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War Games: 'Internal Look'

Aired December 11, 2002 - 13:46   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.


WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: It's probably the most important simulated war game in recent memory, a war game designed to set the stage for a possible U.S.-led war against Iraq. It's called "Internal Look." Joining us now is Jim Wilkinson. He's the director of strategic communication for the U.S. Central Command.
Jim, thanks for joining us.

What exactly do you hope to achieve by this simulated exercise?

JIM WILKINSON, U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND: Let me take a second to explain exactly what "Internal Look" is first. The secretary and president talk a lot about transformation. That means changing our military to meet new and emerging threats. Enemies today are different than the enemies of old. This exercise, internal look, is designed to allow General Franks to have a new modern, forward headquarters to that allows him to improve the way he communicates on the battlefield. The Civil War, World War I and World War II, and Vietnam, things got quicker and quicker as things moved on.

Today, warfare is very quick, much quicker than we...

BLITZER: You need realtime, live communications, if you will.

And General Franks, Tommy Franks, the commander of Central Command, he wants to have a forward headquarters. That's going to be right here.

WILKINSON: That's right. He needs to be able to speak to his regular headquarters in Tampa. He needs to be able to speak to aircraft carriers, to the people in charge of our airwing, our ground commanders, and instantly, as you see video-like Predator and other types of things, he needs to be able to talk to these folks hourly, minutely in some cases, and get instant updates.

BLITZER: Sir, is that what you're doing right now, making sure all the systems, these high-tech systems, the modular command-and- control units that you've brought over from Tampa and elsewhere around the world, that they work?

WILKINSON: Yes, sir. What happens is General Franks wakes up. He gets his normal updates for Afghanistan, and the rest of his area of responsibility. He then gets a simulated briefing on what -- on a computer-assisted scenario. I can't tell you about the scenario. That's classified. But he gets that briefing. And so it tests his ability to get information. The commander's hardest job is getting good, reliable information, and this tests his ability to do so. BLITZER: Why Qatar?

WILKINSON: Well, it's a great, obviously , central location. It's in our area of responsibility. General Franks has an area of 25 countries, going from Egypt, all the way up to Kurdistan (ph). It's centrally located, the headquarters that is here now, can be taken anywhere in our AOR. That's our area of responsibility for those who don't speak acronym, and so it's a deployable headquarters that can go anywhere.

BLITZER: And the defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, he's here, he's in Qatar right now, just signed an important agreement, formalizing access to this huge air base, the Al Udaide Air Base. He's going to be out there tomorrow observing what's going on. What can we expect?

WILKINSON: Al Udaide is an important air base. It's the longest runway in the region. He'll be out there meeting the troops, seeing the folks from the enlisted people up to the senior officers. He will give classified briefings that, unfortunately, you can't attend. He'll certainly speak to the press.

BLITZER: And he'll have a town hall meeting with, too, the troops.

WILKINSON: He will have a town hall meeting with the troops. The secretary really is concerned as is. General Franks, about those frontline soldiers.

But more importantly, General Franks and Secretary Rumsfeld are big advocates of transformation, changing this military to meet these new threats that we've learned about, and I think Secretary Rumsfeld is here to make sure that we're doing it.

BLITZER: Is the battle plan ready to go?

WILKINSON: Well, as General Franks says, even the best military plans change once action begins, and so I don't know that any plan is ever perfect. They're fine-tuning any number of scenarios right now, and I'll leave it at that.

BLITZER: Any glitches so far in the first three days? The exercise started on Monday. It's going to go on maybe another week or so. Any major problems come up yet?

WILKINSON: Well, what we call the battle rhythm actually began before General Franks arrived. It is a 24-hour a day exercise because warfare is 24 hours a day. There have been some lessons we're learning. General Franks like to get his information in a certain way. Those fine tunings are happening right now. There hasn't been any major kinks, but like I say, this is not about -- this exercise is not proving anything to the rest of the world, it's about proving some things to ourselves.

BLITZER: All right, Jim Wilkinson, if we can pan in, can take a look over here, it says, we all know that Wilkinson. What does this say over there, reading the opposite direction in Arabic?

WILKINSON: It says Jim Wilkinson, or Gene Wilkinson, depending on the part of the Middle East you're in -- different letters are pronounced different ways.

BLITZER: Want to make sure the hosts understand who you are, Jim Wilkinson, director of strategic communications for the U.S. Central Command. Good luck to you.

