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On the Story
CNN ON THE STORY looks at Iraq
Aired April 12, 2003 - 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.
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to our special War in Iraq version of "On the Story." I'm Christiane Amanpour in Baghdad, with the story of Iraq in some chaos as it transitions to a Saddam- free future.
Joining us are Jane Arraf in northern Iraq, Rym Brahimi in Amman, Jordan, and Dana Bash in Washington, D.C., at the White House.
Well, from here, the picture looks fairly good. Here, Iraqis saying they are so relieved that Saddam Hussein is gone. Today a group of people on the city streets told me that for the first time now, they can breathe freely.
Certainly they have been way outmatched by a far-superior force, but also the Iraqis were underwhelmed by the idea of fighting to the last man for Saddam Hussein. So many of the people we talked to said that they simply didn't wish to fight for this man. It was their third war in nearly two decades.
But there is some concern as well, in this transitional period, in this period of flux, as the Marines are on the streets in east Baghdad and the Army in west Baghdad. There has been three or four days now of looting. There has been everything that anyone can get their hands on basically stripped from government buildings, even private shops and some private homes.
And the worst, perhaps, in terms of humanitarian concern, are the hospitals, where so much equipment, so much vitally needed medicine has simply been stripped away and taken off, perhaps to sell on the open market at some time in the future. Hospitals we spoke to today, those that have hired their own gunmen to keep the bandits away tell us that they can't even get any staff. And tomorrow, they say, they're going to go out with their vehicles to every staff members' house -- the nurses, the doctors, the radiologists, the anesthetists -- and ask them to come back to work.
So it is, as many people tell us, a moment of relief, but a moment that is imbued with very much mixed feelings.
DANA BASH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Christiane, I'm just curious, you mentioned the fact that there was very little resistance. Is there a surprise, in talking to the people in and around Baghdad, that there was such little resistance, after having lived sort of under the thumb of Saddam Hussein's regime for so long, that they just seemed to melt away? Is there surprise there on the streets about that?
AMANPOUR: Yes, quite a lot of surprise. It really was a paper tiger in the end. And you know what? Even today, when we went around town, for the, you know, several days we've been doing this now, we see heavy artillery pieces, for instance, under bridges that are still -- their nozzles are covered, they weren't even uncovered to fire.
We see many armored vehicles and tanks and other kinds of vehicles that have been picked out by aerial bombs, the U.S., and destroyed. And certainly, the people are just stunned that all the propaganda that they had over the last many, many years and certainly during the lead-up to the war amounted to almost nothing.
But let's not forget, that in the run-up -- or rather, while the Marines and the Army were racing across the desert, there were fanatical pockets of resistance. There was the Fedayeen, there were these militias. There have been people who are still popping out of the civilian infrastructure with sniper guns. So it's not completely secure, it's not completely over. And there is still a concentration now of armed Republican Guards and other elements in Tikrit, which is Saddam Hussein's birthplace.
But they have been surprised, very surprised; and also so worried because they don't know where Saddam Hussein is. And they're concerned, after all these years of Big Brother watching them and having survived so many attempts on his life and the last Gulf War, they're afraid, until they see his body, they're afraid that he might somehow jump up, like a phoenix from the ashes. We don't think that that's likely, but these are people who've gone through an enormous amount of tyranny, and they just don't know what happened, and they are relieved, at the moment, as well as being surprised and still somewhat afraid.
RYM BRAHIMI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Christiane, this is Rym in Amman.
There are a lot of questions over what the next step should be in order for the U.S. and Britain maybe to be able to bring some sort of law and order in Baghdad, especially. But of course, there is also the dilemma that if they do that maybe with too strong a hand, they might also be criticized as the occupying power for interfering too violently.
On the other hand, as an occupying power, the Geneva Convention says they should also be making sure at least that the humanitarian stations (ph), the hospitals, are able to be safe.
Are they telling you anything about that?
AMANPOUR: Absolutely. We hear it all the time. In fact, just outside the Palestine Hotel, where we are, there was an impromptu, organized, small demonstration, with people carrying a banner saying, "We want a new government as soon as possible in order to bring us security and to secure the peace." And they were chanting, "We want peace."
But it's a reflection of what people have been saying here for the last several days, that they do want the U.S. troops here to impose order. And they're wondering why that hasn't happened yet. So we hear from the U.S. that they don't have enough troops, but this is the dilemma right now.
BASH: Christiane, it's Dana Bash at the White House. The president is of course at Camp David right now, but before he left, he taped his radio address, which is starting right now. Let's listen.
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BASH: There you heard President Bush talking about the fact that he believes Saddam Hussein's regime is, quote, "passing into history," and telling a couple of stories of how coalition forces were, in his words, "being greeted as liberators."
And I wondering from Christiane if that is the sense that she is getting on the street in Baghdad.
Clearly, there are scenes of jubilation among Iraqis, but do they actually see British and U.S. forces as liberators? Is that how they're being greeted?
