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American Morning
Interview with Eric Margolis
Aired December 12, 2002 - 09:07 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.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Did Iraq sell nerve gas to terrorists affiliated with al Qaeda? As I just mentioned, the "Washington Post" today reporting that a possible exchange may have occurred within the past few weeks. Now, if it is true, does it mean Saddam Hussein has been supporting terrorists?
Well, Eric Margolis is the foreign editor of the Sun Media Group, and has written extensively on al Qaeda. He joins us from Toronto. We won't hold that against him. We like it better when you are here -- welcome back, Eric.
ERIC MARGOLIS, FOREIGN EDITOR, SUN MEDIA GROUP: Hello, Paula. I'm glad to have escaped New York's gridlock you had yesterday.
ZAHN: Well, it could only get worse if there is this transit strike which they are trying mightily to work out. Eric, let's go back to this front page story, and to put this all in perspective, I think we need to make it clear that UNSCOM in 1999 said it could not account for more than a ton of the VX agent known to have been produced in Iraq.
Now, let's factor that into the front page story you are seeing in "Washington Post" this morning. What do you make of it?
MARGOLIS: Paula, there is no doubt there is a large amount of VX nerve agent, the most advanced form that is and remains missing. The Iraqis say that they don't know where it is, or what happened to it. It is a big question mark. Whether Iraq sold it to al Qaeda through a third party as the story goes, I'm skeptical about that.
ZAHN: Why?
MARGOLIS: Well, as Winston Churchill said, truth is the first casualty of war, and we're getting a lot of sort of pro-war leaks and stories comes out of the government and other interested sources.
ZAHN: Wait, wait, wait a minute, Eric. This is a story that the Bush administration won't even confirm. They are saying they can't corroborate it. You are not suggesting that a member of the administration floated this story to the "Washington Post" are you?
MARGOLIS: Well, it seems to me to be a planted story that has come from someone in the administration, and when they don't have a hard story with facts and figures to it, they simply say, Well, we can't really deny or confirm it, we don't know it's true.
But the net effect of this is that people who listen to the news here and say, Yes, Iraq is applying chemical or biological weapons to terrorist groups.
Now, this story is interesting because it alleges that Iraq sold some amount of VX to an obscure Lebanese group, that is almost unheard of in the north of Lebanon, which then smuggled it out across Turkey, and somehow it has gotten into the hands of al Qaeda, it just -- the pieces don't add up...
ZAHN: Why though? Why is that so implausible?
MARGOLIS: Well, first of all, Iraq doesn't need the money to sell VX. Secondly, Iraq is under total observation at this point, and is desperately trying to avoid presenting any pretext for war which the U.S. government is very anxious to find.
So it seems unlikely the Iraqis would be trying to do something that they know would trigger a war immediately. Also, Iraq has had poisonous relations with militant Islamic groups all along. It has arrested, jailed, tortured, killed many of these people. The al Qaeda is a bitter enemy of Osama bin Laden (sic), it has called him the worst kind of despicable Arab despot. It's offered to send troops to fight him. We have no record of any cooperation between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein in spite of planted stories. For example, the famous Prague meeting which turned out to be fakes.
ZAHN: Oh, but I don't think that that analysis is entirely fair. Didn't you have one of the foreign ministers come out and still abide by the fact that he still believes to this day that that meeting happened?
MARGOLIS: That is something to do with Czech internal politics. My best understanding of this story, and what we hear from CIA and other reputable sources is that this smoking gun meeting actually never took place.
ZAHN: Let's come back to this front page story again. If it ends up being true, then help us understand how the Bush administration would factor this into their strategy. Is this the smoking gun, then, if this is corroborated, and does that mean we're at war come the end of January?
MARGOLIS: It would be a smoking gun. I know Bush administration officials have expressed concern that the inspectors will not find anything in Iraq, they will not provide a causus belli (ph) to start a war. So obviously, something else will have to be discovered to kick this war off by late December or January, certainly the latest February. If the story is true, it is very serious.
However, comma, I must caution that VX, nasty as it is, a drop on your skin will kill you, still requires -- to be an effective weapon requires special aerosol dispensing technologies, and a great deal of expertise that none of these terrorist groups would possess. The worst they could do is set it off in a subway or an apartment building to release it. It's a clumsy weapon, not very effective.
ZAHN: And buried in the same piece is the suggestion that the CIA has been looking seriously at that potential threat, and John King reported apparently looking at that since September 17 of 2001.
Eric Margolis, always good to hear from you. Thanks for your time this morning.
MARGOLIS: My pleasure, Paula.
ZAHN: You do have to come to New York before Christmas time so you can see all the lovely decorations.
MARGOLIS: Thank you, I was just there.
ZAHN: I missed you. Take care.
