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Lou Dobbs Tonight
Negroponte Chosen to Head National Intelligence; Official Says Terrorists May be Entering Country from Mexico
Aired February 17, 2005 - 18:00 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.
ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Thursday, February 17. Here now for an hour of news, debate and opinion is Lou Dobbs.
LOU DOBBS, HOST: Good evening,
President Bush today nominated John Negroponte as this country's first director of national intelligence. Negroponte, who is our ambassador to Iraq, is one of our most experienced diplomats. President Bush said Negroponte's job will be to stop terrorist attacks by ensuring that our 15 intelligence agencies work together as a single unified enterprise.
White House correspondent Suzanne Malveaux reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It was a compromise choice for Mr. Bush, who reached out to at least two former top administration officials before offering the job to Negroponte.
Mr. Bush had been coming under increasing fire from critics who charged the vacancy was crippling the intelligence committee's ability to deal with potential threats.
While Negroponte has four decades of diplomatic experience as the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, to the U.N., Mexico and the Philippines, he is seen as a surprise pick, with little experience in the intelligence field.
SEN. JOE LIEBERMAN (D), CONNECTICUT: I think I always expected that the person who became the DNI would be more of a national security expert and a leader, and would bring together the various experts on intelligence in the community.
MALVEAUX: As the newly created head of some 15 intelligence agencies, who will have to decide how they share a $40 billion budget, Mr. Bush argued Negroponte's background is especially suited for the task.
BUSH: This is going to take awhile to get a new culture in place, a different way of approaching the budget process. That's why I selected John. He's a diplomat.
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: This is a largely managerial challenge that he's going to face to start with. MALVEAUX: While Negroponte brings negotiation skills and trust, he lacks intelligence experience. His deputy, the president says, will provide the balance. Mr. Bush nominated Michael Hayden, who heads the largest agency within the intelligence community, to become Negroponte's deputy.
If the former ambassador is confirmed by the Senate, the president's chief intelligence officer will be walking into unchartered territory.
JOHN NEGROPONTE, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE NOMINEE: The most challenging assignment I have undertaken in more than 40 years of government service.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MALVEAUX: Now the director's office will not be located in the White House, to convey a sense of independence from the executive branch, but of course he will have the ear of the president on a regular basis, this new intelligence director.
That is because he is going to be the one who is going to be delivering the presidential daily brief, the assessment of the potential threats that the United States faces from around the world -- Lou.
DOBBS: Suzanne, thank you very much. Suzanne Malveaux from the White House.
John Negroponte's biggest challenge will be to end the bureaucratic in-fighting among our intelligence agencies. The CIA and the Pentagon in particular have clashed over their missions and their responsibilities in the global war on terror and against radical Islamists.
David Ensor has the report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAVID ENSOR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Power in Washington flows to those with access to the president, and those with control of budgets and personnel. Mr. Bush sought to make clear the new director of national intelligence will have both.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: He will have access on a daily basis in that he'll be my primary briefer.
ENSOR: On the estimated $40 billion intelligence budget, the president said Negroponte will determine who gets what.
BUSH: People make their case. There's a discussion, but ultimately John will make the decisions on the budget.
ENSOR: Former deputy director of central intelligence, John McLaughlin, who has joined CNN as an analyst, says Negroponte will have the work cut out for him. JOHN MCLAUGHLIN, FORMER DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE: It's the legislation that empowers him, not as precise as everyone would like it to be in authorizing his powers.
ENSOR: Critics charge that the intelligence reform law that sets up the DNI job contains too much ambiguity about budget and personnel power. They predict trouble between Negroponte and the Pentagon.
RICHARD FALKENRATH, CNN SECURITY ANALYST: I don't think a powerful job. This is a miserable job. This is one of the hardest in Washington. And it is so undefined, the authorities are so ambiguous, and the expectations are so high that it's unlikely to be a successful, fun experience for this person.
ENSOR: But the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee disagrees.
SEN. JAY ROCKEFELLER (R-WV), VICE CHAIRMAN, INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: If we had prescribed in Congress every relationship between each of the agencies, I think that would have been an enormous mistake and would have rendered this person more useless. This person can exercise power, and I think that's good.
ENSOR: As ambassador in Iraq and before, Negroponte has been a consumer of intelligence, but he has no intelligence experience. His new deputy, however, General Michael Hayden, head of the National Security Agency, is a seasoned hand.
Many present and former intelligence officials are praising the president's choice of Negroponte.
JAMES PAVITT, FORMER CIA SPY CHIEF: I think he will be a first- rate leader of this organization.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ENSOR: Negroponte called it his most challenging assignment in 40 years in government, and that may be putting it mildly. Being the first in anything is always harder. But the ambassador has been good at setting up and leading teams in a number of jobs in government. And CIA regulars, present and former, are promising him their full support -- Lou.
DOBBS: Thank you very much, David Ensor.
John Negroponte said today said timely and objective national intelligence is a critical national task. To complete that task, Negroponte will be drawing on 40 years experience in many of the world's trouble spots, from Vietnam to Iraq, in all sorts of roles.
Kitty Pilgrim has the report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BUSH: Congratulations, Godspeed.
KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): John Negroponte has managed to draw more than his share of top assignments.
LESLIE GELB, PRESIDENT EMERITUS, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS: He's a very straight diplomat, and he's always been given the toughest diplomatic assignments, whether it's down in Central America or the Philippines, or now in Iraq.
He really was handed a mess in the U.N., too, because the U.N. turned very strongly anti-American, so the job was much harder for John than for many of his predecessors.
PILGRIM: As U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from September 2001 to June 2004, his diplomatic talent was needed as the United States tried to convince member nations to approve military action against Saddam.
Then appointed as the first U.S. ambassador to the new Iraq, after the transfer of sovereignty, he headed the U.S. embassy in the violent struggle to transition to a representative government. Yet elections were held successfully.
Negroponte has been a career diplomat since 1960. Involved in peace talks after the war in Vietnam as a young man, he went on to serve foreign service posts in Asia, Europe, and Latin America. His ambassadorial duties in the late 1980s and 1990s included ambassadorships to the Philippines and Mexico.
During his four-year stint as U.S. ambassador to Honduras, he had a difficult balancing act in the battle against communism in the neighboring Sandinista government in Nicaragua.
Foreign policy veterans say his skills are perfect for the new assignment.
REP. PETE HOEKSTRA (R), MICHIGAN: I think his personal skills, the background, the diplomatic skills and those kinds of things, I think you've got a package that indicates this guy can be successful in the assignment that this president has given to him.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PILGRIM: Some foreign policy experts say to be so-called intelligence czar will take a skilled diplomat to coordinate the various power centers of the intelligence community, but they say that Negroponte's track record of being able to negotiate delicate situations makes them ideal for the new position -- Lou.
DOBBS: Kitty, thank you very much.
Later here in the broadcast I'll be talking with both the chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee about the president's appointment of John Negroponte. Senator Pat Roberts and Senator Jay Rockefeller will be joining me here.
One of the key issues facing the new director of national intelligence is the possibility that radical Islamist terrorists could infiltrate this country from Mexico. Yesterday, Admiral James Loy, the deputy secretary of homeland security, testified to Congress that al Qaeda may have considered using the Mexican border as an entry point.
Lisa Sylvester reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LISA SYLVESTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Admiral James Loy, the deputy chief of homeland security, gave this standard testimony when he spoke before Congress, warning that al Qaeda is still a threat.
But buried in his written testimony were new details of how the terrorist group might try to buy its way into the country through Mexico.
Quote, "Recent information from ongoing investigations, detentions and emerging threat streams strongly suggests that al Qaeda has considered using the Southwest border to infiltrate the United States. Al Qaeda leaders believe illegal entry is more advantageous than legal entry for operational security reasons," end quote.
Senator Dianne Feinstein highlighted the passage in questioning Admiral Loy.
SEN. DIANNE FEINSTEIN (D), CALIFORNIA: I've looked at the statistics for each country, and the so-called countries of concern -- Syria, Iran, others -- the numbers are up of penetrations through our southwest border.
SYLVESTER: When Mexican illegal aliens are caught, policy is to transfer them back across the border, but illegal aliens not of Mexican descent are freed, with only the promise that they'll return for a court date, a gaping security hole.
REP. SOLOMON ORTIZ (D), TEXAS: This is just common sense that once they pay $900 or $1,000 to a coyote, you think they're going to come back in three months and say, "Here I am. Send me back"?
SYLVESTER: Admiral Loy blames limited resources.
ADMIRAL JAMES LOY, DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL SECURITY: We are releasing because of the resource implications attendant to keeping them, and bedding them and detaining them until resolution can come of their -- of their individual cases.
SYLVESTER: But lawmakers worry that among those released in the American population could be a terrorist who simply walked across the border from Mexico.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SYLVESTER: Last year, there were nearly 45,000 illegal aliens not of Mexican descent who were released into the United States. That's up 48 percent from 2003 -- Lou.
DOBBS: The admiral -- did he make any specific recommendation, like, for example, taking control of our borders?
SYLVESTER: Well, he just reiterated some of the policies and the things that they've already been doing that you're well aware of, US- VISIT, for instance, using unmanned aerial vehicles, but no new ideas, Lou.
DOBBS: Thank you very much.
Nor, apparently, a new commitment.
