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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Interview With Rear Admiral John Kirby; Will U.S. Strike Syria?; Gun Range Death; Mother Pleads with ISIS to Release Her Son; American Student Missing in Israel

Aired August 27, 2014 - 16:00   ET

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

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: So, how quickly could the U.S. role in Syria turn from eyes in the sky to bombs on the ground?

I'm Jake Tapper. This is THE LEAD.

The world lead, President Obama has given the green light to surveillance flights over Syria, but the real question is, will he authorize strikes against ISIS and, if so, what is he waiting for?

Also:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHIRLEY SOTLOFF, MOTHER OF STEVEN SOTLOFF: I ask you to please release my child.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: The desperate plea from a mother of an American journalist to the ISIS terrorists holding him hostage. She's begging them not to hold her son accountable for U.S. government actions against ISIS.

And the national lead, a terrible accident or terrible negligence? A 9-year-old girl will have to grow up knowing she killed a man after an Uzi was put in her hands.

Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to THE LEAD.

We're going to begin today with the world lead.

ISIS has already beheaded one American and disgustingly shown it on tape. They're believed to be holding at least three other Americans hostage. They have sucked still other Americans into their web of sick and twisted ideology. They have been called "beyond anything we have seen before" by the defense secretary, Chuck Hagel, and now a U.S. official has said that President Obama OKed surveillance flights to gather intelligence on ISIS in Syria.

But, as our Pentagon correspondent, Barbara Starr reports, U.S. airstrikes on ISIS targets in Syria, as we have seen in Iraq, well, they are not a sure thing.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Desperate Iraqis again on the run from ISIS, this time minority Turkmen in Northern Iraq under siege for weeks, people desperate for food, water and, above all, safety.

The U.S. military is prepared to potentially expand operations to airdrop humanitarian supplies and bomb ISIS positions to help break its grip here if President Obama orders it.

Across the border in Syria, no decision yet by the White House on whether to begin airstrikes against ISIS strongholds inside Syria.

JOSH EARNEST, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I would not at this point set up a time frame for a presidential decision.

STARR: President Obama's critics, as expected, impatient.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Could I just say that when the secretary of defense and the chairman of Joint Chiefs talk about how this is -- a huge threat this is and the biggest we have ever seen, et cetera, and then -- and there's nothing to follow that up because there's no strategy.

STARR: For now, Pentagon drones continue flying inside Iraq looking into Syria for possible future targets, including ISIS convoys, weapons, personnel, anything that could be hit to stop the momentum as a capable military force, its critical military intelligence needed first before the president is expected to make a decision about ordering airstrikes.

COL. PETER MANSOOR (RET.), U.S. ARMY: And if we could locate insurgent trucks, Humvees, armored vehicles, tanks, mortars, artillery, airstrikes would be most effective at eliminating those pieces of the ISIS arsenal.

STARR: But the reality of the airstrikes also settling in.

MANSOOR: It's not a panacea to destroying the group, because it will simply melt into the areas it already controls and then comes the much more difficult problem of how to root them out.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

STARR: Defense Department officials are making the case that airstrikes can only do so much. Generally, they can break the momentum of an enemy force, but they cannot stop it -- Jake.

TAPPER: Barbara Starr at the Pentagon, thank you so much.

Now a follow-up to the story we told you yesterday about that American jihadi fighting for ISIS, Douglas McAuthur McCain. We are today being told that it was not just one American killed in Syria while fighting for ISIS. It was two, according to a coalition of opposition groups that have been battling ISIS in that country.

That coalition has not named this supposed second American or offered any evidence of its claims, but it did release photos of that first American it claims to have killed, Douglas McAuthur McCain, the California man who has become a part of this disturbing phenomenon of Americans joining terrorist groups that want to kill Americans.

Let's bring in justice correspondent Pamela Brown in San Diego, where Douglas McCain once lived.

Pamela, what are you learning about McCain's life before he became radicalized?

PAMELA BROWN, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jake, we have been speaking to law enforcement officials.

And what we have learned is that authorities actually became aware of Douglas McCain back in the early 2000s because he was associated with someone who authorities were interested in at that time, but we learned back then that -- as authorities telling us that there was nothing linking McCain to anything nefarious.

And we also learned, Jake, that it wasn't until after McCain traveled to Turkey that he was put on authorities' radar most recently, just in the past few months.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): It was just months ago that Douglas McAuthur McCain began to attract the attention of U.S. intelligence. U.S. law enforcement tells CNN the government was investigating his overseas connection to the brutal ISIS terror group, but the extent of his radical side was not evident to his American family.

