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Foxhole View of War in Afghanistan; Backing the Enemy's Backer; Betrayal of Trust

Aired July 26, 2010 - 14:02   ET

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

ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: All right. I'm Ali Velshi. It's a new hour. We've got a new "Rundown."

Condemnation from the U.S., shock from Afghanistan, denials from Pakistan. Reaction is pouring in after the leak of thousands of Afghan War documents. It's information you were never supposed to see.

Plus, a case of faith and trust horribly betrayed. Two men used God to bilk people out of $190 million.

And a child gets treated at a hospital. Years later, he treats the hospital to $1 million. We'll tell you how he did it.

But first, a purportedly unfiltered foxhole view of the war in Afghanistan, a picture of the war that appears to be bogged down by rugged territory and a determined enemy who's been fighting foreign invaders for years. All of this and much more contained in more than 90,000 classified military documents released on the Internet by self- proclaimed whistleblower site WikiLeaks yesterday.

These logs cover the war between 2004 and December of last year, January of this year. They were published today in "The New York Times" and two overseas publications. CNN has not independently confirmed the documents, but our producers are in the process of reviewing them now.

Here are some of the key points of the logs from "The New York Times."

Number one, we talked about this extensively last week -- Pakistan's intelligence agency, ISI, allegedly has been aiding the Afghan Taliban for years. The founder of WikiLeaks says there's evidence of what he calls war crimes committed during the war.

The Taliban allegedly is using shoulder-fired heat-seeking missiles to shoot down aircraft. These missiles helped Afghan guerillas defeat the Soviet occupation in the 1990s.

There's been a huge number of civilians killed in the war, caught in the crossfire both in land and air operations, and also secret commando raids against Taliban leaders. Some have been very successful. Others have resulted in civilian deaths.

The leaking of the classified documents has triggered outrage from Washington to Kabul to Pakistan. Here are some examples.

The White House strongly condemned the leaks. National Security Adviser James Jones denounced them as irresponsible. The Pentagon says it's studying the documents to determine any potential damage to the lives of troops and to U.S. allies.

From Kabul, the Afghan government says it's shocked by the information in the documents, saying they've opened the reality of the Afghan War. And the Pakistani government says that reports that its spy agency is aiding the Taliban are baseless. A former chief of the ISI -- that's Pakistan's spy agency, intelligence agency -- says the reports are absolutely and utterly false.

Let's get a little bit more on this story from Jane Perlez. She's the Pakistan correspondent for "The New York Times." She joins us now from our New York studio.

Jane, thank you for being with us.

We talk about this all the time, allegations that the ISI, Pakistan's intelligence service, is helping the Taliban with money, with organization. And denials from Pakistan.

First of all, does that come to you as a surprise, or does your reporting indicate that that's quite possible and quite likely?

JANE PERLEZ, CHIEF PAKISTAN CORRESPONDENT, "NEW YORK TIMES": I think it's quite possible. And it doesn't surprise me that the ISI would deny it. Any spy agency would. That's what they do.

VELSHI: Would it be likely that if the ISI were involved in this, that they would be doing so with the approval and understanding of the Pakistani government? Because we've heard that it's quite possible the Pakistani government doesn't really have much control over its spy agency.

PERLEZ: Well, it's very hard to define the inner workings, even the outer workings of any spy agency. But I think it's safe to say that it's well known in Pakistan that the Afghan Taliban is a major asset of Pakistan.

That's the way it has been, and that's the way people I know in Pakistan, both in the military and out of it, see it. They see the Afghan Taliban as an important asset for the country. And so I don't doubt that that's the case.

VELSHI: And yet, Pakistan is a major recipient of U.S. government funding and military aid and material in what most Americans would think would be the battle against the Taliban, the stated enemy in Afghanistan.

How do you square that circle, that there are many in Pakistan who believe the Afghan Taliban are allies, versus those who think that that's who they're fighting?

PERLEZ: Well, I don't think there are many people in Pakistan who think they're fighting the Afghan Taliban. But put that aside, I think the United States says it has an ally in Pakistan. It does to is a certain extent. But on another side of it, they don't have an ally. There's some duplicity going on here.

