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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown
U.S. Economy Creates Only 32,000 Jobs in July; Uprising by Shiite Militia Rages for Second Straight Day in Iraq
Aired August 06, 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.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening. I'm Daryn Kagan. Aaron is off tonight, and he apparently is not the only thing that is off.
So, are the jobs numbers. The U.S. economy created only 32,000 jobs in July, a fraction of what most economists were expecting. Before you grab the remote and run in fear of an economics lesson, however, let me assure you we will talk about why that number is important to the millions of Americans who are out there looking for a job and to two men in particular who are running for a specific job, president of the United States.
The unwelcome summer surprise is where our whip begins this evening and our Kathleen Hays starts us off with that headline -- Kathleen.
KATHLEEN HAYS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thank you, Daryn. You know when the jobs numbers slow down people get more worried about the economy slowing down. That's why this was a big disappointment on Wall Street and at the White House.
KAGAN: Missouri is up next where the jobs numbers were the talk of the day on the campaign trail. Our Dana Bash is in Kansas City with her headline -- Dana.
DANA BASH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Daryn. It was certainly the thing the Kerry campaign wanted to talk about today. Bad news on the job front is good political news for a Democratic ticket running on the jobs lost on the president's watch -- Daryn.
KAGAN: Thank you, Dana. We will be back with you in a moment.
On to Iraq where an uprising by a Shiite militia raged for a second day. CNN's Matthew Chance has the watch there, Matthew a headline.
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good evening to you, Daryn. A dangerous escalation in the Iraq conflict with the Mehdi Army, controlled of course by the firebrand Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr clashing with U.S. Marines around the country but particularly in the holy city of Najaf. There have been heavy casualties too. According to the U.S. Marines at least 300 of those Mehdi Army militiamen killed in the past two days.
KAGAN: Back to Baghdad in just a moment.
Finally, though, a look at Sudan, a promise to stop the killing. Christiane Amanpour is in Khartoum with her headline -- Christiane.
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Daryn, it's been nearly a year and a half and now the international community is trying to step up pressure on the government here. Sudan says that it will try to start disarming the Janjaweed militias who have conducted a reign of terror in Darfur. Meantime, the U.S. is warning that unless humanitarian aid gets out there and very quickly, one million people could be dead in Darfur by the end of this year.
KAGAN: Christiane, thank you, back to you and to the rest shortly.
Also ahead on NEWSNIGHT tonight, new developments in the 2001 anthrax attacks, three searches with one person in common.
Plus, a story of a real life band of brothers from Omaha, Nebraska, four young men from a single family. They are off to serve in the same unit in Iraq.
And later, the Olympic field of dreams for two Greek Americans living in Boston. All of that and a lot more is ahead in the program.
We're going to start, though, with the economy. If job reports give a snapshot of economic health, the picture released today, well let's just say it was not very pretty. The number of jobs created last month was the smallest gain since last December.
Here again, CNN's Kathleen Hays.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HAYS (voice-over): Shock, disbelief and a swift sell off in the stock market, the reaction to a stunningly small increase in new jobs in July. Just 32,000 when an increase of more than 200,000 was widely expected.
PHIL FLYNN, ALARON TRADING: It was unbelievable. It was like somebody ran a truck through here.
JARED BERNSTEIN, ECONOMIC POLICY INSTITUTE: Well, if June was a disappointment, July is downright depressing.
HAYS: The job market, which looked bright last spring, has suddenly run out of steam. As for the past four months the jobs increases have been getting smaller.
JAMES WHITE, EXCELSIOR CAPITAL MANAGEMENT: It's going to be pretty hard to put a smiley face on this one.
HAYS: The president's top advisers insisted the economy is moving in the right direction.
JOHN SNOW, TREASURY SECRETARY: As we've seen for the last year, 11 straight months of job creation, the highest GDP growth rates in 20 years, so the American economy remains strong and sound and on a good path.
HAYS: The unemployment rate, which is calculated separately from the numbers on job creation, inched down to 5.5 percent.
ELAINE CHAO, LABOR SECRETARY: This is lower than the average unemployment rate in the decade of the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s.
HAYS: But even the Labor Department says the number of new jobs is a better barometer of where the economy is heading and with hourly wages growing less than two percent over the past year and soaring energy prices eating away at people's paychecks, some speculate that the lack of jobs may be George Bush's Achilles heel come November.
BERNSTEIN: With these wage trends, with these price trends, with these oil trends, with these jobs trends, this makes it a tough argument for the incumbent.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HAYS: There may be some good news for consumers on the interest rate front. The Federal Reserve meets on Tuesday and was widely expected to raise rates again, at least until they saw today's numbers -- Daryn.
KAGAN: And those are terms that people at home can really understand. Also they understand the numbers at the gas pump. How much, Kathleen, do energy prices and incredibly rising energy prices have to do with the jobs numbers?
HAYS: Well, certainly a lot of economists, Daryn, and folks at the White House were saying that's probably one reason why the economy has lost some steam. They're not saying the president's policies aren't working. They're saying there's lot of headwinds.
Remember, every time somebody has to fill up that SUV that they're driving to work every day, the higher price is taking a chunk out of the family budget. We're also going to heading into the fall and winter pretty soon and the prospect of high natural gas prices and high home heating oil prices could also way in on the economy in the months ahead, so there are some worries that these headwinds are not going to be dissipating just in these last few months before the election.
KAGAN: A daily reminder for families across America. Kathleen Hays in New York City thank you for that.
Well on their face, today's jobs numbers were disappointing. Wall Street left no doubt about that and, as you might imagine, on the campaign trail there were two competing versions of the same story.
Our Dana Bash has more on that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BASH (voice-over): Against a backdrop of hay bales and cornstalks on a Missouri farm, John Kerry used the lackluster jobs report to mock the president's new campaign slogan.
SEN. JOHN KERRY (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: In the last few days you've heard people in positions of leadership on the other side saying American has turned the corner. Well, it must have been a U- turn.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're not turning back.
BASH: On the stump in New Hampshire, an undeterred president talked up the economy with a concession.
BUSH: We've got more to do. I'm not going to be satisfied until everybody who wants to work can find a job.
BASH: The 32,000 jobs created in July was a figure much lower than expected, the political reality the bad jobs news is good news for Senator Kerry. The Democratic National Committee already had an ad cut.
ANNOUNCER: Millions of good jobs lost to plant closures and outsourcing.
BASH: Bush aides note support for the president's handling of the economy has improved. That may be true but a recent CNN-USA Today Gallup poll shows Americans think John Kerry is a better leader on the issue by ten points.
Bush campaign officials privately admit they're frustrated by several months of improved job numbers that had major competition for air time.
April's report showed a long awaited sign of growth, 308,000 new jobs, but that week U.S. civilians were brutally killed in Fallujah. May's report, 288,000 jobs added. That day, Donald Rumsfeld testified before Congress at the height of the Abu Ghraib Prison scandal. April's report was later revised upwards, May and June downward.
Bush campaign aides point to considerable job growth where it matters, contested states like New Hampshire where the president campaigned and Missouri where his opponent farmed for votes.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BASH: And some political veterans say if voters don't feel the economic turnaround by now it may be too late to break into their psyche by election day. Daryn, that's something that happened President Bush's father and the president is trying to make sure it doesn't happen to him -- Daryn.
KAGAN: So, Dana, if the economy and jobs is one big topic out there on the campaign trail, the other has to be Iraq and it appears that these two candidates continue to kind of up the ante in daring the other to take some other kind of position.
BASH: That's right. The president in New Hampshire also today said that Senator Kerry should say whether or not he would have voted for the war as he did, of course, if he knew then what he knows now. The president said that he has said that he still would have gone to war knowing now, especially that weapons of mass destruction aren't there.
Now, Senator Kerry's campaign, of course, thinks that he's trying to change the subject away from the bad job numbers but they did release a statement saying that John Kerry does think it's a good thing that Saddam Hussein is gone but they think that the president went about it in the wrong way.
Now, you notice that there's not a yes or no there. That's what the president was essentially taunting John Kerry to say. But talking to some of his senior advisers they say first of all that's a hypothetical but, second of all, unlike some Democrats who have said they do regret their vote, John Kerry's not going to say that but this is something that the Kerry campaign say they relish.
They relish talking about this in the upcoming debates in the fall because they say they're going to ask the president whether or not he perhaps would have waited a little bit longer, gone to the U.N. for longer, gotten more international support had he known that weapons of mass destruction aren't there. It's going to be certainly an interesting debate going through the fall -- Daryn.
KAGAN: A lot to talk about in the 90 or so days still ahead. Dana Bash in Kansas City, Missouri, Dana thank you.
One other political note to share with you this evening. In Louisiana today, U.S. Congressman Rodney Alexander announced he is switching parties. The conservative Democrat will seek reelection in the fall as a Republican. His office gave no details on the reasons for that switch.
We move on now to Iraq where the U.s. Marines say they have killed 300 fighters of the Mehdi Army in southern Iraq. Fierce fighting is raging for a second day in the holy city of Najaf.
Our Matthew Chance is in Baghdad and has this report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHANCE (voice-over): The holy city of Najaf now the scene of pitched battles and bloodshed. Fighters of the Mehdi Army, loyal to the firebrand cleric Muqtada al-Sadr have taken positions in the heart of the ancient city.
U.S. Marines are fighting street to street near the shrine of Imam Ali, one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam and casualties are high. The Mehdi Army denies it but the Marines say they've killed 300 of the militia in just two days.
