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CNN Live At Daybreak

America's New War: Congressional Reaction to Presidential Demands

Aired September 21, 2001 - 07:47   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.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: But right now I'm going to check in with Senator Mike DeWine who is a member of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, and the first Republican senator to serve the Buckeye State in decades.

Welcome, good to see you.

SEN. MIKE DEWINE (R), OHIO: Paula, thank you. Thank you very much.

ZAHN: So, Senator, what is your reaction to the president's speech and your reaction to the Taliban saying today it's not going to take the ultimatum?

DEWINE: Well, what the Taliban said obviously was expected. And I think the president's speech last night was a very strong and forceful speech.

You know, part of the job of the president of the United States is in very difficult times, crisis situation to explain to the American people really what his thinking is and to bring him -- bring them in, make them part of that process. And I think he did a good job last night. Great presidents have done that in the past. Franklin Roosevelt, you know, did it so very, very well during many crises.

The president did it, and said, look, this is what we have to do, that it's going to be a long, long process. This is not going to be done overnight. And he was very clear in saying it's not going to be what we've seen in the last few years where we drop some bombs and hope that that will send a message to the terrorists. I think the time for sending messages to the terrorists is over, as the president was saying last night, and the time to really get the job done is here.

But it is not going to be easy and the president very, very clear last night that this is -- this is going to be very tough.

ZAHN: So you obviously are giving the president credit for trying to be honest with the American public about the complexity and the difficulty of this mission. Are you optimistic that the United States, along with its allies, can wipe out these terror networks? DEWINE: It has to be our goal. It's going to be very, very tough. And one of the keys is more information. No president has ever had enough information. In the age we live in today with terrorists that go from country to country, where you have international terrorism, information is so vitally important and our intelligence community does a great job. The FBI is doing a great job. We have to give them more tools. We're working on some legislation in Congress right now that I'm involved in to try to give them some of those tools. But that's what we have to do.

The information the president has is what's going to be essential not just to know when to strike, where to strike, but also that's what prevents terrorist activities. We've stopped many terrorist activities. Tragically what happened on the 11th we did not stop, but it shows, I think, again, the importance of just good what we call human intelligence which means infiltrating the old-fashioned way, getting information and relating that to what we get form more high tech ways.

ZAHN: The administration calling Osama bin Laden a prime suspect for about a week now. Do you think the administration is over personalizing this?

DEWINE: Well, no, I don't. This is a man, as you know, who's been indicted in the past, and I think that the idea that we're going to look at this as a criminal case is -- we're beyond that. This is the national security of the United States and the president is treating it that way.

But the president was clear last night, it is not just about one man, this is about a whole network that he has and he, as the president said, a loosely knit group of terrorist organizations and there are many of them and there are many, many people around the world. And so eliminating one person, for example, whether it's bin Laden or someone else is not going to totally solve the problem. And I think the president was very, again, very blunt last night about that.

ZAHN: One last question for you, sir. Last night the president announced that he created a Cabinet-level position called the Office of Homeland Security. In order for that position to be effective, what has got to be done?

DEWINE: Well, first of all, the president made a great selection. Tom Ridge is someone who I've served with in Congress. He is the governor now. Couldn't be better to understand how the government works at both the federal level and the state level. It's a very tough job. Rarely in our history do we worry about homeland security. Tom Ridge has got to do that, and the key is to coordinate the federal agencies but also the state and local agencies as well. Very, very, very tough job. Tom is up to it.

ZAHN: We'll be watching. Senator DeWine, thank you for joining us at such a...

DEWINE: Thank you, Paula. ZAHN: ... busy time on the Hill. Appreciate it.

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