BAIER: More with Mr. Herman Cain and our panel in just a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BAIER: Back with Mr. Herman Cain in our "Center Seat" segment. We've been asking you to submit questions. Thousands coming in. Tom would like to know, would you stop sending taxpayer money for foreign aid, because we're suffering enough here at home?

CAIN: First, let's start with what my philosophy is, which is peace through strength and clarity, which is an extension of the Reagan philosophy. We need to clarify who our friends are, clarify who our enemies are, and, yes, stop giving money to our enemies. We lack clarity relative to foreign policy.

BAIER: Charles?

KRAUTHAMMER: A few weeks ago on Greta you were asked about the Iranian attempt at a terrorist attack on the U.S., what you would do about it. And you responded "I would have acted preemptively ahead of time by placing Aegis cruisers near Iran." How does placing Aegis cruisers affect Iran's determination to use terrorism against the United States?

CAIN: It won't deter their intent to use terrorism, but what it would do is it would let them know that we are serious if they fire a ballistic missile toward us, although right now they're not supposed to be able to fire that far, or if fire toward any of our friends like Israel, and to let them know that we have this capability. We're the only country in the world that has this capability, capable of ballistic missile defense at sea.

And what I would do also is double our fleet. We could double it and not only put them strategically in that part of the world but also protect our shores to defer them from feeling like they really want to fire a ballistic missile.

KRAUTHAMMER: But the Aegis is a defensive weapon. It intercepts a missile in flight. Iran doesn't have any they could actually hit the United States now. And moreover, a defensive weapon in no way deters an aggressive action. It could deter a launch of a missile. But it is not going to deter a terrorist campaign.

CAIN: No, it's not. It wasn't intended to mean that it's going to deter a terrorist campaign, not in the least. My point -- the point that I was trying to make was I'm concerned about their march toward having a nuclear weapon, a march toward having more ballistic weapon capability.

KRAUTHAMMER: But I don't see how Aegis affects even that at all.

CAIN: Well, the Aegis warships do have the capability with missiles to be able to detect and destroy them if they're detected early enough.

Two things -- here is what needs to happen. The land-based systems already have more advanced capability than the sea-based system. They need to be upgraded with the minimal amount of technology upgrade. This is what we have to do first in order to make it much more capable.

BAIER: Steve?

HAYES: Iran has been actively harboring senior Al Qaeda leaders for a decade and supporting, financing, training, and equipping terrorists who are killing American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. Are those acts of war?

CAIN: I believe that they are acts of war.

HAYES: And how would a President Cain respond to those "acts of war"?

CAIN: First of all, I don't agree with President Obama's approach in Iraq and Afghanistan. First, I would talk to the commanders on the ground. I've gotten the sense based on reports that his plan to reduce the troop level in Afghanistan, the commanders acted surprised, the same thing in Iraq. It's gonna leave a huge power vacuum. So I would have listened to the commanders on the ground first.

And secondly, I wouldn't have announced it to the enemy when we were going to leave.

The other thing I would have done differently is to make sure that it was clear what our mission was and it was clear what the definition of victory is. I would approach those decisions a whole lot differently than the current administration.

HAYES: But if Iran is already trying to fill the power vacuum that you suggest and they're doing it in ways that you are saying, were acts of war --

CAIN: -- is an act of war

HAYES: -- does that require military response?

CAIN: Not necessarily alone. The other thing that I would do, and we are already working on an energy independence plan. As soon as the United States gets serious about energy independence, it's going to put pressure on the price of oil and it's going to go down. Iran does not want the price of oil to go up. And simply by having a serious energy independence plan, we will put pressure on their economy. This is how we begin to get Iran in check economically as well as letting them know what our military might is.

BAIER: A.B.?

STODDARD: This is actually continuing on the same theme. Do you have any specific criticisms of the president's foreign policy except now that you've talk about Iraq and Afghanistan that you can share with us and possibly on the war in Libya? What mistakes you think he might have made in situations that you would have handled differently.

CAIN: Take Libya. It wasn't clear why we got involved. And now $1 billion later, it's a mess. Secondly, the people now running the country are our enemies. So I don't believe that it was clear why we went in to Libya. Take Iraq, back to this power vacuum. That's a specific example where I would not have agreed. We need according to some of the commanders on the ground, we need to leave troops there for a period of time.

STODDARD: You would not have been involved in the intervention in Libya?

CAIN: No, I didn't say I wouldn't have been involved. I might -- would have been involved in a different way. Once we clearly identified who's side we were on and who we were trying to help, then you determine whether or not you provide aid or you provide weapons or whatever the case may be. It wasn't clear why we were there or whose side we was on.

STODDARD: Well, I think there was a group effort to dispose Qaddafi at which they succeeded.

CAIN: Yes.

STODDARD: And it was a mess even if we had -- it was getting to be a bigger mess if we had not gone in. Do you agree with that?

CAIN: I would agree with that. But it goes back to my fundamental philosophy -- peace through strength and clarity. Every one of these situations we have been in has lacked clarity.

BAIER: Here's a quick one, Lisa Brown. "If you could have lunch with anyone dead or alive, who would it be and why?"

CAIN: Martin Luther King Jr., because he was one of the greatest leader of our time and in history.

BAIER: Mr. Cain, we really appreciate your time. Thank you for coming in to "Center Seat"

CAIN: Glad I survived this --

(LAUGHTER)

KRAUTHAMMER: Inquisition.