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Interview with Secretary of State John Kerry; More Air Strikes Against ISIS

Aired September 24, 2014 - 08:00   ET

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

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ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. Welcome to NEW DAY. It's Wednesday, September 24th, 8:00 in the East.

I'm here with Brooke Baldwin. It's good to have you this morning.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you, sir.

CUOMO: We need to be following this breaking news: more airstrikes against ISIS in the Middle East, four in Iraq, one in Syria. The Pentagon is calling the strikes so far extremely successful. What does that mean?

Well, lucky for you, Christiane Amanpour will speak with Secretary of State John Kerry live in a moment to get some answers.

Let's begin with Barbara Starr at the Pentagon with the latest.

Barbara, extremely successful. How do we put meat on those bones?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning, Chris.

The Pentagon acknowledging just a few moments ago, some additional details about that strike in Syria that you mentioned right off the top. One U.S. warplane and a coalition aircraft strike at an ISIS target just inside Syria near the border with Iraq. It was a group of ISIS suspected vehicles and troops, a staging area where they used to regularly cross into Iraq. The planes, the warplanes going after that, a popup target that they saw.

What about the targets in that first round of strikes that captured the world's attention?

Well, the Pentagon says that the Pentagon operation center top commanders have now looked at the battle damage assessment and they believe they have achieved a very good effect. They believe they hit all the targets they wanted to hit and they caused the damage they wanted to cause. What does that really mean?

Well, in the case of Khorasan, the group of al Qaeda operatives that they hit, they believe they possibly indeed have disrupted their plot to attack the United States or Western targets. About ISIS -- well, they've caused damage where they've caused it. They believe they were effective, not at all clear ISIS is really on the run at any point just yet.

There's a lot of concern that we hear behind the scenes that ISIS operatives may have gone into hiding. Leaders may have moved. They may be blending in with civilian populations. It may be very tough to sort of dig them out and figure out where these additional targets may be. We'll have to keep an eye on it -- Chris.

CUOMO: All right. Barbara, thank you very much for the reporting. You come back to us when you have more. We know it's just starting in terms of what we're starting of what's happened. All right. Thank you very much.

Brooke?

BALDWIN: So, that's just starting. In a couple hours from now, we will be hearing from President Obama, two hours away from a big address at the U.N. General Assembly. This is a high stakes speech to rally support for the global fight against ISIS.

So, to the White House we go to our correspondent there, Michelle Kosinski.

Michelle, good morning. Tell me about the speech he's about to make.

MICHELLE KOSINSKI, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Brooke.

President Obama addresses the U.N. today as the leader of a coalition that is at war against ISIS. He's already gathered some Arab countries, bipartisan support at home. That's a pretty good platform from which to tell the world: (a), this is a big problem, it affects you too. Here's what you can and should be doing about it as well.

And that said, the plan as it stands right now is admittedly a lengthy one. There's no guarantee of success or even what the end game looks like exactly.

And you have countries like Syria and Russia asking where's the international legal justification for doing this in Syria. It's not as if we have a U.N. resolution authorizing it.

Still, there's plenty of support out there. At least 40 countries have agreed to do something in the fight against ISIS. And President Obama arrives looking for broader commitments as well as a Security Council resolution to help stop the flow of foreign fighters, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Michelle Kosinski, thank you. Again, the president speaking in UNGA two hours from now. Thanks.

CUOMO: So many questions on the table right now about what comes next in the fight against ISIS. What's been achieved so far?

Here to answer some of them is going to be Secretary of State John Kerry with chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour -- Christiane. CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Chris,

thank you.

And we'd like to also welcome our viewers who are joining from around the world as we take this first opportunity to interview Secretary of State John Kerry at this amazing time in history right now.

Welcome to the program.

JOHN KERRY, SECRETARY OF STATE: Thank you.

AMANPOUR: Welcome to CNN, Secretary Kerry.

KERRY: Well, I'm very happy to be here. Thank you.

AMANPOUR: Can you confirm what we have all been talking about that there's a second day of strikes underway on targets in Syria and Iraq? And that the leader of the Khorasan group and another major leader have been killed?