On the one hand, Pakistan does allow the United States quietly -- Pakistan gives us permission -- to run drone strikes inside their territory to strike at al Qaeda operatives. There is very important for the conduct of the Afghan War.

So from Pakistan's point of view, they give us that. And from Pakistan's point of view, they don't want to give us a clampdown, or they don't want to separate themselves from the Afghan Taliban. I guess you can't have a complete ally in Pakistan. You can have a kind of quasi ally, maybe.

VELSHI: And clearly if you know this, and other journalists know this, and other analysts and diplomats know this -- the U.S. State Department knows this, the U.S. intelligence community knows this -- and yet when the U.S. government -- we just heard it less than an hour ago with the press secretary, Robert Gibbs, talking about Pakistan -- they talk about Pakistan as a strong ally. Our White House correspondent, Ed Henry, continued to push Robert Gibbs on this.

As far as the administration is concerned, they describe Pakistan as an ally in the war in Afghanistan and an ally in the war against terrorism for the United States.

PERLEZ: Well, the United States gets some things from Pakistan and doesn't get others. I mean, American military officials and Hillary Clinton have been visiting Pakistan virtually nonstop.

I read two days ago that Admiral Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, when he went to Islamabad two days ago, was having his 19th meeting with General Kayani. That's a lot of meetings.

And I would say in the last half of those meetings, Admiral Mullen has been asking the chief of the Pakistani military to please conduct a campaign against the Afghan Taliban inside Waziristan so that these people stop going into Afghanistan. And the Pakistanis have made it very, very clear they're not going to do it.

I mean, the Afghan Taliban are a national asset for Pakistan. So it's a big ask for the United States to say don't do it.

VELSHI: You pointed that out a couple times. I'm going to just ask you to describe what you mean by that.

When you say the Afghan Taliban are a national asset for Pakistan, in what way?

PERLEZ: Pakistan feels it's very necessary to have a sphere of influence, to have some control in southern Afghanistan, particularly when the war -- the end game of the war in Afghanistan starts to come about, which is about now. People are thinking about what's Afghanistan going to look like when the Americans leave?

And for Pakistan, it's very, very important that India not control Afghanistan. India is, from Pakistan's point of view, its big rival. And so to counter India's influence in Afghanistan, Pakistan cultivates and keeps the Afghan Taliban.

So when all is said and done and when the war is over, it's hardly likely that Pakistan will have the Afghan Taliban, at the very least, in a sphere of influence in southern Afghanistan. So that's basically what this is about.

I might say that if Pakistan and India were able to reduce their tensions and able to solve the problem of Kashmir, then we might be able to solve these problems in Afghanistan. But that, so far, is a bridge too far.

VELSHI: You've done an excellent job, Jane, at explaining something that has many, many layers of complexity, but that we're all going to have to understand almost as well as you do. Not as well as you do, but we're all going to have to understand this to understand how this war is being carried out.

Jane Perlez is the chief Pakistan correspondent for "The New York Times" joining us from our New York bureau.

Thanks, Jane.

Well, the enemy, the Afghan Taliban, the allegations that they are being trained and armed by a major U.S. ally in the war on terror. We're going to have a live report from Pakistan coming up next.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: We've been following this WikiLeaks document dump, I guess you could call it, 90,000 documents, classified documents, about the war in Afghanistan. One of the most devastating points in the documents that were leaked by WikiLeaks is the allegation that Pakistan's spy agency is supplying weapons, training and even planning some operations for the Afghan Taliban.

On Friday, I had a conversation with Matt Waldman. He's an analyst who, through his own research, came to the same conclusion. He's visited Afghanistan numerous time. He's interviewed Taliban field commanders, Taliban officials, foreign diplomats, other analysts.

Here's a chunk of what he told me on Friday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MATT WALDMAN, ANALYST: Well, this is research that we conducted over six months. And as you say, we interviewed a very large number of individuals, all of whom have some experience or knowledge of the insurgency in Afghanistan, as well as insurgents themselves. And what was remarkable about this research was that there was a great deal of agreement between the different interviewees about the level of support from Pakistan being provided to the insurgents.

