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America's Longest War Ends as Last U.S. Troops Leave Afghanistan; 1 Million-Plus Without Power for Possibly Weeks amid Scorching Heat; . Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired August 31, 2021 - 13:00   ET

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

[13:00:00]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: God bless them. Thank you so much, Doctor, for speaking up and for what you do.

And thank you so much for joining us. Ana Cabrera picks up right now.

ANA CABRERA, CNN ANCHOR: Hello. I'm Ana Cabrera in New York.

Next hour, President Biden will stand before the nation and deliver his first remarks since ending America's longest war. History will remember the deaths, the chaos and confusion, the failures and agony and the successes of the final retreat out of Afghanistan after 20 years. The images, the implications, they will resonate for years. Will the president's next words?

We're covering this remarkable moment from every angle with our team of reporters and experts standing by. I want to begin at the White House. Jeff Zeleny is there.

Jeff, as we await this big speech, how did the president spend his morning preparing and any insight into what he might say?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Ana, we do know that President Biden and Vice President Harris spent at least part of the morning with their team of national security advisers, getting the first in-person briefing on the final day of America's longest war in Afghanistan, getting operational briefings and hearing about those final flights that took off yesterday afternoon here in Washington time, but at midnight in Afghanistan.

We do know that the president is going to a layout, a series of what led him to this decision. We know, of course, that this is a decision that President Biden has long wanted to make. In fact, it goes back to a trip he took six days before he became vice president in January of 2009. As just a senator as vice president-elect he went to Afghanistan on a fact-finding mission for President Obama at the time. And he came to the conclusion that there simply was not a strategy there going forward. So, he became one of the loudest voices of criticism for the Afghanistan policy as vice president. So, this has been something that has been building for a long time. But, of course, as commander-in- chief, he faced a decision, and this is something that he is going to, of course, lay out in his remarks this afternoon, we're told.

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki says he's going to go through what led America to this point of 20 years of war but he's also going to be talking about a forward-looking strategy for how to keep America safe from terror threats from abroad. And that is something that people really have questions about. Yes, how did this mission sort of unspiral at the end?

How did the 13 American service members lose their lives? Did that have to happen? Of course, all that will come in an after action report. He will address that. But I'm told it's going to be a history lesson as well as a forward-looking speech about what the U.S. intends to do now to protect this country and the homeland from another terror attack, Ana.

CABRERA: Jeff Zeleny at the White House, thank you.

So, let's head to the Pentagon and CNN's Barbara Starr.

Barbara you have some brand new reporting on this secret arrangement, apparently, between the Taliban and the U.S. military during the evacuation. So what can you share?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, Ana, what we know, and we all know this because we've heard it from the Pentagon for days, is that they had a communications channel with the Taliban that they were trying to, quote, de-conflict and coordinate a bit, that there was a pragmatic, in the words of the Pentagon, relationship with the Taliban. But now, we are learning many more details about how deep that relationship went.

Two defense officials are telling CNN this morning that there was a secret escort arrangement that the U.S. came to with the Taliban, that, basically, Americans would be notified in Kabul by the U.S. government of muster points that they should go to, one of them being a building near the airport that was a ministry of interior building, for example.

Go to these points. They would be met by the Taliban, essentially, who would check their credentials and then move them closer to the airport so they could get through one of the gates that are more manned by U.S. forces in those days and hours and be let into the airport. In many cases, they were able to be monitored visually by U.S. forces at the gates.

Now, let me stop right there. Of course, there's many reports of some Americans not being able to get past Taliban checkpoints, having their paperwork rejected. Where it all has wound up is the administration says about 6,000 Americans got out and they're still hoping to get 100, perhaps 200 more who want to leave out. So, the arrangement that was reached, we are told, by large -- to a large extent, was successful, that it helped hundreds of Americans get through the airport mess and get out of Afghanistan. Ana?

CABRERA: I guess the question now is what does that arrangement look like moving forward now that American forces are gone.

[13:05:00]

As you mentioned, there are still maybe 100-plus Americans wanting to get out.

Barbara Starr, you're going to stay on it. Thank you.