KERRY: Well, there's definitely a second day and there will be a third and more. This is going to go on.

The president has been very clear that we're going to do what's necessary to get this job done. So, the answer is, this will go on for some time in various forms.

One of the things I'd like to emphasize, Christiane, is that everybody is fixated on the strikes. But this is a very broad-based strategy, which involves foreign fighters.

The president will chair a U.N. Security Council meeting today on foreign fighters. It involves cutting off financing. It will involve major effort to reclaim Islam by Muslims, by those to whom it belongs. And I think you will hear from the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia, from the council, from people all around the world who are outraged by what ISIL is doing to Islam.

AMANPOUR: Can you confirm the death of the leader of the Khorasan group? Which you struck, we were all surprised. Nobody had really been paying attention to it.

KERRY: Right.

AMANPOUR: Has the leader been killed?

KERRY: I can't personally confirm that at this moment, no.

AMANPOUR: Regarding one of the things you just mentioned and the president said, to cut off the flow of funding to ISIS and other such groups, many of the coalition partners who you have got, the Arab coalition partners have been blamed for either directly funding or turning an eye away from the funding going to these groups.

What are you going to say to them? Are you convinced they are onboard to stop this funding? KERRY: Well, I'm absolutely convinced that the coalition is onboard.

There's no question about it and they proved that in the air, in their willingness to join historically -- to many people's amazement -- they all came together. We had a very frank meeting yesterday with all of them with the president.

They are committed to this because this is a threat to every nation, and they see that. It's also a threat to legitimacy. It's a threat to statehood. It's a threat to their futures.

And so, it's much bigger stakes than just immediate counterterrorism and so forth.

AMANPOUR: And you can be sure that they're going to cut the funding?

KERRY: Well, let me talk about the funding for a minute. In the very beginning, Christiane, when the efforts to oust Assad took place, there were people who made calculations that the important thing is to remove Assad. Yes, there are some bad apples there, but we want to get him out.

And that, unfortunately, resulted in funding to different groups and it was frankly a sloppy process. It did not provide the coordinated, concerted effort that was need.

So, since then, there's been a real focus on this financing. And state-sponsored support of these groups, I believe, is over, is ended.

There are still individuals within certain countries who have been funneling money to these groups, and the theory back in the beginning by many of these people were -- well, we're going to get rid of Assad and then we'll focus on these bad apples. They realized it morphed into something more ominous, more threatening.

And so, I think people have really pulled back. There's a sense of purpose now in this focus against ISIL.

AMANPOUR: You say a sense of purpose. The president just laid out a multiyear task ahead. Quickly, the Khorasan plot, can you confirm precisely what it was and the imminence of it?

KERRY: Well, these are remnants of al Qaeda, core al Qaeda, as we called it. These are people who were definitively plotting against the United States and the West. We have been tracking them for some period of time now. And it is true that we didn't put a lot of public focus on it because we really didn't want people -- we didn't want them to know that we were, in fact, tracking them as effectively as we were.

So, this would have happened with or without ISIL. We were focused on them, and the moment actually was ripe. There were active plots against our country. We knew where they were and we did what we needed to do.

AMANPOUR: Can you tell us what the plots were? KERRY: No, I'm not -- I can't. I'm not going to go into that, but

suffice it to say that we knew that there were active plots against the country.

AMANPOUR: Secretary Kerry, I'd like to ask about the military campaign. You yourself are a former military. You fought against insurgents yourself in Vietnam. This is an insurgent war.

Can they be flushed out by air power alone? Once you have done the first one or two days of fixed targets, buildings, vehicles, this and that, surely it needs special forces on the ground to be able to identify future targets?

KERRY: Well, there are a lot of different --

(CROSSTALK)

KERRY: There are a lot of different parts of this, Christiane. There -- clearly, intelligence comes from people on the ground. There's no question about that.

But there are lots of people on the ground already in different forms. I'm not going to go into all of that. But there are other intelligence systems, there are other countries, there are lots of inputs to intel with respect to ISIL. That's number one.

