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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

American Military Spokesman Vows to Pacify Fallujah; Kerry, Bush in Statistical Dead Heat in Polls

Aired April 01, 2004 - 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: Good evening again everyone.
A report we saw out of Fallujah tonight said the residents of that city feel a combined sense of pride and shame, pride at the killings of four American contract workers yesterday, shame at the brutal mob scene that followed.

In Baghdad, the American military spokesman promised today to pacify Fallujah. That challenged, the depth of it, was laid out pretty clearly on this program last night.

The original attack was the work of three people, maybe four. What followed, the mob scene, the butchering of the bodies that obscenity was the handiwork of far, far more and you can't kill them all and you can't capture an entire town.

We've said this before. Iraq, a student of the country said to us a couple of weeks ago, has a high insanity factor. Yesterday, yet again, he was proved right.

Again, Fallujah tops the news and begins the whip. CNN's Jim Clancy in Baghdad starts us off, Jim a headline from you tonight please.

JIM CLANCY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, U.S. officials and Iraqis are reacting to those grisly scenes in the streets of Fallujah that were seen around the world.

BROWN: Jim, thank you. We'll get to the details coming up.

Next to the White House and another window into the thinking there on national security in the days before 9/11, including the day of 9/11. Our Senior White House Correspondent John King there tonight, John a headline.

JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, on that very day, the president's most trusted aide on foreign policy, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, would have delivered a speech in which she talked about the president's world view and never once said al Qaeda, never once used the word terrorism. Critics say it's proof this president pushed terrorism off the priority list. The White house says it proves nothing -- Aaron.

BROWN: John, thank you. Finally, to the campaign and the mad, mad march that was, at least for John Kerry. CNN's Kelly Wallace has that for us tonight, Kelly a headline.

KELLY WALLACE, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, one month ago Super Tuesday when John Kerry essentially clinched the Democratic presidential nomination but the rest of the month even his supporters say was not his best. Still right now polls show a statistical dead heat, so both the Kerry and Bush campaigns feeling good about their prospects going into April -- Aaron.

BROWN: Kelly, thank you. We'll get back to you and the rest shortly.

Also coming up on the program tonight, the contractors who lost their lives in Fallujah, non-military men doing military work it seems.

Plus, shock and awe rendered in pencil and crayon, how war colors a child's view of the war.

And the rooster makes an appearance of course, no April fool he. We'll have a look at tomorrow morning's papers tonight, all that and more in the hour ahead.

We begin tonight in Iraq with the repercussions and the complications and the contradictions of Fallujah. It became clear today that for at least some who live there certain acts of brutality are beyond the pale.

Said an American official today, these people are actually aware that Fallujah now has a reputation as the worst place on earth but he went on to add they have to be careful what they say or they'll end up dead. Harsh reality for the good people of Fallujah and the Marines whose job it is to help them take the city back.

We have two reports tonight beginning in Baghdad and CNN's Jim Clancy.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CLANCY (voice-over): A day after Iraqi insurgents ambushed and killed nine American soldiers and civilians in separate attacks around Fallujah, U.S. officials vowed to stay the course in Iraq and pursue those responsible.

The incident involving four civilian contractors whose charred bodies were dismembered and put on display by a crowd of jubilant Iraqis cause the most concern. Some Iraqis were shocked by the violence.

Others said Fallujah harbored some of the most ardent supporters of Saddam Hussein in all of Iraq and that no one should be surprised they treated American civilians Wednesday just like they treated Iraqis for decades. But most appeared to excuse the mob scene in the streets as a reaction to the continuing U.S. occupation. U.S. officials rejected that notion.

PAUL BREMER, IRAQ CIVIL ADMINISTRATOR: The acts we have seen were despicable and inexcusable and they violate the tenets of all religions including Islam as well as the foundations of civilized society. Their deaths will not go unpunished.

CLANCY: General Mark Kimmitt was more direct promising to send in the Marines.

BRIG. GEN. MARK KIMMITT, DEPUTY DIR., COALITION OPERATIONS: They are coming back. They are going to hunt down the people responsible for this bestial act. It is up to the people, the small number of people in Fallujah to determine if they want to do it with a fight or without a fight.

CLANCY: But the fight continued. In northwest Baghdad, two roadside bombs took aim at a U.S. supply convoy including fuel trucks. The first roadside bomb struck a civilian vehicle wounding the Iraqi driver who was evacuated for medical treatment.

A convoy of fuel trucks coming behind the car were the suspected target and U.S. troops prepared to search using a robot for any other improvised explosive devices. That is when a second explosion rocked the scene. Dust, debris and smoke could be seen rising from its location. The blast hit the middle of the convoy shattering windscreens with shrapnel.

U.S. troops took up defensive positions along their vehicles taking aim at suspected gunmen on nearby rooftops. It was believed both roadside bombs were detonated by remote control.

Meantime, medics treated one of the drivers of a fuel truck for head wounds. Wrapped in bandages that covered most of his face, it was unclear as he was evacuated whether this civilian contract worker was an Iraqi or a foreign national working for the U.S.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CLANCY: While those events, those scenes from the streets of Fallujah Wednesday reminded some people of Somalia a decade ago, Aaron, there is a huge strategic and political difference. U.S. officials appear to know that. They're not even promising to step back much less pull out -- Aaron.

BROWN: There is some controversy about why the Marines didn't go into Fallujah yesterday. Did the CPA address that at all today?

CLANCY: Well they said certainly that would be a normal reaction but not a wise one. They fear that it would make the situation worse. They fear that the insurgents inside the town might use human shields, use those crowds on the streets to then attack the Marines. They said they would prefer to choose the time and place on their own that would be best for them.

You have to remember it was Tariq Aziz when asked whether or not -- he pointed out you aren't the Vietnamese. You don't have swamps. You don't have jungles. Tariq Aziz replied our cities are our swamps, the buildings our jungles -- Aaron.

BROWN: Jim, thank you, Jim Clancy in Baghdad for us tonight.

Pacification is the unlikely name for the mission ahead in Fallujah involving, as it does, a blend of good deeds and deadly force. The balance has shifted over the past year or so and safe to say it's been tough finding the right mix. The current job falls to the 1st Marine Division now all but certain to be hands-on work.

From the Pentagon tonight, CNN's Jamie McIntyre.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SR. PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The murder and mutilation of four American contractors has driven the U.s. military to ditch the strategy of keeping several thousand Marines on the outskirts of Fallujah.

It will no longer rely only on poorly trained and ill-equipped Iraqi police and civil defense forces to provide security. The Marines are now being told they will retake the city.

KIMMITT: The coalition forces will respond. They will be in that city. It will be at a time and a place of our choosing. It will be methodical. It will be precise and it will be overwhelming.

MCINTYRE: Pentagon sources say planning is underway now for a major effort to "pacify Fallujah" to being in the next few days. Marines will go in, in force, and hunt for enemy fighters as well as pressure city officials to finger those responsible for recent attacks, the message help us find them or we will do it the hard way with brute combat force. Marines will also be looking for any Iraqis who can be identified from television footage showing the angry mob celebrating the U.S. deaths.

KIMMITT: Those people that we have photographed and we have video that were involved in this operation that were involved in this brutality we have a significant interest in finding them and talking to them.

MCINTYRE: Last Friday when Marines engaged local insurgents in a fierce firefight, 18 Iraqis, one Marine and five civilians were killed. The deaths only fueled anti-U.S. sentiment.

So, the new strategy is to try at the same time to also win hearts and minds by pumping more money into local schools and health clinics. The U.S. insists that as disturbing as the gruesome events have been, the Marines will not be intimidated.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was in Fallujah today and people were saying, yes, the Americans were scared to come back in. Does not send a bad message of tolerance of violence?

KIMMITT: Ask them after the Americans have come back in.

MCINTYRE (on camera): The U.S. insists sending in more American troops is not the answer but until more Iraqi police are on the job the Marines will have the tough assignment of hunting down insurgents while trying to win over the locals with acts of kindness. It is, however, a mission befitting the official motto of the 1st Marine Division, no better friend, no worse enemy.

Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: We have more on this a little bit later in the program. We'll look at the contract workers, what they do and who they are and also some mystery still surrounding what happened in Fallujah yesterday. That's later in the program.

On now to 9/11, what the administration knew in the days and months leading up to it and, just as important, where the priorities might have been. As the 9/11 commission prepares to question National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice next week, a speech she never made has come into the public eye. The date on it chilling, the content could be telling.

So once again we turn to our Senior White House Correspondent John King. John, good evening.

KING: Good evening, Aaron.