And, of course, it's in terms of sanctuaries so the fact that insurgents can cross the border from Afghanistan into Pakistan, where they're relatively safe, where they can re-equip, where they can re- arm, where they can prepare for future attacks, or, indeed, in other respects, so in terms of the supplies that they have or, indeed, the training.

VELSHI: What would be the point of this? Why would Pakistan -- even though they've got this history with India and this ongoing conflict with India, why would they be interested now, today, in continuing to help the Taliban when, in fact, official government policy in Pakistan is not to do so?

WALDMAN: Well, I mean, I think that we have to appreciate the fact that there is, if you like, a sort of latent conflict. In other words, a sort of hidden rivalry and tension between Pakistan and India. And it is a very serious competition between the two states that, as you said, have been to war three times and have had numerous other skirmishes and minor confrontations.

And indeed, as you know, there was the attack in Mumbai in 2008 in India which killed over 160 Indian civilians. And that has contributed to the tension between the two states because India believes that somehow the ISI, as you mentioned, the Pakistani intelligence agency, was behind this.

So we've got to acknowledge that there is real rivalry between these two countries. And indeed, they see Afghanistan as somehow significant in terms of that rivalry.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELSHI: All right. That's Matt Waldman. He was in Afghanistan, in Kabul.

Let's go to Islamabad now, where our own Reza Sayah is there.

Reza, you are there. This is the capital for Pakistan.

They continue to deny officially that there's any connection, that they back the Afghan Taliban. But the reality, as we heard it from Matt, we heard it from Jane Perlez from "The New York Times," you know it well, that something we in the West don't think about all the time, this ongoing, more than half a century old tension between Pakistan and India may be at the root of Pakistan's double dealing, if they are doing that in Pakistan.

REZA SAYAH, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It is, Ali. And with all the focus about the fight against extremists and militants in Afghanistan, you rarely hear about India's role. But India is a huge factor.

I know a lot of viewers must be asking why? Why would the Pakistani security forces, why would the Pakistani spy agency, the ISI, that's getting millions of dollars from the U.S., partner up with the Afghan Taliban? It all comes back with India.

A few months ago, Pakistan's army chief, Ashfaq Pervez Kayani, who never does on-camera interviews, invited some reporters to army headquarters where he briefed them. We were fortunate enough to be there. And he laid it out plainly that the state policy, that the regional policy of Pakistan, has everything to do, first and foremost, with India.

The fact is that Pakistan is obsessed with India. They have a real fear that India, its perennial enemy, is trying to encircle them with its growing influence in Kabul. And many U.S. officials and many analysts are convinced that Pakistan's spy agency, some elements within it, are maintaining relationships with the Afghan Taliban to counter that growing influence from India in Kabul, with the ultimate goal of securing a friend, an ally in Kabul once U.S. forces pull out.

So, today in Islamabad, all day you had government officials flatly reject these allegations. But certainly, Ali, these WikiLeaks reports are going to raise more questions about the ISI, a shadowy spy agency that has a checkered pass. And they're also going to feel doubts about Pakistan being fully on board with U.S. missions here.

VELSHI: And this has memories of the Cold War, the idea of having a sphere of influence in a neighboring country -- or a country. And Afghanistan's always been so central to everything that goes on in the region.

I want to ask you this, Reza -- does the Pakistani government control its spy agency? We already know that the Pakistani government doesn't effectively control that area that's just beyond where you are that we're talking about, these mountainous regions between Pakistan and Afghanistan. So the Pakistani government denies these allegations, but do they actually control what the spy agency does?

SAYAH: Well, they will tell you that they do, but there's a lot of evidence that will indicate that they don't.

One example, after the Mumbai attacks a year and a half ago, what the civilian government tried to do to ease tensions was send the head of the ISI, Pakistan's top spy agency, to Mumbai. Within about 24 hours, the Pakistan military and the ISI said no, that that's not going to happen.

