Interview with Nathalie Loiseau, French Embassy, Director of Communications

July 29th, 2004
Transcription by Volunteer Citizen Journalist Mark Baber

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Okay. So why don't you go ahead and introduce yourself, and what do you here at the Embassy.
NATHALIE LOISEAU: Okay. I'm Natalie Loiseau. I'm the spokesperson of the French Embassy here in Washington.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Okay. And so -- When you look at this time period of -- from August to March 17th or March 19th -- How would you describe what your job was like here?
LOISEAU: Well, I arrived here in August 2002 at the very moment where the focus was beginning to be on Iraq, and what had to be done to have Iraq disarmed. So it was 99 % of my job was to explain to American media, what was our position -- France's position on Iraq -- which was stated very early by the French President in an interview to the New York Times. It was, I think, September 9th, 2002.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Okay. And so -- Tell me a little bit about how easy of a job it was to describe what your actual positions were. Or go into a little bit about interacting with the journalists.
LOISEAU: Well, it was a challenging moment for us. Both because there was high -- a very high level of interest for France's position -- much more, for instance, than for [the] position of other members of the Security Council. Very rapidly the American media saw the discussions about Iraq as a dispute -- as a divergence between France and the United States -- which was false on several ways. That is, it was not France alone which was advocating for inspections, and advocating caution about a military option. There were a lot of countries which were on the same position. And the idea was not to be against the United States, but the idea was to try to have a united, international community finding the most effective and less dangerous way to have Iraq disarmed. But from day one, the idea in the media was to say, ‘There is a dispute between two old allies – this is France and the United States.’ And it was very hard to get out of this first impression.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: So even before 1441 was passed, you're saying that the media was casting this as a "U.S. versus France" ?
LOISEAU: Yes, it was one of our problems, if I may say so --
ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: I'm sorry, I'm just -- I'm going to be deleting my question.
LOISEAU: Okay. So I have to repeat some way so that people understand?
ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Yeah.
LOISEAU: From the beginning -- even before 1441 -- there was a sort of a bias in the media. They way they were seeing it was that there was a dispute between France and United States -- not at all that there were discussions in the Security Council about a very serious issue -- which was disarming Iraq. And after 1441, whether military force was necessary. There was certainly lack of knowledge from a lot of media about what a discussion in the Security Council is -- and stands for. That is, they were focusing about French statements as there were statements from other countries that they were not interested in. They were not really following what Hans Blix for the UNMOVIC and Mohamed El Baradei for IAEA were saying at the same time. We had very high media exposure, not exactly a precise and an accurate one to say the truth.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: So what you're saying is -- Is that you got a lot of coverage that there was a dispute. But not a lot of what you were actually saying. Can you go into that?
LOISEAU: Well, I must pay tribute to American journalists, because they were extremely interesting -- interested in what we were saying. Some had already knowledge about what was happening in the United Nations, and it was making things easier. Others were completely discovering U.N. -- which is something a little bit special and which is very American. I mean, many American journalists had very little knowledge about U.N. Resolutions -- the way you negotiate them, what they mean. It was making things more difficult, obviously.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: So do you see this sense that -- one thing that American journalists that I saw, were saying that the United States has this right to enforce all these resolutions, and not seeing that it's actually the Security Council's job to decide.
LOISEAU: Well – Indeed, there is a big difference between the United States and most of the other Western countries. That is, that international law is not dramatically enforced in the American state of law. International law is not considered superior to domestic law in the United States. Whereas, for instance in France and in other Western countries, international law is considered superior. So there was a difference of perspective from the very beginning, of course. But I must say there is a big difference for me -- to my view -- between staff writers -- reporters, who were trying to know as much as possible about our positions, and about what was happening in the United Nations -- what was happening at the IAEA. And editorial writers, who to me seemed to have their opinion made from the very beginning. That is that Saddam Hussein was a danger for the United States -- that he was a threat. And that after September 11, America could not afford to ignore such a threat. And whatever was said was considered as friendly or hostile to this so-called "obvious" position.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Did you see a lot of journalists seeing war as inevitable?
LOISEAU: What I must say -- and it really amazed me -- is that during that period I had maybe thirty to forty journalists a day either on the phone or in my office or I was meeting them -- the vast majority of them were either opposed to a war or cautious or reluctant. But at the same time, they were all considering that war was coming -- that nothing could be done to avoid the war. So they didn't really understand why we were sticking to our principles -- at a moment, where in their view, war would be coming.
ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And so when you look at this time period of the eight weeks of trying to get 1441, what -- From your sense, what was the United States trying to do during that time period? And what was France trying to stop the United States from doing?