The 33-year-old American told them just last week that he was in Turkey.

KENYATA MCCAIN, COUSIN OF DOUGLAS MCAUTHUR MCCAIN: Last time I communicated with him was on Facebook last Friday on a picture I posted and he commented about my boys growing up.

BROWN: Within days of his Facebook post, McCain was killed in a battle between rival extremist groups near Aleppo, Syria. After his death, a rival opposition group released photos of McCain's body and his U.S. passport, seen here.

K. MCCAIN: This is so outlandish. That's not who he was. For him to be in Syria fighting for a terrorist group. That doesn't make sense.

BROWN: McCain converted from Christianity to Islam a decade ago. Sources tell CNN it appears he radicalized gradually.

K. MCCAIN: His religion was very important to him, but those people, the ISIS people, they don't -- they don't represent what my cousin's beliefs are or were.

BROWN: His family tells CNN they weren't alarmed by his conversion, but his recent posts on social media caught their attention. On a Twitter account reported to be McCain's, he wrote on June 9: "I will be joining you guys soon." The next day, he wrote: "I'm with the brothers now."

On June 26, he re-tweeted this post, which says: "It takes a warrior to understand a warrior. Pray for ISIS." It's not clear if McCain was in Syria when he tweeted. McCain grew up near Minneapolis and later moved to San Diego, where he attended college. Between 2000 and 2008, he was arrested at least six times, all for minor offenses. McCain's radicalization and death in Syria stunned loved ones back home.

ISAAC CHASE, FRIEND OF MCCAIN: That's what hurts the most, is because he was a good person.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: And, Jake, we learned that after officials learned of his travel to Turkey that he was put on a list of Americans believed to have joined militant groups and therefore if he had tried to travel back to the U.S., he would have been subject to additional scrutiny.

And, also, Jake, in speaking to law enforcement officials, we learned that McCain had been associated with a number of individuals over the past few years, one of whom he knew from Minnesota who was killed in Somalia back in time apparently by committing jihad -- Jake.

TAPPER: Pamela Brown, thank you so much.

Let's join now to Rear Admiral John Kirby. He's the Pentagon press secretary.

Admiral Kirby, good to see you, as always.

REAR ADM. JOHN KIRBY, PENTAGON PRESS SECRETARY: Thank you.

TAPPER: So, this coalition of Syrian opposition groups fighting ISIS now claims that Douglas McCain was one of two Americans that that group killed in Syria. Do we have any information about the supposed second American, any confirmation that it's true?

KIRBY: No, no confirmation that we have seen here at the Pentagon, Jake, no, no.

TAPPER: The American people know that the U.S. government, especially the NSA, conducts so much surveillance, so much study and research and intrusion into our e-mails and our phone calls and our travel and other personal information.

I guess a lot of people, knowing about this NSA story, are confused as to why so many of these individuals like Douglas McAuthur McCain, like the jihadi from Florida who committed -- who did a suicide bombing in Syria earlier this year, why they're able to slip through the cracks.

Do we even have a number of Americans that we know who have joined these terrorist groups?

KIRBY: I don't know that we have a precise number, Jake. And I certainly have seen a number of upward of 100. Certainly, we

believe several dozens are involved in this kind of activity. And, frankly, there could be more. These kinds of people with these kinds of intentions, they're not going to make them well-known.

And they can be pretty good at hiding them. It is the foreign fighter threat that is something that definitely concerns us here in the Pentagon. And when we talk about the immediacy of the threat that ISIL poses, this is one of the factors that we're talking about.

And it's not just the United States government. We were in Australia just a couple of weeks ago. Australian officials stated the same thing to us there, that they're concerned about foreign fighters leaving Australian soil, going over there and fighting for these guys, and then potentially coming back to wherever their homelands are to conduct terrorist attacks inside those countries.

TAPPER: Is there a process in place that these individuals would be stopped before they got on an airplane to the United States?

KIRBY: That's a law enforcement issue, Jake. I'm not really qualified to talk about that.

I know that law enforcement agencies in this country are taking this very, very seriously. You have heard the attorney general talk about this as well. And I know they're working very hard at exactly that issue.

TAPPER: There's been criticism that there's not a strategy to defeat ISIS. The Daily Beast reports that President Obama has said he wants a plan by the end of this week, a plan finalized to attack ISIS in Syria.

