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American Morning

U.S. Makes Direct Strike Against Terror Outside of Afghanistan

Aired November 05, 2002 - 08:16   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.


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: For the first time since the September 11 attacks, the U.S. has made a direct strike against terror outside of Afghanistan. In Yemen yesterday, a car carrying six suspected al Qaeda members was hit by a U.S. Hellfire missile fired by an unmanned CIA surveillance plane known as a Predator. All six were killed, including a former security guard for Osama bin Laden, Abu Ali. He is said to be the man shown in this exclusive CNN video back in 1998. Ali was wanted in connection with the bombing of the USS Cole.
And joining us now from Tucson, Arizona to discuss the significance of this strike is CNN military analyst Retired Major General Don Shepperd.

Good morning.

MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD (RET.), U.S. AIR FORCE, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Good morning, Carol.

COSTELLO: First of all, tell us a little bit how this operation went down. What is a Hellfire missile?

SHEPPERD: A Hellfire missile is an anti-tank missile that has been adapted to be carried on the Predator unmanned drone. Now, this drone has reportedly been operated by the CIA. This is not the first time it's been used. We've seen it used at least twice before on announced strikes in Afghanistan, once against Mohamed Atif, the military chief of bin Laden in Afghanistan, and another one recently against Gubadin Hekmatar (ph), who is one of the warlords over there that is trying to put down the sitting government of Afghanistan.

So this is not the first time this strike has been used.

COSTELLO: OK, but it's an unmanned plane and the missile fired and it hit its target, which is, it's just absolutely amazing. Apparently the United States had good intelligence to know who was in that car. Why not capture these guys and question them to get more information about al Qaeda?

SHEPPERD: Yes, that would be ideal, if you could capture them. Unfortunately, these people were hit in an area about 100 miles east of Sanna, the campaign of Yemen. And it's one of those lawless areas. It's the homeland of bin Laden. Lots of sympathizers in that area. Before, earlier this year when Yemeni forces went in there to try to capture some al Qaeda, 17 of them were killed. So it's extremely dangerous. You have to have very, very good human intelligence for this to work. You have to be watching for the suspect. You have to know he's in the car. You have to follow him, get him in an uninhabited area, if you will, and then strike him. This was a typical operation of the CIA operatives.

COSTELLO: Are we going to see more of this in other countries?

SHEPPERD: Carol, I think you will. This is the opening strike outside of Afghanistan. But we've been told this is going to be a worldwide search and we've been told that there may even be some preemptive strikes. This was not preemptive because we were after Abu Ali because of his connection to the Cole incident. But it's very likely that we'll see other strikes such as this.

COSTELLO: Well, you know, General, there's been much criticism about Israel going into the Palestinian territories and targeting enemies there. How is this different?

SHEPPERD: Yes, it's different in the fact that this is part of a war in which we were struck. We have announced that we are after these people. We put out a list of 15 of the top leaders of al Qaeda. We would like to get them with law enforcement, but we're telling people that we're going after them worldwide. The message to these people is no matter where you go, no matter where you flee, no matter what time of the day or night it is, we're after you, we're watching and when we find you, we are going to kill you or we're going to bring you to justice, and we're not real particular which one it's going to be.

COSTELLO: You know, it sounds like an absolutely perfect operation, but what if the intelligence is wrong?

SHEPPERD: That can always happen, Carol. These things take, these things have great risk. We've seen in Afghanistan, we've seen instances where we've hit the wrong target. So you're always taking a chance. But they're reviewed very carefully at the highest levels to make sure that we're not making mistakes. In this case...

COSTELLO: But isn't it...

SHEPPERD: ... it doesn't look like we did.

COSTELLO: Isn't it different if we have the wrong intelligence in Afghanistan than it is if we have the wrong intelligence in another country?

SHEPPERD: It is, absolutely. We're going to have to be even more careful outside of the war zone. You know there is a prohibition against assassinations. This is not an assassination. There was an intelligence finding by the president that allowed us to go after identified suspects. This is not a case of us just going out looking for anybody and shooting them wherever they are. We're going after known people in known locations. That makes it a lot different from an assassination.

COSTELLO: All right, Major General Shepperd, thank you very much for joining us this morning on AMERICAN MORNING.

