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CNN Live Saturday

The Weapons Hunt

Aired May 03, 2003 - 18:05   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.


ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: The U.S. may have won the war in Iraq, but some administration critics say U.S. credibility is on the line if weapons of mass destruction are not found. It was, after all, the premise for war, or at least, one of the major ones.
CNN senior international correspondent Nic Robertson tracks the incidents that partly lead up to the war and the hunt for the smoking gun.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INT'L CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): When U.N. inspectors, acting on British intelligence, raided the home of Iraqi nuclear scientist, Dr. Falih Hassan, in January, they discovered missing nuclear research documents.

For the first time the new U.N. inspection regime had unearthed something unexpected, triggering suspicions. Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction, or WMD secrets, were finally on the verge of being exposed.

Iraqi authorities held a news conference for Falih, he gave the impression he was fighting for his life.

DR. FALIH HASSAN, IRAQI NUCLEAR SCIENTIST: My name is Dr. Falih Hassan, whose home was inspected yesterday by the inspection...

ROBERTSON: Now, free from the pressure he admits he felt from Iraqi authorities, he says he was telling the truth.

HASSAN: As I said in my press conference, and I am saying now, and they could make sure of it, this belongs to the nuclear center, it was academical. And UNMOVIC or UNSCOM didn't ask for such reports. It was a personal document. I didn't hide anything, and I didn't hide any work. We were very clear. We were very transparent in our declaration.

ROBERTSON: Falih is not the only Iraqi WMD scientists to say he didn't lie to U.N. inspectors. Saddam Hussein's scientific adviser, Amer Al-Saadi, stuck to his original story that Iraq had no WMD programs when he handed himself in to U.S. officials recently.

We tracked down Dr. Nassir Hindawi, the U.S. trained former head of Iraq's bio-warfare program, who said in the past, he had lied, until his cover was blown in the mid-1990s. Since then, he says, he's been telling the truth. DR. NASSIR HINDAWI, FMR. HEAD, IRAQ BIO PROGRAM: For biological weapons, I don't think there is any truth, even think about it. Because, as I said, the toxins are degenerating. The bacillus antracis spores went non-viable by now, because of the long storage.

ROBERTSON: What stops Hindawi from turning himself in to the U.S. troops who look for him, he says, is fear of retribution against him and his family from Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Party.

HINDAWI: In every street there are members of the Ba'ath Socialist Party that are probably hoping and dreaming of getting power again. They have weapons and arms. And so nobody knows how the country is going to turn to be in the future.

ROBERTSON: According to U.N. inspectors Iraq had several thousand scientists and engineers, like Hindawi, who were involved in Iraq's WMD programs. What's happening with them is raising concerns about post-war efforts to control what maybe left of Iraq's weapons programs.

DAVID ALBRIGHT, FRMR. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: Any weapons of mass destruction or the equipment to make them is unprotected. And given the looting, you have to assume that some of it has been taken away.

These scientists have to worry about their future. And they may opt to leave Iraq, looking for a better future. There may be some scientists who have a deep grudge against the United States, who knows? That are going to try to find some way to get revenge?

ROBERTSON: But it's not just the slow pace of picking up the scientists that bothers Albright.

ALBRIGHT: If now weapons of mass destruction are found then the fundamental justification for this war is not there. And there is going to have to be some real answers. Why we went to war? And how did the United States make such a huge mistake about the weapons of mass destruction programs in Iraq?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COOPER: Don't go away, Nic Robertson isn't finished with his weapons of mass destruction report. When we come back, a basic question:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTSON: United States and Britain, perhaps, fall victim to overly enthusiastic intelligence operatives on the ground.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: And then when we move on to the South Carolina nine, Democratic candidates for president. Yes, for president, are debating tonight. Our Candy Crowley is there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) COOPER: We continue our in-depth look, by Nic Robertson, on the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and the search for them. Was there an intelligence failure on the WMD in Iraq? And if so, how does the U.S. try to recover?

Here again is CNN's senior international correspondent Nic Robertson.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON (on camera): In October last year, as the United States put pressure on the world and Iraq to accept an aggressive U.N. weapons inspection program, President Bush delivered a speech in Cincinnati.

He used a satellite picture of this site to show what he said was the rebuilding of a past nuclear weapons facility. An indication, he said, that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program.

(voice over): At the time, Iraqi officials rushed hundreds of journalists to al Farat (ph), to show they had nothing to hide. It was the same when inspectors visited on their third day of work in Iraq. Journalists were allowed back.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't have anything as far as this type is concerned, you understand. We don't have anything to hide.

