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Wolf

Former French Navy SEAL Talks Terrorism, Hostage Standoffs; 3 French Terrorists Killed, Female on the Run; Cultural, Economic Problems in France; Lessons to Learn from French Terror Attack; French President Comments on Standoffs.

Aired January 09, 2015 - 13:30   ET

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

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN: The third terror suspect inside the kosher market. What does he say?

FABRICE MAGNIER, FORMER FRENCH NAVY SEAL: I want to reach authorities, so tried to discus with him and ask, why are you doing that and explain do you have some -- the two brother and said --

(CROSSTALK)

CUOMO: So, he said, I am connected to the brother?

MAGNIER: Yes, I am connected with these guys. "Charlie Hebdo" was the target. My job was to target the police.

CUOMO: So, he did not put himself at "Charlie Hebdo," as the third member of the team here?

MAGNIER: Didn't say that.

CUOMO: But he did say I'm supposed to go hit these two other officers.

MAGNIER: Yes.

CUOMO: Remember, Wolf, two were shot. One was a female. Se died from her wounds.

MAGNIER: Then he decided to choose a grocery market to take hostages.

CUOMO: Why that market?

MAGNIER: Because he like it.

CUOMO: What do you mean?

MAGNIER: He liked that place.

CUOMO: He liked that place?

MAGNIER: Was protection inside and when he rush inside, he killed four hostages.

CUOMO: Was it because it was a Jewish market or he just thought it was a target of opportunity?

MAGNIER: I don't have that information.

CUOMO: So, we do know that part, Wolf. I know that was an important aspect we were dealing with.

However, what happened when he went in, you're saying right away, he killed?

MAGNIER: Yeah, he killed those four hostages.

CUOMO: He killed hostages. This is what he said to the magazine?

MAGNIER: Yes. And was 16 people inside.

CUOMO: 16.

MAGNIER: That's why so many people escaping from the grocery market when SWAT team --

CUOMO: So, by his own admission, he said he killed people when he entered inside and that there were 16 inside.

MAGNIER: Yes, yes. This is what we heard.

CUOMO: Wolf --

MAGNIER: And he said I'm working for ISIS.

CUOMO: ISIS? He said ISIS.

MAGNIER: It's interesting because one side we have al-Qaeda, Yemen, and the other side, we have the ISIS branch.

CUOMO: It's not completely consistent information, Wolf, but very interesting in piecing together the motivations and mind set of these men.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: We have not confirmed, Chris, that four of the hostages were murdered by this terrorist. Your guest is saying that. Ask him what the source is for that suggestion, that very alarming suggestion, that the terrorist went into that kosher supermarket and murdered four people right away.

CUOMO: Right.

Wolf is asking the obvious question, very important, that the man's admission that, I killed four people, I picked this, that's what he said to the magazine. That's the source of the information?

MAGNIER: Yes, exactly.

CUOMO: And you heard someone from the magazine reporting that conversation?

MAGNIER: Exactly, yes. Heard the voice on the first, Cherif. Cherif, we have the voice of that guy.

CUOMO: They had that recording. The Cherif conversation recorded. Did they have the one in the kosher market recorded?

MAGNIER: I'm not sure.

CUOMO: OK, but you did hear it reported by the magazine.

MAGNIER: Yes, yes.

CUOMO: All right, Wolf, so that's why we're trying to track down the magazine to get their version of events, but this is what's out there from this magazine.

MAGNIER: That information very, very soon, since the beginning they are thinking -- to not compromise investigation and preparation.

CUOMO: Do the police have the information?

MAGNIER: For sure, yes.

CUOMO: They did. So the magazine had communicated with authorities?

MAGNIER: Yes.

CUOMO: But they didn't make it public because they didn't want to compromise the investigation.

MAGNIER: Yes, exactly.

CUOMO: All right, that's what we have from here. We're reaching out to the magazine. We'll get you more.

BLITZER: Yeah, we've got to hear from the police. This guy named Said, to the magazine, he killed four people inside that market, but did he really kill four people? Are there four people who are dead because of a result of what this guy told the magazine? So I want to be cautious.

Chris, we'll get back to you in a moment.

I want to bring Tom Fuentes into this.

What do you make of what we just heard?