It was one of many speeches canceled across Washington, of course, on that horrible day but this one more than any of the others now part of the intensifying debate over whether President Bush ignored warnings that al Qaeda was stirring to strike.

Some Democrats today say the entire text of this speech should be made public. The White House says no and those who think that it is proof that the president ignored, pushed aside terrorism as a policy priority, they want to know more about this speech. Again, the White House and the administration says no.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KING (voice-over): The White House called it ridiculous to cite one speech as evidence the president underestimated the terrorist threat.

SCOTT MCCLELLAN, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: This administration doesn't measure commitment based on one speech or one conference call or one meeting. We look at the sum total of the strong actions that we take.

KING: The speech in question was to be delivered by National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice on September 11, outlining the administration's efforts to deal with "the threats and problems of today and the day after, not the world of yesterday." Administration officials confirm the text contained no mention of Osama bin Laden or al Qaeda, though it did have a general mention of terrorism.

"We need to worry about the suitcase bomb, the car bomb and the vial of sarin released in the subway," Rice was to have said but her focus was to have been more on administration efforts to rally support for an ambitious missile defense plan, a case she also made in a speech two months before the 9/11 attacks.

CONDOLEEZZA RICE, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: But as the president has made clear, we must deal with today's world and today's threat including weapons of mass destruction and missiles in the hands of states that would blackmail us from coming to the aid of friends and allies.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KING: In that July speech, just as in the speech she never delivered on September 11, again, no mention of al Qaeda, use of the word terror but not use of the word terrorism. To be fair to the administration, Aaron, Condoleezza Rice did take 30 minutes of questions after that July speech. No one asked about al Qaeda either.

BROWN: Obviously you're there every day and you've covered a lot of this. As you look at the body of what the administration said over time is it clear that their focus was on state sponsored terrorism and the anti-missile system with little mention of al Qaeda or is that too simple?

KING: No, that's a very fair statement and the administration does not dispute that. How the administration would justify that is to say that it makes the case it was continuing the Clinton administration terrorism policy while developing a new one, so there was no need to be out in public clamoring, making a case for public support.

Missile support, of course, was very controversial, so the administration says of course it had to go public quite aggressively making its case. That is what the White House says. Others and, of course, the critics of this administration say how can they dispute Richard Clarke when Condoleezza Rice was giving all these speeches in the eight months leading up to 9/11 and one speech planned on that day in which she never mentioned al Qaeda?

BROWN: And just briefly is there nervousness, anticipation, what's the mood there regarding Dr. Rice's testimony next week?

KING: All of the above that the administration wants this to happen. They pushed to have it next week. It will be on Thursday. The know Mr. Clarke's story is being debated across the country. They want to rebut it and they want to rebut it forcefully and quickly.

BROWN: John, thank you, our Senior White House Correspondent John King.

Ahead on the program tonight it's March madness of a completely different sort, plenty of sharp elbows being thrown. We'll take a look at the political month that just passed.

Also, images of war and how they shape the way war is seen and war is waged, a break first. This is NEWSNIGHT from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: When all is said and done, March may not mean much in the life of John Kerry. On the plus side, he had a few days off to ski, raise some money to boot. On the other hand, the Bush campaign spent millions of dollars in ads raising questions about the Senator on policy both foreign and domestic. Like we said when all is said and done March may not mean that much. Then again it might.

Here's CNN's Kelly Wallace.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE (voice-over): John Kerry's own supporters say the month since he clinched the Democratic presidential nomination well just hasn't been his best.

STAN GREENBERG, DEMOCRATIC POLLSTER: I'm sure this won't be his favorite month when the campaign is over but it's not a big deal.

WALLACE: In the headlines, stories about how some Democrats are concerned Kerry is slipping out of the picture recovering from shoulder surgery after a March that started with a series of missteps.

SEN. JOHN KERRY (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it.

WALLACE: Then the week of R&R in Idaho just as President Bush was launching his campaign and unleashing a multimillion dollar ad blitz.

ANNOUNCER: Raising taxes is a habit of Kerry's.

WALLACE: The damage, according to this week's CNN-USA Today Gallup poll, Kerry's unfavorable rating has gone up ten points since February an even larger increase among those who think he's too liberal and so there is some nervousness on the part of Democrats.

GREENBERG: They're looking for him to run, you know, the perfect campaign. He needs to run a better campaign and step onto the stage and I'm sure they're going to do it.

WALLACE: Kerry's advisers say he is already doing that.

ANNOUNCER: George Bush says sending jobs overseas makes sense for America.

WALLACE: With new national ads and an aggressive schedule of speeches beginning next week, aides say they are not seeing slippage in the Senator's support. They point to the latest national poll in Thursday's "Los Angeles Times" showing Kerry ahead of the president by three points. As for the Bush reelection team, it believes its strategy is working. MARC RACICOT, BUSH CAMPAIGN CHAIRMAN: The American people have a right to know and understand what these candidates are about. That's precisely why it is that we're focusing upon what it is that are his positions. If they were clear, they'd be more easily understood.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE: And now to the money trail. The Kerry campaign announced today that it raised more than $40 million in the first three months of the year what it says, Aaron, is a record for a Democratic presidential candidate in three months but still a long way to go to catch the Bush team.

BROWN: I'm thinking $40 million over here, $170 million over there.

WALLACE: There's a little bit in the middle but they feel good and they hope to raise millions more in the months ahead.

BROWN: We have a long way to go. Thank you. Kelly Wallace with us tonight.

A quick look at some of the other stories that made news today. The president signed a bill making it a federal crime to harm a fetus during an attack on a pregnant woman. The new law covers crimes against fetuses from the moment of conception. Critics say it undermines abortion rights.

In Colorado, a fire that began in a yard two days ago has grown to at least 3,500 acres threatening homes near Fort Collins, Colorado, north of Denver. In two neighborhoods, voluntary evacuation warnings are now mandatory. One official called it extreme fire behavior for March. That's what we were thinking too.

And Gateway, the maker of personal computers and consumer electronics, says it will close 188 retail stores, eliminating 2,500 jobs nearly 40 percent of its workforce in the process. The move follows Gateway's purchase last month of rival e-Machine.

Still ahead on the program tonight, bearing arms in Iraq without wearing the uniforms, civilians doing military work and taking military risks, a break first.

From New York this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: The most basic facts of yesterday's attack in Fallujah are known but much remains a mystery tonight and we'll deal with that in a few moments. First, though, a bit of background on those contract workers, who they are, what they do and why.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): The civilian contractors who died in yesterday's ambush probably looked a lot like this, by which we mean they looked like soldiers or members of a big city police SWAT team and, in all likelihood, that's exactly what they used to be.

North Carolina based Blackwater Security, the company that employed them, was formed by former Navy SEAL Gary Jackson and most of the people the company hires are skilled veterans.

KEN ROBINSON, NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: These are typically former Special Operations community personnel who are highly trained in the use of deadly force.

BROWN: The contractors attacked in Fallujah were hired to ensure the safety of civilians delivering food supplies. Other Blackwater Security employees have been hired to protect those working for private companies, charitable organizations. They even protect Paul Bremer, the most powerful American in Iraq.

Blackwater and a growing number of other private security companies are increasingly doing what otherwise would be done by American soldiers. It is dangerous work but it has one major advantage over the military.

CHRIS BOYD, KROLL CRUCIBLE SECURITY: It pays quite well. There's a lot of contracts that pay anywhere from $350 a day to $1,500 a day.

BROWN: Private contractors in Iraq are not just carrying weapons, of course. They are also skilled workers from around the world who are rebuilding the country's ruined infrastructure but even that has its risks.

TOM BRUDENELL-BRUCE, CONTRACTOR: When I first came here my car was shot at quite a few times and that's when I realized that you were going to have to be pretty quick on your feet.

BROWN: But there is a point for many of us when risks are outweighed by the money or the need for a job, any job.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In terms of a dangerous place, it is a war zone theater.

BROWN: When the largest contractor in Iraq, Halliburton, held a job fair in Houston last week, hundreds of applicants showed up. A fatalistic attitude might not have been required but it doesn't hurt.

CARLOS AGUILAR: I don't mind too much. I mean I am not afraid. (Unintelligible.)

BROWN: Brave words and in truth these are brave people. On the Blackwater Web site today a statement read: "While we feel sadness for our fallen colleagues we also feel pride and satisfaction that we are making a difference for the people of Iraq."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Rod Nordland joins us now from Baghdad. He's "Newsweek" magazine's bureau chief there. It's always good to see him. There is a lot we don't actually know about what happened. Do we know what those contract workers were doing in Fallujah, do we really know?