That brings us to the subject of tonight's poll. The question: Do you believe securing our borders should be the first priority of national security -- homeland security? Yes or no. Cast your vote at loudobbs.com. We'll have the results later in the broadcast.
Still to come here, "Assault on the Middle Class." I'll be talking with Senator Edward Kennedy about his plan to protect American families from bankruptcy because of massive medical bills.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: We've reported here extensively on the Bush administration's free trade policies and their relationship to China and the rising power of China both economically and militarily.
Today, news that China has overtaken the United States as the world's biggest consumer of many basic and consumers goods. The Chinese are now the world's largest consumers of grain, of meat, coal and steel. That according to the Earth Policy Institute. And in consumer goods, the Chinese have topped Americans in purchases of refrigerators, televisions and cell phones.
Today's report demonstrates the Chinese economy is firmly on track to become larger than the U.S. economy within the next quarter century. China, because of U.S. trade policies, is dealing a devastating blow to another industry in this country -- our food industry, specifically garlic producers.
Garlic farmers are fighting cheap Chinese imports, but this latest battle with China goes beyond just garlic production. It has implications for nearly every American farmer and consumer.
Casey Wian reports from Bakersfield, California.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): You'd think U.S. garlic producers would be enjoying healthy profits. Garlic demand tripled during the 1990s. Instead, many are struggling just to survive.
Chinese exporters are using a loophole in U.S. trade law to illegally dump millions of pounds of cheap garlic on to the U.S. market.
JOHN LAYOUS, PARTNER, THE GARLIC CO.: The impact is kind of devastating. The company was able to stay profitable up until a year ago. A year ago, the amount of imports greatly increased.
WIAN: Through the late '90s, Chinese garlic imports averaged a million pounds a year. In 2001, the flood began, cresting at 86 million pounds last year, about a third of the entire U.S. garlic market. The Commerce Department has determined that China is illegally dumping garlic here, meaning it's being sold at prices far below what it would cost to produce in a market economy.
Importers of products under suspicion of dumping are supposed to post a cash bond. If they're found to be dumping, the government takes the money and transfers it to the damaged U.S. industry.
MICHAEL COURSEY, TRADE ATTORNEY: In 1995, the law was changed to allow imports from so-called new shippers, new companies, to bring in product without posting that cash deposit. This has turned into a disaster.
WIAN: Now Chinese garlic importers take advantage of a 10- to 18-month review period to dump as much garlic as they can, then disappear. Last year, Commerce ordered nearly $25 million in anti- dumping duties on Chinese garlic, but the Customs Department only collected $175,000 of that, less than a penny on every dollar.
(on camera): Cheap Chinese imports have forced California growers to cut the amount of garlic they plant. This company's acreage is down 30 percent from last year. Legislation to close the loophole died in Congress last year. Garlic producers plan to try again this year.
Meanwhile, as the fresh garlic business suffers, they're trying to compete with China by developing new products, such as roasted garlic chips, but that takes expensive new equipment and years for the investments to pay off. With many producers now losing money, time is running short.
Casey Wian, CNN, Bakersfield, California.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
DOBBS: The Senate Judiciary Committee today passed legislation that would make it more difficult for individuals to file for bankruptcy. Half of all personal bankruptcies in this country occur because of medical bills that are overwhelming.
Senator Edward Kennedy has proposed amendments to the current bankruptcy legislation which would protect American families from bankruptcy as a result of skyrocketing medical costs.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SEN. TED KENNEDY (D), MASSACHUSETTS: Well, the so-called bankruptcy bill that passed the Judiciary Committee today is not to really get after the free spenders. If that had been so, we would have passed it over five years ago.
This legislation was drafted by the credit card companies for the credit card companies, and the people that are falling victim to it are hard-working Americans, in most cases those that have extraordinary medical bills.
They'll have health insurance, but the extraordinary medical bills that they'll have as a result of cancer, as a result of a heart attack, as a result of a childhood disease, has just driven them into bankruptcy, and, rather than giving them a chance to get back on their feet, this is just going to provide indentured servitude to those individuals, to the credit card companies.
That's not what America is about. It's never been what bankruptcy has really been about, and it is basically wrong.
DOBBS: The Senator Majority Leader Bill Frist has said he will push and permit quick passage. What's your response?
KENNEDY: Well, I and others will have a series of amendments. More than half of the people that go into bankruptcy every year -- and there's been an extraordinary increase in the number of people going into bankruptcy, and that's because there's a good deal of outsourcing, as you're very familiar with.
Many Americans have been losing their jobs, losing their health insurance. There's been a decline in terms of the cost -- there's an increased cost of housing, increased cost of health care, increased cost of prescription drugs, increased cost of tuition, and, in a number of instances, this has tipped the scales for middle income, hard-working families into bankruptcy.
The most overwhelming issue has been the cost of health care. More than 50 percent of the bankruptcies in this country now is a result of extraordinary health conditions. A majority of those people had health insurance. They're hard-working, they try hard, and this bill, if it's permitted to pass, will really indenture those individuals and their families to the credit card companies for years.
It's not fair, it's not right, it's not what this country is about.
DOBBS: And, Senator, as you say, it's not what this country's about, yet we're having to deal with personal bankruptcies, your amendments, the legislation itself. Working men and women in this country being forced into bankruptcy when productivity has never been higher. The broader arc of this is that the middle class is simply under assault.
What is the mood there in the Senate on Capitol Hill to begin to focus on the true needs of working men and women in this country, providing real, real jobs with living wages?
KENNEDY: Well, that's the $64 question. It seems to me, as we hear time and again on your program, the real challenge is globalization, and are we going to be run out of this country because of the globalization, with the rush to outsourcing, the rush to the bottom with poorer jobs, part-time jobs? Are we going to accept the challenge of globalization and prepare every person in this country to be able to deal with globalization, prepare our country to deal with globalization and, as a result of it, still be the economic giant in 20 and 30 years from now, and, most importantly, have the national security capability to defend our nation and our interests around the world?
We just cannot continue to sit back, see outsourcing and see a rush to the bottom. That's what we're seeing at the present time.
DOBBS: Senator Kennedy, we thank you for being with us.
KENNEDY: Thank you very much.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
DOBBS: And as Senator Kennedy spoke, globalization and the challenge to future generations in this country, our special report "Culture in Decline," why the United States is now losing its edge in mathematics, science and engineering and how that threatens not only our prosperity, but our national security, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: Tonight, in our special report "Culture in Decline," this country is losing its edge in mathematics and science. The number of American students now studying math, science and engineering is on the decline, and, over the past 20 years, the number of students graduating from American colleges with engineering degrees is down almost 25 percent.
Bill Tucker has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BILL TUCKER, CNN FINANCIAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The most challenging question isn't on the blackboard.
JIM SIMONS, PRESIDENT, MATH FOR AMERICA: I can't find Americans. That is, the majority of the people that I've hired in the last seven or eight years, high-quality research people, are not U.S. people. They're not born in America, and they weren't educated in America.
TUCKER: Simons has been called the world's most successful hedge fund manager. He started Math for America last year to encourage math teachers.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The total integrand has to be continued.
TUCKER: He calls what's happening with math a crisis. Between 1995, and 2002, the number of American-born college students pursuing graduate degrees in science and engineering fell, while at the same time foreign grad students at U.S. colleges rose by 50 percent. More teachers with the knowledge and a passion for the subject are key to exciting students. DAMAN BOUYA, HIGH SCHOOL MATH TEACHER: I explain to them how CDs work and how cell phones work and how trigonometry is used. Without trigonometry or advanced trigonometry, you would not have cell phones today, you would not have television
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We all use math every day. Every day.
TUCKER: The head of the math department at the California Institute of Technology serves as a consultant on the CBS show "Numb3rs," which features a mathematician as the hero. He says that we not only have to get kids excited at an early age, we also have to overcome a cultural bias.
GARY LORDEN, CALTECH MATH DEPARTMENT CHAIR: I think the financial rewards of working in math, science and engineering are greatly underestimated. The idea that going into law or medicine kind of sets you up for life is very prevalent in many parts of this country, and I think it's an exaggeration.
TUCKER: What's at stake is simple. We've exported manufacturing. We're increasingly exporting product design.
C.D. MOTE, JR., PRESIDENT, UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND: If we lose our edge in innovation, then it's hard for me to see how we'll maintain our quality of life and even our national security going forward.
TUCKER: The biggest part of the problem may be that most people don't understand there's a problem.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TUCKER: It's not like we woke up and learned Russia had put a satellite into space, which back then sparked a national initiative on science education. This time, Lou, the threat has snuck up on us quietly, and we have yet to recognize that, in fact, it's upon us.
DOBBS: Well, we haven't been too quiet on this broadcast. A lot of people are waking up to this fact. We need to wake up to it now. The policymakers in Washington, whether in the Senate, the Congress or the White House, they should frankly be ashamed of the duplicity on the issue of the importance of this and what is being done about it because this -- they're playing literally games with future generations of this country and the national interests.
Thank you. Excellent report, Bill.
Bill Tucker.
Next, the powerful chairman and vice chairman of the Senator Intelligence Committee, Senator Pat Roberts, Republican, Senator Jay Rockefeller, Democrat, on the president's choice for the first director of national intelligence. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) DOBBS: In just a moment, I'll be joined by the chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. We'll be talking about the president's nominee for the first director of national intelligence.
But, first, these stories.