LT. GARY JOHNSTON, U.S. MARINES: There is no end state or end, really end time that we'll place on this one. I think at this point in time it will be effects based, when in fact we believe that those attacking Iraqis and Iraqi civilians are no longer capable of doing that. And so, we'll continue to press, continue to address these anti-Iraqi forces until we feel that they're no longer capable of these type of attacks in the future.
CHANCE: Fighting has flared elsewhere too. Overnight violence engulfed the mainly Shiite Sadr City district of Baghdad. Health ministry officials say at least 20 Iraqis have been killed in the clashes. Amara (ph) and Basra in the south have also seen confrontations involving the Mehdi Army and British forces.
Now, Muqtada al Sadr is again the center of growing Shia unrest. U.S. officials say his militia overtly violated a cease-fire agreed in June. His own spokesman, Sheikh Mahmood al-Sadani (ph) insists they're ready for a truce.
"Najaf has strong relations with other cities," he warns. "The tension in Najaf will be reflected there but our people are willing to establish stability," he says.
It's what the Iraqi government and the U.S.-led coalition say they want too. A general uprising among Iraq's majority Shia could spell disaster.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHANCE: Well, to make matters worse, one powerful voice among Iraq's Shia has actually left the country. The Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has been shipped over to London where he's receiving medical treatment for a suspected heart condition. There's a great deal of concern that even in his absence those people who favor a more violent approach to the situation may come to the fore -- Daryn.
KAGAN: Is there talk there in Iraq that that is what sparked the end of this cease-fire, the power vacuum of al-Sistani leaving the country?
CHANCE: Well, the violence actually started two nights ago before the grand ayatollah actually left the country but there's a great deal of concern about what that means for the ability of the U.S.-led forces in Najaf to actually operate in Najaf.
When the grand ayatollah was there, he's a widely revered figure, there was a certain sense in which the U.S. forces may have wanted to hold back while he was in there. Now that he's gone from the area they may have no such restraints on them.
KAGAN: Matthew Chance in Baghdad, Matthew thank you for the latest from the Iraqi capital.
More now on Iraq. There was more, in fact of everything today, more violence, more unrest and more kidnappings, four more hostages taken today, Lebanese truck drivers. No word yet on who took them or what they want.
In Samara, north of Baghdad, rebels opened fire on a convoy of Army humvees this morning. The troops returned fire. So did troops in Army choppers. The firefight took place as the Army launched a series of raids and patrols. They're calling it Operation Cage and Mousetrap II. According to a military spokesman, three insurgents have been killed and about a dozen captures in that operation so far.
And, in Ramadi, guerrillas stopped and burned a truck that was carrying supplies for the coalition. It happened not far from the spot where the Lebanese truckers were abducted.
It has been a difficult week in Iraq to say the least for everyone, including those who cover the story. Rod Nordland is in the Baghdad Bureau and he is the Baghdad Bureau Chief for "Newsweek." He has been in Iraq for most of the war and he joins us now. Actually, we will work on getting him from Baghdad, a little bit of technical problem there. More with Rod Nordland just ahead.
Meanwhile, let's go on to some other news of the day. It was one of the ugliest chapters in the war on Iraq. It has been on display in a North Carolina courtroom all week. The military hearing will decide whether Private First Class Lynndie England will face a court martial for her role in the prisoner abuse scandal at Abu Ghraib.
Today, the soldier who blew the whistle on the abuse testified and our Susan Candiotti has that story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Both the Army and PFC Lynndie England came under siege as the pregnant private faced her fourth day in military court.
Testimony indicated abuses began at Abu Ghraib Prison almost as soon as her military police unit arrived there last fall. The Army specialist who first reported the abuse told the court he was shown a photo back in October, possibly this one with a hooded detainee handcuffed to the prison bars.
He quoted guard Charles Graner as saying: "The Christian in me knows it was wrong, but the corrections officer in me can't help but to love to make a grown man urinate on himself."
At that time, Specialist Joseph Darby said he shrugged it off but two months later, after Graner gave him a CD disk with more photos, Darby said he was shocked at what he saw, abuse and sexual degradation.
Darby told the court he waited a month to tell investigators because it was a hard call to turn in his friends. The whistle-blower said he did so to stop the mistreatment. Darby testified: "It violated everything I personally believed in and everything I had been taught about war."
Lynndie England and her boyfriend Charles Graner are among the seven reservists charged in the scandal. An Army investigator, James Stewart, testified England identified herself in a number of the now notorious photos. He said she called this dog leash an intimidation device to try to lead a prisoner called Gus to another cell. This human pyramid, she said, was part of humiliation tactics. On another occasion, Stewart testified, England admitted stepping on some of these prisoners. It was a trying a week for the young Army clerk.
RICHARD HERNANDEZ, PFC ENGLAND'S LAWYER: She's holding up as anybody could in her situation, a 21-year-old young lady in a situation like this with all the cameras. It's a high stress situation but she's holding up as well as she can.
CANDIOTTI (on camera): On Saturday, the defense will try to convince a judge to call eleven of its own witnesses, including three generals who oversaw the prison. The government has at least one more witness, Specialist Jeremy Sivits, one of seven charged in the scandal. He's already pleaded guilty, agreeing to testify against his fellow reservists.
Susan Candiotti, CNN, Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: Our most excellent technical team has reestablished contact with our Baghdad bureau. We're able now to bring in Rod Nordland, Baghdad Bureau Chief for "Newsweek" magazine. Rod, thanks for being here with us.
ROD NORDLAND, "NEWSWEEK" BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF: My pleasure.
KAGAN: I want to go back and talk about the departure of the Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani leaving Iraq, going to London for medical treatment, yet this seems to be having a huge effect especially on the fighting in the southern part of the country in Najaf.
NORDLAND: Well, we talked to some of Sistani's supporters in Baghdad, for instance, and their reaction, I mean they're very anti- Muqtada al-Sadr, and their reaction to Sistani's departure was, "Well, wasn't that clever of him to decide to leave now?"
Because he's gone, it removes one very big obstacle that the Americans had to attacking Sadr, whose troops are all over the center of Najaf and around Sistani's house and office and the big fear was that Sistani would be hurt in the process and that would alienate the vast majority of Shia people.
But that said, there's also a danger that by attacking Muqtada al-Sadr they make him more popular and that's what we saw happening back in April when the Americans decided with Iraqi advice to desist from trying to capture Muqtada al-Sadr and just leave him be and then they came to a truce.
Now they say that he broke that truce and they're left with no choice. The Sadr people say that, in fact, the Americans were the aggressors. It's a little hard to tell but it's difficult to see what, you know, whether there's going to be any gain if they do capture Muqtada al-Sadr in terms of settling down those radical Shia that support him. KAGAN: Let's talk about the hostage situation. I reported just a little, a few minutes before we brought you on that four Lebanese truck drivers have been taken hostage today and yet it doesn't seem like we're hearing as much about hostage taking as we had in recent weeks when the target were more Americans. What's really the situation there?
NORDLAND: Well, that's right. There have been a steady stream of hostage takings. There have been some released. A few Turks and Jordanians were released but they took some Lebanese. They've taken Indians and Pakistanis and Egyptians and they haven't taken Americans, so we haven't perhaps been paying as much attention.
But the cumulative effect of this has been that it's almost completely cut off civilian truck traffic into Iraq from its neighbors Jordan and Turkey and to a lesser extent from Kuwait and, although early days yet, that's going to have a very severe effect on supplies in Baghdad. Already we're seeing longer lines at the gas pumps here and we may actually see some shortages of military supplies at some point.
KAGAN: And, Rod, in the final seconds we have left, what do you think the other big story of the last week was in Baghdad and Iraq?
NORDLAND: Well, the biggest long term story probably is the failure to get this political process going, to form a national assembly and also to find countries that are willing to contribute to a force to protect the United Nations. It now looks certain that the United Nations will have to fall back on the Americans for protection and that's what they didn't want.
They wanted to look like, you know, an independent party on the scene and not under the thumb of the Americans, if you will, and it doesn't look like they'll have that latitude. So, that bodes very ill for the process of actually bringing off elections in this country.
KAGAN: Rod Nordland, "Newsweek's" Baghdad Bureau Chief, we can see more of your work and your reporting in "Newsweek" next week. Thank you for that.
Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, a new lead in the anthrax case as investigators begin new searches in New York State.
Plus, more information involving a terror arrest made yesterday in England involving U.S. soldiers and al Qaeda plans of attack.
From Atlanta tonight this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: After nearly three years the anthrax investigation has roared back into the headlines. Federal agents have searched a number of locations and they're not saying a lot tonight but we do know one thing. The locations have one thing in common, a person.
Here's CNN's Deborah Feyerick. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): FBI officials will not say why they searched Dr. Kenneth Berry's home in Wellsville, New York. They're also not saying why the searched a house nearby where Berry lived until June of 2001, or why they carted off boxes and bags from the beach house at the Jersey shore owned by Berry's parents.
All the FBI will say is the search has something to do with finding the origins of the deadly 2001 anthrax mailings, New York Governor George Pataki telling CNN...
GOV. GEORGE PATAKI (R), NEW YORK: Well, what they're doing is they're simply checking every possible lead to see, to try to eliminate those who might be in any way considered a suspect in the anthrax attacks.
FEYERICK: Everyone in the small Wellsville community seemed to be talking about it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm sure for Wellsville, it will be a day that goes down in our history.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They have a very loving family and this is just a complete shock and it's very sad to hear.
FEYERICK: Berry is founder of 3M Systems, the counterterrorism company trained first responders how to react if there's a biological or chemical attack. Berry was head of emergency medicine at Jones Memorial Hospital in Wellsville resigning in October, 2001, around the time of the anthrax attacks.