ROD NORDLAND, "NEWSWEEK" BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF: No, we don't really know what they're doing. We don't know their names, for instance. The company didn't release them. We don't even know how many cars went in.

A lot of people in Fallujah have told us that there were three or four cars and that one or two of them escaped when the attack took place, so there are a lot of mysteries around that.

And it's also a little hard to understand what a company of Blackwater's caliber was doing guarding a supposed food convoy into a place like Fallujah, a place that's always been hot and always been dangerous for Americans to go in any guise.

BROWN: Was there or is there evidence that there was food being moved into the area that they were securing?

NORDLAND: Nobody has come up with any evidence, eyewitnesses that our folks talked to said they didn't see any trucks, just these other two four-wheel drive SUVs which people say escaped.

Now, it may be they're mistaken. They might have just -- there might just happened to have been two other vehicles nearby at the time that they took to be part of that convoy but people were quite sure there were two other vehicles with foreigners in it that escaped.

BROWN: And just quickly to wrap up this point, in fairness to these discrepancies if that's -- or at least unanswered questions, it is not unusual, I would assume, for lots of rumor to circulate in moments like this.

NORDLAND: No, not at all and there's no suggestion that the attack on them had anything to do with whatever their mission might have been. I mean they might have been protecting some visitor from, you know, some high-ranking visitor or something. Who knows?

But they were basically attacked because they appeared to be foreigners and, in fact, when people -- originally when the attack took place there was no -- there were no weapons on their part showing so the attackers were assuming they were attacking civilians.

BROWN: You wrote today that to assume that Fallujah is unique in how it feels about the occupation would be a mistake. How many Fallujahs are there?

NORDLAND: Well, I think the attitude of the people in Fallujah is typical of the opposition throughout Iraq. That isn't to say that in other towns and communities you have the kind of level of opposition that you do in Fallujah.

Fallujah is an old company town for the Mukhabarat and its had a long history of conflict between the American troops and the residents, so things are much worse there than elsewhere but the same kind of sort of viciousness and lack of all scruples in the attacks is typical of the kind of attacks the opposition has conducted everywhere.

I mean you only have to look at Karbala last month where they killed 200 Iraqi civilian Shiite pilgrims with no connection whatsoever to the coalition simply because they were Shia.

BROWN: Is it clear to you that, for example, an attack during the Islamic holiday several weeks ago that you just referred to is being done, coordinated by the same people who would have done the attack yesterday?

NORDLAND: No. That's hard to say but there seems to be a commonality of purpose of all the opposition folks. There do seem to be a number of different actors who have different methods of operation but the one thing that kind of typifies all of them is a complete lack of scruples in terms of their targets and who they choose to attack.

They're attacking any foreigners, civilian or not civilian, any Iraqis working with foreigners or even just Iraqis as in the case of Karbala who seem to be sort of distantly associated with foreigners in the sense that they're kind of supporting the American role for the time being.

BROWN: It's good to see you again. Thank you. Stay safe out there.

NORDLAND: Thank you.

BROWN: Rod Nordland of "Newsweek" magazine with us.

Still to come on the program changing the course of events with a camera, how the images of war can change our perceptions of the war.

Around the world this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: What happened yesterday in Iraq raised many questions. The e-mails started coming in almost as soon as we showed the pictures out of Fallujah. Not everyone approved to say the least, and we weren't surprised.

Reporting the unspeakable is our job. How to do so is the hard part. Yesterday's pictures were excruciating to watch. We suspect they'll be hard to forget. But will they change anything?

Other pictures have in other wars. You're about to see some of them, and we warn you they are difficult, as well.

This is our senior analyst, Jeff Greenfield.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SENIOR ANALYST (voice-over): When these now famous images flashed across our TV sets and web sites on Wednesday, they came with a history of questions and controversy. One question, of course, was about taste, standards, judgment. How much should we show? How much do we withhold? Different networks and then newspapers made different calls here.

(on camera) But the bigger question may not have to do with taste, or judgment or standards at all but rather with the impact such images have on our emotions and ultimately on our opinions about how the government is prosecuting the grave matter of war. That, at least, is what our history tells us.

(voice-over) When "Life" magazine published this photo of three dead American soldiers on a New Guinea beach, it was the first time Americans had been allowed to see any image of a dead American soldier, nearly two years after Pearl Harbor.

The government wanted these pictures shown, out of concern that America needed to take the war more seriously. And in fact, after they were shown, the sale of war bonds jumped dramatically.

More than 20 years later, these images of soldiers setting fire to huts in Vietnam appeared on American TV. They were not what the government wanted the public to see.

Nor did they want this image to be seen, a street corner execution during the 1968 Tet offensive. It helped push American public opinion against the Vietnam War.

And look at these graphic images of a mob in Somalia dragging the corpse of an American soldier through the streets of Mogadishu in 1993. These pictures helped shape the withdrawal of American forces a few months later and may have convinced future enemies that the United States was weak in the face of deadly force.

Clearly, policymakers understand that the visceral, visual impact of a photograph can carry a powerful wallop.

The ban on photos at Dover Air Force Base, where the bodies of dead American servicemen and women come home, may be a matter of privacy, but it may also be about shaping public opinion.

And when TV networks make judgments about how graphically to show civilian casualties in Iraq, they may be making decision about decency and standards, but there may be a collateral impact, as well.

Clearly, some of the Arab based networks are far more willing to show such images. Is that a different standard about taste or about the potential impact on their different publics?

And one more point to keep in mind: some of the most powerful images need not be graphic or bloody at all. In June of 1969, "Life" magazine simply showed the faces of the 200 Americans who had died in one week of fighting in Vietnam. It hit America like a blow to the solar plexus.

(on camera) Maybe these images from Iraq will strengthen the will of the American public, make it determined to stay and overcome such violence. Maybe these images will trigger new doubts about the mission and its cost.

But one thing we do know from history is that, when it comes to the grave issue of war, all the debates about policy and strategy and tactics can at times be overwhelmed by the force of a single image.

Jeff Greenfield, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Powerful images are the stock and trade of our next two guests. David Turnley is a Pulitzer Prizewinning journalist whose book, "Baghdad Blues," chronicles the war in Iraq in still photos. Kim Burns, an award winning documentary filmmaker, whose work includes the documentary epic "Civil War," which showcases some of the earliest photographs of war.

They're both friends of the program. We're glad to have them with us tonight.

David, let me start with you.

When you are out there and you look through the lens, do you see the power of the image or are you shooting so fast that you really don't have a chance to evaluate it that way?

DAVID TURNLEY, PHOTOGRAPHER: I think photojournalists who do what we do, and certainly as I have for the last 25 years -- I was in Beirut in '82 -- are constantly looking through the viewfinder and sketching the reality that we see in front of us. And we're quite acutely aware of what we're actually seeing and what we're framing.

BROWN: You actually go: "That's the shot."

TURNLEY: On occasion. You certainly know when you're getting near a photograph that has impact, that resonates emotionally, that has graphic qualities and iconic value, like moment, all that come together that you know it's going to have an emotional resonance.

BROWN: Ken, you make the argument to us today that you think we have all -- we've seen it all and become jaded to it all, that none of this is going to have the power. Does that fairly summarize?

KEN BURNS, FILMMAKER: I think it's a paradox, you know? I think that a picture is not worth a thousand words any more. It's been divided.

Think about what happens after Janet Jackson or any other thing. We're so hit with the images that they lose their meaning. And yet we're reminded that, still at the heart of this medium of ours and the way we talk to each other, is a respect for the power of individual images to communicate complex information.

And it's very hard to transcend that power, no matter how many times we see them and how jaded we're...

BROWN: Are you arguing both positions? BURNS: I think so, because we are scared to show a lot of this stuff.

You know, in 1862 Matthew Brady had an exhibition after Antietam, and Walt Whitman was stunned to see the photographs of the dead at Antietam. They were the most powerful graphic images of bloated American corpses.

We saw them at Tarwa (ph). We saw them in Korea and Vietnam. Now we've got wars in which we're not even choosing it. There's censorship from our government, and there's self-censorship that we think we can't handle the images.

So we're aware of how powerful they are, and yet we're aware of the way in which we cheapen them through their overuse. We're in a funny kind of paradoxical realm in which they have still great force to reinvigorate our beliefs or to get us to run, but we're not sure exactly how to use them now.

So we're having a discussion today. Did "The New York Times" go too far?

BROWN: Right.

BURNS: Did ABC, did NBC not go far enough?

BROWN: Do you think, David, that the fact that it is so easy to alter photos these days changes how we see anything?

