 I can't give a specific answer to that because, as you know, there is a process in the Justice Department and all before things get to my desk for decision. And I don't know whether or anything, I never have any warning when they complete their processing and all the recommendations are sent here. I don't seem to me that would be very likely that they will be able to complete anything with this being the last day in office. Well, they have a lot over here already, recommendations, so you obviously have made up your mind not to do it. Well, no, there have been some recommendations as there are routinely and some fairly recently, but I have no knowledge of any that are imminent that are coming here. You've said, Mr. President, that you felt the judicial process, of course, with regard to the ideology of the North and John point of view. Is that still your feeling? Well, yes, because I still think that to step in in advance is going to leave them under a cloud of guilt for the rest of their lives. Mr. President, in 1980 you sharply criticized President Carter for the inability to do anything about getting the hostage at home. It is now eight years later, and a matter of fact, eight years from tomorrow, Mr. President, when you were sworn in, 52 hostages did come home in retrospect, sir. What I would like to ask you is, do you feel perhaps you were a little too harsh on Carter during the campaign, and do you now, after eight years, have perhaps an appreciation of some of the limits of power as to what an American president can do with these situations with third world terrorist nations? Well, I think we're facing two very different situations. One, more than 50 people in an embassy, knowledge of where they were kidnapped by the government of that country. This is another one in which some terrorist group has kidnapped several individuals. We don't know where they are. We know that any overt attempt at rescue, even if we did have a hint or a clue, would run the risk of their assassination or execution before we could get them out. And there hasn't been a moment that this isn't on our minds and that we haven't been exploring quietly and privately as you must in this kind of a situation. Whatever opening there could be to get them back. I think these two situations are completely different. I want you to know also that at the end of President Carter's term, I made a number of statements and so forth that were aimed at helping, in other words, portraying myself and the things that I said to that government that was holding them that maybe they'd rather deal with him than deal with me. If I could follow up, sir, your recent initiative with respect to the PLO, is this, aside from the issues of the Middle East peace process and the intricacies there, is there a recognition or has there been a recognition on your part and would you advise George Boyce and will we see an evolution in American policy that in effect uses perhaps a stance of attempting to deal with these third world countries in a way of some moderation that accepts at least their influence, if not their legitimacy in the world, as well as the policy you've been willing to use in the past, of course, which is to use American power where you felt it was needed, such as in Libya in 1986. Well, ever since we've been here, we have been trying to be helpful in bringing about peace in the Middle East. Actually, a technical state of war does still exist between the Arab nations and Israel. We believe that that peace can only come about when the principles themselves agree to negotiations. And so we've been trying to do everything we can to be helpful in bringing that about. And it's not one in which we think that we can dictate a peace in any way. You've never made a statement against the Israeli violence against the Palestinians, killing them every day, blowing up their homes. They throw stones and they get killed with ball bearings used as bullets. Not one public statement in this human right situation. Well, and I'm not going to talk about diplomatic relations that we may have. Just as we right now, we still have an ambassador that is in negotiations with the PLO as a result of our recent decision on that. But, Helen, no, this is one of the things is to get the violence and the killing stopped on both sides. But you have to look at this one in which the violence is being perpetrated against the governing authority of the area. And yes, we hope the killing will stop. If you were under occupation and your land was under a military occupation for 40 years, would you fight? I can't say about this because whatever the terms you have to look at what the situation would be in such a case. I think you fight. Mr. President, you seem to have established quite a good personal chemistry relationship with Soviet leader Gorbachev. The Bush administration has said that they're going to take some time to review the bidding in the arms control negotiations. Do you think that's a good idea to kind of stand back and take a look at what's gone forward, or should we press ahead on the start of negotiations? Well, now, wait a minute again. And at the beginning, this is... I haven't switched my mind yet. Do you think the President Bush is well advised to stand back and review the bidding as they put it in the arms control negotiations between the U.S. and the Soviets? Or should we press ahead on what has been done? Oh, I think you'll be there and if pressing ahead is the appropriate thing to do. But again, I think we have to realize that in these negotiations and all that have taken place so far, they're not just based on what someone says. They're based on the deeds and I think the George would be very prepared there based on what the deeds were. Remember that in these arms negotiations, one thing that seems to escape many people's attention