I would engage in negotiations with Iran, with no conditions because we don't really understand how Iran works. We think we do, from the outside, but I think it is misleading. We spent a couple of weeks paying all this attention to Ahmadinejad. He is a figurehead. He does not have the real power. The real power is held in the supreme leadership and the clerical leadership. They actually control the Iranian revolutionary guard. So I think we should engage in negotiations. And I want to have some leverage when we go into the negotiations.
From: HillaryClinton.com, "Associated Press Story Mischaracterizes Hillary's Comments on Iran," October 11, 2007
When Senator Clinton used the term "no conditions," she was referring to meetings between the United States government and Iran, not personal meetings with the President.
From: HillaryClinton.com, "Associated Press Story Mischaracterizes Hillary's Comments on Iran," October 11, 2007
Question: ...would you be willing to meet separately, without precondition, during the first year of your administration, in Washington or anywhere else, with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea, in order to bridge the gap that divides our countries?
Clinton: I will not promise to meet with the leaders of these countries during my first year. I will promise a very vigorous diplomatic effort because I think it is not that you promise a meeting at that high a level before you know what the intentions are.
I don’t want to be used for propaganda purposes. I don’t want to make a situation even worse. But I certainly agree that we need to get back to diplomacy, which has been turned into a bad word by this administration.
And I will purse very vigorous diplomacy.
And I will use a lot of high-level presidential envoys to test the waters, to feel the way. But certainly, we’re not going to just have our president meet with Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez and, you know, the president of North Korea, Iran and Syria until we know better what the way forward would be.
From: CNN-YouTube Democratic Presidential Debate, Charleston, SC, July 24, 2007
...we still have to make it clear that Iran having a nuclear weapon is absolutely unacceptable. We have to try to prevent that at all costs.
But we need to start with diplomacy in order to see what we can accomplish.
From: WMUR-TV, CNN, and the New Hampshire Union Leader Democratic Presidential Debate, Manchester, New Hampshire, June 3, 2007
U.S. policy must be unequivocal: Iran must not build or acquire nuclear weapons. Iran's President has made a series of incendiary, outrageous comments, questioning the Holocaust, calling for Israel to be wiped off the map. We know that a nuclear Iran poses a direct threat to its neighbors in the region, with Israel as its chief target. It also poses a significant threat to the United States by combining access to nuclear materials and technology with support for terrorists whose aim is to attack and kill Americans.
We have to keep all options on the table, including being ready to talk directly to Iranians should the right opportunity present itself. Direct talks, if they do nothing else, lets you assess who's making the decisions -- what their stated and unstated goals might be. And willingness to talk sends two very important messages. First, to the Iranian people, that our quarrel is with their leaders, not with them; and second, to the international community, that we are pursuing every available peaceful avenue to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power.
From: Hillary Clinton, speech to the Council on Foreign Relations, October 31, 2006
Sen. Clinton voted in favor of the Kyl-Lieberman
amendment (Senate Amendment 3017) on September
26, 2007, which called for the designation of the Iranian
Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization.
I am not in favor of this rush for war, but I’m
also not in favor of doing nothing…Iran is
seeking nuclear weapons, and the Iranian
Revolutionary Guard is in the forefront of that,
as they are in the sponsorship of terrorism…I
prefer vigorous diplomacy, and I happen to
think economic sanctions are part of vigorous
diplomacy….I’m prepared to pass legislation
that—with my colleagues who are here in
the Congress, to try to get some Republicans
to join us, to make it abundantly clear that
sanctions and diplomacy are the way to go; we
reject and do not believe George Bush has any
authority to do anything else.
From: MSNBC and NBC Democratic Presidential Debate, Philadelphia , PA , October 30, 2007
After the Kyl-Lieberman vote, Clinton became a cosponsor
of S.759, Sen. Jim Webb’s (VA) bill to prohibit the use of
funds for military operations in Iran without congressional
authorization.