TURNLEY: I think fundamentally the photojournalists that go out into our world are motivated by the motivation to document the human condition. And I think that it doesn't really matter whether you're using film cameras, video cameras, old 8-by-10 view cameras or single reflex cameras. I think that the kind of people that do the work I do are motivated by their hearts.

BROWN: That's from the photographer's point of view. I'm really asking from the viewer's point of view, because the viewer who knows that it's easy to manipulate photos -- is the power lost on the viewer, not on the photographer?

TURNLEY: This morning I woke up, and I went to my favorite diner where I have my coffee and read "The New York Times" every day. And I put the paper out in front of me and I suddenly see this image.

And I have to tell you, regardless of any of the elements you're talking about, this photograph had unbelievable impact on my sense, not only of the tragedy of the war in Iraq and the -- ultimately the division that's happening in the world today, but clearly the wrath that is underneath at some level the perception of what the United States is doing in Iraq.

Whether you feel that's right or wrong, that photograph has such unbelievable resonant power, to register that this is a very tragic situation. BROWN: It was -- I know every newsroom went through this yesterday. The "Times" photo this morning was -- in some ways them becomes defining -- was an incredibly powerful and painful thing to look at.

BURNS: Hugely. But you know, when we can PhotoShop stuff then nothing is sort of true. And I think people do get that sort of distance. And we don't want to be reminded.

Remember, these were not soldiers. These were civilians, which we can show. We don't show this if it's soldiers, and we've been carefully editing other things.

BROWN: Well, I would argue that, had it been soldiers yesterday, it would have played out exactly the same way.

BURNS: The same argument about what to show?

BROWN: Absolutely. Yes. I don't believe that decisions that we made here, organizationally made, would have been any different. The moment was so dramatic, so horrible, so obscene.

BURNS: I agree.

BROWN: That it had -- it had to be seen to some degree. The question really was how much is too much, how much is enough?

BURNS: Well, it's interesting that we're talking about matters of taste and sensibility, as if we show the reality of war too much, which was possible in the Second World War and Vietnam way back to the Civil War that perhaps people aren't going to want to watch the "American Idol" that night or "The Bachelorette." And there may be something in that.

And that's why I still think that the power of what this guy does every day is still intact, even if it gets over-manipulated, even if we're arguing about what we can show and what we can't show.

BROWN: Thank you, good to see you as always.

Nice to see you again. Good to see you well, all things considered, the work you do. Thank you, David, very much.

TURNLEY: Thank you.

BROWN: Ahead on the program, pictures of a very different sort of war: children in Iraq drawing on their memories. We'll take a break first. This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We continue in "Segment Seven" with "The Power of Pictures." It's where we often showcase still photographers, but tonight the images are drawings, drawings by Iraqi children.

They were made in the wake of what the U.S. military called its "shock and awe" campaign, the intense bombing of Baghdad and other parts of the country at the start of the invasion.

The pictures are part of a traveling exhibit now here in New York. The sponsor, a nonprofit arts organization, believes how kids see war is something to look at.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CARL ROSENSTEIN, THE PUFFIN FOUNDATION: I titled the show "Shock and Awe" after the initial bombing campaign of Baghdad.

We were hoping to give people an opportunity to understand the impact of war on children, the impact of the massive bombing assault on their city. And the drawings directly communicate this experience and the incredible emotion that comes through in the drawings, the despair as well as the hope.

The drawings were done by children in the Assail primary school in Baghdad, just weeks after the bombing. The school was looted. We arrived, and it was wrecked. The teachers were petrified of doing anything political, but they agreed to let us come in there with my camera.

I brought the art supplies into the classroom and the teacher explained. "What did you see during the last two or three weeks out your window. What happened to your family? What happened to you?"

I saw energy that exploded inside this classroom.

The first time I saw these drawings it was overwhelming. It was a very, very powerful moving experience.

It was war at its most raw, through very apolitical, innocent eyes. What they saw was horrific, and what they drew was horrific.

The boys are fascinated with armament, and they draw battle scenes, which is kind of universal. The girls show more images of families and caring for wounded and there's an image of a crying girl, which is recurrent.

This is a typical boy's image but with fantastic detail of the fighting. You see American paratroopers and the helicopters and the tanks. It's a drawing that you'll see boys do anywhere, but this was the real thing. The boy is age 11.

Here is a very sympathetic image showing American soldiers distributing Red Cross aid to Baghdad civilians.

There's an image of rebuilding, an image of hope by a 10-year- old.

This is an image of houses being bombed that's perhaps the most familiar images of missiles striking houses. And a house is a house anywhere, it's -- children draw. And they have the same gabled proof and flowers in front. It's very sad. And it's done by Evian Abdoo (ph), who's in the fourth grade. Artistically, this is one of the most powerful images in the show. It takes a moment to understand what you're looking at, but this red ribbon is the Tigris running red with blood. It was drawn by Ahmed Samir (ph), who's 14.

Here's a beautiful image of hope and it says, "I'm Jwan Salim Yanis (ph). I'm from Iraq. I'm 10 years old. With one hand, we built Iraq."

Art can sensitize people, as well as break down barriers and fears. People know so little about other cultures that it's easy for them to believe that people are not like us.

This image is one of the saddest images in the show. It shows a girl just devastated and crying, and in Arabic it translates to "Where is my Dad?"

PATRICK DILLION, LAUGHING MAN FILMS: Try to imagine what this whole last year has been like for the Iraqis and for kids in Baghdad. Children are the most sensitive and vulnerable creations we have.

ROSENSTEIN: All children are just that. They're children, and it will take a very long time for these terrible scars to heal.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Morning papers after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Time to check the morning papers from around the country. This is what will be arriving at your hotel room if you're on the road, or why ever else you are in a hotel I don't know, and don't want to speculate.

"USA Today" leads with the Final Four, guide to the Final Four. Everybody has this on the front page: "Military response vowed in Fallujah. Attack, mutilation of U.S. civilians bestial."

But here's to me the most interesting story on the front page. "Pope declares feeding tubes a moral obligation. Directive applies to vegetative patients. That will cause some controversy." One in ten hospitals in the United States will be affected by that, presumably.

"The Aniston Star" in Aniston, Alabama, a home owned newspaper. "Chemical weapons program tested. Officials say continued funding best way to keep destruction on track in the United States."

Also down in the corner, "Debate rages over warning change on condom wrappers." People read the warnings on condom wrappers? I don't know.

"The Charleston Gazette." This is Charleston, West Virginia. Same sex marriage makes the front page. "Same sex vows case will not be heard. West Virginia Supreme Court rejects gay's petition to get marriage licenses." How much time we got? Oh, we'll slow down. I was cruising there for a minute.

I think this is the first time we've had "The Birmingham News." Birmingham, Alabama. "U.S. vows to" -- thank you for sending it our way. "U.S. vows to punish attack by Iraqi mob. Action will come at time and place of our choosing."

And then they chose to localize the story by talking to Alabamians who say it is not time to leave Iraq, despite the horror of yesterday. That's "The Birmingham News," Birmingham, Alabama. That's a good town.

"The Washington Times" leads with the war, also. "U.S. vows to hunt down killers." This was the only paper that I've seen -- that doesn't mean it's the only paper -- that put the Laci and Connor Bill on the front page, but they did. The president signed that today, as we told you.

And "The Chicago Sun-Times." The weather tomorrow in Chicago, delectable. That's the "Sun-Times" for tomorrow.

We've got one more segment to go tonight. I think that would be April Fool's. No kidding. Break first.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: So was the first of April a big deal where you are? It wasn't here either. And we think we know why. It's because the news is so often unbelievable that any day might be April Fool's Day.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): The French prime minister's party is pretty much humiliated at the polls, but the prime minister isn't asked to step down. Instead, he's asked to refresh his cabinet. So he takes his old foreign minister and makes him his new interior minister; takes his old interior minister and makes him his new finance minister.

Is this an April fool's joke? No it's not. It's on the level.

ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER: This saga (ph) is irrelevant. I am a machine.

BROWN: An actor famous for repeatedly playing the part of the vigilante cyborg is elected governor of the state of California, elected easily. April Fool's? Nope.

This one is a real knee-slapper. The folks over in the Ukraine say they've misplace a couple of hundred S-75 surface to air missiles. They're not lost. They're not stolen. They're just a matter, according to the defense minister, of bad accounting. April Fool? Hardly.

"The Passion of the Christ," which is now the highest grossing R- rated movie of all time, was only No. 2 at the box office this past week. Coming in ahead of the savior by a nose was -- a large computer animated talking dog.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Scooby Doo.

BROWN: April Fool? Nope.