is that their superiority has been such that so far they still, in spite of the cuts that they have proposed making, they still have a superiority, an edge. Now what must happen is get down to parity and then see if both sides don't want to continue reducing down as long as we're at a parity. Where are we at this point in the starting negotiations? Are we halfway through further along than that? I know these are being very difficult. They're much more complicated than the INF treaty was. It would be hard for me to say. I think some of the things that are holding it up is that there has not been the agreement on verification that we had with the INF treaty. Mr. President, were you ever in a situation where you might have to push the ultimate button or put us on red alert or anything where it was really a touch-and-go? No, I don't think there's ever been a moment of that kind that has come up while we've been here. I'm happy to say. Would you have taken the decision to go on the doomsday plane or stay here? That would have to depend on the circumstances also. I'm quite sure that we would never be the first to push the button, and so if ever such a situation had arisen, very possibly those hostile missiles would be on their way here, and then it would depend on what information we had. Are you most scared now that you know all of our technological possibilities to blow up the world? No, I think I was always aware that, well, from the very first I said a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. You never said that until about the third year in office. Did you always believe that? Because we felt that during the campaign you felt that if we had to have nuclear superiority and you said you could have a little war in Europe with tactical nuclear. Well, I know that the situation we inherited here was that our nuclear superiority had been the basic NATO position because we had it, but the nuclear superiority by the time we got here was rapidly disappearing. Mr. President, how do you explain the fact that Mr. Gorbachev is much more popular in Europe than you are? Are you concerned about that? Is there fear that Europe could drift toward neutrality? Well, actually I have just finished reading a document here that was citing authorities and press media and so forth all over the world, and I can't quite accept that he's more popular than I am. I was quite moved and touched by the words that were spoken about me and my departure from office. But as the second part of the question, is there any concern that because of this dealing with Mr. Gorbachev, because of this American attitude that Europe could drift toward neutrality, especially after 92 when there will be more, let's say, more unity and it could lead toward protectionism? Is there any threat to the alliance? I don't think so. I know that every country, literally including our own, has elements within that country that speak out and that demonstrate and so forth, but who are philosophically more attuned to the Soviet Union and its philosophy than to the democratic philosophy that the rest of the world is being guided by. And I think we have to be careful and not take that as national opinion. Mr. President, you formally headed the Screen Actors Guild and you've been talking in these recent spate of interviews about the high spots of your presidency and some of the low spots. I'd like to ask you, sir, in retrospect, if you had it to do over again, would you have fired the air traffic controllers in 1981 during the strike? And secondly, does it bother you, sir, as a former head of the Screen Actors Guild, that there's a perception, at least within major elements of organized labor or the leadership of the Union movement, that your administration was somehow hostile to workers who are members of unions or to the legitimacy of the Union movement in this country? There's nothing, there's no way that I am opposed to the legitimacy of the Union movement and certainly I am supportive. First of all, I'm a lifetime member of an AFL-CIO Union, was given a lifetime membership card when I left the Screen Actors Guild to come here. I do feel this, I have been critical many times at authorities or authorities seized at the Federation level without taking into consideration the interests of each individual union or, for that matter, union member. For example, when I came here as the head of a union to appear before a congressional committee on a tax matter and I was representing 36 unions of the motion picture industry, not just our own, they had authorized me to represent them. And I was accosted in the capital corridors by two representatives of the AFL-CIO and they were showing me that the position was counter on this tax matter than the one that I was going to defend and put before the Congress. And I said to them, I said, I'm the president of an AFL-CIO Union. No one from the AFL-CIO has ever suggested anything of this kind to me nor to any of the unions that I know of. Now, what their proposal was, they were supportive of higher and more taxes because, as they showed me, the AFL-CIO had a great package of social reforms that would need more money, that would cost more. And yet none of us out there who were the member unions of this federation have been told about this. So there, I made a claim, this is a yes, I've taken a position on that. For example, my union, the Screen Actors Guild, had a provision in its Constitution that no decision taken even by a general membership meeting could become guilt policy if it affected guilt policy until it was submitted to the entire membership for a secret mail ballot. And hearing the history and seeing other unions there in the industry at work, recognizing how many times in meetings of other unions there was fear on the part of the membership to stand up and take a position that they