Hardball

Thanks to you both for joining us.

JAMES WOOLSEY, FORMER CIA DIRECTOR: Good to be with you, Campbell.

DAVID SCHEFFER, FORMER AMB AT LARGE FOR WAR CRIMES: Good to be with you.

BROWN: Let me ask you both this question. And Jim, I’ll start with you. I watched those images today in that video, and I found it so compelling and almost surreal, just seeing him. What was your reaction when you saw it?

WOOLSEY: Well, he’s a ranting sociopath and…

BROWN: OK!

(LAUGHTER)

WOOLSEY: … that the United States and Britain and our allies have done a great thing by bringing him to justice and helping establish an Iraqi government that can prosecute him. I think this may be the beginning of people across the world seeing what some of the positive outcomes can be and are being of our intervention in Iraq.

BROWN: David, do you think he understood what was happening in the court? I mean, or is he a little bit delusional?

SCHEFFER: Well, I won’t judge the delusional side, but I do think he probably misunderstood some aspects of why he was in that courtroom. He did not have counsel with him. He asked a lot of questions when he entered the courtroom: Where’s the authority of this? Are you an occupation authority judge? Are you an Iraqi judge? Who are you? What is this about? If he had had counsel with him to just brief him as to why he was walking in, we might not have seen those types of questions. I did find it a little surprising that counsel was not in this arraignment with him. Now, under Iraqi criminal procedure, it is not necessary to have…

BROWN: Right.

SCHEFFER: … counsel there. But because this is such a high-profile crime and because occupation authority has actually — you know, before it transferred sovereignty, had such a large degree of responsibility with respect to this individual, and because the special Iraqi tribunal is going to be exercising standards of international due process, they should have leaned over backwards, I think, to have counsel with him in that courtroom.

BROWN: Do you agree?

WOOLSEY: I think Dave’s got a point. I think it would be wise for us all the way along to advise the Iraqis, and when we’re responsible for anything ourselves, to make sure that procedural guarantees are there. This man is, I think, quite certain to be found guilty, but we don’t want this to look like a — you know, a fake or a show trial.

BROWN: Well, I want to get into the logistics of the trial in just a second, but first focus for me, if you can, on — on what you think the initial reaction was, and not just from us — I’ve heard yours — but the Iraqi people because he came off as defiant and almost tough. I mean, you know, whether you agree with him or not, he didn’t go in there cowering.

WOOLSEY: I think, among about 85 percent of the Iraqi people — the Shia, the Kurds, the Turkomans, the Christians, everybody but the Sunni Arabs — the reaction is likely to be almost universally one of — of pride and pleasure that a new Iraqi government is able to bring this man to justice. In the Sunni Arab part of Iraq, some maybe 15 to 20 percent, it could be more complex because some of these clans, particularly his own Tikriti clan and some of the others, provided huge numbers, a huge share of military officers, of members of his intelligence services, Saddam Fedayeen and the rest. And they realize that this means they are now more or less down and out until they win their way back into Iraqi society.

BROWN: But in fairness, the anti-American sentiment throughout Iraq is not limited just to the Sunnis. And you heard a lot of people saying today not — not only there — there — in — concede in — in light of the war and what’s gone on, that there is a fair amount of anti-American sentiment throughout the country, in all different sects.

WOOLSEY: Iraqis are a proud people, and they don’t like occupiers. And we occupied too long. WE should have held elections earlier. I think we should have turned things over to the Iraqis earlier. But nonetheless, the thrust of the hostility has been in the Sunni triangle and Fallujah and places like that, and among Sunnis. Muqtada al Sadr was a serious problem fore a time. It looks like they may have more or less pulled his teeth in the Shi’ite areas of the south. But generally, in a lot of these areas in the south, the Shi’ites, in the north, the Kurds, Saddam Hussein is not popular. And whereas we may not…

BROWN: Right.