Things keep up this way in the foolery department, we may as well cancel April 1 altogether.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: We'll see you tomorrow. Good night for all of us.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com


Aired April 1, 2004 - 22:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening again everyone.
A report we saw out of Fallujah tonight said the residents of that city feel a combined sense of pride and shame, pride at the killings of four American contract workers yesterday, shame at the brutal mob scene that followed.

In Baghdad, the American military spokesman promised today to pacify Fallujah. That challenged, the depth of it, was laid out pretty clearly on this program last night.

The original attack was the work of three people, maybe four. What followed, the mob scene, the butchering of the bodies that obscenity was the handiwork of far, far more and you can't kill them all and you can't capture an entire town.

We've said this before. Iraq, a student of the country said to us a couple of weeks ago, has a high insanity factor. Yesterday, yet again, he was proved right.

Again, Fallujah tops the news and begins the whip. CNN's Jim Clancy in Baghdad starts us off, Jim a headline from you tonight please.

JIM CLANCY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, U.S. officials and Iraqis are reacting to those grisly scenes in the streets of Fallujah that were seen around the world.

BROWN: Jim, thank you. We'll get to the details coming up.

Next to the White House and another window into the thinking there on national security in the days before 9/11, including the day of 9/11. Our Senior White House Correspondent John King there tonight, John a headline.

JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, on that very day, the president's most trusted aide on foreign policy, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, would have delivered a speech in which she talked about the president's world view and never once said al Qaeda, never once used the word terrorism. Critics say it's proof this president pushed terrorism off the priority list. The White house says it proves nothing -- Aaron.

BROWN: John, thank you. Finally, to the campaign and the mad, mad march that was, at least for John Kerry. CNN's Kelly Wallace has that for us tonight, Kelly a headline.

KELLY WALLACE, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, one month ago Super Tuesday when John Kerry essentially clinched the Democratic presidential nomination but the rest of the month even his supporters say was not his best. Still right now polls show a statistical dead heat, so both the Kerry and Bush campaigns feeling good about their prospects going into April -- Aaron.

BROWN: Kelly, thank you. We'll get back to you and the rest shortly.

Also coming up on the program tonight, the contractors who lost their lives in Fallujah, non-military men doing military work it seems.

Plus, shock and awe rendered in pencil and crayon, how war colors a child's view of the war.

And the rooster makes an appearance of course, no April fool he. We'll have a look at tomorrow morning's papers tonight, all that and more in the hour ahead.

We begin tonight in Iraq with the repercussions and the complications and the contradictions of Fallujah. It became clear today that for at least some who live there certain acts of brutality are beyond the pale.

Said an American official today, these people are actually aware that Fallujah now has a reputation as the worst place on earth but he went on to add they have to be careful what they say or they'll end up dead. Harsh reality for the good people of Fallujah and the Marines whose job it is to help them take the city back.

We have two reports tonight beginning in Baghdad and CNN's Jim Clancy.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CLANCY (voice-over): A day after Iraqi insurgents ambushed and killed nine American soldiers and civilians in separate attacks around Fallujah, U.S. officials vowed to stay the course in Iraq and pursue those responsible.

The incident involving four civilian contractors whose charred bodies were dismembered and put on display by a crowd of jubilant Iraqis cause the most concern. Some Iraqis were shocked by the violence.

Others said Fallujah harbored some of the most ardent supporters of Saddam Hussein in all of Iraq and that no one should be surprised they treated American civilians Wednesday just like they treated Iraqis for decades. But most appeared to excuse the mob scene in the streets as a reaction to the continuing U.S. occupation. U.S. officials rejected that notion.

PAUL BREMER, IRAQ CIVIL ADMINISTRATOR: The acts we have seen were despicable and inexcusable and they violate the tenets of all religions including Islam as well as the foundations of civilized society. Their deaths will not go unpunished.

CLANCY: General Mark Kimmitt was more direct promising to send in the Marines.

BRIG. GEN. MARK KIMMITT, DEPUTY DIR., COALITION OPERATIONS: They are coming back. They are going to hunt down the people responsible for this bestial act. It is up to the people, the small number of people in Fallujah to determine if they want to do it with a fight or without a fight.

CLANCY: But the fight continued. In northwest Baghdad, two roadside bombs took aim at a U.S. supply convoy including fuel trucks. The first roadside bomb struck a civilian vehicle wounding the Iraqi driver who was evacuated for medical treatment.

A convoy of fuel trucks coming behind the car were the suspected target and U.S. troops prepared to search using a robot for any other improvised explosive devices. That is when a second explosion rocked the scene. Dust, debris and smoke could be seen rising from its location. The blast hit the middle of the convoy shattering windscreens with shrapnel.

U.S. troops took up defensive positions along their vehicles taking aim at suspected gunmen on nearby rooftops. It was believed both roadside bombs were detonated by remote control.

Meantime, medics treated one of the drivers of a fuel truck for head wounds. Wrapped in bandages that covered most of his face, it was unclear as he was evacuated whether this civilian contract worker was an Iraqi or a foreign national working for the U.S.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CLANCY: While those events, those scenes from the streets of Fallujah Wednesday reminded some people of Somalia a decade ago, Aaron, there is a huge strategic and political difference. U.S. officials appear to know that. They're not even promising to step back much less pull out -- Aaron.

BROWN: There is some controversy about why the Marines didn't go into Fallujah yesterday. Did the CPA address that at all today?

CLANCY: Well they said certainly that would be a normal reaction but not a wise one. They fear that it would make the situation worse. They fear that the insurgents inside the town might use human shields, use those crowds on the streets to then attack the Marines. They said they would prefer to choose the time and place on their own that would be best for them.

You have to remember it was Tariq Aziz when asked whether or not -- he pointed out you aren't the Vietnamese. You don't have swamps. You don't have jungles. Tariq Aziz replied our cities are our swamps, the buildings our jungles -- Aaron.

BROWN: Jim, thank you, Jim Clancy in Baghdad for us tonight.

Pacification is the unlikely name for the mission ahead in Fallujah involving, as it does, a blend of good deeds and deadly force. The balance has shifted over the past year or so and safe to say it's been tough finding the right mix. The current job falls to the 1st Marine Division now all but certain to be hands-on work.

From the Pentagon tonight, CNN's Jamie McIntyre.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SR. PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The murder and mutilation of four American contractors has driven the U.s. military to ditch the strategy of keeping several thousand Marines on the outskirts of Fallujah.

It will no longer rely only on poorly trained and ill-equipped Iraqi police and civil defense forces to provide security. The Marines are now being told they will retake the city.

KIMMITT: The coalition forces will respond. They will be in that city. It will be at a time and a place of our choosing. It will be methodical. It will be precise and it will be overwhelming.

MCINTYRE: Pentagon sources say planning is underway now for a major effort to "pacify Fallujah" to being in the next few days. Marines will go in, in force, and hunt for enemy fighters as well as pressure city officials to finger those responsible for recent attacks, the message help us find them or we will do it the hard way with brute combat force. Marines will also be looking for any Iraqis who can be identified from television footage showing the angry mob celebrating the U.S. deaths.

KIMMITT: Those people that we have photographed and we have video that were involved in this operation that were involved in this brutality we have a significant interest in finding them and talking to them.

MCINTYRE: Last Friday when Marines engaged local insurgents in a fierce firefight, 18 Iraqis, one Marine and five civilians were killed. The deaths only fueled anti-U.S. sentiment.

So, the new strategy is to try at the same time to also win hearts and minds by pumping more money into local schools and health clinics. The U.S. insists that as disturbing as the gruesome events have been, the Marines will not be intimidated.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was in Fallujah today and people were saying, yes, the Americans were scared to come back in. Does not send a bad message of tolerance of violence?

KIMMITT: Ask them after the Americans have come back in.

MCINTYRE (on camera): The U.S. insists sending in more American troops is not the answer but until more Iraqi police are on the job the Marines will have the tough assignment of hunting down insurgents while trying to win over the locals with acts of kindness. It is, however, a mission befitting the official motto of the 1st Marine Division, no better friend, no worse enemy.

Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: We have more on this a little bit later in the program. We'll look at the contract workers, what they do and who they are and also some mystery still surrounding what happened in Fallujah yesterday. That's later in the program.

On now to 9/11, what the administration knew in the days and months leading up to it and, just as important, where the priorities might have been. As the 9/11 commission prepares to question National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice next week, a speech she never made has come into the public eye. The date on it chilling, the content could be telling.

So once again we turn to our Senior White House Correspondent John King. John, good evening.

KING: Good evening, Aaron.

It was one of many speeches canceled across Washington, of course, on that horrible day but this one more than any of the others now part of the intensifying debate over whether President Bush ignored warnings that al Qaeda was stirring to strike.