AMANPOUR: Yes, they are, and that is -- we've been reporting that for the last several days. There is no doubt that most of the people we talked to and most of the people you see in the television and other reports do wave, thumbs up, say thank you. They do feel that they have been released and freed from an enormous tyranny.
But they also want to be free of fear itself, in the words of one of your former great presidents. They want to be free to have their lives to be lived in security. And they perhaps have to go through maybe these kind of flux transition days of chaos, but they just don't understand why, in their view, if this war was so planned and everybody had planned to sort of get rid of the regime, why, they ask us, wasn't more security better planned? Certainly we heard that from a doctor.
And of course, you know, we asked the same of the Army and the Marines, and they tell us, "Well, this is not our job right now. We're still doing the -- we're still doing the remnants of the war fighting. And we're simply stretched thin."
But so, that is, you know, something that -- you know, one doesn't want to see the tarnish come on the rose. So one's hoping to see some kind of order imposed and sort of lawlessness end, so that this is a net positive feeling for the people here.
JANE ARRAF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is Jane in northern Iraq, in Irbil.
Christiane, after we come back from the break, I wanted to ask you and Rym particularly about something I'm curious about, whether you have that same reaction to seeing those posters torn up, the statues come down.
And we'll be back soon to talk about that, I hope, after this break. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ARRAF: I'm Jane Arraf in Irbil, in northern Iraq. We've covered just an amazing array of stories in this past week that have seen people's worlds absolutely change here.
Friday, yesterday, we were in Mosul, where there was this eerie silence after U.S. Special Forces, we thought, were in, following the surrender of Iraqi forces. All there was was chaos.
Just a few days before, we were on the front lines with Special Forces actually engaging in battle with Iraqi tanks.
But the one thing I've really been struck by is just that absolute change -- sudden change in tone, where I still get a shudder of something almost close to fear where I see people destroying those statues, putting daggers in those pictures of Saddam Hussein. It is so ingrained, even in people like us who have worked in Iraq for so long, that that is something you just do not do.
I'm wondering, Christiane and Rym, whether you've had the same surprise, that people have so easily switched from those years of fear and repression to being able to do that?
AMANPOUR: Jane, let me take that first. Yes, definitely, to see the symbol of the tyranny being brought down by people's bare hands is quite impressive.
And let me just get out of the way and show you. The Marines have been running around behind me, and there's a bit of a firefight that's been going on. They've rushed up there, which is basically overlooking the banks of the Tigris. And we don't really know exactly what's happening, except that there has been about five minutes of gunfire, about five minutes ago.
So just to show you, perhaps in graphic detail, that it's not all over yet. It's still mopping up little pockets that are springing up here and there.
And in terms of the pictures and the statues, you know, it is happening, but I'm surprised that so many are still up here in Baghdad, to be frank. There are many murals still up. There are many statues still up. And I can't quite figure out exactly the psychology of that, except that there's been a lot of danger on the streets and perhaps people aren't, you know, going out and risking their lives at this precise moment. Maybe that will happen later.
But there's not as much tearing down of the symbolism here as there was, let's say, in Eastern Europe back in the early '90s.
ARRAF: And I wonder if that's because they actually have to see the body. There's so many people I've talked to who will not believe that Saddam Hussein is dead unless they see a body, and preferably, according to some of them, paraded through the streets like previous bodies have been.
I wonder what you think about that, Rym?
AMANPOUR: I think you're absolutely right. People are...
BRAHIMI: Jane, as far as -- sorry, Christiane, go ahead.
AMANPOUR: No, you go ahead. Let's be gentlewomen.
BRAHIMI: What I was thinking was, I think we had this conversation, if you remember in Baghdad, Jane, when we used to cover Baghdad, the two of us, when we were there together, we used to look at all those statues, if you remember, and we used to wonder, "My God, what is this going to be when it all collapses and when all those statues are pulled down?" Maybe in my case, I would probably have imagined that they would've pulled them down themselves. In many cases, the U.S. Marines had to help them pull them down.
But it is fascinating how all this flipped. The morning that the government, if you will, or the leadership totally disappeared, I remember receiving a phone call from one of the people who worked with us in Baghdad. And he said, you can't believe this. All the minders have gone. Everybody's disappeared from the hotel. The minister of information has disappeared, and the only person left was this one minder that actually went up to a couple of TV journalists and said, "Remember, I helped you. Maybe you could help me find a job in the future," which was also maybe a little bit sad in a way. But it is pretty stunning how it all seems to have collapsed completely.
And then there was also the head of the statue that was being dragged through the street of Baghdad. You kind of don't really want to think what would have happened if they'd been able to lay their hands on President Saddam Hussein himself. But it seemed to be very highly symbolic of what the frame of mind may be, and also a history, in a way, that's been happening over the past 50 years in Iraq.