A hospital spokeswoman did not know why Berry stepped down. Before he did, he filed a patent application for a system to identify chemical and biological agents. That was ten days before the first two anthrax letters were postmarked from New Jersey.
Berry's Web site says he's a weapons of mass destruction consultant for the Defense Department. CNN could not confirm that with the Pentagon. Repeated attempts to reach Berry or his representative were unsuccessful.
(on camera): Berry was arrested Thursday, not because of anything to do with anthrax but because of an alleged domestic disturbance.
Deborah Feyerick CNN, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: Another jurisdiction, another case, this one against a man being held by authorities in Britain but wanted right here in the U.S. Now, last night CNN reported that the government believed he acted as an online fund-raiser for jihad. Today with the unsealing of charges against him, we learned that he is suspected actually of much more than that.
With the story here's CNN's Alina Cho.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): By police escort, Barbar Ahmad arrived at a London court for an extradition hearing Friday. The British citizen is charged with operating several U.S.- based Web sites that asked for donations and supplies for terrorist groups.
KEVIN O'CONNOR. U.S. ATTORNEY: The main purpose of all of these sites was to solicit financial support for terrorist organizations, including the Taliban and the Chechen mujahideen.
CHO: The criminal complaint said one of the Web sites in question published Osama bin Laden's 1996 declaration of war against Americans. Authorities say they also recovered a floppy disk that contained classified blueprints, including planned movements of a U.S. battleship group conducting operations against al Qaeda and enforcing sanctions against Iraq.
O'CONNOR: Most important, the documents specifically described the battle group's vulnerability to terrorist attack.
CHO: The complaint detailed alleged e-mail exchanges between Ahmad and a then active duty American sailor. CNN has learned the unidentified sailor had knowledge of classified ship movement plans.
JEFFREY ROBINSON, MONEY LAUNDERING EXPERT: A terrorist group, al Qaeda or any other, is in business. Their product is blowing something up. Like any business it needs cash flow and reinvestment. You've got to keep the money going through the business to keep it alive.
CHO: British authorities arrested Ahmad Thursday night following a raid on his London home. He is allegedly linked to a Chechen group that took hundreds of hostages at a Moscow movie theater two years ago. In court Friday, Ahmad said he was confused by the charges
MUDDASSAR ARANI, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: It appears that anybody who is arrested in this country in relation to terrorism offenses and there is not sufficient evidence to prosecute those individuals that those individual extraditions are being sought by America.
CHO (on camera): Ahmad told the judge he would not voluntarily go to the United States. Meanwhile, the U.S. attorney in New Haven admitted it could take years to extradite him.
Alina Cho, CNN, New Haven, Connecticut.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, Christiane Amanpour returns to Sudan where a recent visit by a high profile diplomat may finally mean help for that suffering country. And later, the story of one family who says goodbye to four sons at a single time as they all ship out to Iraq.
Around the world this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: After a year and a half of relative neglect, the world is finally taking notice of what's going on in Sudan. On Wednesday, a U.N. envoy secured promises from the Sudanese government to take measures to stop what has arguably become the worst humanitarian crisis in the world today.
But, as our Christiane Amanpour reports, promises only go so far.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Sudan organizes a massive street protest against mounting international pressure. The government complains about an end-of-August deadline to disarm Arab militias which are terrorizing the western province of Darfur.
MUSTAFA OSMAN ISMAIL, SUDANESE MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS: We feel that, although the resolution is unfair, but we're trying our best in order to cope with it.
AMANPOUR: This pressure comes after an 18-month conflict that's gutted towns and villages across Darfur, a region the size of France. This map reflects satellite imagery showing 300 of Darfur's 500 villages have been burned. Aid groups say villages have been ethnically cleansed, 30,000 killed.
And about two million people are in urgent need of help. They have become refugees in their own country, pitching makeshift camps all over the province.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's pretty bad. There's no doubt that we have a very severe humanitarian crisis.
AMANPOUR: It began in early 2003, when Darfur's indigenous African tribes demanded better treatment and a share of resources. The Arab-led Sudanese government responded with air raids and unleashed militias called the janjaweed.
The killings finally led to high-profile visits last month by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. That has led to better access for humanitarian aid. But the U.N. says the violence hasn't stopped. Civilians are still being killed and human rights groups report women are systematically raped.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: Human rights groups and other observers are saying that it's not just rhetorical pressure that will affect Sudan, but real, real pressure, in other words, punitive measures if doesn't meet its obligations to disarms the janjaweed.
In the meantime, the USAID is warning that, in the humanitarian situation, unless aid gets to the desperate people quickly, there could be about a million people dead in Darfur by the end of this year. And even if aid does get there in a rapid way, they're predicting, USAID says, 300,000 deaths by the end of this year. So the situation is extremely dire and many are saying that Darfur simply cannot wait any longer -- Daryn.
KAGAN: Christiane, let's talk about enforcement. You touched on this a little bit. But, really, what power, what can the U.N. threaten the Sudanese government with if they don't come through?
AMANPOUR: Well, initially, the U.S. was trying to get a resolution passed that would call for sanctions if the Sudanese government didn't meet its requirements. That then was watered down because the U.S. couldn't get support for the word sanctions. That was watered down, nonetheless, to imply sanctions if the janjaweed are not disarmed.
But all of that is rather easier said than done, the Sudanese government now saying that, A, the janjaweed are not in their control, B, the situation is out of control, and, C, that they won't accept foreign troops to do the disarming or the peacekeeping. They're saying that they're going to try to do their best, but many are very, very skeptical.
KAGAN: Still many, many challenges head ahead for Sudan.
Christiane Amanpour, thank you for the report.
Still to come on NEWSNIGHT, some pretty good news for the Army. Recruitment numbers are going up. We'll look at those numbers.
And later, two middle-aged men, American men, the Olympics, and the dream they've been chasing for a year.
From Atlanta, this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: To the U.S. military now.
You might think that, with soldiers dying every day in Iraq, it would be a tough sell to get anyone to sign up. It is a tough sell, but, danger or not, the Army says that young men and women are answering the call in surprising numbers. It says a lot about love for the red, white and blue, also, though, a shaky job market, something as well about the green.
More now from our senior Pentagon correspondent, Jamie McIntyre.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN MILITARY AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Who wants a job that requires long days far from home under uncomfortable conditions? Oh, you could also die at any time. It turns out, quite a few do.
Take 17-year-old Joshua Brunais, a high school senior who, despite his slight build, aspires to be an Army Ranger.
JOSHUA BRUNAIS, U.S. ARMY RECRUIT: Joining the Army, you should know that there's a possibility that you can be deployed. So I have no worries.
MCINTYRE (on camera): There's also a possibility you could be killed.
BRUNAIS: Yes, but at least I know I was serving my country and doing something right.
MCINTYRE (voice-over): Twenty-one-year-old David Williams also walked into the Army recruiting station in Woodbridge, Virginia, and walked out a private 1st class.
DAVID WILLIAMS, U.S. ARMY: My dad has raised me to love this country. I love the freedoms we enjoy and I am ready to defend them.
MCINTYRE: The Army insists Williams is the rule, not an exception. Still, worried the stress of combat will scare off fresh recruits and prompt an exodus of battle-weary veterans, the Army is adding some 300 recruiters to offices across the country and arming them with higher bonuses, up to $15,000 in some cases they can use to lure potential prospects.
While the active Army and Reserve are on track to meet or exceed recruiting goals, the National Guard is lagging by several thousand soldiers.
SGT. SANDRA POWELL, U.S. ARMY STATION COMMANDER: This is our delayed entry board. These are the individuals that have actually already joined the military.
MCINTYRE: And recruiters, like Sergeant First Class Sandra Powell, could face bigger challenges next year, because the Army has been drawing on its pool of delayed entry recruits to make up for shortages this year. Still, Powell insists it's not mission impossible.
(on camera): Is it tougher recruiting when there are actually wars going on and people are actually dying in a war zone?
POWELL: I haven't seen a recruiting change either way. It hasn't gone up and it hasn't gone down.
SGT. AMY CERVANTES, U.S. ARMY RECRUITER: This is our principal at Hilton (ph) High School. They're very, very helpful to us.
MCINTYRE (voice-over): So why are young people buying the Army's pitch? Same reasons they always have, says veteran recruiter Sergeant Amy Cervantes.
CERVANTES: A lot of times, it's for that college money. A lot of times, it's to travel, to get away from the area, a place that they grew up, lived in their whole lives.
MCINTYRE: Or, as new recruit 21-year-old Aaron Chandler put it, it's about living a life that matters.
AARON CHANDLER, U.S. ARMY RECRUIT: It's something I want to have and it will provide the right meaning, so that when I am dying I can look back and say my life had purpose.
MCINTYRE (on camera): Despite its continued recruiting success in a time of war, the Army is not complacent. It's well aware that too much strain on the force now could result in a crisis in the future. Army leaders insist they have their finger on the pulse of the all-volunteer force and can do what's needed to make sure that doesn't happen.
Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: With us now is Lawrence Korb. He's a senior fellow at the Center For American Progress, also a former assistant secretary of defense for manpower. He served at the Pentagon during the Reagan administration.
Larry, good to see you this evening.
LAWRENCE KORB, SENIOR FELLOW, CENTER FOR AMERICAN PROGRESS: Nice to be with you.
KAGAN: What do you make of these latest numbers from the Army? Are they smoke and mirrors or are they encouraging?