Iraq's electoral commission today certified the results of the nation's first democratic elections. The Shiite-dominated United Iraqi Alliance claimed a majority of the 275 seats in the new parliament.
FDA drug safety scientist Dr. David Graham today said the risk associated with so-called COX-2 pain medications, including Vioxx, appear to outweigh the benefits. Graham testified today before an FDA advisory panel that will recommend or not whether the drug should be taken off the market, Vioxx was pulled from the market in September. Graham said he sees a class effect of heart risk with similar drugs, including Celebrex.
The House of Representatives today easily passed legislation that will move most major class action lawsuits from state to federal courts. The measure is intended to limit multi-million-dollar verdicts against corporations. The Senate approved that bill last week. President Bush is expected to sign it into law tomorrow.
Over the past two days, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has faced tough questions from members of Congress on four separate committees. In Rumsfeld answers, he reaffirmed his reputation as being one of the most combative members of the president administration. And many members of Congress aren't happy.
Senior Pentagon correspondent, Jamie McIntyre, has the report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SENIOR PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Donald Rumsfeld is a hard man to pin down.
DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: I'd dearly love to be able to give you a specific date. I can't.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was wondering, do you have any comment on that?
RUMSFELD: Congressman, I don't. I'm not familiar with the cuts you're referring to.
MCINTYRE: "It's unknowable" is Rumsfeld's rote (ph) response to everything from how long the war in Iraq will last to how much it will cost
RUMSFELD: There's never been a war predictable to length, casualty or cost in the history of man kind.
MCINTYRE: A crafty political in fighter, Rumsfeld knows anything he says can and will be used against him, so he rarely goes out on a limb.
SEN. BARBARA MIKULSKI (D), ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: I remember your testimony that said this war isn't going to cost us anything.
RUMSFELD: I never said anything like that ever.
MIKULSKI: It's going to be paid for by frozen assets.
MCINTYRE: Rumsfeld was right, of course, it was his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, who made that rosy prediction. But Rumsfeld's routine refusal to share even his informed opinion infuriates his critics.
Senator John McCain, pressed for numbers of Iraqi insurgents, only to watch Rumsfeld easily evade the question.
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: Shouldn't the American people also know, the size and shape and nature of the enemy that we're facing, since it's their sons and daughters who are going to serve?
RUMSFELD: On the insurgency question, you -- one can't help but agree with you. In a perfect world, you would like very much to have a good grip on the numbers.
MCINTYRE (on camera): But Rumsfeld's world is never perfect. And unless he has a perfect bullet bulletproof answer, he's loathe to give his detractors any ammunition to use against him. It may be smart politics, but to some members of Congress, it's decidedly unsatisfying.
Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
DOBBS: Well, Secretary Rumsfeld will soon be working with the new director of national intelligence. If approved, that directory will be John Negroponte. And he may face some tough questions ahead as well. Negroponte will be responsible for the budgets of all 15 intelligence agencies, including those controlled by the Pentagon.
I'm joined now by the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Senator Pat Roberts and its vice chairman, Senator Jay Rockefeller. Gentlemen, good to have you with us.
SEN. PAT ROBERTS (R-KA), CHAIRMAN, INTELLIGENCE CMTE.: Good to be with you, Lou.
SEN. JAY ROCKEFELLER (D-WV), VICE CHAIRMAN, INTELLIGENCE CMTE.: Thank you.
DOBBS: First, Senator Roberts, the -- I -- this choice of Negroponte, do you fully who heartedly endorse it?
ROBERTS: I think it's an excellent pick. One of the things I've been trying to point out, that as a diplomat he has a lot of credibility with our allies. And after all, intelligence is an international challenge and responsibility. What Jay and I learned on the Intelligence Committee about the WMD inquiry, was that this was not only an American failure but a global failure.
So I think ambassador Negroponte's appointment will certainly buttress the credibility of U.S. intelligence with our allies. And I think as an ambassador, both working in the U.N. and certainly in Iraq, he's been a collector of intelligence. He's got great managerial experience, and goodness knows we need that within the intelligence community.
DOBBS: And your support as well, Senator Rockefeller?
ROCKEFELLER: Absolutely. And for somewhat comparable reasons. See, he isn't of the intelligence community. He's not of the military community. He's of the foreign service. And as Pat indicated, that gives him a world view. It also gives him a great sense of nuance of the situations of different countries, how they might feel, therefore what's possible, what's not possible. But he also got, today, the president's total blessing to do whatever he needed to do. He's the president's man. It's not on this subject, it's not Rumsfeld, it's John Negroponte. And he also has a first-rate deputy in General Michael Hayden.
ROBERTS: And let me add, Lou, there were some of us, (UNINTELLIGIBLE) who were worried about the authority that he would have under the new intelligence reform bill. The president made it very clear he would set and direct that budget authority, and that he was the doorkeeper of intelligence. So he laid those worries to rest.
DOBBS: Ask you both this question, because it occurs -- well, John Negroponte has a remarkable distinguished career of service to this country in a wide range of activities going back to the early days of Vietnam, in his postings there, through to U.N. Ambassador, and then of course, serving in Iraq.
He does not have experience with massive budgets, and certainly the intelligence budget is massive, if nothing else. His administrative experience is quite limited, compared to the challenge before him. Does that concern either of you?
ROBERTS: Well, there's always a concern about managing the budget in regards to the intelligence community, but let me say that as his deputy, he will have Lieutenant General Mike Hayden, who is recognized within the intelligence community as one of the very best that we've ever had in that capacity. He heads up the National Security Agency. He knows the community forward and backwards. I would even say, that it isn't so much how much money we spend on intelligence, we've been plusing that up -- that's a Washington word for increasing the funding or investment in intelligence...
DOBBS: Plusing that up.
ROBERTS: But are we spending it widely? And that's what Jay meant. He can bring a unique perspective, and then with the help of General Hayden, he has all the expertise that we need in regard to the intelligence community. DOBBS: May we turn, Senator Rockefeller, to a couple of other issues, and one, of course, is Iran, another is Iraq, and of course North Korea -- and Syria.
ROCKEFELLER: Thank you, Lou. Those are three easy ones.
DOBBS: OK, I just find it extraordinary that we -- I'm sorry, Senator Roberts.
ROBERTS: I said there were four, actually, but please -- yes, ask Jay those questions, please.
DOBBS: Well, I'm going to ask you both, if I may. The fact is, that we have seen the profile of the tensions with Syria and Iran rise markedly. North Korea of its own initiative has done so. Your thoughts, if I may, Senator Rockefeller first.
ROCKEFELLER: They're all very tough countries. I mean, Iraq has achieved a remarkable success in selection. That's one way of looking at it. Another way of looking at it is, they now enter into a new phase where they're going to be, you know, dealing with each other, and there could be new types of conflicts and trouble. Iran is nothing but trouble, and always has been that. We've not handled ourselves particularly well there over the last 15 years, on the other hand they haven't done anything to help. And they have a nuclear weapon probably on the way. In the case of North Korea, they certainly have a nuclear weapon, and the question is how many. And I think the overall question is that the president and we in Congress are going to have to have a policy towards North Korea and Iran, just as much in our mind as we do towards Iraq. And we don't at this point.
DOBBS: Senator Roberts, it is clear that quite purposefully, Secretary of State Rice, the White House has ratcheted up both the tension and public concern about each of these -- each of these hot spots, potentially. In the case of North Korea, is it your judgment that we have adequate intelligence to be making proper assessments? You brought up the issue of WAD. The great concern as we're sitting here tonight, beginning with our discussion with the national director of intelligence, is our capacity.
Are you satisfied that our intelligence is now valid for the United States in engaging these issues?
ROBERTS: I think we're in better shape than we have been before. I think we're making progress, but Senator Rockefeller and I learned a pretty good -- pretty good lesson with the WMD inquiry. We're not going to accept intelligence assessments or consensus threat analysis at face value. We're going to become more pre-emptive. We're going to become more proactive, that's the word that Jay uses. And we're going to use the same methodology.
I talked to Ambassador Negroponte about this. We're going to become -- or take a real hard look at the capabilities, what are our capabilities in regards to North Korea. Can we get credible intelligence that we can give to the policy maker, where a reasonable policy can be conducted? I still believe that that policy is a good one with the six-party talks, if North Korea will take part. That's a big if. So we're going to be more challenging on the committee. We're going to be asking some very tough questions.
DOBBS: Senator Roberts, Senator Rockefeller, we're out of time. We do thank you for being here. We appreciate it.
ROBERTS: Thank you, Lou.
ROCKEFELLER: Thank you, Lou.
DOBBS: Still ahead, expanding the U.S. military. Two leading senators today declared we don't have enough troops to fight the global war against radical Islamist terrorists. One of those senators is Senator Jack Reed, he's our guest next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have illustrated the huge dependence of our military on reservists and national guardsmen. But yesterday the chairman of the joint chiefs, General Richard Myers, testified before Congress that nearly all of the military's reserve components have failed to meet their recruiting goals over the past four months.
Joining me now to assess the situation is General David Grange. Dave, good to have you with us. What's your reaction to that assessment?
BRIG. GEN. DAVID GRANGE (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, I think that the problem we're going to have, Lou, is that with all the different conflicts we have coming up, they're going to have to permanently increase the size of the military. There's no way around it. There's nothing we can do.
DOBBS: The fact is there has been this, if you will, turbulence and noise around the Pentagon on the issue of raising the size of the military. The Pentagon seems to be in some disputatious mood about it, when you would think that they would embrace the idea of having more resources and manpower to carry out their responsibilities. What's going on?
