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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

Milosevic Defends Himself at the Hague; Colin Powell Urges Sharon to Use Restraint

Aired March 06, 2002 - 22:00   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.
AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you, Larry. That was a long time ago. I didn't know that was coming. Good evening again everyone. That's how we always begin this. We don't usually put breaking news right here at the top of the program, the first 90 seconds or so being devoted to some weird and self-indulgent rant.

But how can we resist this. Item: the investigation into Bill Clinton is officially over. The independent counsel announced that today. Wow, I was worried there might be an impeachment or something. Look, do me a little favor. If you thought the investigation of Mr. Clinton ended a year ago when he left office, raise you hand. OK, now you can lower them. If you thought the investigations would never end, raise you hand? It turns out you were closer to correct.

It's remarkable, isn't it, a year after the guy leaves office, makes the deal so both sides can avoid a trial with an uncertain outcome, the country was still spending money on this? Anyway, it's over now. After about $70 million we can say he lied when he said he didn't have sex with Monica Lewinsky. I wasn't sure of that until today.

It turns out we'll spend some time, more time on Mr. Clinton today. Joe Klein has written an interesting and very balanced book on the former president, one of those books that will make everyone happy, or perhaps unhappy. We'll see.

On to the whip we go and that brings us to the war unfortunately. Jamie McIntyre is where he usually is, at the Pentagon. Jamie, a headline from you tonight.

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Aaron, they have a saying here at the Pentagon, that no plan survives first contact with the enemy, and it appears that was the case with Operation Anaconda. But it's also an axiom that flexibility is the key to success, and tonight it appears the U.S. has been able to adapt and is enjoying some success. We'll have details.

BROWN: Jamie, thank you. On to the latest violence in Israel, Sheila MacVicar working that for us this evening. Sheila, a headline from you.

SHEILA MACVICAR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Israel strikes hard, continuing its fierce military offensive, and says it will stop only if Mr. Arafat yields.

BROWN: Sheila, thank you, back to you shortly. On to The Hague and something a bit overdue, we think, an update on the war crimes trial of Slobodan Milosevic. Christiane Amanpour, of course, is there. Christiane, a headline.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Aaron, it's been nearly a month. This trial was intended to show the Serbian people at least that Slobodan Milosevic was guilt of heinous crimes. But instead, it seems that his courtroom theatrics are playing very well with the home crowd back in Serbia. That plus senior U.S. officials here at the tribunal, trying to make nice after some very negative comments about the tribunal.

BROWN: Christiane, back to you and all of you shortly. A lot for us to cover tonight. We'll talk you through a day in the life of Operation Anaconda, with some fascinating pictures that we now have in our possession, and we put them all together in a more organized way to give you a day in the life.

Also tonight, the latest on that gruesome story out of Noble, Georgia, heartbreaking in its own way, the crematory case, what's to be found in a small lake on the grounds? Jim Polk has that. And we'll follow the online trail to al Qaeda terrorists. Mike Boettcher has that piece a little bit later.

But we begin with Operation Anaconda, and this question of expectations, what American forces thought they were getting into and what they actually found. We bring this up tonight, not to second guess. There is a reason it's called the art and not the science of war, especially when it comes to figuring out just what the enemy intends to do, and it is on that judgment that the story turns tonight. Here again, CNN's Jamie McIntyre.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MCINTYRE (voice over): The fierce resistance encountered by U.S. troops in the opening phase of Operation Anaconda was no surprise, the Pentagon has repeatedly said. But soldiers on the frontlines have a slightly different perspective.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They didn't really expect them to sit there and try to duke it out with us, and a lot of small arms fire, followed by RPGs being shot, and to conclude, I saw at least one SA-7 shot and just, I was just surprised at the intensity of how much stuff was on the valley floor.

MCINTYRE: U.S. troops had been told, sources say, that faced with overwhelming force, the al Qaeda fighters would likely flee, not fight, as they did in Tora Bora, and then U.S. forces would have them trapped.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The idea we were in blocking positions and that General (inaudible) would come in and actually work through the village trying to find the al Qaeda that were in here. MCINTYRE: It didn't happen that way. The al Qaeda dug in, and after five U.S. Apache helicopters were disabled by heavy fire, U.S. commanders called for more to be sent. Sources say close to a dozen more Apache gun ships are being shipped to Afghanistan from Fort Campbell, Kentucky, while Marine Cobra attack helicopters have been moved from ships to Kandahar as a precaution. But sources say, neither the Apaches nor the Cobras are likely to be rushed into battle.