Is that correct? Is the Pentagon drafting a plan right now to give to President Obama by the end of the week?

KIRBY: Well, we're a planning organization, Jake. You know that.

Our job is to be ready for all options and to be able to execute all orders of the commander in chief. And without getting into specifics and certainly timelines and details, I can tell you we're putting a lot of thought and energy to it here at the Pentagon and down in Tampa at Central Command.

TAPPER: Is there a strategy to go after ISIS right now?

KIRBY: We're executing a strategy right now.

You don't have to look any further than the press releases coming out of Central Command to see the airstrikes we're conducting, doing it every day. We did conduct some humanitarian missions a little while ago on Mount Sinjar. We're always watching the humanitarian situation.

But more importantly, we are there in support of Iraqi security forces and the Kurdish forces. We have upped our naval presence in the Gulf. We have upped and intensified the number of surveillance flights over Iraq. And we have been engaged in this for quite some time now and I think that engagement will continue.

TAPPER: That's the engagement against ISIS in Iraq. What about in Syria?

KIRBY: Well, I'm not going ahead of decisions the president hasn't made.

But, clearly, as Chairman Dempsey said and Secretary Hagel said last week, we have got to take a regional approach at this. We have got to look at the sanctuary they have in Syria. We have to consider the free rein they across what is really a nonexistent border right now.

But just as importantly as what they said -- and I think is getting lost in the conversation -- is no military solution is going to be enough. And when you take a regional approach, you have to look at the whole situation, politically, economically, diplomatically.

This is a group that's trying to create funding streams and revenue. They're trying to grab ground and hold it. They want infrastructure. This is not just a normal terrorist group. And one of the things that's really important is good governance. And one of the things that we have got to try to get is eliminating some of the conditions that they use to fester and to exacerbate the tensions in the region.

And that comes from good governance. We're seeing a unity government stand up in Iraq. That's a healthy thing. The Assad regime is doing nothing but causing deprivations on their own people and allowing groups like ISIL to persist on their territory.

TAPPER: So what is the political solution? A year ago, you guys were drafting up plans to bomb Assad's forces. Now you're talking about drafting up plans to bomb forces fighting Assad. How can there possibly be a political solution in Syria?

KIRBY: Well, there can be a political solution in Syria when the Assad regime steps down, and you have a government in Syria that's representative of all Syrians and can respond to the needs of the people that are living there.

Again, we are seeing a similar approach in Iraq here with a unity government being formed. That's a healthy thing. It's important to have partners in the region and partners you can rely on, not just willing partners, but partners you can rely on.

TAPPER: All right, Rear Admiral John Kirby, thank you so much. We appreciate it.

KIRBY: Thanks for having me, Jake.

TAPPER: Coming up: They killed one American journalist and said her son would be next, and now a mother is making a direct appeal to ISIS to let him go.

And she's just 9 years old, but someone thought it would be a good idea to let her shoot an Uzi, a tragedy on an Arizona gun range.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back on THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper.

Continuing in world news, it is a mother's painful plea for mercy from what until now has proven to be a merciless terror group, ISIS.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHIRLEY SOTLOFF, MOTHER OF ISIS HOSTAGE STEVEN SOTLOFF: I ask you to please release my child. As a mother, I ask your justice to be merciful and not punish my son for matters he has no control over.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Steven Sotloff is the American journalist who appears at the end of that horrific video that ISIS released of the beheading of another journalist they had taken hostage, James Foley. Sotloff went missing last summer after entering to northern Syria from Turkey to report on the country's violent civil war. His family tried to keep his abduction quiet in hopes that that would help keep him alive. But now that the world has seen images of him in the hands of ISIS, Sotloff's mother is asking Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, the leader of the ruthless terrorist group himself, to spare her son.

Now, if you can imagine the kind of pain the Sotloffs are going through or the hell that Steven himself is likely enduring in captivity except my next guest, of course, is an exception. David Rohde is a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and he was kidnapped by the Taliban and held prisoner for seven months before escaping.

David, good to see you again.

There are other Americans being held by ISIS. We're not going to release their names because we hope that that will help secure their safety a little bit more. "The New York Times," for instance, tried to keep your capture quiet. Is it a mistake, do you think, for Sotloff's mother to be putting this plea out there, or is the genie out of the bottle once he appeared in that video?

