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U.S. Troops Wounded in Mosul Arrive at Ramstein Air Base; Casualties From Mosul Attack Cause High Anxiety for Family, Friends; Sticking to the Mission
Aired December 22, 2004 - 10:59 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.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Our Matthew Chance is there at that airbase to tell us more about this operation.
Going slowly, but incredibly, that is on purpose -- Matthew.
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It is, Daryn, a painstaking process in the bitterly-cold weather here in southern Germany at the Ramstein Air Base where this U.S. military aircraft right behind me is still in the process of offloading the 40 to 50 or so injured, many of whom are from the Mosul attack which, of course, killed 22 and injured 72 others. Other planes like this one are being readied, we're told by military officials, to bring any further injured here to the Ramstein Air Base, where they'll be transported, of course, to the Landstuhl Medical Hospital, a short distance from here, if that is deemed to be necessary in the hours or in the days ahead. For the moment, though, this is the only plane that has been scheduled.
We've been seeing over the course of the past hour, as you mentioned, some of those individuals being carried off. The most critical of those injured on board carried off on stretchers, looking in very poor condition, indeed, on the shoulders of some of the military personnel, surrounding the gang plank into the back of that aircraft.
We're not permitted to go too close to the injured. We're not allowed to show any faces, no close-ups, no images that would render any of those injured recognizable to the family members. Those are the terms in which we're actually like here, the terms set by the U.S. military.
What we do know is those people on board, some of whom who will be able to walk, most of whom are being carried off on stretchers, will be taken as soon as possible to the nearby Landstuhl medical facility, the biggest U.S. Army hospital outside of the United States, where they'll receive the kind of specialist medical attention and intensive care that they need to gain their strength so they can be put on an aircraft back home to the U.S. -- Daryn.
KAGAN: All right. We will get back with you, Matthew. We're going to keep the live picture up from the Ramstein Air Base -- Randi.
RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR: And in the meantime, we'll visit once again with Kathleen Koch, who is joining us today from the Pentagon.
Kathleen, just talking a little bit more about the investigation of exactly what happened yesterday there at Camp Marez, we know that the FBI is on the ground there beginning that investigation, trying to find out exactly what happened. They have a team of forensic experts there, but already Lieutenant General Thomas Metz was saying that this is a certain possibility that a bomb was placed inside that tent.
How long before we might know this for sure?
KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Randi, that's very tough to say, because this is an investigation obviously going on as we speak. And that was a large dining hall, the size of a football field. So they've got a great distance to cover, a lot of evidence to pour over.
And again, the military's first thought was that this was indeed a rocket because this was a dining hall that had been attacked numerous times before in the past, some 30 times alone this year by mortars, though they never scored a direct hit. So that was their first instinct.
But as I had been reporting earlier, and Karl Penhaul did just a few minutes ago, we hear from this Task Force Olympia spokesman that these tiny concentric perforations like those of a ball bearing have been found in the stainless kitchen equipment and other areas in the tent, which might indicate something, that they were used as shrapnel in a bomb in order to increase the deadly nature of the bomb. But it's going to take a while for military investigators and for the FBI to pour through all the evidence they have.
But obviously this is one thing that does show that this kind of structure that is being built right now, something out of steel, out of concrete, will afford troops in Iraq much more protection. But as we've been told by a spokesman for the multinational forces there, Lieutenant Colonel -- Lieutenant Colonel Steven Boylan, that that's just simply not possible throughout Iraq. When you have 138,000 forces there, sprinkled throughout the country, you can't have that kind of a hardened structure.
Most of them simply have to deal with these tents and deal with large numbers of them meeting in one place at a time, where -- which is very predictable on the part of insurgents, morning, midday and evening. So they know they're going to continue to be vulnerable -- Randi.
KAYE: All right. Kathleen, we'll be back to you shortly.
KAGAN: And as we stay with live pictures from Ramstein Air Base, want to go to the phones. And one of our military analysts, Major General Don Shepperd, retired from the Air Force National Guard joining us by phone.
General, good morning.
MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD, U.S. AIR FORCE (RET.): Good morning, Daryn.
KAGAN: As we are watching stretcher after stretcher being brought off, the first question that came to mind, I thought, you know what? This isn't a question for the general, it's a question for his wife. What is it like to be the family members waiting and wondering and trying to get a word about their loved one serving overseas?
SHEPPERD: Daryn, I can't imagine anything worse than being a family member waiting to wonder if my son or my daughter was in that dining hall, if they were -- if they were injured, if they were -- if they were dead. It's just -- it's as tough as it gets.
Of course the holiday times also exacerbate the situation. But these are -- these are very difficult times. And it's hard for us to watch this. We've watched it too many times over the years.
KAGAN: An infrastructure question for you, something that Kathleen Koch was just talking about. How they were, you know, just days from completing this harder, tougher structure. But she also makes a point you cannot -- by the nature of the mission and the operation, you cannot have higher protection for the men and women that are serving out there in the field. You are going to have soft structures, you are going to have tents, and you are going to have exposure.
SHEPPERD: Yes, Kathleen was right on the mark. You've got 138,000 troops over there. You have tens, if not hundreds, of locations in which they're gathered. And you have to gather them to protect them.
You can't just have them disbursed all ever the country or you'd have chaos, inability to do military missions. So you can't put them all in hard structures. There's going to be soft structures. You're going to be vulnerable, and that's part of the risk that the military simply accepts.
KAGAN: If we have the photos available from yesterday, if we can put a few of those up, to our producers in the control room. These photos coming out just as we were on the air.
General, the story that they tell, where you see one injured soldier taking care of a soldier who might be more injured, one coming to the aid of another, it tells a story unlike any words I think can.
SHEPPERD: Yes. Pictures are very powerful. And that's -- what the military does is everybody is trained in buddy care. That's your first level of care.
When someone is injured, you take care of your buddy, you take care of yourself. First of all, you take care of yourself. Then you take care of your buddy.
Then you're evacuated for immediate medical care to a medical facility in the theater, and then you're evacuated out of the theater and eventually back to the states, if needed. So it's a well-ordered system there, but everybody is trained in all facets of this thing to save lives. And we've saved -- you know, we've saved hundreds of lives in this situation and, of course, in others.
KAGAN: And as night falls in Germany, and they continue to bring out stretcher after stretcher of wounded soldiers, they are being taken by ambulance to the Landstuhl U.S. Military Hospital. General, I don't know how familiar you are with this particular facility, but -- but it is huge and it has played a huge role in helping mend soldiers that have been hurt all around the world.
SHEPPERD: Yes. I've been to Landstuhl, I was stationed in Germany. As a matter of fact, I've been to Marez where these casualties are coming from as well.
And the system is an amazing system. And in Landstuhl they are experts in traumatic injuries and in life-saving. These medical evacuation crews and these C-7 teams that are bringing the injured in are experts in critical care, in keeping the people alive until they can get them to a facility. They are stabilized in Iraq, then they are given en-route care by these expert medical evacuation teams, most of them Reservists, as a matter of fact, and then they're taken to Landstuhl, where they get medical care just like you would in any large hospital in the United States.
KAGAN: Well, and you bring up a good point. And I know we can't take our cameras inside that plane, but there is a great story to be told in there. Because consider, it's a cargo plane, it's a big empty shell. And before these patients are loaded on board it has to be instantly converted to a moving, flying hospital.
SHEPPERD: Yes. They're designed from scratch to do this. And you can put in litters, as well as carry cargo on these things.
And the troops, again, are trained to do this. They're trained in IVs and all of the things necessary.
There are nurses and doctors on board. And the system, they will not allow the news media to get anywhere near the airplanes once they get in, for obvious privacy reasons there. It is -- it's a well- ordered system, and the troops and families can feel good that they're feeling -- that they're getting the best of care in tough situations.
KAGAN: And we appreciate you with your insight on how the system works and helping us to understand it better. General Shepperd, thank you for your time.
SHEPPERD: A pleasure.
KAYE: As we've been telling you all morning, investigators from the FBI are in Mosul this morning to help determine the cause of the explosion. The possibilities include a rocket, a mortar or even planted bomb. Two reporters were among those at the scene of yesterday's attack, and here's how they described the immediate aftermath of the deadly blast.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
JEREMY REDMON, "RICHMOND TIMES-DISPATCH": There were hundreds of soldiers in there having lunch at the time. And then it was a bright blue sky, very few clouds, people were cheery, they were having lunch, enjoying themselves when it happened. And as soon as the explosion and the fireball occurred, scores of soldiers ran out of the tents and crammed into these concrete blast barriers. And then I ran out and was observing what was going on.
There were folks that were in shock. There was blood all over the floor, food, trays. It tore a pretty large hole in the roof of the tent.
Outside, they set up a -- several medics had showed up and set up an area, where they're working on the soldiers in the parking lot. It was really just sort of a sea of wounded and dead.
There were people crying. There were folks that were numb, that collapsed in grief. It really was unreal.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BILL NEMITZ, "PORTLAND PRESS HERALD": It was just truly remarkable what these soldiers were doing. I mean, I saw -- I saw a triage area immediately take form outside the entrance to the dining facility. I saw soldiers, both Iraqi and American, carrying litters out, civilians doing that as well. You might think at first glance that it was a chaotic scene, but the more you looked it, the more you could see the order of it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KAGAN: And we're going to continue to keep those live pictures up from Ramstein Air Base. While we do, let's look at some numbers that help tell the story as they bring off another soldier on a stretcher.
This attack near Mosul was among the deadliest to date against U.S. forces. A total of 22 people were killed, 14 of those were U.S. soldiers. Four were American civilians and four were Iraqi security personnel.
