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Bowe Berghdal Freed by Taliban; Malaysian Airlines Search Back to Square One

Aired May 31, 2014 - 16:00   ET

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

RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR: You are in the CNN "Newsroom." I'm Randi Kaye in for Don Lemon. Good evening, everyone. We'd like to welcome viewers around the world watching right now on CNN International.

Breaking news right now and much of the time, those words mean tragedy or emergency. Well, not today. A U.S. soldier captured by the Taliban five years ago is free and he's coming home. Beau Bergdahl, sergeant, United States Army, the Taliban snatched him on deployment to eastern Afghanistan in 2009.

Today he is safe and in U.S. military hands. We're about to tell you all about how he was freed. But that is not the most important thing to the Bergdahl family. Here's what his parents said just a short time ago.

"We were so joyful and relieved when President Obama called us today to give us the news that Bowe is finally coming home. We cannot wait to wrap our arms around our only son."

CNN Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr is with me live, also Erin McPike at the White House. Barbara, let's start with you first. Surprises all around today at the news that Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl no longer being held by the Taliban. How did this incredible rescue come to be?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Randi, we are getting continuous information from officials, U.S. officials about how this unfolded, a dangerous mission fraught with concerns to get Bowe Bergdahl on that ride to freedom.

The negotiations to get Bergdahl in return for five detainees from Guantanamo Bay back to Qatar to be held in detention, but all of those negotiations have been going on for the last several days but separately there had been the secret discussions, the procedures for precisely how Bergdahl would be handed back over to American commandos right on the front lines, right along the Afghanistan/Pakistan order under extremely dangerous conditions.

What we know is the Taliban set the meeting point. They told the U.S. where to come to pick up Bergdahl. It was very close to the border, we're told. U.S. commandos in helicopters flew to that meeting point this morning. The military is not saying who exactly the commandos were, but what we have learned is they were one of the U.S. military's most elite commandoes special operations forces uses. Delta force, S.E.A.L. team 6, task force 160 flying with the Air Force. We don't know the precise makeup but it was commandos from that very secret world of U.S. special operations forces. They fly to the point.

The Taliban are there, about 18 Taliban. They're armed. The U.S. military certainly is armed. There are aircraft flying overhead keeping watch so if trouble breaks out, they can move in. We're told the transfer happened very quickly, that Sergeant Bergdahl walked to the point where the commandos were that they spoke to them right away. We are told he then walked to the helicopter.

The standard procedure would have been to search him to make sure he's not wired up with explosives or weapons or something like that against his will. We have every reason to believe that did happen. But how did the Taliban know that once they turned Bergdahl over they were still going to get those detainees released from Guantanamo Bay? Apparently there were a number of secret procedures worked out that we don't know what they are, but these procedures, I am told by sources, basically involved - there were Qataris at Guantanamo Bay. The five detainees were turned over to them on the ground at Guantanamo Bay, and we can presume in some fashion the Qataris then communicated to the Taliban, "OK, we have the guys."

Now those five Taliban had been in the air for about two hours on their way back to Qatar. The Qataris promising to keep them under secure conditions. Bergdahl, Sgt. Bergdahl is now back at Bagram Air Base, the largest U.S. base in Afghanistan. He's undergoing medical checks. He is talking to a reintegration team that is, you know, assisting him with understanding what's happening around him.

The expectation is if he - if they get the all clear on his condition, that he will move very quickly to Langstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. And at this hour, the plan is if he is well enough is to get him out of Langstuhl and back on his way, back to the United States. The current plan is to have him land and go to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio for further medical care and to be reunited with his family.

Randi, let me - I know I talked a long time. We had one perhaps most dramatic detail. You just don't get to tell good news from the Pentagon very often. On the helicopter Sergeant Bergdahl wrote down the letters S.F. with the question mark. Special Forces. The guys on the helicopter said, "yes, we are special forces. We've been looking for you for a long time" and we're told at that time Sergeant Bergdahl broke down, Randi.

KAYE: Highly, highly emotional moment, I'm sure. Such a well- orchestrated endeavor their for those troops involved. Barbara, thank you. Erin McPike at the White House today. Erin, the Bergdahl family got the news as we said at the top of the program, straight from President Obama. What is the White House saying about today's developments now?

