Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Saturday Morning News
Views Ask Questions on Situation in Iraq
Aired November 23, 2002 - 08:39 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.
KRIS OSBORN, CNN ANCHOR: Now it's time for us to return to our reporter's notebook on the Iraqi weapons hunt. We are joined by a number of key participants, including Major General George Harrison, a retired Air Force pilot and CNN military analyst, along with CNN's Nic Robertson, who joins us now from Baghdad.
Hello to both of you.
GEN. GEORGE HARRISON, U.S. AIR FORCE (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: It's good to be here.
OSBORN: Let me begin with an e-mail for General Harrison. It is, "Why can't U.N. inspectors ask for air support/assistance, i.e., why can't reconnaissance use submarine detector software, cameras to detect underground armaments, etc., in Iraq?"
That is from Pearl in Boston, Massachusetts.
General, to you.
HARRISON: Well, I think the answer is that the technology that's being used to analyze the substances and the chemicals in Iraq are the ones that are matched to the terrain and matched to the substance that you're trying to detect. A lot of technology is being used by the inspection team. The submarine detection devices, of course, would not work in a terrain or in an earth kind of substance. All of those things have to be carefully matched to the thing that you're looking through.
So it's simply a matter of matching the technology to what you're trying to find.
CATHERINE CALLAWAY, CNN ANCHOR: And I want to thank Nic Robertson for standing by for us for such a long time in Baghdad -- Nic, we have an e-mail for you from Canada.
This is from Maurice. And they want to know, "For the last four years, the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad has been in the hands of the Iraqis. They've had complete access to the compound. Are weapons inspectors concerned at all about the building being possibly bugged or perhaps booby-trapped? What are they planning to do about the potential security risk while inside the buildings? And if the buildings are bugged, is that a breach of the U.N. resolution which is now in place?"
Nic? NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think there's a number of issues there. One of them, perhaps a central issue here, is that this building, although the United Nations inspection team left in 1998, another part of the same building has been occupied by another U.N. mission. So it hasn't been completely deserted.
Now, as far as detection equipment, perhaps bugging equipment that might have been, might be placed in that, certainly that is one thing the United Nations inspection team will do, the advanced team that's in there now. One of the things that they'll, one of the duties that they'll carry out in the next few weeks is to sweep the building. And this is something that they've done in the past when the other inspection teams were here. They swept the building quite routinely looking for this type of device.
Certainly it's an environment here where they do feel the information they have is critical and certainly they don't want to feel that that information is leaking out of their hands to anyone, the Iraqi government or any other government, for example, who might want to know exactly what they're doing.
CALLAWAY: You know, Nic, but is it specific in the access that they have been given there that the building not be bugged?
ROBERTSON: That's something that's not clear to me. Certainly as far as the U.N. goes, it would be a vi -- the United Nations would consider it a violation of their operating conditions and procedures, the way they normally work, the understanding of openness that they have with the Iraqi government or any other government that might choose to bug those offices.
They would certainly consider it a violation. I don't know if it's written into the words of their agreement...
CALLAWAY: But you answered the question right.
ROBERTSON: ... but certainly it's not something they're expecting.
CALLAWAY: OK, thank you.
OSBORN: Well, we will have another e-mail question for Major General George Harrison. But before that, we want to let you know that the president is receiving a medal in Romania. You're looking at a live picture of the president, of course. This is part of an extensive trip which took him to the NATO summit in Prague then up to Russia then to Lithuania and then today to Bucharest, Romania, where he will welcome one of the former Soviet Bloc countries into NATO.
They have received an invitation.
And as we move on, let's talk to General Harrison again and tell him that an e-mail is asking him about his earlier appearance on CNN. And it says, "The general interviewed this morning said the reason that the Iraqi military has not damaged any U.S. planes in 10 years is that Saddam Hussein would like to bring down one of our planes. Why would he want to provoke such a crisis now, when the international attention and U.S. military are so mobilized? Also, if it's true that his forces have been unable to hit our planes despite so many years of effort, are they trying something different now that leads you to believe they really intend to figure out how to hit one now?"
General?