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





Afghanistan>


Aired November 5, 2002 - 08:16   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: For the first time since the September 11 attacks, the U.S. has made a direct strike against terror outside of Afghanistan. In Yemen yesterday, a car carrying six suspected al Qaeda members was hit by a U.S. Hellfire missile fired by an unmanned CIA surveillance plane known as a Predator. All six were killed, including a former security guard for Osama bin Laden, Abu Ali. He is said to be the man shown in this exclusive CNN video back in 1998. Ali was wanted in connection with the bombing of the USS Cole.
And joining us now from Tucson, Arizona to discuss the significance of this strike is CNN military analyst Retired Major General Don Shepperd.

Good morning.

MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD (RET.), U.S. AIR FORCE, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Good morning, Carol.

COSTELLO: First of all, tell us a little bit how this operation went down. What is a Hellfire missile?

SHEPPERD: A Hellfire missile is an anti-tank missile that has been adapted to be carried on the Predator unmanned drone. Now, this drone has reportedly been operated by the CIA. This is not the first time it's been used. We've seen it used at least twice before on announced strikes in Afghanistan, once against Mohamed Atif, the military chief of bin Laden in Afghanistan, and another one recently against Gubadin Hekmatar (ph), who is one of the warlords over there that is trying to put down the sitting government of Afghanistan.

So this is not the first time this strike has been used.

COSTELLO: OK, but it's an unmanned plane and the missile fired and it hit its target, which is, it's just absolutely amazing. Apparently the United States had good intelligence to know who was in that car. Why not capture these guys and question them to get more information about al Qaeda?

SHEPPERD: Yes, that would be ideal, if you could capture them. Unfortunately, these people were hit in an area about 100 miles east of Sanna, the campaign of Yemen. And it's one of those lawless areas. It's the homeland of bin Laden. Lots of sympathizers in that area. Before, earlier this year when Yemeni forces went in there to try to capture some al Qaeda, 17 of them were killed. So it's extremely dangerous. You have to have very, very good human intelligence for this to work. You have to be watching for the suspect. You have to know he's in the car. You have to follow him, get him in an uninhabited area, if you will, and then strike him. This was a typical operation of the CIA operatives.

COSTELLO: Are we going to see more of this in other countries?

SHEPPERD: Carol, I think you will. This is the opening strike outside of Afghanistan. But we've been told this is going to be a worldwide search and we've been told that there may even be some preemptive strikes. This was not preemptive because we were after Abu Ali because of his connection to the Cole incident. But it's very likely that we'll see other strikes such as this.

COSTELLO: Well, you know, General, there's been much criticism about Israel going into the Palestinian territories and targeting enemies there. How is this different?

SHEPPERD: Yes, it's different in the fact that this is part of a war in which we were struck. We have announced that we are after these people. We put out a list of 15 of the top leaders of al Qaeda. We would like to get them with law enforcement, but we're telling people that we're going after them worldwide. The message to these people is no matter where you go, no matter where you flee, no matter what time of the day or night it is, we're after you, we're watching and when we find you, we are going to kill you or we're going to bring you to justice, and we're not real particular which one it's going to be.

COSTELLO: You know, it sounds like an absolutely perfect operation, but what if the intelligence is wrong?

SHEPPERD: That can always happen, Carol. These things take, these things have great risk. We've seen in Afghanistan, we've seen instances where we've hit the wrong target. So you're always taking a chance. But they're reviewed very carefully at the highest levels to make sure that we're not making mistakes. In this case...

COSTELLO: But isn't it...

SHEPPERD: ... it doesn't look like we did.

COSTELLO: Isn't it different if we have the wrong intelligence in Afghanistan than it is if we have the wrong intelligence in another country?

SHEPPERD: It is, absolutely. We're going to have to be even more careful outside of the war zone. You know there is a prohibition against assassinations. This is not an assassination. There was an intelligence finding by the president that allowed us to go after identified suspects. This is not a case of us just going out looking for anybody and shooting them wherever they are. We're going after known people in known locations. That makes it a lot different from an assassination.

COSTELLO: All right, Major General Shepperd, thank you very much for joining us this morning on AMERICAN MORNING.

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





Afghanistan>