ERIN MCPIKE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Randi, they are speaking through senior administration officials to clarify some of the details that went down. Barbara, of course, referred to this release of those five detainees from Guantanamo. Now, I want to make this clear though that this is a little bit of a political issue. We've been seeing some traffic from conservatives who while they are thrilled that Bowe Bergdahl is now safe and in U.S. military hands, they're concerned about the precedent that it's setting.

And as you know, Senator John McCain was a prisoner of war himself in Vietnam for roughly the same period, for about five years. This was an issue that he discussed when he was running for president in 2008 and we got a statement from him a little bit ago and I want to read part of that to you because he expresses concern about this very thing.

He said, "These particular individuals are hardened terrorists who have the blood of Americans and countless Afghans on their hands. I am eager to learn what precise steps are being taken to ensure that these vicious and violent Taliban extremists never return to the fight against the United States and our partners are engaged in any activities that can threaten the prospects for peace and security in Afghanistan, the American people and our Afghan partners deserve nothing less."

Randi, I know I've been reading a lot, but the White House did make mention of this very thing in a statement from a senior administration official today that they were trying to explain what happened, and I want to read part of that to you as well. "As the administration has repeatedly affirmed, we will not transfer any detainee from Guantanamo unless the threat the detainee may pose to the United States can be sufficiently mitigated and only when consistent with our humane treatment policy by conducting successful indirect talks with the Taliban's political commission." This transfer was part of a broader reconciliation framework.

So there you have it. Obviously, we expect to get a little bit more clarity from the White House over the next few days. We have not heard yet directly from President Obama except for that written statement but we certainly will hear more from him in the next day or so, Randi.

KAYE: All right. Erin McPike, thank you very much. Appreciate that.

On the phone with me now, CNN national security analyst Peter Bergen. Peter, this is certainly an important day for the troops and certainly an important day for Bowe Bergdahl's family, his captivity is over. Not every Taliban hostage end this well though, right? I mean, certainly not every hostage taking goes this way. So did the fact, do you think, Peter, that Bergdahl is military make him a different caliber of captive?

PETER BERGEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: No doubt. I mean there are numerous cases where the U.S. government has not negotiated with groups that it deems to be terrorists where the captive is, you know, just an ordinary civilian. An example of this is Al Qaeda a few years back took hostage of an American aid worker in Lahore, in Pakistan. His name is Weinstein. We've seen videotape of him. He looks in very bad shape. He's in his early 70s now.

He's appealing to President Obama to negotiate for his release but the likelihood of that happening I think is very low, unfortunately, for him. So in the case where there's a military hostage, it's a different kind of set of concerns. And (INAUDIBLE) point there, Randi, you know, combat troops, U.S. combat troops are out of Afghanistan at the end of December 2014. So be it there's some kind of presence going on after that but it will not be a combat presence once an agreement is signed with the Afghan government.

You know, traditionally at the end of war there's an exchange of prisoners of war and this is an example of that. You know, the Taliban detainees at Guantanamo are considered prisoners of war. So the hostilities against the Taliban are ceasing, there's a kind of interesting question here which is this the beginning of potentially other releases of people in the Taliban who are at Guantanamo because when the war is over, the prisoners are traditionally swapped by both sides.

KAYE: Getting back, though, to the policy, I mean the American position on negotiating with terrorists has always been a very firm no. So how do you think this deal was made to exchange these detainees from Guantanamo?

BERGEN: Well, I mean the deal has been a long time in the making, Randi. I mean, you know, it's not a law that - you know, the U.S. government is not constrained by law saying, "hey, you can't negotiate with terrorists. It's a policy and policies can change depending on the circumstances. So it's not like - we've seen the Reagan administration negotiated indirectly with the people who had taken hostages of Americans officials in Lebanon in the mid-'80s and that led eventually to the Iran-contra scandal. So, you know, this is not something that hasn't happened before and my guess is it will happen again and because the situation here is not a typical situation.

KAYE: Yes, certainly not. It's just fascinating to think of what was going on behind the scenes. Peter Bergen. Thank you.

