HAMILTON: I suppose you can define new isolationism any way you want to. For me, the word isolation refers to a withdrawal of American leadership, the concept of Fortress America, the United States not leading, the United States not being involved in the world. I don't think the critics of the Clinton administration are isolationists in that sense. They want to see American involvement, they want to see American leadership, of a very different kind, perhaps, than President Clinton.

I prefer the label unilateralist, over isolationist. I think it more accurately describes the critics, because their view is in support of unilateral sanctions, they have a deep skepticism of international agreements— They likewise have a skepticism of the international organizations, like the IMF, and the United Nations, and the World Bank. They are not willing to support the resources necessary to have a robust American diplomacy. So I prefer the word unilateralist to isolationists.

BAKER: Many experts, including National Security Advisor Berger, have cited the Senate rejection of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty as a sign of a growing isolationist, unilateralist trend. What did you make of the treaty's rejection?

HAMILTON: I think the critics of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty were unilateralists in the sense that they have this deep suspicion of an international agreement, in this case, the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. More broadly, really, a skepticism of any international agreement.

But I also think with regard to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty there were some very real differences on the merits. Whether or not we could maintain the reliability of our weapons, whether or not we could stop other nations from testing those nations that did not participate in the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. And that was a genuine debate.

I personally favored the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, but I recognized that the debate had some real points of disagreement on the merits. And in addition to that, I think the administration handled the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty very poorly. They put the matter up a couple of years ago, didn't do anything about it— Kind of suddenly it came up for a vote, and they just weren't prepared.

BAKER: So do you think that the rejection of the treaty was more a sentiment of anti-Clinton partisanship in the Senate, that it was a sign of unilateralism?

HAMILTON: I think the rejection of the treaty came about for a variety of reasons. Certainly, the politics were strong. Many in the Senate just did not want to give President Clinton a victory. And they intensely disliked him, they, there was a strong residue left over from the impeachment proceeding, which of course failed with regard to the Senate. So that was clearly a factor.

But I also think that the arguments on the merits, the reliability of our weapons, and what you do about other states that might test nuclear weapons, was a genuine argument. A genuine debate, and where reasonable people might, might differ. And the fact that the Clinton administration had not laid the groundwork for approval of the treaty, over a period of months, I think played an important role, too.

You don't get two thirds vote in the Senate easily on a treaty. It takes an awful lot of work, and it has to be won one on one, over a period of months, and I think that hard door to door kind of work just was not done.

BAKER: There are a number of other multilateral treaties that the US has chosen not to support, that have come up in recent years, that have been widely supported by other countries. From land mines, to the international criminal court. Does the U.S. refusal to join in other treaties, specifically, say, the international criminal court on war crimes, does that also reflect this unilateralist sentiment?

HAMILTON: I think the unwillingness of many to consider the land mine treaty, the international war criminal tribunal, are indications of a unilateralist feeling among many of the critics. They are deeply skeptical of international agreements, and international regimes.

But I also think there's some real questions on the merits on those. In the land mine case, for example, the military weighed in very heavily on that, the US military. And they strongly opposed it, largely because of the land mines being used on the Korean Peninsula.

And likewise, the war crime tribunal, there were concerns about American servicemen being subject to that, so these substantive matters played a role, but it took place, the consideration of these things in a framework when a lot of people are just very skeptical of international agreements— And it's made it very tough for those to move forward.

BAKER: One area that has been a particular conflict recently is over the United Nations, and the dues issue, which I know you've spent a lot of time working on. Senator Helms recently spoke at the UN, as you know, and laid down a rather harsh appraisal of its performance, and even laid out the possibility of US withdrawal, if there wasn't steps towards reform. Does the United States need the United Nations today?

HAMILTON: I think the United States does need the United Nations, and I don't think it's helpful to threaten a withdrawal from the United Nations. The United States should never permit the United Nations to define its national interest; only we should do that. But the United States does need the help of the United Nations in carrying out what we think our national interest is.

