Should Germany, France Be Cut out of Post-War Iraq?

Coming up tonight, we'll show you the ad that's being used to draft Senator Hillary Clinton to run for president.

But first, our top story, the White House said it's perfectly appropriate and reasonable to exclude countries that opposed the war with Iraq from bidding on contracts for the reconstruction. But does it make sense to further alienate countries like Germany, France and Russia, or are they getting what they deserve?

Joining us, the director of European affairs and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, Philip Gordon, and former aid to Margaret Thatcher and fellow at the Heritage Foundation, Nile Gardiner.

Good to have you with us, gentlemen.

Nile, let me begin with you. Why should we not continue to alienate - - or why should we, I should say, continue to alienate these countries?

And from what I understand, according to the "Washington Post," the White House was upset that the Pentagon did this and did it without consulting with them at a time that's very sensitive with Colin Powell having just come back from Brussels, and you have James Baker going on and asking these countries to forgive the debt.

Why not use this as leverage? We're not doing that.

NILE GARDINER, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: I think this was the right move by the Pentagon. It's now being fully backed up by the White House. It's also being backed up by the British government, which is kind of significant a development.

I believe that it is morally right to only include those nations who participated in the coalition of the willing and the reconstruction of Iraq.

The French, the Russians and the Germans have not lifted a finger to help the Iraqi people, and therefore I believe it would be completely unethical to use U.S. taxpayers' money to subsidize a French, Russian, German (UNINTELLIGIBLE) reconstruction.

COLMES: The way they're doing it in Canada, for example, who was excluded originally, gave $190 million for Iraq reconstruction. Got the incoming premiere pretty upset about it. They pledged $300 million for reconstruction.

Israel's left out. Eritrea and the Marshall Islands (ph) included. They've done barely nothing for this effort.

Are you saying this is a fair assessment of how we treat these countries, given the way the countries are being -- you think this is fair to these countries?

GARDINER: I think it is fair, actually. It's important to remember that the Canadian government was totally opposed to the war. And in fact it was very difficult all the way. And joined the appeasement of Saddam Hussein lobby before the war broke out.

It's also important to remember that France and Russia in many ways say the Saddam Hussein regime as a client state of Russian and France. They had huge economic investments in these countries.

Both regimes supplied very sensitive intelligence information to the Saddam Hussein regime before the war. They're very clear reasons why these nations should be excluded from the post war reconstruction.

COLMES: Let me go to Philip here.

Philip, Jean Chretien has said that there would be no pan, but the incoming prime minister says just the opposite. He says he's concerned about it.

And you have the Kremlin wanted to make sure contracts awarded to Russian companies, they stayed on top of that, like $6 billion to the second biggest oil company. He made sure they were enforced. The Kremlin gets nothing. Russia gets nothing out of this.

This is incredibly unfair. These countries have a right and a reason to be upset with us.

PHILIP GORDON, BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: Well, they do have a reason to be upset.

I mean, Alan, it's a very bad policy, and for some of the reasons you've already said. It's been very amateurishly implemented.

It's a bad policy, not because we should be being nice to the countries who is opposed us in the war in Iraq, even though they had a right to do. It's a bad policy because it has about a zero chance of having the effect that it's designed to have, which is to get them the help.

So the point is, whatever you think -- Nile talks about the moral imperative and so on. But whatever you think about that, the bottom line is, do you really think that these countries, which were in fact warming up to the idea that they might come around and start being constructive in rebuilding Iraq, are now going to say, "Oh, my goodness, we are being punished by the Americans. Let's get onboard and start supporting them"?

It's going to have exactly the opposite effect.

James Baker was about to go out there and start working on debt relief, which would be a major contribution to our goals. And now these countries are going to say no instead of yes. It's a bad policy, and they implemented it very badly.

SEAN HANNITY: Philip, they weren't reaching to the table in the first place, by the way.

I want you to look into the camera. You know, American mothers and fathers, we lost 450 of our brave soldiers in this conflict. We had another 2,500 injured in this conflict to beat back this tyrant, this man responsible for terror, this man that murdered innocent people. The world is a safer place, with no help from Germany, no help from France, no help from a lot of these countries.

Tell those parents who gave their sons and daughters, lost their sons and daughters, why these countries should benefit in any way from the reconstruction here. Tell them.

GORDON: I'll tell them. I'll tell them that I think the United States did a great thing by removing Saddam Hussein. That was a major contribution.

Now what we're asking them to do is let's bear the burden entirely ourselves for the peacekeeping and reconstruction.