Ahead, new information on a suicide attack in Syria. An American with Al Qaeda ties being blamed for the bombing.

Plus, anti-government protests in Turkey take a surprising turn. Police detain a CNN correspondent reporting live on television.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: A U.S. marine being held in a Mexican jail cell says he's been beaten, shackled and deprived of food and water. Sgt. Andrew Tahmooressi is being held on weapons charges after he says he accidentally crossed the Mexican border with three guns in his car on March 31st. He said he was beaten and sometimes left naked and cold in the jail but his treatment has improved after his case was highlighted in the media. His court date has been delayed Wednesday because he fired his attorney.

CNN's Nick Valencia spoke to Tahmooressi and you'll hear that interview in our next hour.

We now know it was an American who launched a suicide attack in Syria last Sunday. The State Department confirms it is the first time a U.S. citizen has been linked to an Al Qaeda-backed bombing in Syria's civil war. Mohammed Jamjoom is following this story for us in Washington. Mohammed, what have we learned exactly about this man?

MOHAMMED JAMJOOM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Randi, State Department officials believe that the man in (INAUDIBLE) this is a man who grew up and studied in Florida. They have not divulged when exactly this man actually went to Syria, but it is believed to be the first American suicide bomber in the Syrian civil war.

Now, this was a huge attack. As you can tell by the video you're seeing on the screen, it was a truck that was packed allegedly with 17 tons of explosives. That's according to jihadists who posted this information online. Because they're saying that this is a real propaganda coup for them. You also see videos like this one which is artillery shells being loaded into the back of another truck which was also used in the attack which was in a government checkpoint in (INAUDIBLE) Syria.

Now, We're still trying to get more details about the American who went to Syria and when exactly he went to Syria. But one of the reasons American officials are so concerned isn't just because there are American fighters on the ground in Syria, and analysts that I have spoken with believed that there are at least 100 there as of now and that more possibly on the way. American officials also very worried about Americans who might come back to the U.S. after having learned terrorism techniques and bomb making techniques from hard line Al Qaeda insurgents in Syria and then might plot attacks against the U.S. here from within the U.S..

This is something that's really becoming a nightmare scenario for U.S. officials. They say there are networks that they're trying to shut down of recruiters who are trying to lure anybody who is like-minded with Al Qaeda jihadists from the states to Syria and then have them go back to the states and launch attacks against the homeland from within. So very, very worrying developments this week with this story, Randi.

KAYE: And in terms of this particular case, they have no idea who trained him or where he got his training yet?

JAMJOOM: No, they don't but they say that it's relatively easy for Americans or Europeans who want to get into Syria, amongst these group to get into Syria, once they're there, very easy to get the kind of training that could one day cause a devastating attack inside the homeland.

So that's really the grave concern here and they're trying as hard as they can to shut this down. But they say the problem is - we heard from an FBI official yesterday. One of the problems is that a lot of the people who are going over there they look like ordinary average Americans. They can be men, they can be women and it would be very hard to detect when they would come back. Randi.

KAYE: Certainly. Mohammed Jamjoom, thank you very much for the update.

Police in Turkey fired tear gas to break up an anti-government demonstration in Istanbul today. Officers fought with activists attempting to commemorate last year's protest against the country's current leadership. Police also detained CNN correspondent Ivan Watson while he was reporting live on the air.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Police cracked down and used force and then often you get clashes erupting, demonstrators throwing rocks, bottles, and police cracking down with their support as well. So - excuse me. I think I'm getting - I think we're - I'm being.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just a minute. May I see your passport?

WATSON: CNN.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. Can I see your passport?

WATSON: We're now being checked.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Journalist cut.

WATSON: This is my press card. It allows me to -

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where is your passport?

WATSON: It allows me to work in Turkey.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let me see your passport.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAYE: Incredibly he continued to report there as you saw. Ivan and his crew, we should tell you are fine. They were released soon after that incident and Ivan actually tweeted that police apologized for kneeing him while he was being detained.