By and large, the United Nations supports objectives that we support. It wants peace and stability in the world, it wants sustainable economic development, it wants governments to treat their people decently, human rights. We support all of those things. And so does the United Nations, so I see the United Nations as an instrumentality which can help advance US interests, if we employ the United Nations in the right way, and use it in the right way. There are many areas where the United Nations performs services that are terribly important to our interests. World health, the fight against a number of epidemics, global warming, the International Atomic Energy Agency, which helps on non-proliferation.

UNICEF, the refugee work, the peacekeeping work, many, many areas where our interests are parallel. But those of us who support the United Nations must be very clear that we are not suggesting that the United Nations define American interests. We define American interests in this country, through our constitutional processes. But we can certainly use the United Nations to help advance our interests in many areas around the world.

BAKER: What, specifically what reforms do you think would help save the UN, improve its performance?

HAMILTON: Oh, I think the United Nations needs a lot of reforms. In a sense, it has to go through what the American private sector went through a few years back. It has to get leaner, more efficient, more productive. I think the United Nations should focus most of its energy and resources on its number one mission, which is really peacemaking. I think it does tend to get diverted into a lot of other things.

My own view is that it's too bureaucratic, that it could pare down a lot. I've never agreed with the US position that we should try to impose reforms on the United Nations. I think that's created a real backlash, and a real resentment in the United Nations, which is causing us, will cause us, a lot of trouble in the years ahead.

On the other hand, I'm rather sympathetic with the goals of those in the United States who want reforms in the United Nations. They want the United Nations to be more efficient. They want it to do better what it's supposed to do. And they want to reduce the American assessment, both for the regular functions of the United Nations, and for peacekeeping.

It makes a lot of difference, I think, how we go about it. And so much of the resentment in the United Nations today towards the United States, arises not so much because they don't like what we're advocating, they don't like the way we're doing it. We're coming in there and insisting that it be done, we're passing an American law, kind of ramming it down the throats of the United Nations, and thus you find today in the United Nations a deep sense of resentment against the United States.

BAKER: I think we saw that in the response of the ambassadors to Senator Helms, in that forum.

HAMILTON: Yes, we did, and it's too bad. This is a relationship which has to get better. I've not agreed with the administration's position on the United Nations, I don't think they have supported the United Nations strongly enough— I don't think they have fought hard enough for the assessments and the penalties that were due. But it seems to me to be getting some improvement, but far from what I would like to see it.

BAKER: It seems to me that if the United States has a unilateralist tendency, and perhaps a tendency to say whether foreign entanglements are in our national interests or not— In other words, if we don't want to be the ones playing global cop, the UN would be the natural one to follow. But they can't do that without better, better funding, and better mandate, it seems to me. So it seems to me we're working at, against our own interests.

HAMILTON: If there is not some kind of a regional or international body to refer these disputes to, then the United States is going to be the country that has to answer the call. In the sense we're the only 911 number in the world today, because we have the capabilities to intervene; other bodies, other countries do not.

Over time, I think you will see the United Nations develop the capacity to intervene. In a limited way, but in a military way. But there are tremendously difficult political problems with working that out, it's going to take some time to do. But I think that point that you're making is a very valid point. And it is that the United States needs some help in sharing these burdens. And the United Nations can help other countries get involved in picking up some of the burdens, both financial and human resources, in order to deal with these problems. Here is a case where the United Nations objectives will work in support of the American national objective. And we ought to be pleased with it, because it'll reduce the burden on us.

BAKER: I think Ambassador Holbrooke cited three or four spots around the world that are the current and future tests of the UN. I look at that list, whether you start with Kosovo, and go around to East Timor, Sierra Leone, and probably the most daunting of all, the Congo— And see potential for conflict and potential for, for falling down on the job to prevent it, loom large. Do you think the UN will be capable of playing a significant role in preventing conflict around the world?

