Condoleeza continues her trash talking on the White House's news channel, FOX News. Also, potential McCain presidential candidate, Tom Ridge. Read the entire transcript.
WALLACE: Clear up some confusion, if you will, for us, Secretary Rice. Under the cease-fire, what will the Russians be allowed to do inside Georgia proper? And will they be allowed to keep peacekeepers in the so-called breakaway provinces of Abkhazia and South Ossetia?
RICE: Well, let's remember that there were Russian peacekeepers in Abkhazia — or in South Ossetia, which is really the zone of conflict that we're talking about here. They were there as — in an agreement that goes all the way back to 1992. Those peacekeepers will be permitted to stay.
The Russians also had talked about some special security measures that their peacekeepers could take in a very limited area outside of the zone of conflict. They will be permitted to do that for a limited period of time in a very proscribed way.
They're not to go into urban centers. They're not to tie up the east-west highway. That's the clarification, Chris, that President Sarkozy gave to President Saakashvili when I went from France to Tbilisi.
But even that Russian activity outside of the zone of conflict is only until there are monitors in, international monitors.
The other thing the Russians said to the French is that they are now prepared to let the monitors from the OSCE enter the zone of conflict. That should be about 100 additional monitors, and that should happen also within days.
WALLACE: Let's turn, if we can, Secretary Rice, to the bigger issue. There's been a lot of tough talk this week from President Bush and other top officials, including yourself, about viewing the whole range of U.S.-Russia relations. Let's take a look at what Secretary Gates, Defense Secretary Gates, had to say this week.
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DEFENSE SECRETARY ROBERT M. GATES: My personal view is that there need to be some consequences for the actions that Russia has taken against a sovereign state.
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WALLACE: Secretary Rice, if Russia complies with the cease-fire, do relations go back to normal or, as Secretary Gates says, do there have to be consequences for the action that Russia has already taken in the last 10 days?
RICE: Well, I think there's no doubt there will be further consequences. I would note that there have already been significant consequences for Russia.
You know, any notion that Russia was the kind of responsible state, ready to integrate into international institutions of the political, diplomatic, security, economic kind, that this was a different Russia — a Russia, by the way, that President Medvedev himself described about a month ago — this forward-leaning, modern Russia, well, you know, that reputation's, frankly, in tatters, and so that in itself is a significant consequence.
And also, by the way, if the Russians intended this as intimidation, they have done nothing but harden the attitudes of the small states around them, as witnessed by Ukraine's defiance in going to Georgia, Poland, the fact that we are moving forward on missile defense.
I think the Russians have made a significant mistake here.
WALLACE: Just following up directly on that, does the U.S. still want to see Georgia and Ukraine as part of NATO? And are we prepared, if they become part of NATO, to defend their territorial sovereignty with American troops?
RICE: Well, first of all, the NATO alliance has made clear in the Bucharest Declaration that Georgia and Ukraine will be members of NATO.
What the United States is advocating for right now with others is the Georgians and Ukrainians would become part of something called the Membership Action Plan, which is not membership, but it is an umbrella under which numerous states of Eastern and Central Europe have been able to resolve their differences, have been able to make important domestic reforms, civil-military relations, reform their militaries.
That's what we're advocating. We continue to believe that that would be important for Georgia and Ukraine.
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