GENERAL TOMMY FRANKS, COMMANDER, U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND: What we find is, this is a very, very dangerous environment for attack helicopters to operate in.

MCINTYRE: With assault helicopters out of the mix, the job of close air support has fallen to heavily armored A-10 attack planes, as well as AC-130 gun ships, armed with .105-millimeter canons. Over the last day or so, the U.S. has sent in some 200 to 300 additional troops, which the Pentagon insists are not reinforcements.

FRANKS: Once again, that has not been in response to surprise. It has been in accordance with our plan to reposition our forces inside the objective area as necessary over time, in order to completely clear it.

MCINTYRE: The Pentagon says, no matter how good the al Qaeda fighters are, they are outgunned and out-manned by superior U.S. forces, and victory is a matter of days, not weeks away.

DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: I believe that the outcome is reasonably assured, that the people who have been in the battle will either surrender or be killed in the days ahead.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCINTYRE (on camera): And, Aaron, tonight Pentagon officials are still hedging about how a Navy SEAL was killed on Sunday. According to a videotape that was provided by an unmanned spy plane, the commanders on the scene were convinced that he was executed by al Qaeda forces. But tonight, Pentagon officials are suggesting it's not conclusive. They say he may have died of wounds that he suffered before he fell out of that helicopter. Aaron.

BROWN: In any case we, none of us, have seen the tape, and is there any plan, and I'm not suggesting we air the tape here, but for reporters to take a look at it?

MCINTYRE: Well at this point, they're not planning to release the tape at all; however, that is under consideration. They haven't released other video from these unmanned Predators, including one that would theoretically support their contention that a couple of men that were killed by a Hellfire missile were not scrap collectors, as some local residents said. So, at this point, the Pentagon is holding those tapes close to the vest.

BROWN: Jamie, thanks. I'm not sure what the PA announcement is, but you'll figure that out too. Thank you very much. Jamie McIntyre at the Pentagon tonight.

Just a quick note on this, the pictures that you saw in Jamie's piece came from a CNN crew that was operating. That's the pool crew in the operation the other day. If you were with us last night, we watched bits and pieces of this as it was fed in raw.

We asked Producer David Fitzpatrick to day to put them together chronologically to give you a "day in the life" look at the soldiers in the operation, and we have done that, and we will show that towards the end of the program. That's coming up still.

On to the rest of the news of the day. Turmoil yet again in the Middle East, Israeli forces firing at least two missiles at Yasser Arafat's office in Ramallah. The Palestinian leader not hurt and the Israeli Navy firing two rockets that hit a Palestinian police station in Gaza city, all of course in response to attacks on Israel by the Palestinian side. Back and forth it goes.

Today's bloodshed came as the secretary of state had some very strong words for the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, Secretary of State Powell warning Sharon not to declare war on the Palestinians. If it's not war already, it certainly looks like one. Here again, Sheila MacVicar joining us from Jerusalem. Sheila, good evening.

MACVICAR: Good evening, Aaron. Well, as we speak in this very early morning from Jerusalem, there is at least one Israeli military operation underway that we are aware of. Dozens of Israeli tanks are reported to be in the West Bank town of Tulkam. There is something taking place there, but these things obviously take place in a way in which it's very difficult for us to get information until these operations are over.

But over the course of the last 24 hours, we have seen Israel intensify its military pressure on Mr. Arafat. Just take a look at what happened in Gaza yesterday. Israel naval gunboats pounding away at a number of targets, five different places where Israeli forces went into Gaza, meeting in at least some of those places, they say, fierce resistance, and at one point targeting a police building just moments before Palestinian, senior Palestinian intelligence and security chiefs were to meet.

Now late last night, or earlier in your afternoon, Aaron, Israel also fired missiles and not for the first time, into Yasser Arafat's Ramallah compound. Whoa, and we just heard a very big boom here. And that compound, of course, is where Mr. Arafat has been holed up.

He was meeting with the EEU's representative Miguel Moratinos (ph) at the time, and talking on the phone to Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres. The Palestinians who were there said it was very loud and very dangerous, and also, Israel has repeatedly said it doesn't intend to kill Mr. Arafat. They're asking that question again, all of this on a day when, very unusually from the Bush Administration, a rebuke for Israel -- Aaron.

