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American Morning
Interview With Mike Turner
Aired July 11, 2003 - 09:05 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: American troops may be in Iraq perhaps four years from now, maybe longer, that assessment from General Franks yesterday, who led the war in Iraq, and just stepped down as head of Central Command. He did not give a precise estimate, but did suggests to members of Congress that the U.S. could be involved possibly two to four more years, perhaps longer. Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry accusing the White House of not having a plan to rebuild Iraq after the war.
Retired Air Force Colonel Mike Turner with us live in Colorado Springs, Colorado, to talk more with us about this. Colonel, thank you for coming back on AMERICAN MORNING.
COL. MIKE TURNER (RET.), U.S. AIR FORCE: My pleasure, Bill. Thank you.
One of the options you say to withdraw immediately and completely disengage. Do you really think that's a solution?
TURNER: Well, I don't think it's -- it's a moot point, because I don't think the administration has the option to choose that for political reasons. I say that, because at this point, all I'm concerned about is saving military lives. That would represent -- an immediate withdrawal would represent an enormous foreign policy defeat, and I don't think the administration realistically has any intention of accepting that level of a defeat.
So it's problematic for the administration. If, however, someone believes, as I do, that the foreign policy defeat has probably already occurred, that the fact that there is no empirical or circumstantial evidence at this point to suggest that the administration has a comprehensive, multinational, multiorganizational plan to really make democracy in Iraq a reality.
Then we'll wait another year or year and a half or two years down the road with no substantive change on the ground in Iraq in the factors that caused this crisis in the first place. And we'll kill 200 or 300 more U.S. troops in the process.
If that's where we're headed, let's get them out now.
HEMMER: Doesn't this all take time? You get interim government in place over the weekend. That's the reports we're getting anyway. And if you take these incremental steps, yes, granted, it's not a masterpiece right now, but given time, in time, this place will stabilize? TURNER: That's certainly a possibility. But I would suggest that at least the superficial evidence speaks fairly loudly to the contrary.
For the four years I was in the interagency, we spent hundreds of hours in policy discussions about military interventions in and around Sub-Saharan Africa and Middle East and Southwest Asia. And in those discussions, we always had a mantra that we used which was what's the exit strategy and what is the multi-national commitment and will of the United States to pursue changing the factors on the ground for the long term?
At the very least, after three months, we ought to see the electricity back on, the water back on, a massive U.N.-sanctioned international effort that would be indicative of a comprehensive plan and existence to do those kind of things.
So yes, it is entirely possible there is a plan, we just haven't seen it. But given the pressure the administration is under I would think that we would begin to see some milestones, some benchmarks and some very obvious multi-national, international progress along these lines certainly before now.
HEMMER: I know you're a pretty strong critic. Go back to this House hearing yesterday. Listen to what a Missouri Democrat, Ike Skelton, said about the current operation right now. Listen to his words especially at the end right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. IKE SKELTON (D), MISSOURI: We cannot leave Iraq. This has to be a success. If it's not a success, the credibility of the United States of America as a leader in this free world will hit rock bottom.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HEMMER: Hit rock bottom. Colonel, you already think it's there. Why?
TURNER: Well, we can't leave. From a practical standpoint, from a political and international standpoint, we can't. Which means we only have two options. We can go in with massive military force on the presumption that greater military forces lead to greater security. Well if you study the French in Algeria, that's not necessarily true and simply creates more targets. And in addition, it would cost hundreds of billions of dollars.
Or we hunker down, we accept half a dozen U.S. military deaths every week and hope that we don't exceed the threshold of American public outrage that nothing is changing on the ground except U.S. troops are dying.
And I don't frankly see any options other than what General Franks alluded to yesterday, which is to hunker down and stay there for the two to four-year period with no fundamental changes in the factors in this society that caused this crisis in the first place. HEMMER: More to come. We'll follow it this weekend too. Colonel Mike Turner, live there in Colorado Spring. Thanks for your time again.