WOOLSEY: … be all that popular, either, we’re also not all that unpopular. It’s, I think, mainly in the Sunni triangle, which…

BROWN: David, do you think there’s a danger, though, that Iraqis, Sunnis or other — you know, universally may look at this as an American show trial?

SCHEFFER: Well, I think that risk is — is being minimized as much as possible because this Iraqi special tribunal is Iraqi top-heavy. It will be Iraqi judges, an Iraqi prosecutor, an Iraqi investigating judge…

BROWN: Yes, but…

SCHEFFER: … so there’s a lot…

BROWN: … American lawyers are involved. They’re advising them on every step of the process.

SCHEFFER: But…

BROWN: And there is no system here in place.

SCHEFFER: Right.

BROWN: They’re not familiar…

SCHEFFER: Right.

BROWN: … with an independent judiciary.

SCHEFFER: During the occupation, it’s true that they were behind the scenes doing so. They’ll continue to do that for a while. But once this trial actually gets under way, I don’t think you’ll see much of an American presence in the courtroom. So the visuals will not be American.

But I think it is very important to look at the Milosevic precedent here, with respect to your question to Jim, and that is, Milosevic used his self-representation in the trial, and is still doing so, to grandstand politically in that trial and to…

BROWN: And it gave him…

SCHEFFER: … communicate…

BROWN: … a political platform and a forum.

SCHEFFER: … and to communicate to his political supporters, who do still exist in Serbia. And that had an objective. If Saddam Hussein chooses to represent himself in this trial, he may try to use the same tactic in order to garner that support among the populace. But he seemed to also indicate that he wanted a lawyer today. I think it’ll be incumbent upon this court to insist that he have a lawyer and that the lawyer do the professional speaking for him in the courtroom. And the statute to the court empowers the court to require that of him, that he have a lawyer in the courtroom.

BROWN: But do you see him, you know, standing behind a lawyer, or taking this opportunity to try to use it to his advantage?

WOOLSEY: I think he should be required to have a lawyer. I don’t think he has or should be given any right to just stand up and try to use this as a propaganda device. And there’s one thing to remember about — about Iraq. Not only did these people invent the rule of law, with Hammurabi’s code a long time ago, but they had a very decent civil and criminal code from the 1920s to the 1950s. They had a distinguished set of jurists. This is not a primitive place.

Now, admittedly, for the last 30 to 40 years, they’ve been under a terrible dictatorship, but the Iraqi people, particularly older ones, have an appreciation for many aspects of the rule of law that certainly aren’t apparent if one, you know, looks at images of burning vehicles and so forth…

BROWN: Right.

WOOLSEY: … in the streets of Fallujah. But we have a lot to build on in this country, and this is a very good beginning to show the Iraqis how they are able to move back to some aspects of the rule of law that they once knew.

BROWN: OK, we got to take a quick break. We’ll be back with more with James Woolsey and David Scheffer. And when we come back, what will Saddam Hussein’s trial look like? We’ll look back on the trials of other tyrants.

You’re watching HARDBALL on MSNBC.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Welcome back to HARDBALL.

Today has been history in the making. We’re continuing to discuss Saddam Hussein’s first appearance in an Iraqi court. And as NBC’s Mike Taibbi reports, most modern-day dictators and war criminals have actually escaped trial.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MIKE TAIBBI, NBC CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From this to this, until today, the enduring image of Saddam Hussein’s fall from power. This morning, the money shot, Saddam arraigned and formally charged with crimes against humanity.

COL RICK FRANCONA, U.S. AIR FORCE (RET.), MSNBC MIDDLE EAST ANALYST: The importance of this indictment is that it’s being done by Iraqis in an Iraqi courtroom.

TAIBBI: But few of history’s most sinister figures have ever been truly held accountable. Hitler, Stalin and Mao Zedong never faced trial, or any form of punishment, for their brutality. Neither did Cambodia’s Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge leader whose atrocities were documented in the film “The Killing Fields.” His regime was responsible for the death, imprisonment or exile of nearly two million people. Yet he avoided trial and died in 1998 past the age of 70, apparently of natural causes.