Seventy-two were wounded, including 51 U.S. soldiers. Many of those we see coming off the plane there at Ramstein. Thirty-five of the soldiers, many in critical condition, flown here to go to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. The attack raises the overall death toll for U.S. forces in Iraq to more than 1,300.
About 4,500 of the troops deployed in Mosul are based in Fort Lewis, Washington. The high number of casualties in yesterday's attack has caused understandably high anxiety back home among family and friends. Our Kimberly Osias has our report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KIMBERLY OSIAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Melissa Doss got an early morning e-mail from her husband, a battalion personnel officer serving in Mosul, saying he was alive and uninjured. But she's still feeling the loss of life there. MELISSA DOSS, SOLDIER'S WIFE: I'm happy that I know, but I feel guilty. I have that guilt that I know my husband's OK and I know there's other families that know that their soldier's OK, but there's a lot that don't. And I feel guilty that I know and they don't.
OSIAS: Doss is a support group leader talking to families of other soldiers at the base.
DOSS: Right now, it's just consoling, you know, giving them -- letting them know that there's somebody here to talk to if they need anything.
OSIAS: Raw nerves at the headquarters of the 276th Engineering Battalion in Virginia, where she lives. In the hometown paper, conflicting images, a ray of sunlight streaming in through the blown- out mess hall tent, soldier helping soldier, brothers in arms trying to escape to safety.
Serving there, 4,500 of Fort Lewis' Stryker Brigade in Washington State. Since Operation Iraqi Freedom broke out, this bridge has worn yellow ribbons and hosted the base's most ardent supporters.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I feel kind of crying and weeping. And I said I have to pray for the people that got injured and killed, and their relatives, too.
OSIAS: Young's (ph) Barber Shop is less than a click. That's military talk for about a half a mile away from base. Haircuts are still $6 unless soldiers are getting a buzz, which is most of the business here. Soldiers come to relax, especially today.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's real tragedy, you know, especially right before Christmas.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm waiting -- waiting for e-mails, waiting for something to let me know that they're all right.
OSIAS: Cesar Contrarez (ph) was one of the lucky ones. He just got back from Mosul a month ago. For him and many like him, there's a pall over Fort Lewis and other bases this Christmas as everyone watches and waits.
Kimberly Osias, CNN, Fort Lewis, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAYE: And let's take you now back live back to Ramstein Air Base there. A full picture for you. Matthew Chance standing by there on the ground.
Matthew, tell us a little bit about -- we're seeing a lot of the soldiers coming off with some very heavy equipment on them on those stretchers. Apparently, this equipment obviously is to help with their vitals, help them breathe, help keep them alive. Give us an idea of exactly how they might have been treated, if you can, while on that plane, which is apparently basically a mobile ICU. CHANCE: Well, that's absolutely exactly what it is. I think obviously the first thing that would have been done, first-aid at the scene, where the actual attack took place. But then many of them were taken either to medical facilities in Mosul, elsewhere in Iraq, even outside of Iraq to get the kind of specialist attention they needed to actually stabilize them enough to make this six-hour journey by aircraft from Balad, which is just to the north, an air base just to the north of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, and to touch down here at the Ramstein Air Base in southern Germany.
But you're right. On board this C-141 Starlifter U.S. aircraft, there's a great deal of medical equipment on board, all of it needed, of course, simply to keep these people alive. Eight of those individuals on board, and there are as many as 50 injured, most of which are from the Mosul incident, are in critical condition, which means extremely serious injuries indeed.
And you can imagine what kind of injuries we're talking about when you see those injuries of the devastation caused by that blast, the mortar attack, the bomb attack, whatever it turns out to have been in that dining facility in the camp in Mosul. Some people have lost limbs, other people, we're told by medical officials, will have to lose limbs as a result of operations they'll receive at the Landstuhl medical facility just down the road.
At least eight of them, as I say, in critical condition. Only 13 out of the 50 on board are able to walk. The rest are being carried off by stretcher -- Daryn.
KAYE: And Matthew, I know that we are -- we're obviously focusing here on the wounded soldiers as they come off the airplane and their well being. But let's talk a little bit about the medical staff that is on board that airplane.
Quite a long day they've had. It apparently began in Germany, then they flew to -- they flew to Baghdad, reconfigured the entire plane, and now are here back in Germany at the air base, bringing these folks out. They are certainly to be commended for the work that they're doing inside that C-141.
CHANCE: Absolutely. And it's been quite a scramble from the outset because, as we've been reporting all along, it was an unexpected attack. There was no battle raging in Iraq when this happened, there was no planned offensive under way at which they could have expected some kind of casualties.
It was a relatively quiet period, certainly from the points of view of the hospital workers at the Landstuhl medical facility. So they had to scramble to get the right teams out of their Christmas and holiday vacation, to get them back from that, to get them over to Iraq, to reconfigure the aircraft to make sure that it was equipped well enough take so many injured, so many critically ill patients, the six-hour journey to Landstuhl.
And now, they're back here in Germany, debriefing the medical teams that have been waiting here on the ground or on the airstrip who will take this short few-mile journey to the Landstuhl Hospital from this air base in this driving and freezing snow in southern Germany, whereupon those people will be offloaded again. And that again will take another couple of hours to get those people out of the ambulances, into their hospital beds as well, and for them to be given the kind of surgery, the kind of attention, the kind of intensive care that they're going to need to get stronger so that they can eventually, perhaps in a few days for some, perhaps longer than that for many, for them to be strong enough to go back to the U.S. to their homes.
KAYE: All right. Our Matthew Chance, live at Ramstein Air Force Base. Thank you.
KAGAN: We've been monitoring this event as the soldiers are loaded off the plane for just about an hour and 15 minutes now. And while it was taking place, there was another event that we showed you live, and we want to go back and talk about and see once again.
It was thousands of miles away in the Washington, D.C., at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall. You had people who had put together greetings for U.S. military members all around the world, reading those greetings, and then a Christmas tree placed on top of the wall.
So, once again, let's listen -- while we keep these live pictures up, let's listen to those greetings from the wall.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "Today, I remember and pray for my daughter in the United States Army in Iraq. Merry Christmas, Julie (ph). Come home to us" -- Jane Goodman (ph).
I just might want to add. I pray the day we all come home safe and be with our families. Happy holidays to all. Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: From Ann Chalmers (ph), "We appreciate what you have done for us and our country. Thanks."
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There are no words I could ever write to let you know what I feel in my heart for you all. You humble me with the sacrifices you have made. God bless you and keep you throughout eternity. And I hope all our guys come home and our women. Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To all who have served or will serve, you will not be forgotten. I'd just like to add that I'm an OIF veteran. I'll be going back next week to finish the mission. And I want to extend my thoughts and prayers to my comrades who are over there now, and all the soldiers, especially the ones in Mosul yesterday, and pray that all our guys come home safe.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "Thanks for everything." And as a personal note, I would like to say happy holidays to all the servicemen and women serving overseas in Iraq and Afghanistan, to everybody. Merry Christmas, Happy New Year. Thanks. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "May this wall always be a reminder of those who sacrificed their lives and all who served in this war in service to our country and our ordeals" -- Vernon L. Olsen (ph). "Your courage and dedication to the freedom of our country will always be remembered by our family." -- Shirley B.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "All of you war heroes are truly honorable men and women with dignity. I salute you and support you to the fullest. Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, and thanks for the service and devotion to this great country." -- David.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "Dear American hero, during this holiday season you are remembered with honor and love and gratitude. My thoughts and prayers are with you all. Your thoughtful friend, Dorothy, Reynoldsville, Pennsylvania."
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "May the joy and spirit of the holiday season heal the hearts of the families and friends of the soldiers who gave the ultimate sacrifice." Sincerely, Donald Kraus Sr. (ph).
Merry Christmas.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "God bless you. You will never be forgotten. What more can a man do than lay down his life for another?" -- Guy Caltech (ph), U.S. Navy, retired.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "To all my brothers and sisters, may you rest in peace and know that you're not forgotten. With love, Doc and Marion (ph)."
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KAGAN: What we've been watching the last few minutes on the left side of the screen and listening in to, that was a ceremony that took place about an hour ago at the wall, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall. People and volunteers reading greetings to U.S. military members all around the world.
On the right side we have not left the picture of -- from Ramstein Air Base in Germany. Soldier after soldier -- wounded soldier after soldier being offloaded from that cargo plane on to buses that are serving as ambulances, taking them to the U.S. military hospital in Landstuhl.
While the care for the wounded takes place in Germany, questions still back in Iraq about what caused and who caused and how was this attack caused yesterday. For more on that, let's check in with our Kathleen Koch, who is at the Pentagon this morning -- Kathleen.
KOCH: And, Daryn, let's talk a little about the insurgencies, because indeed the Pentagon had expected that the insurgents in Iraq would, as the January election day approached, try to mount more such large, dramatic and deadly attacks. And so they had been taking measures in recent weeks to really limit the exposure of U.S. troops on the ground to the insurgents. They've been moving much, much more in the way of supplies and manpower by air in Iraq than ever before. And when it came to the few convoys that did still have to operate on the ground, they've been changing their routes, the timing and the directions that they were taking so that those would not be so predictable, so that the forces in those convoys would not be such predictable targets.
And then, also, there is the issue of the armored vehicles. Obviously, after that exchange between the defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, and a soldier in Kuwait about unarmored vehicles, now the military is saying that they will, by June, they expect, to have every single wheeled vehicle in Iraq armored at a cost of some $4.1 billion. Right now, about 40 percent of them still don't have enough armor.
So -- so the military has been doing quite a bit. But again, when it comes to these dining halls, these very large football field- sized structures, there's only so much that they can do as far as hardening them. We do know that there is a steel and concrete structure that is being built right now at Camp Marez and should soon be finished. But they simply can't do that throughout Iraq for every single soldier on the ground when you have some 138,000 -- Daryn.