Some Democrats today say the entire text of this speech should be made public. The White House says no and those who think that it is proof that the president ignored, pushed aside terrorism as a policy priority, they want to know more about this speech. Again, the White House and the administration says no.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KING (voice-over): The White House called it ridiculous to cite one speech as evidence the president underestimated the terrorist threat.

SCOTT MCCLELLAN, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: This administration doesn't measure commitment based on one speech or one conference call or one meeting. We look at the sum total of the strong actions that we take.

KING: The speech in question was to be delivered by National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice on September 11, outlining the administration's efforts to deal with "the threats and problems of today and the day after, not the world of yesterday." Administration officials confirm the text contained no mention of Osama bin Laden or al Qaeda, though it did have a general mention of terrorism.

"We need to worry about the suitcase bomb, the car bomb and the vial of sarin released in the subway," Rice was to have said but her focus was to have been more on administration efforts to rally support for an ambitious missile defense plan, a case she also made in a speech two months before the 9/11 attacks.

CONDOLEEZZA RICE, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: But as the president has made clear, we must deal with today's world and today's threat including weapons of mass destruction and missiles in the hands of states that would blackmail us from coming to the aid of friends and allies.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KING: In that July speech, just as in the speech she never delivered on September 11, again, no mention of al Qaeda, use of the word terror but not use of the word terrorism. To be fair to the administration, Aaron, Condoleezza Rice did take 30 minutes of questions after that July speech. No one asked about al Qaeda either.

BROWN: Obviously you're there every day and you've covered a lot of this. As you look at the body of what the administration said over time is it clear that their focus was on state sponsored terrorism and the anti-missile system with little mention of al Qaeda or is that too simple?

KING: No, that's a very fair statement and the administration does not dispute that. How the administration would justify that is to say that it makes the case it was continuing the Clinton administration terrorism policy while developing a new one, so there was no need to be out in public clamoring, making a case for public support.

Missile support, of course, was very controversial, so the administration says of course it had to go public quite aggressively making its case. That is what the White House says. Others and, of course, the critics of this administration say how can they dispute Richard Clarke when Condoleezza Rice was giving all these speeches in the eight months leading up to 9/11 and one speech planned on that day in which she never mentioned al Qaeda?

BROWN: And just briefly is there nervousness, anticipation, what's the mood there regarding Dr. Rice's testimony next week?

KING: All of the above that the administration wants this to happen. They pushed to have it next week. It will be on Thursday. The know Mr. Clarke's story is being debated across the country. They want to rebut it and they want to rebut it forcefully and quickly.

BROWN: John, thank you, our Senior White House Correspondent John King.

Ahead on the program tonight it's March madness of a completely different sort, plenty of sharp elbows being thrown. We'll take a look at the political month that just passed.

Also, images of war and how they shape the way war is seen and war is waged, a break first. This is NEWSNIGHT from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: When all is said and done, March may not mean much in the life of John Kerry. On the plus side, he had a few days off to ski, raise some money to boot. On the other hand, the Bush campaign spent millions of dollars in ads raising questions about the Senator on policy both foreign and domestic. Like we said when all is said and done March may not mean that much. Then again it might.

Here's CNN's Kelly Wallace.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE (voice-over): John Kerry's own supporters say the month since he clinched the Democratic presidential nomination well just hasn't been his best.

STAN GREENBERG, DEMOCRATIC POLLSTER: I'm sure this won't be his favorite month when the campaign is over but it's not a big deal.

WALLACE: In the headlines, stories about how some Democrats are concerned Kerry is slipping out of the picture recovering from shoulder surgery after a March that started with a series of missteps.

SEN. JOHN KERRY (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it.

WALLACE: Then the week of R&R in Idaho just as President Bush was launching his campaign and unleashing a multimillion dollar ad blitz.

ANNOUNCER: Raising taxes is a habit of Kerry's.

WALLACE: The damage, according to this week's CNN-USA Today Gallup poll, Kerry's unfavorable rating has gone up ten points since February an even larger increase among those who think he's too liberal and so there is some nervousness on the part of Democrats.

GREENBERG: They're looking for him to run, you know, the perfect campaign. He needs to run a better campaign and step onto the stage and I'm sure they're going to do it.

WALLACE: Kerry's advisers say he is already doing that.

ANNOUNCER: George Bush says sending jobs overseas makes sense for America.

WALLACE: With new national ads and an aggressive schedule of speeches beginning next week, aides say they are not seeing slippage in the Senator's support. They point to the latest national poll in Thursday's "Los Angeles Times" showing Kerry ahead of the president by three points. As for the Bush reelection team, it believes its strategy is working. MARC RACICOT, BUSH CAMPAIGN CHAIRMAN: The American people have a right to know and understand what these candidates are about. That's precisely why it is that we're focusing upon what it is that are his positions. If they were clear, they'd be more easily understood.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE: And now to the money trail. The Kerry campaign announced today that it raised more than $40 million in the first three months of the year what it says, Aaron, is a record for a Democratic presidential candidate in three months but still a long way to go to catch the Bush team.

BROWN: I'm thinking $40 million over here, $170 million over there.

WALLACE: There's a little bit in the middle but they feel good and they hope to raise millions more in the months ahead.

BROWN: We have a long way to go. Thank you. Kelly Wallace with us tonight.

A quick look at some of the other stories that made news today. The president signed a bill making it a federal crime to harm a fetus during an attack on a pregnant woman. The new law covers crimes against fetuses from the moment of conception. Critics say it undermines abortion rights.

In Colorado, a fire that began in a yard two days ago has grown to at least 3,500 acres threatening homes near Fort Collins, Colorado, north of Denver. In two neighborhoods, voluntary evacuation warnings are now mandatory. One official called it extreme fire behavior for March. That's what we were thinking too.

And Gateway, the maker of personal computers and consumer electronics, says it will close 188 retail stores, eliminating 2,500 jobs nearly 40 percent of its workforce in the process. The move follows Gateway's purchase last month of rival e-Machine.

Still ahead on the program tonight, bearing arms in Iraq without wearing the uniforms, civilians doing military work and taking military risks, a break first.

From New York this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: The most basic facts of yesterday's attack in Fallujah are known but much remains a mystery tonight and we'll deal with that in a few moments. First, though, a bit of background on those contract workers, who they are, what they do and why.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): The civilian contractors who died in yesterday's ambush probably looked a lot like this, by which we mean they looked like soldiers or members of a big city police SWAT team and, in all likelihood, that's exactly what they used to be.

North Carolina based Blackwater Security, the company that employed them, was formed by former Navy SEAL Gary Jackson and most of the people the company hires are skilled veterans.

KEN ROBINSON, NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: These are typically former Special Operations community personnel who are highly trained in the use of deadly force.

BROWN: The contractors attacked in Fallujah were hired to ensure the safety of civilians delivering food supplies. Other Blackwater Security employees have been hired to protect those working for private companies, charitable organizations. They even protect Paul Bremer, the most powerful American in Iraq.

Blackwater and a growing number of other private security companies are increasingly doing what otherwise would be done by American soldiers. It is dangerous work but it has one major advantage over the military.

CHRIS BOYD, KROLL CRUCIBLE SECURITY: It pays quite well. There's a lot of contracts that pay anywhere from $350 a day to $1,500 a day.

BROWN: Private contractors in Iraq are not just carrying weapons, of course. They are also skilled workers from around the world who are rebuilding the country's ruined infrastructure but even that has its risks.

TOM BRUDENELL-BRUCE, CONTRACTOR: When I first came here my car was shot at quite a few times and that's when I realized that you were going to have to be pretty quick on your feet.

BROWN: But there is a point for many of us when risks are outweighed by the money or the need for a job, any job.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In terms of a dangerous place, it is a war zone theater.

BROWN: When the largest contractor in Iraq, Halliburton, held a job fair in Houston last week, hundreds of applicants showed up. A fatalistic attitude might not have been required but it doesn't hurt.

CARLOS AGUILAR: I don't mind too much. I mean I am not afraid. (Unintelligible.)

BROWN: Brave words and in truth these are brave people. On the Blackwater Web site today a statement read: "While we feel sadness for our fallen colleagues we also feel pride and satisfaction that we are making a difference for the people of Iraq."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Rod Nordland joins us now from Baghdad. He's "Newsweek" magazine's bureau chief there. It's always good to see him. There is a lot we don't actually know about what happened. Do we know what those contract workers were doing in Fallujah, do we really know?

ROD NORDLAND, "NEWSWEEK" BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF: No, we don't really know what they're doing. We don't know their names, for instance. The company didn't release them. We don't even know how many cars went in.