Let's go to Sam Kiley now. He is in Doha, Qatar, where thousands -- tens of thousands, really, of evacuees have been 'arriving. What has been the reaction there to America's final departure, Sam?

SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, an enormous relief obviously for the Afghans who have been able to get out and sadness because of what they've had to leave behind. 20 years of hope, really, that they could emerge as not a western nation, not a western- style democracy, but a nation in which free speech, the arts and culture, journalism, and other intellectual activities could be practiced without fear or favor.

They've fled because of their relationship with the United States and other coalition partners and because they fear what the Taliban will do in the years and weeks, in the near future.

Now, that said, the Qataris are working as point on the diplomatic efforts to try to continue to persuade the Taliban to stick to their moderate message, a message that was repeated at the airfield today by the Taliban spokesman, telling Taliban special forces, members of the Haqqani Network, a network that, in the past, has committed terrorist atrocities in Kabul itself, for this same unit being told to respect local Afghan people, to respect traditions, to behave not in the -- and this is my paraphrasing, not in the sort of medieval approach that they had in 1996 and for the five years after that but in a much more conciliatory way.

This is consistent with their messaging. They're going to the international community. Of course, it remains deep cynicism as to what will happen in reality.

But the Qataris, at any rate, are very hard over on trying to make sure that this message gets through and is stuck to by the Taliban in terms of their future actions. One of the key areas will be the test of this will be the reopening of the international airport. They have -- the Taliban has asked for help from Turkey and behind the scenes from Qatar to do that. And that is being looked at intensely as we speak.

CABRERA: All right. Sam Kiley, thank you.

There's obviously so much uncertainly right now. Let's discuss more with retired Lieutenant General Mark Hurtling, who served 37 years in the Army. He is now a CNN Military Analyst. And also with us, Daniel Silverberg, former Defense Department official and former National Security Adviser to the House majority leader.

General Hertling, zero U.S. troops are in Afghanistan right now. Is the U.S. counterterrorism position stronger now than it was 20 years ago?

LT. GEN. MARK HERTLING (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Of course not, Ana. It's not. I mean, when you're missing not only the soldiers on the ground but also the intelligence collectors within the environment, it's much more difficult to collect information and target specific terrorist groups or terrorist individuals.

But that doesn't mean that it's ended. There is a spectrum of the capability to hit lots of targets or key specific targets. And I think you're going to see the kinds of things that will allow us to hit key targets but not be as -- well, let's just say as overt as we've been in the past in terms of targeting specific groups.

CABRERA: I know, Daniel, you feel differently. You feel the president's critics on this withdrawal wrong. And, as you know, some of the criticism is coming from Democrats. You write in The Atlantic, and I quote, various critics of President Biden are engaging in fantasies amid Kabul's collapse. If only we'd use more force, demonstrated more will, stayed a few months longer, then the Taliban would have adopted a different strategy. Why are they wrong?

DANIEL SILVERBERG, FORMER DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE OFFICIAL, : They're wrong because we never had control in Afghanistan. We didn't have it 20 days ago. We did not have it two decades ago. And the longer that this war would have continued, it would have just been putting more blood and more treasure where we were not going to gain any more than we already had.

One of the main things that I think has to happen moving forward here is, one, the diplomatic strategy that Secretary Blinken has talked about, an aggressive effort in coordination with our allies to get people out. But I'll tell you what I feel strongly we should not be doing, which is putting boots on the ground. The one thing that we know empirically after two decades of war in Afghanistan is that more boots on the ground does not necessarily make us safer or secure our counterterrorism objectives.

CABRERA: Explain that. Why doesn't it make us safer?

SILVERBERG: Well, after two decades, we've come up with any number of alternative ways which Congress has robustly funded to be able to pursue our counterterrorism objectives without having people on the ground. We, right now, have suffered in terms of prestige, money, personnel by being committed to Afghanistan, after a point when we were not going to make any further gains once bin Laden had been killed.

[13:10:06] So, I think the reason why I wrote that article was I felt that the administration was being unfairly maligned for a decision that most Americans, I sense, actually agree with.

CABRERA: What do you think, General Hertling? I see you shaking your head.