KAGAN: And what about the military investigation and the FBI getting involved, trying to figure out the cause, the exact cause of yesterday's explosion?
KOCH: Well, again, they're still looking at three things; rocket, mortar, or the possibility of a bomb. There is an Islamic militant group that on a Web site has claimed that it was a suicide attack carried out by one person. And we are told by a Camp Olympia spokesperson that indeed they have found concentric little metal holes in pieces of the stainless steel equipment, kitchen equipment that was there in the tent and in other areas of the tent that could indicate something like ball bearings were used to produce shrapnel to make the explosion even more deadly.
So the investigators, military investigators, and FBI will be looking at. And they do indeed tell us that there are a large number of Iraqis who do have access to the U.S. military facilities. They're workers there.
When they come on to base, they do have to show an ID. They are looked at. They are sometimes searched, but not always completely searched, we're told. And then once they go on the base and go about their work, they're largely unattended. So they're going to be looking very carefully at the roster of the Iraqis who were working at Camp Marez, how many of them, who are they, and where are they now -- Daryn.
KAGAN: All right. Kathleen Koch, we'll be back to you at the Pentagon -- Randi.
KAYE: In the meantime, we're going to stick with these live pictures here from Ramstein Air Base Germany as we move on just a little bit. A North Carolina company that makes "Support Our Troops" magnets is vowing to stick to its mission. The firm has been forced to lay off half of its staff, and that is due to overseas knockoffs. But as CNN's Lisa Sylvester reports, some American ingenuity is helping the company stay ahead.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LISA SYLVESTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): You see them everywhere, on cars and trucks, those yellow "Support Our Troops" ribbons. The original yellow magnets are from King, North Carolina, where about 70,000 are made a month. The owner of Magnet America is motivated not by money, but a mission.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was a -- I thought it was a really neat symbol, a neat way for somebody that maybe had a loved one over there to be able to express that without -- by just putting something on their car.
SYLVESTER: The idea to make the yellow magnets came from a local screen printer.
CHRIS SMITH, KING INTERNATIONAL CORP.: April of last year, I read an article in the local paper about a shortage of yellow ribbon that was being manufactured up north, and kind of put the idea with what we were already doing, which was car magnets.
SYLVESTER: Dwayne Golian (ph) wanted to market and distribute the ribbon magnets as a way to raise make money to help support military families.
(on camera): True to its word, Magnet America has been supporting the troops. The company donated $42,000 to Freedom Calls, a nonprofit that help soldiers communicate with their families back at home.
(voice-over): But knockoffs from overseas are undercutting the company's business. The ribbons on the right are from Magnet America. The copycat from the left made in Taiwan. Magnet America has let go about half of its staff.
DEREK LONG, MAGNET AMERICA: It upsets you to see that, you know, we were out here trying to -- you know, a good cause. Not just to make a fast dollar, but to actually help the community, help our country, help the troops.
SYLVESTER: To stay ahead of the competition, Magnet America has branched out, making ribbons in various colors, sizes, shapes and for different causes. But one thing will remain the same: the magnets will continue to be made in America.
Lisa Sylvester, CNN, North Carolina.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: And as we watch more and more soldiers being carried off the cargo plane at Ramstein Air Base, as night falls in Germany, want to think and talk about the family members back here in the U.S., perhaps some in Germany, actually stationed around the world. When word of this attack took place, of course, the immediate worry began on the part of the family members.
One wife of a soldier based there, Trish Otto, spoke with CNN about what the wait is like to find out if her husband was OK.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRISH OTTO, SOLDIER'S WIFE: He called, and it was after the incident, because they were ahead of us. He called and said, "Hi, honey. I just want to let you know that I'm OK and I love you very much." And immediately I knew something was wrong.
He said, "I can't talk, but something bad has happened. And I can't talk right now. I have to go. I love you." And then he hung up.
I was horrified. I was upset. I knew that he was OK. I didn't know if he was completely OK. But I was really upset for the soldiers.
I wasn't sure what was going to happen next, if there was going to be another attack. I was just -- I was filled with emotions, not knowing, like I said, what was going to happen next, when I was going to hear from him again. Not knowing, you know, what the other families were thinking, what was going on, knowing that they were not going to hear from their soldiers. I got a lucky call.
He's holding up really well. He's a very strong man, a very decent, honorable person. He would give his life for one of his soldiers.
I think deep in his heart he is hurting. But I could not tell that by his IMs. He just said, "I'm exhausted, I'm tired. I have to keep my men up, I have to keep their morale up, and get our missions completed so we can come home."
It is a rollercoaster. I cried a lot of tears yesterday, mainly for the families that won't have soldiers coming back home to them, all the people out there serving our country.
I just have so much love for them giving their lives for us, and the ones just that are -- that are going to be coming home, and their families. I'm thinking of everyone. My heart -- my heart goes out to them. My prayers go out to them.
It's just full of emotion. I can only imagine what all the other families are going through right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KAGAN: And we're coming up on the half-hour here. Live pictures from Ramstein Air Base. We've been watching these pictures for over an hour-and-a-half now, as soldier after injured soldier carried off the cargo plane put on the bus. And it appears, as was the plan, they took off the more critical soldiers first.
We saw as those were carried off, those stretchers having a lot of equipment attached, moving a lot more slowly. That last soldier we just saw loaded, you could tell that he was awake and alert and moving his head and looking around where he was. Where he is is on the way to getting some very good medical attention.
Our Matthew Chance has been with us this entire time from Germany at the Ramstein Air Base. Matthew, if you could recap what we've been watching for our viewers just joining us and those that have been with us.
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Daryn, over the course of past hour and half, the painstaking procedure of offloading the -- between 40 to 50 injured that have come in mainly from that incident, that attack, that devastating attack in Mosul, which killed 22 and injured 72.
Here at the U.S. Air Base in Ramstein, southern Germany, this big C-141 aircraft is offloading those passengers now, those injured people, onto ambulances. They will be taken for intensive care at the nearby Landstuhl Medical Facility. It has been extremely interesting watching these injured people being carried off the aircraft on the shoulders of military personnel, here in Ramstein, some of them looking completely unconscious. Others, like the people who we saw just a few moments ago, the person we saw a few moments ago, his head sitting up, his eyes open, clearly sort of looking around and conscious of what was going on.
At least eight people on board the aircraft are said to be in critical condition, which means they have extremely serious injuries indeed and will require the most urgent medical attention at the Landstuhl Medical Facility, which is just a few miles down the road. 13 people on board the plane are able to walk. We're told injuries are sufficiently light -- enable them to still walk around on their own.
But the rest of them, possibly as many as 30 people, are being carried out by stretchers. We've seen at least 15 of those people are being brought out right now. We're still sort of trying to count how many people have come off the plane so far, but there's obviously still a good many people on board the aircraft waiting to get onto the ambulances that will take them to that Landstuhl Medical Facility, where they can receive the intensive care they need to get strong enough to get that journey finally back home to the U.S. -- Daryn.
KAGAN: And yet, Matthew, it looks like something's going on there, like if nothing else, it's a shift change. You say there's more people on board. But we saw a lot of handshaking and some of those who are assisting in getting the more severely injured off the plane, shaking hands and going to the vans that we see in the background there.
CHANCE: Yes, I mean, there's obviously been a lot of activity. And some of the ambulances have already left. It's not entirely clear how many people have -- are still on the plane, if indeed any at all. There's a certain amount of confusion from our point of view, because we're not, obviously, permitted to go there next to the plane and see who's on board, the conditions in which they're being kept and the sort of situation of the people who have loaded onto the ambulances.
But behind this sort of front of military personnel, there has been a great deal of military activity, a great deal of medical activity. And as you can see, I mean, clearly, the last ambulance there seems to be pulling away. And so obviously, we must have -- among those people that were carried off, some of them obviously able to walk off the aircraft and get onto the ambulances that we perhaps didn't notice from our vantage point here.
KAGAN: All right. Well, Matthew, thank you for that. And we've been with you since it was daylight and not snowing. It's gotten darker and progressively more snowy as we watched this operation unfold with you. Thank you -- Randi.
RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR: And all morning we've been discussing whether or not this was indeed a rocket attack or possibly some mortar rounds or possibly even a bomb planted inside that dining hall, the mess tent, at Camp Merez, Base Merez, there in Mosul. There is an investigation underway. We're not sure exactly how long this investigation might take. We do know the FBI is there in Mosul, full forensic team trying to find out exactly what happened.
Our Karl Penhaul is in Baghdad, joins us now. And Karl, what are you hearing about the investigation in your area, in Baghdad there?
KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the investigation at Camp Merez in Mosul has now been going on for at least the last 16 hours. An FBI team of experts arrived at the camp at that dining hall blown apart 2:00 a.m. local time, our time. Now, initially, there were reports out of the Pentagon suggesting that this could have been a rocket attack and that's what caused the blast. Now, we've heard also sources out at the Pentagon suggesting that it could have been called by a placed explosive on the ground at Camp Merez.
We know there's a great deal of frustration by the local U.S. military commanders there, because they feel that it is way too premature to pinpoint the cause of this explosion. What they have said, though, is that so far, indications -- their theories that they're working on are that it could have been a rocket, it could have been a mortar, or it could have been a placed explosive.
That placed explosive determination would effectively mean that somebody simply wandered into the dining hall with a bomb in a backpack possibly or something like that and then detonated the charge mid-day, at the time when that dining hall was most full. Interestingly, what Lieutenant Colonel Hastings, one of the spokesmen for Task Force Olympia, has told us, is that a lot of shrapnel marks caused by this explosion are symmetrical, round perforations, akin to ball bearings or B.B.s, the marks that they would have made.
