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New Air strikes Hit ISIS Oil Targets in Syria; Interview with Congressman Jim Himes of Connecticut; Nine Arrested in London on Suspicion of Terror Offenses

Aired September 25, 2014 - 08:00   ET

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

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CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking overnight, new air strikes on ISIS in Syria, target, the terror group's flow of money.

REAR ADMIRAL JOHN KIRBY, PENTAGON PRESS SECRETARY: We're very confident that we caused the kind of damage we wanted to cause.

CUOMO: Also new, Arab countries dropping more bombs than the U.S., and new allies prepare to join the fight.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Britain should now move to a new phase of action.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Britain calling back Parliament for a key vote to launch its out air strikes, as an ISIS off-shoot retaliates, beheading a French hostage.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: The only language understood by killers like this is the language of force.

BALDWIN: President Obama pressing world leaders, securing a new resolution to stop money and recruits from getting to the terror group.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: A special edition of NEW DAY begins right now.

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CUOMO: Good morning. Welcome back to NEW DAY. It's Thursday, September 25th, 8:00 in the East.

U.S. and Arab air strikes hitting ISIS where it could hurt the most, where? The pipeline -- bombing a dozen oil targets. The obvious goal: to choke off the flow of black market cash ISIS needs to spread terror in Iraq and Syria, this as Britain inches closer to joining the air campaign, the news breaking overnight of British police arresting nine men suspected of terrorist offenses. They reportedly include a prominent radical cleric.

So, let's begin our coverage with senior White House -- Washington correspondent Joe Johns, has the latest on the air strikes. What do you know for us?

JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Chris.

The latest efforts according to the Pentagon spokesman here on CNN speaking just a few minutes ago saying the punch this morning was to get at places where ISIS is freely operating, the Pentagon now stealing itself for a campaign that could be measured in terms of years.

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JOHNS (voice-over): Overnight in Syria, another wave of air strikes targeting ISIS headquarters, a training camp, oil refineries and checkpoints in the Deir Ezzor Province.

The attacks killing at least 14 militants and also five civilians, including women and children, according to a rights monitor group.

The U.S.-led coalition aiming to degrade the brutal militant group's source of revenue. According to U.S. officials striking 12 oil facilities, seized by ISIS in Eastern Syria Wednesday, bringing the total number of air strikes in the region to over 30.

REAR ADMIRAL JOHN KIRBY, PENTAGON PRESS SECRETARY: This is the beginning of a long effort. There will be more. There will be more.

JOHNS: U.S. officials estimate that ISIS makes upwards of $2 million a day by smuggling oil, refining it and producing some 500 barrels a day and selling them on the black market. U.S. officials hope these air strikes in the remote countryside would lessen the risk of civilian casualties.

A concern raised after the initial air strikes fell upon densely populated areas like Raqqa and Idlib.

An activist from Raqqa says the ISIS fighters began moving into civilian homes two weeks ago.

In Wednesday's strike, the U.S. flew only about half a dozen F-15 aircraft. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates flying more. Now, Belgium and the Netherlands are expressing a commitment to join the U.S. and five Arab nations in the attack against ISIS.

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JOHNS: And while the Pentagon says the focus was on the infrastructure around some of these small refineries, the question really is whether the push on the pocketbook of ISIS won't be complete until they get at the ability of the organization to take oil out of the ground and smuggle it across the border -- Brooke.

BALDWIN: OK, we'll talk about it in a second here.

Let me turn to CNN military analyst, retired Lieutenant Colonel Rick Francona. So, Colonel, walk with me, because we have the visual with the map and

visual. So, that helps me.

As opposed to when we saw yesterday, this is the third wave and all these red dots represent strikes.

LT. COL. RICK FRANCONA (RET), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Right. Some of them were oil refineries, these mobile or these makeshift oil refineries out in the desert and some of them are just true concentrations of ISIS fighters.

BALDWIN: OK, so mobile oil refineries, command and control trucks all targeted.

FRANCONA: Yes, anything having to do with ISIS out in this area they're trying to hit. The ones up in the further Northeast are, of course, trying to take pressure off of the Kurds. They're pushing the Kurds up against the Turkish border. So, we're trying to relieve that.

Right in the center here though, this is the center of the Syrian oil industry. This is where the oil fields are almost every -- all the oil series concentrated in this area and it's around this city of Deir Ezzor.