HERTLING: Yes, I agree with him completely. There have been so many shifts and change in the strategy and the approach and the policies related to Afghanistan over the last 20 years that I believe we lost our way a while ago. It was a continuation of a mission for the mission's sake.

And, Ana, there're a lot of people to blame for this. And I don't want to use the word blame because that's too harsh. But there's a lot of people who should take responsibility for this. And I'm not just talking about military intelligence collectors but ambassadors, members of Congress, presidents that didn't want to make hard decisions.

To me, it's critically important that we have, I would almost say, a process or a system for determining the use of military force. And it is to extend politics by other means. That goes with classical theory. That's always the approach we've used. But, unfortunately, in the last several wars we've fought, we've forgotten that.

And it's almost been relegated to the people who are fighting the wars to make the key decisions or push for key decisions. We don't see the kinds of meetings between the politicians and the military and the intelligence collectors as we did in the past. It's normally a congressional hearing once a year or something like that, and a lack of vote because of the divisiveness of the Congress who represent the people.

So I certainly agree that it was more than right to get out of Afghanistan at this time. The only thing I disagree with Mr. Silverberg on, as well as everybody else who uses the phrase, is boots on the ground. I personally can't stand that phrase because there is more to the people who serve in our country and we ought to quit equating that to just a piece of a uniform and understand that when the nation sends its human beings to war, that we have a responsibility for it.

CABRERA: Daniel, what do you want to hear from President Biden next hour?

SILVERBERG: First, I 100 percent agree with General Hertling, that when we talk about our foreign policy, when we talk about what happened in Afghanistan, it's not just the military. It's not just physical boots on the ground. It is a full spectrum of U.S. capabilities, our diplomats, our aide workers that have put their lives on the line and a number that have been killed in Afghanistan and other places.

The number one thing that I think we need to hear from the president is, first, a message of empathy. And I'm confident he'll deliver that not only to the service members and their families who were injured and killed last week but to an entire generation of Americans for whom today is really a day of anguish and confusion.

What I'd also like to hear him say, quite frankly, is to take a victory lap for an extraordinary airlift over the last 20 days. This was a herculean effort and coordination with our allies.

Third, in addition to, I think, giving us some of the details on the diplomatic plan that the secretary alluded to yesterday to continue to get our people out, both Americans and our partners that helped us, I'd like to see the president push back really hard against what I perceive as a degree of revisionism, of people who are saying, well, what I wrote in that article, if only we had stayed longer, if only Trump had done this, it would have been totally different. It would not have been different. What we are seeing in many ways is inevitable and, ultimately, it was the right policy decision to pull out.

CABRERA: Daniel Silverberg and General Mark Hertling, I appreciate both of you. Thank you.

SILVERBERG: Thank you.

CABRERA: And now to the aftermath of Ida. Residents stuck in flood waters in scorching heat with no air-conditioning. What's the reality right now? That is it for more than a million Americans along the gulf coast and relief for many could be a month away, no power for the next month. We're live in New Orleans.

Plus, parents throwing punches in Florida after another school takes steps to protect kids from COVID as the Governor Ron DeSantis pours more fuel on the fire.

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CABRERA: People across Louisiana facing days of misery in the aftermath of Hurricane Ida. There are more than a million people without power. It could be that way for weeks.

This is just some of the destruction left behind by the storm, homes flattened, neighborhoods left unrecognizable. Towns are facing a water crisis. Some hospitals have been evacuated while others in that state are at capacity. Evacuees are being told not to go home, at least for now. In Mississippi, at least two people were killed after a highway was washed away.

Let's begin our CNN storm coverage with Brian Todd in New Orleans and Ed Lavandera in LaPlace, Louisiana. Brian, how are people coping?

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Ana, in working class and lower income neighborhoods like this one in the Algiers section of New Orleans, people are picking through the remnants of their homes and they're wondering when they're going to get help.

Take a look at this tree damage at this home here in the Algiers neighborhood. This large tree came down squarely on top of this house. It hit this house and the one next to it.

[13:20:00]

We knocked on the doors here to see if anyone needed help or how they were doing here. We got no response from either house. You can see where it came up on its roots here and just plowed into this house. So, we're a little bit concerned with the residents of those two houses and how they're doing.