AMANPOUR: Do you feel you have it --

KERRY: Well, we will continue.

AMANPOUR: -- to be able to expand the campaign?

KERRY: General Allen is going there this next week with the Ambassador McGurk. They will be there working on this networking of intelligence, this networking of entities on the ground. We will be training openly -- thanks to the congressional vote -- Syrian opposition.

We believe that with the open effort against ISIL from many different players in the region there's going to be much greater confidence in this possibility of the opposition. And there will be more recruits. There will be -- the morale will go up. People are going to be more willing to fight.

In addition to that, there are other options. The president has been clear: there won't be American Special Forces on the ground, but there are plenty of ways to begin to bring greater pressure on ISIL.

AMANPOUR: Plenty of ways, you've been doing this now for six-weeks- plus in Iraq itself against ISIS and whatever targets.

KERRY: Right.

AMANPOUR: They have not been flushed out, Secretary Kerry. They're not retreating. They're not surrendering. They're also not flooding back to the central government, you know, the prime minister who you have helped stand up.

KERRY: Well, the government is in its infancy, in its very first days, still in formation. And it was very important that Haider al- Abadi came here, the prime minister, that he's had meetings. They will go back and they will continue to do what they need to do. We will be working with them to reconstitute the military.

The military has not yet come back together completely. Now, we know there are -- I won't go into the numbers, but there are an adequate number of brigades ready to fight and capable of fighting. And, of course, they haven't been flushed out yet. In fact, they're bunkering down, you know? They're kind of --

AMANPOUR: And more villages are falling.

KERRY: Well, that is possible for a period of time. But what we've done is we stopped the onslaught. That's what we were able to achieve with air power. They were moving towards Irbil. They were moving towards Baghdad.

Baghdad could well have fallen. Irbil could have fallen. They could have control of all the oil fields.

We re-secured the Mosul dam. We protected the Haditha dam. We broke the siege at Amerli. We broke the siege at Sinjar Mountain.

So, air power has been effective. And now, as their supplies begin to get hit and other things begin to happen, I believe there is the possibility of a slow degrading that ultimately -- and I say ultimately because the president has been clear, this will take time.

You and others should not be looking for some massive retreat within the next week or two. There are going to have to be major efforts to stand up tribes, to do the kind of things that happened with the sons of Anbar with the Arab -- with the awakening, the Iraqi awakening that took place years ago.

AMANPOUR: So, that leads me my next question. I interviewed the new prime minister, al-Abadi, last night. He says that he wants to bring the Sunnis in. Clearly, that is the backbone of your strategy, the political part of it.

Do you believe that he gets it and that he will be able to do something dramatic and radical to convince the Sunnis that they are part of this nation again?

KERRY: Well, it's absolutely critical. The first steps have been taken.

I believe he understands the challenge. Obviously, he has pressures on him. We all understand that. And we're all going to have to work together very carefully at this.

But it is imperative, I cannot underscore how imperative this is that this be one nation with all the different parties coming together with an opportunity to be part of the decision-making and part of the future. And if it does break down into the sectarian divisions and a refusal to share responsibility and decision-making, that will be very problematic. But we believe this government came together precisely around that promise.

That's why there's a new prime minister. That's why there's a new president. That's why there's a new speaker, and they are clearly moving in the same direction at this point in time.

AMANPOUR: Regarding Bashar al Assad -- all of us know Bashar al Assad must go. That's what the president of the United States said. That's what many regional allies said three years ago.

He's not only there, but you have informed him of the strikes. You have informed Iran of the strikes. I'd like to get your confirmation about how that happened.

People have said, your ambassador said to me -- there must be no sense that this is going to help Bashar al Assad.

Are you sure that what you're doing in Syria will not help Bashar al Assad?