LOISEAU: Well, when we were together to get 1441, we were not trying to block the United States of doing something special. We were -- We had all come to a common conclusion -- United States, France, and most of the members of the Security Council -- which was to say, ‘We have things that we don't know about Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq. We have doubts. We have suspicions. We have unanswered questions, and it has lasted for too long --We have to put more pressure on Saddam Hussein, and show him that there is unanimity in the international community, and he has to disarm.’ This is the point we had reached at the end of summer 2002. And when President Bush came to the United Nations' General Assembly on September the 12th and said that ‘Basically, Iraq had a last chance to disarm.’ He was unanimously supported. Everybody was in the same mood, which was to say, this stance, once and for all, Saddam has to show good will, has to disarm, the inspectors have to go back to Iraq. And we were -- in France -- among the countries which had regretted that the inspectors were withdrawn from Iraq in 1998. So we were all sharing the same objective -- full, controllable, measurable disarmament of Iraq. This is the reason why we started discussing a draft resolution. And this is the reason why we were able to adopt Resolution 1441 unanimously, which was a big achievement. For instance, unanimously was meaning having Syria on board voting for the resolution.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And there seemed to be a discussion about making this a two-stage process versus -- a "no-hidden triggers", and "no automaticity." Can you elaborate on that?
LOISEAU: This was really the heart of France's position. And we expressed it very clearly in September 9th's interview of the President with the New York Times. That is to say, we wanted to have the inspectors back in Iraq. We wanted them to assess the situation because they had been absent from Iraq for years. And obviously the serious, valuable information we had on Weapons of Mass Destruction, and the serious results we had had of -- on destruction of Weapons of Mass Destruction were due to inspections between ‘91 and ‘98. So we wanted to have the inspectors back in Iraq. We wanted to have them do their -- do their job. Assess the situation. Tell the Security Council what was going on. And then we wanted the Security Council to be the international body taking a decision about world peace. We were not hostile to war in any case. That is, we had considered that in case Saddam Hussein would have cheated -- in case the inspections would have been impossible, what was qualified as a "material breach" -- we might have decided the use of force. And we would, as France, have participated in a military action in Iraq. But we wanted -- First, that the assessments would be made by UNMOVIC and IAEA. And second, that the decision to go to war to enforce UN Security Council resolutions would be taken by the UN Security Council.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And what did John Negroponte mean when he said there are "no hidden triggers" and "no automaticity?"
LOISEAU: Well, obviously we had a sense that in the American administration, there were divergences about the role of the United Nations in the decision to go to war. Somewhere acknowledging the fact that in the UN charter, you are allowed to go to war in very specific circumstances. And in that circumstances, which was to enforce UN Security Council resolutions, obviously you needed to have approval from the United Nations’ Security Council. In other parts of the administration, the idea of going to the UN to get an authorization was strongly rejected, obviously.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And what was France's interpretation of what actually happened? Was it set out -- And did you expect it to have a second resolution before war would be authorized? Or did you believe the US legal argument and theory?
LOISEAU: Well obviously, to our view there was a need to have a second resolution in order to be able to use force. And this is what was written in 1441 -- to our view -- to our reading of the resolution. When we voted the resolution, we had no knowledge of what would be the behavior of Saddam Hussein towards the return of the inspectors, and towards letting inspections go on without any obstacle. And what happened, was that step-by-step -- from the moment that the inspectors were back in Iraq, which was late November, until they had to leave early March -- step-by-step there was first passive cooperation from Saddam Hussein, and then active cooperation. Passive cooperation was already a progress compared to 1998. There were no more restricted areas for the inspectors. There were no more delays between the moment where the inspectors were deciding to go to a specific place in Iraq, and the moment they were able to inspect it. And then, I think it was the end of January -- beginning of February, started a sort of active cooperation when there was the destruction by Saddam Hussein's regime of the Al Samoud 2 missiles. And this is the moment where we started to obviously diverge with the United States because we were saying, ‘Well, it works. This is what we wanted. Inspectors are back in Iraq. Al Samoud 2 missiles are being destroyed. Saddam Hussein is in the sort of a box and the inspectors are in a box as well. So he's under control. He's no longer an imminent threat. We know what's happening in Iraq.’ And this was the moment where this cooperation was dismissed as insufficient by the American administration -- which were saying, ‘Time has passed. He had a chance to do it earlier. And now let's use force.’

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And did you see a difference in the rhetoric of the United States administration before the destruction of the Al Samoud 2 missiles and then afterwards.
