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QUESTION: But, Secretary Gates, this is not about the U.S. and the USSR anymore. It's not about the U.S. and Russia anymore. And critics, what they've seized on is this idea that American nuclear power, muscle, is ultimately what has deterred aggressors in the past. So, as you look at this posture review, disarmament decision, how does this deter a country like Iran or North Korea from, you know, a--going away from their nuclear ambitions?

SECRETARY GATES: Well, first of all, we have still a very powerful nuclear arsenal. The Nuclear Posture Review sets forth a process by which we will be able to modernize our nuclear stockpile to make it more reliable, safer, more secure and effective. We have, in addition to the nuclear deterrent today, a couple of things we didn't have in the Soviet days. We have missile defense now, and that's growing by leaps and bounds every year; significant budget increase for that this year both regional and the ground-based interceptors. And we have prompt global strike affording us some conventional alternatives on long-range missiles that we didn't have before. So, believe me, the chiefs and I wouldn't--the Joint Chiefs of Staff and I would not have wholeheartedly embraced not only the nuclear posture review but also the START agreement if we didn't think, at the end of the day, it made the United States stronger, not weaker.

QUESTION: But it still doesn't answer the question of if you're in Iran or North Korea and you've been proliferating even after disarmament started between the U.S. and Russian, what's to stop them from continuing down that path just because of this posture?

SECRETARY GATES: Well, first of all, I think it puts us in a much stronger position in terms of going to other countries and getting their support for putting pressure on the Iranians and the North Koreans. I think it also has, potentially, a deterrent effect on other countries who might be potential proliferaters as they look at North Korea and, and Iran.

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QUESTION: Let, let me talk to a related topic, and that is trying to deter Iran from building a nuclear weapons program.

Secretary Gates, is the notion of Iran becoming a nuclear power inevitable at this point? Is the strategy of the U.S. government becoming more and more containment?

SECRETARY GATES: No, we have not, we have not made that--drawn that conclusion at all. And, in fact, we're doing everything we can to try and keep Iran from developing nuclear weapons. We have--we're probably going to get another U.N. Security Council resolution, and that's really, I mean, it's important, but it's all--in it's own, in it's own right, in terms of isolating Iran, but it's also important in terms of a legal platform for organizations like the E.U. and individual countries to take even more stringent actions against Iran. At the end of the day, what, what has to happen is the Iranian government has to decide that its own security is better served by not having nuclear weapons than by having them. And it's a combination of economic pressures, it's a combination of more missile defense and cooperation in the Gulf to show them that any attack would--we can defend against and react against. So I think it's a combination of, of all of these different options in terms of trying to convince the Iranians that, that they're headed down the wrong path.

QUESTION: Secretary Clinton, it raises to me a larger question about the U.S. role in the world. This president tried engagement as he came into office--engagement with the Iranians, engagements with the North Koreans. It hasn't worked. They don't want to talk. They don't want to dance with this president. So what is the next phase then? What is America's influence in the world?

SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, David, I would argue because the president was willing to offer engagement, we actually have more support vis-a-vis North Korea and Iran than was certainly present when he became president. The fact that Iran and North Korea have not responded makes our case, in a way. And if you look at North Korea, for example, we now have a very clear understanding with the other members of the six party talks, led by China, that North Korea cannot be permitted to just go on its own course, that it has to be pressured to come back into this framework to try to get to the denuclearization of the peninsula.

With Iran, a lot of countries were on the sidelines. Their attitude was, "Well, you know, the United States, you know, they're just hurling insults. They're not really, you know, willing to have any diplomatic engagement." We said, "OK, fine. We're willing." We, we stretched out our hand. The president made extraordinary efforts. It was the Iranians who refused. That has brought more people to the table. We have unity in what's called the P5-plus-1, the permanent members of the U.N. plus Germany. They are meeting in New York as, as we speak, to begin the hard process of coming up with the language of a resolution.

QUESTION: So you don't think the U.S. would have to go, go it alone on sanctions before bringing others?

SECRETARY CLINTON: No, not at all.

QUESTION: Before going to the United Nations?

SECRETARY CLINTON: No, I think...

QUESTION: Because you don't have results yet. You say there's been all this unity, but there's been missed deadlines and you still don't have results.

SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, but, you know, David, I have--I'm a big believer in strategic patience. I mean, you know, if we, if we could wave the magic wand and get everybody to move like we could. But that's never been the case in the world. You, you work through persuasion. You present evidence. We have been consistently doing so. And, as Secretary Gates just said, the Security Council resolution will not in any way forestall us or the E.U. or other concerned countries from taking additional steps. But it will send a really powerful message. The Iranians have been beating down the doors of every country in the world to try to avoid a Security Council resolution. And what we have found over the last months, because of our strategic patience and our willingness to keep on this issue, is that countries are finally saying, "You know, I kind of get it. I get that they didn't, they didn't cooperate. They're the ones who shut the door, and now we have to do something."

QUESTION: Is a nuclear-capable Iran as dangerous as a nuclear state of Iran?

SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, clearly, weapons are more dangerous than potential. Potentially is troubling, too.

QUESTION: Are they capable now?

SECRETARY CLINTON: They're, you know, that, that's an issue upon which intelligence services still differ. But our goal is to prevent them from having nuclear weapons.

QUESTION: Secretary Gates, I want to ask you about...

SECRETARY GATES: I'd say it's our judgment here...

QUESTION: Yeah.

SECRETARY GATES: ...they are not nuclear capable.

QUESTION: They are not nuclear capable?

SECRETARY GATES: Not yet.

QUESTION: And is that just as dangerous as being a nuclear state to your mind?

SECRETARY GATES: Only in this respect: how you differentiate. How far, how far have they gone? If they--if their policy is to go to the threshold but not assemble a nuclear weapon, how do you tell that they have not assembled? So it becomes a serious verification question, and I, I don't actually know how you would verify that. So they are continuing to make progress on these programs. It's going slower, slower than they anticipated, but they are moving in that direction.

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