TOM FUENTES, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: I think what's usual about that is you have one of the terrorists, of the two terrorist brothers, I should say, taking credit saying al-Qaeda of the Arabian peninsula, al Qaeda Yemen, was directing them, then you have the third guy at the market saying ISIS. And normally, you wouldn't see, I'm anxious to hear what Paul has to say about that.

BLITZER: There's a little rivalry, but a lot of overlap between ISIS and AQAP as well.

PAUL CRUICKSHANK, CNN TERRORISM ANALYST: I don't think a group could be doing this for both ISIS and AQAP. This is very early information, not confirmed by CNN at this point. We'll have to kind of do more reporting on this.

BLITZER: Clearly, Paul, there were collaborations between ISIS and AQAP, that would raise this to a whole new level.

CRUICKSHANK: It would, but I don't think that's --

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: We haven't confirmed that.

Colonel Reese, what do you make of what we just heard?

LT. COL. JAMES REESE, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: I think the guy in the south, who assaulted the store, I think he was in a panic. Came in, I think, he said 14 to 16 people. He comes rushing in, him and his girlfriend with a weapon. He's all excited, doesn't know what to do and the first thing he does is pull the trigger, drops some people, gets everyone down. I think, however, my assessment, this probably caused the assault force commander up north and for the hostage negotiators to start looking at this, to start making a plan for what we call a near simultaneous assault. If those four people were killed, they had to look at it. I was hoping it was going to last a little longer until nighttime, but it got to dusk before they kicked it off. I think that was the cause.

Plus, I believe they had some communication between the north site and south site that the law enforcement and the assault force folks knew, and so that really started pushing the timeline down for the assault, which again, you've been talking about it for a day now, is they'd rather just let this thing play out if they can with negotiators, but once someone's been killed, the gas pedal goes on to start the assault.

BLITZER: And presumably, Colonel Reese, they would explain a near simultaneous operation at these two locations.

REESE: Absolutely. As I've been watching now, the target up north, I would tell you from a target perspective, probably a little bit easier. It sounds like there weren't many people inside. Multiple entrance points to get in and the GIGN up there ready to go. Tier one force up there.

As I watched the southern aspect -- and again, this happens everywhere around the world, these type of forces -- when you commit your tier one force, in the one target, then you've got to go down to your next level of forces. As I watched the forces down south start to get prepped, they did not look as organized as the guys up front. But again, down south is you've got the store, you're in more of a built up area, you've got all these different ins and outs, alley ways, streets coming in. It's a much more difficult target to take down. And they might not have had as many entrance points. And every time you do one of these, you want to try to go in multiple locations to make the bad guys fight in opposite directions.

BLITZER: That's a very, very good point.

Bob Baer, you said you served in France for three years, so you know how the French operate. I assume, there is a massive sweep underway right now, a lot of potential suspects out there, people who may have known these three terrorists are being rounded up, being questioned. Walk us through what might be going on.

BOB BAER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: For a start, they'll be going through telephone records, cell phones, any communications between these people, going through travel documents. A lot of these people were on lists, but that doesn't mean you can put them in jail. I think, at this point, the French are going to be knocking on doors. Anybody associated with doing raids against houses. The French, when they pull out the stops, really know how to do it and they are terribly shaken by this. And they have a very, very competent police force. It may not look like it to casual viewers, but they are very, very good and they're going to move hard.

What's really going to be interesting to me is what they do about the Muslim population in France, because it is disaffected, to say the least, and they have a lot of potential recruits there. Not being integrated. They can't make it in society. Unemployment is through the roof. And so, the French police really have their work cut out for them.

BLITZER: They certainly do.

Everybody, stand by.

We're waiting to hear from the French president, Francois Hollande. He is going to be speaking shortly. We're told President Obama will be making a statement, as well, about the situation in France.

We'll take another break. Much more of our coverage right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Welcome back. We're waiting to hear from the French president. Once he starts speaking, we'll have live coverage of that.

Let's update you now on what we know. Just a little while ago, French police and Special Forces successfully ended two hostage stand offs. One involved the two men that attacked the offices of "Charlie Hebdo on Wednesday. They were the subject of a massive nationwide manhunt before being cornered in an industrial complex near the Charles de Gaulle Airport. Both the brothers, Cherif and Said Kouachi, are dead. The other involved, a man linked to the brothers, he was the suspect in the shooting yesterday of a policewoman -- he had taken several hostages in a kosher market. That suspect is now also dead. The fourth suspect remains on the loose now. She's linked to the killing of the policewoman on Wednesday. It's unknown what her role was in the kosher market stand off. She is on the loose right now. A lot going on as we await the situation.