LOISEAU: Yes, it was a clear signal to our review that at that moment we were not pursuing the same objective any more. That is, before -- When the inspectors found the Al Samoud 2 missiles, and had clues that these missiles were forbidden because they were able to reach a length which was not allowed by the Security Council. At that moment, the American administration made it public that the destruction of these missiles would be a test of the strong will of the international community. And we were in full agreement with the American administration. The international community had found these forbidden missiles. These missiles had to be destroyed. And it was a test of the goodwill of the Iraqi regime if they were able to destroy them. And it was a test of the resolve of the international community to be able to force the Iraqi regime to destroy the missiles. And it was stated very clearly, very strongly, by the American administration. And then the destruction started. And we -- we France, but we other countries as well -- were celebrating this achievement -- the idea that the inspections were tough, and were proving right -- were working. And at that moment the American administration started saying, ‘Well, we knew from the beginning that they would destroy these missiles. It's meaningless. This is not big stuff.’ And it was sort of surprising to see a shift in the exposed objectives of the international community.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And -- Talk a little bit about how television -- diplomatic correspondents -- pick up on these little shifts? Did they see these patterns at all?
LOISEAU: I don't know, you should ask them. But my impression was that things were going fast, and what had been said the previous week was already forgotten. There was a lot of public relations made by the administration. They were making the case to go to war. I was told by American journalists that their job was basically to testify about what the American administration was doing, and to assess whether it was working well or not -- not exactly to know what the rest of the world was thinking about it. And obviously this is what happened at that moment.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And do you see kind of like what they call "horse race coverage?" – "Who's up? Who's down?" When you're looking at the coverage every day?
LOISEAU: Well, yes. Because important things --
ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: I'm sorry --
LOISEAU: Well -- The impression we had was that news cycles were getting shorter and shorter. People were rushing to news without comparing them to what had happened even the previous week. And there was sort of a preparation in the media for deciding who would go to Iraq, who would be embedded, from early February I think. The media were already preparing for a military action.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And do you see -- What differences did you see in the foreign press versus the American press?
LOISEAU: Well -- many differences, of course. I must say that, for instance -- During the military operations, for instance, I was watching American TV as well as European TV -- either the BBC or the French TV -- and I was watching Arab networks as well to be able to understand what was in the Arab public opinion's mind. And I was obviously watching three different wars.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: During the build-up to the war, is what I'm specifically focussing on -- So what differences did you see in, let's say, the French press versus the United States press?
LOISEAU: There was a difference in, let's say, the European press -- because the French press was part of a more general movement of the European press -- and the American press. It was, for instance, the importance given to what Hans Blix was saying in the UNMOVIC and Mohamed El Baradei was saying for IAEA. It was closely followed by the European press, and considered as valuable. I mean, they were the highest moral authorities of the international community to the view of the European press. So when Blix was saying in January that cooperation from Iraq was too slow, European press was impressed by the fact that Blix was tough against the Iraqis. And the European press was starting to think, ‘Well, maybe the Iraqis – the Iraqis are not doing enough. And maybe we should prepare to a military action.’ After that, when Blix went back to the council saying, ‘There's progress made. And there's sort of active cooperation which starts.’ It was a turning point for the European press. They were saying, ‘Well, so -- If he says so, he's the one who knows it. So we believe him.’

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And when you look at – Hold on one second -- I guess in 1441 they have provisions that said, ‘If Saddam does not have a full declaration, and does not give immediate access to scientists’ -- that for the United States, that was enough to go to war. What's your response to that?
LOISEAU: 1441 was a resolution which was negotiated for weeks for very good reasons. There were two levels of discussions when we discussed 1441. The first one was the question of ‘automaticity,’ as it was called. This was to decide whether there would be a need for a second resolution if 1441 was not implemented. A second important part of the discussion was to know exactly what we were expecting from Saddam Hussein. And that was two things, but two things which had to be done jointly. That was -- A declaration about what had been done with Weapons of Mass Destruction in the past, and full cooperation with the inspectors as soon as they were back in Iraq. And "and" is a very important word because we discussed that word for quite a while between members of the Security Council. The idea was to say, ‘Well, Saddam is going to make a declaration. We may have our feelings -- our views -- our suspicions -- about these declarations. But we have not been in Iraq for a while -- So we are not certain that what he says is right or that what he says is just a lie. So we can not determine -- at the position of the international community -- simply after reading his declaration. So we need to have an idea of the declaration and to witness what kind of cooperation he is offering to the inspectors.’

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And so – if the "and" part of the cooperation is not providing scientists right away, does the United States – you know, it seems like, to me the big picture is that they’re looking at technical violations of 1441 to use as a pretext. Did you ever see that the United States was just using this process as a trigger to go to war?