It was a devastating blow announced by the Australian government. Pings detected in the southern Indian Ocean did not come from Malaysian Airlines flight 370. So was the entire search so far a waste? And nearly three months later, are we any closer to solving the mystery of the missing plane? I'll ask an expert coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: Back to square one. That is the devastating news this week on the search for Malaysian Airlines flight 370. Australian officials now say they don't think the missing plane is in the southern Indian Ocean area where underwater pings were picked up last month. So has the entire search, the last 11 weeks, been a complete waste. Joining me now "The Daily Beast" contributor Clive Irving. Nice to see you again. Here we are talking about this topic again. You say -

CLIVE IRVING, "DAILY BEAST" CONTRIBUTOR: Three months.

KAYE: Three months. You have devoted so much of your time and certainly writing for the "Daily Beast" about this. So let's talk about the latest news. Without any debris, say, in your article and with this huge area to cover, do you think the fact is they just didn't want to admit that - how difficult this was going to be?

IRVING: I think they were under enormous emotional pressure to raise hopes and raise expectations to get some chance that they would find the wreckage pretty soon, and, of course, that hasn't happened. I think one is that politicians should keep out of situations like this. I think the Australian Prime Minister when he said they were very close to finding the black boxes, he should not have spoken because he spoke with no real background information on that.

I think what we moved to now is phase 2. We just ended Phase 1. Phase 1 was too much hope and too fewer sources. It's natural to feed people's hopes that they will find something but it's not realistic. I hope we can call phase 2 the new realism about the gigantic task that lies ahead to find this. Really there are four phases to this.

One is to map it. You've got to map the ocean floor over this vast area before you can do anything else. You have to map this. There were no maps on this. The second one is you have to scan it. The next is you have to find it. And when you found it, you have to lift it up. In the case of Air France 447, that whole process which was very well targeted. It took a little over two years and in this case, I was surprised by how few resources were devoted to it in the beginning. Just one ship and one pinger.

KAYE: With Air France though, I mean is it a fair comparison? Because with Air France they did have some debris right at the surface even though it took two years to find everything but this, they have nothing.

IRVING: Well, I think that shows, in fact, how hard it's going to be. Because although they had very early wreckage within a few days. They found floating wreckage then even with that advantage, it was two years before they found a debris field at the bottom of the ocean. Also, this is a very remote part of the world. It's the worst place on earth for a plane to disappear with no maps. At least the area is now getting mapped.

KAYE: So the question is for phase 2 going forward, I mean who will be doing the searching and who's going to pay for it? This is a pretty expensive venture.

IRVING: I think money's a real factor here and I think the way do it properly and economically is to not - they can't throw a lot of resources at it. All that can do is throw the right sources at it, which means once the mapping is finished, then one specific kind of under water vehicle is then used to scan it. That will take months to do that in an area this large. So I think what we've got to do is clamp down on the expectations. I think it's only realistic now to thing this is going to take years, not months.

KAYE: Absolutely. Clive, thank you very much. See you again soon.

IRVING: You're welcome. KAYE: This is just the beginning of the conversation. Tonight at 7:00 Eastern Time we'll devote a half hour to these latest developments in the search and ask the experts what's next and what really happened to Flight 370. That's 7:00 Eastern tonight, right here on CNN.

Coming up, a celebration that has nothing do with touchdowns and everything to do with compassion. NFL quarterback Robert Griffin III wasn't directing a team but he was part of a big, big win.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: Robert Griffin III is a star on the football field. He was a star off it as well this week. Well, here's the story. The young lady helping Griffin hold the sign is Morgan (INAUDIBLE), a student at Centreville High School in Virginia. She wanted to ask her friend (INAUDIBLE) who battles cerebral palsy to the Centreville prom. (INAUDIBLE) favorite player is RG3. So she asked the Red Skins quarterback if he would help her pop the big question. He did and he said (INAUDIBLE) said "yes," a very happy yes. Look that little selfie right there. Check that out. What a great moment that is. How nice to help them out.

Well, CNN "Newsroom" continues at the top of the hour with more on our top story. After being held for nearly five years by the Taliban, Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl has been released. We will have team coverage on that for you. Right now keep it here for "Sanjay Gupta, M.D." I'll see you here at 5:00.