Let me bring in Tom Fuentes, our law enforcement analyst. Tom, you served in France. You've worked closely when you were the

assistant director of the FBI with the French. They've got major problems over there right now.

FUENTES: When I was running FBI International and on the board of Interpol, having frequent trips to Paris and France, the ministers and head of their police would tell me you're not going to have this problem in the United States because immigrants come in and get assimilated and become American very quickly. We have Moroccans and Algerians here whose the parents were born in France, the kids were born in France, but they're not French. They still think of themselves as Moroccan or Algerian. They don't assimilate. Their society doesn't operate the way the U.S. society does. And they knew this was a problem 10 years ago when I started discussing this.

BLITZER: Bob Baer, was that your experience?

BAER: Oh, absolutely. These suburbs around Paris or Leone or Nice are poor. There's no opportunity. These kids cannot grow up through the bureaucracy. They don't go to the good schools. They have to work at menial labor. On top of that, you have a lot of criminal gangs in France that you can buy automatic weapons from. So that combination, the alienation, easy weapons, make France a vulnerable target. There's not a whole lot the French police can do except come down on them hard. But that will cause real political problems in France, also.

BLITZER: Paul Cruickshank, you studied these groups. Are these organizations in France likely to help these groups recruit more individuals?

CRUICKSHANK: Unfortunately, yes. They're going to use this for propaganda purchases. We may see videos come out from al Qaeda. The brothers said they were doing this to avenge the death of an American, an American terrorist cleric, Anwar al Awlaki, who was a key figure in this group who inspired a generation of jihadists.

BLITZER: He was killed by a U.S. drone in 2011.

CRUICKSHANK: He was killed by a U.S. drone in September, 2011, following a CIA-kind of operation. An absolute key figure. He himself plotted two attacks against the United States, the underwear bombing attempt on Christmas day in 2009 and also that printer bomb plot. He was plotting more attacks when he was killed. A lot of jihadis around the world, they were distraught when he died and wanted to avenge him. The Boston bombers were also inspired by him. The brothers involved if that -- Wolf?

BLITZER: Let me bring back Chris Cuomo. He's in Paris, watching what's going on.

Set the scene a little bit, Chris. I'm really curious the mood that you sense what's going on right now, now that these two hostage situations are over, but a lot of folks are bracing potentially. We hope it doesn't happen, but they're bracing for more. CHRIS CUOMO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, as is often the case in big

cities, Wolf, as you know well, life kind of goes on around these violent situations unless their so cataclysmic that it engulfs an entire city. You have Paris moving. And one of the frustrations with what happened for authorities at "Charlie Hebdo," was it was 11:30, 12:00, lunchtime locally, and yet, these men were able to get away by car, even though this was so much traffic. However, today, as events were unfolding here, the memorial for "Charlie Hebdo" is right over my shoulder. It's been growing literally by the hour, flowers, candles, notes, people putting down different protests against the violence. So, we've been seeing that. And we'll get one of the cameras up to show you what I'm talking about because, at night, we'll get the glow of it and people have been there to pay their respects.

But there was also a lot of people, you know, passively watching what was going on, on our monitors here, but there was debate that was starting, also, that goes to the conversation you were just having with Paul and your other guests about well, why did this happen? Why are these Muslims doing this here? What is it about French culture or society that is feeding this or not addressing it and solving it? And there were real differences of opinion here about whether or not they're really French or not, and if they are French, is the government and the population and the culture embracing them and assimilating the way they need to. So, there's been a lot going on here.

But Wolf, it's so early. This is an unusually violent and complex situation they just lived through and it's going to have very far reaching implications, not just for government, but for society. More than a few people on the expert level have told us, Wolf, this is a wake up call for French society that the war on terrorism isn't abroad, it's at home as well.

BLITZER: Yeah, it certainly is.

One again, we'll hear from the French president, Francois Hollande, says when he gets before that microphone.