LOISEAU: Well, our view was that -- The ones who would have to assess the level of cooperation were the inspectors. They were the ones who were on the ground, who had their experience. Because even between '99 and 2002 where they were not in Iraq, they had all their records in New York, so they knew what they were looking after. They knew what they needed. And they knew what kind of obstacles they would face. They knew the ones who would be a real problem. They knew the ones that they would be able to deal with. So we were not saying, ‘We know better than the inspectors what they need.’ And when we negotiated 1441, for instance, we were all in favor of very tough inspections. But at the same time we were saying, ‘Let's make the inspections work. So let's ask Hans Blix what he needs.’ There was an idea, for instance, from the American administration -- but which was also coming from American think tanks -- which was that the inspectors should be escorted by dozens or hundreds of military from the international community -- basically from the five permanent members of the Security Council. We were not opposed to the idea, but we asked Hans Blix what he thought about it. And he said, ‘First, I don't need them. Second, they would ruin my efforts to surprise the Iraqis. What I need is to have a small team of inspectors taking cars and rushing to a chemical plant or to a weapons factory -- and see what's inside. If I have to be accompanied by hundreds of military, there's no more surprise. And there's no more tough inspections.’ So he said, ‘I don't need the military.’ And we say, ‘Okay, if you don't need the military, don't have the military.’ The question was the same with scientists. Here in Washington it was considered a big deal that the scientists might be able to meet with the inspectors outside of Iraq and without being recorded. We asked Hans Blix what he was thinking of that. And he was reluctant. He said, ‘Well, there are hundreds of ways to put pressure on scientists. If I take one scientist out of Iraq, and if I bring him to Cyprus, for instance, and the rest of his family stays in Iraq, he won't be more free to talk to me than if he were in Baghdad.’ And he said, ‘We know what we are looking after. So even if the scientists are in Iraq, even if their conversations with us are recorded -- as we are going to interview dozens of scientists -- we know exactly in which loopholes we are going to investigate. And this question of having the scientists inside Iraq or outside Iraq is not a big deal for the inspectors.’

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: In the beginning of 2002, the Bush administration was talking a lot about regime change, and then in August it would have shifted to Weapons of Mass Destruction. So in the context of when France is listening to the United States -- How does France count these public statements that the United States has said about regime change in the context of international law and the UN?
LOISEAU: Well, to our view -- to everybody's view, the American President is the Commander-in-Chief, and he decides what is going to be done by his country. So we focused on his speech in the United Nations' General Assembly in September 12th, 2002, where he mentioned disarmament because of the threat of Mass -- Weapons of Mass Destruction. And when he said that he would go to the U.N. to search for a new resolution – so to our view, this was the position of the United States.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: When you look at the patterns, do you see that the United States wasn’t really concerned about weapons inspectors? They didn't want the inspectors to get in there or calling them "feckless" and "useless" and --?
LOISEAU: Well, once again they were obviously divergences in the administration, and from the beginning we had the feeling that some in the administration were not interested in the inspections. And it was sort of troubling, because it was a big achievement to have unanimity of the international community in favor of 1441. It was a big achievement that immediately after the resolution, the inspectors were admitted in Iraq by Saddam Hussein. But we have to admit that -- just after, for instance, -- Just after the President's statement in the General Assembly on September the 12th, a few days after -- on September 16th -- came a letter to the U.N. Secretary General from the Iraqis saying, ‘Alright. We accept that the inspectors come back to Iraq.’ It was a very positive step, for everybody, because we had been waiting for that for years. And obviously the speech from the American president had produced rapid results. The only ones who seemed not to be happy about this Iraqi letter were American diplomats, who were saying, ‘How -- Have you seen? They accept the inspectors.’ We said, ‘Well, yes. That's what we wanted -- that's what we wanted. That's good news.’ It was not good news for everybody in Washington, obviously.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And when you look at -- During this build-up, there was a lot of General Assembly members coming forward and speaking and – And yet not a lot of coverage, visually, of what they were actually saying. And so can you kind of speak to the support of France -- in the sense that they're not -- it wasn't just France.
LOISEAU: Well, it was not just France who opposed a rush to war. But here in the American media it was seen as a dispute between France and the United States. For instance, there were several occasions in which members of the General Assembly -- members of the United Nations in general, were saying, "This is such an important issue, ‘War or Peace in the Middle East.’ We don't want to let it to members of the Security Council. We want to be able to express our views -- all of us -- so that people get a sense of what the international community has in mind." And on several occasions before the war, there were meetings of General Assembly members representing their countries and delivering statements. The vast majority, more than a hundred countries, took the floor to say, ‘We don't want this war now. We don't see the necessity of this war now. We think it's dangerous. We think that it's in a region which has already so many problems that it would even destabilise even more the Middle East. And we don't see why we should go after Saddam Hussein more than after North Korea or Iran or other threatening countries.’ There was basically no coverage of this debate in the American media. But there was always, always words about ‘France is opposing. France is taking a strong position against the United States.’ And it was never against the United States. It was saying, ‘Let's be cautious. Let's stick to international principles. Let's disarm Iraq peacefully. And only if we draw the conclusion that we can not do it peacefully should we envisage the military option.’