TURNER: Thank you.
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 11, 2003 - 09:05 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: American troops may be in Iraq perhaps four years from now, maybe longer, that assessment from General Franks yesterday, who led the war in Iraq, and just stepped down as head of Central Command. He did not give a precise estimate, but did suggests to members of Congress that the U.S. could be involved possibly two to four more years, perhaps longer. Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry accusing the White House of not having a plan to rebuild Iraq after the war.
Retired Air Force Colonel Mike Turner with us live in Colorado Springs, Colorado, to talk more with us about this. Colonel, thank you for coming back on AMERICAN MORNING.
COL. MIKE TURNER (RET.), U.S. AIR FORCE: My pleasure, Bill. Thank you.
One of the options you say to withdraw immediately and completely disengage. Do you really think that's a solution?
TURNER: Well, I don't think it's -- it's a moot point, because I don't think the administration has the option to choose that for political reasons. I say that, because at this point, all I'm concerned about is saving military lives. That would represent -- an immediate withdrawal would represent an enormous foreign policy defeat, and I don't think the administration realistically has any intention of accepting that level of a defeat.
So it's problematic for the administration. If, however, someone believes, as I do, that the foreign policy defeat has probably already occurred, that the fact that there is no empirical or circumstantial evidence at this point to suggest that the administration has a comprehensive, multinational, multiorganizational plan to really make democracy in Iraq a reality.
Then we'll wait another year or year and a half or two years down the road with no substantive change on the ground in Iraq in the factors that caused this crisis in the first place. And we'll kill 200 or 300 more U.S. troops in the process.
If that's where we're headed, let's get them out now.
HEMMER: Doesn't this all take time? You get interim government in place over the weekend. That's the reports we're getting anyway. And if you take these incremental steps, yes, granted, it's not a masterpiece right now, but given time, in time, this place will stabilize? TURNER: That's certainly a possibility. But I would suggest that at least the superficial evidence speaks fairly loudly to the contrary.
For the four years I was in the interagency, we spent hundreds of hours in policy discussions about military interventions in and around Sub-Saharan Africa and Middle East and Southwest Asia. And in those discussions, we always had a mantra that we used which was what's the exit strategy and what is the multi-national commitment and will of the United States to pursue changing the factors on the ground for the long term?
At the very least, after three months, we ought to see the electricity back on, the water back on, a massive U.N.-sanctioned international effort that would be indicative of a comprehensive plan and existence to do those kind of things.
So yes, it is entirely possible there is a plan, we just haven't seen it. But given the pressure the administration is under I would think that we would begin to see some milestones, some benchmarks and some very obvious multi-national, international progress along these lines certainly before now.
HEMMER: I know you're a pretty strong critic. Go back to this House hearing yesterday. Listen to what a Missouri Democrat, Ike Skelton, said about the current operation right now. Listen to his words especially at the end right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. IKE SKELTON (D), MISSOURI: We cannot leave Iraq. This has to be a success. If it's not a success, the credibility of the United States of America as a leader in this free world will hit rock bottom.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HEMMER: Hit rock bottom. Colonel, you already think it's there. Why?
TURNER: Well, we can't leave. From a practical standpoint, from a political and international standpoint, we can't. Which means we only have two options. We can go in with massive military force on the presumption that greater military forces lead to greater security. Well if you study the French in Algeria, that's not necessarily true and simply creates more targets. And in addition, it would cost hundreds of billions of dollars.
Or we hunker down, we accept half a dozen U.S. military deaths every week and hope that we don't exceed the threshold of American public outrage that nothing is changing on the ground except U.S. troops are dying.
And I don't frankly see any options other than what General Franks alluded to yesterday, which is to hunker down and stay there for the two to four-year period with no fundamental changes in the factors in this society that caused this crisis in the first place. HEMMER: More to come. We'll follow it this weekend too. Colonel Mike Turner, live there in Colorado Spring. Thanks for your time again.
TURNER: Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