In other words, let's pay more than 90 percent of the costs ourselves, because we don't want anyone else helping. Let's bear 90 percent of the casualties ourselves, because we don't want anybody's help. We're going to exclude everyone from this. This is our baby.

I think the Americans...

HANNITY: There are 60 countries -- no, no. There are 60 countries that are part of this coalition.

GORDON: Let's be serious. The number of countries...

HANNITY: They are 60 countries.

GORDON: You know the percentage of American troops?

HANNITY: But that's not the point here. And the world is a safer place.

GORDON: The point is that Eritrea and Mauritius (ph) are very important countries, but they're not doing a lot to help us in Iraq.

HANNITY: They are doing a lot to help us in Iraq, and they're certainly doing a lot more than the French have done. They're doing a lot more than the Germans.

But the dirty little secret -- hang on a second. But the dirty little secret of this entire war is that the reason, when we get to the root cause is the reasons of why countries like France and why countries like Germany didn't want to join us in this effort is because they were willing to do business with, and they were making profits from a regime that they knew was corrupt and that they knew was evil.

Their financial motive was on front end of this entire thing. Isn't that true?

GORDON: You think that's why the French and the Germans didn't want to invade Iraq?

HANNITY: Absolutely.

GORDON: You know, if you look at the numbers, which you might want to do, they're tiny fractions of French and German imports and exports...

HANNITY: Billions and billions of dollars, sir.

GORDON: That's silly. They weren't doing billions of dollars. There were U.N. sanctions on Iraq for 10 years, and both countries were completely abiding by them. And...

HANNITY: That's a lie.

GORDON: You don't think it might have had something to do with the fact that they were afraid it might lead to a nasty occupation and more terrorism against their troops?

HANNITY: Let me go to Nile. Nile...

GORDON: Do you think those might have had something to do with it?

HANNITY: Nile, there's more than that.

GORDON: Those were important reasons.

HANNITY: We -- hang on. Nile, we have found, and our own reporters have witnessed, and we have chronicled weapons from countries like France in the hands of the Iraqis, sent recently in this conflict. Isn't it true?

GARDINER: Yes. Let's not forget the fact that Russia and France invested billions and billions of dollars in Iraq in an effort to try to keep Saddam Hussein in power.

All they are really concerned about, frankly, is exploiting the economic wealth in that country. They don't necessarily have a vested interest in seeing a prosperous, free Iraq which is pro American. I think they would like to see exactly the opposite take place.

We should also, of course, remember the fact that the Russians were even supplying night vision goggles to the Iraqis during the war. This is very embarrassing stuff.

We need to look at the bigger picture here, exclude those nations from the reconstruction process who simply don't have the interest of the Iraqi people at heart.

HANNITY: Yes. Well, Philip, obviously you disagree. But why should a country that was providing night vision goggles, as Nile points out, why should they be a part of the reconstruction effort?

GORDON: You wouldn't welcome their economic support and debt relief...?

HANNITY: No.

GORDON: ... in Iraq?

HANNITY: I would welcome that.

GORDON, This is not a question of...

HANNITY: That's not the question on the table today. The question is should they be allowed in the bidding process for reconstruction?

GORDON: Yes, I think they should be allowed in the bidding process because by denying them in this simplistic, amateurish way, it makes us look like this big bully that says we run the world, you have to support us.

And, you know, there's a more subtle way to do this. The fact is nobody expected French and German and Russian firms to get the major primary contracts in Iraq. That wasn't going to happen.

But why come out with this sort of dictate that says you are banned, we don't want you involved? Why not say that relevant factors will be taken into account as we award contracts? And of course it will be obvious.

COLMES: We're going to...

GORDON: Those who helped us more...

COLMES: We're going to take a quick break. We'll pick it up right there. We'll pick it up right after the break.

Coming up, is Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge about to legalize the eight million to 12 million illegal immigrants in this country? We'll tell you what he said. You may be surprised.

Then new TV ads are asking voters to draft Hillary Clinton for president. Is there something she isn't telling us? We'll show you the ads.

And later, are the Democratic presidential candidates hurting their own party by bickering over Al Gore? We'll debate it.

It's all coming up on HANNITY & COLMES.

HANNITY: Still to come tonight, does Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge really want to give legal status to illegal immigrants? We'll have a report on that coming up tonight.

We continue our debate.

All right. I want to go back to you, Philip, if I can. You refer to it as simplistic and amateurish, what the president is doing as policy, not to allow countries that did not support us in this effort in Iraq to have an opportunity to bid on the reconstruction issues.

