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American Morning

Guerrilla Word War

Aired July 01, 2003 - 08:17   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Despite recent attacks on U.S. troops, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld insists this is not turning into a guerrilla war. Rumsfeld also rejects any comparisons to Vietnam.
Our senior Pentagon correspondent Jamie McIntyre has more on this guerrilla word war.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): While many military experts may believe the attacks against U.S. forces in Iraq fit the textbook definition of guerrilla war, Donald Rumsfeld does not.

(on camera): Appreciating, as I do, your appreciation of precision in language...

DONALD RUMSFELD, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: You've got the dictionary definition?

MCINTYRE: Well, you know, THE definition of guerrilla war.

RUMSFELD: I was afraid you would have. I should have looked it up. I knew I should have looked it up. I could...

MCINTYRE: According to the Pentagon's own definition, military and paramilitary...

RUMSFELD: I could die that I didn't look it up.

MCINTYRE: ... operations conducted in enemy held or hostile territory by irregular predominantly indigenous forces. That does seem to fit a lot of what's going on over there.

RUMSFELD: It really doesn't.

MCINTYRE: The problem with conceding the U.S. may be locked in guerrilla warfare is that it raises the specter of Vietnam. In fact, a cartoon on that point hangs on Rumsfeld's wall.

RUMSFELD: There are so many cartoons where people, press people are saying, "Is it Vietnam yet?," hoping it is and wondering if it is. And it isn't. It's a different time. It's a different era. It's a different place.

MCINTYRE: And any comparison to Vietnam brings up the "Q word." MCINTYRE: Quagmire.

RUMSFELD: What happened in Eastern Europe? Were they in a quagmire when the Berlin Wall fell down and they started struggling and working their way towards democracy?

MCINTYRE: The criticism would be that you're in a situation from which there's no good way to extricate yourself. Can you speak to whether or not that (UNINTELLIGIBLE)...

RUMSFELD: Then the word clearly would not be a good one.

MCINTYRE (on camera): Meanwhile, the hunt goes on for Saddam Hussein and his two sons, whose capture is seen as key to breaking the will of the insurgents. Pentagon officials say there's no evidence they were in a convoy that was attacked nearly two weeks ago. But officials do concede it's possible that some senior Iraqis may have slipped across the border into Syria during that operation.

Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: So, clearly, the words quagmire and guerrilla war are sensitive to some people in the Pentagon.

Our senior analyst Jeff Greenfield joining us now.

So, what was up with all of that?

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Vietnam. The Secretary was right about that. The notion that the United States might find itself a kind of Gulliver trapped, big though it is, trapped in some kind of conflict in which people hit, wound, kill and slip away, keeping us there for years to come with a body count, is something that is a nightmare for not just the Pentagon, but for all of us.

Look, Vietnam was different in so many different ways. There's not a North Vietnam in this situation, feeding in troops. There's not a Soviet Union and China giving these guerrillas support.

But, on the other hand, the notion that the United States might have to stay there for years with a couple of hundred thousand people for peacekeeping purposes, to keep the peace, to prevent a new outbreak of war and maybe taking casualties, is something that the optimists didn't predict. And so any hint of that is something that the administration, and Rumsfeld in particular, is going to want to push off.

But, of course, reality will tell us whether this is true or not. That's the one part of this conversation that I never understand. We were going to know either well or badly whether this is an ongoing organized campaign in which Americans are at risk.

COLLINS: Yes, we certainly are, reality always coming back to that, of course. We, also, though, want to get your take this morning on the political dash for dollars. The 2004 presidential election is just 16 months away now, but candidates already racing for that money, as they always do, before the second quarter filing period expired about midnight. In fact, President Bush added $3 million to his war chest during events yesterday in Florida. We see some of that now.

You're watching this money scramble. What's new about this? I mean isn't this what politicians do?

GREENFIELD: Well, the first thing that may not be new, but it is unprecedented, is how effective the president is as a fundraiser. I mean he broke all records in 2000 as a candidate and now he's breaking his own records. In the last six weeks, he's raised somewhere around $30 million. It may be more, because the campaign could be low balling the press, which is what it did in 2000. That's probably going to be more than all of the Democrats combined for the last six months. By next spring, Bush will have somewhere between $150 million and $200 million or more, all hard money, that is, direct campaign contributions in chunks of $2,000 or less.

