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CNN Live Saturday
Could Attacks in Iraq Get Worse?
Aired July 12, 2003 - 12:35 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.
RHONDA SCHAFFLER, CNN ANCHOR: Concerns at home rise with every new attack on U.S. troops in Iraq, and a new report says things might get worse as a number of the old regime's anniversaries roll around. CNN security analyst Kelly McCann is in Washington this Saturday. It's great to see you again, Kelly.
KELLY MCCANN, CNN SECURITY ANALYST: Hi, Rhonda.
SCHAFFLER: I guess the big question on everyone's mind is why does this continue, why is there day after day it seems an attack on an American soldier?
MCCANN: There's competing interests. You've got to remember, when there's an offensive combative operation, you're leaning forward, there's mobility. Suddenly when you go to sustaining a security operation or a support operation, there's fixed checkpoints. There's schedules that can be observed by people who would want to exploit them. You have to keep food moving, you have to keep logistics moving, and all of that works to the advantage of a much less significant enemy in number who can hit and run, and that's what we're seeing, Rhonda.
SCHAFFLER: And the military is doing all it can, I would assume?
MCCANN: Sure. It's a formulaic approach, and sometimes you're slow in coming to the exact formula. It will be the balance between the Iraqi police taking more control of the area, like they did in Fallujah. I mean, U.S. troops have now moved out of that and actually empowered Iraqi police, increased humanitarian aid and then less of a footprint with U.S. troops. Somewhere in that mix -- and that governing council we're working on right now will be the right formula.
SCHAFFLER: Now, how key is the governing council, once that finally gets established, to helping out here?
MCCANN: I think it goes less to lessening the look of an occupying power. And that is essential to this whole thing. The Iraqi people are very proud people, and no one would like it if there was an occupation force in place. So I think the sooner that Paul Bremer's office is able to kind of manipulate that situation so that it goes through the all the tests that it needs to, what's the religious density represented? What are the different tribes represented? And once it's OK, I think that they'll be down the road to some successes.
SCHAFFLER: Kelly, how worried should we be about some of these anniversaries coming up?
MCCANN: Well, this one, the 14th of July, the intel community is concerned about. It was certainly -- it's very, very significant to them in that it was the movement from a monarchy to a republic, and it was done by Mr. Kassim (ph), who is very much revered in the country. So I think there's significant interest by intelligence right now to get out in front of this, use signals intelligence, human intelligence assets and try to do some preemption so nothing does happen.
SCHAFFLER: And Kelly, it seems that the public is losing a bit of support for what is going on there. There is an ABC/"Washington Post" poll that basically points out Americans are a little bit more uncomfortable with the troops being in Iraq. How much of a problem now could this potentially be if there is lessening support at home and what's it doing to morale as well, the troops there?
MCCANN: Boy, that's a compound question, Rhonda, and a tough one. You know, the bottom line is I think going into this thing, everyone felt there was a good momentum behind it, there was jubilation, really, just to see something done about the situation.
Now you've got a bunch of things that are combining to make people feel this way. One is the kind of waning interest in the intelligence. I mean, now you see that the intelligence might not have been exactly what it was represented to be. It could have been cherry picked, only certain things selected and represented to the world and to the U.S. people, and now with people getting hurt, of course it hurts.
The morale on street, though, goes to the soldiers that perform daily tasks, day to day look each other in the eye. Really what's going on back here at home is a little bit far for them to think about right now.
SCHAFFLER: You know, Kelly, at this point you've been watching this situation in Iraq develop for months now. Are you comfortable with what you're seeing?
MCCANN: I think that the biggest concern of everybody, Rhonda, is how quickly the average Iraqi citizen feels that his stomach is full, his children have been inoculated, they have electricity, the water is pure and running, and that they're seeing some revenues from the oil that's departing their country. If they don't perceive that that is their day-to-day situation, then you're going to see a decline in any support for U.S. troops.
And an indication of that, and I've said it before on the network, is when you have someone who can walk up in a crowded marketplace and shoot a U.S. troop at point blank range and nobody in that crowd takes any action to capture or dissuade or sound the alarm prior to it happening, I think that's a significant indication, and we need to be very, very conscious of it.
SCHAFFLER: And Kelly, what's this mean for the rebuilding of Iraq? Are American companies and other interests there getting concerned about the level of violence and perhaps not proceed as fast as some would like?
MCCANN: Well, sure, I mean Bechtel's had several conferences nationwide where they've brought in subcontractors who basically passed the word that you can subcontract to us in this larger effort. However, you are responsible for your own company's security. Now, if you're providing support and you have to think about leaving Kuwait and then driving overland with a convoy into Iraq to do any number of things, logistic support or move engineering equipment or road- building equipment, and no one is providing you security, you know, that's of significant concern to some of these subcontractors.
And the other thing is the contracting staff. Right now, there are so many opportunities in Iraq and they're coming out so quickly, Rhonda, that it's very difficult to imagine that a force forward staff that is responsive to Mr. Bremer is going to be large enough to deal with all of this in a regulated manner. So it's kind of wide open right now. There's a lot moving really fast.
SCHAFFLER: Kelly McCann, CNN security analyst, it's always a pleasure talking to you. Thanks for your insight very much, Kelly.