Now, on a lot of mortars or rockets, when they explode, they simply send out a lot of jagged shrapnel. There are only a few artillery pieces that are actually packed with ball bearings. And also, if it was some kind of homemade bomb, for example, then bombers may typically also pack those homemade bombs with ball bearings because then, when the explosion takes place, those ball bearings will fly out and cause maximum damage.
But certainly, the team of experts on the ground say it's too early to tell. They are still investigating. They say, though, that probably before the end of tonight, they will have answers for us. Of course, we have seen on an Islamic Web site that there has been a claim of responsibility by the Ansar al Sunna group and they claim on that Web site that this was, in fact, a suicide bomb attack -- Randy.
KAYE: And Karl, sticking with those ball bearings, those are often something -- those are something that's often found in a roadside bomb or, as you mentioned, maybe a backpack carried by a suicide bomber. Is there -- are you hearing anything about what witnesses might have heard, if they indeed might have heard an incoming rocket or anything of that type?
PENHAUL: What we heard very clearly, from the offices on the ground there, as early as yesterday, was that this explosion was caused by a single large explosion. Then, what seemed to confuse the issue was the information coming out of the Pentagon and this is what's really frustrating U.S. commanders on the ground, because Pentagon sources spoke of a rocket attack involving four rockets, one of which, they say, impacted on the dining hall.
It seems that the Pentagon has backed away from that now and is leaning more towards the placed explosive theory. But certainly, from what officers have told us on the ground, they said it was single large explosion. And we know that the insurgents, although they do have long-range artillery, both rockets and mortars, which are capable of flying anything between 10 and 15 miles -- typically, these devices aren't that precise. And so this would have had to have been a very lucky strike by the insurgents, rather than some pinpoint-precision attack, if indeed it was artillery rather than a placed explosive -- Randy.
KAYE: All right. Karl Penhaul live for us from Baghdad. Karl, thank you.
KAGAN: And for about the last hour and a half or more, hour, forty minutes, we've been watching this operation as some 50-plus soldiers unloaded from the cargo plane at the Ramstein Air Base. They are on their way to more advanced medical help at the Landstuhl U.S. Military Hospital. We will get back to that.
There also, though, is a lot more news to get to today. We're going to take a break, regroup and we'll have more of that after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: Let's go ahead and take a look at headlines now in the news. U.S. troops wounded in the attack on their in Iraq have arrived in Germany for medical treatment. We've been watching these live pictures for about an hour and 40 minutes. Fifty-one soldiers were among the 72 people wounded in the attack near Mosul yesterday. At least 22 people died, including 14 U.S. soldiers.
The roads have reopened, but cleanup continues from a tanker truck explosion near the Pentagon this morning. Officials in Arlington, Virginia say the driver was killed in the accident. Police say it appears the truck hit a guardrail on a ramp from Interstate 395. The highway was shut down for hours.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair makes a stop in the Mideast. Blair met with Israeli and Palestinian leaders during the visit today. He's calling for a conference in London early next year. Blair says it could serve as a bridge back to the road map for Middle East peace.
There's a report today that a major U.S. contractor has pulled out of Iraq's reconstruction efforts. "The L.A. Times" says that contract international won a $325 million-bid to rebuild Iraq's transportation system. The paper said the company cited skyrocketing security cost in its decision to pull out.
KAYE: Detention hearings set tomorrow for five men accused of setting fire to suburb Maryland. A hearing yesterday for a sixth man revealed details of the alleged plot.
CNN Justice Department correspondent Kelli Arena has the latest.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): According to court documents, talk of setting the fires first took place at this Denny's Restaurant last summer, a frequent hangout for a group of men who called themselves the Unseen Cavaliers. There was allegedly a conversation about recruiting new members and making the local gang more famous by setting something on fire.
A friend of some of the suspects spoke on camera but did not want his face shown.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was like, you know, set stuff on fire in the country, set off fireworks, just stuff like that, but I wouldn't put it past them at all.
ARENA: Officials say they still have not nailed down an official motive. In court prosecutors suggested race may have been a factor, the homebuyers were mostly black, the accused all white.
SHERIFF FRED DAVIS, CHARLES COUNTY, MARYLAND: There's no motive yet that we can establish and it could be a multitude, a multitude of motives. That remains to be seen.
ARENA: Aaron Speed was the first arrested. He was a security guard at the housing development. Prosecutors say Speed told investigators he didn't like the way he was treated by his bosses after his infant son died. And Jeremy Periti (ph) who according to court papers helped hatch the scheme was rejected when he applied for a job with the property developer, making the case for the oldest of motives, revenge.
Even if they don't know why the men allegedly set the fires, residents are satisfied with how quickly things have progressed.
CLAYTON THOMPSON, NEIGHBOR: I thought they won't have a problem catching them, but I didn't think it would be this soon.
ARENA: Law enforcement sources say they believe the major organizers are in custody. They say one other man who allegedly knew of the plan is being held on an immigration violation. Investigators plan to interview at least a dozen more individuals and say additional charges could be brought.
Kelli Arena, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: So Randi Kaye is our newest employees here at CNN. I have to explain how things kind of work around here.
KAYE: Yes, please do.
KAGAN: A ton of snow, really bad weather in the Midwest, somebody gets a great idea. Hey, I know, let's get mid-west says I know, let's get Jacqui Jeras, send her to Indiana, and make her stand in the snow.
KAYE: And she has been doing that for, what, about two hours now.
KAGAN: That she has. And what have we done? Ignored her because we have other news, but we will check on Jacqui who we understand is safe, and somewhat warm we hope, in Evansville, Indiana, to tell us about the latest winter blast and white Christmas coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(WEATHER REPORT)
(STOCK MARKET REPORT)
KAGAN: Speaking of popular, it is virtual violence. but does it inspire the real thing? That is the focus of an intense debate between the video game industry and some its critics. Technology correspondent Daniel Sieberg is here with more of our weeklong look at the video game craze. You know there will be a lot of these video games underneath Christmas trees.
DANIEL SIEBERG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, there will be. And a lot of people are very passionate about this issue, knowing which games are appropriate for their kids, and that's what this story is all about. The impact of video games on kids has been an ongoing debate. Do they warp kids' mind and incite dangerous behavior, or are they simply an entertaining distraction. Here now, a look at both sides.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP FROM PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT)
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: There's this car down the street that's fun. So I go in a shoot this woman in the head. And people are screaming and running all over. And there's blood everywhere.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SIEBERG (voice-over): A public service announcement released by the National Institute On Media and the Family, timed to coincide with the annual video game report card from the group and Senator Joe Lieberman.
SEN. JOSEPH LIEBERMAN (D), CONNECTICUT: Violent and sexually provocative video games are not just games, they are a deadly serious matter with real consequences not just for the people, the kids who play them, but for the rest of us and our families that live in the same communities with people who play these games.
SIEBERG: Senator Lieberman says parents are under informed and that the video game rating system, which is similar to that of the movies, is vague and under enforced.
But the industry says they've done their job. In fact, they say, 83 percent of the time parents are the ones making the purchase. The Entertainment Software Association also takes issue with the researcher on video games and youth violence. They cite a study done by the Washington State Department of Health that concluded: "Research evidence is not supportive of a major public concern that violent video games lead to real life violence."
A lead researcher in the field, Craig Anderson from Iowa State University, disagrees.
CRAIG ANDERSON, IOWA STATE UNIVERSITY: The true research experts have come to a solid conclusion here that these violent games really are not appropriate, even the cartoonish violent ones are not appropriate for children, that there are negative effects.
SIEBERG: Dr. Anderson's work was published by the American Psychological Association in April of the following year, concluding that laboratory exposure to a graphic violent video game increased aggressive thoughts and behavior.
Industry representatives contend there's a big difference between violence and aggression.
DOUG LOWENSTEIN, ENTERTAINMENT SOFTWARE ASSOCIATION: Look, people watch football games and are more aggressive after they watch a football game. We've just seen an instance in this country where basketball players and fans got into a full fledge brawl. There weren't any video games involved in that. But we don't necessarily think going to a basketball game is harmful to your health.
SIEBERG: Supporters of the game industry say critics are on a witch-hunt, that studies are simply irrelevant when you look at the fact that while the popularity of games has increased, statistics from the Justice Department suggest that youth violence is down. And ultimately, they say, it's a family affair.
LOWENSTEIN: It isn't for me to tell them what's the right choice for their family, it isn't for Senator Lieberman to tell them what's the right choice. It's for parents to take the tools that are available and make choices that they think are appropriate for their family. And most parents, I think, care about that and do a good job at that.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
SIEBERG: And no matter which side of the debate you're on, it is important for parents to know about these tools and what's out there, the ratings that's in place.
We have an example what parents need to look for, especially at this time of the year, leading into last-minute gift ideas. You can see the 'e,' the 't.' These are on the lower corners of all the games that are on the market, 'E' for everyone, 'T' for teen, and there are mature-rated games out there that are rated 'M,' and that means 17 years or older.
In case you're wondering, all of the games that are on the market today are listed on the Electronic Software Rating Board's Web site. That's at ESRB.org. We saw "Halo 2" there, a very popular game, so the rating for it is actually 'M,' so that means 17 and older. So it's really something that parents have to take a close look at it when they're out shopping. It's just one of those things.
KAGAN: Got it. Daniel Sieberg, thank you.
SIEBERG: All right.
KAGAN: And Daniel's coming back tomorrow. He'll be with us to look at yet another face of the world in games, the arena behind then scenes at the Olympics of video games, where gaming is a team sport. Join us for that about this time tomorrow.
That's going to do it for your first day, Randi Kaye.
KAYE: This is a team sport, too?
KAGAN: Yes, did we scare you off?
KAYE: No, not at all, coming back tomorrow.
