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Becoming an Army of One

Aired February 25, 2003 - 13:15   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: Having spent time with U.S. Army special forces in Afghanistan and Haiti, I can tell you what you've probably already guessed, nobody in the U.S. Army is smarter or tougher. Army special forces know their area of operations. They speak multiple languages and are specialists, used to the toughest assignments.
Our Kyra Phillips is getting a rare exclusive look behind the scenes at Ft. Bragg, where the Army special forces undergo their tough training.

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Sort of bear with me, OK. We're about 30 seconds away. This is actual live training, special forces soldiers. They're going to be coming into this mock city pretty soon. It seems very quiet now, but it's pretty much going to be a live combat zone, as you can probably tell how we're all geared up. Any minute now, you'll see them coming around in the vehicles, and I'm going to sort of set up the scenario of what's going on.

The scenario is downed air crews in a small city setting. The special forces soldiers -- here we see them coming in on the vehicles right now. They'll going to roll in hot, immediately disperse, and we're going to watch their tactics, how they're looking for the downed pilots, they're looking for the downed air crew, they're going to clear the buildings, they're going to be practicing weapons proficiency, target accuracy, and of course the whole point of this, as you see bad guys come out of you don't know where. The whole point is to minimize collateral damage.

Let's watch them here. We're going to follow along. Here we go. I'm going to have Major Bane (ph) with me. We'll be right behind the troops here.

Let's follow the entry, right here. Here we go.

Focus in on the door, you're going to see them do a breach. As you see the special forces soldiers securing the area, looking for bad guys, looking for any type of threat, getting ready to make entry into the city hall. You can see here, they're up on the door.

Behind me, quickly, if you want to see the flash bang -- Lee, let's have you turn around. They're going to breach the door make entry into the building. You can see the devices that they're setting up. Now what you're sort of seeing, overall picture, all the forces standing by. Everything's about safety and security.

You can see them guarding vehicle, guarding windows all across the buildings.

There we go, now we're going in. Let's go. Follow in the troops.

Once again, I want to remind you it's a live scenario, so we're sort of playing this by ear as -- trying to stay out of the way of the special ops, or special forces soldiers. You can see, it's a 360- degree scenario. They're looking up. They're looking down, side to side, making sure they're making entry into this building safely.

My photographer, Leon, behind the troops, you're going to see how they start to clear this building.

Major Baines (ph), you're with me, tell me how they're clearing -- Leon's following the guys inside the building. How are they clearing this building safely, looking for the downed pilot?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have got different techniques tactics and procedures that we use, but the bottom line is, it's a methodical process, going from room to room.

PHILLIPS: Major Baines (ph) making sure it's secure with my photographer in there.

As you can hear, constant communication. You can hear the soldiers talking to each other, telling each other as each room is cleared. You can hear the live munitions. Looking for the downed pilot.

The explosive sound that you're hearing are flash bangs, very common in -- it's a bit of a distraction device. So a bad guy or an enemy will be taken by surprise.

Major Baines (ph). I'm talking about the flash bangs. And as they clear the room, why don't you talk more as we listen to them clear the room?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The flash bangs increase that element of surprise. Obviously, when we roll into an urban scenario at a certain point in time, the bad guys know we're here. So as we go room from room, clearing the rooms, we use the flash bangs to stun the enemy so we can gain entrance into the room.

PHILLIPS: Now right now, it looks like it's settling down. You can see some of the smoke clearing. Obviously, all the special forces guys in the buildings.

We can hear the flash bangs.

As of right now, what are they thinking? What's going through their mind? How do you stay focused on the objective of rescuing a pilot, and at the same time, trying not to get shot or trying not to shoot innocent civilians?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, gaining entry into the structures is the first and foremost. I mean, they come rolling in here. You saw a simultaneous hit on three different structures. But once they're in the room, they've got to make sure they've got the security within the rooms. And as they're rolling through and clearing the rooms, they're obviously looking for our personnel. They're looking for that downed pilot crew.

PHILLIPS: And of course, you think about a downed pilot, you immediately think Mogadishu, Blackhawk down, not a good scenario, lost lives. If you've seen the movie, it gets so crazy, things get so crazy, it was out of control. That was a lesson learned. How does training like this prevent a scenario like that?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, we've talked in depth off camera about it. The urban scenario is a highly intense combat situation, and by practicing the scenarios in the context of training, what we really get is a soldier who is focused on being able to conduct that training in a systemic fashion and consistently through a series of buildings and apparatuses. It's one thing to do one building and a few rooms at a time, but to put them through the complex exercise that we have here today, what we're really talking about is stretching their limits on all of the capabilities that they've learned.

PHILLIPS: Mentally, physically, weaponry.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Roger.

PHILLIPS: All right, Major, thank you very much.

We're going to continue the live coverage here in this mock city. The operation, the live training, is going to be going on for the next hour and a half. We'll show you various assaults and techniques.

But basically, you know, Anderson, put your mind -- you know, think about Iraq. I mean, you're talking about a small area, or a tight area within Baghdad. I mean, this is a real, live scenario. Special forces would have to deal with situations like this, with buildings like this and different insertion techniques.

COOPER: All right, Kyra Phillips, live in Fort Bragg, pretty exciting stuff. Obviously, urban combat, the most difficult kind of combat there is, something it's good to see our forces are training for.