BROWN: Just to go back to the boom for a second. I'm not sure I heard it quite as well as you did. What happened? Do you have any idea, and how far away did it sound, anything like that?

MACVICAR: What we're hearing was some way away. I mean I would have to say, we've got planes. We have planes in the air now. You probably can't hear them, but we've had planes circling around in the air now for about 15 minutes or so, and that boom sound was though it was somewhere perhaps to the south of Jerusalem, somewhere over in the West Bank, maybe around Bethlehem. But at this stage it's, of course, difficult for us to know. We'll have to check and try and let you know.

But as I was saying, Aaron, a very unusual rebuke from Secretary of State Powell, who it has to be said, has directed most of his criticism in the past towards the Israelis, basically now saying "if you declare war on the Palestinians, you decide you can win only by killing more Palestinians, that's not a very helpful situation."

BROWN: Sheila, thank you. Sheila MacVicar is in Jerusalem for us this evening. To The Hague and the war crimes trial of Slobodan Milosevic next, the trial goes on, not very much as expected. The former Yugoslav leader has turned out to be a pretty good lawyer, or at least a combative one.

In truth, there's no major development in the case today, no single shocking moment that required our telling it tonight, but we run this because the trial, the issues raised there are important, and the characters, the witnesses, victims really, and the accused are compelling. Again, here's CNN's Christiane Amanpour.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

AMANPOUR (voice over): Week Four, Witness 14, in the trial of Slobodan Milosevic, and the pattern is now set. The former Yugoslav President sticking to his defense that NATO caused all the suffering in Kosovo.

SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC (through translator): (Inaudible) was never bombed or shelled by the army and police, is that correct?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): This is not accurate because the police and the army, the police and army have burned down the village of Zheger (ph).

AMANPOUR: But at this point in the trial, Kosovar victims appear less intimidated under fierce and lengthy cross-examination by the man they accuse of ordering the rape, deportation, or death of their family members. Most simply refuse to look at him as they answer. In the early days, the pressure forced one witness to excuse himself and others to get flustered. In the face of Milosevic's courtroom style, some accuse the prosecution of mounting a weak case and allowing Milosevic to take the initiative.

CARLA DEL PONTE, WAR CRIMES CHIEF PROSECUTOR: He's doing very well and he's right to defend himself, but we are also working very well and hard.

AMANPOUR: While he still rejects the tribunal's legitimacy, Milosevic is now fully engaged in his defense, well briefed, and taking copious notes. A senior American officials observing the trial admits that it is playing well to the home crowd back in Serbia.

AMANPOUR (on camera): Milosevic received some unexpected assistance from the Bush Administration, when its ambassador-at-large for war crimes told Congress last week that this tribunal was mismanaged, unprofessional, and full of abuse, and should wrap up its work by 2008. That prompted a chorus of criticism here in Europe, with officials accusing the United States of undermining the tribunal, just as its most important suspect is on trial.

AMANPOUR (voice over): So in an effort at damage control, Ambassador Pierre-Richard Prosper came to the tribunal, saying that his comments had been taken out of context and that this court will operate until its two most wanted Bosnian Serb indictees are brought to book.

PIERRE-RICHARD PROSPER: Karadzic and Mladic will go to The Hague. It could happen tomorrow. It could happen next year or the year after. The tribunal will not close before they are brought to justice in The Hague.

AMANPOUR: Prosper and the chief prosecutor both insist U.S. support remains strong, but as the Milosevic trial grinds on here, the U.S. wants low and mid-level war crime suspects to be tried in their home countries, the same countries which the U.S. admits show little willingness or ability to conduct such trials.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AMANPOUR (on camera): So just to recap, Milosevic is charged with 66 different counts, ranging from crimes against humanity to other war crimes, plus the highest crime of genocide. The trial will go on for some time because they're very methodically going through the witnesses.

So far, they're still on what they call the crime based witnesses, eyewitnesses to what happened during the Kosovo war, and then they say they're going to bring insiders, who knew about what Milosevic planned and ordered. So this is going to take a long time for the prosecution case to wrap up as Milosevic spends a lot of time cross-examining every single witness. Aaron.

AMANPOUR: Yes.

BROWN: It is a windy morning there for you. Americans seem to be paying a modicum of attention to all of this. Is the story and the trial getting much bigger play across Europe?