ROBERTSON: Inspectors came back several more times to the suspect al Farat (ph) nuclear site.

(on camera): But now, following widespread looting, where even the door frames have been taken, the little that is left here does seem to support Iraqi government claims that this site was nothing more than a radio frequency testing and repair facility.

(voice over): Just 12 days before the war U.N. Nuclear Weapons Chief Mohamed ElBaradei delivered his verdict on claims Iraq had an ongoing nuclear weapons program.

MOHAMED ELBARADEI, IAEA, DIRECTOR GENERAL: There is not indication of resumed nuclear activities in those buildings that were identified with the use of satellite imagery as being reconstructed for newly erected, since 1998. Nor any indication of nuclear related prohibited activities at any inspected sites.

ROBERTSON: Al Farat (ph) wasn't the only site where the U.S. and British governments alleged Iraq was reconstituting its weapons of mass destruction programs. This site, the al Durah (ph) Foot & Mouth Disease Institute was another, once a key hub in Iraq's biological warfare program. Its equipment had been destroyed by U.N. inspectors in 1996. But so seriously, did the returning inspections teams take allegations about this site, that they visited it on their second day after returning to work in Iraq.

They found two mixers missing, but quickly tracked them down. Iraqi officials denied WMD work had been restarted there. Today, plant director Montasar Al Ani, is happy to show journalists how the site was disabled by U.N. inspectors back in 1996. But still claims he was not aware of a weapons program.

(on camera): Before 1994, what about biological warfare program, before you came here?

DR. MONTASAR AL ANI, DIR. FOOT & MOUTH INST.: I am not responsible for that. Yes, I am here from '94.

ROBERTSON: OK.

(voice over): Despite further visits by inspectors to this and other sites flagged by the U.S. and British, the U.N. failed to substantiate any restarted WMD programs. Privately, inspectors told reporters they were frustrated by the bad intelligence information the U.S. government provided. The U.N. Weapons Chief Hans Blix hinted as much to the U.N. Security Council.

HANS BLIX, CHIEF U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: We must recognize that there are limitations and that miss-interpretations can occur.

ROBERTSON: Since Saddam Hussein's regime collapsed more has been learned about intelligence gathering in Iraq. Mohamed Mohsen Zubaydi, the self-appointed mayor of Baghdad, now in U.S. custody, after Iraqis accused him of receiving funds from looted Baghdad banks, has been revealed by the Iraqi National Congress, which itself has close ties to the Pentagon, to be have been one of the INC's top intelligence gathering officials in Iraq.

ALBRIGHT: The problem isn't that the INC was dishonest, per se, what it is was that they were willing to believe anything bad about Saddam Hussein that could help their cause of regime change. And I think the Pentagon people, particularly the hard-liners, suspended their analytical judgments in order to adopt some of these points of view and information.

ROBERTSON: U.S. officials, however, believe Iraqi scientists will open up and leaders in custody may hold vital information.

RICHARD ARMITAGE, DEPUTY SECRETARY OF STATE: We are finding now that the capabilities were even more dispersed and disguised than we had thought. The evidence of Saddam Hussein's programs is likely to be spread across many hundreds, and even possibly thousands, of sites in Iraq. It is going to take us months to find this material, but find it, we will.

ROBERTSON: Hampering those efforts are many false positives or contradictory results from the U.S. military's various WMD teams. A recent case, Baji, north of Baghdad. The first, by the 10th Cavalry, detected nerve and blister agent in these 55-gallon drums. Another team got the same test results. Yet a third, more senior team, could not substantiate the earlier results.

The failure to find WMD so far raises bigger concerns for former inspector David Albright. ALBRIGHT: One of the questions about whether the U.S. government or officials lied is, if the U.S. believed its own story, there were so many weapons of mass destruction, you would expect them to be completely panicked right now. Because they are not protected and they could go, easily, missing and get into the hands of terrorists. And yet they're not panicked. So, you do have to start to wonder whether the main -- the people who believed these stories really were the American people and not the U.S. government.

ARMITAGE: I want to be clear here, today, I'm extraordinarily confident that Iraq had those capabilities.

ROBERTSON: The question is, will the U.S. and Britain be able to prove it and bolster their international credibility? Or were the Iraqis telling the truth? And did the United States and Britain perhaps fall victim to overly enthusiastic intelligence operatives on the ground?

Nic Robertson, CNN, Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COOPER: A lot of questions.

