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CNN Live At Daybreak

Interview With Former Defense Secretary William Cohen

Aired January 30, 2004 - 07:06   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.


SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Tenet might survive, but if stockpiles of banned weapons are never found in Iraq, the intelligence community will likely have a big job regaining the confidence of the American people.
Joining us this morning from Washington is former Defense Secretary William Cohen.

Nice to see you, Secretary Cohen.

WILLIAM COHEN, FORMER DEFENSE SECRETARY: Good morning.

O'BRIEN: Thanks for being with us.

Do you think George Tenet should step down? Do you think he should resign? Or do you think that the ax should actually fall even wider than just him?

COHEN: I think that at this point we should not be looking for either scapegoats or scalps, but rather the facts. And I would support John McCain's -- Senator McCain's call for an independent nonpartisan commission to get at the facts to determine why we reached the conclusion that we did, based on what evidence, and how did the analysts really put this information together to come to a conclusion or a recommendation to the policy leaders as such.

So, I think the most important thing right now is to find out what the facts were.

O'BRIEN: There are some who say, find those facts, but wait until the work of the Iraqi Survey Group is done. Do you think it should be done sooner than that, or is waiting fine?

COHEN: I think the faster the president can establish this commission, the better, because this is going to be an issue that's going to fester throughout the coming year. And this is one thing that I'd like to point out that we've got young men and women who are over in Iraq dying, losing limbs, on behalf of this country. And I'd like to see the politics taken out of this as quickly as possible. An independent commission would be the best way to achieve that.

O'BRIEN: In his testimony, David Kay said that intelligence failures date as far back as the Clinton administration. When we were talking to Congressman Porter Goss yesterday, he said that insufficiencies in the intelligence community go back to the early 1990s. You were the defense secretary at this time. Do you think it's the intelligence that's to blame or the administration's use of that intelligence that's to blame?

COHEN: Well, I think we can go back and look at the fact that we had insufficient information from human intelligence. We have great technical capability to see and hear things, but we don't have very many agents on the ground or spies on the ground so to speak. And so, there has always been a deficiency that we have recognized. But if we go back and look at this, we based the assumption that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, No. 1, because he did. He used them against the Kurds and the Iranians in the past.

Also, we found after Desert Storm that he had -- was well on his way to developing a nuclear capability. And then, by his own declaration, he submitted documentation to the United Nations and the Security Council indicating he had vast amounts of VX, anthrax, mustard gas, missiles to deliver them. And so, by his own declaration, he indicated that he had these.

So, this assumption was -- and this is, again, an assumption -- that by throwing the inspectors out and refusing to allow them to come back in that he still had them, was continuing his program.

So, go back and look at what was the process and what was the substance of our intelligence analysis, and come to a conclusion then.

O'BRIEN: Let's turn a little bit and talk about Osama bin Laden. We heard from military officials, they announced that they are stepping up the search, but they also said -- quote -- "We intend to catch them" -- Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar -- "in the next year."

I'm curious to know why make this public? And isn't there a tremendous risk of backfiring if you don't catch them in the next year?

COHEN: Well, I think that clearly the concern that criticism has been leveled that the eye has been taken off Afghanistan, that bin Laden has been a secondary factor, that the focus has been on Saddam Hussein. And so, I think there's an effort to say, we're going now to focus with the same kind of intensity in looking for Saddam. We're going to look after Osama bin Laden and to apprehend him with the understanding that if you can take out the head of a vast organization, hopefully the body will wither. But that's a very big assumption.

O'BRIEN: You think an announcement like, which states a timeline, is essentially a PR announcement?

COHEN: I never think it's wise to set a timeline. I think it's fine to say that we are dedicating ourselves to this goal, and we hope that we can do that within a reasonable time to achieve it. But by setting a timeline, you do call into question what happens if you don't meet it.

O'BRIEN: Former Defense Secretary William Cohen joining us this morning. Nice to see you, sir. Thanks for being with us.