GRANGE: Well, there's a lot of moves in place to get efficiencies out of the current structure of the military. And some of those will happen. In other words, to get jobs that are maybe overstrengthed in some areas that you don't need that many skills in that specialty and move them to combat arms, to fill out some of the ranks where we have shortages. But again, when you have this much commitment around the world, you do need a certain number of troops in order to meet all the commitments and have a proper rotation program to continue to put people in and out of the field on a continuous basis for some time to come.
DOBBS: And not only the broad responsibilities that we're putting on our military in Iraq and Afghanistan, but the global war against radical Islamist terrorism, the idea that we have an attitude abroad in the Pentagon, in the command staff, that we can continue to draw upon our National Guard and reservists to the extent that we have, is there a building consensus there that we need to help them out, that we need more manpower simply on that basis alone?
GRANGE: Well, the issue on the reserves, both reserves and national guardsmen, that are filling the ranks on many of these missions, and are doing a fantastic job. I mean, this is tough, taking a citizen soldier off the street, intensifying the training, and having them actually not supplement, but take the place of active duty troopers on the ground overseas in combat. And it's a tall order and they're doing a great job from what we can tell in the reports that come in. But how long can you do that? How long -- how many multiple rotations can you use?
And so there's inequities between benefits between active and reserves, there's this continuous rotation pulling these people out of civilian life, and so to sustain that properly, where the family's quality of life and the predictability is there, something has to happen.
DOBBS: And there is a morale issue here too, and morale was once best defined as, to me at least, as respect for leadership, and the fact that we're putting these kinds of burdens on our reservists, our national guardsmen, suggesting that we don't need -- the Pentagon suggesting we don't need more manpower, these recruiting goals have to fall, because people -- the most patriotic Americans aren't fools. They're watching what's happening, and that has to be part of the equation, don't you think, is to the reason we're not meeting those recruiting goals?
GRANGE: Yeah, I think so. There's always been, you know, a gap in the pay. That's always been a problem. And so, you know, people have to take care of their families. They know there's great jobs outside, especially with contractors and things like that. So that has to somehow get balanced out. And as well as, what we've just talked about earlier, on this predictability, it's a big deal. And so when you ask an employer to take their people away three times in a row, something has got to give eventually.
DOBBS: Eventually, and what we hope does give -- and I know you share this thought, Dave -- is we give as well as we're getting from these brave young men and women who are serving the country so well.
General David Grange, as always, good to have you with us.
GRANGE: Thank you, Lou.
DOBBS: Two leading senators today did introduce legislation that would permanently raise the size of the U.S. Army and the U.S. Marine Corps. Senator Jack Reed and Senator Chuck Hagel say the military has been dangerously stretched by the wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan. These senators want the Pentagon to add another 30,000 troops to the Army. That would increase the Army's strength to 532,000 troops. They also want another 3,000 Marines.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, as I suggested, has approved a temporary increase of 30,000 troops, but Rumsfeld insists it would be a mistake to authorize a permanent increase.
Joining me now from Capitol Hill is Senator Reed, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Good to have you with us, Senator.
SEN. JACK REED (D), RHODE ISLAND: Good to be with you, Lou.
DOBBS: You are joined on this issue against the secretary of defense, the man in charge of the military. Why is it that you and others, I must certainly point out, are in disagreement with the secretary of defense, who's responsible for our manpower?
REED: Well, we feel very strongly that we need more resources in the military, more manpower and more soldiers, basically, both in the Army and more Marines in the Marine Corps. And it's based upon our commitments overseas, it's based upon the operational tempo that we're seeing these troops deployed at a very rapid rate, it's based upon the recruitment issues, with respect to reserve components. All of the things that General Grange spoke about just preceding me.
It's an indication that it's overdue that we increase the size of the regular forces, because we can't -- we're in danger of breaking our army and preventing our national leaders from having the flexibility to confront not just Iraq and Afghanistan, but crises around the globe.
DOBBS: Senator, when you say that we're in danger of breaking our Army, our military, in point of fact, that is chilling, because we are engaged in a war, obviously in both Iraq and Afghanistan, but despite the casualties, the heavy casualties and the loss of life, it is a confined war. At the same time, this administration is, and in most cases most critics even suggest appropriately, focusing on the challenges presented by North Korea, by Iran and Syria in particular. What are we to do, because it's going to take time even with your authorized increase of 30,000 troops, it's going to take time to bring them online, should they be needed?
REED: Well, that's exactly right, Lou. In fact, Senator Hagel and I have been involved for two years to try to increase the strength of the regular Army and Marine Corps. And, frankly, if the Pentagon had been more responsive a year or two years ago, we would be that much further ahead.
We have a huge challenges, not just in Iraq and Afghanistan, but as you indicated, North Korea, Iran, and potential trouble spots that we're not even aware of at the moment. So I think it's better to move rapidly today to formalize what everyone in their -- what everyone really believes I think inside the building, is that we're going to need a larger army for many, many, years, not just the next few months.
DOBBS: Senator Jack Reed, we thank you for being with us here. We appreciate it.
REED: Thank you, Lou.
DOBBS: Next, an astonishing proposal to end the escalating nuclear confrontation between North Korea and the United States. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: China today announced that it will send a top official to North Korea this week in an effort to persuade North Korea to return to the six-party talks on dismantling the North Korean nuclear weapons program.
My guest tonight says, however, President Bush is the one who should be meeting face-to-face with Kim Jong Il. Bradley Martin is the author of a new book, "Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader: North Korea and the Kim Dynasty." Bradley Martin joins me now from New Orleans. Good to have you with us, Bradley.
BRADLEY MARTIN, AUTHOR: Good to be on the show.
DOBBS: I think we should quickly point out, there's considerable irony in the title of your book, correct?
MARTIN: Correct. This is a...
DOBBS: Go ahead.
MARTIN: It's from a propaganda song.
DOBBS: Propaganda songs seem to populate the air of North Korea, but there doesn't seem to be much propaganda associated with these claims of nuclear weapons. What is the North Korean -- in your judgment, because you covered the country for some time, what is the purpose of that revelation coming as it has?
MARTIN: Well, one is further deterrence. The nuclear weapons themselves are largely for deterrence, to keep us from attacking them, and the other is to let us know that maligned neglect, which has been basically the Bush administration policy, is not going to cut it, that they will always find some new surprise up their sleeves if we try that approach.
DOBBS: Let me question you on that, if I may, somewhat closely, Bradley, the idea that those weapons are for defense. Do you really believe that Kim Jong Il thinks the United States really wants to attack North Korea?
MARTIN: Oh, I think it would be done in a second if it could be done without major casualties, if it could be done as a clean preemptive attack, just take him out. I think Washington's mood is that he would be dead meat.
DOBBS: Really? And what is it you think is preventing it? The possession of a handful of nuclear weapons?
MARTIN: Oh, that's not the only thing. Of course, they have enormous conventional forces. And that's -- that would deter anybody from actually attacking their soil in a large-scale fashion.
DOBBS: The role here of China I find fascinating, because this threat, however you organize the geopolitics, it looks like the far greater tinderbox for China itself.
MARTIN: Of course, China does not want North Korea to have nuclear weapons, because, for one thing, then South Korea and Japan would want to have them, and they could very easily acquire them. And this would be unsettling for China.
DOBBS: So what is the resolution? President Clinton sent his Madeleine Albright, his secretary of state, over, agreements were made and agreements were broken by Kim Jong Il; commitments were made but never followed through by the New Korean government. What in the world should the Bush administration do?
MARTIN: OK. Well, the Clinton administration's initial dealings with North Korea were pretty satisfactory. That is, after Carter went over, President Carter. The framework that was set up actually worked to keep the plutonium weapons program frozen all those years until very recently. So that was not a failure. Madeleine Albright went over in the hopes of dealing with missiles, and that didn't -- there was no follow-through on that. Clinton went to the Middle East instead.
DOBBS: I'm sorry, Bradley, what do you think the answer is?
MARTIN: I think at this point, that we have no true irresolvable conflict of interest with North Korea, and we should end the hostility that we've had since 1950. We should find some way to be friends with these people, because the Cold War is over, they don't have an exportable ideology, there are no domino states out there about to fall to their persuasive powers. We should be concentrating on other enemies that are far more implacable than Kim Jong Il. We should make a deal with Kim Jong Il.
DOBBS: Well, I don't expect that you're going to be hearing immediately from the State Department or the White House about your recommendation, but we thank you for sharing it with us here tonight. Bradley Martin.
MARTIN: My pleasure. Thank you.
DOBBS: The book is "Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader," as it is put.
Still ahead, the results of tonight's poll. And we'll tell you what's ahead tomorrow. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: Now the results of our poll -- results overwhelming. Ninety-six percent of you say securing our borders should be the first priority of Homeland Security. Four percent disagree. Makes one wonder why those folks in Washington can't quite figure that one out.
We thank you for being with us tonight. We thank you for voting. Please join us here tomorrow. I'll be talking with the author of the book, "The Truth About the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do About It." And a bold plan in Congress that would give you the power to stop companies from exporting your personal information, financial and medical information, and maybe save American jobs in the process.
And our "Culture in Decline." High school graduates in this country facing fewer and fewer choices as jobs are being exported overseas. Be with us.