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: So you would also leave open the possibility for military action, in other words?
LOISEAU: We said it. We said it in public --
ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: I'm sorry – what?
LOISEAU: We said in public statements, from September 2002, that if Iraq was to be in a new material breach there would be a meeting of the Security Council, there would be a resolution that we would authorize -- we would vote in favor of military action. And not only would we vote in favor, but we would participate as we did in the first Gulf War. And we even sent a mission to the American administration in December 2002 to say that. It was a military mission saying, ‘Well, inspectors are back in Iraq for a few days. We don't know what they will find. We don't know how it will work. Let's envisage that it doesn't work. Let's envisage that there is a new material breach, acknowledged by the Security Council. We will vote for the use of force, and in that case -- but under these very specific conditions -- we will send troops. So be ready to have us on board if there is a new material breach.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Did you ever try to pitch to journalists to try to cast their net wider, and to see that it wasn't just France? Or you know --
LOISEAU: Of course it was my daily job. And I must --
ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: I'm sorry, what?
LOISEAU: My daily job was to explain to journalists what was exactly our position, and also very, very often to tell them, ‘Call my other colleagues -- Call the Mexicans -- call the Chileans -- call the Pakistani’ -- Because they were all members of the Security Council. ‘Call the Russians -- call the Chinese -- call the Germans, and ask them what they think about the necessity to go to war. Why do you always focus on the French?’ Of course, we had a very prominent figure with our foreign minister who was making beautiful statements, so the journalists liked very much to focus on him. They say, ‘Well, for your readers, for your viewers, they would need to know that the situation is more complex than what you think.’ Many of them knew it, but there was a big difference between what they knew and what they could write, obviously.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And so -- It seems that since they weren't writing that, there seemed to be this focus on France, and "Freedom Fries -- Freedom Toast." Can you speak to that whole episode?
LOISEAU: Well it was a very, very unfortunate moment because – "French bashing," as we saw it last year, which was -- I mean, everywhere in the Congress they turned "French Fries" to "Freedom Fries." Some conservative media were using French bashing as a daily recipe for their viewers. It was very unfortunate because there is one thing that we never understood -- two things. The first one was that we could disagree between governments. I would have understood that there would be strong critiques against President Chirac, or the French government, or the French foreign policy, but people were blaming the French for "being French." And there were a lot of examples of bad jokes, or insults written -- or said against the French as a people. And if you read them now after all this has ended, it's really a kind of encouragement to hatred. And it's extremely shocking -- especially in a country like the United States which is a country made of immigrants. Well this kind of behavior should never happen. This was the first thing that surprised us. The second thing was that obviously in some parts of the administration this tendency was encouraged. And this was really amazing for us. That is that, you had so-called "anonymous sources" in the administration which were feeding the media with false allegations against France. And at a period in February / March / April, it was on a daily basis. We even had to protest publicly. The ambassador sent an open letter to the administration, to the Congress and to the media, listing a number of false accusations which were sourced by anonymous sources in the administration. And we said, ‘What was happening? Why is there this need to blame France and to accuse one specific country -- which has been a friend and an ally of the United States for several centuries -- of things that we have not done?’ When we did this, which was very undiplomatic and very unusual, strangely enough it stopped immediately.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And when you look at even now, there seems to be this search for motivations of France. Like it must have been -- oil-for-food scandal. I've talked a lot of people who've said, ‘Well, look at the slush funds of oil-for-food, you know, they were getting paid off.’ Can you speak to that?
LOISEAU: Of course. Once again, when we were expressing principles of international law when we are saying, ‘You can not decide of war and peace elsewhere than in the Security Council. You have to be aware that if you are able to disarm Iraq peacefully, you should not use force -- because it's dangerous. Because Iraq has no tradition of democracy. And so on and so forth.’ Some here in the media -- and elsewhere -- were trying to discredit our positions, saying, ‘The real motivation of France is money. Or the real motivation of France is oil.’ It was easy to dismiss as long as the media were ready and accepting to publish what we were saying to us -- to them. That is, for instance, that -- We were not the first supplier of goods to Iraq through the famous oil-for-food program -- nor the second -- nor the third. We were the thirteenth provider of goods. And Iraq was amounting for 0.20 percent of our external trade. You don't decide of war and peace for 0.20 percent of your external trade. This is not reasonable. But time and again, I could read in the conservative media that ‘France was benefiting from the oil-for-food program. That we are the second provider of goods.’ It was false. It was simply false. And it was easy to check. Many journalists were calling me saying that ‘You're making a lot of money with oil-for-food.’ I said, ‘Well, no. Please check. Go to the U.N. website, and you will see which country amounts for how much of the oil-for-food program. We are thirteenth provider. We have nothing to gain, nothing to lose with oil-for-food. This is not the problem.’