KORB: Well, what they are basically is -- they talked about the delayed entry pool. And these mean people who have signed up and they have up to a year to come on active duty. What they're doing is, they're bringing a lot more of them forward so they'll meet their recruiting goals this year, which ends September 30.
For example, you usually go into the new year with about half of your recruiting goal for the next year, which would roughly be 35,000 or 40,000 people. They're only going to go in with 20,000 people. The other thing is that you have what they call stop-loss now, which means that once your unit gets orders to go to Iraq or Afghanistan, you can't get out until three months after the unit comes back, and some of the units are staying 15 months. So because you can't get out, that means you don't have to recruit as many people to meet your numbers.
(CROSSTALK)
KAGAN: Well, so, Larry, that helps keep the numbers up, but doesn't that also potentially send a bad message to young men and women who are thinking about signing up because they don't want to get stuck like that?
KORB: Well, it does, but it also means you don't have to recruit as many people because you haven't lost as many.
I think you have to look at it both ways, because if a lot of people get out because they don't like what's happening, then you are going to have to recruit more. But with stop-loss, you have got about 45,000 to 50,000 people are in there who can't get out even if they wanted to. The other way they've held down their recruiting numbers is, they have called back a lot of people in what we call the Individual Ready Reserve.
These are people who completed their obligations, their active duty obligations, but still have what we call a military service obligation. You have that for up to eight years after you sign up. Many of these people completed four or five years on active duty. They're calling them back. So there's a lot of things that they're doing now to make sure they get up until September 30.
Next year is going to be difficult for another reason. You're going to have a lot of the units who served in Iraq, like the 3rd Infantry Division that liberated Baghdad. They served there for about nine months. They came home. Then they're going back. When that unit comes back from Iraq, then I think you're going to see problems.
And, as Jamie mentioned, you're already beginning to have problems in recruiting for the National Guard. And the National Guard units in states like Indiana, Alabama, and North Carolina, when the stop-loss expired, a lot of those units there have not been meeting their retention goals.
KAGAN: OK, a lot of information you shoved right in there.
I want to bring our conversation full circle to our lead story was tonight. And that is the jobs numbers report, that it's so many fewer jobs created than economists were originally predicting. It's tough to get a job out there. And here comes the Army not only offering a job, but offering bonuses. How attractive does that make it?
KORB: Well, I think it is.
If you go back and you look, since the creation of the volunteer military, you can track it pretty well, particularly with unemployment among young people. Unemployment among people, young people, unfortunately, is much higher than the rest of society. And in the '90s, when the military was not busy or stretched and the economy was going gangbusters, they did have recruiting problems.
So, paradoxically, when the economy is not going well, it becomes much easier to get people. That's rather unfortunate, but that's basically the way it's been since we created the volunteer military in 1973.
KAGAN: And then, finally, how does the Army compare to the other services?
KORB: Well, interestingly enough, the Navy and the Air Force are cutting people, because they depend an awful lot on technology. And they go and fight the war and then they come home, whereas the Army and now the Marines, they're the ones left there to pick up the pieces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
So the other services actually are trying to get rid of people. And, paradoxically, the Army is the one that actually should have more people than it has right now.
KAGAN: Larry Korb, thanks for your insight this evening.
KORB: Nice to be with you.
KAGAN: Appreciate it. Good to see you.
We're going to bring this home in terms of the story of one family ahead on NEWSNIGHT. It's hard enough to send one child off to war. How about four, four sons?
That story is ahead.
And, finally, how two middle-aged American men plan on playing baseball in the Olympics for Greece.
From Atlanta, this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: It is one thing to be a parent watching your son or daughter head off to war. But if you're Connie and Marty Scherzberg of Papillion , Nebraska, the stakes are especially high. Four of their five children are now in Kuwait on their way to serve in Iraq.
Our Jonathan Freed recently caught up with this band of brothers as they were completing their training and waiting for orders to ship out.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JONATHAN FREED, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From left to right, meet Specialist Scherzberg, Specialist Scherzberg, Sergeant Scherzberg and Sergeant Scherzberg. They're brothers.
JEFFREY SCHERZBERG, U.S. ARMY: If I punch him in the arm, he feels it, actually.
FREED (on camera): Let's see it.
(LAUGHTER)
FREED (voice-over): They're Army reservists, all in the same unit, the 915th Transportation Company.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Company, attention!
FREED: And their unit is heading to Iraq.
SGT. MATTHEW SCHERZBERG, U.S. ARMY: We all knew that when we joined the Reserves, this could happen. And it did. And so now this is what we trained for. So this is what we have to do.
FREED: Matthew Scherzberg, his twin Justin and their brother Brett, served in Iraq last year with a different company. When the 915th got its orders, older brother, Jeffrey, a former reservist, reenlisted, saying he couldn't let the three go back without him.
J. SCHERZBERG: It's defense something I'm not used to. I usually look after the little guys. But this time, I'm kind of counting on them to give me some advice. So it's definitely going to be different.
FREED: At first, their father didn't even want to hear about it.
MARTY SCHERZBERG, FATHER: I kept mentioning, well, I'm going to call the senator, you know. This can't be. And they've already did their time. But the governor, I was going to call the governor.
FREED: But Marty Scherzberg changed his mind, reluctantly, when he saw that his kids weren't the only ones heading back into the war zone for another year.
(on camera): When the brothers get to Iraq, they are going to be working the supply lines driving trucks. And although they're all part of the same unit, they are being split up, assigned to separate platoons.
CAPT. DAVID MARNE, U.S. ARMY: Basically, for safety, security, and, two, just spread out their experience.
FREED (voice-over): The Army approved the brothers' assignment because they're all volunteers and because they have a fifth brother who is staying at home. Their mother believes it's not too much to ask of one family.
CONNIE SCHERZBERG, MOTHER: I think it would be horrible to send one off to war by himself. You would just feel like, oh, we've deserted him. But in this way, we're sending, you know, brothers with them to take care of them. So it's very comforting.
FREED: And the brothers comfort themselves by trying not to think about what could happen to them.
SPECIALIST BRETT SCHERZBERG, U.S. ARMY: You try to keep your head out of that and you'll prepare for the situation when something like that happens.
FREED (on camera): Do you think you're in denial about that?
B. SCHERZBERG: Sure, yes. Definitely. Why wouldn't you be?
FREED (voice-over): But the three Iraq veterans insist that kind of preparation gives you an edge.
Jonathan Freed, CNN, Fort Riley, Kansas.
(END VIDEOTAPE) (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: So there's an interesting bonus that goes to Greece for hosting this summer's Olympic Games. It receives an automatic bid to the baseball tournament. But there is one problem. There aren't a lot of Greeks who happen to play baseball. So, you're going to see, most of the Greek baseball team will be made up of Greek-Americans. In fact, they scoured the U.S. for kids who have a drop of Greek blood, at least one Greek-born grandparent and who can play baseball.
Dan Lothian tonight has the story of two men who grabbed on to the dream, even if really they're just big kids at heart.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAN LOTHIAN, CNN BOSTON BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): Bill Galatis is 50.
BILL GALATIS, OLYMPIC HOPEFULS: Life doesn't end at 50.
LOTHIAN: Chuck Samiotes is 48.
CHUCK SAMIOTES, OLYMPIC HOPEFULS: I feel like I'm 25.
LOTHIAN: Two best friends, business partners, die-hard Red Sox fans, and Major League Olympic dreamers trying to prove that youth isn't the only ticket to Athens.
GALATIS: I want to march out with that team in the opening ceremonies. I want to be able to play an inning.
SAMIOTES: Single up the middle. That's high my hit. And then Bill comes up and Bill hits the home run and we both walk in and cross the plate.
LOTHIAN: They are pitching to make the Greek Olympic baseball team and play at least one inning, even though they're just weekend athletes.
SAMIOTES: All we ask is that one small opportunity to represent our country, our heritage, and our parents and grandparents.
LOTHIAN (on camera): Galatis and Samiotes have been instrumental in developing baseball in Greece, not a popular sport there. They built to field, trained young people, helped to recruit the country's top players. But they also love to play the game. For the past six years, it's been their passion to make the team. They got the idea after spotting an ad in a Greek-American newspaper.
(voice-over): They talked about that moment over lunch at the Boston-area restaurant both men own.
SAMIOTES: I put this article over his head just like this and says, "Greeks Seek U.S. Baseball Players." And he looks at me and says, we're doing it. LOTHIAN: Even though their organized baseball experience is limited to Babe Ruth League, a couple of years of high school ball and a year of inner-city play, they were undeterred. They began weight training four days a week.
GALATIS: He's the personal torture assistant.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's definitely going to be ready. We have got a game plan. We're on target.
LOTHIAN: They hit hundreds of high-speed baseballs on weekends. They have attended fantasy camps, even played in an all-star game in Greece. Coaches were impressed. But despite their best efforts appealing to Greek baseball and Olympic officials, their letter- writing campaigns, their high-powered friends, the dream of these business partners and best friends remains a long shot. The final cut is next week.
SAMIOTES: We don't think we're going to embarrass anyone here.
GALATIS: We can do it. All we're asking for is the chance. That's all we want, is one at-bat.
LOTHIAN: A chance to turn their fantasy into reality on their Olympic field of dreams.
SAMIOTES: Easy.
LOTHIAN: Dan Lothian, CNN, Boston.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: There is nothing embarrassing about going after your dreams. Gentlemen, we wish you well.
A quick break now. I'm back after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: And that's going to wrap up our hour together. I'm Daryn Kagan. Aaron is back in the seat on Monday.
I will see you Monday morning from New York City on "AMERICAN MORNING."