For all of us here, good night from New York. "ANDERSON COOPER 360" is next.
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Aired February 17, 2005 - 18:00 ET
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ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Thursday, February 17. Here now for an hour of news, debate and opinion is Lou Dobbs.
LOU DOBBS, HOST: Good evening,
President Bush today nominated John Negroponte as this country's first director of national intelligence. Negroponte, who is our ambassador to Iraq, is one of our most experienced diplomats. President Bush said Negroponte's job will be to stop terrorist attacks by ensuring that our 15 intelligence agencies work together as a single unified enterprise.
White House correspondent Suzanne Malveaux reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It was a compromise choice for Mr. Bush, who reached out to at least two former top administration officials before offering the job to Negroponte.
Mr. Bush had been coming under increasing fire from critics who charged the vacancy was crippling the intelligence committee's ability to deal with potential threats.
While Negroponte has four decades of diplomatic experience as the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, to the U.N., Mexico and the Philippines, he is seen as a surprise pick, with little experience in the intelligence field.
SEN. JOE LIEBERMAN (D), CONNECTICUT: I think I always expected that the person who became the DNI would be more of a national security expert and a leader, and would bring together the various experts on intelligence in the community.
MALVEAUX: As the newly created head of some 15 intelligence agencies, who will have to decide how they share a $40 billion budget, Mr. Bush argued Negroponte's background is especially suited for the task.
BUSH: This is going to take awhile to get a new culture in place, a different way of approaching the budget process. That's why I selected John. He's a diplomat.
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: This is a largely managerial challenge that he's going to face to start with. MALVEAUX: While Negroponte brings negotiation skills and trust, he lacks intelligence experience. His deputy, the president says, will provide the balance. Mr. Bush nominated Michael Hayden, who heads the largest agency within the intelligence community, to become Negroponte's deputy.
If the former ambassador is confirmed by the Senate, the president's chief intelligence officer will be walking into unchartered territory.
JOHN NEGROPONTE, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE NOMINEE: The most challenging assignment I have undertaken in more than 40 years of government service.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MALVEAUX: Now the director's office will not be located in the White House, to convey a sense of independence from the executive branch, but of course he will have the ear of the president on a regular basis, this new intelligence director.
That is because he is going to be the one who is going to be delivering the presidential daily brief, the assessment of the potential threats that the United States faces from around the world -- Lou.
DOBBS: Suzanne, thank you very much. Suzanne Malveaux from the White House.
John Negroponte's biggest challenge will be to end the bureaucratic in-fighting among our intelligence agencies. The CIA and the Pentagon in particular have clashed over their missions and their responsibilities in the global war on terror and against radical Islamists.
David Ensor has the report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAVID ENSOR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Power in Washington flows to those with access to the president, and those with control of budgets and personnel. Mr. Bush sought to make clear the new director of national intelligence will have both.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: He will have access on a daily basis in that he'll be my primary briefer.
ENSOR: On the estimated $40 billion intelligence budget, the president said Negroponte will determine who gets what.
BUSH: People make their case. There's a discussion, but ultimately John will make the decisions on the budget.
ENSOR: Former deputy director of central intelligence, John McLaughlin, who has joined CNN as an analyst, says Negroponte will have the work cut out for him. JOHN MCLAUGHLIN, FORMER DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE: It's the legislation that empowers him, not as precise as everyone would like it to be in authorizing his powers.
ENSOR: Critics charge that the intelligence reform law that sets up the DNI job contains too much ambiguity about budget and personnel power. They predict trouble between Negroponte and the Pentagon.
RICHARD FALKENRATH, CNN SECURITY ANALYST: I don't think a powerful job. This is a miserable job. This is one of the hardest in Washington. And it is so undefined, the authorities are so ambiguous, and the expectations are so high that it's unlikely to be a successful, fun experience for this person.
ENSOR: But the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee disagrees.
SEN. JAY ROCKEFELLER (R-WV), VICE CHAIRMAN, INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: If we had prescribed in Congress every relationship between each of the agencies, I think that would have been an enormous mistake and would have rendered this person more useless. This person can exercise power, and I think that's good.
ENSOR: As ambassador in Iraq and before, Negroponte has been a consumer of intelligence, but he has no intelligence experience. His new deputy, however, General Michael Hayden, head of the National Security Agency, is a seasoned hand.
Many present and former intelligence officials are praising the president's choice of Negroponte.
JAMES PAVITT, FORMER CIA SPY CHIEF: I think he will be a first- rate leader of this organization.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ENSOR: Negroponte called it his most challenging assignment in 40 years in government, and that may be putting it mildly. Being the first in anything is always harder. But the ambassador has been good at setting up and leading teams in a number of jobs in government. And CIA regulars, present and former, are promising him their full support -- Lou.
DOBBS: Thank you very much, David Ensor.
John Negroponte said today said timely and objective national intelligence is a critical national task. To complete that task, Negroponte will be drawing on 40 years experience in many of the world's trouble spots, from Vietnam to Iraq, in all sorts of roles.
Kitty Pilgrim has the report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BUSH: Congratulations, Godspeed.
KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): John Negroponte has managed to draw more than his share of top assignments.
LESLIE GELB, PRESIDENT EMERITUS, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS: He's a very straight diplomat, and he's always been given the toughest diplomatic assignments, whether it's down in Central America or the Philippines, or now in Iraq.
He really was handed a mess in the U.N., too, because the U.N. turned very strongly anti-American, so the job was much harder for John than for many of his predecessors.
PILGRIM: As U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from September 2001 to June 2004, his diplomatic talent was needed as the United States tried to convince member nations to approve military action against Saddam.
Then appointed as the first U.S. ambassador to the new Iraq, after the transfer of sovereignty, he headed the U.S. embassy in the violent struggle to transition to a representative government. Yet elections were held successfully.
Negroponte has been a career diplomat since 1960. Involved in peace talks after the war in Vietnam as a young man, he went on to serve foreign service posts in Asia, Europe, and Latin America. His ambassadorial duties in the late 1980s and 1990s included ambassadorships to the Philippines and Mexico.
During his four-year stint as U.S. ambassador to Honduras, he had a difficult balancing act in the battle against communism in the neighboring Sandinista government in Nicaragua.
Foreign policy veterans say his skills are perfect for the new assignment.
REP. PETE HOEKSTRA (R), MICHIGAN: I think his personal skills, the background, the diplomatic skills and those kinds of things, I think you've got a package that indicates this guy can be successful in the assignment that this president has given to him.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PILGRIM: Some foreign policy experts say to be so-called intelligence czar will take a skilled diplomat to coordinate the various power centers of the intelligence community, but they say that Negroponte's track record of being able to negotiate delicate situations makes them ideal for the new position -- Lou.
DOBBS: Kitty, thank you very much.
Later here in the broadcast I'll be talking with both the chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee about the president's appointment of John Negroponte. Senator Pat Roberts and Senator Jay Rockefeller will be joining me here.
One of the key issues facing the new director of national intelligence is the possibility that radical Islamist terrorists could infiltrate this country from Mexico. Yesterday, Admiral James Loy, the deputy secretary of homeland security, testified to Congress that al Qaeda may have considered using the Mexican border as an entry point.
Lisa Sylvester reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LISA SYLVESTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Admiral James Loy, the deputy chief of homeland security, gave this standard testimony when he spoke before Congress, warning that al Qaeda is still a threat.
But buried in his written testimony were new details of how the terrorist group might try to buy its way into the country through Mexico.
Quote, "Recent information from ongoing investigations, detentions and emerging threat streams strongly suggests that al Qaeda has considered using the Southwest border to infiltrate the United States. Al Qaeda leaders believe illegal entry is more advantageous than legal entry for operational security reasons," end quote.
Senator Dianne Feinstein highlighted the passage in questioning Admiral Loy.
SEN. DIANNE FEINSTEIN (D), CALIFORNIA: I've looked at the statistics for each country, and the so-called countries of concern -- Syria, Iran, others -- the numbers are up of penetrations through our southwest border.
SYLVESTER: When Mexican illegal aliens are caught, policy is to transfer them back across the border, but illegal aliens not of Mexican descent are freed, with only the promise that they'll return for a court date, a gaping security hole.
REP. SOLOMON ORTIZ (D), TEXAS: This is just common sense that once they pay $900 or $1,000 to a coyote, you think they're going to come back in three months and say, "Here I am. Send me back"?
SYLVESTER: Admiral Loy blames limited resources.
ADMIRAL JAMES LOY, DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL SECURITY: We are releasing because of the resource implications attendant to keeping them, and bedding them and detaining them until resolution can come of their -- of their individual cases.
SYLVESTER: But lawmakers worry that among those released in the American population could be a terrorist who simply walked across the border from Mexico.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SYLVESTER: Last year, there were nearly 45,000 illegal aliens not of Mexican descent who were released into the United States. That's up 48 percent from 2003 -- Lou.
DOBBS: The admiral -- did he make any specific recommendation, like, for example, taking control of our borders?
SYLVESTER: Well, he just reiterated some of the policies and the things that they've already been doing that you're well aware of, US- VISIT, for instance, using unmanned aerial vehicles, but no new ideas, Lou.
DOBBS: Thank you very much.
Nor, apparently, a new commitment.
That brings us to the subject of tonight's poll. The question: Do you believe securing our borders should be the first priority of national security -- homeland security? Yes or no. Cast your vote at loudobbs.com. We'll have the results later in the broadcast.