COHEN: Good to see you. Thank you. 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 January 30, 2004 - 07:06   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Tenet might survive, but if stockpiles of banned weapons are never found in Iraq, the intelligence community will likely have a big job regaining the confidence of the American people.
Joining us this morning from Washington is former Defense Secretary William Cohen.

Nice to see you, Secretary Cohen.

WILLIAM COHEN, FORMER DEFENSE SECRETARY: Good morning.

O'BRIEN: Thanks for being with us.

Do you think George Tenet should step down? Do you think he should resign? Or do you think that the ax should actually fall even wider than just him?

COHEN: I think that at this point we should not be looking for either scapegoats or scalps, but rather the facts. And I would support John McCain's -- Senator McCain's call for an independent nonpartisan commission to get at the facts to determine why we reached the conclusion that we did, based on what evidence, and how did the analysts really put this information together to come to a conclusion or a recommendation to the policy leaders as such.

So, I think the most important thing right now is to find out what the facts were.

O'BRIEN: There are some who say, find those facts, but wait until the work of the Iraqi Survey Group is done. Do you think it should be done sooner than that, or is waiting fine?

COHEN: I think the faster the president can establish this commission, the better, because this is going to be an issue that's going to fester throughout the coming year. And this is one thing that I'd like to point out that we've got young men and women who are over in Iraq dying, losing limbs, on behalf of this country. And I'd like to see the politics taken out of this as quickly as possible. An independent commission would be the best way to achieve that.

O'BRIEN: In his testimony, David Kay said that intelligence failures date as far back as the Clinton administration. When we were talking to Congressman Porter Goss yesterday, he said that insufficiencies in the intelligence community go back to the early 1990s. You were the defense secretary at this time. Do you think it's the intelligence that's to blame or the administration's use of that intelligence that's to blame?

COHEN: Well, I think we can go back and look at the fact that we had insufficient information from human intelligence. We have great technical capability to see and hear things, but we don't have very many agents on the ground or spies on the ground so to speak. And so, there has always been a deficiency that we have recognized. But if we go back and look at this, we based the assumption that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, No. 1, because he did. He used them against the Kurds and the Iranians in the past.

Also, we found after Desert Storm that he had -- was well on his way to developing a nuclear capability. And then, by his own declaration, he submitted documentation to the United Nations and the Security Council indicating he had vast amounts of VX, anthrax, mustard gas, missiles to deliver them. And so, by his own declaration, he indicated that he had these.

So, this assumption was -- and this is, again, an assumption -- that by throwing the inspectors out and refusing to allow them to come back in that he still had them, was continuing his program.

So, go back and look at what was the process and what was the substance of our intelligence analysis, and come to a conclusion then.

O'BRIEN: Let's turn a little bit and talk about Osama bin Laden. We heard from military officials, they announced that they are stepping up the search, but they also said -- quote -- "We intend to catch them" -- Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar -- "in the next year."

I'm curious to know why make this public? And isn't there a tremendous risk of backfiring if you don't catch them in the next year?

COHEN: Well, I think that clearly the concern that criticism has been leveled that the eye has been taken off Afghanistan, that bin Laden has been a secondary factor, that the focus has been on Saddam Hussein. And so, I think there's an effort to say, we're going now to focus with the same kind of intensity in looking for Saddam. We're going to look after Osama bin Laden and to apprehend him with the understanding that if you can take out the head of a vast organization, hopefully the body will wither. But that's a very big assumption.

O'BRIEN: You think an announcement like, which states a timeline, is essentially a PR announcement?

COHEN: I never think it's wise to set a timeline. I think it's fine to say that we are dedicating ourselves to this goal, and we hope that we can do that within a reasonable time to achieve it. But by setting a timeline, you do call into question what happens if you don't meet it.

O'BRIEN: Former Defense Secretary William Cohen joining us this morning. Nice to see you, sir. Thanks for being with us.

COHEN: Good to see you. Thank you. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.