Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Crossfire

Interview with Richard Perle, Carl Conetta, Larry Klayman, Bill McCollum

Aired February 11, 2002 - 19:30   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.
TUCKER CARLSON, CO-HOST: ...bombing. And taking the White House to court, can this man win release of Dick Cheney's energy task force records?

ANNOUNCER: Live from Washington, CROSSFIRE. On the left, Bill Press. On the right, Tucker Carlson. In the CROSSFIRE, former Assistant Defense Secretary Richard Perle and Carl Conetta from the Project on Defense Alternatives. And then, Larry Klayman, chairman and general counsel of Judicial Watch and former Republican Congressman Bill McCollum.

CARLSON: Good evening and welcome to CROSSFIRE. Ceasefire? That's the policy some are suggesting the U.S pursue in Afghanistan. With the Taliban toppled and al Qaeda on the run, there's no good reason to keep fighting they say. It's time to rebuild the country and atone for American sins committed since September 11.

Human rights groups say hundreds of Afghan civilians have been killed in the allied campaign, many by mistake. A report today says three innocent Afghan peasants were killed in a CIA missile attack last week. The Pentagon says there's no indication they were innocent. Other reports suggest Afghan prisoners were roughed up while in civilian custody. Is the United States fighting fair in Afghanistan? Are there too many civilian casualties? Is operation Enduring Freedom really bringing freedom or just more misery?

Bill Press?

BILL PRESS, CO-HOST: Mr. Perle, I'd like to start with this latest incident that the Pentagon was busy trying to explain away today. There are three guys, I've seen three or four reports on this, including our network, there are three guys standing on a hillside in Afghanistan. We don't know who they are. We think they may be al Qaeda. And we fire a missile at three guys on a hillside. Isn't this kind of getting, I mean like, this is not a case of military overkill?

RICHARD PERLE, FMr. ASST. DEFENSE SECRETARY: Well, do I have to accept your description of the situation?

PRESS: Well, unless you know another one. That's what happened.

PERLE: Well, I don't know the three gentlemen in question. I do know that we have gone to enormous lengths, first to identify targets with great care, then to verify the identification before actually taking action. And we have missed a significant number of targets because the verification procedures were so extensive. I'm not saying that there won't be accidents or that there haven't been accidents. It's part of warfare, but we go to enormous lengths. I don't think we can do more than we're doing.

PRESS: Well, here's what seems to be the case is, you know, the al Qaeda's gone. The Taliban is over. So we're still running around bombing whatever can find to bomb. So about 10 days ago, we bombed this compound, killed 21 innocent civilians. We take 27 captives, saying -- bragging about the fact we've captured these al Qaeda people. They've all been released. The CIA is now paying reparations to the victims of the innocent people killed. These guys are released. They're not al Qaeda. And then we got this latest incident here with these three guys on a hillside. I mean, aren't we maybe at the place where we're doing more harm than good and we should declare a ceasefire?

PERLE: No, I don't think so. If you declare a ceasefire and artificially restrain our freedom to go after additional targets, suppose we saw bin Laden the next day? Would we have to violate our own ceasefire? Or other al Qaeda elements the next day. No, I think you don't give the enemy the comfort of a ceasefire. You work as hard as can to hit only the targets that you want to hit, recognizing that from time to time there's going to be a mistake.

CARL CONETTA, PROJECTION DEFENSE ALTERNATIVES: The dichotomy between ceasefire and no ceasefire is a false dichotomy. I think what the recent incident shows is that it is time to change our mode of warfare in Afghanistan. Yes, we need to put greater emphasis on building up the country. But within that, we still have to find al Qaeda cadre who are active in the area, but we don't need to do that with standoff warfare. We don't need to do that from the air.