Still to come here, "Assault on the Middle Class." I'll be talking with Senator Edward Kennedy about his plan to protect American families from bankruptcy because of massive medical bills.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: We've reported here extensively on the Bush administration's free trade policies and their relationship to China and the rising power of China both economically and militarily.
Today, news that China has overtaken the United States as the world's biggest consumer of many basic and consumers goods. The Chinese are now the world's largest consumers of grain, of meat, coal and steel. That according to the Earth Policy Institute. And in consumer goods, the Chinese have topped Americans in purchases of refrigerators, televisions and cell phones.
Today's report demonstrates the Chinese economy is firmly on track to become larger than the U.S. economy within the next quarter century. China, because of U.S. trade policies, is dealing a devastating blow to another industry in this country -- our food industry, specifically garlic producers.
Garlic farmers are fighting cheap Chinese imports, but this latest battle with China goes beyond just garlic production. It has implications for nearly every American farmer and consumer.
Casey Wian reports from Bakersfield, California.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): You'd think U.S. garlic producers would be enjoying healthy profits. Garlic demand tripled during the 1990s. Instead, many are struggling just to survive.
Chinese exporters are using a loophole in U.S. trade law to illegally dump millions of pounds of cheap garlic on to the U.S. market.
JOHN LAYOUS, PARTNER, THE GARLIC CO.: The impact is kind of devastating. The company was able to stay profitable up until a year ago. A year ago, the amount of imports greatly increased.
WIAN: Through the late '90s, Chinese garlic imports averaged a million pounds a year. In 2001, the flood began, cresting at 86 million pounds last year, about a third of the entire U.S. garlic market. The Commerce Department has determined that China is illegally dumping garlic here, meaning it's being sold at prices far below what it would cost to produce in a market economy.
Importers of products under suspicion of dumping are supposed to post a cash bond. If they're found to be dumping, the government takes the money and transfers it to the damaged U.S. industry.
MICHAEL COURSEY, TRADE ATTORNEY: In 1995, the law was changed to allow imports from so-called new shippers, new companies, to bring in product without posting that cash deposit. This has turned into a disaster.
WIAN: Now Chinese garlic importers take advantage of a 10- to 18-month review period to dump as much garlic as they can, then disappear. Last year, Commerce ordered nearly $25 million in anti- dumping duties on Chinese garlic, but the Customs Department only collected $175,000 of that, less than a penny on every dollar.
(on camera): Cheap Chinese imports have forced California growers to cut the amount of garlic they plant. This company's acreage is down 30 percent from last year. Legislation to close the loophole died in Congress last year. Garlic producers plan to try again this year.
Meanwhile, as the fresh garlic business suffers, they're trying to compete with China by developing new products, such as roasted garlic chips, but that takes expensive new equipment and years for the investments to pay off. With many producers now losing money, time is running short.
Casey Wian, CNN, Bakersfield, California.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
DOBBS: The Senate Judiciary Committee today passed legislation that would make it more difficult for individuals to file for bankruptcy. Half of all personal bankruptcies in this country occur because of medical bills that are overwhelming.
Senator Edward Kennedy has proposed amendments to the current bankruptcy legislation which would protect American families from bankruptcy as a result of skyrocketing medical costs.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SEN. TED KENNEDY (D), MASSACHUSETTS: Well, the so-called bankruptcy bill that passed the Judiciary Committee today is not to really get after the free spenders. If that had been so, we would have passed it over five years ago.
This legislation was drafted by the credit card companies for the credit card companies, and the people that are falling victim to it are hard-working Americans, in most cases those that have extraordinary medical bills.
They'll have health insurance, but the extraordinary medical bills that they'll have as a result of cancer, as a result of a heart attack, as a result of a childhood disease, has just driven them into bankruptcy, and, rather than giving them a chance to get back on their feet, this is just going to provide indentured servitude to those individuals, to the credit card companies.
That's not what America is about. It's never been what bankruptcy has really been about, and it is basically wrong.
DOBBS: The Senator Majority Leader Bill Frist has said he will push and permit quick passage. What's your response?
KENNEDY: Well, I and others will have a series of amendments. More than half of the people that go into bankruptcy every year -- and there's been an extraordinary increase in the number of people going into bankruptcy, and that's because there's a good deal of outsourcing, as you're very familiar with.
Many Americans have been losing their jobs, losing their health insurance. There's been a decline in terms of the cost -- there's an increased cost of housing, increased cost of health care, increased cost of prescription drugs, increased cost of tuition, and, in a number of instances, this has tipped the scales for middle income, hard-working families into bankruptcy.
The most overwhelming issue has been the cost of health care. More than 50 percent of the bankruptcies in this country now is a result of extraordinary health conditions. A majority of those people had health insurance. They're hard-working, they try hard, and this bill, if it's permitted to pass, will really indenture those individuals and their families to the credit card companies for years.
It's not fair, it's not right, it's not what this country is about.
DOBBS: And, Senator, as you say, it's not what this country's about, yet we're having to deal with personal bankruptcies, your amendments, the legislation itself. Working men and women in this country being forced into bankruptcy when productivity has never been higher. The broader arc of this is that the middle class is simply under assault.
What is the mood there in the Senate on Capitol Hill to begin to focus on the true needs of working men and women in this country, providing real, real jobs with living wages?
KENNEDY: Well, that's the $64 question. It seems to me, as we hear time and again on your program, the real challenge is globalization, and are we going to be run out of this country because of the globalization, with the rush to outsourcing, the rush to the bottom with poorer jobs, part-time jobs? Are we going to accept the challenge of globalization and prepare every person in this country to be able to deal with globalization, prepare our country to deal with globalization and, as a result of it, still be the economic giant in 20 and 30 years from now, and, most importantly, have the national security capability to defend our nation and our interests around the world?
We just cannot continue to sit back, see outsourcing and see a rush to the bottom. That's what we're seeing at the present time.
DOBBS: Senator Kennedy, we thank you for being with us.
KENNEDY: Thank you very much.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
DOBBS: And as Senator Kennedy spoke, globalization and the challenge to future generations in this country, our special report "Culture in Decline," why the United States is now losing its edge in mathematics, science and engineering and how that threatens not only our prosperity, but our national security, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: Tonight, in our special report "Culture in Decline," this country is losing its edge in mathematics and science. The number of American students now studying math, science and engineering is on the decline, and, over the past 20 years, the number of students graduating from American colleges with engineering degrees is down almost 25 percent.
Bill Tucker has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BILL TUCKER, CNN FINANCIAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The most challenging question isn't on the blackboard.
JIM SIMONS, PRESIDENT, MATH FOR AMERICA: I can't find Americans. That is, the majority of the people that I've hired in the last seven or eight years, high-quality research people, are not U.S. people. They're not born in America, and they weren't educated in America.
TUCKER: Simons has been called the world's most successful hedge fund manager. He started Math for America last year to encourage math teachers.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The total integrand has to be continued.
TUCKER: He calls what's happening with math a crisis. Between 1995, and 2002, the number of American-born college students pursuing graduate degrees in science and engineering fell, while at the same time foreign grad students at U.S. colleges rose by 50 percent. More teachers with the knowledge and a passion for the subject are key to exciting students. DAMAN BOUYA, HIGH SCHOOL MATH TEACHER: I explain to them how CDs work and how cell phones work and how trigonometry is used. Without trigonometry or advanced trigonometry, you would not have cell phones today, you would not have television
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We all use math every day. Every day.
TUCKER: The head of the math department at the California Institute of Technology serves as a consultant on the CBS show "Numb3rs," which features a mathematician as the hero. He says that we not only have to get kids excited at an early age, we also have to overcome a cultural bias.
GARY LORDEN, CALTECH MATH DEPARTMENT CHAIR: I think the financial rewards of working in math, science and engineering are greatly underestimated. The idea that going into law or medicine kind of sets you up for life is very prevalent in many parts of this country, and I think it's an exaggeration.
TUCKER: What's at stake is simple. We've exported manufacturing. We're increasingly exporting product design.
C.D. MOTE, JR., PRESIDENT, UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND: If we lose our edge in innovation, then it's hard for me to see how we'll maintain our quality of life and even our national security going forward.
TUCKER: The biggest part of the problem may be that most people don't understand there's a problem.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TUCKER: It's not like we woke up and learned Russia had put a satellite into space, which back then sparked a national initiative on science education. This time, Lou, the threat has snuck up on us quietly, and we have yet to recognize that, in fact, it's upon us.
DOBBS: Well, we haven't been too quiet on this broadcast. A lot of people are waking up to this fact. We need to wake up to it now. The policymakers in Washington, whether in the Senate, the Congress or the White House, they should frankly be ashamed of the duplicity on the issue of the importance of this and what is being done about it because this -- they're playing literally games with future generations of this country and the national interests.
Thank you. Excellent report, Bill.
Bill Tucker.
Next, the powerful chairman and vice chairman of the Senator Intelligence Committee, Senator Pat Roberts, Republican, Senator Jay Rockefeller, Democrat, on the president's choice for the first director of national intelligence. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) DOBBS: In just a moment, I'll be joined by the chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. We'll be talking about the president's nominee for the first director of national intelligence.
But, first, these stories.
Iraq's electoral commission today certified the results of the nation's first democratic elections. The Shiite-dominated United Iraqi Alliance claimed a majority of the 275 seats in the new parliament.