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Well, I think what they were also saying is that there was illicit funds being diverted somehow. Was there any illicit funding of oil-for-food that was happening?
LOISEAU: Well, once again there has been many accusations in the press. Today, we all supporting the investigation which has been given to Paul Volker in the United Nations to know whether some money had been diverted from oil-for-food -- to know whether U.N. officials had taken advantage of the oil-for-food program. I don't know. I have no clue about it. I have no evidence about it. I never saw any investigation from the Iraqi government focusing on French -- either French officials or French individuals. There may be French individuals who took profit of the program. I don't know. There may be other Westerners who took profit of the program. I don't know. Once again these were accusations in the press. What we all know -- And it should be common knowledge. And it should be explained to the public opinion, and strangely it is not very well explained. It’s easy to have a blame game about oil-for-food -- to say, ‘Well, you know, the U.N. -- you should not give them any responsibility in Iraq, because when they were dealing with the oil-for-food program there was a lot of corruption, a lot of money going out of the program to benefit Saddam Hussein.’ Two things are never said -- or not very often, I should say. First, the oil-for-food program was working. This is -- that when the oil-for-food program started, Iraqi people were starving, and this is the reason why this program was invented. The sanctions were so tough that people were starving. And the program was able to double the number of calories a day each Iraqi was getting. And it was – it was the focus of the program -- give them food and medicine. Second, yes, Saddam Hussein made money with oil during the period of the sanctions. Where did he take his money from? It was mostly -- and obviously and everybody knew it -- because he was allowed to sell oil out of the oil-for-food program to Turkey, to Jordan, with the acceptance of the members of the Security Council -- mainly the acceptance of the United States. The idea was that, Turkey was suffering from Iraqi sanctions, because Turkey was previously a major trade partner of Iraq. And because of the sanctions it was an economic catastrophe for Turkey, which is an ally of the United States. The same with Jordan, which is a small country, which could not afford to have its big neighbor under sanctions. And both countries advocated for exceptions to the program -- to the sanctions, saying, ‘We need Iraqi oil at a favorable price to be able to have our economy going on.’ And it was accepted by all Security members, knowing that it would provide Saddam Hussein with billions of dollars without any control -- out of the oil-for-food program. So we all know that Saddam made money -- made billions of dollars -- selling oil to Turkey and to Jordan. This is obvious, we know it. It was a price to pay not to have the collapse of Jordan, and not to have the collapse of Turkey.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And when you look at the Security Council as an entity, you do have this phenomena of each individual country acting in their own self-interest. And I think when you look at the coverage of the television news on France, you saw a lot of like, ‘France is doing this because of the oil contracts.’ And when I talked to Lawrence Grossman, formerly the president of NBC News, he said, ‘When I asked him what the French position was.’ He said, ‘Well, they just wanted oil.’ I said, ‘Well, that's not what they were saying.’ But when you look at the actual, you know, oil in the context of -- well all of the United Nations Security Council -- you know, the contracts with Russia, the contracts with France, and the contracts with the United States -- Can you speak to that ?
LOISEAU: Well, first Iraq was under sanctions for a decade. So there was no oil contract -- no contract for French oil companies to explore and exploit oil in Iraq. There was none. And when it was written in the American press that we had our own interest because Total Fina Elf had oil contracts with Iraq – No. We were following sanctions. It was forbidden to sign any contract with Iraq during the sanctions period. So that's not true. Second, I would like people to explain to me, why for instance, Mexico or Chile were opposing the idea of going to war. They had no specific economic interest in Iraq -- that's for certain. And their specific economic interests were with the United States. So they were taking a bold position opposing a war that was favored by the American administration. It only means that this way of reading the debate in the Security Council as countries protecting their own greedy interest, maybe missed the point. That is, Mexico was aware that it's position opposing the war would create anger in the United States. Still they stuck to their position. Canada, which is the other neighbor and best friend of the United States was not in the Security Council, but Canada took a strong position saying that they opposed the war. Did they have any economic interest in Iraq? No.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Well, I think what people were picking up on, was that ‘Here's France, they have dirty hands in the past. They've intervened in other countries without UN approval, and here they are making a principled stand on international law. There must be something going on.’