HARRISON: Well, of course, it is true that they have not been able to hit any of our aircraft, despite almost 10 years of trying. As I indicated this morning, that's primarily because of the equipment and the training that our air crews have, that our airplanes have. And we combine a variety of, a variety of assets to make sure that our airplanes are protected when they're patrolling the no fly zones.
Now, as I also said this morning, there's no real military purpose in shooting down a single airplane. And certainly the firing that they have done and the tracking of our aircraft that the Iraqis have done has certainly not stopped our activity in the northern and southern no fly zones. We have continued to patrol.
I would imagine that if there is a purpose to all of this, it's to gain a propaganda coup, to indicate to the world that our aircraft are not invulnerable, they're certainly not invulnerable, but so far they've been totally unsuccessful in stopping our activity or in harming our aircraft.
OSBORN: You know, General, on this topic, many have raised the question that apart from simple provocation, why would they fire on coalition planes when they can be let up so easily and then taken out then depleting the radar and the SAMs that they may have?
HARRISON: That is a mystery, isn't it? It doesn't, as I said, it doesn't make any military sense. It probably makes some political sense to the Iraqi regime. But I honestly don't have a good answer for why they would want to continue that kind of provocation, particularly when it's so costly in terms of their assets and it provides us so much information as to how they operate.
CALLAWAY: All right, well, we've just about run out of time, gentlemen, with all the breaking news that we have.
But, Nic, can we get some final thoughts from you there in Baghdad?
ROBERTSON: Well, perhaps going back to that issue, interestingly, the Iraqi news agency here always presents that not, that it is not military installations that have been hit, but civilian installations. And certainly they're saying that the United States coalition aircraft flying a lot more sorties than normal.
But, indeed, that is something that gets a lot of discussion in our office here, why move equipment like that into an area where it can be damaged? It doesn't make sense to us, either.
CALLAWAY: General, final thoughts? HARRISON: No, I agree with Nic. It really doesn't make sense. It must make sense to the Iraqi regime, but certainly we can't figure out a good military reason for those kinds of things.
CALLAWAY: CNN's Nic Robertson joining us from Baghdad. And we'd like to thank our retired U.S. Air Force General George Harrison here in Atlanta, also our military analyst.
Thank you.
HARRISON: 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 November 23, 2002 - 08:39 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KRIS OSBORN, CNN ANCHOR: Now it's time for us to return to our reporter's notebook on the Iraqi weapons hunt. We are joined by a number of key participants, including Major General George Harrison, a retired Air Force pilot and CNN military analyst, along with CNN's Nic Robertson, who joins us now from Baghdad.
Hello to both of you.
GEN. GEORGE HARRISON, U.S. AIR FORCE (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: It's good to be here.
OSBORN: Let me begin with an e-mail for General Harrison. It is, "Why can't U.N. inspectors ask for air support/assistance, i.e., why can't reconnaissance use submarine detector software, cameras to detect underground armaments, etc., in Iraq?"
That is from Pearl in Boston, Massachusetts.
General, to you.
HARRISON: Well, I think the answer is that the technology that's being used to analyze the substances and the chemicals in Iraq are the ones that are matched to the terrain and matched to the substance that you're trying to detect. A lot of technology is being used by the inspection team. The submarine detection devices, of course, would not work in a terrain or in an earth kind of substance. All of those things have to be carefully matched to the thing that you're looking through.
So it's simply a matter of matching the technology to what you're trying to find.
CATHERINE CALLAWAY, CNN ANCHOR: And I want to thank Nic Robertson for standing by for us for such a long time in Baghdad -- Nic, we have an e-mail for you from Canada.
This is from Maurice. And they want to know, "For the last four years, the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad has been in the hands of the Iraqis. They've had complete access to the compound. Are weapons inspectors concerned at all about the building being possibly bugged or perhaps booby-trapped? What are they planning to do about the potential security risk while inside the buildings? And if the buildings are bugged, is that a breach of the U.N. resolution which is now in place?"
Nic? NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think there's a number of issues there. One of them, perhaps a central issue here, is that this building, although the United Nations inspection team left in 1998, another part of the same building has been occupied by another U.N. mission. So it hasn't been completely deserted.