Going after these refineries hurts them a little bit. It cuts off some of their own oil production. But the biggest amount of oil revenue is actually the crude that they take out of the ground. We're reluctant to strike those.

BALDWIN: That was what -- that's what Joe Johns is making a point, talking to Admiral Kirby a minute ago with the Pentagon. That's the issue because -- and I know the numbers are flexible, right?

FRANCONA: Yes.

BALDWIN: But when we say maybe 2 million out of some of the mobile refineries a day, that is chump change compared to the billions they have in the bank and what they could get by hitting the fields.

FRANCONA: Yes. If you hit the oil fields you cause a lot of damage to the infrastructure of Syria and at some point that all has to be repaired. So, ideally, we'd like to limit ISIS' ability to sell the oil without having to go in and destroy the oil fields.

BALDWIN: You were also saying the lines as we've been watching this campaign, it's been a couple of days but the lines are still drawn the same way, you know, blunting the force but at what point do you see territorial gains?

FRANCONA: Yes, if you look at ISIS as one big target threat, because that black line on the map, we're the only ones that care about it. The ISIS does not.

BALDWIN: They disregard it.

FRANCONA: But if you look at what's going on in Iraq, the air power has been successful in stopping the momentum and that was the --

BALDWIN: That's key.

FRANCONA: -- initial key point that they wanted to stop them from rolling, because remember, they were on a roll. They were coming down the Euphrates Valley. They were coming down the Tigris Valley. They were going right at Baghdad.

BALDWIN: The speed in seizing the territories surprised a lot of people.

FRANCONA: And I think that's what drove the timing, is we've got to stop these guys in place. So, we've done that. ISIS is still there but they're not moving. We have to give the Iraqi army and the Peshmerga time and space to get -- stand back up, get their leadership changes and then start rolling these guys up, because you cannot let them have the territory.

BALDWIN: OK.

FRANCONA: That will work and there's a plan for that. The big problem comes is in Syria, what do we do here? We can bomb them but as long as there's no ground force to go in and follow up the air strikes, the air strikes really can't solve the problem. They can hold it in abeyance.

BALDWIN: And again, when we say problem, you know, echoing what people at the Pentagon had told us, this will take years and years, years and years.

Colonel Francona, thank you so much.

FRANCONA: Sure.

BALDWIN: We'll keep talking to you as the conversation moves forward.

Chris, to you.

CUOMO: All right. Brooke, years and years is right by all accounts which is why you needed to go into it with all due deliberation. Did we do that?

Let's get the perspective of someone who should know, Congressman Jim Himes, Democrat from Connecticut, serves on the intelligence committee, the Permanent Intelligence Committee.

Congressman, it is good to have you this morning. Let me ask you something. Did you --

REP. JIM HIMES (D), CONNECTICUT: Good morning, Chris.

CUOMO: -- know about these attacks before they occurred?

HIMES: It was actually a pretty small number of people in the Congress who knew about these attacks. Look, a lot of us knew that they were coming in some way, shape or form. But as you probably know, the White House reached out to the leadership, we had unfortunately left for the close of session. So, I think it was mainly the leadership that knew the timing and terms of the attacks.

CUOMO: All right. Well, we are in the phase right now of watching this and it's being somewhat celebrated for effectiveness early on. But as you well know, this was a decision that was fraught with risk.

Do you believe the United States entered into it with all due deliberation?

HIMES: Well, no, I don't believe that the U.S. entered into it with all due deliberation. Look, as a lot of people said this is the kind of thing that more broadly -- and I'm not just talking about the specific arming and training of the Syrian moderates -- that we did debate and vote on but a larger -- look, we're using the word now, war -- is something that if we're going to go into it both abiding by the terms of the Constitution but also with the American people having fully understood the implications we need to have a debate and vote on it in the Congress.

I would add look, I am one who would say that adamantly at the same time I support the activities that the president has undertaken in the last couple of days, the bombing that he's been doing for six weeks. So, I'm not saying that I oppose what's happening.

I'm saying it is worth, given this is going to be a long-term thing with reversals for us to have that debate on the floor of Congress so the American people understand what we're getting into.