Have a great weekend.
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 August 6, 2004 - 22:00 ET
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DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening. I'm Daryn Kagan. Aaron is off tonight, and he apparently is not the only thing that is off.
So, are the jobs numbers. The U.S. economy created only 32,000 jobs in July, a fraction of what most economists were expecting. Before you grab the remote and run in fear of an economics lesson, however, let me assure you we will talk about why that number is important to the millions of Americans who are out there looking for a job and to two men in particular who are running for a specific job, president of the United States.
The unwelcome summer surprise is where our whip begins this evening and our Kathleen Hays starts us off with that headline -- Kathleen.
KATHLEEN HAYS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thank you, Daryn. You know when the jobs numbers slow down people get more worried about the economy slowing down. That's why this was a big disappointment on Wall Street and at the White House.
KAGAN: Missouri is up next where the jobs numbers were the talk of the day on the campaign trail. Our Dana Bash is in Kansas City with her headline -- Dana.
DANA BASH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Daryn. It was certainly the thing the Kerry campaign wanted to talk about today. Bad news on the job front is good political news for a Democratic ticket running on the jobs lost on the president's watch -- Daryn.
KAGAN: Thank you, Dana. We will be back with you in a moment.
On to Iraq where an uprising by a Shiite militia raged for a second day. CNN's Matthew Chance has the watch there, Matthew a headline.
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good evening to you, Daryn. A dangerous escalation in the Iraq conflict with the Mehdi Army, controlled of course by the firebrand Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr clashing with U.S. Marines around the country but particularly in the holy city of Najaf. There have been heavy casualties too. According to the U.S. Marines at least 300 of those Mehdi Army militiamen killed in the past two days.
KAGAN: Back to Baghdad in just a moment.
Finally, though, a look at Sudan, a promise to stop the killing. Christiane Amanpour is in Khartoum with her headline -- Christiane.
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Daryn, it's been nearly a year and a half and now the international community is trying to step up pressure on the government here. Sudan says that it will try to start disarming the Janjaweed militias who have conducted a reign of terror in Darfur. Meantime, the U.S. is warning that unless humanitarian aid gets out there and very quickly, one million people could be dead in Darfur by the end of this year.
KAGAN: Christiane, thank you, back to you and to the rest shortly.
Also ahead on NEWSNIGHT tonight, new developments in the 2001 anthrax attacks, three searches with one person in common.
Plus, a story of a real life band of brothers from Omaha, Nebraska, four young men from a single family. They are off to serve in the same unit in Iraq.
And later, the Olympic field of dreams for two Greek Americans living in Boston. All of that and a lot more is ahead in the program.
We're going to start, though, with the economy. If job reports give a snapshot of economic health, the picture released today, well let's just say it was not very pretty. The number of jobs created last month was the smallest gain since last December.
Here again, CNN's Kathleen Hays.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HAYS (voice-over): Shock, disbelief and a swift sell off in the stock market, the reaction to a stunningly small increase in new jobs in July. Just 32,000 when an increase of more than 200,000 was widely expected.
PHIL FLYNN, ALARON TRADING: It was unbelievable. It was like somebody ran a truck through here.
JARED BERNSTEIN, ECONOMIC POLICY INSTITUTE: Well, if June was a disappointment, July is downright depressing.
HAYS: The job market, which looked bright last spring, has suddenly run out of steam. As for the past four months the jobs increases have been getting smaller.
JAMES WHITE, EXCELSIOR CAPITAL MANAGEMENT: It's going to be pretty hard to put a smiley face on this one.
HAYS: The president's top advisers insisted the economy is moving in the right direction.
JOHN SNOW, TREASURY SECRETARY: As we've seen for the last year, 11 straight months of job creation, the highest GDP growth rates in 20 years, so the American economy remains strong and sound and on a good path.
HAYS: The unemployment rate, which is calculated separately from the numbers on job creation, inched down to 5.5 percent.
ELAINE CHAO, LABOR SECRETARY: This is lower than the average unemployment rate in the decade of the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s.
HAYS: But even the Labor Department says the number of new jobs is a better barometer of where the economy is heading and with hourly wages growing less than two percent over the past year and soaring energy prices eating away at people's paychecks, some speculate that the lack of jobs may be George Bush's Achilles heel come November.
BERNSTEIN: With these wage trends, with these price trends, with these oil trends, with these jobs trends, this makes it a tough argument for the incumbent.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HAYS: There may be some good news for consumers on the interest rate front. The Federal Reserve meets on Tuesday and was widely expected to raise rates again, at least until they saw today's numbers -- Daryn.
KAGAN: And those are terms that people at home can really understand. Also they understand the numbers at the gas pump. How much, Kathleen, do energy prices and incredibly rising energy prices have to do with the jobs numbers?
HAYS: Well, certainly a lot of economists, Daryn, and folks at the White House were saying that's probably one reason why the economy has lost some steam. They're not saying the president's policies aren't working. They're saying there's lot of headwinds.
Remember, every time somebody has to fill up that SUV that they're driving to work every day, the higher price is taking a chunk out of the family budget. We're also going to heading into the fall and winter pretty soon and the prospect of high natural gas prices and high home heating oil prices could also way in on the economy in the months ahead, so there are some worries that these headwinds are not going to be dissipating just in these last few months before the election.
KAGAN: A daily reminder for families across America. Kathleen Hays in New York City thank you for that.
Well on their face, today's jobs numbers were disappointing. Wall Street left no doubt about that and, as you might imagine, on the campaign trail there were two competing versions of the same story.
Our Dana Bash has more on that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BASH (voice-over): Against a backdrop of hay bales and cornstalks on a Missouri farm, John Kerry used the lackluster jobs report to mock the president's new campaign slogan.
SEN. JOHN KERRY (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: In the last few days you've heard people in positions of leadership on the other side saying American has turned the corner. Well, it must have been a U- turn.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're not turning back.
BASH: On the stump in New Hampshire, an undeterred president talked up the economy with a concession.
BUSH: We've got more to do. I'm not going to be satisfied until everybody who wants to work can find a job.
BASH: The 32,000 jobs created in July was a figure much lower than expected, the political reality the bad jobs news is good news for Senator Kerry. The Democratic National Committee already had an ad cut.
ANNOUNCER: Millions of good jobs lost to plant closures and outsourcing.
BASH: Bush aides note support for the president's handling of the economy has improved. That may be true but a recent CNN-USA Today Gallup poll shows Americans think John Kerry is a better leader on the issue by ten points.
Bush campaign officials privately admit they're frustrated by several months of improved job numbers that had major competition for air time.
April's report showed a long awaited sign of growth, 308,000 new jobs, but that week U.S. civilians were brutally killed in Fallujah. May's report, 288,000 jobs added. That day, Donald Rumsfeld testified before Congress at the height of the Abu Ghraib Prison scandal. April's report was later revised upwards, May and June downward.
Bush campaign aides point to considerable job growth where it matters, contested states like New Hampshire where the president campaigned and Missouri where his opponent farmed for votes.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BASH: And some political veterans say if voters don't feel the economic turnaround by now it may be too late to break into their psyche by election day. Daryn, that's something that happened President Bush's father and the president is trying to make sure it doesn't happen to him -- Daryn.
KAGAN: So, Dana, if the economy and jobs is one big topic out there on the campaign trail, the other has to be Iraq and it appears that these two candidates continue to kind of up the ante in daring the other to take some other kind of position.
BASH: That's right. The president in New Hampshire also today said that Senator Kerry should say whether or not he would have voted for the war as he did, of course, if he knew then what he knows now. The president said that he has said that he still would have gone to war knowing now, especially that weapons of mass destruction aren't there.
Now, Senator Kerry's campaign, of course, thinks that he's trying to change the subject away from the bad job numbers but they did release a statement saying that John Kerry does think it's a good thing that Saddam Hussein is gone but they think that the president went about it in the wrong way.
Now, you notice that there's not a yes or no there. That's what the president was essentially taunting John Kerry to say. But talking to some of his senior advisers they say first of all that's a hypothetical but, second of all, unlike some Democrats who have said they do regret their vote, John Kerry's not going to say that but this is something that the Kerry campaign say they relish.
They relish talking about this in the upcoming debates in the fall because they say they're going to ask the president whether or not he perhaps would have waited a little bit longer, gone to the U.N. for longer, gotten more international support had he known that weapons of mass destruction aren't there. It's going to be certainly an interesting debate going through the fall -- Daryn.
KAGAN: A lot to talk about in the 90 or so days still ahead. Dana Bash in Kansas City, Missouri, Dana thank you.
One other political note to share with you this evening. In Louisiana today, U.S. Congressman Rodney Alexander announced he is switching parties. The conservative Democrat will seek reelection in the fall as a Republican. His office gave no details on the reasons for that switch.
We move on now to Iraq where the U.s. Marines say they have killed 300 fighters of the Mehdi Army in southern Iraq. Fierce fighting is raging for a second day in the holy city of Najaf.
Our Matthew Chance is in Baghdad and has this report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHANCE (voice-over): The holy city of Najaf now the scene of pitched battles and bloodshed. Fighters of the Mehdi Army, loyal to the firebrand cleric Muqtada al-Sadr have taken positions in the heart of the ancient city.
U.S. Marines are fighting street to street near the shrine of Imam Ali, one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam and casualties are high. The Mehdi Army denies it but the Marines say they've killed 300 of the militia in just two days.