CARLSON: Well, actually, it turns out, Mr. Conetta, that has proven to be the most efficient way to do it and the way that results in the fewest civilian casualties. I'm struck, in all the stories about these three men who were killed by the missile, many of them with political overtones suggesting some sort of massacre of innocence. The Pentagon did not strike a defensive pose. They didn't lie. They didn't start a cover-up. They sent a team of investigators into the site to find out exactly what happened. And they have some hunches. And I want you to listen to Admiral Stufflebeem, who addressed this directly today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN STUFFLEBEEM, REAR ADM., PENTAGON SPOKESMAN: There are no initial indications that these were innocent locals. And I base that on the facts that this team, in addition to just looking at the site where the strike occurred, also did some exploration in the surrounding area to include some caves, a nearby village and talking to locals. So I think that that sort of puts us in a comfort zone right now is that these were not innocents.

(END VIDEO CLIP) CARLSON: Look, the point is we don't think they were innocents. We may never know, but we're doing our best to determine if they were, as we did our best to determine if they were before we threw a missile at them.

CONETTA: I don't think we've done our best. I think that when we're striking from the air with the type of munitions we use, the dicrimination goes out the window.

CARLSON: Oh, well, that is where you're wrong, actually, because it's not just from the air, but we are using human intelligence on the ground. As you know, unmanned drones that take photographs, planes that gather electronic communications, all this information is cross- checked.

CONETTA: Which has done no more than to demonstrate the fact that you can't confuse precision and intelligence. The intelligence we're relying on, on the ground apparently is not very good. This is not the the only incident.

CARLSON: Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. And that's why you don't rely on it exclusively, correct?

CONETTA: We don't rely on it exclusively, but we rely on it too much. If the recent incident is any evidence, our investigation of civilian casualties in Afghanistan suggests, that when all is said and done, we'll find that there have been at least 1,000 civilian dead from aerial bombardment. That's too high price.

PRESS: Richard?

PERLE: I don't know how you can make that kind of calculation. But if you're saying the problem is intelligence, then the problem is not the inaccuracy of the missiles that are fired.

CONETTA: It is in part the inaccuracy of the missiles...

PERLE: Well...

CONETTA: Because we are over reaching.

PERLE: The one we're talking about was pretty accurate.

PRESS: Let me get to what I think is the central issue here. Tucker said there wasn't any cover up. There has been a cover-up. NBC and ABC both reported tonight when reporters tried to go to the scene of this latest missile attack with the three guys on the hillside, they were told by American soldiers, "You go in there, we're going to shoot you dead." Reporters aren't allowed at the scene. So we're left to believe the Pentagon or not believe the Pentagon.

Why should we? Let's take the case of those Red Cross warehouses. They were hit twice. The Pentagon denied they struck them. We found out they struck the warehouses. They struck the hospital. They said they killed these al Qaeda people...

PERLE: Now wait a minute, wait a minute.

PRESS: ...and they were innocent.

PERLE: Hang on.

PRESS: Why should we believe the Pentagon?

PERLE: The Defense Department can -- acknowledgeded that it struck the Red Cross warehouses in error.

PRESS: Later. First they denied it.

PERLE: Well, you know, in the midst of a war, although it might please the press to have real-time reporting, it's sometimes takes a little while to collect information, to go back and do the investigation. As soon as they became aware of that error, it was publicly reported, which is something no other military organization does.

PRESS: Well, you're admitting then that you cannot take the first word of the Pentagon as the absolute truth because they're covering up?

PERLE: In crises, it's very difficult -- no, not because they're covering up, because there's often confusion, uncertainty, a lack of information. This is characteristic of a crisis.

(CROSS TALK)

CARLSON: Now if I could verify one thing. Hold on. Let me just say one thing. The American reporters in Afghanistan were not, Bill, threatened with death by U.S. forces that we know.

PRESS: According to NBC and ABC they were.

CARLSON: But...

PRESS: The soldiers told them, and it's not the first time...

CARLSON: We'll shoot you?

PRESS: ...that if you go in, they will shoot you dead. Check the transcript, yes. Within a half hour.

CARLSON: I must say (INAUDIBLE).

PERLE: If they believed it, this must be the most...

(CROSS TALK)

CARLSON: Now Mr. Perle, let me ask you...

CONETTA: If there's a protocol at all at work, it is to deny until the information is undeniable. I don't know if that constitutes a cover-up, but it certainly constitutes... CARLSON: It constitutes a vast generalization. But let me just ask you a specific question here, if I can. One of the complaints from your group and others on the left like it is that now Afghanistan is less stabile than it was before Operation Enduring Freedom.