HAMILTON: Well the United Nations will be able to prevent conflict only if the members of the United Nations give it the resources and the political will to do it. The great tendency now, I think, so often is to identify a problem somewhere around the world, and say okay, United Nations, you take care of it, without giving the United Nations the resources to do it. And then the critics of the United Nations will come forward and say the United Nations did not handle this well. That's really not a fair criticism.

Most often, the case is that the United Nations simply wasn't given the resources to deal with it, or the member states did not provide the political will within the institution to deal with the problem. The Congo example you gave is right on the mark, because if we, it is not likely that with a peacekeeping force of 5,000 people you're going to be able to solve that problem. That peacekeeping force should be much larger, the resources devoted to it. I would like to see the United States be much more forceful in advocating sufficient resources for the United Nations to handle these kinds of problems.

BAKER: So even if we were to reduce our percentage of the overall funding to 22 percent, I think the Helms-Biden legislation calls for, you would like to see overall spending on the UN increase.

HAMILTON: I'd like to see us provide the resources needed to get the job done in these peacekeeping efforts. And I'm very skeptical of formulas. I just don't think they match the needs that we have. And of course, the great fault with Biden-Helms is, or Helms-Biden, is that it tries to impose the US view on the United Nations, rams it down their throat, in effect. We probably have the power, incidentally, to get that done, but we're going to create, have created enormous resentments against us, which will make our diplomacy much more difficult to carry out in the years ahead.

BAKER: I want to shift gears a little bit. Another security debate that's pressing right now is that of national missile defense. And critics claim that nothing better reflects the growing attitude of Fortress America than the push to develop what was formerly known as Star Wars. How do you weigh in on the missile defense debate?

HAMILTON: I think the country is moving towards a national ballistic missile defense system.

BAKER: By the way, I was yesterday driving around out in Great Falls, and came across the old Nike missile sites out there.

HAMILTON: Oh, my goodness.

BAKER: They have historical markers up.

HAMILTON: Is that right?

BAKER: Saying these are, this is one of thirteen Nike missile sites that surrounded the capital area in the fifties, to take out Soviet bombers—

HAMILTON: I didn't even know they were around anymore.

BAKER: Well, they're shuttered, but there are still some remnants, some radar equipment, kind of thing. this debate has been going on in some form or another for a long time.

HAMILTON: Well, you want to start the question again, or-?

BAKER: The national missile defense, the debate over Star Wars and national missile defense, is heating up, with an important decision coming up this summer, I believe. Where do you, a lot of people claim that Star Wars is going to piss off the Russians and increase ballistic missile programs elsewhere, and further create a sense of Fortress America. How do you weigh in on it?

HAMILTON: First of all, I think the proponents of a national missile defense system have a point when they say that the threat is growing. I believe the threat is growing. I think now there are about two dozen nations which have ballistic missile capability, and it is not a threat that we should dismiss lightly.

Secondly, I make a sharp distinction between theater missile defense, and national missile defense. On the theater missile defense systems, I think it is now pretty clear that we should begin to develop, we are developing, a theater missile defense. We're going to need that, we already have a light system in the Patriot, but we are going to need more, and it seems to me the development and the deployment of a theater missile defense system is going to go ahead. Really, with not very much objection to it.

Now the tougher question is the national missile defense system. And there, what strikes me at this point in time is that we seem to be moving towards an affirmative decision on that, rather quickly, without having looked at several very important factors in detail.

One is the cost. We simply don't have good cost estimates, it is going to be hugely expensive, we've already spent about $100 billion on this. You called it Star Wars, since the Star Wars proposal came in. That's a formidable amount of money, and we don't have it. So the cost is going to be huge. Now what you have to think of in that situation is, if you're going to be spending money on the system, in huge amounts, what other things in the national security interest are you not going to be doing? In other words, there are tradeoffs there.

Secondly, the feasibility of it has still not been clearly proven. And we ought not to proceed with a massive program of the development of this system, until it's been adequately tested. And it has not come close to being adequately tested, as of now.

The third thing that we have to weight much more carefully is the political impact of it— How is China going to react, how is Russia going to react, how are the European allies going to react? So my view on the national defense system is that we've got a lot of work to do, before moving ahead with that.

