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General Franks Says U.S. Forces Ready for War

Aired March 06, 2003 - 13:17   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.


HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: General Tommy Franks says U.S. forces are ready for war, if and when President Bush pulls the trigger on Iraq.
But Pentagon officials say this would not be like the Persian Gulf War, it would be much different than the war in 1991.

Our military analyst Major General Don Shepperd is here now with some insight on it all.

Thanks for being here. We appreciate it.

MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD, (RET.) CNN MILITARY ANALYST: My pleasure, Heidi.

COLLINS: Let's talk for a moment, if we could. We were mentioning in the break, that some of the principles of war, that they really haven't changed for years and years and years to come. One of them, we were talking about mass, meaning that you go in with everything you've got, right off the bat.

SHEPPERD: Yes, I can't quote Sun-Tsu (ph), but it hasn't changed much since that time. In Civil War language, they said get there firstist with the mostest, and the idea is to have overwhelming force at the point of attack. Decide what you want to attack, overwhelm the defenses, get in and get out fast, and that's the shock and awe we've been talking about with the air attacks is about, too -- Heidi.

COLLINS: Can we expect, then, the U.S. to drop more bombs?

SHEPPERD: Yes, reportedly, we're going to hit about ten times the number of tarts in the first 48 hours of the war than we hit during the Gulf War. And the difference this time, is much more of it will be precise-guided munitions. In the Gulf War, about 20 percent guided munitions, precision munitions. This war, probably in the upwards of upwards of 70 percent.

COLLINS: Let's talk about that for a moment. I know in the Gulf War, these were laser-guided. Now we are talk about GPS-guided. Laser-guided being sort of inhibited by the weather possibly. Now we have a little bit better chance of not having that worry.

SHEPPERD: Yes, indeed. Basically, we have global position system satellites, satellite constellations that give us precise geographical information about coordinates enable us to locate them with great precision. They're much more accurate than laser-guided bombs. Let's say it would be about 50 feet, this may be 10 feet. And you don't have to have good weather, you can deliver them anytime, day or night, through any kind of weather. So it gives up a big step up from what we had in the Gulf War.

COLLINS: What about some of the of aircraft? I know the stealth is going.

SHEPPERD: Yes, stealth is going to be important. You'll see very early in the attacks, B2 stealth bombers, and you'll also see stealth fighters, some tomahawk missiles fired off the ship, all of that in the opening hours of the war, to roll back the air defense, put out the early warning radar, hit the fixed missile sites and hit key targets as well. So non-stealthy airplanes can come in more safely behind them.

COLLINS: And, again, those Tomahawk missiles are only going to be launched from the ships.

SHEPPERD: Right, tomahawk missiles basically are going launched from ships in the gulf. We've got five carriers, going to six carriers in there now, two in the Mediterranean, two in the Persian Gulf, two in the Red Sea is what it's shaping up to be. And of course you've got the stealth bombers from Diego Garcia and stealth fighters coming from the Gulf itself.

COLLINS: Will the U.S. go after Saddam Hussein himself, right off the bat?

SHEPPERD: Yes, basically, we're going after leadership targets. And our experience has been that Saddam will be with the leadership in underground bunkers. So we are going to go after all command and control, all communications, all leadership targets and bunkers that we can find. If Saddam is there, so be it. So it's not a case of us just going after him as a person, it's a case of going after those things that prosecute the war. Experience tell us he'll probably be with them.

COLLINS: Right, and we're looking at a graphic now of his most significant palace, kind of homebase, if you will, and this thing is huge. You're talking about it in comparison to Buckingham Palace. Yes, it's many, many acres, and it's in downtown Baghdad.

Now what we had to do in the old days, if we wanted to hit this palace, we'd have to come in with waves of bomber, carpet bombing, if you will, hit the whole thing. Now we have the ability to go after precision, pinpoint strikes within this acres complex, and hit targets that are buried underground so we don't have to wipe out surrounding civilian areas, and can hit what we're after with great precision. It won't be easy. It won't be errorless. But again, it keeps down the collateral damage, and we don't have to destroy infrastructure. So we have tremendous capability, compared even what we had in the Gulf War.

COLLINS: Right, and also, what about the weapons manufacturing facilities?

SHEPPERD: Yes. Basically, we are -- we have been told from a weapon's standpoint, he is going to continue to manufacture missiles. We're gathering all the intelligence we can on those facilities. We're going to take them out, particularly chemical, biological, any weapons of mass destruction storage. We're going to be after that type of thing with precision munitions.

COLLINS: Like the Salman biological weapons research facility.

SHEPPERD: Yes, Salman Pak, the other places that we went after during the war, we're going to be after some of those again, and new places that we've discovered through intelligence.

COLLINS: All right, Major General Don Shepperd, we appreciate you being here so much, and we're going to talk to you again next hour.