WILKINSON: Thank you, sir.

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 December 11, 2002 - 13:46   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: It's probably the most important simulated war game in recent memory, a war game designed to set the stage for a possible U.S.-led war against Iraq. It's called "Internal Look." Joining us now is Jim Wilkinson. He's the director of strategic communication for the U.S. Central Command.
Jim, thanks for joining us.

What exactly do you hope to achieve by this simulated exercise?

JIM WILKINSON, U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND: Let me take a second to explain exactly what "Internal Look" is first. The secretary and president talk a lot about transformation. That means changing our military to meet new and emerging threats. Enemies today are different than the enemies of old. This exercise, internal look, is designed to allow General Franks to have a new modern, forward headquarters to that allows him to improve the way he communicates on the battlefield. The Civil War, World War I and World War II, and Vietnam, things got quicker and quicker as things moved on.

Today, warfare is very quick, much quicker than we...

BLITZER: You need realtime, live communications, if you will.

And General Franks, Tommy Franks, the commander of Central Command, he wants to have a forward headquarters. That's going to be right here.

WILKINSON: That's right. He needs to be able to speak to his regular headquarters in Tampa. He needs to be able to speak to aircraft carriers, to the people in charge of our airwing, our ground commanders, and instantly, as you see video-like Predator and other types of things, he needs to be able to talk to these folks hourly, minutely in some cases, and get instant updates.

BLITZER: Sir, is that what you're doing right now, making sure all the systems, these high-tech systems, the modular command-and- control units that you've brought over from Tampa and elsewhere around the world, that they work?

WILKINSON: Yes, sir. What happens is General Franks wakes up. He gets his normal updates for Afghanistan, and the rest of his area of responsibility. He then gets a simulated briefing on what -- on a computer-assisted scenario. I can't tell you about the scenario. That's classified. But he gets that briefing. And so it tests his ability to get information. The commander's hardest job is getting good, reliable information, and this tests his ability to do so. BLITZER: Why Qatar?

WILKINSON: Well, it's a great, obviously , central location. It's in our area of responsibility. General Franks has an area of 25 countries, going from Egypt, all the way up to Kurdistan (ph). It's centrally located, the headquarters that is here now, can be taken anywhere in our AOR. That's our area of responsibility for those who don't speak acronym, and so it's a deployable headquarters that can go anywhere.

BLITZER: And the defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, he's here, he's in Qatar right now, just signed an important agreement, formalizing access to this huge air base, the Al Udaide Air Base. He's going to be out there tomorrow observing what's going on. What can we expect?

WILKINSON: Al Udaide is an important air base. It's the longest runway in the region. He'll be out there meeting the troops, seeing the folks from the enlisted people up to the senior officers. He will give classified briefings that, unfortunately, you can't attend. He'll certainly speak to the press.

BLITZER: And he'll have a town hall meeting with, too, the troops.

WILKINSON: He will have a town hall meeting with the troops. The secretary really is concerned as is. General Franks, about those frontline soldiers.

But more importantly, General Franks and Secretary Rumsfeld are big advocates of transformation, changing this military to meet these new threats that we've learned about, and I think Secretary Rumsfeld is here to make sure that we're doing it.

BLITZER: Is the battle plan ready to go?

WILKINSON: Well, as General Franks says, even the best military plans change once action begins, and so I don't know that any plan is ever perfect. They're fine-tuning any number of scenarios right now, and I'll leave it at that.

BLITZER: Any glitches so far in the first three days? The exercise started on Monday. It's going to go on maybe another week or so. Any major problems come up yet?

WILKINSON: Well, what we call the battle rhythm actually began before General Franks arrived. It is a 24-hour a day exercise because warfare is 24 hours a day. There have been some lessons we're learning. General Franks like to get his information in a certain way. Those fine tunings are happening right now. There hasn't been any major kinks, but like I say, this is not about -- this exercise is not proving anything to the rest of the world, it's about proving some things to ourselves.

BLITZER: All right, Jim Wilkinson, if we can pan in, can take a look over here, it says, we all know that Wilkinson. What does this say over there, reading the opposite direction in Arabic?

WILKINSON: It says Jim Wilkinson, or Gene Wilkinson, depending on the part of the Middle East you're in -- different letters are pronounced different ways.

BLITZER: Want to make sure the hosts understand who you are, Jim Wilkinson, director of strategic communications for the U.S. Central Command. Good luck to you.

WILKINSON: Thank you, sir.

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