LT. GARY JOHNSTON, U.S. MARINES: There is no end state or end, really end time that we'll place on this one. I think at this point in time it will be effects based, when in fact we believe that those attacking Iraqis and Iraqi civilians are no longer capable of doing that. And so, we'll continue to press, continue to address these anti-Iraqi forces until we feel that they're no longer capable of these type of attacks in the future.
CHANCE: Fighting has flared elsewhere too. Overnight violence engulfed the mainly Shiite Sadr City district of Baghdad. Health ministry officials say at least 20 Iraqis have been killed in the clashes. Amara (ph) and Basra in the south have also seen confrontations involving the Mehdi Army and British forces.
Now, Muqtada al Sadr is again the center of growing Shia unrest. U.S. officials say his militia overtly violated a cease-fire agreed in June. His own spokesman, Sheikh Mahmood al-Sadani (ph) insists they're ready for a truce.
"Najaf has strong relations with other cities," he warns. "The tension in Najaf will be reflected there but our people are willing to establish stability," he says.
It's what the Iraqi government and the U.S.-led coalition say they want too. A general uprising among Iraq's majority Shia could spell disaster.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHANCE: Well, to make matters worse, one powerful voice among Iraq's Shia has actually left the country. The Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has been shipped over to London where he's receiving medical treatment for a suspected heart condition. There's a great deal of concern that even in his absence those people who favor a more violent approach to the situation may come to the fore -- Daryn.
KAGAN: Is there talk there in Iraq that that is what sparked the end of this cease-fire, the power vacuum of al-Sistani leaving the country?
CHANCE: Well, the violence actually started two nights ago before the grand ayatollah actually left the country but there's a great deal of concern about what that means for the ability of the U.S.-led forces in Najaf to actually operate in Najaf.
When the grand ayatollah was there, he's a widely revered figure, there was a certain sense in which the U.S. forces may have wanted to hold back while he was in there. Now that he's gone from the area they may have no such restraints on them.
KAGAN: Matthew Chance in Baghdad, Matthew thank you for the latest from the Iraqi capital.
More now on Iraq. There was more, in fact of everything today, more violence, more unrest and more kidnappings, four more hostages taken today, Lebanese truck drivers. No word yet on who took them or what they want.
In Samara, north of Baghdad, rebels opened fire on a convoy of Army humvees this morning. The troops returned fire. So did troops in Army choppers. The firefight took place as the Army launched a series of raids and patrols. They're calling it Operation Cage and Mousetrap II. According to a military spokesman, three insurgents have been killed and about a dozen captures in that operation so far.
And, in Ramadi, guerrillas stopped and burned a truck that was carrying supplies for the coalition. It happened not far from the spot where the Lebanese truckers were abducted.
It has been a difficult week in Iraq to say the least for everyone, including those who cover the story. Rod Nordland is in the Baghdad Bureau and he is the Baghdad Bureau Chief for "Newsweek." He has been in Iraq for most of the war and he joins us now. Actually, we will work on getting him from Baghdad, a little bit of technical problem there. More with Rod Nordland just ahead.
Meanwhile, let's go on to some other news of the day. It was one of the ugliest chapters in the war on Iraq. It has been on display in a North Carolina courtroom all week. The military hearing will decide whether Private First Class Lynndie England will face a court martial for her role in the prisoner abuse scandal at Abu Ghraib.
Today, the soldier who blew the whistle on the abuse testified and our Susan Candiotti has that story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Both the Army and PFC Lynndie England came under siege as the pregnant private faced her fourth day in military court.
Testimony indicated abuses began at Abu Ghraib Prison almost as soon as her military police unit arrived there last fall. The Army specialist who first reported the abuse told the court he was shown a photo back in October, possibly this one with a hooded detainee handcuffed to the prison bars.
He quoted guard Charles Graner as saying: "The Christian in me knows it was wrong, but the corrections officer in me can't help but to love to make a grown man urinate on himself."
At that time, Specialist Joseph Darby said he shrugged it off but two months later, after Graner gave him a CD disk with more photos, Darby said he was shocked at what he saw, abuse and sexual degradation.
Darby told the court he waited a month to tell investigators because it was a hard call to turn in his friends. The whistle-blower said he did so to stop the mistreatment. Darby testified: "It violated everything I personally believed in and everything I had been taught about war."
Lynndie England and her boyfriend Charles Graner are among the seven reservists charged in the scandal. An Army investigator, James Stewart, testified England identified herself in a number of the now notorious photos. He said she called this dog leash an intimidation device to try to lead a prisoner called Gus to another cell. This human pyramid, she said, was part of humiliation tactics. On another occasion, Stewart testified, England admitted stepping on some of these prisoners. It was a trying a week for the young Army clerk.
RICHARD HERNANDEZ, PFC ENGLAND'S LAWYER: She's holding up as anybody could in her situation, a 21-year-old young lady in a situation like this with all the cameras. It's a high stress situation but she's holding up as well as she can.
CANDIOTTI (on camera): On Saturday, the defense will try to convince a judge to call eleven of its own witnesses, including three generals who oversaw the prison. The government has at least one more witness, Specialist Jeremy Sivits, one of seven charged in the scandal. He's already pleaded guilty, agreeing to testify against his fellow reservists.
Susan Candiotti, CNN, Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: Our most excellent technical team has reestablished contact with our Baghdad bureau. We're able now to bring in Rod Nordland, Baghdad Bureau Chief for "Newsweek" magazine. Rod, thanks for being here with us.
ROD NORDLAND, "NEWSWEEK" BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF: My pleasure.
KAGAN: I want to go back and talk about the departure of the Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani leaving Iraq, going to London for medical treatment, yet this seems to be having a huge effect especially on the fighting in the southern part of the country in Najaf.
NORDLAND: Well, we talked to some of Sistani's supporters in Baghdad, for instance, and their reaction, I mean they're very anti- Muqtada al-Sadr, and their reaction to Sistani's departure was, "Well, wasn't that clever of him to decide to leave now?"
Because he's gone, it removes one very big obstacle that the Americans had to attacking Sadr, whose troops are all over the center of Najaf and around Sistani's house and office and the big fear was that Sistani would be hurt in the process and that would alienate the vast majority of Shia people.
But that said, there's also a danger that by attacking Muqtada al-Sadr they make him more popular and that's what we saw happening back in April when the Americans decided with Iraqi advice to desist from trying to capture Muqtada al-Sadr and just leave him be and then they came to a truce.
Now they say that he broke that truce and they're left with no choice. The Sadr people say that, in fact, the Americans were the aggressors. It's a little hard to tell but it's difficult to see what, you know, whether there's going to be any gain if they do capture Muqtada al-Sadr in terms of settling down those radical Shia that support him. KAGAN: Let's talk about the hostage situation. I reported just a little, a few minutes before we brought you on that four Lebanese truck drivers have been taken hostage today and yet it doesn't seem like we're hearing as much about hostage taking as we had in recent weeks when the target were more Americans. What's really the situation there?
NORDLAND: Well, that's right. There have been a steady stream of hostage takings. There have been some released. A few Turks and Jordanians were released but they took some Lebanese. They've taken Indians and Pakistanis and Egyptians and they haven't taken Americans, so we haven't perhaps been paying as much attention.
But the cumulative effect of this has been that it's almost completely cut off civilian truck traffic into Iraq from its neighbors Jordan and Turkey and to a lesser extent from Kuwait and, although early days yet, that's going to have a very severe effect on supplies in Baghdad. Already we're seeing longer lines at the gas pumps here and we may actually see some shortages of military supplies at some point.
KAGAN: And, Rod, in the final seconds we have left, what do you think the other big story of the last week was in Baghdad and Iraq?
NORDLAND: Well, the biggest long term story probably is the failure to get this political process going, to form a national assembly and also to find countries that are willing to contribute to a force to protect the United Nations. It now looks certain that the United Nations will have to fall back on the Americans for protection and that's what they didn't want.
They wanted to look like, you know, an independent party on the scene and not under the thumb of the Americans, if you will, and it doesn't look like they'll have that latitude. So, that bodes very ill for the process of actually bringing off elections in this country.
KAGAN: Rod Nordland, "Newsweek's" Baghdad Bureau Chief, we can see more of your work and your reporting in "Newsweek" next week. Thank you for that.
Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, a new lead in the anthrax case as investigators begin new searches in New York State.
Plus, more information involving a terror arrest made yesterday in England involving U.S. soldiers and al Qaeda plans of attack.
From Atlanta tonight this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: After nearly three years the anthrax investigation has roared back into the headlines. Federal agents have searched a number of locations and they're not saying a lot tonight but we do know one thing. The locations have one thing in common, a person.
Here's CNN's Deborah Feyerick. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): FBI officials will not say why they searched Dr. Kenneth Berry's home in Wellsville, New York. They're also not saying why the searched a house nearby where Berry lived until June of 2001, or why they carted off boxes and bags from the beach house at the Jersey shore owned by Berry's parents.
All the FBI will say is the search has something to do with finding the origins of the deadly 2001 anthrax mailings, New York Governor George Pataki telling CNN...
GOV. GEORGE PATAKI (R), NEW YORK: Well, what they're doing is they're simply checking every possible lead to see, to try to eliminate those who might be in any way considered a suspect in the anthrax attacks.
FEYERICK: Everyone in the small Wellsville community seemed to be talking about it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm sure for Wellsville, it will be a day that goes down in our history.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They have a very loving family and this is just a complete shock and it's very sad to hear.
FEYERICK: Berry is founder of 3M Systems, the counterterrorism company trained first responders how to react if there's a biological or chemical attack. Berry was head of emergency medicine at Jones Memorial Hospital in Wellsville resigning in October, 2001, around the time of the anthrax attacks.