Another despot, the former shah of Iran, Mohammed Reza Shah Pahlevi, forced out of his country after popular uprisings against his regime, which was oppressive in its use of the secret police. On January 16, 1979, Shah Pahlevi fled Iran following the return of Ayatollah Khomeini. The shah died in Egypt in 1980 without ever facing trial for his crimes.

Death was also the way out for the former Philippine president Ferdinand Marcos. The firm anti-communist leader who was initially supported by the United States. After years of widespread corruption, political bullying and reported links to the assassination of opposition leader Benigno Aquino, Marcos faced a backlash and was exiled to Hawaii, where he remained until his death in 1989.

Like Marcos, Haiti’s Jean-Claude Duvalier was removed from his government courtesy of American transport. Known as “Baby Doc” Duvalier, he declared himself president for life at age 20. He, too, was forced out by mounting instability and anti-government protests. Dancing Haitians took to the streets on the morning of January 7, 1986, as the Baby Doc regime ended.

But among history’s most famous tyrants, there are those who have been brought to justice. In 1989, former Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega was captured and removed from Panama after President George H.W. Bush ordered an invasion of that country. In 1992, Noriega was sentenced by a U.S. judge to 40 years on charges of drug trafficking and the sale of U.S. secrets to Cuba.

And former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic was indicted by the international war crimes tribunal in The Hague for his ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, his trial still ongoing.

Mike Taibbi, NBC News, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: I’m back with James Woolsey and Ambassador David Scheffer. And David, let me ask you to kind of walk us through. We’ve had the history lesson. Walk us through what we’re going to see happen over the next several months.

SCHEFFER: You won’t see much happen at all over the next several months because this who process will probably go somewhat underground with the preparation for the trials — the collection of the evidence, the preparation of witnesses, and the prosecutor, in fact, making those discretionary decisions as to how he’s going to proceed not only against Saddam Hussein, but the 11 others who were also brought…

BROWN: Right.

SCHEFFER: … before this court today. And then, maybe five, six, seven months down the road, you’ll probably see a new hearing before the specially constituted tribunal…

BROWN: Right.

SCHEFFER: … for this — for these crimes.

BROWN: Let’s talk about the challenges, both of you — gathering evidence, interviewing witnesses, getting people to testify, people who are still terrified. How hard is that going to be?

WOOLSEY: I think it’s going to be harder the longer the violence continues in Iraq, of course, and…

BROWN: Well, the security situation prevents people from moving around to collect evidence or interview people.

WOOLSEY: Well, it especially does in the Sunni areas. I think one solution here, Campbell, is to move ahead as promptly as possible with elections, with single-member constituencies, not this proportional representation thing that the United Nations wants, single-member constituencies in the Kurdish and Shia areas and in the Sunni areas where it’s peaceful. Have a national legislature. Go ahead and have the elections. And that establishes an incentive to the other parts of Iraq, such as Fallujah, to start behaving so they get to elect — have elections, as well. I think if we took some step to incentivize a move toward democracy and the rule of law for other parts of Iraq, such as in the Sunni triangle, we could get a better handle on some of the legal processes, too.

BROWN: It’s a good idea, from your perspective. But the reality is, the Bush administration is giving a lot more control to the United Nations, and that’s probably not what’s going to happen. So given the reality, how do you operate under these conditions?

WOOLSEY: Well, the United Nations representative said she liked proportional representation, and that means lots of tiny parties and extremist parties. Muqtada al Sadr will have a party. I think they should reverse that. Jerry Bremer endorsed her recommendations, but I don’t know that the U.S. government as a whole has yet. And I think they’ll have a lot peaceful — more peaceful situations sooner if they can move quickly to elections. And the only way, really, to do that is to have single-member constituencies, not party slates, nationwide.

BROWN: OK, aside from his views on that issue (UNINTELLIGIBLE) I’m trying to bring you back to reality. Witnesses — is it going to be hard to get people to come forward?