But, again, people are looking to assess their damage, but they're also coping with present dangers in their neighborhoods, like downed power lines. Look at these over here. These have been down since the storm and nothing has been cleared up yet. The energy companies have warned and the local officials have warned these could be energized lines that are presenting dangers to people.

Also there are people here wondering where they're going to be going for food in a few days because not many stores and other places are open. We talked to Yolanda Teague who lives on the street. She lives in a small house with her eight children and her mother, including a ten-year-old who has a heart condition. Take a listen.

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YOLANDA TEAGUE, HOME DAMAGED IN HURRICANE: My living room is caved in right now. So, when it rains right now, we get water inside the house. So, we had to move all my living room furniture out of the living room and we're like migrating. It's a four-bedroom. So, right now, we're living in like two bedrooms.

TODD: What's your biggest worry right now, Yolanda?

TEAGUE: Running out of food and beverages. And I have a son with a heart condition. So that's my biggest concern is him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TODD: So, Yolanda told us that he has enough medication now, her ten- year-old son, but when he runs out, she finally got word from a hospital down the street that she can bring him there if he needs some more medication or if he needs some treatment. So, that's a relief to her. But food and water, that's another equation, Ana, people who are very worried about where they're going to go to get that.

CABRERA: It's sounds so, so stressful. Thank you. Stand by for us, Brian.

Ed Lavandera, you're in LaPlace. That's northwest of New Orleans near Lake Pontchartrain, and people there have been hit hard by flooding.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. They've dealt with a heavy dose of flooding yesterday. In many places, those floodwaters have really subsided quite a bit, and that's giving people an opportunity to begin assessing and cleaning up the damage. And the sense of bewilderment and daze in the hours after the storm, that is now settling in to the reality of what is going to be a long recovery process.

These are major power lines through the heart of the city and the extensive structural damage to rooftops throughout much of the city and in the neighborhoods that we have been going through as well as incredibly long lines to get gasoline now as people perhaps returning back to these neighborhoods to begin taking care of their belongings and cleaning out their homes.

And, Ana, it's important to point out that in some of the situations, it can be extremely dangerous. In Slidell, Louisiana, just east of here, there was a 71-year-old man walking through flood waters who was attacked by an alligator. His wife rushed to get him help, then she left to go get medical attention for him. When she came back, the 71- year-old man was nowhere to be found. Sheriff's deputies say they believe he was attacked and killed by this alligator and they're searching for his body now. Ana?

CABRERA: Wow, scary situation. Ed Lavandera, Brian Todd, thank you both. Stay safe, as, again, this is an ongoing issue.

Ida isn't done yet. Parts of the eastern U.S. bracing for possibly more flooding from what is now a tropical depression. And in areas already hard hit and without power, we're talking extreme heat. That's a new danger.

Meteorologist Tom Sater is joining us in the CNN Weather Center. Tom, obviously, this situation is still developing.

TOM SATER, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes. I mean, we're in a new phase now 48 hours in. It's not just the phase of damage assessment or search and rescue, a new phase with the storm. Look at the bright colors of red.

This thing is still generating incredible amount of power with thunderstorms down in Florida and areas northward. The center is about 70 miles southwest of Nashville. Big concerns in West Central Tennessee, in the town Waverly and Centerville, with the horrific scenes we saw with the flooding there, 1 to 2, even some 2 1/2 inch total in the south, so more of a mind came with them.

So, everyone thinks, well, most of the worst weathers near the center, that is not the case. Let's broaden out here and you'll see these thunderstorms, Panama City toward Tallahassee, they could still spin up tornadoes and some minor flash flooding.

Bigger problems, however, with the several states in the Tennessee- Ohio valley to the northeast, three to five inches of rain, you get five inches of rain at any time and it's a problem, but especially in the mountains, so the Smokys (ph), the Blue Ridge, the Appalachian Trail, all of that could squeeze out heavy amounts of rains up in areas of West Virginia to Pennsylvania, but also a pretty good line along I-95, from Philadelphia to New York City could see a lot.