A lot of people in Fallujah have told us that there were three or four cars and that one or two of them escaped when the attack took place, so there are a lot of mysteries around that.

And it's also a little hard to understand what a company of Blackwater's caliber was doing guarding a supposed food convoy into a place like Fallujah, a place that's always been hot and always been dangerous for Americans to go in any guise.

BROWN: Was there or is there evidence that there was food being moved into the area that they were securing?

NORDLAND: Nobody has come up with any evidence, eyewitnesses that our folks talked to said they didn't see any trucks, just these other two four-wheel drive SUVs which people say escaped.

Now, it may be they're mistaken. They might have just -- there might just happened to have been two other vehicles nearby at the time that they took to be part of that convoy but people were quite sure there were two other vehicles with foreigners in it that escaped.

BROWN: And just quickly to wrap up this point, in fairness to these discrepancies if that's -- or at least unanswered questions, it is not unusual, I would assume, for lots of rumor to circulate in moments like this.

NORDLAND: No, not at all and there's no suggestion that the attack on them had anything to do with whatever their mission might have been. I mean they might have been protecting some visitor from, you know, some high-ranking visitor or something. Who knows?

But they were basically attacked because they appeared to be foreigners and, in fact, when people -- originally when the attack took place there was no -- there were no weapons on their part showing so the attackers were assuming they were attacking civilians.

BROWN: You wrote today that to assume that Fallujah is unique in how it feels about the occupation would be a mistake. How many Fallujahs are there?

NORDLAND: Well, I think the attitude of the people in Fallujah is typical of the opposition throughout Iraq. That isn't to say that in other towns and communities you have the kind of level of opposition that you do in Fallujah.

Fallujah is an old company town for the Mukhabarat and its had a long history of conflict between the American troops and the residents, so things are much worse there than elsewhere but the same kind of sort of viciousness and lack of all scruples in the attacks is typical of the kind of attacks the opposition has conducted everywhere.

I mean you only have to look at Karbala last month where they killed 200 Iraqi civilian Shiite pilgrims with no connection whatsoever to the coalition simply because they were Shia.

BROWN: Is it clear to you that, for example, an attack during the Islamic holiday several weeks ago that you just referred to is being done, coordinated by the same people who would have done the attack yesterday?

NORDLAND: No. That's hard to say but there seems to be a commonality of purpose of all the opposition folks. There do seem to be a number of different actors who have different methods of operation but the one thing that kind of typifies all of them is a complete lack of scruples in terms of their targets and who they choose to attack.

They're attacking any foreigners, civilian or not civilian, any Iraqis working with foreigners or even just Iraqis as in the case of Karbala who seem to be sort of distantly associated with foreigners in the sense that they're kind of supporting the American role for the time being.

BROWN: It's good to see you again. Thank you. Stay safe out there.

NORDLAND: Thank you.

BROWN: Rod Nordland of "Newsweek" magazine with us.

Still to come on the program changing the course of events with a camera, how the images of war can change our perceptions of the war.

Around the world this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: What happened yesterday in Iraq raised many questions. The e-mails started coming in almost as soon as we showed the pictures out of Fallujah. Not everyone approved to say the least, and we weren't surprised.

Reporting the unspeakable is our job. How to do so is the hard part. Yesterday's pictures were excruciating to watch. We suspect they'll be hard to forget. But will they change anything?

Other pictures have in other wars. You're about to see some of them, and we warn you they are difficult, as well.

This is our senior analyst, Jeff Greenfield.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SENIOR ANALYST (voice-over): When these now famous images flashed across our TV sets and web sites on Wednesday, they came with a history of questions and controversy. One question, of course, was about taste, standards, judgment. How much should we show? How much do we withhold? Different networks and then newspapers made different calls here.

(on camera) But the bigger question may not have to do with taste, or judgment or standards at all but rather with the impact such images have on our emotions and ultimately on our opinions about how the government is prosecuting the grave matter of war. That, at least, is what our history tells us.

(voice-over) When "Life" magazine published this photo of three dead American soldiers on a New Guinea beach, it was the first time Americans had been allowed to see any image of a dead American soldier, nearly two years after Pearl Harbor.

The government wanted these pictures shown, out of concern that America needed to take the war more seriously. And in fact, after they were shown, the sale of war bonds jumped dramatically.

More than 20 years later, these images of soldiers setting fire to huts in Vietnam appeared on American TV. They were not what the government wanted the public to see.

Nor did they want this image to be seen, a street corner execution during the 1968 Tet offensive. It helped push American public opinion against the Vietnam War.

And look at these graphic images of a mob in Somalia dragging the corpse of an American soldier through the streets of Mogadishu in 1993. These pictures helped shape the withdrawal of American forces a few months later and may have convinced future enemies that the United States was weak in the face of deadly force.

Clearly, policymakers understand that the visceral, visual impact of a photograph can carry a powerful wallop.

The ban on photos at Dover Air Force Base, where the bodies of dead American servicemen and women come home, may be a matter of privacy, but it may also be about shaping public opinion.

And when TV networks make judgments about how graphically to show civilian casualties in Iraq, they may be making decision about decency and standards, but there may be a collateral impact, as well.

Clearly, some of the Arab based networks are far more willing to show such images. Is that a different standard about taste or about the potential impact on their different publics?

And one more point to keep in mind: some of the most powerful images need not be graphic or bloody at all. In June of 1969, "Life" magazine simply showed the faces of the 200 Americans who had died in one week of fighting in Vietnam. It hit America like a blow to the solar plexus.

(on camera) Maybe these images from Iraq will strengthen the will of the American public, make it determined to stay and overcome such violence. Maybe these images will trigger new doubts about the mission and its cost.

But one thing we do know from history is that, when it comes to the grave issue of war, all the debates about policy and strategy and tactics can at times be overwhelmed by the force of a single image.

Jeff Greenfield, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Powerful images are the stock and trade of our next two guests. David Turnley is a Pulitzer Prizewinning journalist whose book, "Baghdad Blues," chronicles the war in Iraq in still photos. Kim Burns, an award winning documentary filmmaker, whose work includes the documentary epic "Civil War," which showcases some of the earliest photographs of war.

They're both friends of the program. We're glad to have them with us tonight.

David, let me start with you.

When you are out there and you look through the lens, do you see the power of the image or are you shooting so fast that you really don't have a chance to evaluate it that way?

DAVID TURNLEY, PHOTOGRAPHER: I think photojournalists who do what we do, and certainly as I have for the last 25 years -- I was in Beirut in '82 -- are constantly looking through the viewfinder and sketching the reality that we see in front of us. And we're quite acutely aware of what we're actually seeing and what we're framing.

BROWN: You actually go: "That's the shot."

TURNLEY: On occasion. You certainly know when you're getting near a photograph that has impact, that resonates emotionally, that has graphic qualities and iconic value, like moment, all that come together that you know it's going to have an emotional resonance.

BROWN: Ken, you make the argument to us today that you think we have all -- we've seen it all and become jaded to it all, that none of this is going to have the power. Does that fairly summarize?

KEN BURNS, FILMMAKER: I think it's a paradox, you know? I think that a picture is not worth a thousand words any more. It's been divided.

Think about what happens after Janet Jackson or any other thing. We're so hit with the images that they lose their meaning. And yet we're reminded that, still at the heart of this medium of ours and the way we talk to each other, is a respect for the power of individual images to communicate complex information.

And it's very hard to transcend that power, no matter how many times we see them and how jaded we're...

BROWN: Are you arguing both positions? BURNS: I think so, because we are scared to show a lot of this stuff.

You know, in 1862 Matthew Brady had an exhibition after Antietam, and Walt Whitman was stunned to see the photographs of the dead at Antietam. They were the most powerful graphic images of bloated American corpses.

We saw them at Tarwa (ph). We saw them in Korea and Vietnam. Now we've got wars in which we're not even choosing it. There's censorship from our government, and there's self-censorship that we think we can't handle the images.

So we're aware of how powerful they are, and yet we're aware of the way in which we cheapen them through their overuse. We're in a funny kind of paradoxical realm in which they have still great force to reinvigorate our beliefs or to get us to run, but we're not sure exactly how to use them now.

So we're having a discussion today. Did "The New York Times" go too far?

BROWN: Right.

BURNS: Did ABC, did NBC not go far enough?

BROWN: Do you think, David, that the fact that it is so easy to alter photos these days changes how we see anything?

