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American Morning

Covered with Glory

Aired December 22, 2003 - 08:36   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.


ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: The nearly 1.5 million men and women of the U.S. military are being honored by "Time" magazine. The magazine's editors have selected the American soldier as the 2003 person of the year. For more on the selection and how it was made we're joined by Nancy Gibbs, editor at large of "Time" magazine.
NANCY GIBBS, "TIME" MAGAZINE: Good morning.

COOPER: How tough a decision was this?

GIBBS: Easiest we've had, I think, in a long time. We knew the war was the story of the year. The question was, are we going to tell it from the top, or from the bottom? From the ground up.

COOPER: Does Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld get credit for this? Because back in November, I read he actually suggested the American soldier should be the person of the year.

GIBBS: He did. A couple editors went down to speak with him, and that was his suggestion. By that time, we had chewed on this question for weeks and weeks, and had already launched our reporting. But it was interesting to have him essentially validating the choice that we had made. We couldn't tell him at the time of course.

COOPER: About the soldiers you write, they are bright, sharp instrument of a blunt policy. What do you mean by that?

GIBBS: You know, here's the policy that the Bush administration has adopted, a preemptive warfare, anything that might be a threat we are going to go after. That in the broadest terms is where this country is. But making that work, making that happen now comes down to a day-to-day, very difficult, often improvised mission for these soldiers. Whether this succeeds or fails falls on their shoulders now.

COOPER: Who are some of the other people editors considered?

GIBBS: Well, we certainly talked about the president. I think every year we have to have the conversation, you know, because the president always has...

COOPER: President Bush was person of the year...

GIBBS: The year he was elected in 2000, he was. And certainly Secretary Rumsfeld, who has had so much to do with how the war and how the peace have unfolded. You could argue Arnold Schwarzenegger or Howard Dean or any of the domestic political figures, I think next year may be the year that we look at our domestic policies.

COOPER: What do you look for? it's such an interesting calculation. It's not science at all. But there are so many different sort of factors at play.

GIBBS: What we're really trying to do is so what is the important thing that happened this year, and how do we tell this story in a way that might help readers pull back, think about 2003, think about what really mattered. And in a year when the country was so divided, the one thing that we were really united about was about our feelings for the soldiers, our hope for their safety, that they'd be able to get the job done, come home soon. It was the one thing that we had in common. Even people who were adamantly protesting the war protested it in a part on behalf of the soldiers and about sending them on a mission that they thought was fraught with danger.

COOPER: The cover photo, which is amazing photo is by Jim Nackway (ph), who is just an extraordinary war photographer, has been for many years. He and Michael Weiskopf, a correspondent, were both injured in a Humvee, someone threw in a grenade. How are they doing? And the story, by the way, which is recounted in "Time" magazine is extraordinary. Michael Weiskopf not only saved Jim Nackway's life, but the lives of several soldiers who he was with.

GIBBS: It was extraordinary. They were among the people we had embedded with this platoon in Baghdad, and they were on patrol when a Humvee they were in had a grenade thrown into it. Weiskopf reached for it to throw it out, and when it exploded, rather than killing all of them, as would have been likely, it blew his hand off, everyone took shrapnel injuries. The woman on the cover is the medic with this platoon who treated the soldiers in that moment.

He is now -- Weiskopf is now at Walter Reed recovering there, and Jim Nackway is back here in New York seeing his doctors. Both of them are in amazing spirits. They are quite extraordinary.

COOPER: Well, it is good to hear. And it's an amazing story recounted in this issue. Nancy Gibbs, appreciate you joining us.

GIBBS: 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 December 22, 2003 - 08:36   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: The nearly 1.5 million men and women of the U.S. military are being honored by "Time" magazine. The magazine's editors have selected the American soldier as the 2003 person of the year. For more on the selection and how it was made we're joined by Nancy Gibbs, editor at large of "Time" magazine.
NANCY GIBBS, "TIME" MAGAZINE: Good morning.

COOPER: How tough a decision was this?

GIBBS: Easiest we've had, I think, in a long time. We knew the war was the story of the year. The question was, are we going to tell it from the top, or from the bottom? From the ground up.

COOPER: Does Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld get credit for this? Because back in November, I read he actually suggested the American soldier should be the person of the year.

GIBBS: He did. A couple editors went down to speak with him, and that was his suggestion. By that time, we had chewed on this question for weeks and weeks, and had already launched our reporting. But it was interesting to have him essentially validating the choice that we had made. We couldn't tell him at the time of course.

COOPER: About the soldiers you write, they are bright, sharp instrument of a blunt policy. What do you mean by that?

GIBBS: You know, here's the policy that the Bush administration has adopted, a preemptive warfare, anything that might be a threat we are going to go after. That in the broadest terms is where this country is. But making that work, making that happen now comes down to a day-to-day, very difficult, often improvised mission for these soldiers. Whether this succeeds or fails falls on their shoulders now.

COOPER: Who are some of the other people editors considered?

GIBBS: Well, we certainly talked about the president. I think every year we have to have the conversation, you know, because the president always has...

COOPER: President Bush was person of the year...

GIBBS: The year he was elected in 2000, he was. And certainly Secretary Rumsfeld, who has had so much to do with how the war and how the peace have unfolded. You could argue Arnold Schwarzenegger or Howard Dean or any of the domestic political figures, I think next year may be the year that we look at our domestic policies.

COOPER: What do you look for? it's such an interesting calculation. It's not science at all. But there are so many different sort of factors at play.

GIBBS: What we're really trying to do is so what is the important thing that happened this year, and how do we tell this story in a way that might help readers pull back, think about 2003, think about what really mattered. And in a year when the country was so divided, the one thing that we were really united about was about our feelings for the soldiers, our hope for their safety, that they'd be able to get the job done, come home soon. It was the one thing that we had in common. Even people who were adamantly protesting the war protested it in a part on behalf of the soldiers and about sending them on a mission that they thought was fraught with danger.

COOPER: The cover photo, which is amazing photo is by Jim Nackway (ph), who is just an extraordinary war photographer, has been for many years. He and Michael Weiskopf, a correspondent, were both injured in a Humvee, someone threw in a grenade. How are they doing? And the story, by the way, which is recounted in "Time" magazine is extraordinary. Michael Weiskopf not only saved Jim Nackway's life, but the lives of several soldiers who he was with.

GIBBS: It was extraordinary. They were among the people we had embedded with this platoon in Baghdad, and they were on patrol when a Humvee they were in had a grenade thrown into it. Weiskopf reached for it to throw it out, and when it exploded, rather than killing all of them, as would have been likely, it blew his hand off, everyone took shrapnel injuries. The woman on the cover is the medic with this platoon who treated the soldiers in that moment.

He is now -- Weiskopf is now at Walter Reed recovering there, and Jim Nackway is back here in New York seeing his doctors. Both of them are in amazing spirits. They are quite extraordinary.

COOPER: Well, it is good to hear. And it's an amazing story recounted in this issue. Nancy Gibbs, appreciate you joining us.

GIBBS: 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