Another attempt by the civilian government was to bring the ISI under civilian government control. Again, in a short time, that plan was rejected.

So you have these developments that once again indicate that the most powerful institution in Pakistan is the military and its spy agency -- Ali.

VELSHI: What an interesting story.

Reza, once again, you do a great job of explaining it. And you're right in the heart of it, so we'll be talking to you a lot.

Reza Sayah in Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan.

All right. Con men will use anything to gain people's trust. Even God. We know about that.

We're going to tell you about a horrible betrayal of faith when I come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: Let me show you what's going on with the Dow. Look at that, 66 points higher, 10,491 on the Dow right now.

We've got another money story to tell you about. It's about fraud. It's about people using -- taking God's name, using faith to defraud other people. A very sad story.

Poppy Harlow's got it. She's in New York for us.

Poppy, unfortunately, it's not a new concept, but it's one you've got a story on.

POPPY HARLOW, CNNMONEY.COM: No. We've all heard about Bernie Madoff. Right, Ali? I mean, we all know about that fraud.

But what we've learned in our months of digging on this story is that there are a lot of other major, major frauds out there. This one that we're going to tell you about happened in my home state of Minnesota.

Almost $200 million, and they used God to make it happen. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: This is a story about huge financial fraud. The feds say Trevor Cook took in $190 million.

It's about trust. It's about faith. And it's about the people that abuse them.

A lot of people that invested with them were bible-believing Christians. They didn't want Wall Street. They didn't want Washington. They trusted people here at home.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

MIKE PATTERSON, FOLLOWED KILEY'S RADIO SHOW: He went after a targeted group of people. Their faith in the Lord is what they're all about.

MARY DINGMAN, COOK'S OFFICE MANAGER, LOST LIFE SAVINGS: Everything is gone. I've lost everything. And now I will be 62 in July.

KYLE GARMAN, INVESTOR: It's been rough. Really rough.

TREVOR COOK, ACCUSED OF FRAUD: There is no risk. OK. Riskless transactions.

HARLOW (voice-over): Cook ran the operation, telling investors he had a system to cash in on moves in the foreign currency market. Cook talked a good game, but it was just an illusion. Behind his high-tech office and glossy brochures were a host of shell companies that sounded like global powerhouses but were nothing of the sort.

Pat Kiley was Cook's business partner. He peddled their scheme on his show, "Follow the Money," broadcast over hundreds of Christian radio stations.

PAT KILEY, "FOLLOW THE MONEY": I'm probably the only senior economist and senior analyst in the United States that also uses the good book.

HARLOW (on camera): Were Christians targeted in a senses? Were faith-based people targeted in these frauds?

JONES: I think any good fraudster is going to leverage whatever means they can to get that trust connection there.

HARLOW (voice-over): Cook pled guilty to one count of mail fraud and one count of tax evasion. And it seems he spent plenty of his investors' money in ways that were decidedly un-Christian.

(on camera): You said there were what, strippers there, hookers? Yes?

DINGMAN: They would call up ladies of the evening, their prostitutes, or whatever you want to call them, and have them come in.

HARLOW: This was another side of Trevor Cook: the heavy drinking, frequenting strip clubs, and even several arrests. One for assaulting an escort at this Minnesota hotel.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: And Ali, that's just the beginning of this story. You know, investors had no idea they were putting their money with a guy that had been arrested multiple times, once for assaulting a hooker at a hotel in Minnesota. I mean, for them to learn this after all of that is shocking.

As for what's next, Cook struck a plea deal with prosecutors. He'll be sentenced next month. He faces a maximum 25 years in prison.

Kiley has not been criminally charged. He won't return our calls. He filed a lawsuit claiming he didn't participate in any wrongdoing. He believed investors' accounts were liquid and segregated, he didn't squander the money.

His lawyer said, look, "Pat Kiley never expected there was anything wrong with these investments. He continued to believe he was doing good for all his clients."

But, you know, Ali, all the people that were drawn in from the radio show, they have a pretty hard time believing that -- Ali.

VELSHI: How do folks see more about the story? I know there's a lot more to it.