AMANPOUR: Yes, it is because this obviously was a story that was so huge in Europe when the war was on, and of course, with this new little sort of (inaudible) if you like with the comments that were made by the U.S. war crimes ambassador, that caused a bit of a storm over here in Europe, people thinking that, you know, the tribunal may be put at the sacrificial altar because this administration, of course, doesn't like international bureaucracy. The Bush Administration doesn't want to see any sign of the international criminal court every taking seed. So people here are a bit anxious about that.

BROWN: Christiane, thanks. Christiane Amanpour in The Hague, and the trial of Slobodan Milosevic. Coming up, a political fight that has been simmering for a while over one the president's judicial nominees, we'll take a look at that, and much more ahead on NEWSNIGHT for Wednesday.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: There's a skirmish going on in Washington tonight that is a reminder of the politics of the Clinton years, funny how his name keeps coming up tonight by the way.

President Bush has nominated Judge Charles Pickering, Sr. for a slot on the Federal Appeals Court, but Democrats in the Senate are blocking the appointment. They say that Judge Pickering is anti women, anti civil rights, and he has questionable ethics. The President met with Judge Pickering today, saying the Democrats aren't being fair or right.

The Senator Judiciary Committee vote on the nomination was scheduled for tomorrow. Republicans are hoping to delay that for a week, to allow time for either some sort of compromise to be worked out, or to give Judge Pickering a change to withdraw his name from consideration and avoid any embarrassment from being defeated.

Another choice made by the President hasn't fared so well either, and that's his pick to take on California's Democratic Governor Gray Davis in November. We stayed up late last night, very late, to bring you this one, a stunning defeat in the Republican primary for former Los Angeles Mayor Dick Riordan, thought by nearly everyone to have the best chance of actually beating Gray Davis in the general election.

Riordan blew a huge lead. He was trounced by someone with no political experience and no real name recognition either, Bill Simon. No surprise that Simon's victory song was the "Rocky Theme." There probably wasn't a lot of celebrating going on in the White House today over this, but they kept a brave face. Here's CNN's Candy Crowley.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Oops! The Bush Administration bet on the wrong horse in California, and don't think Democrats won't ride that for a while.

TERRY MCAULIFFE, CHAIRMAN, DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE: This was a major defeat yesterday for the White House, a major embarrassment for Carl Rowe (ph) and everybody else who went out and tried to get Dick Riordan to run.

CROWLEY: Top Republicans waxed philosophical. "Life" one said "is too short for second guessing." Blatantly taking sides in a primary is not verboten, but usually avoided by sitting presidents and party officials. But the Bush Administration, generally in the form of political strategist Carl Rowe, as well as operatives in the Bush field Republican National Committee, had been knee deep in the 2002 primary season. The stakes, explained one official, are too high not to be involved.

Anxious to install governors in battleground states the President needs in 2004, Bush operatives have encouraged handpicked or otherwise grease the skids for favored candidates in places like Michigan and California where in Riordan, the Bush Administration saw a chance to shoehorn Republicans into the land of 55 electoral votes.

They are intent too on retaking the Senate majority this year, so Team Bush has anointed those it considers most likely to succeed. In North Carolina, Elizabeth Dole enjoys the attentions of the President.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I thank you for getting ready to send a fabulous woman to the United States Senate named Elizabeth Dole.

CROWLEY: This one is personal. While clearly the strongest Republican candidate, Dole won the President's loyalty with her tireless enthusiastic campaigning on his behalf. South Dakota, home state of Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle, billed as the Bush- Daschle race, the White House really wants this senate seat and early on focused its attentions on Jim Thune (ph).

Encouragement, support, et cetera, have also been given to Senate candidates Jim Talent in Missouri, Norman Coleman in Minnesota, and John Cornan (ph) in Texas. "If you're going to play" said one party official "play hard." Does Riordan's loss give them pause? Nope.

ARI FLEISCHER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I think the administration, the President, will continue to make judgments about various races, based on what he thinks and that will always get put to the voters and the voters decide ultimately.

CROWLEY: Indeed they will, as they did in California. The President's pick got trounced by 18 points. On to Plan B.

BILL SIMON: Good morning, Mr. President.

BUSH: Is this Bill?

SIMON: This is Bill Simon, the next governor of California.

BUSH: Absolutely.

CROWLEY: All is forgiven, after all the President still wants California, and the President's blessing, no matter when he offers it, means money, media, and maybe votes. Californians expect to see the President and Mr. Simon appearing at a fundraiser near you before the month is out. Candy Crowley, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Before we go to break, we noticed something in our camera that's pointed at Ground Zero. A short time ago, there were a lot of people down there. It looks like several hundred, and then there is the scene with the American flag. The pool camera coordinator believes now that another body has been found.