You know, I'm sitting here thinking what are we, then, supposed to do? These countries pretty much slapped us in the face, looking out for their own economic interests. We find out they were supplying people we were at war with, with in one case night vision goggles and we found out munitions in other cases.

What are we supposed to do? Just sit back and let all of that roll off us like water off a duck's back? Is that what you would do in your simplistic and amateurish way?

GORDON: Well, I say simplistic and amateurish. There is a case of for bit of subtlety on this. As I said, nobody expected the major contracts to go to these guys.

I think the real practical question is where do we want to be on this issue in about a year? I would like to be in a place where the United States is not seen as trying to punish everyone who's not with us, even if their democracies had some reasons for not going to war. The world having an impression, which I think is wrong, by the way, but that this was all about Halliburton and American economic interests. I don't want people thinking that.

In a year, I want these countries to have relieved some Iraqi debt. I want the French and Germans training Iraqi security forces. And I want their troops helping us in Iraq. We don't have to do this all by ourselves.

HANNITY: It's all nice in a utopia, but let's not forget though, Philip, we have gone out of our way. We have bent over backwards, this president bent over backwards and offered the world a final resolution at their request. They were not willing to enforce that resolution. This president was.

They were willing to put their own economic interests above what was the right thing to do in this particular case, above what they even signed on to in terms of resolutions.

And now, you want to hold the president accountable for their mistakes. And frankly, I find your attitude, frankly, bordering on the type of appeasement attitude that would allow people like Saddam Hussein to stay in power. You sound like an appeaser. You sound like the type of guy that would reward somebody that slapped you in the face.

GORDON: You know, you can throw around all the epithets you want. The fact of the matter is we did have a legal case to go to war. We had a strategic case to go to war and we did. And that's fine.

And those democracies have an equal right to believe that invading Iraq would actually produce more terrorism than it solved and lead to a nasty, bloody long-term occupation that could lead to mounting casualties, which we're seeing. They were right about a lot of stuff.

But when you say they opposed us for their economic interests, I think that's wrong. And I think we're seeing now that they had a point about some of these things.

COLMES: Let me...

GORDON: I don't mean that they were right about the war and we were wrong.

COLMES: Let me go back to Niles here.

Niles, the problem with this situation here is that some countries are being punished who actually helped us, like Canada, in spite of what Jean Chretien has said. And other countries are -- and Israel, which is not part of this.

And other countries are being rewarded that did very little. For example, why should we be rewarding the Marshall Islands? What did they do to help us? Why them? Why did they get in, and why is Israel out?

GARDINER: Well, I think of all the nations on the list of 63 countries stood up and were counted at the right time in history. They took the...

COLMES: Didn't Israel stand up?

GARDINER: I can't really comment specifically on the Israeli situation. But one thing is certain. Paris, Berlin and Moscow made the wrong choice. They chose the side with a brutal dictatorship. The other 63 countries chose to side with the United States and Great Britain in a great effort to remove a brutal regime from power.

COLMES: But the problem, Nile, is that there are so many -- again, if we just put aside the obvious like France and Germany for a second, and we could debate whether they should be included.

I'm talking about other countries that don't get that kind of press that were either excluded when they should be included or included when they could be excluded. This list of countries makes no sense, because countries that contributed like Canada are not part of it. And other countries that are included did very little, like Eritrea, for example.

Why should that be?

GARDINER: Well, the Canadians in many ways had to stand in the way of the United States and Great Britain at the United Nations. They sided with those countries who are backing Saddam Hussein frankly.

Little countries like Eritrea, for example, certainly were not standing in the way. And they decided to side with the United States.

I think that President Bush is sending a message that the United States rewards its allies.

COLMES: Is Israel an ally? Did Israel stand in the way?

GARDINER: I don't think that Israel was directly involved in the Iraq situation. Therefore, I don't think it was appropriate to include Israel in this particular debate.

HANNITY: All right. Thank you both for being with us. Appreciate your time tonight.

We'll going to continue to watch this story.

And coming up next, illegal immigrants in the U.S. They may now have a new friends, an unlikely person. Believe it or not, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge has very surprising ideas for how to handle the immigration situation, and America is talking outrage in the conservative community. And we'll tell you what he had to say.

And later, it may be too late for Hillary Clinton to jump into the presidential race, but that is not stopping her supporters from campaigning for her. You'll meet one supporter who won't rest until Hillary makes it back to the White House, and we'll show you ads that they're running.