KERRY: Well, let me make it clear: Bashar al Assad has lost an ability not because we say so, but because the facts on the ground tell everybody that when you have killed 200,000 of your own citizens, when you have driven a huge percentage of your population into exile, a million and a half refugees in Turkey, a million and a half or so in Jordan and Lebanon, another 4 million or so dislocated within your own country. You dropped barrel bombs. You gassed people, you tortured people. How -- how do you imagine having legitimacy to be able to govern their country?

AMANPOUR: But you're not going after him now?

KERRY: Now -- no, this is not about Assad now. This is about ISIL.

But we are continuing to train openly and to equip and arm the moderate opposition. And over the years, we have done pretty good at vetting and understand we've done 20 years now of this. We did it in Iraq, we've done it in Afghanistan. And our folks know how to separate people and begin to determine to the greatest extent -- you know, to the greatest extent possible who is really moderate and prepared to fight.

Remember something, even in these last two to three years while Assad has been waging his duplicitous efforts against both the opposition, but also not going after ISIL, while that's been going on, it's been the opposition that's been fighting both. And they have survived. They drove ISIL out of Idlib province. They held the line in Aleppo. They pushed them in Dayr az Zawr.

They have proven themselves to be willing to fight and now, we believe with -- if ISIL begins to have less capacity to get in their way, they will have more capacity to achieve their goal.

AMANPOUR: There's been a huge amount of debate within the Obama administration for the past three years of this war in Syria. Many, the whole entire practically national security apparatus of the president, wanted to do something like this much earlier. Secretary Panetta -- former Secretary Panetta, former CIA Chief Panetta, said it recently that we should have done this much earlier what we're doing now. The president dismissed people mostly who promoted this kind of thing. Thought they were trigger happy, you know, used certain terms against it.

Do you regret this wasn't done sooner? Would it have been easier if we were doing this a few years later precisely what you're doing now?

KERRY: Well, first of all, let me make it clear. The president never dismissed anybody. The president engaged in extremely thoughtful and comprehensive discussion to figure out the pros and cons, and pluses and minuses. And the president made his decisions based on judgments that were shared by a lot of different people.

So, I'm not going to get into the debate of the past. I honestly don't have that luxury right now. Others can carry that debate. We're focused on the now and we're focused on the future.

And what is clear is the president has determined that he has the legal capacity -- remember, there were serious questions about legality about what could and couldn't be done previously. There was a big debate over chemical weapons even. We didn't have the same kind of legality to do chemical weapons that we do now have because of the request of the government of Iraq, we didn't have a request from Syria, because international law clearly recognizes a right of self- defense and collective self-defense, and we have the legality to do what we're doing today. That mattered to the president.

And I think it is important that we have allies who are prepared to engage in this too. ISIL raised this threat level to a point that everybody understands the stakes. There's much more at stake than just ISIL and Iraq and this is not just an internal fight.

This is a fight that involves all of us, because there's a level of depravity, of this fundamental evil in what they are doing that challenges states and challenges values and the mores that we have lived by, or tried to live by for a long time. And if that was free to run rampant over those countries, there could be chaos in the region, and far greater dangers for everybody.

So, we're standing up to that. That's the right thing to do. The other debate can go on, but we're focused on what we're going to do now and what we're going to do too succeed.

AMANPOUR: And, finally, you talk about a regional situation at stake, with Iran. You made a huge amount of efforts. Do you believe that by the deadline of November 24th you will have a deal, the French foreign minister, your counterpart, said as things stand now, no, the gaps are too far.

What creative diplomacy --

KERRY: Well, there -- AMANPOUR: -- regarding centrifuges are you proposing now?

KERRY: Well, there were still -- there are still gaps, there's no question about it. But we have the month of October and several weeks in November to continue to negotiate.

We have been very clear with Iran that we need to try to see some progress. We need to move forward.

We're working very, very hard, Christiane, to make sure this historic moment is appropriately put to use but without -- and this is very important -- without compromising one bit what must be achieved in an agreement.

We made it clear that each pathway to a potential nuclear weapon must be cut off. There has to be a clarity to Iran's willingness to prove that it is a peaceful nuclear program. And this has to stand the test of scrutiny of all of us -- of Congress, of our friends in the region, and of each of us. I've said many times no deal is better than a bad deal.