FDA drug safety scientist Dr. David Graham today said the risk associated with so-called COX-2 pain medications, including Vioxx, appear to outweigh the benefits. Graham testified today before an FDA advisory panel that will recommend or not whether the drug should be taken off the market, Vioxx was pulled from the market in September. Graham said he sees a class effect of heart risk with similar drugs, including Celebrex.
The House of Representatives today easily passed legislation that will move most major class action lawsuits from state to federal courts. The measure is intended to limit multi-million-dollar verdicts against corporations. The Senate approved that bill last week. President Bush is expected to sign it into law tomorrow.
Over the past two days, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has faced tough questions from members of Congress on four separate committees. In Rumsfeld answers, he reaffirmed his reputation as being one of the most combative members of the president administration. And many members of Congress aren't happy.
Senior Pentagon correspondent, Jamie McIntyre, has the report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SENIOR PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Donald Rumsfeld is a hard man to pin down.
DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: I'd dearly love to be able to give you a specific date. I can't.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was wondering, do you have any comment on that?
RUMSFELD: Congressman, I don't. I'm not familiar with the cuts you're referring to.
MCINTYRE: "It's unknowable" is Rumsfeld's rote (ph) response to everything from how long the war in Iraq will last to how much it will cost
RUMSFELD: There's never been a war predictable to length, casualty or cost in the history of man kind.
MCINTYRE: A crafty political in fighter, Rumsfeld knows anything he says can and will be used against him, so he rarely goes out on a limb.
SEN. BARBARA MIKULSKI (D), ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: I remember your testimony that said this war isn't going to cost us anything.
RUMSFELD: I never said anything like that ever.
MIKULSKI: It's going to be paid for by frozen assets.
MCINTYRE: Rumsfeld was right, of course, it was his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, who made that rosy prediction. But Rumsfeld's routine refusal to share even his informed opinion infuriates his critics.
Senator John McCain, pressed for numbers of Iraqi insurgents, only to watch Rumsfeld easily evade the question.
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: Shouldn't the American people also know, the size and shape and nature of the enemy that we're facing, since it's their sons and daughters who are going to serve?
RUMSFELD: On the insurgency question, you -- one can't help but agree with you. In a perfect world, you would like very much to have a good grip on the numbers.
MCINTYRE (on camera): But Rumsfeld's world is never perfect. And unless he has a perfect bullet bulletproof answer, he's loathe to give his detractors any ammunition to use against him. It may be smart politics, but to some members of Congress, it's decidedly unsatisfying.
Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
DOBBS: Well, Secretary Rumsfeld will soon be working with the new director of national intelligence. If approved, that directory will be John Negroponte. And he may face some tough questions ahead as well. Negroponte will be responsible for the budgets of all 15 intelligence agencies, including those controlled by the Pentagon.
I'm joined now by the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Senator Pat Roberts and its vice chairman, Senator Jay Rockefeller. Gentlemen, good to have you with us.
SEN. PAT ROBERTS (R-KA), CHAIRMAN, INTELLIGENCE CMTE.: Good to be with you, Lou.
SEN. JAY ROCKEFELLER (D-WV), VICE CHAIRMAN, INTELLIGENCE CMTE.: Thank you.
DOBBS: First, Senator Roberts, the -- I -- this choice of Negroponte, do you fully who heartedly endorse it?
ROBERTS: I think it's an excellent pick. One of the things I've been trying to point out, that as a diplomat he has a lot of credibility with our allies. And after all, intelligence is an international challenge and responsibility. What Jay and I learned on the Intelligence Committee about the WMD inquiry, was that this was not only an American failure but a global failure.
So I think ambassador Negroponte's appointment will certainly buttress the credibility of U.S. intelligence with our allies. And I think as an ambassador, both working in the U.N. and certainly in Iraq, he's been a collector of intelligence. He's got great managerial experience, and goodness knows we need that within the intelligence community.
DOBBS: And your support as well, Senator Rockefeller?
ROCKEFELLER: Absolutely. And for somewhat comparable reasons. See, he isn't of the intelligence community. He's not of the military community. He's of the foreign service. And as Pat indicated, that gives him a world view. It also gives him a great sense of nuance of the situations of different countries, how they might feel, therefore what's possible, what's not possible. But he also got, today, the president's total blessing to do whatever he needed to do. He's the president's man. It's not on this subject, it's not Rumsfeld, it's John Negroponte. And he also has a first-rate deputy in General Michael Hayden.
ROBERTS: And let me add, Lou, there were some of us, (UNINTELLIGIBLE) who were worried about the authority that he would have under the new intelligence reform bill. The president made it very clear he would set and direct that budget authority, and that he was the doorkeeper of intelligence. So he laid those worries to rest.
DOBBS: Ask you both this question, because it occurs -- well, John Negroponte has a remarkable distinguished career of service to this country in a wide range of activities going back to the early days of Vietnam, in his postings there, through to U.N. Ambassador, and then of course, serving in Iraq.
He does not have experience with massive budgets, and certainly the intelligence budget is massive, if nothing else. His administrative experience is quite limited, compared to the challenge before him. Does that concern either of you?
ROBERTS: Well, there's always a concern about managing the budget in regards to the intelligence community, but let me say that as his deputy, he will have Lieutenant General Mike Hayden, who is recognized within the intelligence community as one of the very best that we've ever had in that capacity. He heads up the National Security Agency. He knows the community forward and backwards. I would even say, that it isn't so much how much money we spend on intelligence, we've been plusing that up -- that's a Washington word for increasing the funding or investment in intelligence...
DOBBS: Plusing that up.
ROBERTS: But are we spending it widely? And that's what Jay meant. He can bring a unique perspective, and then with the help of General Hayden, he has all the expertise that we need in regard to the intelligence community. DOBBS: May we turn, Senator Rockefeller, to a couple of other issues, and one, of course, is Iran, another is Iraq, and of course North Korea -- and Syria.
ROCKEFELLER: Thank you, Lou. Those are three easy ones.
DOBBS: OK, I just find it extraordinary that we -- I'm sorry, Senator Roberts.
ROBERTS: I said there were four, actually, but please -- yes, ask Jay those questions, please.
DOBBS: Well, I'm going to ask you both, if I may. The fact is, that we have seen the profile of the tensions with Syria and Iran rise markedly. North Korea of its own initiative has done so. Your thoughts, if I may, Senator Rockefeller first.
ROCKEFELLER: They're all very tough countries. I mean, Iraq has achieved a remarkable success in selection. That's one way of looking at it. Another way of looking at it is, they now enter into a new phase where they're going to be, you know, dealing with each other, and there could be new types of conflicts and trouble. Iran is nothing but trouble, and always has been that. We've not handled ourselves particularly well there over the last 15 years, on the other hand they haven't done anything to help. And they have a nuclear weapon probably on the way. In the case of North Korea, they certainly have a nuclear weapon, and the question is how many. And I think the overall question is that the president and we in Congress are going to have to have a policy towards North Korea and Iran, just as much in our mind as we do towards Iraq. And we don't at this point.
DOBBS: Senator Roberts, it is clear that quite purposefully, Secretary of State Rice, the White House has ratcheted up both the tension and public concern about each of these -- each of these hot spots, potentially. In the case of North Korea, is it your judgment that we have adequate intelligence to be making proper assessments? You brought up the issue of WAD. The great concern as we're sitting here tonight, beginning with our discussion with the national director of intelligence, is our capacity.
Are you satisfied that our intelligence is now valid for the United States in engaging these issues?
ROBERTS: I think we're in better shape than we have been before. I think we're making progress, but Senator Rockefeller and I learned a pretty good -- pretty good lesson with the WMD inquiry. We're not going to accept intelligence assessments or consensus threat analysis at face value. We're going to become more pre-emptive. We're going to become more proactive, that's the word that Jay uses. And we're going to use the same methodology.
I talked to Ambassador Negroponte about this. We're going to become -- or take a real hard look at the capabilities, what are our capabilities in regards to North Korea. Can we get credible intelligence that we can give to the policy maker, where a reasonable policy can be conducted? I still believe that that policy is a good one with the six-party talks, if North Korea will take part. That's a big if. So we're going to be more challenging on the committee. We're going to be asking some very tough questions.
DOBBS: Senator Roberts, Senator Rockefeller, we're out of time. We do thank you for being here. We appreciate it.
ROBERTS: Thank you, Lou.
ROCKEFELLER: Thank you, Lou.
DOBBS: Still ahead, expanding the U.S. military. Two leading senators today declared we don't have enough troops to fight the global war against radical Islamist terrorists. One of those senators is Senator Jack Reed, he's our guest next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have illustrated the huge dependence of our military on reservists and national guardsmen. But yesterday the chairman of the joint chiefs, General Richard Myers, testified before Congress that nearly all of the military's reserve components have failed to meet their recruiting goals over the past four months.
Joining me now to assess the situation is General David Grange. Dave, good to have you with us. What's your reaction to that assessment?
BRIG. GEN. DAVID GRANGE (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, I think that the problem we're going to have, Lou, is that with all the different conflicts we have coming up, they're going to have to permanently increase the size of the military. There's no way around it. There's nothing we can do.
DOBBS: The fact is there has been this, if you will, turbulence and noise around the Pentagon on the issue of raising the size of the military. The Pentagon seems to be in some disputatious mood about it, when you would think that they would embrace the idea of having more resources and manpower to carry out their responsibilities. What's going on?
