    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1995, Book II)]
    [December 1, 1995]
    [Pages 1819-1822]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    [[Page 1819]]

    The President's News Conference With Prime Minister John Bruton of
    Ireland in Dublin
    December 1, 1995

        Prime Minister Bruton. Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. President: I'd like
    to welcome you warmly to Ireland, to thank you for all that you have
    done to help bring peace to our country, to thank you for all that you
    are continuing to do to bring the people that live on this island closer
    together and to improve the relations that exist between this island and
    its neighbors.
        I'm delighted that it was possible for the British Prime Minister,
    John Major, to whom I pay tribute here, and myself to agree on a
    framework for moving forward towards a settlement of the differences
    that have existed on this island for 300 years now. And the fact that we
    were able to do that on the eve of your visit is no accident. Because we
    both realized, both John Major and I, that the sort of support that you
    have been able to give, yesterday and today, to the people of this
    island searching for peace, searching for reconciliation, searching to
    heal the wounds that have been there for so long, and looking positively
    to the future, we both appreciate it that your support gives them
    encouragement, gives us encouragement, and is something for which we
    from the bottom of our hearts sincerely thank you, Mr. President.
        The President. Thank you very much. I'd like to begin by thanking
    the Prime Minister for his warm welcome, and more importantly, I want to
    say a special word of thanks to all of the people of Ireland and the
    people of Northern Ireland who have shown such extraordinary warmth and
    generosity to Hillary and me and now our American delegation. This has
    been an extraordinary experience for us, and I will never forget it.
        I thank the Prime Minister for what he said, but the truth is that
    the credit for this latest progress belongs to the Taoiseach and to
    Prime Minister Major. They announced this twin-track initiative to
    advance the peace process of Northern Ireland shortly before I arrived
    here. It gives the parties a chance to engage in an honest dialog where
    all their views are represented and everybody's voice can be heard. And
    I certainly hope that it will be successful.
        Let me also say, as you know, it establishes a means to address the
    issue of decommissioning, and I am gratified that my good friend Senator
    George Mitchell is going to lead the international body to deal with
    that issue. He is seizing this opportunity already. He has begun to
    organize the effort with other members, and I expect him to be at work
    shortly.
        Let me again say, I know that I speak for all Americans who want
    peace and ultimate reconciliation on this island when I say that the
    Taoiseach has shown great courage in the pursuit of peace, and we intend
    to do whatever we can to help him, Prime Minister Major, Mr. Spring, and
    all others who are working for peace to succeed.
        The United States is honored to stand with those who take risks for
    peace, and we are doing it all across the world, in the Middle East, in
    Bosnia, and here. It is a difficult road to travel. It is always easier
    to stay in the known way and to play on the known fears. But the right
    thing to do is to do what is being done here, and I applaud it and I
    want to do everything I can to support it.
        Let me also say that we had the opportunity to discuss the situation
    in Bosnia, and I described as best I could the terms of the peace
    agreement and what we intend to do in the United States with our allies
    to implement it in a military way and what nonmilitary tasks have to be
    undertaken. I am very hopeful that after the peace agreement is signed
    in Paris in just a couple of weeks, we will see a dramatic change in
    that war-torn land.
        Let me say that the kind of thing that the international community
    is going to have to do in Bosnia is consistent with what Ireland has
    done every day for nearly 40 years now. Irish peacekeepers have helped
    people to live in peace from Cyprus to Somalia, to feed the hungry, to
    do so much that most people in the world don't even know that the people
    of Ireland have done. And again, I want to say on behalf of the American
    people, I am very, very grateful for that.
        So we had a good meeting, we've got a wonderful relationship, the
    Sun is shining, and I hope it's a good omen for peace in Northern
    Ireland.

    [[Page 1820]]

        Thank you.