DAVID ROHDE, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER, REUTERS: I absolutely her for doing this. It's sort of a last ditch effort to somehow communicate with his captors and maybe save his life.

You know, I've been home for five years, I've talked to different families, and not the Sofloffs, but the Foleys and others, and it's just an impossible situation for these families. There is a community that do talk to each other, they try to figure out, do you stay quiet? Do you go public?

In the Foley case and prior to this, prior to Steven Sotloff appearing in this video, the ISIS captors were telling the Foleys and the Sotloffs to not go public, that if they did go public about the kidnap they would kill both of these captives.

So, again, I feel so badly for her and these families in these situations.

TAPPER: Obviously, it's impossible for me to even try to understand what she's going through. What do you see behind this last-ditch effort as we describe it that has a chance of winning? Is it possible that somebody like al Baghdadi who, by all accounts, appears to be a monster, that he might be subject to the whims of some sort of public pressure?

ROHDE: No. I think for these kidnappers it's really -- it's great street cred, if you will, to have an American hostage. And so, having this video released, having him addressed as the caliph, the head of this Islamic State that they declared, is a good thing for him publicly to boost his standing among other jihadists. So, it's very smart that she did that. The wording she used in the video was very intelligent and it was exactly the right thing to do. I have no idea if it will work, but, you know, it's a credit to her again that she's made this effort.

TAPPER: It's interesting, the idea that giving him deference might work.

Peter Theo Curtis is a writer who spent merely two years as a hostage to militants in Syria. And he got to go back home to Boston today, according to his family. What is he going through right now? You have actually been there.

ROHDE: Well, he's elated and he's wondering, why me? Why did I survive? I still don't on know why I was lucky enough to escape with the help of this one Afghan journalist who was kidnapped with me.

But the broader point I want to make, Jake, is that there is a real problem. The United States is not paying ransom, but Europe is paying ransom. There were French, Spanish and a Danish hostage held with Jim Foley and with Steven Sotloff, they were ransomed by their governments and they're home and safe, James Foley is dead and who knows what's going to happen to Steven.

This international approach is not working. There needs to be a unified approach and it's spreading. A colleague of mine at "Reuters" wrote a long history today about a new Japanese captive, a mentally disturbed man who was homeless at some point, he went on sort of an independent, you know, humanitarian mission to Syria. He has now been taken captive by militants there.

TAPPER: James Foley's brother says that the U.S. government did not do enough to save him. Is he right?

ROHDE: Well, it's a difficult situation. The only way you can save an American hostage now is that is to, you know, to pay a very large ransom and the problem with these European payments, there are millions of dollars is that they skew the market. The American policies that the government won't pay, but if a family or an organization can pay a ransom the U.S. government will turn away.

But, again, when millions upon millions are being paid by France and other countries, it puts the Americans in an impossible situation. The U.S. should be putting more I think pressure on France and Europe to stop these payment, or there should be some kind of a unified approach. It's not going to be easy, but the captors are the killers, but the actions of American allies by ransoming these European hostages, you know, inadvertently may have contributed to the death of James Foley.

TAPPER: All right. David Rohde, I do recommend, if you haven't read the book that David co-wrote with his wife, it's called "A Rope and A Prayer: A Kidnapping From Two Sides," I really very highly recommend it.

Thank you so much, David. Appreciate it.

ROHDE: Thank you.

TAPPER: From one American family pleading for their son's return to another, hoping and praying they can find their son alive. Aaron Sofer disappeared late last Friday while hiking in the Jerusalem forest. Israeli police and volunteers, hundreds of them have scoured the area, but the frantic searching has not turned up anything, only confusion and fading hope.

I spoke with Sofer's brother Joel yesterday and he said the police have no evidence about where Aaron might be or whether he was even abducted. Sofer's parents rushed from the New Jersey home to Jerusalem to try and help their son.

They released this emotional plea for his safe return.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHULDA SOFER, MOTHER OF AARON SOFER: I beg of you, beg you, please, has anyone seen the whereabouts of Aaron, please call the police immediately.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Because Sofer is an American citizen, the U.S. State Department is helping Israeli authorities in the search.

Coming up in the politics lead, he's in a heated battle to hang on to the Senate seat he's held for decades. So, why with so much at stake is Republican Mitch McConnell suddenly extending an olive branch to President Obama?

Plus, a 9-year-old girl accidentally kills her shooting instructor with an Uzi, and it's got plenty of folks why it's perfectly legal for kids to get their hands on high-powered weapons.

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