HARLOW: Yes. Right here on CNN Money. That's just about the first two minutes. You can see all of it here on CNN Money, a lot of the outtakes of the interviews.

We also went to Chicago, Ali, to the SEC, just to find out where they were in all of this. You can see that part on the Web site, too.

VELSHI: All right. I mean, I just think people should follow as many of these stories as they can so that they can see the signs that these fraudsters use in order to get your money.

HARLOW: Right.

VELSHI: The only way you can sniff somebody out is if you know what it looks like.

Thanks, Poppy, for that.

Poppy Harlow. Make sure you check out that story, "Breaking the Faith."

OK. Up to 700 more planets in our galaxy right here. Maybe, just maybe, life.

We're going "Off the Radar" -- way "Off the Radar" -- you can't miss this one -- in a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: I don't even need -- Chad's here because he gets paid to be here. I don't need him to do the weather today.

It's hot! It's hot!

In fact, I was saying to Chad, "Where do I have to go to get away from the heat?"

(WEATHER REPORT)

VELSHI: Let's go "Off The Radar" right now. Let's go way off the radar.

MYERS: Radars can't go this far. But telescopes can. And they think they've found some new planets.

You now how they did that? Because they looked at the shadow -- what they think is the shadow of planets passing over other stars. How many stars? 145,000. That means there's 145,000 other suns out there, just in this part of the galaxy alone that they're looking at.

When the star twinkles,--you know when wee see it twinkle. That's just kind of some random things going by. We just know that stars are so far away that they twinkle.

But the thing's going on here is when a planet can fly between us and that star, that twinkle can be real. That dimming of the star of that sun can be real. And then they would know that this planet got in the way. And as planet cans get in the way, this thing can see it. Look at that. There's the little thing up in space. Many years to go --

(CROSSTALK)

VELSHI: Oh so in other words, it's got many years to go before it sends it's stuff down.

MYERS: No. It sends stuff down now. And there you go. And that is what we're going go do.. You can go on to,--go to nasa.gov. And you can see this. So far they think that they're up to 700 potential planets.

VELSHI: But nobody's spotted any life - any S.O.S. signals or anybody--

MYERS: They saw a bald-headed guy up there.

(CROSSTALK)

VELSHI: Since we're going to do breaking news "Off The Radar" if we found life in outer space. Chad thanks very much.

When it comes to drugs and gangs and murders in Mexico, you may think you've heard it all. But I guarantee you, you haven't heard this one. I'm going "Globe Trekking" on the other side of the break stay with me.

(COMMERCAL BREAK)

VELSHI: Time now to go "Globe Trekking". We start in northern Mexico. Even for a region that's all two accustomed to violence, death and corruption, what you are about to hear is shocking.

The Mexican government says jailers in the town of Gomez Palacio released prisoners temporarily, so they could kill members of rival drug gangs.

Allegedly the jailers give the prisoners-gave the prisoner guns and cars. After the hits, the prisoners went back to their jail cells. A case in point? A massacre a week ago yesterday at a birthday party in a neighboring town. 17 people were killed. Four jail officials, including a warden, are being held while authorities investigate further.

The government of Germany is investigating a deadly stampede at a weekend musical festival--music festival. 19 people were crushed or trampled to death in a tunnel leading to the entrance of the love parade in a former railroad yard.

Hundreds of others were hurt. At issue is whether the site was too small for the crowd which was estimated to be as large as 1.4 million people. This much is known, organizers say the event which dates back to 1989, will not be held again.

And Cubans are celebrating revolution day. On this date in 1953, Fidel Castro led an unsuccessful attack on a Cuban army barracks and wound up in prison. But he didn't give up. The revolution came to pass and today Fidel Castro's brother Raul presided over ceremonies in the town of Santa Clara, where Fidel once again, was a no-show.

OK. Ben Sater, said he was going to raise $1 million for Dallas children's hospital before he left for college. Guess what? He's done it. And he's going to tell us how he did it. "Mission Possible" coming up next.