    Northern Ireland Peace Process

        Q. The impasse has been broken at the moment, but the roadblock is
    still there. Senator Mitchell's committee is going to start its work. If
    at the end of the day the deadlock is still there, is your Government,
    your administration prepared to act as persuaders to get to all-party
    talks without preconditions?
        The President. Well, first of all, let me say I think we ought to
    give these folks a chance to succeed. We shouldn't be talking about,
    ``If at the end of the day . . .'' The Prime Minister of Great Britain
    and the Taoiseach have announced, I think, a brilliant formulation which
    permits people to go forward in dealing with all of these issues without
    giving up any of the things they say they believe in and have to have.
        I think we ought to give this process a chance to succeed. If it
    fails, then we'll reconnoiter and see what to do next. But I think the
    lesson of the last 15 months is that the people like peace, they like
    the absence of violence, and they want to go forward, not backward. They
    want to deal with the issues that are still before them. So I'm inclined
    to believe it will succeed. If it doesn't, then you can ask me that
    question.
        Q. What has your visit done, in concrete terms, to change the way
    the United States will engage with the peace process? How has it
    affected where you go from here?
        The President. I don't know that the visit has done anything to
    change, in concrete terms, the way we are engaged, except I believe that
    since we have quite a large number of Members of Congress here and quite
    a large number of business people here and quite a large contingent of
    people in the news media here, all seeing what is going on in Northern
    Ireland, I think it will deepen the support of the American people for
    our constructive involvement, and it might well intensify the pace at
    which people in the private sector are willing to make investments and
    try to bring the economic benefits of peace to the people there. But we
    are committed, we have been committed, and we're going to stay
    committed. And we'll be there until the work is finished.
        Prime Minister Bruton. Now an American journalist.

    Balkan Peace Process

        Q. Mr. President, back home Republicans in Congress are expressing
    concern about snipers and bombs and ethnic hatreds that American forces
    are going to face in Bosnia. When you go to Germany tomorrow, what will
    you tell the American troops about the dangers they face, and have you
    heard any estimates about the casualties that they might suffer?
        The President. Well, first of all, the American troops that have
    trained to go to Bosnia know every bit as much about the dangers they
    might face as I do. What I will tell them is that it is not a risk-free
    mission. Indeed, being in the military is not risk-free. We lose a
    significant number of our finest young people every year just in the
    training exercises because of the inherent danger of moving around and
    doing the things that they do in the air, on the land, and at sea.
        I will tell them that we have done everything we can to minimize the
    risks, we have guaranteed for them very robust rules of engagement so
    that if anyone attempts to interfere with their mission or to take
    action against them, they can respond with decisive, indeed, with
    overwhelming force and that their peace and their security, their safety
    is uppermost in my mind and in the mind of their general officers who
    have done all the planning for this mission but that this is a mission
    very much in America's interest where we can make a huge difference and
    stop the worst slaughter in Europe since World War II, and that I'm very
    proud of them for doing it.
        Q. Mr. President, are you escalating the U.S. involvement in Bosnia
    even before we go there? Suddenly, 20,000 troops have become 25,000 and
    the cost has gone from 1.5 billion to 3 billion.
        The President. No. Well, first of all, I don't think it's going to
    be at 3 billion but we--the numbers keep getting bandied around here.
    Some people who count the money in Europe would be double-counting it.
    Some of this money is going to be spent anyway. I don't think we should
    count as a cost of the operation in Bosnia, for example, the salary of
    someone who's going to get paid their salary whether they're there or
    not.
        The 25,000, let me say--well, I have always said we would have
    20,000 people in the theater. We have been asked how many people are

    [[Page 1821]]

    necessary to support them. We'll have another roughly 5,000 people
    outside of Bosnia in support of those who are in Bosnia, but they will
    not be in the Bosnian theater. There may be some extra costs associated
    with them that are sizable enough, and they ought to be included in the
    bill that we tell Congress we expect to pay here.
        But if you look at it, again I will say, this is an appropriate
    level of contribution. This is no more than a third--may wind up being
    considerably less than a third of the total contribution, depending on
    how many other nations participate. You heard the British Prime Minister
    say 2 days ago that he expected that Great Britain, a country with a
    population of roughly--well, less than a fourth of ours, is going to
    send 13,000 troops to the theater. So the Europeans are going to take
    the major load, and we should support them.

