Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Live Event/Special

America Under Attack: Rescue Operations in NY Continue

Aired September 13, 2001 - 03:49   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.
JONATHAN MANN, CNN ANCHOR: In New York City itself, the damage was, of course, much closer at hand. People are still at work through the night, trying to find the people and help them if they can affect it.

We return now to New York City and CNN's Garrick Utley. Garrick?

GARRICK UTLEY, CORRESPONDENT, CNN: Jonathan, of course, the work is continuing here. But there's something that we've been hearing in our reports this evening, early morning hours East Coast time. In fact, we've heard it really since the attacks on Tuesday morning. That is a new sense of fear, of anxiety, a vulnerability about Americans, not just around the Pentagon or here in New York but, indeed, across the country.

And what does that really lead to? How are Americans going to respond to this? Well, if you look back at the 20th Century, not long gone, generations were formed by World War II and World War I before that, by the Korean War, by Vietnam, by the whole atmosphere of the long cold war and the threat of nuclear annihilation. Well fortunately, that's gone now. It's now the 21st Century. But there's a new kind of enemy. We may not know who or where that enemy is but it's out there or maybe it is within. Here's some thoughts about that.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(voice-over): The parallel has been drawn between these sneak attacks in 2001 and the on Pearl Harbor in 1941 and how both were...

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT, FMR. PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A date which will live in infamy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

UTLEY: Except that 60 years ago, President Roosevelt and the nation knew who the enemy was. And since the enemy in Asia and Europe in World War II wasn't hiding, the full weight of American power could be mobilized to achieve victory. Half a century later the United States could do it again against an enemy who couldn't hide.

But now the face of the enemy is invisible, if not as terror and destruction. And we discover the advantage an enemy has who can choose the time, place and weapons of war.

That is what happened in Vietnam where superior American military strength was inferior to the tactics of a largely invisible enemy and its willingness to take casualties. And the enemy is not always found in war.

One of the greatest tests to face Americans was the Great Depression. American's were fearful about their future in 1933 when Franklin Roosevelt warned that the invisible enemy was within.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROOSEVELT: Let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. Nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert with grief into advance.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

UTLEY: And advancing is where we are right now in the United States, not just in the rescue efforts or the investigation to find out who was responsible; but also in recognizing that the very fear of terrorism can become the enemy.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(on camera): And perhaps it's not really that surprising that facing the devil we know is easier, as the old proverb goes than facing the one we don't know who today appears to be a terrorist. Jonathon.

MANN: Garrick Utley, thanks very much.

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