A hospital spokeswoman did not know why Berry stepped down. Before he did, he filed a patent application for a system to identify chemical and biological agents. That was ten days before the first two anthrax letters were postmarked from New Jersey.
Berry's Web site says he's a weapons of mass destruction consultant for the Defense Department. CNN could not confirm that with the Pentagon. Repeated attempts to reach Berry or his representative were unsuccessful.
(on camera): Berry was arrested Thursday, not because of anything to do with anthrax but because of an alleged domestic disturbance.
Deborah Feyerick CNN, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: Another jurisdiction, another case, this one against a man being held by authorities in Britain but wanted right here in the U.S. Now, last night CNN reported that the government believed he acted as an online fund-raiser for jihad. Today with the unsealing of charges against him, we learned that he is suspected actually of much more than that.
With the story here's CNN's Alina Cho.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): By police escort, Barbar Ahmad arrived at a London court for an extradition hearing Friday. The British citizen is charged with operating several U.S.- based Web sites that asked for donations and supplies for terrorist groups.
KEVIN O'CONNOR. U.S. ATTORNEY: The main purpose of all of these sites was to solicit financial support for terrorist organizations, including the Taliban and the Chechen mujahideen.
CHO: The criminal complaint said one of the Web sites in question published Osama bin Laden's 1996 declaration of war against Americans. Authorities say they also recovered a floppy disk that contained classified blueprints, including planned movements of a U.S. battleship group conducting operations against al Qaeda and enforcing sanctions against Iraq.
O'CONNOR: Most important, the documents specifically described the battle group's vulnerability to terrorist attack.
CHO: The complaint detailed alleged e-mail exchanges between Ahmad and a then active duty American sailor. CNN has learned the unidentified sailor had knowledge of classified ship movement plans.
JEFFREY ROBINSON, MONEY LAUNDERING EXPERT: A terrorist group, al Qaeda or any other, is in business. Their product is blowing something up. Like any business it needs cash flow and reinvestment. You've got to keep the money going through the business to keep it alive.
CHO: British authorities arrested Ahmad Thursday night following a raid on his London home. He is allegedly linked to a Chechen group that took hundreds of hostages at a Moscow movie theater two years ago. In court Friday, Ahmad said he was confused by the charges
MUDDASSAR ARANI, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: It appears that anybody who is arrested in this country in relation to terrorism offenses and there is not sufficient evidence to prosecute those individuals that those individual extraditions are being sought by America.
CHO (on camera): Ahmad told the judge he would not voluntarily go to the United States. Meanwhile, the U.S. attorney in New Haven admitted it could take years to extradite him.
Alina Cho, CNN, New Haven, Connecticut.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, Christiane Amanpour returns to Sudan where a recent visit by a high profile diplomat may finally mean help for that suffering country. And later, the story of one family who says goodbye to four sons at a single time as they all ship out to Iraq.
Around the world this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: After a year and a half of relative neglect, the world is finally taking notice of what's going on in Sudan. On Wednesday, a U.N. envoy secured promises from the Sudanese government to take measures to stop what has arguably become the worst humanitarian crisis in the world today.
But, as our Christiane Amanpour reports, promises only go so far.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Sudan organizes a massive street protest against mounting international pressure. The government complains about an end-of-August deadline to disarm Arab militias which are terrorizing the western province of Darfur.
MUSTAFA OSMAN ISMAIL, SUDANESE MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS: We feel that, although the resolution is unfair, but we're trying our best in order to cope with it.
AMANPOUR: This pressure comes after an 18-month conflict that's gutted towns and villages across Darfur, a region the size of France. This map reflects satellite imagery showing 300 of Darfur's 500 villages have been burned. Aid groups say villages have been ethnically cleansed, 30,000 killed.
And about two million people are in urgent need of help. They have become refugees in their own country, pitching makeshift camps all over the province.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's pretty bad. There's no doubt that we have a very severe humanitarian crisis.
AMANPOUR: It began in early 2003, when Darfur's indigenous African tribes demanded better treatment and a share of resources. The Arab-led Sudanese government responded with air raids and unleashed militias called the janjaweed.
The killings finally led to high-profile visits last month by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. That has led to better access for humanitarian aid. But the U.N. says the violence hasn't stopped. Civilians are still being killed and human rights groups report women are systematically raped.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AMANPOUR: Human rights groups and other observers are saying that it's not just rhetorical pressure that will affect Sudan, but real, real pressure, in other words, punitive measures if doesn't meet its obligations to disarms the janjaweed.
In the meantime, the USAID is warning that, in the humanitarian situation, unless aid gets to the desperate people quickly, there could be about a million people dead in Darfur by the end of this year. And even if aid does get there in a rapid way, they're predicting, USAID says, 300,000 deaths by the end of this year. So the situation is extremely dire and many are saying that Darfur simply cannot wait any longer -- Daryn.
KAGAN: Christiane, let's talk about enforcement. You touched on this a little bit. But, really, what power, what can the U.N. threaten the Sudanese government with if they don't come through?
AMANPOUR: Well, initially, the U.S. was trying to get a resolution passed that would call for sanctions if the Sudanese government didn't meet its requirements. That then was watered down because the U.S. couldn't get support for the word sanctions. That was watered down, nonetheless, to imply sanctions if the janjaweed are not disarmed.
But all of that is rather easier said than done, the Sudanese government now saying that, A, the janjaweed are not in their control, B, the situation is out of control, and, C, that they won't accept foreign troops to do the disarming or the peacekeeping. They're saying that they're going to try to do their best, but many are very, very skeptical.
KAGAN: Still many, many challenges head ahead for Sudan.
Christiane Amanpour, thank you for the report.
Still to come on NEWSNIGHT, some pretty good news for the Army. Recruitment numbers are going up. We'll look at those numbers.
And later, two middle-aged men, American men, the Olympics, and the dream they've been chasing for a year.
From Atlanta, this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: To the U.S. military now.
You might think that, with soldiers dying every day in Iraq, it would be a tough sell to get anyone to sign up. It is a tough sell, but, danger or not, the Army says that young men and women are answering the call in surprising numbers. It says a lot about love for the red, white and blue, also, though, a shaky job market, something as well about the green.
More now from our senior Pentagon correspondent, Jamie McIntyre.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN MILITARY AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Who wants a job that requires long days far from home under uncomfortable conditions? Oh, you could also die at any time. It turns out, quite a few do.
Take 17-year-old Joshua Brunais, a high school senior who, despite his slight build, aspires to be an Army Ranger.
JOSHUA BRUNAIS, U.S. ARMY RECRUIT: Joining the Army, you should know that there's a possibility that you can be deployed. So I have no worries.
MCINTYRE (on camera): There's also a possibility you could be killed.
BRUNAIS: Yes, but at least I know I was serving my country and doing something right.
MCINTYRE (voice-over): Twenty-one-year-old David Williams also walked into the Army recruiting station in Woodbridge, Virginia, and walked out a private 1st class.
DAVID WILLIAMS, U.S. ARMY: My dad has raised me to love this country. I love the freedoms we enjoy and I am ready to defend them.
MCINTYRE: The Army insists Williams is the rule, not an exception. Still, worried the stress of combat will scare off fresh recruits and prompt an exodus of battle-weary veterans, the Army is adding some 300 recruiters to offices across the country and arming them with higher bonuses, up to $15,000 in some cases they can use to lure potential prospects.
While the active Army and Reserve are on track to meet or exceed recruiting goals, the National Guard is lagging by several thousand soldiers.
SGT. SANDRA POWELL, U.S. ARMY STATION COMMANDER: This is our delayed entry board. These are the individuals that have actually already joined the military.
MCINTYRE: And recruiters, like Sergeant First Class Sandra Powell, could face bigger challenges next year, because the Army has been drawing on its pool of delayed entry recruits to make up for shortages this year. Still, Powell insists it's not mission impossible.
(on camera): Is it tougher recruiting when there are actually wars going on and people are actually dying in a war zone?
POWELL: I haven't seen a recruiting change either way. It hasn't gone up and it hasn't gone down.
SGT. AMY CERVANTES, U.S. ARMY RECRUITER: This is our principal at Hilton (ph) High School. They're very, very helpful to us.
MCINTYRE (voice-over): So why are young people buying the Army's pitch? Same reasons they always have, says veteran recruiter Sergeant Amy Cervantes.
CERVANTES: A lot of times, it's for that college money. A lot of times, it's to travel, to get away from the area, a place that they grew up, lived in their whole lives.
MCINTYRE: Or, as new recruit 21-year-old Aaron Chandler put it, it's about living a life that matters.
AARON CHANDLER, U.S. ARMY RECRUIT: It's something I want to have and it will provide the right meaning, so that when I am dying I can look back and say my life had purpose.
MCINTYRE (on camera): Despite its continued recruiting success in a time of war, the Army is not complacent. It's well aware that too much strain on the force now could result in a crisis in the future. Army leaders insist they have their finger on the pulse of the all-volunteer force and can do what's needed to make sure that doesn't happen.
Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: With us now is Lawrence Korb. He's a senior fellow at the Center For American Progress, also a former assistant secretary of defense for manpower. He served at the Pentagon during the Reagan administration.
Larry, good to see you this evening.
LAWRENCE KORB, SENIOR FELLOW, CENTER FOR AMERICAN PROGRESS: Nice to be with you.
KAGAN: What do you make of these latest numbers from the Army? Are they smoke and mirrors or are they encouraging?