CUOMO: True. Two problems with that -- one, it's two late because you're at war. And two, even you, Congressman, who has been open in what you disagree with -- disagree with some things, agree with others -- that's not how it works. Everybody's on the same page. You own the risk going forward.

And that's why when you see what the U.K. is doing, it almost makes the United States look a little jayvee, doesn't it? He calls parliament back, they're going to have a vote, they're going to debate it. They've told him no once before on bombing in Syria, but they're acting the way they do to have a unified people going into it.

How could we have done this here again?

HIMES: Well, you know, unfortunately one of the reasons one of the smaller reasons I voted against the arming of the Syrian moderate rebels was that that was what the president needed from the Congress, and we just handed it to him. And that was our one piece of leverage to say, no, Mr. President, we want to have a broader discussion about what this looks like, where are we, you know, 12, 13 years after we first started this counterterror effort and what should we do right now.

So, yes, look, we traded the one piece of leverage that we had to get a full and vigorous debate on the floor of the Congress with the president. You know, one thing I would just maybe slightly disagree with you, you

said we don't all need to be on the same page and we won't always be on the same page. But we ought to out the issues, have a long conversation about them and let the people see where their representatives stand on this very, very complicated issue.

CUOMO: I think that you're right. You do not have to agree all the time but you do have to come to a consensus. You do have to vote and you do have to have an outcome so that the people know it's the only way for them to know where their leaders wound up on such a major decision.

And I would say it's not the only leverage you had, Congressman, it is politically, because of what the state of play is. The only real thing on the table was arming the Syrians, but the Constitution makes it so clear that it's not even an academic conversation. War is all you guys, all you guys, and you've been handing it to the president for generations and now it may come back to bite you.

HIMES: No, look, exactly. That's a mistake. I don't mean to point fingers solely at the White House here.

The White House, obviously, this has been true for 60 years -- the White House believed they've got more war-making authority than probably the Constitution warrants. But, look, there were an awful lot of senators and members of Congress who didn't want to take that vote, and that's just awful. That is an abrogation of a fundamental responsibility.

I understand it's a tough vote in the context of an election but we're talking about war and peace here. So, yes, look, in a better world, we would not be at home right now, we would be in Washington talking about tough issues, you know, because again I think most of the Congress would have completely backed the president on these air strikes. But we would have talked more about who else is involved. We would have talked more about what are the underlying factors that are giving rise to groups like this.

Frankly, the fact that some of the funding for these guys is still coming out of the very countries that flew with us in the last couple of nights and what can we do about that? That's the broader, deeper conversation that we should be having. Instead, we had a military tactical discussion. Is it air strikes, is it moderate Syrian rebels?

We need to really -- and, by the way, I give the president credit in front of the U.N. yesterday he made these points. That this is a global effort that involves far more than military, it involves some fundamental change and some very broken societies.

CUOMO: Fundamentally, it's the fight over the soul of Islam and that's something not decided by force and not going to be decided by the United States.

Let me ask you something else while I have a member of the Permanent Intelligence Committee before us. This threat from the Khorasan, the offshoot of al Qaeda -- I know you can't get into what you actually know but people need to know how specific this threat was.

Is this just political jazz they're being told to justify air strikes, or was there really information you were given that showed that the use of force was justified to stop something that could happen here in the United States?

HIMES: Let me answer the question this way, Chris. The attacks that were undertaken against Khorasan were in response to a threat that was far more specific and far more credible than any threat that ISIS leveled at the United States. ISIS, as you know, has for weeks now been threatening to do this and threatening to do that. Khorasan actually had as one of its core reasons for being to plan attacks in the West, some a little bit like the ones that have been announced in the media.

But when the president says that he went after Khorasan because it was actually a direct and eminent threat to the United States, he is not, I forget the word you used but he's not being political.

CUOMO: You know you're in a tough situation when you're at war with one group but they're not issuing threats as bad against the United States as another group and you need to attack them as well. It just really speaks to the urgency of the situation.

Congressman, thank you for coming on NEW DAY and talking about these issues. Push your brothers and sisters to come in and debate. I still say it's too late but they have to get on record at some point.

Thank you for being with us.

HIMES: I'm with you on that, Chris. Thank you.

CUOMO: Thank you, sir.

A lot of news, let's get to John Berman, in for Michaela. Go those top stories.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks so much, Chris.