CONETTA: Right.

CARLSON: I just want to read you a quote, leaving aside the point that, you know, just because a country is stable like Nazi Germany, doesn't mean it's a good country. But I want you to read this quote. This is from a man who lost a son and two daughters to American bombs.

He's quoted in "The Washington Post" last week. He said, "I'm not angry at the Americans. It's not their fault. It was Mullah Mohammad Omar and his friends' fault. They're the ones to blame."

It strikes me, you have to agree with this, that if there have been civilian casualties in Afghanistan, the country is in ruins, it's not the fault of the United States, but the people who ran the country, no?

CONETTA: A survey of reports on casualties will show you a dozen quotes that say exactly the opposite, that I consider my enemy to be the people who bomb me.

CARLSON: That goes without saying that people would be upset they were killed.

CONETTA: The issue of stability of here isn't a question of blame. It isn't a question of whether this particular person blames the United States. The issue is whether the country will stay in one piece in the future. And in fact, the current government doesn't control much of the country. Most of the forces that exist on the ground are under the control of people who we have very little influence over, who have high...

(CROSS TALK)

PERLE: Are you arguing that the cohesion accomplished by the tyranny of the Taliban would be better than the fracturing of Afghanistan?

CONETTA: No, I think that's a false dichotomy. I think that the way to look...

PERLE: What are you trying to say?

CONETTA: What I'm trying to say is that we should have divided the war into two components: one focusing on al Qaeda, and the other looking to change the government over a period of time, perhaps six to eight months, in Afghanistan, possibly including a number of the Taliban.

PERLE: There is actually no practical distinction between the Taliban and al Qaeda. They were working together. Bin Laden was virtually the defense minister.

PRESS: I want to ask one question about the overall objective here. You know, when this thing started out, out there Camp David when the president sitting around with his advisers, they had Osama bin Laden's picture in front of them in a circle with a slash through the circle. The goal was not to throw out the government of Afghanistan. The goal was to get Osama bin Laden. He can run, but he can't hide. Bring him back dead or alive. Okay. Osama bin Laden's still out there somewhere. So is Mullah Omar. I mean, this operation, even though we brag about it all the time, hasn't really succeeded. Has it, Richard Perle?

PERLE: Well, we're a lot safer today than we were before. We...

PRESS: With Osama bin Laden still out there?

PERLE: Yes, because...

CONETTA: I don't think we can make...

PERLE: His effectiveness has been diminished to the point, where we don't have to go to bed at night not knowing whether we're going to get up.

(CROSS TALK)

CARLSON: Was it a bad idea to go in?

CONETTA: I'm sorry?

CARLSON: Was it a bad idea for the U.S. forces to go to Afghanistan?

CONETTA: We needed to address the problem of Afghanistan. We've had to address that problem for 10 years, and failed to do so. So certainly we needed to do something. I think what we did was we moved in too quickly with objectives that were too ambitious for the timeframe. And as a result, we run into a lot of problems in the aftermath with stability. And this has left us with an enormous management task. And to think that this is the beginning, supposedly of our war against terrorism, and that this will be the model for the future, what I see is is a great deal of strategic over extension for the United States.

PERLE: Well, the number one priority of this country was to protect the American people. And it was not the stability of Afghanistan.

PRESS: And with that, the last word. Richard Perle from the Defense Policy Board, a member of it, thank you very much for joining us. Carl Conetta, the Project on Defense Alternatives. Good to have you here.

And now, when we come back, from the war on terror, to the war on the White House. Larry Klayman goes to court tomorrow to force Dick Cheney to release those energy records, but he argues his case first right here tonight.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PRESS: Now CROSSFIRE continues. There's a long line of folks waiting to sue Dick Cheney over his refusal to release records of his Energy Task Force: the General Accounting Office, the Sierra Club, the Natural Resource and Defense Council, but Larry Clayman beat them all to the punch.

