these pictures in my next re-election campaign either.
We said our goodbyes and waited. The Iraqi News Agency was breaking the story the way its boss wanted it broken: "President Saddam Hussein told Richardson that he accepts the plea by President Bill Clinton, the Congress, and the American people. His excellency issued an order . . . to pardon the two detainees and set them free immediately." The Iraqis, in other words, wanted to make it sound as if I was an official envoy after all. I set the record straight in my statement to the international press: "I undertook this mission as a member of Congress and not as a presidential envoy. There was no quid pro quo or concessions . . . I commend the Iraqi government for taking this positive humanitarian action."
Later that day, the Iraqis brought in two Americans. They looked scruffy and confused but otherwise reasonably fit. Barloon and Daliberti knew something was going on because they had been better fed over the past few days, but they didn't know exactly what was happening. It was an emotional moment. They didn't recognize me--there was no reason they should--so I just held out a hand to each of them and said: "I'm Congressman Bill Richardson from New Mexico, and you've been released to me. I'm taking you home." Both men burst into tears.
From the book Between Worlds by Bill Richardson with Michael Ruby.Copyright (c) 2005 Bill Richardson. Published by G. P. Putnam's Sons.
This story appears in the November 14, 2005 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.