But our hopes are, President Obama's hopes, the entire administration knows the world will be better off if Iran and the United States can find the agreement that satisfies everybody's test that they do not have a pathway to a bomb, that they will be living by international standards and more in order to prove that, and that we can see a way towards a safe and secure nuclear bomb-free region. That's the key here and that's what we're working towards. And we hope they will do it.

AMANPOUR: So much -- thank you. So much more to ask you. I know your time is up. Thank you very much for joining us this morning.

KERRY: My pleasure. Thanks. Good to be with you.

AMANPOUR: And back to you, Chris.

CUOMO: Christiane Amanpour, thank you so much. Great timing for the interview. You covered the range of topics that we need to understand.

There's a lot to digest in what just happened between Christiane Amanpour and Secretary of State John Kerry, specifically about the fight against ISIS and the separate strikes in al Qaeda cell. What it means, what's going forward, what is this plan?

We're going to be back right after the break to discuss it all.

Also, those strikes in Syria and Iraq sparking warnings about retaliation from homegrown terrorists here in the U.S. The word "lone wolf" keeps being thrown around. We're going to look at how law enforcement across the country is responding.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) BALDWIN: All right. Welcome back to NEW DAY.

We just heard a big interview, 20 minutes or so. Christiane Amanpour sat down exclusively with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.

And so, Christiane is now back with us. And we'll just have a big discussion about really the news that was made looking ahead, of course, to the president's speech at the UNGA.

And along with us is also Philip Mudd, CNN counterterrorism analyst and former CIA counterterrorism official.

So, just welcoming everyone.

And, Christiane, first just to you. I mean, out of the gate, Secretary Kerry saying this campaign would go on for some time, various forms, saying, you know, listen, this isn't just about strikes. It's about cutting off financing, stopping those foreign fighters, what was your biggest takeaway?

AMANPOUR: Well, precisely that. In his own way, he was urging what everybody said, strategic patience and this is going to be a long fight. It's not a question of couple days of aerial bombardment. He, of course, confirmed what we've been reporting, that they are in a second day of bombing.

He talked about how you're going to move from the initial targets to continuing the campaign, to try to flush out these insurgents, the ISIS insurgents who have really dug in so heavily inside Iraq and in Syria. He says you're mot going to see them being flushed out immediately. This is again, he kept saying, it's a long campaign. But we're in it for the long haul. He said the allies are in it for a long haul, for the long haul.

After we wrapped up, I asked him about Turkey because he's obviously been meeting with Turkish counterparts. He said they will be involved, quote, "big time" in all aspects. Turkey has said that they will get into this fight in all different aspects, and that's what the secretary of state confirmed as he was heading off to his big round of meetings today.

He talked about the absolute necessity of cutting off ISIS funding and all the other, you know, extremist groups funding which has either been by direct Gulf state approval or by turning a blind eye and allowing their own national sympathizers to funnel money to them. That has to stop. He said he believes they have the commitment from those states to do that. He thinks the alliance will stick together.

He also believes that the new prime minister of Iraq, Haider al-Abadi, who I interviewed last night, does get it and knows that the backbone of this it is a political resolution that involves convincing the Sunnis, who let's face it, prefer to stick with ISIS than the central government under Nouri Maliki and fled the ISIS advance and join the ISIS advance. He believes this new prime minister gets it, and to be honest, he has to get it, he must get it is what he told me -- Brooke. CUOMO: All right. So, Philip Mudd, let's bring you in here. You got

to hear what the secretary of state was saying. And now, the big concern, obviously, is what happens over there and what it means back in the U.S. We're hearing about lone wolves in this new eminent threat and that's why they hit this Khorasan group. And John Kerry said they kept it all quiet because they u didn't want people to know, but they've had them on the radar.

So, what does this mean back here? Are these attacks going to spur counterattacks back here?

PHILIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: I think that's possible, but if you look at the warnings that come out from the FBI and the Homeland Security Department, these are the typical things you would do in a circumstance like this.