MARGOLIS: I missed you. Bye-bye.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired December 12, 2002 - 09:07 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Did Iraq sell nerve gas to terrorists affiliated with al Qaeda? As I just mentioned, the "Washington Post" today reporting that a possible exchange may have occurred within the past few weeks. Now, if it is true, does it mean Saddam Hussein has been supporting terrorists?
Well, Eric Margolis is the foreign editor of the Sun Media Group, and has written extensively on al Qaeda. He joins us from Toronto. We won't hold that against him. We like it better when you are here -- welcome back, Eric.
ERIC MARGOLIS, FOREIGN EDITOR, SUN MEDIA GROUP: Hello, Paula. I'm glad to have escaped New York's gridlock you had yesterday.
ZAHN: Well, it could only get worse if there is this transit strike which they are trying mightily to work out. Eric, let's go back to this front page story, and to put this all in perspective, I think we need to make it clear that UNSCOM in 1999 said it could not account for more than a ton of the VX agent known to have been produced in Iraq.
Now, let's factor that into the front page story you are seeing in "Washington Post" this morning. What do you make of it?
MARGOLIS: Paula, there is no doubt there is a large amount of VX nerve agent, the most advanced form that is and remains missing. The Iraqis say that they don't know where it is, or what happened to it. It is a big question mark. Whether Iraq sold it to al Qaeda through a third party as the story goes, I'm skeptical about that.
ZAHN: Why?
MARGOLIS: Well, as Winston Churchill said, truth is the first casualty of war, and we're getting a lot of sort of pro-war leaks and stories comes out of the government and other interested sources.
ZAHN: Wait, wait, wait a minute, Eric. This is a story that the Bush administration won't even confirm. They are saying they can't corroborate it. You are not suggesting that a member of the administration floated this story to the "Washington Post" are you?
MARGOLIS: Well, it seems to me to be a planted story that has come from someone in the administration, and when they don't have a hard story with facts and figures to it, they simply say, Well, we can't really deny or confirm it, we don't know it's true.
But the net effect of this is that people who listen to the news here and say, Yes, Iraq is applying chemical or biological weapons to terrorist groups.
Now, this story is interesting because it alleges that Iraq sold some amount of VX to an obscure Lebanese group, that is almost unheard of in the north of Lebanon, which then smuggled it out across Turkey, and somehow it has gotten into the hands of al Qaeda, it just -- the pieces don't add up...
ZAHN: Why though? Why is that so implausible?
MARGOLIS: Well, first of all, Iraq doesn't need the money to sell VX. Secondly, Iraq is under total observation at this point, and is desperately trying to avoid presenting any pretext for war which the U.S. government is very anxious to find.
So it seems unlikely the Iraqis would be trying to do something that they know would trigger a war immediately. Also, Iraq has had poisonous relations with militant Islamic groups all along. It has arrested, jailed, tortured, killed many of these people. The al Qaeda is a bitter enemy of Osama bin Laden (sic), it has called him the worst kind of despicable Arab despot. It's offered to send troops to fight him. We have no record of any cooperation between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein in spite of planted stories. For example, the famous Prague meeting which turned out to be fakes.
ZAHN: Oh, but I don't think that that analysis is entirely fair. Didn't you have one of the foreign ministers come out and still abide by the fact that he still believes to this day that that meeting happened?
MARGOLIS: That is something to do with Czech internal politics. My best understanding of this story, and what we hear from CIA and other reputable sources is that this smoking gun meeting actually never took place.
ZAHN: Let's come back to this front page story again. If it ends up being true, then help us understand how the Bush administration would factor this into their strategy. Is this the smoking gun, then, if this is corroborated, and does that mean we're at war come the end of January?
MARGOLIS: It would be a smoking gun. I know Bush administration officials have expressed concern that the inspectors will not find anything in Iraq, they will not provide a causus belli (ph) to start a war. So obviously, something else will have to be discovered to kick this war off by late December or January, certainly the latest February. If the story is true, it is very serious.
However, comma, I must caution that VX, nasty as it is, a drop on your skin will kill you, still requires -- to be an effective weapon requires special aerosol dispensing technologies, and a great deal of expertise that none of these terrorist groups would possess. The worst they could do is set it off in a subway or an apartment building to release it. It's a clumsy weapon, not very effective.
ZAHN: And buried in the same piece is the suggestion that the CIA has been looking seriously at that potential threat, and John King reported apparently looking at that since September 17 of 2001.
Eric Margolis, always good to hear from you. Thanks for your time this morning.
MARGOLIS: My pleasure, Paula.
ZAHN: You do have to come to New York before Christmas time so you can see all the lovely decorations.
MARGOLIS: Thank you, I was just there.
ZAHN: I missed you. Take care.
MARGOLIS: I missed you. Bye-bye.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