We're on the 6th of March now, and that they may, and we've seen this many times before, and you have with us, be preparing to remove the body from the area in that kind of ceremony we haven't seen in quite a long time, since that weekend more than a month ago when a number of firefighters, six I believe, were found over the same weekend.

In any case, around the perimeter of Ground Zero, there are several hundred people who are standing and watching all of this, this going on tonight, a reminder. We'll talk with Joe Klein when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: For President Clinton now, or citizen Clinton, the investigation is now officially over. We mentioned this earlier in that sometimes-annoying Page 2 that begins the program. No reason to say it again, it's done, he lied, $70 million, no trial.

Which leads us, and how is this for great planning by the way, to Joe Klein, who wrote the book on Mr. Clinton. Well actually, he wrote two books on Mr. Clinton. The first Primary Colors, the campaign book. Now, The Natural, which strikes us as the perfect title for a book about a guy who seemed to have been born to run for something, anything. Nice to see you, Joe.

JOSEPH KLEIN, AUTHOR: Good to be here, Aaron.

BROWN: You've covered him a long time, Mr. Clinton.

KLEIN: Yes.

BROWN: Do you believe you know him?

KLEIN: No. I know what he's done. I know what his achievements and his failures were, and I've talked to him, you know, many, many times. But I don't think that he has ever really showed his true feelings to me. He's certainly never said a word, pro or con, about anything I ever wrote about him.

BROWN: Are there people who you think know him?

KLEIN: His wife, perhaps.

BROWN: Yes.

KLEIN: Some of his close friends. But I think that, you know, the epigraph for the book, the quote at the beginning was, George Santiana (ph) the great Harvard philosopher at the turn of the century on William James the great Harvard psychologist, and he said of James: "He was so extremely natural that there was no telling what his exact nature was, or what came next" and that seemed to me to be perfect for Bill Clinton. BROWN: Let's try and cover a couple things real quickly here. It's always seemed to me that he is perceived in a kind of black and white way. You either love him or you hate him, and one of the arguments you make in the book is that, in fact, the guy did good and the guy did bad.

KLEIN: Yes, most presidents do.

BROWN: On the good, what did he do that was good?

KLEIN: Well, his domestic policy was excellent and it was courageous. He did something that was really quite remarkable for a president. He went right up into the face of his base, his strongest supporters, by deficit reduction, when you know the liberal Democrats really wanted to spend more money on social programs, welfare reform, free trade.

These are all things that are kind of an anathema of died-in-the- wool Democrats, and yet he did them and he did them because he had a vision of the world. He wanted to move us from the industrial age to the information age, and he had mixed success in doing that.

BROWN: And would you agree that he was less successful a president on the foreign policy side?

KLEIN: Yes. I don't think he ever felt really comfortable with the military. I think that that resulted from his position on the war in Vietnam, and it was there from Day One, and it was probably still there at the last day. Also, he didn't pay as much attention as he should have to foreign policy, and then in the end, I really believe that the Lewinsky affair had some deleterious really bad effects on the foreign policy.

BROWN: It was a distraction to him?

KLEIN: It was more than a distraction. I think that a lot of people knew that the FBI really wasn't in very good shape. In fact, it was a disaster, and I think he wanted to fire Louie Freed (ph) but he couldn't do it because it would appear that he was firing him over Monica Lewinsky.

BROWN: You talked about his relationship to the military and going back to Vietnam, which for me, a perfect segueway into this theory I have about people's feelings about him.

I've always thought that many people had, inappropriately, I'm not sure that's the word I want, strong dislike for him that is out there somewhere years ago, but not necessarily related to anything he specifically did.

KLEIN: Yeah, well, you know in the ancient, ancient world, in very early world, a scapegoat was always guilty of the crimes he or she was accused of.

And Bill Clinton was a classic scapegoat because he represented the three great crimes of my Baby Boom generation, my awful self indulgent Baby Boom generation. There was the sexual stuff. There was the looseness, the moral looseness. There was the fact that he put marketing over substance too often. And then there was the dreadful fudging and skating and avoiding service that we all did. And it's one of the reasons why I think we haven't been as good public servants as our parents were.

BROWN: Yes or no, do you like the guy?