(COMMERCIRAL BREAK)

VELSHI: This hour's top stories start with your views on illegal immigration. A new CNN opinion research corporation poll shows that half the country, 51 percent, are dissatisfied with the number of illegal immigrants in America.

But less than 1 in 4 describe themselves as angry. On Thursday, a law that gives police immigration enforcement powers takes effect in Arizona unless a judge decides otherwise before that.

At least 200 buildings are destroyed, more than 1,000 damaged downstream of a broken dam in eastern Iowa. The dam gave way after 10 or more inches of rain in 48 hours. So far we've heard of no injuries or deaths.

And this may or may not be an answered prayer. But a group of French nuns has just hit the big time.

After a worldwide search of 70 convents to find the best female singers of Gregorian chant, Decca records, signed a group of cloistered Benedictine nuns to a music deal. Cloistered means the sisters have taken a vow of isolation.

So they'll photograph their own album cover and film their own TV commercial. The album is due out in November.

OK. "Mission Possible", every day we do this. Ben Sater, a teenager, raises over $1 million for a children's hospital in Dallas, Texas. And he joins me now to tell me why and how he did it.

We're going to do that after the break or is Ben with us now? All right. Let's talk to Ben right now. Ben Sater joining me now from Dallas, Texas. Ben, good to see you. You've got a T-shirt on that says "Kid Swing". That's the organization that you are a founder of.

Take me back in time to when you were 3 years old and you first had your -- you had your first experience with this hospital that you raised money to.

BEN SATER, RASIED OVER $1M FOR SCOTTISH RITE: Well, I was first a patient there when I was 3 years old. I had a surgery there when I was 3 and then again when I was 10. And it was shortly after my second surgery that I figured out at the hospital that they do all their treatments for free.

They don't charge patients for anything. So I told my mom that I wanted to do something for the hospital for all they'd done for me.

VELSHI: This is a Texas Scottish Rite hospital for children. You asked your mom, how do they pay for this stuff? And tell me what ensued from that.

SATER: Well when she told me they did all the treatment for free, I didn't know how that was possible. I didn't know how they could run this huge hospital, not charging any of the patients. So I asked her how they got all their money. And she told me that all the money they get to raise the hospital comes from donations, charity events and stuff like that. Immediately I told her that I wanted to do something to give back to them.

VELSHI: So what did you do?

SATER: Well, after we talked about it a little bit, at first we weren't thinking anything big at all, just something very small to give back to them. But after we talked about it a little bit, we eventually came up with the idea of a charity golf tournament. Since I played golf most of my life, my dad's played golf most of his life.

And eventually came up with that idea, that we'd have a charity golf tournament that kids would play in, ages 7-18.

VELSHI: All right . So now you're doing this. And you've been raising money. And this I guess ,when did this happen? A year or two ago you sort of decided to tally it all up and you figured you'd made about a half a million for the-for the hospital.

And then you were going to be disqualified yourself because once you hit 18, you're not going to be able to play in the tournament?

SATER: Yes, it was a few years ago. And we were about halfway to the $1 million. And we kind of got the idea in our heads that we might be able to get to the $1 million in a few years. And we figured that when I turned 18, that would be my last year before I went off to college, that'd be my last year to play in the tournament. And we set that goal for the tournament to raise $1 million by the time I went off to college, which is coming up in the fall.

And we just had our (INAUDIBLE) tournament and we got our $1 million goal.

VELSHI: $1 million and 18 -- $1, 018, 842 is what you've raised so far. Is this going to continue after you've gone off to college?

SATER: Yes, definitely. We have a kids swing kids committee which is about 20 kids that work on the tournament and kind of decide things to make the tournament more fun for the kids and we also have an adult committee that kind of makes more of the executive decisions that the kids can't make.

So I'm sure it will continue and I'll definitely come back and help out.

VELSHI: It does seem -- holding the tournaments seems something familiar for adults. What do you think the kids who are involved in this, the kids' committee end up taking from this?

SATER I think all the kids that play in the tournament actually take away a lot because they learn about the importance of giving back and community service early in their lives. And I think that they'll be able to continue that on as they go on with their lives.