The U.S. attorney general will be heading to Paris this weekend, Eric Holder, for high-level meetings with French officials. That is going to happen this weekend.

Richard Haass is joining us now. He's a former U.S. official, president of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Take us through the big picture, Richard, right now. What are the most important lessons, not only France, other countries in Europe, the United States, but the world needs to learn right now from what has just happened in Paris.

RICHARD HAASS, PRESIDENT, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS: Probably, the single most important lesson, Wolf, is that this is not an exception. I'm uncomfortable saying it's the new normal, but it could be. This is retail terrorism. Now, we've seen roughly a half dozen such incidents in the United States, Canada, Australia and France, as opposed to something as dramatic as 9/11. And the problem with retail terrorism, it's much more difficult to detect. And essentially, every single place where people live and work becomes a potential target, so there's limits to what law enforcement can do to prevent it. This is a frightening scenario.

Also, it shows the ability of events in the Middle East, both by example or as training ground to radicalize the Middle East, to essentially spread. This is yet another form of globalization and it's anything but benign.

BLITZER: So, what should the U.S. government now, if you were advising President Obama and his national security team, what would you tell them?

HAASS: Well, several things we'd need to do, but let me preface it by saying there's no solution. This is not so much a problem to be solved, but if we're lucky, emphasize that it's a condition to be managed.

In the Middle East, we need to regain the momentum. We need to take away the recruiting argument from these groups that somehow, they're the wave of the future. Initially, that will be Iraq. It will be shoring up the neighbors of Iraq and Syria. Over time, it will mean doing something in Syria.

It means we've got to use law enforcement. We've got to think about the use of intelligence, what we do to reduce vulnerability.

And probably as important as anything, it's a conversation within the Muslim community and non-Muslims can be part of that, but what steps can be done to delegitimize this sort of behavior. And it's going to be far more important that Muslim community delegitimize it than anything non Muslims could ever say.

BLITZER: Richard, what do you make of the fact that the two brothers, Cherif and Said Kouachi, they claim they were working for al-Qaeda, the Arabian Peninsula, al Qaeda in Yemen, as it's know, and this third terrorist says he was working for ISIS, supposedly.

Hold on. Here's the French president.

FRANCOIS HOLLANDE, PRESIDENT OF FRANCE (through translation): -- with the murder of the officer and employer, and today, with two hostage- takings, one in Paris, which led to four deaths. France faced up to this.

First of all, I express all my solidarity to the families of the victims of the wounded.

But France faced up to it because when she overcomes a hardship, a tragedy for the nation, and this is an obligation for us to face up to it.

The killers have been out of a state of harm due to two operations, one in (INAUDIBLE), and the other one in the kosher shop. I want to congratulate the courage, the bravery of the police officers of all of those who participated in these operations. I want to say to them that we are proud, proud of them because order has been given and they carried out the assault with the same result. They did this to save human lives, those of the hostages. They did this to neutralize the terrorists, those who had killed.

But France, even if she is aware that she's overcome, that she can, together with security forces, bring man and women who are capable. France has not finished with this threat. And so I want to call on you for vigilance, unity and mobilization. Vigilance is first for the state to show demonstration and together with the prime minister, I have a reinforced even more in order to protect public places and to ensure that we can live peacefully without any time being threatened or at risk but we must be vigilant.

I call on you also to unity because I expressed myself, the French people, this is our best weapon, unity that we must demonstrate our determination to fight against anything that can divide us. And first of all, to be impeccable, to be totally against any racism, because there was an anti-Semitic attack. A terrible anti-Semitic attack was committed today in the kosher shop. Not to be divided means we must not make any confusion and to make it easy to remove any concerning these terrorists and fanatics that have nothing to do with the Muslim religion.

Finally, we must mobilize ourselves. We have to be capable to respond to the attacks with force because we have to use force, but also with solidarity. This solidarity is something that we have to show with all our capacities.

We're a free people. We will not give in to any pressure to any fears because we have an ideal which is greater than ourselves and we are capable of defending peace and capable of protecting ourselves from these threats.

I want to thank the soldiers for undertaking our responsibilities facing the terrorists, the head of state and the head of government. I want to thank our solidarity throughout the world and who will be there for the great meeting on Sunday. I will be with them, and I call on all French women and French men to rise up on Sunday in order to carry these values of democracy, of freedom, of pluralism to which we are all attached, and Europe to some extent. And in this hardship, I assure you, we will come out even stronger from this hardship.