Breaking this morning: the man wanted for abduction in the case of missing UVA student Hannah Graham is expected to appear in a Texas courtroom any moment. Thirty-two-year-old Jesse Matthew was arrested on a beach in Galveston County, Texas, on Wednesday. Police believe he's the last person seen with Graham when she vanished nearly two weeks ago in Virginia.

President Obama will shift today from coalition building against ISIS to a potential global health disaster. We're talking about Ebola. He will focus on the virus in a speech at the United Nations later this morning. The United States is already committing more than $1 billion to try to contain the virus. The World Health Organization says more than 2,900 people have died in West Africa from the outbreak already and it could get much, much worse.

A disturbing trend revealed in an FBI study, mass shootings are occurring more frequently with nearly one incident a month between 2000 and 2013. Now, a lot of people will say this was obvious but this was the first comprehensive study by the government on this subject.

The report says 70 percent of the shootings took place at schools or businesses. Most of the reported 160 incidents during that time were carried out by men, only six of the shooters were female.

Matthew Miller, the American detained in North Korea begins his six- year sentence of hard labor today. This new photo of miller dressed in prison garments was released by a North Korean government official. There are no details about where he will serve his sentence or what labor he will be required to perform. Miller was convicted of committing hostile acts, that's in quotes, to North Korea, and sentenced earlier this month.

CUOMO: Poor look on that guy's face tells it all, he's losing weight already.

BALDWIN: So young.

CUOMO: Look, it also speaks to the problem of when you don't have diplomatic relations with a place, the question is what can you do, how do you get it done? We'll stay on that story as well.

John, thank you very much.

So, this big arrest overnight, nine men arrested in what's called a terror dragnet in the U.K. One of them is this prominent cleric, you're looking at right now this cleric on your screen. He's been all over American media, this going on as the threat of homegrown terror ramps up in the U.S.

We have the latest ahead.

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BALDWIN: Got some breaking news overnight.

Nine people were arrested in London on suspicion of terror offenses. British media reports that among them is this prominent radical cleric Anjem Choudary. This comes amid growing concerned about deadly attacks on Western hostages abroad.

A terror group that supports ISIS beheaded this French hiker in Algeria and then released the video showing the killing on Wednesday as retaliation for French air strikes in Iraq. And back here at home officials are on high alert over the possibility of these so-called lone wolf attacks.

So, a lot to get to this morning. Here to discuss this potential new threat is CNN counterterrorism analyst, Philip Mudd, and senior vice president of the Soufan Group, Bob McFadden.

So, gentlemen, welcome to both of you.

And let me begin with you here in studio, when you hear about these nine arrested in London and especially this radical cleric who we've seen in interviews here in the United States, espousing his views. What's your response to this?

ROBERT MCFADDEN, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, THE SOUFAN GROUPO: In the era, the period we're in right now there's an awful lot of rhetoric out there and in a country likes ours in the U.K., it's a fine line between free speech and incitement to terrorism.

We don't know the details of what the special branch and British authorities have, but it could be from financing to facilitating fighters to get to battlefronts and those sort of things. So, tense times.

BALDWIN: Philip Mudd, we saw the French president, President Hollande, mentioning yesterday at the UNGA condemning the killing of this French hiker in Algeria over the weekend and it's tough to keep all these groups straight. This is a splinter group. They're calling themselves the soldiers of the caliphate. They're not ISIS. They have pledged their allegiance to the leader of ISIS, al Baghdadi.

Who are they?

PHILIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: What you're looking at happening in the extremist world I used to follow at the agency, is interesting. Let me simplify it for you. You have the core al Qaeda people responsible for the attacks of 9/11, they look at groups like ISIS and this group in Algeria as fringe groups, believe it or not. You can think of core al Qaeda as the big brother and what they're saying to the fringe groups is, look, if you get too extreme, if you start beheading people, the prospect that you can recruit more fund- raisers, more young people over time is going to diminish because people will say you're too far out on the fringe.

So, what you're seeing in the extremist world is a separation between the terrorists who are part of the al Qaeda network of 13 years ago, and this new phenomenon of people who are even further out than al Qaeda and who say, hey, beheading people and putting their heads on stakes is fine t helps us recruit in places like Europe and the United States.

BALDWIN: So, Phil, you have those core people, these splinter groups. I'm just curious, and I was asking Bob about this as well, just are they trying to in a sense one-up each other? Do they get along? Are they all in the fight together?