SCHEFFER: Well, this is extremely problematic, the witnesses. One of the most challenging aspects for any international criminal tribunal, but particularly for this domestic tribunal in Iraq, given the context of the violence and the security situation, is how do you assure witnesses that their testimony will not endanger their lives or that of their families?

BROWN: Well, they’re trying to create a witness protection program, right?

SCHEFFER: Right, but it’s very, very — well, it’s very expensive, too, by the way, to create those programs. And it hasn’t been demonstrated yet that there’s been investment in that. You know, in Iraq, before Iraqi courts, judges have typically — certainly before Saddam Hussein’s time, are more impressed with witness testimony than they are with documentary evidence.

BROWN: Right.

SCHEFFER: This is just the way of those — of their courts. So I think if this court, which is going to be composed primarily of Iraqi judges — they may bring in an international judge. They have the right to do so. They are going to be looking for witnesses. And particularly, when you go as high as Saddam Hussein, guess who the witnesses are going to be? Some of those other 11.

BROWN: Right.

SCHEFFER: And while their…

BROWN: They’re going to pull out a plea deal?

SCHEFFER: While their security and the security of their families may not be as critical, it’ll be other witnesses who are brought into the courtroom who will talk about the actual commission of the crimes, and their security is going to have to be assured.

BROWN: OK. When we come back, we’re going to talk to you about whether or not he has secrets with regard to his relationship with the U.S. that he could spill as part of his defense. So more with Jim Woolsey and David Scheffer on Saddam’s appearance in court today.

You’re watching HARDBALL on MSNBC.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We’re back, talking about Saddam’s day in court with former CIA director Jim Woolsey and David Scheffer, the former U.S. ambassador for war crimes.

Let me ask you what we were talking about just a moment ago. Some of the charges stem from a time when the U.S. was allied with Saddam Hussein. Could this work in his favor? Do you see a scenario where he may start spilling secrets about what the U.S. may have known and turned a blind eye to?

SCHEFFER: Oh, he’ll try to — anything he can get away with. But what we really did during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s was provide him with some intelligence. And also, I think the gates were open for some shipments of some things to him that shouldn’t have been, precursors on some chemicals, for example.

But I think that he won’t be successful in steering a trial toward that kind of thing. First of all, it doesn’t really have a great deal to do with most of the charges against him. And secondly, any judge who’s worth a darn is going to keep him in the provision of information and testimony on the charges that have been brought against him — the gassing of Halabja and the Kurds, the war crimes, et cetera. And we weren’t really complicit in his war crimes.

BROWN: What do you think? How did you think the judge handled the — the appearance today?

SCHEFFER: Well, I would give him a B, a grade of B for his performance, from what I’ve seen. He seemed a little intimidated at times by Saddam Hussein. He didn’t seem to know exactly how to discipline this individual in front of him. I thought some of his responses to what Saddam Hussein said sounded a little weak. You know, he just said, Well, but it’s the law. Well, as a judge…

BROWN: Right.

SCHEFFER: … you don’t just say it’s the law, you actually discipline the individual and put him right back on the procedural path he should be…

BROWN: Well, is that a danger…

SCHEFFER: … in the courtroom.

BROWN: … during this trial?

SCHEFFER: Well, hopefully, the judges that will be on the special tribunal — because it’s not this court…

BROWN: Right.

SCHEFFER: … that he’ll appear before — will be more probably more experienced, more seasoned, and frankly — well, I don’t want to say more, but they will be courageous with respect to their presence on that bench. They know they have to be courageous.

BROWN: We got about a minute left.

WOOLSEY: I think they ought to put him in a glass booth that’s soundproof and bulletproof and let him sound off when the judge believes it is appropriate to let him say something. Let him stay in there and rant to himself, but have his lawyer do the speaking for him.

BROWN: Well, I am sure we will be hearing much more from the two of you as this progresses. Thanks to you both for being with us.

SCHEFFER: Thank you.

WOOLSEY: Thank you, Campbell.

BROWN: James Woolsey and David Scheffer.