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 March 6, 2003 - 13:17   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: General Tommy Franks says U.S. forces are ready for war, if and when President Bush pulls the trigger on Iraq.
But Pentagon officials say this would not be like the Persian Gulf War, it would be much different than the war in 1991.

Our military analyst Major General Don Shepperd is here now with some insight on it all.

Thanks for being here. We appreciate it.

MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD, (RET.) CNN MILITARY ANALYST: My pleasure, Heidi.

COLLINS: Let's talk for a moment, if we could. We were mentioning in the break, that some of the principles of war, that they really haven't changed for years and years and years to come. One of them, we were talking about mass, meaning that you go in with everything you've got, right off the bat.

SHEPPERD: Yes, I can't quote Sun-Tsu (ph), but it hasn't changed much since that time. In Civil War language, they said get there firstist with the mostest, and the idea is to have overwhelming force at the point of attack. Decide what you want to attack, overwhelm the defenses, get in and get out fast, and that's the shock and awe we've been talking about with the air attacks is about, too -- Heidi.

COLLINS: Can we expect, then, the U.S. to drop more bombs?

SHEPPERD: Yes, reportedly, we're going to hit about ten times the number of tarts in the first 48 hours of the war than we hit during the Gulf War. And the difference this time, is much more of it will be precise-guided munitions. In the Gulf War, about 20 percent guided munitions, precision munitions. This war, probably in the upwards of upwards of 70 percent.

COLLINS: Let's talk about that for a moment. I know in the Gulf War, these were laser-guided. Now we are talk about GPS-guided. Laser-guided being sort of inhibited by the weather possibly. Now we have a little bit better chance of not having that worry.

SHEPPERD: Yes, indeed. Basically, we have global position system satellites, satellite constellations that give us precise geographical information about coordinates enable us to locate them with great precision. They're much more accurate than laser-guided bombs. Let's say it would be about 50 feet, this may be 10 feet. And you don't have to have good weather, you can deliver them anytime, day or night, through any kind of weather. So it gives up a big step up from what we had in the Gulf War.

COLLINS: What about some of the of aircraft? I know the stealth is going.

SHEPPERD: Yes, stealth is going to be important. You'll see very early in the attacks, B2 stealth bombers, and you'll also see stealth fighters, some tomahawk missiles fired off the ship, all of that in the opening hours of the war, to roll back the air defense, put out the early warning radar, hit the fixed missile sites and hit key targets as well. So non-stealthy airplanes can come in more safely behind them.

COLLINS: And, again, those Tomahawk missiles are only going to be launched from the ships.

SHEPPERD: Right, tomahawk missiles basically are going launched from ships in the gulf. We've got five carriers, going to six carriers in there now, two in the Mediterranean, two in the Persian Gulf, two in the Red Sea is what it's shaping up to be. And of course you've got the stealth bombers from Diego Garcia and stealth fighters coming from the Gulf itself.

COLLINS: Will the U.S. go after Saddam Hussein himself, right off the bat?

SHEPPERD: Yes, basically, we're going after leadership targets. And our experience has been that Saddam will be with the leadership in underground bunkers. So we are going to go after all command and control, all communications, all leadership targets and bunkers that we can find. If Saddam is there, so be it. So it's not a case of us just going after him as a person, it's a case of going after those things that prosecute the war. Experience tell us he'll probably be with them.

COLLINS: Right, and we're looking at a graphic now of his most significant palace, kind of homebase, if you will, and this thing is huge. You're talking about it in comparison to Buckingham Palace. Yes, it's many, many acres, and it's in downtown Baghdad.

Now what we had to do in the old days, if we wanted to hit this palace, we'd have to come in with waves of bomber, carpet bombing, if you will, hit the whole thing. Now we have the ability to go after precision, pinpoint strikes within this acres complex, and hit targets that are buried underground so we don't have to wipe out surrounding civilian areas, and can hit what we're after with great precision. It won't be easy. It won't be errorless. But again, it keeps down the collateral damage, and we don't have to destroy infrastructure. So we have tremendous capability, compared even what we had in the Gulf War.

COLLINS: Right, and also, what about the weapons manufacturing facilities?

SHEPPERD: Yes. Basically, we are -- we have been told from a weapon's standpoint, he is going to continue to manufacture missiles. We're gathering all the intelligence we can on those facilities. We're going to take them out, particularly chemical, biological, any weapons of mass destruction storage. We're going to be after that type of thing with precision munitions.

COLLINS: Like the Salman biological weapons research facility.

SHEPPERD: Yes, Salman Pak, the other places that we went after during the war, we're going to be after some of those again, and new places that we've discovered through intelligence.

COLLINS: All right, Major General Don Shepperd, we appreciate you being here so much, and we're going to talk to you again next hour.

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