KAGAN: Good, we'll you're invited, and good to have you with us. This is the part of the show we say thanks for joining us, and that Wolf Blitzer will be here after the break. We'll see you tomorrow.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
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Aired December 22, 2004 - 10:59 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Our Matthew Chance is there at that airbase to tell us more about this operation.
Going slowly, but incredibly, that is on purpose -- Matthew.
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It is, Daryn, a painstaking process in the bitterly-cold weather here in southern Germany at the Ramstein Air Base where this U.S. military aircraft right behind me is still in the process of offloading the 40 to 50 or so injured, many of whom are from the Mosul attack which, of course, killed 22 and injured 72 others. Other planes like this one are being readied, we're told by military officials, to bring any further injured here to the Ramstein Air Base, where they'll be transported, of course, to the Landstuhl Medical Hospital, a short distance from here, if that is deemed to be necessary in the hours or in the days ahead. For the moment, though, this is the only plane that has been scheduled.
We've been seeing over the course of the past hour, as you mentioned, some of those individuals being carried off. The most critical of those injured on board carried off on stretchers, looking in very poor condition, indeed, on the shoulders of some of the military personnel, surrounding the gang plank into the back of that aircraft.
We're not permitted to go too close to the injured. We're not allowed to show any faces, no close-ups, no images that would render any of those injured recognizable to the family members. Those are the terms in which we're actually like here, the terms set by the U.S. military.
What we do know is those people on board, some of whom who will be able to walk, most of whom are being carried off on stretchers, will be taken as soon as possible to the nearby Landstuhl medical facility, the biggest U.S. Army hospital outside of the United States, where they'll receive the kind of specialist medical attention and intensive care that they need to gain their strength so they can be put on an aircraft back home to the U.S. -- Daryn.
KAGAN: All right. We will get back with you, Matthew. We're going to keep the live picture up from the Ramstein Air Base -- Randi.
RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR: And in the meantime, we'll visit once again with Kathleen Koch, who is joining us today from the Pentagon.
Kathleen, just talking a little bit more about the investigation of exactly what happened yesterday there at Camp Marez, we know that the FBI is on the ground there beginning that investigation, trying to find out exactly what happened. They have a team of forensic experts there, but already Lieutenant General Thomas Metz was saying that this is a certain possibility that a bomb was placed inside that tent.
How long before we might know this for sure?
KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Randi, that's very tough to say, because this is an investigation obviously going on as we speak. And that was a large dining hall, the size of a football field. So they've got a great distance to cover, a lot of evidence to pour over.
And again, the military's first thought was that this was indeed a rocket because this was a dining hall that had been attacked numerous times before in the past, some 30 times alone this year by mortars, though they never scored a direct hit. So that was their first instinct.
But as I had been reporting earlier, and Karl Penhaul did just a few minutes ago, we hear from this Task Force Olympia spokesman that these tiny concentric perforations like those of a ball bearing have been found in the stainless kitchen equipment and other areas in the tent, which might indicate something, that they were used as shrapnel in a bomb in order to increase the deadly nature of the bomb. But it's going to take a while for military investigators and for the FBI to pour through all the evidence they have.
But obviously this is one thing that does show that this kind of structure that is being built right now, something out of steel, out of concrete, will afford troops in Iraq much more protection. But as we've been told by a spokesman for the multinational forces there, Lieutenant Colonel -- Lieutenant Colonel Steven Boylan, that that's just simply not possible throughout Iraq. When you have 138,000 forces there, sprinkled throughout the country, you can't have that kind of a hardened structure.
Most of them simply have to deal with these tents and deal with large numbers of them meeting in one place at a time, where -- which is very predictable on the part of insurgents, morning, midday and evening. So they know they're going to continue to be vulnerable -- Randi.
KAYE: All right. Kathleen, we'll be back to you shortly.
KAGAN: And as we stay with live pictures from Ramstein Air Base, want to go to the phones. And one of our military analysts, Major General Don Shepperd, retired from the Air Force National Guard joining us by phone.
General, good morning.
MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD, U.S. AIR FORCE (RET.): Good morning, Daryn.
KAGAN: As we are watching stretcher after stretcher being brought off, the first question that came to mind, I thought, you know what? This isn't a question for the general, it's a question for his wife. What is it like to be the family members waiting and wondering and trying to get a word about their loved one serving overseas?
SHEPPERD: Daryn, I can't imagine anything worse than being a family member waiting to wonder if my son or my daughter was in that dining hall, if they were -- if they were injured, if they were -- if they were dead. It's just -- it's as tough as it gets.
Of course the holiday times also exacerbate the situation. But these are -- these are very difficult times. And it's hard for us to watch this. We've watched it too many times over the years.
KAGAN: An infrastructure question for you, something that Kathleen Koch was just talking about. How they were, you know, just days from completing this harder, tougher structure. But she also makes a point you cannot -- by the nature of the mission and the operation, you cannot have higher protection for the men and women that are serving out there in the field. You are going to have soft structures, you are going to have tents, and you are going to have exposure.
SHEPPERD: Yes, Kathleen was right on the mark. You've got 138,000 troops over there. You have tens, if not hundreds, of locations in which they're gathered. And you have to gather them to protect them.
You can't just have them disbursed all ever the country or you'd have chaos, inability to do military missions. So you can't put them all in hard structures. There's going to be soft structures. You're going to be vulnerable, and that's part of the risk that the military simply accepts.
KAGAN: If we have the photos available from yesterday, if we can put a few of those up, to our producers in the control room. These photos coming out just as we were on the air.
General, the story that they tell, where you see one injured soldier taking care of a soldier who might be more injured, one coming to the aid of another, it tells a story unlike any words I think can.
SHEPPERD: Yes. Pictures are very powerful. And that's -- what the military does is everybody is trained in buddy care. That's your first level of care.
When someone is injured, you take care of your buddy, you take care of yourself. First of all, you take care of yourself. Then you take care of your buddy.
Then you're evacuated for immediate medical care to a medical facility in the theater, and then you're evacuated out of the theater and eventually back to the states, if needed. So it's a well-ordered system there, but everybody is trained in all facets of this thing to save lives. And we've saved -- you know, we've saved hundreds of lives in this situation and, of course, in others.
KAGAN: And as night falls in Germany, and they continue to bring out stretcher after stretcher of wounded soldiers, they are being taken by ambulance to the Landstuhl U.S. Military Hospital. General, I don't know how familiar you are with this particular facility, but -- but it is huge and it has played a huge role in helping mend soldiers that have been hurt all around the world.
SHEPPERD: Yes. I've been to Landstuhl, I was stationed in Germany. As a matter of fact, I've been to Marez where these casualties are coming from as well.
And the system is an amazing system. And in Landstuhl they are experts in traumatic injuries and in life-saving. These medical evacuation crews and these C-7 teams that are bringing the injured in are experts in critical care, in keeping the people alive until they can get them to a facility. They are stabilized in Iraq, then they are given en-route care by these expert medical evacuation teams, most of them Reservists, as a matter of fact, and then they're taken to Landstuhl, where they get medical care just like you would in any large hospital in the United States.
KAGAN: Well, and you bring up a good point. And I know we can't take our cameras inside that plane, but there is a great story to be told in there. Because consider, it's a cargo plane, it's a big empty shell. And before these patients are loaded on board it has to be instantly converted to a moving, flying hospital.
SHEPPERD: Yes. They're designed from scratch to do this. And you can put in litters, as well as carry cargo on these things.
And the troops, again, are trained to do this. They're trained in IVs and all of the things necessary.
There are nurses and doctors on board. And the system, they will not allow the news media to get anywhere near the airplanes once they get in, for obvious privacy reasons there. It is -- it's a well- ordered system, and the troops and families can feel good that they're feeling -- that they're getting the best of care in tough situations.
KAGAN: And we appreciate you with your insight on how the system works and helping us to understand it better. General Shepperd, thank you for your time.
SHEPPERD: A pleasure.
KAYE: As we've been telling you all morning, investigators from the FBI are in Mosul this morning to help determine the cause of the explosion. The possibilities include a rocket, a mortar or even planted bomb. Two reporters were among those at the scene of yesterday's attack, and here's how they described the immediate aftermath of the deadly blast.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
JEREMY REDMON, "RICHMOND TIMES-DISPATCH": There were hundreds of soldiers in there having lunch at the time. And then it was a bright blue sky, very few clouds, people were cheery, they were having lunch, enjoying themselves when it happened. And as soon as the explosion and the fireball occurred, scores of soldiers ran out of the tents and crammed into these concrete blast barriers. And then I ran out and was observing what was going on.
There were folks that were in shock. There was blood all over the floor, food, trays. It tore a pretty large hole in the roof of the tent.
Outside, they set up a -- several medics had showed up and set up an area, where they're working on the soldiers in the parking lot. It was really just sort of a sea of wounded and dead.
There were people crying. There were folks that were numb, that collapsed in grief. It really was unreal.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BILL NEMITZ, "PORTLAND PRESS HERALD": It was just truly remarkable what these soldiers were doing. I mean, I saw -- I saw a triage area immediately take form outside the entrance to the dining facility. I saw soldiers, both Iraqi and American, carrying litters out, civilians doing that as well. You might think at first glance that it was a chaotic scene, but the more you looked it, the more you could see the order of it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KAGAN: And we're going to continue to keep those live pictures up from Ramstein Air Base. While we do, let's look at some numbers that help tell the story as they bring off another soldier on a stretcher.
This attack near Mosul was among the deadliest to date against U.S. forces. A total of 22 people were killed, 14 of those were U.S. soldiers. Four were American civilians and four were Iraqi security personnel.
Seventy-two were wounded, including 51 U.S. soldiers. Many of those we see coming off the plane there at Ramstein. Thirty-five of the soldiers, many in critical condition, flown here to go to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. The attack raises the overall death toll for U.S. forces in Iraq to more than 1,300.