But it's the heat that's a big deal. The National Weather Service, this, actually, advisory came from the National Weather Service in Jacksonville because they had to leave their offices in New Orleans. They adjusted the threshold here because there is no air-conditioning. Heatstroke is the number one cause from weather events. And we're going to have several days where the heat index values are going to be in the triple digits. There's so much water on the ground. The humidity levels will be through the roof and worst than they typically are found.

So, again, we don't want to get more, of course, injuries into the hospitals.

[13:25:00]

They're already at their limit. And then you toss in some heat exhaustion victims. Please, check on those with children. Check on those with seniors. And it's not just this. It's going to provide an explosive growth, Ana, of mold. And it's not just going to be those homes that are flooded. Homes that remain dry day in and day out are going to have some mold problems. I mean, we could be looking at a $30, $40 billion disaster here. It's just incredible.

CABRERA: Oh, my. And as you point out, the hospitals are already at capacity in resources and in hospital beds and some hospitals had to be evacuated during the storm. So, it is a tense situation.

SATER: Yes, the next phase.

CABRERA: Thank you, Tom Sater.

With us now is Keith Turi. He is the FEMA assistant administrator heading up recovery. Thank you for being with us, Keith.

Right now, it seems like the biggest problem, especially with the heat, is the lack of power. What is FEMA doing to help restore electricity?

KEITH TURI, FEMA ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR, RECOVERY: Yes. Thanks for having me and the opportunity to talk to you about what FEMA is doing here in support the citizens of Louisiana. As you said, power is a really critical issue. This was a very powerful storm, stayed at cat 4, multiple miles inland and really wreaked havoc on the electric system. And so not only do we have transmission lines that are down but we also have distribution lines.

It's going to be a challenging recovery and a challenging restoration. We are fully synced with the state of Louisiana and with the power companies on their efforts to get the power up. We will be doing everything we can to support them.

And in the interim, while the power is out, we are working closely with our partners at the Army Corps of Engineers. We've brought in close to 200 generators that we can move to critical facilities, hospitals, water plants, to ensure that there is some power while restoration is ongoing. No one is happy with the timeframe for restoration. We're all going to do everything we can to speed that up, but it is going to be a long road.

CABRERA: I understand FEMA is also coordinating with supply groups to make sure hospitals that were hit by hurricane have enough oxygen? How are those efforts going?

TURI: Yes. It's a critical need, obviously, is to make sure that those critical services that support communities every day are up and running, hospitals being one of the most important. We are laser- focused with the state of Louisiana and with our interagency partners on making sure that hospitals have what they need. We recognize that we're into day two of this.

So, there will be some challenges and shortfalls but we're going to do everything possible to make sure that every hospital has what they need to be able to continue to provide care for the citizens of Louisiana.

CABRERA: Do you know, were those four hospitals that were evacuated, are they back up and running and have patients returned?

TURI: So, again, it's day two. There's a lot of moving parts, a fluid situation. There have been evacuations from hospitals, as you noted. Those evacuations and those movements continue. Damage assessments continue. And so we'll continue to make progress on that, again, with our partners on ground and ensure that, as information is available, we make it available to the public.

CABRERA: This is alligator country, right? Local officials, as Ed was talking about, are investigating a report of one person killed by an alligator as he was wading through floodwaters. What do people need to know to stay safe in that regard?

TURI: Yes. Obviously, the goal is to avoid loss of life in any way. Our current mission is about life-sustaining, life-saving efforts. That's what we're focused on. And it's really important that the citizens understand, unfortunately, many of the fatalities that occur around a hurricane happen after the storm.

They happen when someone goes to an area that's still flooded, downed power lines, or even the operation of a generator. It's one area where there is a lot of risk. You need to make sure if you're running a generator, you do it away from your house, away from your windows. You let it cool down before you refuel.

So, now is not the time to be coming back to the area. It's important to be listening closely to local officials. They'll give you the direction of when you can or cannot return. But, most importantly, we need to keep people safe right now.

CABRERA: Keith Turi, I appreciate your time. Thanks again for being with us today.

TURI: Thank you.

CABRERA: Florida school says mask up and the fists come out. Things are getting really ugly, and as battle over mask requirements.

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