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Posted on 03/27/2002 3:16:28 AM PST by kattracks
Pacific Rim Bureau (CNSNews.com) - As New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark held what she called a "warm, positive" meeting with President Bush Tuesday, New Zealanders were pondering a claim by one of her predecessors that former Vice President Dan Quayle wanted to have him "liquidated" because he was pursuing a nuclear-free policy.
David Lange, a Labor Party prime minister between 1984 and 1989, told New Zealand TV that Quayle, vice-president under President Reagan, had made the threat during a meeting with Australian cabinet ministers. One of the ministers had informed him, he added later, declining to identify the source.
Lange's government had shortly beforehand brought in legislation barring entry to New Zealand ports of vessels that were either nuclear-powered or armed with nuclear weapons. The move effectively cut New Zealand out of the three-way ANZUS defense treaty with the U.S. and Australia.
Lange said his government was under massive pressure to rescind the policy.
"There was personal pressures, there were veiled threats, there were specific threats ... It was announced to the Australian Cabinet at one stage that I would have to be liquidated," he said, adding that the threat had come from Quayle.
He said he asked his security officials whether the threat should be taken seriously, and was told "I shouldn't regard it as a credible threat because the vice-president wasn't regarded as credible."
The leader of a small New Zealand party, ACT, Richard Prebble, said Wednesday that, as a member of the cabinet security committee under the Lange administration, he could recall no occasion on which Lange had mentioned threats from Quayle.
Lange had at the time told the committee of his discussions on the matter with other U.S. officials, including Defense Secretary George Schultz, "so it's incredible that he wouldn't mention a threat on his life," Prebble said.
"I believe the threat is all in Mr. Lange's mind," he added, questioning the former prime minister's "mental condition."
Lange is regarded in New Zealand as an outspoken and sometimes "colorful" character.
In Washington Tuesday, Clark became the first Labor premier of New Zealand to meet an American president since 1975. She also held talks with Secretary of State Colin Powell and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz.
Asked about Lange's allegation, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher told a press briefing the subject had not come up during a lunch hosted by Powell for Clark.
An official at the U.S. Embassy in Wellington called the claim "preposterous."
Meanwhile in Washington, Clark said after her meeting with Bush that despite the differences over nuclear policy, she was confident that "we have found a way to move forward in the relationship."
New Zealand has contributed a small contingent of Special Forces troops to the U.S.-led anti-terror war in Afghanistan, which has targeted the al-Qaeda terror network blamed for last September's attacks on the U.S.
Clark said she had told Bush she would not rule "out of hand" a request to support a campaign against terrorism beyond Afghanistan, in cases where there was evidence that al-Qaeda bases had emerged elsewhere.
But she added that New Zealand would not support an attack on Iraq, on the grounds there was no proof that Baghdad was involved in the Sept. 11 attacks.
After his meeting with Clark, Powell said he had a clear understanding of the New Zealand government's position on the nuclear issue, "and the prime minister certainly understands our position."
"It's one of those areas where we have a disagreement, but disagreements between close friends are not that unusual."
While the U.S. did not regard New Zealand as an ally because of the nuclear issue, Powell did describe the relationship as one between "very, very, very close friends."
See also:
U.S.-New Zealand Defense Policy Rift Lingers (Mar. 18, 2002)
E-mail a news tip to Patrick Goodenough.
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Hey, Einsten, Quayle was not the VP under Reagan. Duhhhhh, he was Bush's VP.
Incompetent reporting and editing.
(Best Jack Benney voice) Now cut that out! ;O)
This is what happens if you wrap the tinfoil too tightly around your head. It could cut off oxygen to the brain.
If Quayle threatened to kill him, he probably deserved to be killed.
And the media said Quayle was dumb.
That is all...
Actually, Dan Quayle saved this man's life.
In 1984, Lange was leaving a meeting at the White House with John Foster Dulles, Secretary of State to President Harding. As he entered the parking lot, three large men accosted him and began to beat him with billy-clubs and black-jacks. They said, "This is how we treat sheep herders in these parts!"
Dan Quayle, Vice-President under Ronald Reagan, walked up and said:
Okay, boys, he's had enough."
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