He goes into federal court tomorrow afternoon to seek access to all documents which the White House still insists are privileged. But why wait until tomorrow? The CROSSFIRE courtroom opens for business right now.

Representing the White House, former Congressman Bill Mccollum. Representing Judicial Watch, Larry Klayman.

Tucker?

CARLSON: Larry Klayman, welcome. We know a lot about the president's energy policy. The task force report, as you know, has already gone to Congress. The policies themselves are available to the public. Why do you need information about the meetings that led up to those policies. And more to the point, why would any administration have any conversation of any kind if that administration thought it might end up on your website, promoting Judicial Watch?

LARRY KLAYMAN, JUDICIAL WATCH: First of all, it's not just on our website. It's all over the papers. And this is matter of public importance, Tucker.

Open government is honest government. That's why we have these laws. It's not just Judicial Watch. But to answer your question with regard to the White House, the White House is subject to the Federal Advisory Committee Act. And that means that when you have these meetings, as occurred with the Hillary Clinton medical task force, and you're meeting with outside individuals, you have to open that up to the public.

We're not challenging the internal deliberations of the White House. We're talking about meeting with energy lobbyists that want to stuff politicians' pockets with money. And I'm not just talking about the energy...

CARLSON: (INAUDIBLE).

KLAYMAN: I'm talking about environmentalists, too. We want to see what they were doing because they were in there behind closed doors. And the American people, when they meet with those private interests, deserve that information.

CARLSON: As you're fully aware, as a licensed presumably attorney.

KLAYMAN: Actually, I am. CARLSON: I believe you.

KLAYMAN: Presumably.

CARLSON: Presumably. Executive privilege does protect deliberations that assist the president, as you know. And all this White House would have to do is claim executive privilege and it would back off. They've essentially said but they don't want to.

KLAYMAN: No, no, no. See, you're wrong because executive privilege would apply to deliberations within people in the executive branch. Here they went to outside to outside lobbyists. And those conversations are not privileged.

We just want through this with Ken Starr and Monica Lewinsky in Clinton's conversations with people from the outside. Decision after decision ruled that you could not claim executive privilege. Nixon, conversations he had outside of the White House with plumbers, are not subject to executive privilege. This is a ruse.

And what in fact, Cheney is doing, Tucker, is he's trying to run the clock out. He thinks that by the time this goes through the courts, that there won't be an Enron scandal.

CARLSON: It's not going to make (INAUDIBLE).

PRESS: Congressman Mccollum, good to see you back here. I have to say only George W. Bush could get Larry Klayma and me on the same side. I mean, I never thought I'd...

BILL MCCOLLUM, FMR. U.S. REPRESENTATIVE: I'm on the left. I mean, what can I do?

PRESS: Never thought I'd see the day. But let's look at this energy policy. This is a national energy policy. It's a huge impact, affects every one of us. Could impact how much we pay for heating fuel, how much we pay for gas, what kind of cars we're going to be able to drive, whether there's enough energy around to fuel this economy. Don't you think the American people have a right to know who took part in shaping that energy policy?

MCCOLLUM: Well, I don't think that the public has the right, whether it's the energy policy or anything else, to have information on who the vice president or the president meets with individually, who he seeks counsel from, what the notes say, what the advice may be. Because if you do, then you have a chilling effect, Bill. And people won't come forward and give their, as Dick Cheney calls it, unvarnished advice to the president and the vice president. You will get the -- no notes being taken by the staffers. You will get a clamming up. And that's what executive privilege is all about of why it's there. That's the reason.

PRESS: Yes, but I don't know when you changed all of a sudden. I mean, I do remember when Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton took over. And Hillary Clinton, as Larry just indicated, was put in charge of this task force on healthcare. You Republicans screamed bloody murder. We want the records! We want the records! We demand the records! We want to know who they're meeting with! This is the same thing, the same rules apply. I don't care what you think. The law says they have to be open.

MCCOLLUM: No, they don't, Bill. And this is a huge difference. In the case of Hillary Clinton, she had a task force set up, comprised of people who were outside to give advice as a group. The law says that had to be open. In this case, you had administration officials and government employees...