Thank you very much, Kyra.

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 February 25, 2003 - 13:15   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Having spent time with U.S. Army special forces in Afghanistan and Haiti, I can tell you what you've probably already guessed, nobody in the U.S. Army is smarter or tougher. Army special forces know their area of operations. They speak multiple languages and are specialists, used to the toughest assignments.
Our Kyra Phillips is getting a rare exclusive look behind the scenes at Ft. Bragg, where the Army special forces undergo their tough training.

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Sort of bear with me, OK. We're about 30 seconds away. This is actual live training, special forces soldiers. They're going to be coming into this mock city pretty soon. It seems very quiet now, but it's pretty much going to be a live combat zone, as you can probably tell how we're all geared up. Any minute now, you'll see them coming around in the vehicles, and I'm going to sort of set up the scenario of what's going on.

The scenario is downed air crews in a small city setting. The special forces soldiers -- here we see them coming in on the vehicles right now. They'll going to roll in hot, immediately disperse, and we're going to watch their tactics, how they're looking for the downed pilots, they're looking for the downed air crew, they're going to clear the buildings, they're going to be practicing weapons proficiency, target accuracy, and of course the whole point of this, as you see bad guys come out of you don't know where. The whole point is to minimize collateral damage.

Let's watch them here. We're going to follow along. Here we go. I'm going to have Major Bane (ph) with me. We'll be right behind the troops here.

Let's follow the entry, right here. Here we go.

Focus in on the door, you're going to see them do a breach. As you see the special forces soldiers securing the area, looking for bad guys, looking for any type of threat, getting ready to make entry into the city hall. You can see here, they're up on the door.

Behind me, quickly, if you want to see the flash bang -- Lee, let's have you turn around. They're going to breach the door make entry into the building. You can see the devices that they're setting up. Now what you're sort of seeing, overall picture, all the forces standing by. Everything's about safety and security.

You can see them guarding vehicle, guarding windows all across the buildings.

There we go, now we're going in. Let's go. Follow in the troops.

Once again, I want to remind you it's a live scenario, so we're sort of playing this by ear as -- trying to stay out of the way of the special ops, or special forces soldiers. You can see, it's a 360- degree scenario. They're looking up. They're looking down, side to side, making sure they're making entry into this building safely.

My photographer, Leon, behind the troops, you're going to see how they start to clear this building.

Major Baines (ph), you're with me, tell me how they're clearing -- Leon's following the guys inside the building. How are they clearing this building safely, looking for the downed pilot?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have got different techniques tactics and procedures that we use, but the bottom line is, it's a methodical process, going from room to room.

PHILLIPS: Major Baines (ph) making sure it's secure with my photographer in there.

As you can hear, constant communication. You can hear the soldiers talking to each other, telling each other as each room is cleared. You can hear the live munitions. Looking for the downed pilot.

The explosive sound that you're hearing are flash bangs, very common in -- it's a bit of a distraction device. So a bad guy or an enemy will be taken by surprise.

Major Baines (ph). I'm talking about the flash bangs. And as they clear the room, why don't you talk more as we listen to them clear the room?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The flash bangs increase that element of surprise. Obviously, when we roll into an urban scenario at a certain point in time, the bad guys know we're here. So as we go room from room, clearing the rooms, we use the flash bangs to stun the enemy so we can gain entrance into the room.

PHILLIPS: Now right now, it looks like it's settling down. You can see some of the smoke clearing. Obviously, all the special forces guys in the buildings.

We can hear the flash bangs.

As of right now, what are they thinking? What's going through their mind? How do you stay focused on the objective of rescuing a pilot, and at the same time, trying not to get shot or trying not to shoot innocent civilians?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, gaining entry into the structures is the first and foremost. I mean, they come rolling in here. You saw a simultaneous hit on three different structures. But once they're in the room, they've got to make sure they've got the security within the rooms. And as they're rolling through and clearing the rooms, they're obviously looking for our personnel. They're looking for that downed pilot crew.

PHILLIPS: And of course, you think about a downed pilot, you immediately think Mogadishu, Blackhawk down, not a good scenario, lost lives. If you've seen the movie, it gets so crazy, things get so crazy, it was out of control. That was a lesson learned. How does training like this prevent a scenario like that?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, we've talked in depth off camera about it. The urban scenario is a highly intense combat situation, and by practicing the scenarios in the context of training, what we really get is a soldier who is focused on being able to conduct that training in a systemic fashion and consistently through a series of buildings and apparatuses. It's one thing to do one building and a few rooms at a time, but to put them through the complex exercise that we have here today, what we're really talking about is stretching their limits on all of the capabilities that they've learned.

PHILLIPS: Mentally, physically, weaponry.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Roger.

PHILLIPS: All right, Major, thank you very much.

We're going to continue the live coverage here in this mock city. The operation, the live training, is going to be going on for the next hour and a half. We'll show you various assaults and techniques.

But basically, you know, Anderson, put your mind -- you know, think about Iraq. I mean, you're talking about a small area, or a tight area within Baghdad. I mean, this is a real, live scenario. Special forces would have to deal with situations like this, with buildings like this and different insertion techniques.

COOPER: All right, Kyra Phillips, live in Fort Bragg, pretty exciting stuff. Obviously, urban combat, the most difficult kind of combat there is, something it's good to see our forces are training for.

Thank you very much, Kyra.

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