LOISEAU: Well, there are different things. First, dirty hands in the past -- We have our own colonial experience. That is, that we had wars unauthorized by the Security Council -- opposing the natural tendency of our former colonies to claim their independence. But we drew lessons from these experiences. That is -- We had the Algerian war, we had the war in Indochina before your own Vietnam war, and it learned us a few things. First, that you should never underestimate Arab nationalism. This is obviously what we did in Algeria. We were able to win the war militarily, and we lost the war politically. Because Algeria, even if the Algerian insurgents were weaker than we were militarily, the unity of the Algerian people in favor of their independence was so strong we had to acknowledge and leave. So, yes -- We had our own "bad" wars, but we tried to draw lessons from that. And for decades now, we have been advocating, as founding members of the United Nations -- as the United States are -- for respect of the international law -- respect of the U.N. Charter, which means that you go to war in very specific circumstances. Either you're in a situation of self-defense -- and, for instance, you have to know that France took the position to propose a resolution, just after September 11th in 2001 to reform/renew the international law deciding that United States had been attacked by terrorists. And that a terrorist attack was equivalent to an act of war, and that -- so United States was allowed to retaliate as an act of self-defense. It was brand new in the international law because it had never happened before to that extent. And France had taken the lead to this reform in the international law in favor of the United States. But this is one situation in which you are allowed to go to war, that is self-defense -- you've been attacked, you retaliate. The other situation is a Security Council resolution under Chapter 7 of the Charter. This is what we've been doing for years -- for decades. This is under this basis that we have troops in Bosnia, that we have troops in Kosovo, that we have troops -- we had troops in Haiti with the United States. That we have troops in Côte d'Ivoire. Each time there were humanitarian emergencies. In Kosovo, in Bosnia there was ethnic cleansing. In Côte d'Ivoire there was the risk of huge massacres, and each time we went on the basis of a Security Council resolution.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And when you look at – look at going back to February 5th 2003, can you describe what that day was like for you?
LOISEAU: It was a tough day.
ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: I’m sorry --
LOISEAU: February 5th, 2003 was the day where Colin Powell went to the Security Council and to make the case for war -- to make his presentation about what he thought was the imminent threat posed by Saddam Hussein. It was a difficult day because we have the deepest admiration for Colin Powell. We considered that he was saying what he knew -- what he believed. The problem was that we were not sharing the same knowledge nor the same beliefs. For instance, the idea that Saddam Hussein had something to do with Al Qaeda and with September 11th was completely rejected in Europe -- not because of ideology, but because of experience. Because Europe has faced -- and France notably has faced -- Islamic terrorism for decades. Starting in the eighties -- and '86, '93, '95 -- we faced Islamist terror in the streets of Paris -- in Paris subway. And we have had terrorist -- anti-terror experts, judges, law enforcement experts, who have been working on terrorist networks for decades. And they kept on repeating, even publicly, that to their view there was no link between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda. So we were not buying this part of the case. On Weapons of Mass Destruction, we had doubts -- we had questions -- we had suspicions. But we were saying -- seeing no imminent threats. For instance, we were listening to what was said by El Baradei in IAEA regarding nuclear weapons. In February he was saying. ‘Give me one more month and I think I will be able to tell you that there is no nuclear program going on in Iraq.’ And I mean, he's the expert. And nuclear programs is not something that you hide behind -- under the carpet. It's visible. It's big. It requires imports and requires networks -- you had nothing of this kind in Iraq. We were more skeptical about chemical weapons -- not to mention biological weapons, because our idea was that even if Saddam had had biological weapons, it's not so easy to keep. And we were not sure whether he still had them. Regarding chemical weapons, we were not so sure -- we didn't know. And we wanted the inspectors to help us know. But not to know whether Iraq had or didn't have chemical weapons was not a sufficient reason to go to war. So the presentation on February the 5th was, ‘Well, yes. There are question marks. Yes, there are suspicions. This is exactly why we have sent the inspectors in Iraq. Let them do their job, and we'll see.’

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And what was the reaction that you heard from the journalists. What were they --
LOISEAU: It was an amazing reaction from the American media after the presentation of Colin Powell on the 5th. They were all convinced. Because Colin Powell is an American idol. Because he -- He put all his personal weight behind his presentation, and the journalists all said, ‘Well, now he's right. Now we're convinced. You should be convinced too.’ And I received tons of messages -- or phone calls saying, ‘Well, at last we hope you’re convinced.’ And I said, ‘Well, we are convinced that the inspectors should do their job. This is what we are convinced of. Nothing else. And regarding the question of Saddam and Al Qaeda, we don't buy it.’ And there was a kind of anger against our position that day, because Colin Powell had put his weight in the fight.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And when you jump to March 7th when El Baradei said that aluminum tubes were not for nuclear weapons -- Niger documents. And that was the same day that the United States had put a ten-day ultimatum on Saddam Hussein.