And, Heidi, this is the part that I think will have people head scratching. Technically, this money is for the president's renomination, even though he has no opposition, because the general election is publicly funded. And that means next March the Democrats' likely nominee will almost certainly be out of money, and at that point the Bush campaign can spend this money right up till its nominating convention in late August to praise Bush and the Republicans, to criticize the Democratic likely nominee and the party.

And Democrats can't even turn to their rich supporters, because next time, unless the Supreme Court strikes it down, that McCain- Feingold law, no soft money. They've got to raise their money in $2,000 increments.

So Bush can do to the Democrats pretty much what Clinton did to Dole in '96.

COLLINS: So, I mean, are we supposed to feel bad for the Democrats at this point or, I mean, we say he's got no opposition?

GREENFIELD: Well, you know, journalists are not supposed to feel good or sorry about anybody.

COLLINS: No, I don't mean we. I mean the public, in viewing all of this.

GREENFIELD: You know, the people who were are in power tend to raise more money. I'll show you what I mean. In 1996, incumbent President Bill Clinton had the soft money. Dole was sitting there out of money. And let me show you one of the kind of ads that the Clinton people ran against Dole, if we can see that for a second.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP FROM CLINTON CAMPAIGN AD)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Oval Office, if it were Bob Dole sitting here, he would have already cut Medicare $270 billion...

-- toxic polluters off the hook

-- no to the Brady Bill

-- 60,000 criminals allowed to buy handguns

-- and slashed education.

President Clinton stood firm and defended our values. But next year, if Newt Gingrich controls Congress and his partner, Bob Dole, enters the Oval Office, there'll be nobody there to stop them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GREENFIELD: Now, those ads ran day after day. Dole was out of money. He couldn't answer them. And by the time Dole was formally nominated, those ads had helped define him into pretty much the guy who couldn't wage an effective campaign.

Do I think Bush will do that to whoever the Democratic nominee is next time? Oh, yes.

COLLINS: What other strategies do you think President Bush will use?

GREENFIELD: Well, he will -- I think they will certainly praise his own record, say they delivered on their promises. And, also, this money can also be funneled to the Republican House and Senate campaigns, because remember, we elect a new Congress in 2004. So that's the story on the Republican side.

COLLINS: All right, CNN senior analyst -- what's the problem?

GREENFIELD: We haven't talked about the Democrats and Howard Dean.

COLLINS: We want to talk about the Democratic fundraising, absolutely. All right.

GREENFIELD: Well, the point about that is Howard Dean is the big story. He raised, in the second quarter, more than $7 million. In fact, they -- he'd already gained a lot of attention by being the most severe critic of President Bush, by criticizing his own party's people for not being sufficiently strong. He went on the Net and every half hour yesterday they were updating it. It was like a Jerry Lewis telethon without the TV.

It turns out he raised $7.1 million in the second quarter. That's probably going to be more than any other Democrat. So this ex- Vermont governor, considered a second tier candidate, the money has elevated him into the top tier. And meanwhile a guy like Joe Lieberman, who leads in the public opinion polls, may have explaining to do if he has faulted in the fundraising, because that's the only thing we have to measure now.

COLLINS: All right, so, but Dean is clearly the story here?

GREENFIELD: I think Dean is the story because -- and not just because of all the money he raised. It's the power of the Internet. In 2000, John McCain raised a lot of money on the Internet. But this time, Dean has used the Web to organize medians, to link supporters with each other and to raise money, and I think that notion of the Web, the Internet finally being a powerful political tool, I think Dean is going to test that notion more than any other candidate we've seen.

That's a pretty good story. And, as I say, you know, Joe Lieberman, maybe John Edwards, who was the fundraiser, top fundraiser in the first quarter, if they -- Dick Gephardt -- if they falter, we political journalists are going to say...

COLLINS: Right.

GREENFIELD: Are you in trouble?

COLLINS: All right, CNN senior political analyst Jeff Greenfield, thank you so much this morning.

GREENFIELD: Thanks, Heidi.