Now, as far as detection equipment, perhaps bugging equipment that might have been, might be placed in that, certainly that is one thing the United Nations inspection team will do, the advanced team that's in there now. One of the things that they'll, one of the duties that they'll carry out in the next few weeks is to sweep the building. And this is something that they've done in the past when the other inspection teams were here. They swept the building quite routinely looking for this type of device.
Certainly it's an environment here where they do feel the information they have is critical and certainly they don't want to feel that that information is leaking out of their hands to anyone, the Iraqi government or any other government, for example, who might want to know exactly what they're doing.
CALLAWAY: You know, Nic, but is it specific in the access that they have been given there that the building not be bugged?
ROBERTSON: That's something that's not clear to me. Certainly as far as the U.N. goes, it would be a vi -- the United Nations would consider it a violation of their operating conditions and procedures, the way they normally work, the understanding of openness that they have with the Iraqi government or any other government that might choose to bug those offices.
They would certainly consider it a violation. I don't know if it's written into the words of their agreement...
CALLAWAY: But you answered the question right.
ROBERTSON: ... but certainly it's not something they're expecting.
CALLAWAY: OK, thank you.
OSBORN: Well, we will have another e-mail question for Major General George Harrison. But before that, we want to let you know that the president is receiving a medal in Romania. You're looking at a live picture of the president, of course. This is part of an extensive trip which took him to the NATO summit in Prague then up to Russia then to Lithuania and then today to Bucharest, Romania, where he will welcome one of the former Soviet Bloc countries into NATO.
They have received an invitation.
And as we move on, let's talk to General Harrison again and tell him that an e-mail is asking him about his earlier appearance on CNN. And it says, "The general interviewed this morning said the reason that the Iraqi military has not damaged any U.S. planes in 10 years is that Saddam Hussein would like to bring down one of our planes. Why would he want to provoke such a crisis now, when the international attention and U.S. military are so mobilized? Also, if it's true that his forces have been unable to hit our planes despite so many years of effort, are they trying something different now that leads you to believe they really intend to figure out how to hit one now?"
General?
HARRISON: Well, of course, it is true that they have not been able to hit any of our aircraft, despite almost 10 years of trying. As I indicated this morning, that's primarily because of the equipment and the training that our air crews have, that our airplanes have. And we combine a variety of, a variety of assets to make sure that our airplanes are protected when they're patrolling the no fly zones.
Now, as I also said this morning, there's no real military purpose in shooting down a single airplane. And certainly the firing that they have done and the tracking of our aircraft that the Iraqis have done has certainly not stopped our activity in the northern and southern no fly zones. We have continued to patrol.
I would imagine that if there is a purpose to all of this, it's to gain a propaganda coup, to indicate to the world that our aircraft are not invulnerable, they're certainly not invulnerable, but so far they've been totally unsuccessful in stopping our activity or in harming our aircraft.
OSBORN: You know, General, on this topic, many have raised the question that apart from simple provocation, why would they fire on coalition planes when they can be let up so easily and then taken out then depleting the radar and the SAMs that they may have?
HARRISON: That is a mystery, isn't it? It doesn't, as I said, it doesn't make any military sense. It probably makes some political sense to the Iraqi regime. But I honestly don't have a good answer for why they would want to continue that kind of provocation, particularly when it's so costly in terms of their assets and it provides us so much information as to how they operate.
CALLAWAY: All right, well, we've just about run out of time, gentlemen, with all the breaking news that we have.
But, Nic, can we get some final thoughts from you there in Baghdad?
ROBERTSON: Well, perhaps going back to that issue, interestingly, the Iraqi news agency here always presents that not, that it is not military installations that have been hit, but civilian installations. And certainly they're saying that the United States coalition aircraft flying a lot more sorties than normal.
But, indeed, that is something that gets a lot of discussion in our office here, why move equipment like that into an area where it can be damaged? It doesn't make sense to us, either.
CALLAWAY: General, final thoughts? HARRISON: No, I agree with Nic. It really doesn't make sense. It must make sense to the Iraqi regime, but certainly we can't figure out a good military reason for those kinds of things.
CALLAWAY: CNN's Nic Robertson joining us from Baghdad. And we'd like to thank our retired U.S. Air Force General George Harrison here in Atlanta, also our military analyst.
Thank you.
HARRISON: 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