MCCANN: Pleasure to see you, Rhonda.
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 July 12, 2003 - 12:35 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RHONDA SCHAFFLER, CNN ANCHOR: Concerns at home rise with every new attack on U.S. troops in Iraq, and a new report says things might get worse as a number of the old regime's anniversaries roll around. CNN security analyst Kelly McCann is in Washington this Saturday. It's great to see you again, Kelly.
KELLY MCCANN, CNN SECURITY ANALYST: Hi, Rhonda.
SCHAFFLER: I guess the big question on everyone's mind is why does this continue, why is there day after day it seems an attack on an American soldier?
MCCANN: There's competing interests. You've got to remember, when there's an offensive combative operation, you're leaning forward, there's mobility. Suddenly when you go to sustaining a security operation or a support operation, there's fixed checkpoints. There's schedules that can be observed by people who would want to exploit them. You have to keep food moving, you have to keep logistics moving, and all of that works to the advantage of a much less significant enemy in number who can hit and run, and that's what we're seeing, Rhonda.
SCHAFFLER: And the military is doing all it can, I would assume?
MCCANN: Sure. It's a formulaic approach, and sometimes you're slow in coming to the exact formula. It will be the balance between the Iraqi police taking more control of the area, like they did in Fallujah. I mean, U.S. troops have now moved out of that and actually empowered Iraqi police, increased humanitarian aid and then less of a footprint with U.S. troops. Somewhere in that mix -- and that governing council we're working on right now will be the right formula.
SCHAFFLER: Now, how key is the governing council, once that finally gets established, to helping out here?
MCCANN: I think it goes less to lessening the look of an occupying power. And that is essential to this whole thing. The Iraqi people are very proud people, and no one would like it if there was an occupation force in place. So I think the sooner that Paul Bremer's office is able to kind of manipulate that situation so that it goes through the all the tests that it needs to, what's the religious density represented? What are the different tribes represented? And once it's OK, I think that they'll be down the road to some successes.
SCHAFFLER: Kelly, how worried should we be about some of these anniversaries coming up?
MCCANN: Well, this one, the 14th of July, the intel community is concerned about. It was certainly -- it's very, very significant to them in that it was the movement from a monarchy to a republic, and it was done by Mr. Kassim (ph), who is very much revered in the country. So I think there's significant interest by intelligence right now to get out in front of this, use signals intelligence, human intelligence assets and try to do some preemption so nothing does happen.
SCHAFFLER: And Kelly, it seems that the public is losing a bit of support for what is going on there. There is an ABC/"Washington Post" poll that basically points out Americans are a little bit more uncomfortable with the troops being in Iraq. How much of a problem now could this potentially be if there is lessening support at home and what's it doing to morale as well, the troops there?
MCCANN: Boy, that's a compound question, Rhonda, and a tough one. You know, the bottom line is I think going into this thing, everyone felt there was a good momentum behind it, there was jubilation, really, just to see something done about the situation.
Now you've got a bunch of things that are combining to make people feel this way. One is the kind of waning interest in the intelligence. I mean, now you see that the intelligence might not have been exactly what it was represented to be. It could have been cherry picked, only certain things selected and represented to the world and to the U.S. people, and now with people getting hurt, of course it hurts.
The morale on street, though, goes to the soldiers that perform daily tasks, day to day look each other in the eye. Really what's going on back here at home is a little bit far for them to think about right now.
SCHAFFLER: You know, Kelly, at this point you've been watching this situation in Iraq develop for months now. Are you comfortable with what you're seeing?
MCCANN: I think that the biggest concern of everybody, Rhonda, is how quickly the average Iraqi citizen feels that his stomach is full, his children have been inoculated, they have electricity, the water is pure and running, and that they're seeing some revenues from the oil that's departing their country. If they don't perceive that that is their day-to-day situation, then you're going to see a decline in any support for U.S. troops.
And an indication of that, and I've said it before on the network, is when you have someone who can walk up in a crowded marketplace and shoot a U.S. troop at point blank range and nobody in that crowd takes any action to capture or dissuade or sound the alarm prior to it happening, I think that's a significant indication, and we need to be very, very conscious of it.
SCHAFFLER: And Kelly, what's this mean for the rebuilding of Iraq? Are American companies and other interests there getting concerned about the level of violence and perhaps not proceed as fast as some would like?
MCCANN: Well, sure, I mean Bechtel's had several conferences nationwide where they've brought in subcontractors who basically passed the word that you can subcontract to us in this larger effort. However, you are responsible for your own company's security. Now, if you're providing support and you have to think about leaving Kuwait and then driving overland with a convoy into Iraq to do any number of things, logistic support or move engineering equipment or road- building equipment, and no one is providing you security, you know, that's of significant concern to some of these subcontractors.
And the other thing is the contracting staff. Right now, there are so many opportunities in Iraq and they're coming out so quickly, Rhonda, that it's very difficult to imagine that a force forward staff that is responsive to Mr. Bremer is going to be large enough to deal with all of this in a regulated manner. So it's kind of wide open right now. There's a lot moving really fast.
SCHAFFLER: Kelly McCann, CNN security analyst, it's always a pleasure talking to you. Thanks for your insight very much, Kelly.
MCCANN: Pleasure to see you, Rhonda.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