About 4,500 of the troops deployed in Mosul are based in Fort Lewis, Washington. The high number of casualties in yesterday's attack has caused understandably high anxiety back home among family and friends. Our Kimberly Osias has our report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KIMBERLY OSIAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Melissa Doss got an early morning e-mail from her husband, a battalion personnel officer serving in Mosul, saying he was alive and uninjured. But she's still feeling the loss of life there. MELISSA DOSS, SOLDIER'S WIFE: I'm happy that I know, but I feel guilty. I have that guilt that I know my husband's OK and I know there's other families that know that their soldier's OK, but there's a lot that don't. And I feel guilty that I know and they don't.
OSIAS: Doss is a support group leader talking to families of other soldiers at the base.
DOSS: Right now, it's just consoling, you know, giving them -- letting them know that there's somebody here to talk to if they need anything.
OSIAS: Raw nerves at the headquarters of the 276th Engineering Battalion in Virginia, where she lives. In the hometown paper, conflicting images, a ray of sunlight streaming in through the blown- out mess hall tent, soldier helping soldier, brothers in arms trying to escape to safety.
Serving there, 4,500 of Fort Lewis' Stryker Brigade in Washington State. Since Operation Iraqi Freedom broke out, this bridge has worn yellow ribbons and hosted the base's most ardent supporters.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I feel kind of crying and weeping. And I said I have to pray for the people that got injured and killed, and their relatives, too.
OSIAS: Young's (ph) Barber Shop is less than a click. That's military talk for about a half a mile away from base. Haircuts are still $6 unless soldiers are getting a buzz, which is most of the business here. Soldiers come to relax, especially today.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's real tragedy, you know, especially right before Christmas.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm waiting -- waiting for e-mails, waiting for something to let me know that they're all right.
OSIAS: Cesar Contrarez (ph) was one of the lucky ones. He just got back from Mosul a month ago. For him and many like him, there's a pall over Fort Lewis and other bases this Christmas as everyone watches and waits.
Kimberly Osias, CNN, Fort Lewis, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAYE: And let's take you now back live back to Ramstein Air Base there. A full picture for you. Matthew Chance standing by there on the ground.
Matthew, tell us a little bit about -- we're seeing a lot of the soldiers coming off with some very heavy equipment on them on those stretchers. Apparently, this equipment obviously is to help with their vitals, help them breathe, help keep them alive. Give us an idea of exactly how they might have been treated, if you can, while on that plane, which is apparently basically a mobile ICU. CHANCE: Well, that's absolutely exactly what it is. I think obviously the first thing that would have been done, first-aid at the scene, where the actual attack took place. But then many of them were taken either to medical facilities in Mosul, elsewhere in Iraq, even outside of Iraq to get the kind of specialist attention they needed to actually stabilize them enough to make this six-hour journey by aircraft from Balad, which is just to the north, an air base just to the north of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, and to touch down here at the Ramstein Air Base in southern Germany.
But you're right. On board this C-141 Starlifter U.S. aircraft, there's a great deal of medical equipment on board, all of it needed, of course, simply to keep these people alive. Eight of those individuals on board, and there are as many as 50 injured, most of which are from the Mosul incident, are in critical condition, which means extremely serious injuries indeed.
And you can imagine what kind of injuries we're talking about when you see those injuries of the devastation caused by that blast, the mortar attack, the bomb attack, whatever it turns out to have been in that dining facility in the camp in Mosul. Some people have lost limbs, other people, we're told by medical officials, will have to lose limbs as a result of operations they'll receive at the Landstuhl medical facility just down the road.
At least eight of them, as I say, in critical condition. Only 13 out of the 50 on board are able to walk. The rest are being carried off by stretcher -- Daryn.
KAYE: And Matthew, I know that we are -- we're obviously focusing here on the wounded soldiers as they come off the airplane and their well being. But let's talk a little bit about the medical staff that is on board that airplane.
Quite a long day they've had. It apparently began in Germany, then they flew to -- they flew to Baghdad, reconfigured the entire plane, and now are here back in Germany at the air base, bringing these folks out. They are certainly to be commended for the work that they're doing inside that C-141.
CHANCE: Absolutely. And it's been quite a scramble from the outset because, as we've been reporting all along, it was an unexpected attack. There was no battle raging in Iraq when this happened, there was no planned offensive under way at which they could have expected some kind of casualties.
It was a relatively quiet period, certainly from the points of view of the hospital workers at the Landstuhl medical facility. So they had to scramble to get the right teams out of their Christmas and holiday vacation, to get them back from that, to get them over to Iraq, to reconfigure the aircraft to make sure that it was equipped well enough take so many injured, so many critically ill patients, the six-hour journey to Landstuhl.
And now, they're back here in Germany, debriefing the medical teams that have been waiting here on the ground or on the airstrip who will take this short few-mile journey to the Landstuhl Hospital from this air base in this driving and freezing snow in southern Germany, whereupon those people will be offloaded again. And that again will take another couple of hours to get those people out of the ambulances, into their hospital beds as well, and for them to be given the kind of surgery, the kind of attention, the kind of intensive care that they're going to need to get stronger so that they can eventually, perhaps in a few days for some, perhaps longer than that for many, for them to be strong enough to go back to the U.S. to their homes.
KAYE: All right. Our Matthew Chance, live at Ramstein Air Force Base. Thank you.
KAGAN: We've been monitoring this event as the soldiers are loaded off the plane for just about an hour and 15 minutes now. And while it was taking place, there was another event that we showed you live, and we want to go back and talk about and see once again.
It was thousands of miles away in the Washington, D.C., at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall. You had people who had put together greetings for U.S. military members all around the world, reading those greetings, and then a Christmas tree placed on top of the wall.
So, once again, let's listen -- while we keep these live pictures up, let's listen to those greetings from the wall.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "Today, I remember and pray for my daughter in the United States Army in Iraq. Merry Christmas, Julie (ph). Come home to us" -- Jane Goodman (ph).
I just might want to add. I pray the day we all come home safe and be with our families. Happy holidays to all. Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: From Ann Chalmers (ph), "We appreciate what you have done for us and our country. Thanks."
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There are no words I could ever write to let you know what I feel in my heart for you all. You humble me with the sacrifices you have made. God bless you and keep you throughout eternity. And I hope all our guys come home and our women. Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To all who have served or will serve, you will not be forgotten. I'd just like to add that I'm an OIF veteran. I'll be going back next week to finish the mission. And I want to extend my thoughts and prayers to my comrades who are over there now, and all the soldiers, especially the ones in Mosul yesterday, and pray that all our guys come home safe.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "Thanks for everything." And as a personal note, I would like to say happy holidays to all the servicemen and women serving overseas in Iraq and Afghanistan, to everybody. Merry Christmas, Happy New Year. Thanks. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "May this wall always be a reminder of those who sacrificed their lives and all who served in this war in service to our country and our ordeals" -- Vernon L. Olsen (ph). "Your courage and dedication to the freedom of our country will always be remembered by our family." -- Shirley B.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "All of you war heroes are truly honorable men and women with dignity. I salute you and support you to the fullest. Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, and thanks for the service and devotion to this great country." -- David.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "Dear American hero, during this holiday season you are remembered with honor and love and gratitude. My thoughts and prayers are with you all. Your thoughtful friend, Dorothy, Reynoldsville, Pennsylvania."
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "May the joy and spirit of the holiday season heal the hearts of the families and friends of the soldiers who gave the ultimate sacrifice." Sincerely, Donald Kraus Sr. (ph).
Merry Christmas.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "God bless you. You will never be forgotten. What more can a man do than lay down his life for another?" -- Guy Caltech (ph), U.S. Navy, retired.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "To all my brothers and sisters, may you rest in peace and know that you're not forgotten. With love, Doc and Marion (ph)."
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KAGAN: What we've been watching the last few minutes on the left side of the screen and listening in to, that was a ceremony that took place about an hour ago at the wall, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall. People and volunteers reading greetings to U.S. military members all around the world.
On the right side we have not left the picture of -- from Ramstein Air Base in Germany. Soldier after soldier -- wounded soldier after soldier being offloaded from that cargo plane on to buses that are serving as ambulances, taking them to the U.S. military hospital in Landstuhl.
While the care for the wounded takes place in Germany, questions still back in Iraq about what caused and who caused and how was this attack caused yesterday. For more on that, let's check in with our Kathleen Koch, who is at the Pentagon this morning -- Kathleen.
KOCH: And, Daryn, let's talk a little about the insurgencies, because indeed the Pentagon had expected that the insurgents in Iraq would, as the January election day approached, try to mount more such large, dramatic and deadly attacks. And so they had been taking measures in recent weeks to really limit the exposure of U.S. troops on the ground to the insurgents. They've been moving much, much more in the way of supplies and manpower by air in Iraq than ever before. And when it came to the few convoys that did still have to operate on the ground, they've been changing their routes, the timing and the directions that they were taking so that those would not be so predictable, so that the forces in those convoys would not be such predictable targets.
And then, also, there is the issue of the armored vehicles. Obviously, after that exchange between the defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, and a soldier in Kuwait about unarmored vehicles, now the military is saying that they will, by June, they expect, to have every single wheeled vehicle in Iraq armored at a cost of some $4.1 billion. Right now, about 40 percent of them still don't have enough armor.
So -- so the military has been doing quite a bit. But again, when it comes to these dining halls, these very large football field- sized structures, there's only so much that they can do as far as hardening them. We do know that there is a steel and concrete structure that is being built right now at Camp Marez and should soon be finished. But they simply can't do that throughout Iraq for every single soldier on the ground when you have some 138,000 -- Daryn.
KAGAN: And what about the military investigation and the FBI getting involved, trying to figure out the cause, the exact cause of yesterday's explosion?