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






Aired May 3, 2003 - 18:05   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: The U.S. may have won the war in Iraq, but some administration critics say U.S. credibility is on the line if weapons of mass destruction are not found. It was, after all, the premise for war, or at least, one of the major ones.
CNN senior international correspondent Nic Robertson tracks the incidents that partly lead up to the war and the hunt for the smoking gun.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INT'L CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): When U.N. inspectors, acting on British intelligence, raided the home of Iraqi nuclear scientist, Dr. Falih Hassan, in January, they discovered missing nuclear research documents.

For the first time the new U.N. inspection regime had unearthed something unexpected, triggering suspicions. Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction, or WMD secrets, were finally on the verge of being exposed.

Iraqi authorities held a news conference for Falih, he gave the impression he was fighting for his life.

DR. FALIH HASSAN, IRAQI NUCLEAR SCIENTIST: My name is Dr. Falih Hassan, whose home was inspected yesterday by the inspection...

ROBERTSON: Now, free from the pressure he admits he felt from Iraqi authorities, he says he was telling the truth.

HASSAN: As I said in my press conference, and I am saying now, and they could make sure of it, this belongs to the nuclear center, it was academical. And UNMOVIC or UNSCOM didn't ask for such reports. It was a personal document. I didn't hide anything, and I didn't hide any work. We were very clear. We were very transparent in our declaration.

ROBERTSON: Falih is not the only Iraqi WMD scientists to say he didn't lie to U.N. inspectors. Saddam Hussein's scientific adviser, Amer Al-Saadi, stuck to his original story that Iraq had no WMD programs when he handed himself in to U.S. officials recently.

We tracked down Dr. Nassir Hindawi, the U.S. trained former head of Iraq's bio-warfare program, who said in the past, he had lied, until his cover was blown in the mid-1990s. Since then, he says, he's been telling the truth. DR. NASSIR HINDAWI, FMR. HEAD, IRAQ BIO PROGRAM: For biological weapons, I don't think there is any truth, even think about it. Because, as I said, the toxins are degenerating. The bacillus antracis spores went non-viable by now, because of the long storage.

ROBERTSON: What stops Hindawi from turning himself in to the U.S. troops who look for him, he says, is fear of retribution against him and his family from Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Party.

HINDAWI: In every street there are members of the Ba'ath Socialist Party that are probably hoping and dreaming of getting power again. They have weapons and arms. And so nobody knows how the country is going to turn to be in the future.

ROBERTSON: According to U.N. inspectors Iraq had several thousand scientists and engineers, like Hindawi, who were involved in Iraq's WMD programs. What's happening with them is raising concerns about post-war efforts to control what maybe left of Iraq's weapons programs.

DAVID ALBRIGHT, FRMR. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: Any weapons of mass destruction or the equipment to make them is unprotected. And given the looting, you have to assume that some of it has been taken away.

These scientists have to worry about their future. And they may opt to leave Iraq, looking for a better future. There may be some scientists who have a deep grudge against the United States, who knows? That are going to try to find some way to get revenge?

ROBERTSON: But it's not just the slow pace of picking up the scientists that bothers Albright.

ALBRIGHT: If now weapons of mass destruction are found then the fundamental justification for this war is not there. And there is going to have to be some real answers. Why we went to war? And how did the United States make such a huge mistake about the weapons of mass destruction programs in Iraq?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COOPER: Don't go away, Nic Robertson isn't finished with his weapons of mass destruction report. When we come back, a basic question:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTSON: United States and Britain, perhaps, fall victim to overly enthusiastic intelligence operatives on the ground.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: And then when we move on to the South Carolina nine, Democratic candidates for president. Yes, for president, are debating tonight. Our Candy Crowley is there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) COOPER: We continue our in-depth look, by Nic Robertson, on the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and the search for them. Was there an intelligence failure on the WMD in Iraq? And if so, how does the U.S. try to recover?

Here again is CNN's senior international correspondent Nic Robertson.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON (on camera): In October last year, as the United States put pressure on the world and Iraq to accept an aggressive U.N. weapons inspection program, President Bush delivered a speech in Cincinnati.

He used a satellite picture of this site to show what he said was the rebuilding of a past nuclear weapons facility. An indication, he said, that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program.

(voice over): At the time, Iraqi officials rushed hundreds of journalists to al Farat (ph), to show they had nothing to hide. It was the same when inspectors visited on their third day of work in Iraq. Journalists were allowed back.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't have anything as far as this type is concerned, you understand. We don't have anything to hide.

