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American Morning

Marines Undergoing Anti-Terrorism Training

Aired October 30, 2001 - 11:35   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.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Fearing more terrorist attacks, the Pentagon has reactivated the Fourth Marine Expeditionary Brigade. That unit would be among the first to be deployed in the event of a terrorist threat here or overseas. And today troops are conducting training exercises at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. That's where we find CNN's Brian Cabell watching it for us there. Brian, hello.

BRIAN CABELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A little difficult to hear you at this point, Bill, but this is live training exercises. Actually live rounds that this Fourth Marine Expeditionary Brigade is engaged -- engaged in a lot of new training over the last couple of weeks. They were just reactivated here this month. They many be fully operational, we're told, by December. 4800 Marine personnel and also a handful of navy personnel involved in these exercises. They were deactivated back in 1992 but with the new world conditions they have been reactivated specifically to combat terrorism, to deter terrorism, to detect it, to defend against it, and also to respond to any sort of problems that might occur either here at home or across the world, as a matter of fact. With us right now is a first lieutenant to give us some idea of exactly what they are doing right now. This is not normal Marine training, right? -- let's hold off for a second. Again , this is not normal Marine training.

UNIDENTIFIED MARINE: No sir, this is enhanced marksmanship, specifically designed for close-in shooting and for urban environments.

CABELL: Specifically to be used in a terrorist type of environment?

UNIDENTIFIED MARINE: Yes, sir. Any time, any time we can be deployed -- to combat a terrorist situation, this type of marksmanship can be employed. We are dealing no longer with long-range marksmanship which Marines have been the experts in for so long. We're now dealing with short-range marksmanship anywhere from 15 meters, closer up.

CABELL: We've had an awful lot of -- what other types of training are we talking about?

UNIDENTIFIED MARINE: This brigade, sir, has been going through other types of training to include urban assault climbers, to include non-lethal weapons where we learn to shoot weapons to include bean bags, foam, little foam batons, and also use pepper spray and batons. So that we add another weapon to our arsenal so that we can use a force continuum. No longer are we going straight to deadly force. We have other options available to us now, sir.

CABELL: Thank you very much, First Lieutenant.

UNIDENTIFIED MARINE: Yes, sir.

CABELL: Once again, in training right now and fully deployable and fully operational, we are told, by December. They are based up and down the coast. About 4800 personnel. They could defending facilities that could be considered targets, they could be tracking down terrorists, conceivably, ambushing terrorists, we're told, or responding to terrorist activities, either chemical, biological, or more conventional. Bill, back to you.

HEMMER: Brian Cabell, Camp Lejeune, Brian, thank you.

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