KLEIN: You can't not like the guy. Also -- also, yes or no, do you like a hurricane? Do you like a tornado? I mean, this is the most talented politician I covered in 33 years doing this stuff. And sometimes, you just sat back with your mouth agape in wonder that he could do it.

BROWN: Terrific read. Thanks for coming in.

KLEIN: Thank you very much.

Joe Klein, I just wanted to ask one unfair question and that was it. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We haven't done this story much on the program, but every time you read something new about it, it never fails to horrify or disgust. It is the crematory in Noble, Georgia, the one we found out last week or this week, was it, that it actually worked. But for some inexplicable reason, one knew some 300 bodies discarded over 16 acres. And searchers have made more grim discoveries in the lake on the ground or at least what's left in the lake.

Our update comes from CNN's James Polk.

(BEGAN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMES POLK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is what the small lake on the crematory grounds looked like. Once underwater cameras spotted a skull and torso, agents decided it had to be drained. So far, with the lake now two-thirds empty, searchers are coming up dry.

KRIS SPERRY, GEORGIA MEDICAL EXAMINER: We have men in flat- bottom boats who are going out periodically, and just paddling around to see what they can see. But so far, we haven't found anything.

POLK: Authorities say it may be another week or more, before they can find what may be stuck in the mud at the bottom.

SPERRY: The way the rest of this operation has gone, until we have begun to dig or to look deeper, we have not been able to discover what's been hidden. So that's the way we're treating the lake, as a mystery that we need to excavate.

POLK: Agents found 11 separate burial pits on the grounds. With the search on land finished, the count stands at 339 bodies recovered that should have been cremated. More than 100 have been identified, all sent to the crematory in the last five years, after Brent Marsh took over the operation from his parents.

Marsh remains in jail in Lafayette, Georgia, held without bond, on 174 counts of fraud for taking money for cremations he failed to do. Until now, he was a respected young businessman, a county official on the board of property tax appeals. At Susie's Sunset Cafe, where a mourning ribbon hangs on the front door, his arrest evokes a range of emotions.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Extreme disappointment, and definitely outrage and anger.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think shocked, more than anything, because this was a guy everybody trusted, you know.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just think it's a mess. Nobody understands the question why.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's unbelievable. I don't see why it went so long.

POLK: Neighbors now say they should have suspected something sooner.

BARBARA BROWN, NEIGHBOR: One day I came home and my dog had brought up this huge bone on my porch, you know. I thought nothing about it.

POLK: Because many of the dead were elderly, with little or no family left, authorities fear as many as 150 or more bodies may never be identified.

SPERRY: Personally, if we can identify half of the remains that we've recovered, I will be extremely pleased.

POLK: For the nameless who were never cremated, officials say eventually they will be buried in a memorial, in case a relative ever comes forth in the future.

James Polk, CNN, Walker County, Georgia.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: At the trial of Andrea Yates, the defense has now rested, but not before another dramatic moment in this sad and terribly tragic case. The jurors got to hear Ms. Yates actually speak. The defense showing a taped interview a psychiatrist held with Ms. Yates about a month after she drowned her five kids. Yates said that Satan was sending her messages, and the kids were not progressing the right way in their school work.

Jurors also saw another tape of Ms. Yates in February, after a month of drug treatments, smiling and saying "the psychosis seems to have left me."

Despite all we've heard about Andrea Yates, she is still in many ways a mystery at least to us. So we're glad tonight to be joined by author Suzy Spencer. She's written a book about the case, been in the courtroom virtually every day, watching it all unfold. Good evening, to you.

SUZY SPENCER, AUTHOR, "BREAKING POINT": Good evening.

BROWN: I want to talk about moments in the trial so far. A particularly effective moment come to mind for the defense in their -- as they laid out their case?

SPENCER: There were tons of moments. Dr. Melissa Ferguson, the intake psychiatrist at the jail with her details of Andrea's psychosis that was quite overwhelming. Debbie Holmes, Andrea's best friend, talking about, you know, asking Rusty Yates, the husband over and over to get Andrea help. And Andrea being so out of it, that she wasn't bathing and stunk. And then again today, as you mentioned the videotapes of Andrea from I think the July 27, and then from February.

BROWN: There was a tape, wasn't there, a week or so ago that they played where she looked -- it sounds crazy to say it, but she looked very sick?

SPENCER: She looked like a heroine addict.

BROWN: Yes.