Long live the republic. Long live France.

BLITZER: All right. There you have the president of France, Francois Hollande. A very passionate statement, looking forward, looking forward to Sunday when the entire country will have special commemorative moments to remember what has happened.

Richard Haass, you heard the president of France. Give us your reaction.

HAASS: What you see is the dilemma or challenge for any free society, Wolf. On one hand, you talk about strength. For good reason, he congratulated and thanked the French police and military forces who were involved in today's events. He's also basically saying we've got to not just pull together as a society, but we can't overreact. There's no room for various types of bigotry. And he obviously doesn't want to see anti-Muslim sentiment in any way come out of this, which would only, over time, lead to more young men and women doing terrible things. I think that's the challenge for society is to get the Goldilocks thing. You can't under react. You can't overreact. Getting it just right will be awfully difficult.

BLITZER: Chris Cuomo, you are there in Paris for us. Have you sensed from the few days that you've been there, a growing anti-Muslim sentiment on the streets of Paris?

CUOMO: No. That would be a very difficult thing to tell. Certainly, I haven't seen anything that I could report on that way. I mean, we have been getting read in about what cultural tensions do exist here. There's a large part of the population that is assimilated. What's happened in north Paris is not a secret. We know there were riots there several years ago. There are what they call a no-go zone. There are problems with policing, problems with dis-enfranchisement. And we hear about that in urban centers about what they have to deal with in terms of minorities. But you are also going to have a phobic response when you have a particular member of a group that seems to be attacking the rest. The reaction has been to the violence. It hasn't been cultural or Muslim centered. It's just been, who is doing it and how is it going to be stopped?

BLITZER: Colonel Reese, just listening between the lines to what President Hollande said, he's telling the people of France, get ready for more of this.

REESE: Yeah, Wolf. I mean, the president had a great speech. He now has to rally his country. They have to be prepared for what they're doing. And he needs to get onboard and get everyone going, whether it's the law enforcement, military forces. And I think he realizes that we're in a long war. He realizes what has been going on in the U.S. and in Europe and across the nation. It's a long war.

BLITZER: Very different circumstances, Bob Baer. 9/11 here in the United States, what has happened in Paris over the past couple of days, but this is presumably a turning point for the people of France.

BAER: I think, absolutely. In the mid '80s, there were some bombings done by Hezbollah, and in the '90s, an Algerian group attached the French, but this is very different. They've taken over the center of the city essentially and the French will react. You have a weak president. Hollande's numbers are way down. Big elections coming up in that country. You'll have to see the president turn on this violence and radicals in a strong way or the Socialists are going to lose the election, for sure.

BLITZER: These terrorists, Paul Cruickshank, they think this is a big win for them, don't they?

CRUICKSHANK: They think it's a big win. This is electrifying for the global jihadist movement. Caused a lot of anger. They have been calculating for years and years if they can strike the cartoonists. They can boost recruitment and boost their profile. BLITZER: Where do we go from here, Tom Fuentes?

FUENTES: I think the vigilance will have to stay at the highest level. We've had all of threats and warnings and concerns.

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: I don't think the United States is at the highest security level.

FUENTES: But the services are. Maybe the public isn't because we've got warning fatigue but whether it's the law enforcement or intel services, FBI, the CIA, they have been -- you can only stay so high so long. And they've been at that. They know they don't have resources to cover. Here in the U.S., we have 1.1 million people on the terror watch list. 47,000 estimated on the no-fly list. There's not enough people here to follow every one of them around. And you never know. You can't read minds to know when that one or two or three are going to break bad and go violent.

BLITZER: Bob Baer, there's very, very close collaboration between the U.S. and the French security services, right?

BAER: Oh, absolutely. There's been no hiatus ever. They give us everything they have and we give them everything we have. We work closely together even on technology. Not much you can do about that.

The real question we should be looking at is the same Frenchmen can come to this country without visas, and as we know, they can much more easily pick up automatic weapons. And I keep on asking law enforcement here, is it going to happen? Is it going to happen here? All I get is, "They're here." I don't think there's anything specific. And we may just get lucky or one of these groups may appear here, and it will be too late.