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






Aired July 1, 2003 - 08:17   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Despite recent attacks on U.S. troops, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld insists this is not turning into a guerrilla war. Rumsfeld also rejects any comparisons to Vietnam.
Our senior Pentagon correspondent Jamie McIntyre has more on this guerrilla word war.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): While many military experts may believe the attacks against U.S. forces in Iraq fit the textbook definition of guerrilla war, Donald Rumsfeld does not.

(on camera): Appreciating, as I do, your appreciation of precision in language...

DONALD RUMSFELD, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: You've got the dictionary definition?

MCINTYRE: Well, you know, THE definition of guerrilla war.

RUMSFELD: I was afraid you would have. I should have looked it up. I knew I should have looked it up. I could...

MCINTYRE: According to the Pentagon's own definition, military and paramilitary...

RUMSFELD: I could die that I didn't look it up.

MCINTYRE: ... operations conducted in enemy held or hostile territory by irregular predominantly indigenous forces. That does seem to fit a lot of what's going on over there.

RUMSFELD: It really doesn't.

MCINTYRE: The problem with conceding the U.S. may be locked in guerrilla warfare is that it raises the specter of Vietnam. In fact, a cartoon on that point hangs on Rumsfeld's wall.

RUMSFELD: There are so many cartoons where people, press people are saying, "Is it Vietnam yet?," hoping it is and wondering if it is. And it isn't. It's a different time. It's a different era. It's a different place.

MCINTYRE: And any comparison to Vietnam brings up the "Q word." MCINTYRE: Quagmire.

RUMSFELD: What happened in Eastern Europe? Were they in a quagmire when the Berlin Wall fell down and they started struggling and working their way towards democracy?

MCINTYRE: The criticism would be that you're in a situation from which there's no good way to extricate yourself. Can you speak to whether or not that (UNINTELLIGIBLE)...

RUMSFELD: Then the word clearly would not be a good one.

MCINTYRE (on camera): Meanwhile, the hunt goes on for Saddam Hussein and his two sons, whose capture is seen as key to breaking the will of the insurgents. Pentagon officials say there's no evidence they were in a convoy that was attacked nearly two weeks ago. But officials do concede it's possible that some senior Iraqis may have slipped across the border into Syria during that operation.

Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: So, clearly, the words quagmire and guerrilla war are sensitive to some people in the Pentagon.

Our senior analyst Jeff Greenfield joining us now.

So, what was up with all of that?

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Vietnam. The Secretary was right about that. The notion that the United States might find itself a kind of Gulliver trapped, big though it is, trapped in some kind of conflict in which people hit, wound, kill and slip away, keeping us there for years to come with a body count, is something that is a nightmare for not just the Pentagon, but for all of us.

Look, Vietnam was different in so many different ways. There's not a North Vietnam in this situation, feeding in troops. There's not a Soviet Union and China giving these guerrillas support.

But, on the other hand, the notion that the United States might have to stay there for years with a couple of hundred thousand people for peacekeeping purposes, to keep the peace, to prevent a new outbreak of war and maybe taking casualties, is something that the optimists didn't predict. And so any hint of that is something that the administration, and Rumsfeld in particular, is going to want to push off.

But, of course, reality will tell us whether this is true or not. That's the one part of this conversation that I never understand. We were going to know either well or badly whether this is an ongoing organized campaign in which Americans are at risk.

COLLINS: Yes, we certainly are, reality always coming back to that, of course. We, also, though, want to get your take this morning on the political dash for dollars. The 2004 presidential election is just 16 months away now, but candidates already racing for that money, as they always do, before the second quarter filing period expired about midnight. In fact, President Bush added $3 million to his war chest during events yesterday in Florida. We see some of that now.

You're watching this money scramble. What's new about this? I mean isn't this what politicians do?

GREENFIELD: Well, the first thing that may not be new, but it is unprecedented, is how effective the president is as a fundraiser. I mean he broke all records in 2000 as a candidate and now he's breaking his own records. In the last six weeks, he's raised somewhere around $30 million. It may be more, because the campaign could be low balling the press, which is what it did in 2000. That's probably going to be more than all of the Democrats combined for the last six months. By next spring, Bush will have somewhere between $150 million and $200 million or more, all hard money, that is, direct campaign contributions in chunks of $2,000 or less.