MUDD: They don't get along. You've seen core al Qaeda, including Ayman al Zawahiri, who's now in charge of al Qaeda, who took over after Osama bin Laden talk against this kind of activity. It's not because he likes America. Obviously, it's not even because necessarily, he disagrees with what these folks are doing.

But Al Qaeda has been around for 25 years or so. They've gone through phases where they, themselves sponsored so much extremism that local populations said, hey, this is not acceptable. We don't buy what you're doing. We saw this by the way remember in Iraq about what, six or seven years ago when we had extremists start to kill a lot of Sunnis and Shias in Iraqi. Al Qaeda said don't do that. Go after the Americans because you'll alienate the local population.

BALDWIN: So, you have these groups, core members and splinter groups over there, Bob McFadden, but then you have the fear of what they call lone wolves, right, lone attackers potentially here at home, ISIS released that audio over the weekend, calling on members or those inspired by ISIS to kill Westerners or Americans. You know, local and federal law enforcement working to protect.

How big of an issue -- how difficult is it to protect against these kinds of attacks?

MCFADDEN: Well, one underlining great point that Phil made there never was a monolith and never will be against the groups.

BALDWIN: OK.

MCFADDEN: There's so much internecine, bickering going on even what happened with the French hostage in that tragic event. This group, the Soldiers of the Caliphate is a sprinter group from al Qaeda's affiliate group in North Africa. So, you have those kinds of things going on.

Now back to the idea of a singleton or lone wolf -- look, there's nothing new what ISIS has done in the last few weeks to encouraging those kind of things. In fact, al Qaeda back in the day would latch onto when there was an individual act country like ours or England and encourage others to do that.

Now, when you talk about if this phenomenon and what's going on with the situation in Syria and Iraq it's important to place things in the context of where events are going on. Would we have a situation like just happened with the French hostage with the splinter group in Algeria? Little to no chance of something like that, although you can never rule out individuals being inspired.

BALDWIN: Individuals who were inspired. I mean, gosh, I was in Boston for a month what happened on Boylston Street, the Tsarnaev brothers, you think of Major Nidal Hasan, what happened at Ft. Hood, I mean, there had been examples, horrible examples of success.

MCFADDEN: That's right. And usually, behind those tragedies unfortunately almost like from the same play book, there are individual factors or factors from those persons that spurred them into action. Being able to sort that out, whether it's at the family level, local law enforcement, colleagues, that's key.

BALDWIN: OK. Bob McFadden and Philip Mudd, thank you both very much this morning. I really appreciate it.

MUDD: Thanks, Brooke.

MCFADDEN: Thank you.

BALDWIN: Also, President Obama going to expand the coalition against ISIS. Did his tough talk, big speech yesterday at the U.N. General Assembly, did that help? Did that do the trick? We will bring in Fareed Zakaria here in studio this morning to discuss that.

Also ahead, the U.K. is now poised to vote on air strikes in Iraq. What other allies will join the fight against ISIS?

You're watching NEW DAY.

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BERMAN: All right. Breaking news.

You're looking at live pictures right now of a courthouse in Texas. This is the first court appearance of the only suspect in the case right now in the missing UVA student Hannah Graham, that's Jesse Matthew, the 32-year-old man who was arrested on a beach in Galveston County, Texas, on Wednesday. He's wanted on suspicion of abduction with intent to defile again, this is his first court appearance.

I believe we have Jean Casarez on the phone right now. No, we're waiting on Jean right now. But, again, this man is wanted as a suspect in this case.

Let's listen to what he's saying.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's going to have you sign two times saying you're not requesting a court appointed attorney this morning. Again, on your Galveston County charge, you can change your mind on the Virginia charge. That's only to say that that's not who you are, you got the wrong person, and you should not be extradited.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What? I'm sorry.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's OK. Requesting a court appointed attorney for the fugitive from justice warrant out of Virginia would only be to fight extradition, basically saying you're not the person on the warrant, that they have the wrong person and you should not be extradited back to Virginia.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If I sign it?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm going to ask you to sign either way, either requesting a court appointed attorney or declining consideration for a court appointed attorney.

If you request one the only thing the attorney can do for you is challenge the validity of the warrant and fight your extradition back to Virginia.