VELSHI: That's great of you. You're taking something that you first experienced when you were 3 and then when you were 10. And you just turn it around and do what other people think they're going to do. You did it, you raised $1 million for the hospital for children. Congratulations on that, Ben. I hope your good works continue through your life and you'll keep us posted on them.

SATER: Yes, thank you.

VELSHI: Ben Sater is joining me from Dallas. He's the founder of Kids's Swing. To find out more about Ben Sater and the kid-and Kid Swing you can go to the website, which is www.kidswing.org.

All right another guy who likes to golf, Ed Henry, he is standing by. He is at the White House. He was grilling the White House Press Secretary, Robert Gibbs, earlier about this Wikileaks. We're going to find out what he learned when we come back..

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs is used to getting grilled. But today he was especially grilled at the White House briefing about Wikileaks.

Wikileaks, founder Julian Assange will be on Larry King live tonight at 9:00 P.M by the way. If you haven't been following the story, about 90,000 documents were dumped onto the internet, given to some publications.

They all talk about the war in Afghanistan. Let's go to our man at the White House, on "The Stakeout", Ed Henry. He was there, you were really-I mean I know you guys in the White Press corps all have a sort of an understanding and a relationship.

But you kept on going at Robert Gibbs. What were you trying to get at with him today in the White House briefing?

ED HENRY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: What I was trying to get at is that when a story like this breaks, you typically hear the White House Press Secretary this-similar in the Bush administration we're seeing the play out here. There's a story they don't want to talk about they'll go back to the idea, look there's nothing new here.

We already knew for example that maybe there are problems with Pakistan. And maybe that could undermine the war effort. And basically saying, there's not a lot here new, guys, move on there's not a lot new here. But when you have some 90,000 secret documents, even if some of the premises of them are not new, the level of detail is certainly new.

It comes at a time when this administration has been trying to claim that it's got a whole new approach to the war in Afghanistan that is maybe going to turn the situation around. And what I was trying to get at is the fact that when you strip all of this away, just last week Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was in Pakistan saying that we're partners, we're on the same page.

And these new documents, while we've heard before about challenges from Pakistan and whether we're really on the same page, is now laying out these allegations that the Pakistani intelligence service has been working in cahoots potentially with the Taliban.

That maybe the Pakistanis have been working with al Qaeda, in trying to go after U.S. troops on the ground. That seems to me to be something that could really undermine the war effort at a very, very delicate time.

VELSHI: So you were asking him -- I heard you ask this several times. They had come out with a statement. I don't know if it was the State Department or Hillary Clinton or the White House.

But somebody had sort of outlined, had stated that the U.S. and Pakistan are on the same page with respect to the war on terror, the war in Afghanistan.

And as a result of these documents that Wikileaks released, can we still continue to say that? I think that was the gist of what you were trying to get at?

HENRY: Yes, that's the gist at what we're trying to get at specifically on Pakistan. But more broadly, I think others were also pressing Robert Gibbs on whether this will undermine the war effort, whether this is a setback. And he would not answer it directly.

There's no question now that some of the president's own fellow Democrats, liberals like Dennis Kucinich, for example just put out a statement a short time ago saying they've already been challenging the president's policies in Afghanistan.

And now they're wondering whether the war can continue the way it's going right now that is the picture more broadly. Is it much worse than this administration and the previous administration have been suggesting to us?

And I think at the end of the day through all of these revelations, the big question is going to be whether or not that war effort has now been undermined in a major way.

And I think when Robert Gibbs keeps saying there's really nothing new hear and we've known about these challenge, certainly we're getting a lot more detail. But we're also getting a picture that maybe the government didn't want us to see.

VELSHI: Right now, the president is speaking. It's an unexpected statement about campaign finance if you want to follow it. You can see it on CNN.com. We weren't expecting this. What is he talking about with respect to --

HENRY: Well he--this is something they added. It's about the disclose act, which we're expecting to come up for a vote on the Senate floor tomorrow. Harry Reid is not likely to have the 60 votes to break a filibuster.