ROBERTSON: Inspectors came back several more times to the suspect al Farat (ph) nuclear site.

(on camera): But now, following widespread looting, where even the door frames have been taken, the little that is left here does seem to support Iraqi government claims that this site was nothing more than a radio frequency testing and repair facility.

(voice over): Just 12 days before the war U.N. Nuclear Weapons Chief Mohamed ElBaradei delivered his verdict on claims Iraq had an ongoing nuclear weapons program.

MOHAMED ELBARADEI, IAEA, DIRECTOR GENERAL: There is not indication of resumed nuclear activities in those buildings that were identified with the use of satellite imagery as being reconstructed for newly erected, since 1998. Nor any indication of nuclear related prohibited activities at any inspected sites.

ROBERTSON: Al Farat (ph) wasn't the only site where the U.S. and British governments alleged Iraq was reconstituting its weapons of mass destruction programs. This site, the al Durah (ph) Foot & Mouth Disease Institute was another, once a key hub in Iraq's biological warfare program. Its equipment had been destroyed by U.N. inspectors in 1996. But so seriously, did the returning inspections teams take allegations about this site, that they visited it on their second day after returning to work in Iraq.

They found two mixers missing, but quickly tracked them down. Iraqi officials denied WMD work had been restarted there. Today, plant director Montasar Al Ani, is happy to show journalists how the site was disabled by U.N. inspectors back in 1996. But still claims he was not aware of a weapons program.

(on camera): Before 1994, what about biological warfare program, before you came here?

DR. MONTASAR AL ANI, DIR. FOOT & MOUTH INST.: I am not responsible for that. Yes, I am here from '94.

ROBERTSON: OK.

(voice over): Despite further visits by inspectors to this and other sites flagged by the U.S. and British, the U.N. failed to substantiate any restarted WMD programs. Privately, inspectors told reporters they were frustrated by the bad intelligence information the U.S. government provided. The U.N. Weapons Chief Hans Blix hinted as much to the U.N. Security Council.

HANS BLIX, CHIEF U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: We must recognize that there are limitations and that miss-interpretations can occur.

ROBERTSON: Since Saddam Hussein's regime collapsed more has been learned about intelligence gathering in Iraq. Mohamed Mohsen Zubaydi, the self-appointed mayor of Baghdad, now in U.S. custody, after Iraqis accused him of receiving funds from looted Baghdad banks, has been revealed by the Iraqi National Congress, which itself has close ties to the Pentagon, to be have been one of the INC's top intelligence gathering officials in Iraq.

ALBRIGHT: The problem isn't that the INC was dishonest, per se, what it is was that they were willing to believe anything bad about Saddam Hussein that could help their cause of regime change. And I think the Pentagon people, particularly the hard-liners, suspended their analytical judgments in order to adopt some of these points of view and information.

ROBERTSON: U.S. officials, however, believe Iraqi scientists will open up and leaders in custody may hold vital information.

RICHARD ARMITAGE, DEPUTY SECRETARY OF STATE: We are finding now that the capabilities were even more dispersed and disguised than we had thought. The evidence of Saddam Hussein's programs is likely to be spread across many hundreds, and even possibly thousands, of sites in Iraq. It is going to take us months to find this material, but find it, we will.

ROBERTSON: Hampering those efforts are many false positives or contradictory results from the U.S. military's various WMD teams. A recent case, Baji, north of Baghdad. The first, by the 10th Cavalry, detected nerve and blister agent in these 55-gallon drums. Another team got the same test results. Yet a third, more senior team, could not substantiate the earlier results.

The failure to find WMD so far raises bigger concerns for former inspector David Albright. ALBRIGHT: One of the questions about whether the U.S. government or officials lied is, if the U.S. believed its own story, there were so many weapons of mass destruction, you would expect them to be completely panicked right now. Because they are not protected and they could go, easily, missing and get into the hands of terrorists. And yet they're not panicked. So, you do have to start to wonder whether the main -- the people who believed these stories really were the American people and not the U.S. government.

ARMITAGE: I want to be clear here, today, I'm extraordinarily confident that Iraq had those capabilities.

ROBERTSON: The question is, will the U.S. and Britain be able to prove it and bolster their international credibility? Or were the Iraqis telling the truth? And did the United States and Britain perhaps fall victim to overly enthusiastic intelligence operatives on the ground?

Nic Robertson, CNN, Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COOPER: A lot of questions.

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