KORB: Well, what they are basically is -- they talked about the delayed entry pool. And these mean people who have signed up and they have up to a year to come on active duty. What they're doing is, they're bringing a lot more of them forward so they'll meet their recruiting goals this year, which ends September 30.
For example, you usually go into the new year with about half of your recruiting goal for the next year, which would roughly be 35,000 or 40,000 people. They're only going to go in with 20,000 people. The other thing is that you have what they call stop-loss now, which means that once your unit gets orders to go to Iraq or Afghanistan, you can't get out until three months after the unit comes back, and some of the units are staying 15 months. So because you can't get out, that means you don't have to recruit as many people to meet your numbers.
(CROSSTALK)
KAGAN: Well, so, Larry, that helps keep the numbers up, but doesn't that also potentially send a bad message to young men and women who are thinking about signing up because they don't want to get stuck like that?
KORB: Well, it does, but it also means you don't have to recruit as many people because you haven't lost as many.
I think you have to look at it both ways, because if a lot of people get out because they don't like what's happening, then you are going to have to recruit more. But with stop-loss, you have got about 45,000 to 50,000 people are in there who can't get out even if they wanted to. The other way they've held down their recruiting numbers is, they have called back a lot of people in what we call the Individual Ready Reserve.
These are people who completed their obligations, their active duty obligations, but still have what we call a military service obligation. You have that for up to eight years after you sign up. Many of these people completed four or five years on active duty. They're calling them back. So there's a lot of things that they're doing now to make sure they get up until September 30.
Next year is going to be difficult for another reason. You're going to have a lot of the units who served in Iraq, like the 3rd Infantry Division that liberated Baghdad. They served there for about nine months. They came home. Then they're going back. When that unit comes back from Iraq, then I think you're going to see problems.
And, as Jamie mentioned, you're already beginning to have problems in recruiting for the National Guard. And the National Guard units in states like Indiana, Alabama, and North Carolina, when the stop-loss expired, a lot of those units there have not been meeting their retention goals.
KAGAN: OK, a lot of information you shoved right in there.
I want to bring our conversation full circle to our lead story was tonight. And that is the jobs numbers report, that it's so many fewer jobs created than economists were originally predicting. It's tough to get a job out there. And here comes the Army not only offering a job, but offering bonuses. How attractive does that make it?
KORB: Well, I think it is.
If you go back and you look, since the creation of the volunteer military, you can track it pretty well, particularly with unemployment among young people. Unemployment among people, young people, unfortunately, is much higher than the rest of society. And in the '90s, when the military was not busy or stretched and the economy was going gangbusters, they did have recruiting problems.
So, paradoxically, when the economy is not going well, it becomes much easier to get people. That's rather unfortunate, but that's basically the way it's been since we created the volunteer military in 1973.
KAGAN: And then, finally, how does the Army compare to the other services?
KORB: Well, interestingly enough, the Navy and the Air Force are cutting people, because they depend an awful lot on technology. And they go and fight the war and then they come home, whereas the Army and now the Marines, they're the ones left there to pick up the pieces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
So the other services actually are trying to get rid of people. And, paradoxically, the Army is the one that actually should have more people than it has right now.
KAGAN: Larry Korb, thanks for your insight this evening.
KORB: Nice to be with you.
KAGAN: Appreciate it. Good to see you.
We're going to bring this home in terms of the story of one family ahead on NEWSNIGHT. It's hard enough to send one child off to war. How about four, four sons?
That story is ahead.
And, finally, how two middle-aged American men plan on playing baseball in the Olympics for Greece.
From Atlanta, this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: It is one thing to be a parent watching your son or daughter head off to war. But if you're Connie and Marty Scherzberg of Papillion , Nebraska, the stakes are especially high. Four of their five children are now in Kuwait on their way to serve in Iraq.
Our Jonathan Freed recently caught up with this band of brothers as they were completing their training and waiting for orders to ship out.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JONATHAN FREED, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From left to right, meet Specialist Scherzberg, Specialist Scherzberg, Sergeant Scherzberg and Sergeant Scherzberg. They're brothers.
JEFFREY SCHERZBERG, U.S. ARMY: If I punch him in the arm, he feels it, actually.
FREED (on camera): Let's see it.
(LAUGHTER)
FREED (voice-over): They're Army reservists, all in the same unit, the 915th Transportation Company.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Company, attention!
FREED: And their unit is heading to Iraq.
SGT. MATTHEW SCHERZBERG, U.S. ARMY: We all knew that when we joined the Reserves, this could happen. And it did. And so now this is what we trained for. So this is what we have to do.
FREED: Matthew Scherzberg, his twin Justin and their brother Brett, served in Iraq last year with a different company. When the 915th got its orders, older brother, Jeffrey, a former reservist, reenlisted, saying he couldn't let the three go back without him.
J. SCHERZBERG: It's defense something I'm not used to. I usually look after the little guys. But this time, I'm kind of counting on them to give me some advice. So it's definitely going to be different.
FREED: At first, their father didn't even want to hear about it.
MARTY SCHERZBERG, FATHER: I kept mentioning, well, I'm going to call the senator, you know. This can't be. And they've already did their time. But the governor, I was going to call the governor.
FREED: But Marty Scherzberg changed his mind, reluctantly, when he saw that his kids weren't the only ones heading back into the war zone for another year.
(on camera): When the brothers get to Iraq, they are going to be working the supply lines driving trucks. And although they're all part of the same unit, they are being split up, assigned to separate platoons.
CAPT. DAVID MARNE, U.S. ARMY: Basically, for safety, security, and, two, just spread out their experience.
FREED (voice-over): The Army approved the brothers' assignment because they're all volunteers and because they have a fifth brother who is staying at home. Their mother believes it's not too much to ask of one family.
CONNIE SCHERZBERG, MOTHER: I think it would be horrible to send one off to war by himself. You would just feel like, oh, we've deserted him. But in this way, we're sending, you know, brothers with them to take care of them. So it's very comforting.
FREED: And the brothers comfort themselves by trying not to think about what could happen to them.
SPECIALIST BRETT SCHERZBERG, U.S. ARMY: You try to keep your head out of that and you'll prepare for the situation when something like that happens.
FREED (on camera): Do you think you're in denial about that?
B. SCHERZBERG: Sure, yes. Definitely. Why wouldn't you be?
FREED (voice-over): But the three Iraq veterans insist that kind of preparation gives you an edge.
Jonathan Freed, CNN, Fort Riley, Kansas.
(END VIDEOTAPE) (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: So there's an interesting bonus that goes to Greece for hosting this summer's Olympic Games. It receives an automatic bid to the baseball tournament. But there is one problem. There aren't a lot of Greeks who happen to play baseball. So, you're going to see, most of the Greek baseball team will be made up of Greek-Americans. In fact, they scoured the U.S. for kids who have a drop of Greek blood, at least one Greek-born grandparent and who can play baseball.
Dan Lothian tonight has the story of two men who grabbed on to the dream, even if really they're just big kids at heart.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAN LOTHIAN, CNN BOSTON BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): Bill Galatis is 50.
BILL GALATIS, OLYMPIC HOPEFULS: Life doesn't end at 50.
LOTHIAN: Chuck Samiotes is 48.
CHUCK SAMIOTES, OLYMPIC HOPEFULS: I feel like I'm 25.
LOTHIAN: Two best friends, business partners, die-hard Red Sox fans, and Major League Olympic dreamers trying to prove that youth isn't the only ticket to Athens.
GALATIS: I want to march out with that team in the opening ceremonies. I want to be able to play an inning.
SAMIOTES: Single up the middle. That's high my hit. And then Bill comes up and Bill hits the home run and we both walk in and cross the plate.
LOTHIAN: They are pitching to make the Greek Olympic baseball team and play at least one inning, even though they're just weekend athletes.
SAMIOTES: All we ask is that one small opportunity to represent our country, our heritage, and our parents and grandparents.
LOTHIAN (on camera): Galatis and Samiotes have been instrumental in developing baseball in Greece, not a popular sport there. They built to field, trained young people, helped to recruit the country's top players. But they also love to play the game. For the past six years, it's been their passion to make the team. They got the idea after spotting an ad in a Greek-American newspaper.
(voice-over): They talked about that moment over lunch at the Boston-area restaurant both men own.
SAMIOTES: I put this article over his head just like this and says, "Greeks Seek U.S. Baseball Players." And he looks at me and says, we're doing it. LOTHIAN: Even though their organized baseball experience is limited to Babe Ruth League, a couple of years of high school ball and a year of inner-city play, they were undeterred. They began weight training four days a week.
GALATIS: He's the personal torture assistant.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's definitely going to be ready. We have got a game plan. We're on target.
LOTHIAN: They hit hundreds of high-speed baseballs on weekends. They have attended fantasy camps, even played in an all-star game in Greece. Coaches were impressed. But despite their best efforts appealing to Greek baseball and Olympic officials, their letter- writing campaigns, their high-powered friends, the dream of these business partners and best friends remains a long shot. The final cut is next week.
SAMIOTES: We don't think we're going to embarrass anyone here.
GALATIS: We can do it. All we're asking for is the chance. That's all we want, is one at-bat.
LOTHIAN: A chance to turn their fantasy into reality on their Olympic field of dreams.
SAMIOTES: Easy.
LOTHIAN: Dan Lothian, CNN, Boston.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: There is nothing embarrassing about going after your dreams. Gentlemen, we wish you well.
A quick break now. I'm back after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: And that's going to wrap up our hour together. I'm Daryn Kagan. Aaron is back in the seat on Monday.
I will see you Monday morning from New York City on "AMERICAN MORNING."
Have a great weekend.
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