PRESS: You mean, outsiders.

MCCOLLUM: No, no, no. They may be meeting with outsiders. I meet with outsiders. The Congress do all the time. But there's a difference between the group giving the advice being outsiders and the group being giving the advice being insiders.

(CROSS TALK)

KLAYMAN: Here's the hypocrisy of this thing. You have the president meeting with Bob Woodward, writing stories about what went on during the war, taking it right out of his personal diaries. If ever you can claim executive privilege, this is dealing with national security information. They're turning this over to "The Washington Post." But information dealing with energy industry lobbyists and environmentalist lobbyists, somehow that's immune from the scrutiny by the American people.

MCCOLLUM: Well, that happens to be whether or not it's in the discretion of the president to give it out. If somebody wants to give it out, Larry, that's fine. But there's...

(CROSS TALK)

MCCOLLUM: There's not a whiff of criminality here. If there was a criminal issue here...

KLAYMAN: No one said there's criminality.

MCCOLLUM: No, no. But if there were, well you don't have a right just to go fishing.

KLAYMAN: I tell you something. When you hold the information back, Tucker, you create the appearance that you've done something wrong.

CARLSON: Speaking -- well, you create the appearance. And people ask, "Well, what's Larry Klayman doing in this?" And we didn't a little checking. You have 82 lawsuits pending. You've sued virtually everyone in Washington. This is a partial list. Commerce Department...

KLAYMAN: (INAUDIBLE).

CARLSON: Well, we're hoping you don't. Justice Department, FBI, FAA, Park Service, HHS, FEC, FDA, INS, GSA, CIA, INS, Rudy Giuliani, George Stephanopolous for something he said on "LARRY KING," your own mother famously...

KLAYMAN: No, no.

CARLSON: You are essentially a political (INAUDIBLE).

KLAYMAN: I knew you were going to do that, Tucker, because you see...

CARLSON: Do what?

KLAYMAN: ...you can't resist. I'm very disappointed. OK, when you were the apologist of the Republicans in the Clinton administration, you thought what I was doing was great. But all of a sudden...

CARLSON: Actually...

KLAYMAN: ...because now...

CARLSON: (INAUDIBLE) cause.

KLAYMAN: Now because I've shown my non-partisanship and Judicial Watch has shown this non-partisanship, you have a problem with that because we're going against your friends. OK? I tell you something. We're doing a favor to your friends and other friends...

CARLSON: Really?

KLAYMAN: ...because the situation here is such that.

CARLSON: I'll tell you who you're doing a favor to, Larry Klayman, is your own fundraising efforts. Let me give you a couple examples. You're suing, among many other ludicrous cases, you're suing on behalf of Panamanian tug boat operator, in his efforts to reverse the unlawful transfer of the Panama Canal from the U.S. to Panama. Do you really expect to get...

KLAYMAN: Well, I tell you something.

CARLSON: You're suing the Baltimore Orioles over their hiring practices. These are frivolous lawsuits.

KLAYMAN: Bill, I think we need to change spots here. I think Tucker should go on the left and I should go on the right. I'm trying to get the Panama Canal back because it was given...

CARLSON: Sure.

KLAYMAN: Tucker, give me a break, OK? I mean, these kinds of approaches towards the law...

CARLSON: They're frivolous.

KLAYMAN: They're not frivolous because frankly, if you look on our website, you'll see a list of 61 victories, 61 victories.

CARLSON: And a lot of waste of money.

PRESS: Here's the problem.

KLAYMAN: Apparently, you don't like to be challenged.

PRESS: Isn't this the problem, Mr. Mccollum? 60 percent of the American people say the White House is either lying or has something to hide. Now I don't know whether they do or not, but all we are talking about. Larry doesn't want all the documents. What they're suing for is the names of the people they met with, the dates, the locations, the topic they discussed, and the cost of the meeting.

MCCOLLUM: Well, the reality is that that is all, again, privileged information. Is it bad politics, Bill? Perhaps it is, but is it protecting a president and a vice president and the future administrations of this country in allowing them to gain confidential information from people who wouldn't otherwise necessarily give them advice or opinions. I think that's the issue here.