GRANGE: Well, there's a lot of moves in place to get efficiencies out of the current structure of the military. And some of those will happen. In other words, to get jobs that are maybe overstrengthed in some areas that you don't need that many skills in that specialty and move them to combat arms, to fill out some of the ranks where we have shortages. But again, when you have this much commitment around the world, you do need a certain number of troops in order to meet all the commitments and have a proper rotation program to continue to put people in and out of the field on a continuous basis for some time to come.
DOBBS: And not only the broad responsibilities that we're putting on our military in Iraq and Afghanistan, but the global war against radical Islamist terrorism, the idea that we have an attitude abroad in the Pentagon, in the command staff, that we can continue to draw upon our National Guard and reservists to the extent that we have, is there a building consensus there that we need to help them out, that we need more manpower simply on that basis alone?
GRANGE: Well, the issue on the reserves, both reserves and national guardsmen, that are filling the ranks on many of these missions, and are doing a fantastic job. I mean, this is tough, taking a citizen soldier off the street, intensifying the training, and having them actually not supplement, but take the place of active duty troopers on the ground overseas in combat. And it's a tall order and they're doing a great job from what we can tell in the reports that come in. But how long can you do that? How long -- how many multiple rotations can you use?
And so there's inequities between benefits between active and reserves, there's this continuous rotation pulling these people out of civilian life, and so to sustain that properly, where the family's quality of life and the predictability is there, something has to happen.
DOBBS: And there is a morale issue here too, and morale was once best defined as, to me at least, as respect for leadership, and the fact that we're putting these kinds of burdens on our reservists, our national guardsmen, suggesting that we don't need -- the Pentagon suggesting we don't need more manpower, these recruiting goals have to fall, because people -- the most patriotic Americans aren't fools. They're watching what's happening, and that has to be part of the equation, don't you think, is to the reason we're not meeting those recruiting goals?
GRANGE: Yeah, I think so. There's always been, you know, a gap in the pay. That's always been a problem. And so, you know, people have to take care of their families. They know there's great jobs outside, especially with contractors and things like that. So that has to somehow get balanced out. And as well as, what we've just talked about earlier, on this predictability, it's a big deal. And so when you ask an employer to take their people away three times in a row, something has got to give eventually.
DOBBS: Eventually, and what we hope does give -- and I know you share this thought, Dave -- is we give as well as we're getting from these brave young men and women who are serving the country so well.
General David Grange, as always, good to have you with us.
GRANGE: Thank you, Lou.
DOBBS: Two leading senators today did introduce legislation that would permanently raise the size of the U.S. Army and the U.S. Marine Corps. Senator Jack Reed and Senator Chuck Hagel say the military has been dangerously stretched by the wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan. These senators want the Pentagon to add another 30,000 troops to the Army. That would increase the Army's strength to 532,000 troops. They also want another 3,000 Marines.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, as I suggested, has approved a temporary increase of 30,000 troops, but Rumsfeld insists it would be a mistake to authorize a permanent increase.
Joining me now from Capitol Hill is Senator Reed, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Good to have you with us, Senator.
SEN. JACK REED (D), RHODE ISLAND: Good to be with you, Lou.
DOBBS: You are joined on this issue against the secretary of defense, the man in charge of the military. Why is it that you and others, I must certainly point out, are in disagreement with the secretary of defense, who's responsible for our manpower?
REED: Well, we feel very strongly that we need more resources in the military, more manpower and more soldiers, basically, both in the Army and more Marines in the Marine Corps. And it's based upon our commitments overseas, it's based upon the operational tempo that we're seeing these troops deployed at a very rapid rate, it's based upon the recruitment issues, with respect to reserve components. All of the things that General Grange spoke about just preceding me.
It's an indication that it's overdue that we increase the size of the regular forces, because we can't -- we're in danger of breaking our army and preventing our national leaders from having the flexibility to confront not just Iraq and Afghanistan, but crises around the globe.
DOBBS: Senator, when you say that we're in danger of breaking our Army, our military, in point of fact, that is chilling, because we are engaged in a war, obviously in both Iraq and Afghanistan, but despite the casualties, the heavy casualties and the loss of life, it is a confined war. At the same time, this administration is, and in most cases most critics even suggest appropriately, focusing on the challenges presented by North Korea, by Iran and Syria in particular. What are we to do, because it's going to take time even with your authorized increase of 30,000 troops, it's going to take time to bring them online, should they be needed?
REED: Well, that's exactly right, Lou. In fact, Senator Hagel and I have been involved for two years to try to increase the strength of the regular Army and Marine Corps. And, frankly, if the Pentagon had been more responsive a year or two years ago, we would be that much further ahead.
We have a huge challenges, not just in Iraq and Afghanistan, but as you indicated, North Korea, Iran, and potential trouble spots that we're not even aware of at the moment. So I think it's better to move rapidly today to formalize what everyone in their -- what everyone really believes I think inside the building, is that we're going to need a larger army for many, many, years, not just the next few months.
DOBBS: Senator Jack Reed, we thank you for being with us here. We appreciate it.
REED: Thank you, Lou.
DOBBS: Next, an astonishing proposal to end the escalating nuclear confrontation between North Korea and the United States. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: China today announced that it will send a top official to North Korea this week in an effort to persuade North Korea to return to the six-party talks on dismantling the North Korean nuclear weapons program.
My guest tonight says, however, President Bush is the one who should be meeting face-to-face with Kim Jong Il. Bradley Martin is the author of a new book, "Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader: North Korea and the Kim Dynasty." Bradley Martin joins me now from New Orleans. Good to have you with us, Bradley.
BRADLEY MARTIN, AUTHOR: Good to be on the show.
DOBBS: I think we should quickly point out, there's considerable irony in the title of your book, correct?
MARTIN: Correct. This is a...
DOBBS: Go ahead.
MARTIN: It's from a propaganda song.
DOBBS: Propaganda songs seem to populate the air of North Korea, but there doesn't seem to be much propaganda associated with these claims of nuclear weapons. What is the North Korean -- in your judgment, because you covered the country for some time, what is the purpose of that revelation coming as it has?
MARTIN: Well, one is further deterrence. The nuclear weapons themselves are largely for deterrence, to keep us from attacking them, and the other is to let us know that maligned neglect, which has been basically the Bush administration policy, is not going to cut it, that they will always find some new surprise up their sleeves if we try that approach.
DOBBS: Let me question you on that, if I may, somewhat closely, Bradley, the idea that those weapons are for defense. Do you really believe that Kim Jong Il thinks the United States really wants to attack North Korea?
MARTIN: Oh, I think it would be done in a second if it could be done without major casualties, if it could be done as a clean preemptive attack, just take him out. I think Washington's mood is that he would be dead meat.
DOBBS: Really? And what is it you think is preventing it? The possession of a handful of nuclear weapons?
MARTIN: Oh, that's not the only thing. Of course, they have enormous conventional forces. And that's -- that would deter anybody from actually attacking their soil in a large-scale fashion.
DOBBS: The role here of China I find fascinating, because this threat, however you organize the geopolitics, it looks like the far greater tinderbox for China itself.
MARTIN: Of course, China does not want North Korea to have nuclear weapons, because, for one thing, then South Korea and Japan would want to have them, and they could very easily acquire them. And this would be unsettling for China.
DOBBS: So what is the resolution? President Clinton sent his Madeleine Albright, his secretary of state, over, agreements were made and agreements were broken by Kim Jong Il; commitments were made but never followed through by the New Korean government. What in the world should the Bush administration do?
MARTIN: OK. Well, the Clinton administration's initial dealings with North Korea were pretty satisfactory. That is, after Carter went over, President Carter. The framework that was set up actually worked to keep the plutonium weapons program frozen all those years until very recently. So that was not a failure. Madeleine Albright went over in the hopes of dealing with missiles, and that didn't -- there was no follow-through on that. Clinton went to the Middle East instead.
DOBBS: I'm sorry, Bradley, what do you think the answer is?
MARTIN: I think at this point, that we have no true irresolvable conflict of interest with North Korea, and we should end the hostility that we've had since 1950. We should find some way to be friends with these people, because the Cold War is over, they don't have an exportable ideology, there are no domino states out there about to fall to their persuasive powers. We should be concentrating on other enemies that are far more implacable than Kim Jong Il. We should make a deal with Kim Jong Il.
DOBBS: Well, I don't expect that you're going to be hearing immediately from the State Department or the White House about your recommendation, but we thank you for sharing it with us here tonight. Bradley Martin.
MARTIN: My pleasure. Thank you.
DOBBS: The book is "Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader," as it is put.
Still ahead, the results of tonight's poll. And we'll tell you what's ahead tomorrow. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: Now the results of our poll -- results overwhelming. Ninety-six percent of you say securing our borders should be the first priority of Homeland Security. Four percent disagree. Makes one wonder why those folks in Washington can't quite figure that one out.
We thank you for being with us tonight. We thank you for voting. Please join us here tomorrow. I'll be talking with the author of the book, "The Truth About the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do About It." And a bold plan in Congress that would give you the power to stop companies from exporting your personal information, financial and medical information, and maybe save American jobs in the process.
And our "Culture in Decline." High school graduates in this country facing fewer and fewer choices as jobs are being exported overseas. Be with us.
For all of us here, good night from New York. "ANDERSON COOPER 360" is next.
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