KOCH: Well, again, they're still looking at three things; rocket, mortar, or the possibility of a bomb. There is an Islamic militant group that on a Web site has claimed that it was a suicide attack carried out by one person. And we are told by a Camp Olympia spokesperson that indeed they have found concentric little metal holes in pieces of the stainless steel equipment, kitchen equipment that was there in the tent and in other areas of the tent that could indicate something like ball bearings were used to produce shrapnel to make the explosion even more deadly.
So the investigators, military investigators, and FBI will be looking at. And they do indeed tell us that there are a large number of Iraqis who do have access to the U.S. military facilities. They're workers there.
When they come on to base, they do have to show an ID. They are looked at. They are sometimes searched, but not always completely searched, we're told. And then once they go on the base and go about their work, they're largely unattended. So they're going to be looking very carefully at the roster of the Iraqis who were working at Camp Marez, how many of them, who are they, and where are they now -- Daryn.
KAGAN: All right. Kathleen Koch, we'll be back to you at the Pentagon -- Randi.
KAYE: In the meantime, we're going to stick with these live pictures here from Ramstein Air Base Germany as we move on just a little bit. A North Carolina company that makes "Support Our Troops" magnets is vowing to stick to its mission. The firm has been forced to lay off half of its staff, and that is due to overseas knockoffs. But as CNN's Lisa Sylvester reports, some American ingenuity is helping the company stay ahead.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LISA SYLVESTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): You see them everywhere, on cars and trucks, those yellow "Support Our Troops" ribbons. The original yellow magnets are from King, North Carolina, where about 70,000 are made a month. The owner of Magnet America is motivated not by money, but a mission.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was a -- I thought it was a really neat symbol, a neat way for somebody that maybe had a loved one over there to be able to express that without -- by just putting something on their car.
SYLVESTER: The idea to make the yellow magnets came from a local screen printer.
CHRIS SMITH, KING INTERNATIONAL CORP.: April of last year, I read an article in the local paper about a shortage of yellow ribbon that was being manufactured up north, and kind of put the idea with what we were already doing, which was car magnets.
SYLVESTER: Dwayne Golian (ph) wanted to market and distribute the ribbon magnets as a way to raise make money to help support military families.
(on camera): True to its word, Magnet America has been supporting the troops. The company donated $42,000 to Freedom Calls, a nonprofit that help soldiers communicate with their families back at home.
(voice-over): But knockoffs from overseas are undercutting the company's business. The ribbons on the right are from Magnet America. The copycat from the left made in Taiwan. Magnet America has let go about half of its staff.
DEREK LONG, MAGNET AMERICA: It upsets you to see that, you know, we were out here trying to -- you know, a good cause. Not just to make a fast dollar, but to actually help the community, help our country, help the troops.
SYLVESTER: To stay ahead of the competition, Magnet America has branched out, making ribbons in various colors, sizes, shapes and for different causes. But one thing will remain the same: the magnets will continue to be made in America.
Lisa Sylvester, CNN, North Carolina.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: And as we watch more and more soldiers being carried off the cargo plane at Ramstein Air Base, as night falls in Germany, want to think and talk about the family members back here in the U.S., perhaps some in Germany, actually stationed around the world. When word of this attack took place, of course, the immediate worry began on the part of the family members.
One wife of a soldier based there, Trish Otto, spoke with CNN about what the wait is like to find out if her husband was OK.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRISH OTTO, SOLDIER'S WIFE: He called, and it was after the incident, because they were ahead of us. He called and said, "Hi, honey. I just want to let you know that I'm OK and I love you very much." And immediately I knew something was wrong.
He said, "I can't talk, but something bad has happened. And I can't talk right now. I have to go. I love you." And then he hung up.
I was horrified. I was upset. I knew that he was OK. I didn't know if he was completely OK. But I was really upset for the soldiers.
I wasn't sure what was going to happen next, if there was going to be another attack. I was just -- I was filled with emotions, not knowing, like I said, what was going to happen next, when I was going to hear from him again. Not knowing, you know, what the other families were thinking, what was going on, knowing that they were not going to hear from their soldiers. I got a lucky call.
He's holding up really well. He's a very strong man, a very decent, honorable person. He would give his life for one of his soldiers.
I think deep in his heart he is hurting. But I could not tell that by his IMs. He just said, "I'm exhausted, I'm tired. I have to keep my men up, I have to keep their morale up, and get our missions completed so we can come home."
It is a rollercoaster. I cried a lot of tears yesterday, mainly for the families that won't have soldiers coming back home to them, all the people out there serving our country.
I just have so much love for them giving their lives for us, and the ones just that are -- that are going to be coming home, and their families. I'm thinking of everyone. My heart -- my heart goes out to them. My prayers go out to them.
It's just full of emotion. I can only imagine what all the other families are going through right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KAGAN: And we're coming up on the half-hour here. Live pictures from Ramstein Air Base. We've been watching these pictures for over an hour-and-a-half now, as soldier after injured soldier carried off the cargo plane put on the bus. And it appears, as was the plan, they took off the more critical soldiers first.
We saw as those were carried off, those stretchers having a lot of equipment attached, moving a lot more slowly. That last soldier we just saw loaded, you could tell that he was awake and alert and moving his head and looking around where he was. Where he is is on the way to getting some very good medical attention.
Our Matthew Chance has been with us this entire time from Germany at the Ramstein Air Base. Matthew, if you could recap what we've been watching for our viewers just joining us and those that have been with us.
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Daryn, over the course of past hour and half, the painstaking procedure of offloading the -- between 40 to 50 injured that have come in mainly from that incident, that attack, that devastating attack in Mosul, which killed 22 and injured 72.
Here at the U.S. Air Base in Ramstein, southern Germany, this big C-141 aircraft is offloading those passengers now, those injured people, onto ambulances. They will be taken for intensive care at the nearby Landstuhl Medical Facility. It has been extremely interesting watching these injured people being carried off the aircraft on the shoulders of military personnel, here in Ramstein, some of them looking completely unconscious. Others, like the people who we saw just a few moments ago, the person we saw a few moments ago, his head sitting up, his eyes open, clearly sort of looking around and conscious of what was going on.
At least eight people on board the aircraft are said to be in critical condition, which means they have extremely serious injuries indeed and will require the most urgent medical attention at the Landstuhl Medical Facility, which is just a few miles down the road. 13 people on board the plane are able to walk. We're told injuries are sufficiently light -- enable them to still walk around on their own.
But the rest of them, possibly as many as 30 people, are being carried out by stretchers. We've seen at least 15 of those people are being brought out right now. We're still sort of trying to count how many people have come off the plane so far, but there's obviously still a good many people on board the aircraft waiting to get onto the ambulances that will take them to that Landstuhl Medical Facility, where they can receive the intensive care they need to get strong enough to get that journey finally back home to the U.S. -- Daryn.
KAGAN: And yet, Matthew, it looks like something's going on there, like if nothing else, it's a shift change. You say there's more people on board. But we saw a lot of handshaking and some of those who are assisting in getting the more severely injured off the plane, shaking hands and going to the vans that we see in the background there.
CHANCE: Yes, I mean, there's obviously been a lot of activity. And some of the ambulances have already left. It's not entirely clear how many people have -- are still on the plane, if indeed any at all. There's a certain amount of confusion from our point of view, because we're not, obviously, permitted to go there next to the plane and see who's on board, the conditions in which they're being kept and the sort of situation of the people who have loaded onto the ambulances.
But behind this sort of front of military personnel, there has been a great deal of military activity, a great deal of medical activity. And as you can see, I mean, clearly, the last ambulance there seems to be pulling away. And so obviously, we must have -- among those people that were carried off, some of them obviously able to walk off the aircraft and get onto the ambulances that we perhaps didn't notice from our vantage point here.
KAGAN: All right. Well, Matthew, thank you for that. And we've been with you since it was daylight and not snowing. It's gotten darker and progressively more snowy as we watched this operation unfold with you. Thank you -- Randi.
RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR: And all morning we've been discussing whether or not this was indeed a rocket attack or possibly some mortar rounds or possibly even a bomb planted inside that dining hall, the mess tent, at Camp Merez, Base Merez, there in Mosul. There is an investigation underway. We're not sure exactly how long this investigation might take. We do know the FBI is there in Mosul, full forensic team trying to find out exactly what happened.
Our Karl Penhaul is in Baghdad, joins us now. And Karl, what are you hearing about the investigation in your area, in Baghdad there?
KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the investigation at Camp Merez in Mosul has now been going on for at least the last 16 hours. An FBI team of experts arrived at the camp at that dining hall blown apart 2:00 a.m. local time, our time. Now, initially, there were reports out of the Pentagon suggesting that this could have been a rocket attack and that's what caused the blast. Now, we've heard also sources out at the Pentagon suggesting that it could have been called by a placed explosive on the ground at Camp Merez.
We know there's a great deal of frustration by the local U.S. military commanders there, because they feel that it is way too premature to pinpoint the cause of this explosion. What they have said, though, is that so far, indications -- their theories that they're working on are that it could have been a rocket, it could have been a mortar, or it could have been a placed explosive.
That placed explosive determination would effectively mean that somebody simply wandered into the dining hall with a bomb in a backpack possibly or something like that and then detonated the charge mid-day, at the time when that dining hall was most full. Interestingly, what Lieutenant Colonel Hastings, one of the spokesmen for Task Force Olympia, has told us, is that a lot of shrapnel marks caused by this explosion are symmetrical, round perforations, akin to ball bearings or B.B.s, the marks that they would have made.
Now, on a lot of mortars or rockets, when they explode, they simply send out a lot of jagged shrapnel. There are only a few artillery pieces that are actually packed with ball bearings. And also, if it was some kind of homemade bomb, for example, then bombers may typically also pack those homemade bombs with ball bearings because then, when the explosion takes place, those ball bearings will fly out and cause maximum damage.