SPENCER: She -- I mean, just the dark black eyes, total skin and bones, body hunched over. She looked like the beggars you see on the street, who are strung out on drugs.

BROWN: I want to talk about where the case goes from here. But let me ask you one jury question. I'm not going to ask you what they're thinking. I don't expect anyone knows that. But as you look at them, how are they reacting? What do you see when you see them?

SPENCER: Lots of times, stonefaced, just really listening. There's one juror who is really stonefaced. And then the rest are like they're really listening and paying attention. But today as they played the videotapes and the prosecution also replayed the 911 tape and the confession tape, and what amazed me is the jurors have heard all this before. And yet, they just started sinking in their chairs, covering their mouths. Their shoulders slumped. It was hitting them again.

BROWN: What does the prosecution's theory of the case as to why she did this?

SPENCER: Revenge. She was so smushed down, smashed down, submissive woman, that she did it to get back at Russell Yates, her husband.

BROWN: And the evidence that supports that is?

SPENCER: They keep bringing up the preacher, Michael Warnecke and the teachings there about, you know, here she was with five kids, home schooling them, living in a bus, you know, no life of her own, no friends. And she was just so packed down, that she had to erupt. BROWN: I don't know if it will happen tomorrow, but it will happen soon. The prosecution will call their psychiatrist, a somewhat celebrated Park Dietz, correct?

SPENCER: Right.

BROWN: And what do we expect him to say?

SPENCER: That she's sane. And one of the things that was most interesting is the defense sneaked that his nickname is Hollywood Park. Though they got it in, it's sort of a hint, I think the jury picked on it. And they've also been really setting it up, that Park Dietz is expensive, high priced guy who hangs with the celebs. And everyone on the defense team, they're doing it for the love of Andrea Yates.

BROWN: Has Mr. Dietz -- he's testified a lot. Has he ever found anyone insane?

SPENCER: Anyone insane? Not that I could think of offhand. But that's, you know, because in 99 percent of the time, if not all the time, he's a witness for the prosecution.

BROWN: All right. And how much longer does it seem to be playing out, another week?

SPENCER: There's a remote chance of closing arguments on Friday, but more than likely Monday or Tuesday.

BROWN: Suzy Spencer, thanks for taking some time with us tonight.

SPENCER: Thank you.

BROWN: Thank you. We'll talk again.

Coming up next on NEWSNIGHT, tracking the terrorists, not where you think. High-tech search, when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: One of the most fascinating and disturbing aspects of how al Qaeda is -- operates is how successful they are at what you might call technological Jujitsu. They're an organization ideologically at home in the seventh century, using 21st century technology like the Internet to do their deadly business.

At first blush, it would seem like a great strength. After all, the Internet handles billions of bits and bytes every day. And a lot of places to hide just a few messages, or so you might think.

Here's CNN's Mike Boettcher.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MIKE BOETTCHER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With his scruffy hair and torn T-shirt, Guido Rudolphi hardly looks like a man who now spends hours each day tracking terrorists. But Rudolphi, who operates an Internet monitoring service from this spartan loft in Zurich, Switzerland, is a hacker. And two coalition intelligence agencies believe he has unmasked a major player in al Qaeda's communications network, a Mauritanian named Mohammed Ould Slahi.

GUIDO RUDOLPHI: As you can see, it has so-called private entries, which can only be viewed by him.

BOETTCHER: Rudolphi says Slahi was running a seemingly innocuous Web site, but behind it there was something called a guest book, where visitors to the site could leave messages. It was a way of communicating that he had seen in action when he previously tracked web usage by extreme right-wing groups.

RUDOLPHI: The perfect communication tools if you want to hide the content of the communication. You can put a message in a guest book. The owner of the guest book receives an e-mail, but in seconds, can look at the message, edit it. And so, it looks pretty normal, although the real content, which he has seen already, has disappeared and may be quite harmful.

BOETTCHER: Were al Qaeda terrorists using the guest book as a means to communicate and activate attacks? Rudolphi began to look at a number of what he calls radical Islamic web sites with guest books, including Slahi's. He soon found a disturbing pattern.

RUDOLPHI: Here you see the traffic for the last two years. And it started to increase dramatically in May 2001. And shortly before September 2001, it dropped to an all-time low.

BOETTCHER: Rudolphi tried to find a reason why there was a dramatic peak before the September 11 attacks, and was suspicious that terrorists might be using some of those Web sites, to coordinate operations. CNN has learned that several coalition intelligence agencies now agree with Rudolphi's hunch.

