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Do Americans Care If No Weapons of Mass Destruction Have Been Found in Iraq?
Aired April 16, 2003 - 15:38 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.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Well before the war, President Bush said repeatedly that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and the U.S. would use force if necessary to disarm him. To date, no weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq.
And CNN's Jonathan Mann, reports many Americans don't really care.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JONATHAN MANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): U.S. forces searching a farm near Karbala found suspicious chemicals that turned out to be pesticide. They found a suspicious warhead at Kirkuk, marked in a way suggestive of a chemical weapon. Only it wasn't one.
They found buried containers that were full of military equipment, but not the banned kind. Iraq's chief military scientist, General Amer Hammoudi al-Saadi, who surrendered to U.S. forces, said that's because the weapons of mass destruction that Washington wants just aren't there.
AMER HAMMOUDI AL-SAADI, IRAQ CHIEF MILITARY SCIENTIST: I was knowledgeable about those programs, the past programs. And I was telling the truth, always telling the truth. I haven't told anything but the truth. And time will be bail me out, you will see. There will be no difference after this war.
MANN: Ridding Iraq of its alleged weapons of mass destruction was a cornerstone of the Bush administration's case for attacking Iraq.
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: Indeed, the facts and Iraq's behavior show that Saddam Hussein and his regime are concealing their efforts to produce more weapons of mass destruction.
MANN: And so the obvious irony. The U.S. has won the war without yet finding the very thing it said the war was about.
SCOTT RITTER, FMR. U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: If we don't find them, we've got serious issues. We've got issues with international law. We've got issues here at home about why the president of the United States told Congress these weapons existed, getting Congress to therefore give him war powers action. MANN: The Bush administration says it's confident the weapons are there. But chief of the U.S. Central Command, General Tommy Franks, says there may be 3,000 places to look, and it could take a year to get to them all.
International weapons inspectors are asking to be let back into Iraq to continue their search, but the U.S. believes that Iraqi insiders are more important. People who might come forward more easily now that it's safe and could be lucrative.
BRIG. GEN. VINCENT BROOKS, U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND: People that have knowledge of the weapons of mass destruction program, for example, may be rewarded if they provide information about that program.
MANN: But looters may have been faster than U.S. soldiers or Iraqi experts. The scenes in major cities have reportedly been repeated at some suspect weapons sites which have been robbed before they could be studied.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's going to take the United States quite a long time to search Iraq for weapons of mass destruction and have a complete answer. I mean they may get lucky tomorrow and stumble across a stock of chemical weapons, but they actually have to find everything so they have assurance it's not going to be picked up accidentally by someone and kill them or somehow be stolen and given to an enemy of the United States.
MANN: And, according to one published account, bureaucratic infighting among U.S. authorities has added to the muddle. A competition over the how the search should be conducted and who should conduct tit. But does it matter?
Now that Saddam Hussein is no longer in control of the country, the American public, at least, is split over how vital it is to succeed in the search. A Gallup poll taken just after military action started showed 38 percent of Americans thought the war would be justified, even if no weapons of mass destruction were found. With the war essentially over, that number has jumped to 58 percent.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think that because of the greeting that the American troops got in Iraq, there's going to be -- that there will be a sense of, well, OK, there wasn't any decisive evidence, but there were good effects from it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's important for the American people to find the weapons of mass destruction, because that will justify our purpose being there.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: First and foremost, I think it's most important that the United States and its allies be honest about what they find.
MANN (on camera): It may all come down to honesty. The United States and its allies have clearly won the war in Iraq, and they stand every chance of making it a better place because of that fact. Still, millions of people around the world are deeply suspicious about the U.S. and its motives.
Real progress on the ground in Iraq, real progress on its weapons of mass destruction may be the only way to put those suspicions to rest.
Jonathan Mann, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Been Found in Iraq?>
Aired April 16, 2003 - 15:38 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Well before the war, President Bush said repeatedly that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and the U.S. would use force if necessary to disarm him. To date, no weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq.
And CNN's Jonathan Mann, reports many Americans don't really care.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JONATHAN MANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): U.S. forces searching a farm near Karbala found suspicious chemicals that turned out to be pesticide. They found a suspicious warhead at Kirkuk, marked in a way suggestive of a chemical weapon. Only it wasn't one.
They found buried containers that were full of military equipment, but not the banned kind. Iraq's chief military scientist, General Amer Hammoudi al-Saadi, who surrendered to U.S. forces, said that's because the weapons of mass destruction that Washington wants just aren't there.
AMER HAMMOUDI AL-SAADI, IRAQ CHIEF MILITARY SCIENTIST: I was knowledgeable about those programs, the past programs. And I was telling the truth, always telling the truth. I haven't told anything but the truth. And time will be bail me out, you will see. There will be no difference after this war.
MANN: Ridding Iraq of its alleged weapons of mass destruction was a cornerstone of the Bush administration's case for attacking Iraq.
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: Indeed, the facts and Iraq's behavior show that Saddam Hussein and his regime are concealing their efforts to produce more weapons of mass destruction.
MANN: And so the obvious irony. The U.S. has won the war without yet finding the very thing it said the war was about.
SCOTT RITTER, FMR. U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: If we don't find them, we've got serious issues. We've got issues with international law. We've got issues here at home about why the president of the United States told Congress these weapons existed, getting Congress to therefore give him war powers action. MANN: The Bush administration says it's confident the weapons are there. But chief of the U.S. Central Command, General Tommy Franks, says there may be 3,000 places to look, and it could take a year to get to them all.
International weapons inspectors are asking to be let back into Iraq to continue their search, but the U.S. believes that Iraqi insiders are more important. People who might come forward more easily now that it's safe and could be lucrative.
BRIG. GEN. VINCENT BROOKS, U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND: People that have knowledge of the weapons of mass destruction program, for example, may be rewarded if they provide information about that program.
MANN: But looters may have been faster than U.S. soldiers or Iraqi experts. The scenes in major cities have reportedly been repeated at some suspect weapons sites which have been robbed before they could be studied.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's going to take the United States quite a long time to search Iraq for weapons of mass destruction and have a complete answer. I mean they may get lucky tomorrow and stumble across a stock of chemical weapons, but they actually have to find everything so they have assurance it's not going to be picked up accidentally by someone and kill them or somehow be stolen and given to an enemy of the United States.
MANN: And, according to one published account, bureaucratic infighting among U.S. authorities has added to the muddle. A competition over the how the search should be conducted and who should conduct tit. But does it matter?
Now that Saddam Hussein is no longer in control of the country, the American public, at least, is split over how vital it is to succeed in the search. A Gallup poll taken just after military action started showed 38 percent of Americans thought the war would be justified, even if no weapons of mass destruction were found. With the war essentially over, that number has jumped to 58 percent.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think that because of the greeting that the American troops got in Iraq, there's going to be -- that there will be a sense of, well, OK, there wasn't any decisive evidence, but there were good effects from it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's important for the American people to find the weapons of mass destruction, because that will justify our purpose being there.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: First and foremost, I think it's most important that the United States and its allies be honest about what they find.
MANN (on camera): It may all come down to honesty. The United States and its allies have clearly won the war in Iraq, and they stand every chance of making it a better place because of that fact. Still, millions of people around the world are deeply suspicious about the U.S. and its motives.
Real progress on the ground in Iraq, real progress on its weapons of mass destruction may be the only way to put those suspicions to rest.
Jonathan Mann, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Been Found in Iraq?>