But certainly, the team of experts on the ground say it's too early to tell. They are still investigating. They say, though, that probably before the end of tonight, they will have answers for us. Of course, we have seen on an Islamic Web site that there has been a claim of responsibility by the Ansar al Sunna group and they claim on that Web site that this was, in fact, a suicide bomb attack -- Randy.
KAYE: And Karl, sticking with those ball bearings, those are often something -- those are something that's often found in a roadside bomb or, as you mentioned, maybe a backpack carried by a suicide bomber. Is there -- are you hearing anything about what witnesses might have heard, if they indeed might have heard an incoming rocket or anything of that type?
PENHAUL: What we heard very clearly, from the offices on the ground there, as early as yesterday, was that this explosion was caused by a single large explosion. Then, what seemed to confuse the issue was the information coming out of the Pentagon and this is what's really frustrating U.S. commanders on the ground, because Pentagon sources spoke of a rocket attack involving four rockets, one of which, they say, impacted on the dining hall.
It seems that the Pentagon has backed away from that now and is leaning more towards the placed explosive theory. But certainly, from what officers have told us on the ground, they said it was single large explosion. And we know that the insurgents, although they do have long-range artillery, both rockets and mortars, which are capable of flying anything between 10 and 15 miles -- typically, these devices aren't that precise. And so this would have had to have been a very lucky strike by the insurgents, rather than some pinpoint-precision attack, if indeed it was artillery rather than a placed explosive -- Randy.
KAYE: All right. Karl Penhaul live for us from Baghdad. Karl, thank you.
KAGAN: And for about the last hour and a half or more, hour, forty minutes, we've been watching this operation as some 50-plus soldiers unloaded from the cargo plane at the Ramstein Air Base. They are on their way to more advanced medical help at the Landstuhl U.S. Military Hospital. We will get back to that.
There also, though, is a lot more news to get to today. We're going to take a break, regroup and we'll have more of that after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: Let's go ahead and take a look at headlines now in the news. U.S. troops wounded in the attack on their in Iraq have arrived in Germany for medical treatment. We've been watching these live pictures for about an hour and 40 minutes. Fifty-one soldiers were among the 72 people wounded in the attack near Mosul yesterday. At least 22 people died, including 14 U.S. soldiers.
The roads have reopened, but cleanup continues from a tanker truck explosion near the Pentagon this morning. Officials in Arlington, Virginia say the driver was killed in the accident. Police say it appears the truck hit a guardrail on a ramp from Interstate 395. The highway was shut down for hours.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair makes a stop in the Mideast. Blair met with Israeli and Palestinian leaders during the visit today. He's calling for a conference in London early next year. Blair says it could serve as a bridge back to the road map for Middle East peace.
There's a report today that a major U.S. contractor has pulled out of Iraq's reconstruction efforts. "The L.A. Times" says that contract international won a $325 million-bid to rebuild Iraq's transportation system. The paper said the company cited skyrocketing security cost in its decision to pull out.
KAYE: Detention hearings set tomorrow for five men accused of setting fire to suburb Maryland. A hearing yesterday for a sixth man revealed details of the alleged plot.
CNN Justice Department correspondent Kelli Arena has the latest.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): According to court documents, talk of setting the fires first took place at this Denny's Restaurant last summer, a frequent hangout for a group of men who called themselves the Unseen Cavaliers. There was allegedly a conversation about recruiting new members and making the local gang more famous by setting something on fire.
A friend of some of the suspects spoke on camera but did not want his face shown.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was like, you know, set stuff on fire in the country, set off fireworks, just stuff like that, but I wouldn't put it past them at all.
ARENA: Officials say they still have not nailed down an official motive. In court prosecutors suggested race may have been a factor, the homebuyers were mostly black, the accused all white.
SHERIFF FRED DAVIS, CHARLES COUNTY, MARYLAND: There's no motive yet that we can establish and it could be a multitude, a multitude of motives. That remains to be seen.
ARENA: Aaron Speed was the first arrested. He was a security guard at the housing development. Prosecutors say Speed told investigators he didn't like the way he was treated by his bosses after his infant son died. And Jeremy Periti (ph) who according to court papers helped hatch the scheme was rejected when he applied for a job with the property developer, making the case for the oldest of motives, revenge.
Even if they don't know why the men allegedly set the fires, residents are satisfied with how quickly things have progressed.
CLAYTON THOMPSON, NEIGHBOR: I thought they won't have a problem catching them, but I didn't think it would be this soon.
ARENA: Law enforcement sources say they believe the major organizers are in custody. They say one other man who allegedly knew of the plan is being held on an immigration violation. Investigators plan to interview at least a dozen more individuals and say additional charges could be brought.
Kelli Arena, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: So Randi Kaye is our newest employees here at CNN. I have to explain how things kind of work around here.
KAYE: Yes, please do.
KAGAN: A ton of snow, really bad weather in the Midwest, somebody gets a great idea. Hey, I know, let's get mid-west says I know, let's get Jacqui Jeras, send her to Indiana, and make her stand in the snow.
KAYE: And she has been doing that for, what, about two hours now.
KAGAN: That she has. And what have we done? Ignored her because we have other news, but we will check on Jacqui who we understand is safe, and somewhat warm we hope, in Evansville, Indiana, to tell us about the latest winter blast and white Christmas coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(WEATHER REPORT)
(STOCK MARKET REPORT)
KAGAN: Speaking of popular, it is virtual violence. but does it inspire the real thing? That is the focus of an intense debate between the video game industry and some its critics. Technology correspondent Daniel Sieberg is here with more of our weeklong look at the video game craze. You know there will be a lot of these video games underneath Christmas trees.
DANIEL SIEBERG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, there will be. And a lot of people are very passionate about this issue, knowing which games are appropriate for their kids, and that's what this story is all about. The impact of video games on kids has been an ongoing debate. Do they warp kids' mind and incite dangerous behavior, or are they simply an entertaining distraction. Here now, a look at both sides.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP FROM PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT)
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: There's this car down the street that's fun. So I go in a shoot this woman in the head. And people are screaming and running all over. And there's blood everywhere.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SIEBERG (voice-over): A public service announcement released by the National Institute On Media and the Family, timed to coincide with the annual video game report card from the group and Senator Joe Lieberman.
SEN. JOSEPH LIEBERMAN (D), CONNECTICUT: Violent and sexually provocative video games are not just games, they are a deadly serious matter with real consequences not just for the people, the kids who play them, but for the rest of us and our families that live in the same communities with people who play these games.
SIEBERG: Senator Lieberman says parents are under informed and that the video game rating system, which is similar to that of the movies, is vague and under enforced.
But the industry says they've done their job. In fact, they say, 83 percent of the time parents are the ones making the purchase. The Entertainment Software Association also takes issue with the researcher on video games and youth violence. They cite a study done by the Washington State Department of Health that concluded: "Research evidence is not supportive of a major public concern that violent video games lead to real life violence."
A lead researcher in the field, Craig Anderson from Iowa State University, disagrees.
CRAIG ANDERSON, IOWA STATE UNIVERSITY: The true research experts have come to a solid conclusion here that these violent games really are not appropriate, even the cartoonish violent ones are not appropriate for children, that there are negative effects.
SIEBERG: Dr. Anderson's work was published by the American Psychological Association in April of the following year, concluding that laboratory exposure to a graphic violent video game increased aggressive thoughts and behavior.
Industry representatives contend there's a big difference between violence and aggression.
DOUG LOWENSTEIN, ENTERTAINMENT SOFTWARE ASSOCIATION: Look, people watch football games and are more aggressive after they watch a football game. We've just seen an instance in this country where basketball players and fans got into a full fledge brawl. There weren't any video games involved in that. But we don't necessarily think going to a basketball game is harmful to your health.
SIEBERG: Supporters of the game industry say critics are on a witch-hunt, that studies are simply irrelevant when you look at the fact that while the popularity of games has increased, statistics from the Justice Department suggest that youth violence is down. And ultimately, they say, it's a family affair.
LOWENSTEIN: It isn't for me to tell them what's the right choice for their family, it isn't for Senator Lieberman to tell them what's the right choice. It's for parents to take the tools that are available and make choices that they think are appropriate for their family. And most parents, I think, care about that and do a good job at that.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
SIEBERG: And no matter which side of the debate you're on, it is important for parents to know about these tools and what's out there, the ratings that's in place.
We have an example what parents need to look for, especially at this time of the year, leading into last-minute gift ideas. You can see the 'e,' the 't.' These are on the lower corners of all the games that are on the market, 'E' for everyone, 'T' for teen, and there are mature-rated games out there that are rated 'M,' and that means 17 years or older.
In case you're wondering, all of the games that are on the market today are listed on the Electronic Software Rating Board's Web site. That's at ESRB.org. We saw "Halo 2" there, a very popular game, so the rating for it is actually 'M,' so that means 17 and older. So it's really something that parents have to take a close look at it when they're out shopping. It's just one of those things.
KAGAN: Got it. Daniel Sieberg, thank you.
SIEBERG: All right.
KAGAN: And Daniel's coming back tomorrow. He'll be with us to look at yet another face of the world in games, the arena behind then scenes at the Olympics of video games, where gaming is a team sport. Join us for that about this time tomorrow.
That's going to do it for your first day, Randi Kaye.
KAYE: This is a team sport, too?
KAGAN: Yes, did we scare you off?
KAYE: No, not at all, coming back tomorrow.
KAGAN: Good, we'll you're invited, and good to have you with us. This is the part of the show we say thanks for joining us, and that Wolf Blitzer will be here after the break. We'll see you tomorrow.
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