thought might be counter to the executive's position. I tried to promote and I had union members from many other unions and not only picture unions but other unions when I was campaigning on this that said, please get that for us, that secret ballot. And I tried and I couldn't get it off the ground and because the leadership of the AFL-CIO was opposed to such a thing for union members, I think what I was proposing was the height of democracy for any union member. Mr. President, I'd like to be back to your relationship with Mr. Gorbachev. During the last summit at Governor's Island there was some talk that there might be some follow-on meetings that you'd have with him as a private citizen. Are there any firm plans for him to come visit you in California or are you and Mrs. Reagan to go to Moscow? No, but there was a mutual exchange of invitations that any time we felt we could or that they could. I had extended that invitation and he counted with the same suggestion to me. What do you think of the possibilities that happened? I don't know. I have found out now getting down here to these last hours I can't foresee what I'm going to be faced with until I get out there and have to deal with it. I don't know what I can schedule or what my plans can be. Mr. President, Casey apparently knew according to what I've read. That he had a brain tumor two years before he died. Did you know it? No. You did not know it? No, I did not know. He would have told you, do you think? I should have told you. Well, I don't know. I could see where probably he had concern that this might create a doubt or a suspicion that he wasn't up to the job or what he was doing. So I'm not going to judge him on that. I'm puzzled, Mr. President, and it's probably the last time we'll ever be able to ask you the question. Why do you insist that North and Point Dexter did nothing wrong when you fired them for diverting funds? They burned and shredded official documents after a government inquiry was underway. They thwarted your power. They usurped your power. They're two military men when we have a civilian government. Why do you continue to forgive them? Helen, because when I said doing nothing wrong, this was in countering what I have to say is the total media distortion of the process that was underway. And I can't understand it because I, as you know, the day after that leak revealed the covert operation, I went before the press and told them exactly what the operation was. We were not doing business with the Ayatollah. We were not trading arms for hostages. We had received word by way of a third country, Israel, that a delegation of people at a time when everyone was saying that the Ayatollah was not going to live out the week and that factions were rising up as to who was going to be the government of Iran. This group was vouched for by, as I say, a third country responsible citizens who wanted to meet, a meeting somehow with representatives of the United States as to how there could be a better relationship between a government of Iran and the United States. And it had to be covert because these people would obviously have been executed if anyone in the government had known that they were doing what they were doing. So these people of ours were there meeting on that setup. I told exactly what, how the thing of arms came about. They, word came back to us that the people they were dealing with for two reasons wanted a token shipment of arms, of weapons. One, this would convince them that the people they were dealing with actually had access to the top of government here. The second one was they would turn it over to the Revolutionary Guard in Iran but to the regular military which had been created you might say in large part by the United States and it would give them the prestige they would need if they were to be able to take over the government and establish a democratic government there. My reply, first reply to them was we can't do business with countries that support terrorism. Their reply back was that they themselves were opposed to terrorism. There would be no support for it if they were governing Iran and they gave some personal incidents of where they as individuals had opposed terrorism. So my word went back to them, all right, but we believe that the group that is holding our people hostage has a philosophical relationship with Iran. If you will use your influence to try and get our hostages free, we will meet your request. And they were the ones who specified the tow missiles. The tow missiles could be shipped on one airplane. They didn't in any way alter the balance between the Iran and Iraq and the war that was going on because we were trying to help bring about an end to that war. So this we did, and it was all covert and so forth. And it wasn't until the thing was exposed by that Beirut paper, not too reliable sheet, but the whole press, as you know, took off on what had been exposed. But no, because they said it was trading arms for hostages. Well, I don't think we had people here that said this is what it's going to appear to be. And I said, wait a minute, if I've got someone kidnapped in my family and I don't pay ransom because that just encourages further kidnapping, but if I find there is someone else that possibly could get my family member back for me, yes, I'd be happy to do something for that individual. Well, that's what this situation was. These were people, we were never dealing with the kidnappers. These were people who I thought could have an influence and help get it back and they were asking a favor for themselves. So this was the, and the day after was when the attorney general came in. He had been looking in to make sure there were no smoking guns or things we didn't know about. And he had found a paper that for the first time we'd gotten our price that we'd asked for