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CNN Live At Daybreak

CIA Director George Tenet Will Forcefully Defend His Agency

Aired February 05, 2004 - 06:24   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.


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: In just about three hours from now, the CIA director, George Tenet, will forcefully defend his agency. He'll speak out at his alma mater, Georgetown University, and the world will be watching avidly.
We take you live to Washington, D.C. and our producer there, Paul Courson -- good morning, Paul.

PAUL COURSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning.

COSTELLO: Of course, Tenet will talk about prewar intelligence and hopefully weapons of mass destruction. But this is an unusual step for him. His decision did not go through the usual White House vetting process.

Why?

COURSON: Well, it's unusual in the sense that the White House may not have gotten a draft report of the remarks that he'll deliver at Georgetown University. But it's certainly been a period of time now where the intelligence community collectively has been beat up on enough that you might expect Tenet to come forward and say look, here's our information, here's how we can defend it and kind of go with it from there.

COSTELLO: So will he just give his speech or will he take questions?

COURSON: Well, we hope he'll take questions. You know, that at the Pentagon briefings from time to time, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has turned to Tenet and said, look, ask him the questions about Saddam Hussein, who's been held and has been interrogated. It's been turned to Tenet to tell us what Saddam might be telling people.

COSTELLO: Interesting.

You know, oddly enough, it's been a year since Colin Powell made a case for war at the United Nations.

Let's take you back for a second.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: We have firsthand descriptions of biological weapons factories on wheels and on rails. The trucks and train cars are easily moved and are designed to evade detection by inspectors. In a matter of months, they can produce a quantity of biological poison equal to the entire amount that Iraq claimed to have produced in the years prior to the Gulf War.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: And, you know, we see Tenet sitting behind Powell at the United Nations.

How can he defend against that?

COURSON: Well, you'll notice that even in Powell's remarks there, it was kind of a theoretical, that they could produce in a matter of months such and such weapons of mass destruction. Even there, it sounded like he was cautious. And we get into the whole thing about how much weight do you attach to the intelligence that's been gathered.

You know, David Kay is out again today, too. He's got a public event in Washington at which he might be able to react to Tenet's comments. So it's a real point-counterpoint situation -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Well, you know, a lot of people are saying the CIA is being made a scapegoat in all of this.

Morale is down at the CIA and Tenet really cares about morale within his troops, doesn't he?

COURSON: He does. He has a track record of wanting to defend and uphold the spirits of those in the trenches, if you will, who look at all this intelligence information, analyze it, try to make sense out of what are considered millions of documents still yet to be analyzed. And we'll see, perhaps, in his remarks today at Georgetown just that sort of defense of those who are doing the work.

COSTELLO: Interesting.

Paul Courson live from Washington.

Thank you.

And, by the way, Tenet's speech is set for 9:30 Eastern this morning.

CNN will bring that to you live.

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




Agency>


Aired February 5, 2004 - 06:24   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: In just about three hours from now, the CIA director, George Tenet, will forcefully defend his agency. He'll speak out at his alma mater, Georgetown University, and the world will be watching avidly.
We take you live to Washington, D.C. and our producer there, Paul Courson -- good morning, Paul.

PAUL COURSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning.

COSTELLO: Of course, Tenet will talk about prewar intelligence and hopefully weapons of mass destruction. But this is an unusual step for him. His decision did not go through the usual White House vetting process.

Why?

COURSON: Well, it's unusual in the sense that the White House may not have gotten a draft report of the remarks that he'll deliver at Georgetown University. But it's certainly been a period of time now where the intelligence community collectively has been beat up on enough that you might expect Tenet to come forward and say look, here's our information, here's how we can defend it and kind of go with it from there.

COSTELLO: So will he just give his speech or will he take questions?

COURSON: Well, we hope he'll take questions. You know, that at the Pentagon briefings from time to time, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has turned to Tenet and said, look, ask him the questions about Saddam Hussein, who's been held and has been interrogated. It's been turned to Tenet to tell us what Saddam might be telling people.

COSTELLO: Interesting.

You know, oddly enough, it's been a year since Colin Powell made a case for war at the United Nations.

Let's take you back for a second.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: We have firsthand descriptions of biological weapons factories on wheels and on rails. The trucks and train cars are easily moved and are designed to evade detection by inspectors. In a matter of months, they can produce a quantity of biological poison equal to the entire amount that Iraq claimed to have produced in the years prior to the Gulf War.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: And, you know, we see Tenet sitting behind Powell at the United Nations.

How can he defend against that?

COURSON: Well, you'll notice that even in Powell's remarks there, it was kind of a theoretical, that they could produce in a matter of months such and such weapons of mass destruction. Even there, it sounded like he was cautious. And we get into the whole thing about how much weight do you attach to the intelligence that's been gathered.

You know, David Kay is out again today, too. He's got a public event in Washington at which he might be able to react to Tenet's comments. So it's a real point-counterpoint situation -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Well, you know, a lot of people are saying the CIA is being made a scapegoat in all of this.

Morale is down at the CIA and Tenet really cares about morale within his troops, doesn't he?

COURSON: He does. He has a track record of wanting to defend and uphold the spirits of those in the trenches, if you will, who look at all this intelligence information, analyze it, try to make sense out of what are considered millions of documents still yet to be analyzed. And we'll see, perhaps, in his remarks today at Georgetown just that sort of defense of those who are doing the work.

COSTELLO: Interesting.

Paul Courson live from Washington.

Thank you.

And, by the way, Tenet's speech is set for 9:30 Eastern this morning.

CNN will bring that to you live.

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




Agency>