BAKER: Do you think the decision coming up this summer is premature to make any kind of a commitment to it?

HAMILTON: There are a number of ways you can make that commitment. We ought not to make a clear, irrevocable decision to go ahead this summer. We're just not there yet. You could make a qualified decision of some kind, which would create, if you would, stages, or tiers, of decision-making down the path, so that future presidents could participate in the judgment.

I'm not sure what President Clinton will decide to do, but I think the principal point I would make is that we're not ready yet, and we're not going to be in the next few months, to make a definitive decision on a national missile defense system. And to make it now, or to try to make it now, would be very extravagant, and I think not prudent.

BAKER: Two of, another part of that is that the political side. We saw the Class of '94 come into Congress, many suggest, reflected some of the unilateralist sentiment, and particularly we saw a reduction in foreign affairs funding for the apparatus of diplomacy that might be viewed as conflict prevention money. We also saw the arms control agency and AID and USIA rolled into the State Department. Do you think these developments, reducing the spending on foreign affairs, and consolidating the foreign affairs apparatus, are signs of a, again, of a neo-isolationist trend?

HAMILTON: I think the move in the Congress to reduce the diplomatic budget, so-called 150 account, has been very unwise. And has made it more difficult for the United States to lead in American foreign policy. I hope it's going to be reversed.

If you look at the money we spend on foreign policy, conflict prevention, aid, trade, defense, intelligence— And you see it as a kind of a continuum, developing as it were, resources to provide for the national defense of the United States, and to carry out American foreign policy— What strikes you most heavily is how much money we spend on one end of that continuum, the national security budget, the national defense budget, and how little we spend on the other end of the continuum. It's out of balance.

Now, that's not an argument for sharp reductions in defense spending; it's certainly an argument in my mind for increases in the softer expenditures, if you would, so that we can try to prevent conflict, so we can carry out American diplomacy— So we can have programs of foreign aid, and so we can support the international institutions. And I think the move in the Congress to reduce these resources have seriously hurt the American national interest.

BAKER: One area that the US has used a number of times is unilateral sanctions, and nowhere is the case of that more evident than with Cuba. The trade embargo hasn't brought Castro down, and many claim it provides a handy excuse for him. Almost every other country is trading with them. Does it make sense to continue our policy of isolation towards Cuba today?

HAMILTON: I do not think it makes sense to continue our policy of trying to isolate Cuba. In the near term, that is in the year 2000, during our presidential election, you're not going to see a shift in our policy.

So I think what we have to work towards in the shorter term is to increase the contacts between Americans and Cubans in all walks of life, which can be done under the so-called Helms-Burton Act.

I think in the longer run, we have to think very hard about the American national interest in Cuba. And the American national interest in Cuba, I believe, is to try to assure that there's a peaceful transition from Castro to whomever follows Castro as the leader. We want that to be a democratic Cuba, we want it to be a market-oriented Cuba, and the question really becomes, how best do you assure that? And I think you best assure it by increasing contacts of all kinds and descriptions, with the Cubans, to engage, not to isolate. This is a policy we followed with the Soviet Union for many years, it's a policy we followed with communism in Eastern Europe. We're pretty good at it. We succeeded at it; we know how to do it, and we've had remarkable success with it. And I think we ought to do it with Cuba as well. I think much of our Cuba policy today is driven by virulent anti-Castro feeling. I hold no (inaudible) for Castro; I think he's made a mess of Cuba.

And he has without doubt, denied all kinds of rights, human rights, to the Cuban people. But our focus should be on the American national interest, a peaceful transition, and not on an anti-Castro policy.

BAKER: We've been all over the map here. That's all I have.

HAMILTON: Okay.

BAKER: Is there anything you'd like to add?

HAMILTON: I've told you all I know.

BAKER: Okay.

HAMILTON: All right.

BAKER: Mr. Hamilton, thank you very much.

HAMILTON: You bet.