Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Sunday Morning

Reports Indicate Noose is Tightening Around Taliban

Aired November 18, 2001 - 08:08   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN ANCHOR: U.S. officials say that the noose is tightening and that the Taliban may be losing more ground in Afghanistan this morning. As U.S. military forces keep up the pressure, CNN military analyst retired Air Force Major General Don Shepperd joins us live from Washington.

Good morning, General.

MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Morning, Martin.

SAVIDGE: Just in the last several hours, we have learned that the Taliban are at least willing to surrender in Konduz but only to the United Nations, not to Northern Alliance troops. As far as I know, there's not a significant force of U.N. troops there and that would seem to be problematic.

SHEPPERD: Yes, there's no U.N. force up there. They're surrounded by 30,000 of the Northern Alliance troops reportedly waiting for the Air Force strikes to take effect before they take military action. I think it's highly unlikely that the U.N. will accept responsibility for this surrender. Remember when the Northern Alliance troops supposedly went in the first time to accept surrender of the city, they were attacked so they're going to be very cautious about any move to let these people go that are inside their noose.

SAVIDGE: And moving to the south and the spiritual capital of Kandahar, the Taliban saying that they're willing to fight to the death. Do you believe that's credible?

SHEPPERD: It's credible. It's a very confusing situation down in Kandahar, because remember, Kandahar is the Pashtun area and the Pashtun are the major source of support for the Taliban. So you've got the Taliban agreeing to surrender to the Pashtuns from which they came and therefore it's really confusing to say what's going to happened down there. But it's fairly obvious that if the right thing doesn't happen there's going to be war in Kandahar and there's going to be significant fighting because also there's a lot of Arabs and other fighters down in that area that are -- that are going to be a real problem.

SAVIDGE: There's also some interesting stories coming out of this morning's "Washington Post." One, the CIA is fighting its own -- quote, unquote -- "secret war" on Afghanistan. What do we know of that?

SHEPPERD: Well, there's two reports in the "Washington Post," one about the CIA and the other about controversy between the Central Command in Florida and Air Force targeteers, if you will. I'm sure, by the way, that both of those stories are true. If there wasn't controversy, it would be the first war that there wasn't controversy over targeting.

The targeteers are responsible for finding targets and putting them in the crosshairs and then they have to go to a chain of command that approves pulling the trigger. That is sometimes cumbersome and slow in the best of times. Also, the CIA has been in that area for a long time. They're charged with a lot of the human intelligence. They develop their own targets.

And I'm sure they're in the area and I'm sure there is occasional conflicts between the military forces and them. But we've practiced working together. The CIA has representatives in all of the targeting agencies there. So this is kind of a normal piece of warfare with a lot of frustrations probably on both sides.

SAVIDGE: Do we know how far up the chain of command approval for hitting a target must go? I know there were other cases, say the Gulf War, where there was even talk decisions were made at the White House level.

SHEPPERD: It's fairly apparent the decisions are not made at the White House level in this war from the words coming out of the Secretary of Defense. There are probably certain levels of targets can be approved at lower levels and then there is a few targets that have to be approved at the highest level.

The concern of the commander is, look, we've got to be very careful about collateral damage. We can't just go because there's a truck convoy down there hosing off at every truck convoy. The commander, the SINK (ph), if you will, General Franks is responsible for the conduct of the war, for public opinion, for holding the coalition together and he will retain the rights in some cases.

But there is a review process and you have to make sure that the review process is rapid. We spent billions of dollars being able to put people in the crosshairs of things such as the Predator and you have to have a process that responds rapidly to use it.

SAVIDGE: This critique is not new, as we've heard, it's come up in other conflicts, but it does seem to be very public this time around. Does that surprise you?

SHEPPERD: No, it doesn't surprise me at all. If you think back in the Vietnam War, it was the -- we had the same frustrations there. I was involved in some operations in the Vietnam War where the rules of engagements prevented us from doing what was absolutely obvious should be done, such as truces during holidays and this type of thing not being allowed to hit lines of trucks until 6:00 in the evening at which they vanished. So this is -- this is simply not unusual. It has to be worked out over the course of a war and it's very frustrating to the people in the targeting cells that are charged with finding the targets and having them in the crosshairs.

SAVIDGE: And lastly, I want to talk about Osama bin Laden, the prospect that he could perhaps try to escape. It was the Secretary of Defense who said well it's not unlikely he could take a helicopter and hide flying through a ravine. I thought that there were aircraft up above that could look down and spot that very thing.

SHEPPERD: There are, Martin. But again, it's the same thing as targeting, you've got to be very careful who you shoot. Remember, we shot down one of our own aircraft -- two of our own helicopters before in Turkey with Americans onboard -- or rather, one of our helicopters, Americans onboard. It was a tragic, tragic accident. You've got a lot of special forces helicopters, you have CIA operating that area, you also have Northern Alliance with some helicopters and aircraft so you just can't shoot at every moving target.

There has to be careful, careful coordination. And so is it possible he could escape, sure. I'm one of Kathleen Koch's 41 percent that say finding him is somewhat likely but certainly not certain.

SAVIDGE: All right, thanks for your input. Major General Don Shepperd, as always, I'm sure we're going to talk again. Thank you, sir.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com