LOISEAU: Well, it was covered in the press. I could not say it was not covered. But more and more, it had lost a prominent position in the press. You have to open your newspaper and look for El Baradei's report, and say, ‘Well, aluminum tubes -- he doesn't believe it was for nuclear weapons.’ It was very difficult for American public opinion to get a sense of what was going on in the Security Council, and in the IAEA.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And do you have a sense that the American media had, kind of blinders on -- of like only concerned about the United States, and not really listening to a lot of different perspectives?
LOISEAU: Well, it's a general tendency. International coverage was not very efficient in the '90's in the United States. You have to know that many bureaus of the American media abroad were closed during that period. Because there was a lack of interest from the viewers -- especially in TV networks -- for what was happening elsewhere. I talked to many newspapers, to many TV networks, and asked them what had happened. Because for instance, very few American media had a bureau in Paris. And even their bureau chiefs who were supposed to be Paris correspondents, but were working at the same time about Turkey, Jerusalem, Afghanistan. And I was complaining about that -- I was saying, ‘Well, if you have -- want to have proper coverage of what's happening in France, if you want me to help you get access to prominent French decision makers, I would need to have your correspondent spending more than two days a month in Paris.’ Because when I call him to tell him, ‘Well, if you want to talk to the minister he might be available.’ The guy tells me, ‘Well, well, right now I'm in Kabul doing something else.’ So this is what had happened in the nineties. More and more money, and more and more means were put in domestic issues -- in covering the West Coast or the Midwest -- in covering trials or really domestic issues, and less and less on international relations and on bureaus abroad. Very few American journalists were able to speak Arabic. And the ones who were sent to Iraq, for instance, very few of them were speaking Arabic. And of course, it makes things more difficult to explain things to your viewers or to your readers when you come to a country, you have not been posted there for a while, and you don't speak the language, you don't know the people, you have to struggle for access. It makes things more difficult.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Do you see the result of the American population kind of being in a bubble and not really knowing what’s going on, and outside of their?
LOISEAU: Well, this is natural. I mean, 300 million people -- this is natural that they focus on their own domestic issues. You cannot blame them for that. But what I don't understand is that sometimes I'm told by media, ‘Oh, you know, we don't make international coverage because people are not interested.’ But how could they be interested if you don't provide them with the international coverage of good quality? It's a question of ‘Who start it first?’ And I'm not certain that the answer of the media, which is to say, ‘You know, we don't do it because they are simply not interested. Or it's too complicated.’ I say, ‘Okay. Explain them. I mean, it might be complex, but the international situation for the United States after September 11th, and at a moment where American troops are in Afghanistan and in Iraq, your viewers -- your readers have to know what happens.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: And when you look at the importance of international law, a lot of – I’ve hit a lot of walls that it's just not important. So could you explain -- summarize why international law should be important?
LOISEAU: Well, we all live in a globalized world. We all speak of globalization all day long. So if we are in a globalized world with rising economic powers, with failing states at the same time, it means that this world might be dangerous. And in a dangerous world, you have to have rules of the game. America is the current superpower. It's good news because America is a democratic country. In the coming decades, we don't know whether we will see or not -- emerge new superpowers with less democratic values. Let's imagine, for instance that, in the coming decades, China becomes a big military superpower. It can happen. It's already a big economic growing superpower. And if you don't have rules of the game about who is entitled to use military force to do what with the approval of who, it could become the law of the jungle. It's the same thing with environment. You know that there is a big divergence between the United States and Europe about the necessity to sign and ratify the Kyoto protocol about environment. We share the same planet. We can not say, ‘Well, we love our way of living. We love spending a lot of energy for our SUVs or our air condition. We are pretty certain that in the coming decades we will have make a scientific progress, and will be able to find new energies.’ We don't know. And as we don't know, and as obviously there is a problem with the climate for the time being, let's work together. Let's have international laws in force so that there is not one bully in the classroom who decides what he wants to do despite of the others. And we're not saying we're anti-American. We are concerned that any country considering it is big enough to do what he wants, might decide to invade it's neighbor or to refuse international law considering protection of the sea, for instance. We have to give the example -- to set the rules of the game -- because we have one single planet to take care of.

ECHO CHAMBER PROJECT: Okay. Great.