And, Heidi, this is the part that I think will have people head scratching. Technically, this money is for the president's renomination, even though he has no opposition, because the general election is publicly funded. And that means next March the Democrats' likely nominee will almost certainly be out of money, and at that point the Bush campaign can spend this money right up till its nominating convention in late August to praise Bush and the Republicans, to criticize the Democratic likely nominee and the party.

And Democrats can't even turn to their rich supporters, because next time, unless the Supreme Court strikes it down, that McCain- Feingold law, no soft money. They've got to raise their money in $2,000 increments.

So Bush can do to the Democrats pretty much what Clinton did to Dole in '96.

COLLINS: So, I mean, are we supposed to feel bad for the Democrats at this point or, I mean, we say he's got no opposition?

GREENFIELD: Well, you know, journalists are not supposed to feel good or sorry about anybody.

COLLINS: No, I don't mean we. I mean the public, in viewing all of this.

GREENFIELD: You know, the people who were are in power tend to raise more money. I'll show you what I mean. In 1996, incumbent President Bill Clinton had the soft money. Dole was sitting there out of money. And let me show you one of the kind of ads that the Clinton people ran against Dole, if we can see that for a second.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP FROM CLINTON CAMPAIGN AD)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Oval Office, if it were Bob Dole sitting here, he would have already cut Medicare $270 billion...

-- toxic polluters off the hook

-- no to the Brady Bill

-- 60,000 criminals allowed to buy handguns

-- and slashed education.

President Clinton stood firm and defended our values. But next year, if Newt Gingrich controls Congress and his partner, Bob Dole, enters the Oval Office, there'll be nobody there to stop them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GREENFIELD: Now, those ads ran day after day. Dole was out of money. He couldn't answer them. And by the time Dole was formally nominated, those ads had helped define him into pretty much the guy who couldn't wage an effective campaign.

Do I think Bush will do that to whoever the Democratic nominee is next time? Oh, yes.

COLLINS: What other strategies do you think President Bush will use?

GREENFIELD: Well, he will -- I think they will certainly praise his own record, say they delivered on their promises. And, also, this money can also be funneled to the Republican House and Senate campaigns, because remember, we elect a new Congress in 2004. So that's the story on the Republican side.

COLLINS: All right, CNN senior analyst -- what's the problem?

GREENFIELD: We haven't talked about the Democrats and Howard Dean.

COLLINS: We want to talk about the Democratic fundraising, absolutely. All right.

GREENFIELD: Well, the point about that is Howard Dean is the big story. He raised, in the second quarter, more than $7 million. In fact, they -- he'd already gained a lot of attention by being the most severe critic of President Bush, by criticizing his own party's people for not being sufficiently strong. He went on the Net and every half hour yesterday they were updating it. It was like a Jerry Lewis telethon without the TV.

It turns out he raised $7.1 million in the second quarter. That's probably going to be more than any other Democrat. So this ex- Vermont governor, considered a second tier candidate, the money has elevated him into the top tier. And meanwhile a guy like Joe Lieberman, who leads in the public opinion polls, may have explaining to do if he has faulted in the fundraising, because that's the only thing we have to measure now.

COLLINS: All right, so, but Dean is clearly the story here?

GREENFIELD: I think Dean is the story because -- and not just because of all the money he raised. It's the power of the Internet. In 2000, John McCain raised a lot of money on the Internet. But this time, Dean has used the Web to organize medians, to link supporters with each other and to raise money, and I think that notion of the Web, the Internet finally being a powerful political tool, I think Dean is going to test that notion more than any other candidate we've seen.

That's a pretty good story. And, as I say, you know, Joe Lieberman, maybe John Edwards, who was the fundraiser, top fundraiser in the first quarter, if they -- Dick Gephardt -- if they falter, we political journalists are going to say...

COLLINS: Right.

GREENFIELD: Are you in trouble?

COLLINS: All right, CNN senior political analyst Jeff Greenfield, thank you so much this morning.

GREENFIELD: Thanks, Heidi.

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