TURNLEY: I think fundamentally the photojournalists that go out into our world are motivated by the motivation to document the human condition. And I think that it doesn't really matter whether you're using film cameras, video cameras, old 8-by-10 view cameras or single reflex cameras. I think that the kind of people that do the work I do are motivated by their hearts.

BROWN: That's from the photographer's point of view. I'm really asking from the viewer's point of view, because the viewer who knows that it's easy to manipulate photos -- is the power lost on the viewer, not on the photographer?

TURNLEY: This morning I woke up, and I went to my favorite diner where I have my coffee and read "The New York Times" every day. And I put the paper out in front of me and I suddenly see this image.

And I have to tell you, regardless of any of the elements you're talking about, this photograph had unbelievable impact on my sense, not only of the tragedy of the war in Iraq and the -- ultimately the division that's happening in the world today, but clearly the wrath that is underneath at some level the perception of what the United States is doing in Iraq.

Whether you feel that's right or wrong, that photograph has such unbelievable resonant power, to register that this is a very tragic situation. BROWN: It was -- I know every newsroom went through this yesterday. The "Times" photo this morning was -- in some ways them becomes defining -- was an incredibly powerful and painful thing to look at.

BURNS: Hugely. But you know, when we can PhotoShop stuff then nothing is sort of true. And I think people do get that sort of distance. And we don't want to be reminded.

Remember, these were not soldiers. These were civilians, which we can show. We don't show this if it's soldiers, and we've been carefully editing other things.

BROWN: Well, I would argue that, had it been soldiers yesterday, it would have played out exactly the same way.

BURNS: The same argument about what to show?

BROWN: Absolutely. Yes. I don't believe that decisions that we made here, organizationally made, would have been any different. The moment was so dramatic, so horrible, so obscene.

BURNS: I agree.

BROWN: That it had -- it had to be seen to some degree. The question really was how much is too much, how much is enough?

BURNS: Well, it's interesting that we're talking about matters of taste and sensibility, as if we show the reality of war too much, which was possible in the Second World War and Vietnam way back to the Civil War that perhaps people aren't going to want to watch the "American Idol" that night or "The Bachelorette." And there may be something in that.

And that's why I still think that the power of what this guy does every day is still intact, even if it gets over-manipulated, even if we're arguing about what we can show and what we can't show.

BROWN: Thank you, good to see you as always.

Nice to see you again. Good to see you well, all things considered, the work you do. Thank you, David, very much.

TURNLEY: Thank you.

BROWN: Ahead on the program, pictures of a very different sort of war: children in Iraq drawing on their memories. We'll take a break first. This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We continue in "Segment Seven" with "The Power of Pictures." It's where we often showcase still photographers, but tonight the images are drawings, drawings by Iraqi children.

They were made in the wake of what the U.S. military called its "shock and awe" campaign, the intense bombing of Baghdad and other parts of the country at the start of the invasion.

The pictures are part of a traveling exhibit now here in New York. The sponsor, a nonprofit arts organization, believes how kids see war is something to look at.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CARL ROSENSTEIN, THE PUFFIN FOUNDATION: I titled the show "Shock and Awe" after the initial bombing campaign of Baghdad.

We were hoping to give people an opportunity to understand the impact of war on children, the impact of the massive bombing assault on their city. And the drawings directly communicate this experience and the incredible emotion that comes through in the drawings, the despair as well as the hope.

The drawings were done by children in the Assail primary school in Baghdad, just weeks after the bombing. The school was looted. We arrived, and it was wrecked. The teachers were petrified of doing anything political, but they agreed to let us come in there with my camera.

I brought the art supplies into the classroom and the teacher explained. "What did you see during the last two or three weeks out your window. What happened to your family? What happened to you?"

I saw energy that exploded inside this classroom.

The first time I saw these drawings it was overwhelming. It was a very, very powerful moving experience.

It was war at its most raw, through very apolitical, innocent eyes. What they saw was horrific, and what they drew was horrific.

The boys are fascinated with armament, and they draw battle scenes, which is kind of universal. The girls show more images of families and caring for wounded and there's an image of a crying girl, which is recurrent.

This is a typical boy's image but with fantastic detail of the fighting. You see American paratroopers and the helicopters and the tanks. It's a drawing that you'll see boys do anywhere, but this was the real thing. The boy is age 11.

Here is a very sympathetic image showing American soldiers distributing Red Cross aid to Baghdad civilians.

There's an image of rebuilding, an image of hope by a 10-year- old.

This is an image of houses being bombed that's perhaps the most familiar images of missiles striking houses. And a house is a house anywhere, it's -- children draw. And they have the same gabled proof and flowers in front. It's very sad. And it's done by Evian Abdoo (ph), who's in the fourth grade. Artistically, this is one of the most powerful images in the show. It takes a moment to understand what you're looking at, but this red ribbon is the Tigris running red with blood. It was drawn by Ahmed Samir (ph), who's 14.

Here's a beautiful image of hope and it says, "I'm Jwan Salim Yanis (ph). I'm from Iraq. I'm 10 years old. With one hand, we built Iraq."

Art can sensitize people, as well as break down barriers and fears. People know so little about other cultures that it's easy for them to believe that people are not like us.

This image is one of the saddest images in the show. It shows a girl just devastated and crying, and in Arabic it translates to "Where is my Dad?"

PATRICK DILLION, LAUGHING MAN FILMS: Try to imagine what this whole last year has been like for the Iraqis and for kids in Baghdad. Children are the most sensitive and vulnerable creations we have.

ROSENSTEIN: All children are just that. They're children, and it will take a very long time for these terrible scars to heal.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Morning papers after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Time to check the morning papers from around the country. This is what will be arriving at your hotel room if you're on the road, or why ever else you are in a hotel I don't know, and don't want to speculate.

"USA Today" leads with the Final Four, guide to the Final Four. Everybody has this on the front page: "Military response vowed in Fallujah. Attack, mutilation of U.S. civilians bestial."

But here's to me the most interesting story on the front page. "Pope declares feeding tubes a moral obligation. Directive applies to vegetative patients. That will cause some controversy." One in ten hospitals in the United States will be affected by that, presumably.

"The Aniston Star" in Aniston, Alabama, a home owned newspaper. "Chemical weapons program tested. Officials say continued funding best way to keep destruction on track in the United States."

Also down in the corner, "Debate rages over warning change on condom wrappers." People read the warnings on condom wrappers? I don't know.

"The Charleston Gazette." This is Charleston, West Virginia. Same sex marriage makes the front page. "Same sex vows case will not be heard. West Virginia Supreme Court rejects gay's petition to get marriage licenses." How much time we got? Oh, we'll slow down. I was cruising there for a minute.

I think this is the first time we've had "The Birmingham News." Birmingham, Alabama. "U.S. vows to" -- thank you for sending it our way. "U.S. vows to punish attack by Iraqi mob. Action will come at time and place of our choosing."

And then they chose to localize the story by talking to Alabamians who say it is not time to leave Iraq, despite the horror of yesterday. That's "The Birmingham News," Birmingham, Alabama. That's a good town.

"The Washington Times" leads with the war, also. "U.S. vows to hunt down killers." This was the only paper that I've seen -- that doesn't mean it's the only paper -- that put the Laci and Connor Bill on the front page, but they did. The president signed that today, as we told you.

And "The Chicago Sun-Times." The weather tomorrow in Chicago, delectable. That's the "Sun-Times" for tomorrow.

We've got one more segment to go tonight. I think that would be April Fool's. No kidding. Break first.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: So was the first of April a big deal where you are? It wasn't here either. And we think we know why. It's because the news is so often unbelievable that any day might be April Fool's Day.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): The French prime minister's party is pretty much humiliated at the polls, but the prime minister isn't asked to step down. Instead, he's asked to refresh his cabinet. So he takes his old foreign minister and makes him his new interior minister; takes his old interior minister and makes him his new finance minister.

Is this an April fool's joke? No it's not. It's on the level.

ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER: This saga (ph) is irrelevant. I am a machine.

BROWN: An actor famous for repeatedly playing the part of the vigilante cyborg is elected governor of the state of California, elected easily. April Fool's? Nope.

This one is a real knee-slapper. The folks over in the Ukraine say they've misplace a couple of hundred S-75 surface to air missiles. They're not lost. They're not stolen. They're just a matter, according to the defense minister, of bad accounting. April Fool? Hardly.

"The Passion of the Christ," which is now the highest grossing R- rated movie of all time, was only No. 2 at the box office this past week. Coming in ahead of the savior by a nose was -- a large computer animated talking dog.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Scooby Doo.

BROWN: April Fool? Nope.

Things keep up this way in the foolery department, we may as well cancel April 1 altogether.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: We'll see you tomorrow. Good night for all of us.

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