PRESS: If that's the philosophy, when Dan Burton said he wanted the record, the Clinton e-mails from the White House, under this administration, George Bush, George Bush released 2,000 pages of e- mails -- Clinton e-mails to the Congress...

MCCOLLUM: All depends on (INAUDIBLE).

PRESS: But he won't release his own records. He's got a double standard.

MCCOLLUM: All depends on what the subject matter is.

KLAYMAN: There's a lot of double standards here, you know.

MCCOLLUM: I disagree with that.

KLAYMAN: I like Tucker. He's a nice guy, but that barrage of personal attack....

CARLSON: The description of lawsuits you filed.

KLAYMAN: ...is just -- that's exactly what Clinton would have done...

CARLSON: You have done.

KLAYMAN: And that's exactly...

(CROSS TALK)

MCCOLLUM: Rather than arguing Judicial Watch, I think we ought to be thinking about the fact that if there had been an independent commission, if there had been a task force appointed of outside advisers, that all of this could be public. There wasn't. In this case, we have a situation where you had people who were administration officials getting individual advice.

(CROSS TALK)

CARLSON: I'm afraid we're going to have to leave it there, much as we're enjoying it. Hypocrisy.

KLAYMAN: That's the name of the game.

(CROSS TALK)

CARLSON: Larry Klayman, Bill Mccollum, thank you both very much for joining us.

Up next, they look behind corners. They crouch in dark places. They're editorial cartoonists and they specialize in visual ambush. Tonight in a picture of the day, one of them ambushed the president. We'll show you when we return.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Welcome back. Time now for our pictures of the day, about as subtle as a car crash goes the saying. Here's something even less subtle. It's a drawing of President Bush flying an airplane labeled "Bush budget" into twin towers labeled "Social" and "Security." This visual atrocity posing as a cartoon ran in Friday's edition of "The Concord Monitor" in New Hampshire. Later that same day, the paper's editor explained he ran the cartoon because he believed it would have been "censorship" not to. As the cartoonist, Mike Myland, he admitted, "I probably should have used an different image." Probably. You know, I haven't seen a cartoon that vulgar since Herb Block passed.

PRESS: No, it's like -- oh Herb Block was a great guy.

CARLSON: Was the least subtle cartoonist.

PRESS: No, no, no, great guy. He would never have done anything like this, Tucker. And you know, bad taste is like obscenity. Maybe you can't define it, but you know it when you see it. That cartoon was the ultimate in bad taste.

Now shocking video out of Salt Lake City. Even though we knew the White Houst staff think of reporters as the enemy, we never expected them to resort to violence. But look at this, folks. Right now you're going to see chief political aide, Karl Rove. There he goes without provocation, attack a reporter with a snowball. Shocking.

He's not the only one. Watch this. They are wash a Monica-like beret. Press Secretary Ari Fleischer is deputy snowballer, launching their own unilateral attack. Busted. Ladies and gentlemen, this is war. And on behalf of an aggrieved press corps, I can assure you these attacks shall not go unpunished.

CARLSON: What are you saying, Bill? Cream pies at noon? Is it you and Ari Fleischer in the cage match? Are you laying down the gauntlet?

PRESS: Here's what I would say. I would love to be the one to smash a snowball in Ari Fleischer's face and then in Carl Rove's face.

CARLSON: You know, I bet you...

PRESS: It was be so, so delicious.

CARLSON: You're going to get a call from the Secret Service tonight saying "threatening high level employees with ice."

PRESS: No. Let's challenge. We challenge Carl Rove and Ari Fleischer to a snowball fight the next time (INAUDIBLE).

CARLSON: I'm there. It may be a while.

PRESS: Hey, we love to see your e-mail,folks, crossfire@cnn.com is where you can reach me and Tucker. We will read as many of them as we can on the air. For tonight, that's it. Good night for CROSSFIRE. I'm Bill Press.

CARLSON: And from the right, I'm Tucker Carlson. Join us tomorrow night, Tuesday night, for another edition of CROSSFIRE. See you then.

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