the weapons been sent to us. He found a paper that indicated there was more money. In other words, someone had increased the price. And that's what I went in and told. And the same day I told the congressional leadership. But we're saying that why do you keep absolving North and Point Dexter? And they obviously raised the price. They took the money and they gave some of it to the Contras, some in a Swiss bank. That we have no way of knowing any of that. This is the thing that I'm still waiting to find out. This is why I was the first one to appoint a commission to look into this, to find out. How was their extra money? They admitted they did it under immunity. But how that money was obtained, I don't know. I knew that we couldn't deliver the weapons all the way to Iran. Then that wouldn't be a covert operation anymore. We delivered them to the people we were doing business with. How they got the weapons on, I don't know. How the price was increased to see that there was more money. I did not know. And I believe that, well, I don't think that there has been yet any declaration of a crime, a violation of law. Well, they've been charged. They've both been charged. But you've seen that the charges that have been dropped also. Sir, can we just stick with this for a second? Is it fair to say, is it fair to summarize your feelings about this business of partners for North and Point Dexter? That short of having the release of information, you consider too sensitive to the national security to be released in a public trial. Is it your feeling as you leave the presidency that these trials should go forward? Because neither Ronald Reagan nor the American people know precisely what became of the money. And that's your attitude is that that should come out even if, for example, it creates a lot of distractions for George Bush's first 100 days. Well, as I've said before, there have been implications of, well, that would be crimes, personal gain and so forth. A pardon now before a trial would leave them forever after with that guilt hanging over them. I see that they let the legal process go forward and then determine with regard to pardon. I have to say this. I think there is a great likelihood that their operating covertly and then not telling me some things could have been an effort to protect me. In other words, to not involve me in any way, not in crime, but in some of the procedures that they followed. Have you ever talked to them about it? No, because I felt, and it was felt by all of us, that when this thing was exposed, and obviously there had been things not told to me, that I had to do what I did and that is ask for the resignation. Do you still believe these trials should be held at least in part to get the story out of what happened, to have a system of justice resolve what really happened? Yes, because I can't believe that either one of these men was guilty of any criminal activity myself. And I think that this is what would be hanging over them, the shadow that they were, unless the process goes forward. Why does Bush Shades was out of the loop on all this? When you said he was part of every decision? Well, he did not get into the discussions. There was a difference between some of our cabinet members and me. Now, the difference was never, as it has been again reported. Secretary Schulz, Secretary Weinberg, they were opposed, not on the basis that this was arms for hostages. They both felt very strongly that if it was ever exposed or came to light, that this is what it would be made to appear. Well, they turned out to be right. It didn't take 24 hours for this to be portrayed as arms for hostages. Well, he was present at some meetings when this took place, but he did not enter into the discussion because it was a decision of mine and with regard to some disagreements in the part of others. Mr. President, the final question. If you had just one single piece of advice that you could leave with George Bush, what would that be? Well, I have reserved ever suggesting any advice or giving any advice. I would give it if it were asked, but I don't think it's proper for me to just volunteer such advice. What would your role be as an ex-president? Will you be kind of a president emeritus? Have you talked with Mr. Bush about being in consultation about the affairs of state? No, because there is a system that prevails in which all former presidents are regularly advised of what is going on in the government here. Now, I have approved and sent on those reports to the existing previous presidents and all of them, and when I've been doing it, I've been saying to myself, well, pretty soon I'll be getting these reports. So, no, but if ever he thought there was anything that I could be helpful in or wanted to ask advice, well, I would probably try to do my best to comply. We must know how to handle something on how to handle the presidency. Some one little quick reward? Well, as I say, he's been so close to this and every week we lunch together and he's the president of the cabinet meetings. Mr. Trump, he's had a big advantage in that respect. He has a big advantage in that. Yes. I made up my mind long before I was here, in fact, when I was a governor with regard to a lieutenant governor, that this whole concept down through the years of a vice president and a lieutenant governor in the state level just keeps someone sitting there waiting to see if something happens to me was a waste of great talent. That they should be like an executive vice president of a corporation, and that's what I did as governor with a lieutenant governor, and that's what I did here. George had very, very much a part in the things that we did. I put him in charge of the task force to see how many regulations we could get rid of. Thank you, sir. You were supposed to be nice from the beginning. Thank you very much.