RUDOLPHI: We were able to locate him.

BOETTCHER: Guido Rudolphi and his colleagues were able to find Slahi using the web. They tracked to his native country of Mauritania in West Africa, where Slahi operates an Internet cafe, another fact that raised Rudophi's suspicion.

What did you do with this information when you saw it and thought it looked suspicious?

RUDOLPHI: First, I got in contact with the Swiss police. They were interested, but since then, I never heard back.

BOETTCHER: But other law enforcement and intelligence agencies did have Slahi on their radar. Last September, the Mauritanian government detained and questioned Slahi at the request of the FBI, then released him. The FBI will not comment on Slahi.

(on camera): However, two coalition intelligence agencies tell CNN they now believe that Slahi was tied to both the millennium bomb plot and the September 11 hijackers. Those intelligence sources are convinced that Slahi was key in communicating orders to activate those terrorist cells.

(voice-over): To get his side of the story, we tried to contact Slahi, but there has been no reply. Is Mohamed Ould Slahi a simple Internet cafe owner or the key to al Qaeda communications? Guido Rudolphi has his suspicions and key stroke by key stroke, keeps looking for answers.

Mike Boettcher, CNN, Zurich.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: In a moment, Operation Anaconda as seen by the people fighting it. This is NEWSNIGHT from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We end tonight where we began in Afghanistan. The war in Afghanistan has largely been unseen. We don't need to debate this here and now, whether reporters should have had more access. The fact is they haven't. But as this current battle has played out, a pool team has been present for at least some of that. So we've taken those pictures and married them with the chain of events. And here is one day, one battle of a war that many thought was over.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(voice-over): Before the battle, at Bagram airbase outside of Kabul, there is a soldier's saying, "when the chaplains are busy, things are bound to become deadly."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's my favorite verse is Psalm 121, verse 1. "I will lift up mine eyes to the hills, from where my help cometh. My help cometh from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth." Turn around, will you. Look at this hills. God's with you. God bless you. Go in safety. Amen.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Amen.

BROWN: The first American soldiers into the battle begin their jobs at night.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's a valley like this. And you got to the two like hills that came up, and they drop back off and went up to the bigger ridges. We were in there, using that for cover.

BROWN: It is dawn now and freezing. CNN cameraman Scott McQuinney taking the pictures for the American pool was there, too.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Head back.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We found a cave. We've got -- looks like rocks. The front portion of it, half of the front portion, brick.

BROWN: Carefully exploring, cave to cave. Shooting first, no chances.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because I'm from New York, and I have friends that were lost in the World Trade Center. And it's my job to do this. I want to see how all of us react when, you know, this all goes down. Not just me, but all my guys, the whole platoon. This job we've been waiting for this whole time. I don't want to sound like hero or nothing, you know. But yeah, I want to go, all of us, not just me, all my guys.

BROWN: There's sporadic fire. And at a Taliban command post, evidence of a very quick departure.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Taliban.

BROWN: But just before dark, a fire fight erupts. The enemy, whoever he is, has not disappeared.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Fire!

UNIDENTIFID MALE: Number two gun. Fire!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They weren't really zeroing in. They were just dropping round after round. One would hit right after the other. And it got to a point we were all down and in between the little wadih. And luckily, a mortar round never land there.

BROWN: And soon the need for air power. To the soldiers on the ground, it is a glorious sight.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When nightfall came in, inspector gunship came in, took everything out. And we were able to get casualties out. In the process of getting casualties out, we had fire from one more ridge line. Inspector went in and took it out. And then they brought in two Chinooks and two Apache gunships to protect us.

BROWN: The next morning, the big guns called in, big planes, big helicopters, a day long pounding.

And the soldiers from the 101st Airborne were headed home to safety.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I fell asleep. Everybody did. The whole bird was asleep. We'd been up for over 24 hours, fighting. So it takes a lot out of you.

BROWN: One battle, the work of NEWSNIGHT producer David Fitzpatrick.

We leave you tonight at ground zero. We started to look at this 20 minutes or so ago, 15. And yes, another body was found today. We believe, you see the large American flag behind the group of men carrying the body out that it was a Marine Corp veteran. We don't know much more about it than that. It is a scene we have not seen in a long time. But it's an important scene as we come up on the six month anniversary, which is Monday. 2800 people, that's the number of people who died. We'll see you tomorrow. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com