    Northern Ireland Peace Process

        Q. It seems that this historic trip by President Clinton to Ireland
    has facilitated an agreement between yourself and John Major. Is that
    not ominous for the future of the peace process if it takes President
    Clinton's arrival to produce that level of movement forward? When we get
    to the really serious negotiations, won't it be more difficult?
        Prime Minister Bruton. I think the ingredients for the agreement
    have been there for quite some time. But I think it is the case that we
    both recognized that the President's visit to Britain and Ireland was an
    opportunity for both of us to launch in the best possible circumstances
    an initiative which we were probably going to have to agree anyway very
    shortly. But we were able to do it on the eve of President Clinton's
    visit in such a fashion as to ensure that his presence here has given it
    the fairest possible wind.

    Balkan Peace Process

        Q. Mr. Prime Minister, why is it necessary for the United States for
    the third time in this century to send troops to Europe? Why aren't the
    Europeans capable, in your opinion, of resolving these kinds of problems
    in Bosnia by themselves?
        Prime Minister Bruton. I think it's important to recognize that if
    you have genocide of the kind that was occurring in Bosnia, that's not
    just a European problem; that's a problem for the world at large. It's a
    problem for the common civilization which we all share. It's a common
    problem for all of us who have democratic values, democratic values
    which stem in Europe chiefly from the inspiration of the American War of
    Independence and the United States Declaration of Independence. Those
    values are universal, and therefore there is a universal responsibility,
    in my view, for all of us to do whatever we can in proportion to our
    means to facilitate the making of peace.
        It is very important also to stress that the role that the United
    States, the European Union, and others have played in Bosnia is one of
    facilitating peacemaking. The peace is not being made by the United
    States, no more than it is being made by the European Union. The peace
    in Bosnia is being made by the people of Bosnia themselves. And that is
    the same situation in this country. We provide a framework. They must do
    the deal.
        The President. And I just want to mention one other thing, too. I
    want you to think about these points: Number one, at the end of World
    War II, we established NATO, recognizing that we would try to stay
    together dealing with common security concerns. Admittedly, at the time,
    we thought those concerns might play themselves out in Central Europe in
    the contest between what was then the Soviet Union and the Western bloc,
    the NATO bloc. But we understood that we had shared concerns that would
    manifest themselves first on the Continent of Europe but could become
    much more immediate for us.
        Now, the NATO powers have voted among themselves to work with others
    through the United Nations and on our own in brokering this peace
    agreement and trying to implement it. This is consistent with what we
    have done since World War II.
        The second thing I'd like to ask every American is how you would
    have felt--I would like to ask every American how would you have felt
    when President Bush sent out the call for help in Desert Storm, which
    was a war, not a peacekeeping measure, if they said, ``You handle that.
    You have more money, more soldiers, more interests there. You're
    concerned about the oil. You waste more oil than the rest of us do. You
    guys handle that''? Or think about all the countries that helped us in
    Haiti who didn't say, ``I'm sorry. That's not our problem; that's your
    problem. You have the refugees in the

    [[Page 1822]]

    United States. We don't have them. They're on your shore. They're your
    problem. We can't be bothered with that.'' But instead, we have had
    dozens of countries rally to the United States to work with us in common
    cause when their values were violated by things that were of more
    immediate concern to us. That's what they did in Desert Storm. That's
    what they did in Haiti.
        And I will say, every day, every day for almost 40 years, there has
    been a citizen of Ireland in some distant country working for
    peacekeeping in places where the United States did not go. And they did
    not ask, ``What is the immediate interest of the people of Ireland in
    doing that?''
        So I think the United States has been very well-served by countries
    that have been willing to stand up with us, to stand up for good things
    and right things that also affect our interest. And I believe we should
    do this now.
        Prime Minister Bruton. Thank you. We must respect the timetable. I'm
    sorry. Thank you very much, indeed. Thank you.

    Note: The President's 108th news conference began at 1:20 p.m. on the
    steps of the Government Buildings.