So there's been some head scratching in Washington today about why is the president speaking out on this right now. Particularly business groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce are saying he's just basically pushing this disclose act because it would restrict what corporations can do in term of electioneering and campaign fund- raising and giving what not.

And that more likely would--that corporate giving would help Republicans and maybe conservative Democrats. And the allegation from the business groups has been the president is trying to restrict corporate free speech here.

The White House is insisting they're just trying to sort of clean up elections, make them fairer, make them cleaner. And they're trying to make a political point here that Republicans are going to be filibustering and blocking a chance to sort of clean up elections. '

I think the bottom line is the White House is looking at the fact that this disclose act is going to fail on the Senate floor tomorrow and it may open the door to a flood of more corporate -- corporations putting more money into Republican campaigns, something the Democrats don't need right now when they're already in desperate shape.

If all of a sudden corporations can end up giving even more money, that's going to be probably a bad development for Democrats. There's going to be a lot posturing. But that's really behind the scenes what's going on.

VELSHI: Good to see you as always. There's somebody who's been tweeting that he doesn't like the fact that you and I, sort of comment on each other's clothes and it's a waste of time and it's not the news. But I have to tell you, that's very---I like that look, the paisley and the striped shirt. It's fetching .

HENRY: Reporter: I appreciate it. You know I also-I wonder if we could-I appreciate-fetching, I haven't heard you say that before.

But wonder if you could also work on the transition to "The Stakeout". Because some days you've got like-- some kid who grew a 50-pound pepper or something -- maybe we ought to just come up with a slightly better pitch.

VELSHI: Yes. It's always some kid whose done something. I'll work on that. Ed Henry at "The Stakeout" at the White House. We'll work on our entries to him.

Listen. I could tell you what today's "Wordplay" is. But then I'd have to kill you. It's coming up next, and it's classified.

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VELSHI: Today's "Wordplay" is classified. Doesn't mean I can't tell you. I mean classified is actually our word. This all had to do with those leaked Afghan war documents the government is so mad about. A lot of times people use words like classified, secret and confidential interchangeably.

Classified is actually a catch-all term for sensitive, restricted information. There are three levels of classification. Top secret is the stuff that gets seen by the fewest and highest ranking eyeballs, next is secret, the lowest level is confidential. The determining factor in how information is classified, potential damage to the country should it be disclosed.

For example, the government says top secret information reasonably could expect to cause exceptionally grave damage to national security. Last year, about 183,000 documents were classified by the government. Only 2 percent were listed as top secret. The most restrictive category.

The vast majority, 77 percent were made secret. 21 percent were just confidential. According to "The New York Times", most of the Afghanistan reports it got from Wikileaks are marked secret.

Speaking of all this secrecy or lack of secrecy, I wonder what one of my late and renowned colleagues would have made of it all. I'll tell you about in my "XYZ"

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VELSHI: Time now for the "XYZ" of it and some well-earned recognition for a giant of my profession. Daniel Schorr was one Murrow's boys at CBS. A foreign correspondent who persuaded Nikita Khrushchev to give his firs ever TV interview.

Eventually his reporting got him barred from the Soviet Union but he stayed with CBS for another two decades. In 1979, Ted Turner persuaded him to lend his name and reputation, to what was then a crazy idea, cable news network.

"The New York Times" says Schorr turned down a top executive role to be Senior News Analyst. He left here in 1985 and soon joined national public radio where he aired keen-eyed commentaries for the rest of his life. And a long life it was.

Daniel Schorr passed away in Washington on Friday in 93. He's in my thoughts today all of these leaked classified documents from the Afghan war, this is a Dan Schorr kind of story. And once more--more than once he wrestled with the questions, do we really have the right to know secret information in wartime.

Could lives and careers be lost when secrets are blown? Do we in this business really have the public's best interest at heart. Or are we mainly motivated by ratings? I can't answer definitively but I do know this. Daniel Schorr spent a lifetime seeking and speaking the truth, and his listeners were the better for it.

I submit that this country is better for it as well. I'm Ali Velshi.. Time now for "RICK'S LIST"