So definitely, a fascinating moment for all. And definitely a lot of instability that we're still watching. I mean, I'm extremely curious to see, once I get there, what it's like and how it's changed.
ARRAF: And then those parallels with '91. Christiane, I'm curious, because you remember after '91, after the Gulf War, that society essentially split apart. I mean, people really draw that as a line. Before that, it was a law-abiding society, no corruption. After the Gulf War, there was crime in the streets, there were the kind of things we're seeing, although not in this scale.
And I wonder if this has something to do with the fact that it really did change, all the rules changed after '91. And maybe that's part of what we're seeing now, just that loss of control from way back then.
AMANPOUR: Yes, I mean, we've heard different explanations for what's going on. I mean, firstly, people say to us, "Look, we never were able to share, as Iraqis, in Iraq's prosperity and its resources." Somebody told me yesterday, that, you know, while the rich men and the government officials slept and ate well and lived well, we went hungry and we went, you know, without our freedom, and now this is our revenge. Somebody else today told me that, you know, in the past, when Saddam Hussein's regime suspected you of doing anything wrong, whether it was political or in any kind of way, they would not only haul you into prison, but take all your family wealth for the government. And this, now, they say, is revenge for that.
Perhaps it's just an incredible sort of pressure cooker, that the top has blown off and they're just sort of giving vent in any way possible. But we've certainly seen this in many, many places before, whether it be Albania, whether it be Somalia, Haiti, we've seen this a lot. The question is -- there is no government here right now, and the question is, when will any kind of civil administration start up and running and try to impose some kind of order? There isn't even a radio station that's really broadcasting any kind of orders or advice or anything.
And let's say, just the electric plant, for instance, none of the workers are there. And tomorrow, they're going to try to go with Marines and go to each of the workers' houses to try to bring them back and restart that electric grid, because this city doesn't have electricity mostly.
ARRAF: You know, there's a story that I think is really important, and I'm wondering if Dana or Christiane or Rym have any more on this. It's the killing of that Shi'a cleric in Najaf. And that is something that people had long feared, that it would be sectarian violence -- Shi'a/Sunni. We haven't really seen that. But that killing in Najaf particularly, is that the start of something?
BRAHIMI: You know, Jane, this is again something that we always expected it would be, not only Shi'a versus Sunni, but also have versus have-not, Ba'ath versus non-Ba'ath. There was, and there still is I think, a huge potential for chaos. And that killing in Najaf is certainly a demonstration that that potential is still very, very real.
Now, maybe it won't be as dramatic or as divided as we expected it to be, but definitely it's not all clear, and those divides might emerge.
"On the Story" will return a little later now. After some breaking news, we'll be talking about the reaction in the Arab world. I'll bring you some perspective from Amman. But for now, let's go to Leon Harris with some breaking news.
(NEWSBREAK)
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BRAHIMI: We're back with "On the Story" with a perspective from Amman, Jordan, where I've been trying to find out about reaction in the region over what's been happening in Iraq, the toppling of the Iraqi regime, especially among all these people that, only a week ago, were demonstrating in favor not only of Iraq and to support the Iraqi people, but also for some part in favor of President Saddam Hussein.
Well, we headed off to the marketplace on Friday to try and talk to people. It was really, really incredible, the difference in behavior. A week ago we could have gone down there, so many people would have rushed to us just to talk to us, just to tell us how much they were against this war and how much they supported Iraq.
Well, this day -- that day when we went down, there was no reaction. People were actually shying away from the camera. They didn't want to talk to us. And the few people who actually did want to talk to us all expressed a lot of disappointment. So we heard things like, "We're really disappointed. Umm Qasr put up a better fight than Baghdad did. This is really very disappointing."
Some people, maybe the younger generation and more the poorer, younger generation here thought that seriously Saddam Hussein could have actually put up a challenge or at least maybe tried to win. But no, he totally disappeared, so a lot of a disappointment there as well.
But also, a lot of disappointment on the part of many people with regard to the United States. People are seeing, through Arabic TV channels, the looting. They're seeing what's happening there. And they're asking, "Why is the U.S. not putting an end to this? Why have they secured only the oil ministry?" This is the rumor that's going around. "And why have they not tried to secure at least in other places to help with civilians?"
Dana, I was wondering if you could give us a bit of your perspective, as well, on that?
BASH: I'm sorry, I thought you were...
AMANPOUR: Just in the last few seconds, there's been an escalation of this firefight we were telling you about, which is just about 20 yards from where we are. It's the Marines in their armored vehicles and their Humvees. And they are firing off, we heard the 50- caliber machine gun, and at one point, it sounded like a tank round as well.
From our point, we cannot see exactly what is the target. But we are, I believe, here on the bank of the river. And clearly they are seeing something that they're firing at.
But it just goes to show that things are not quite calm yet.
And on one other note, this idea of General Amir Al-Sadi having turned himself in, we're also trying to track this down and try to confirm this information. And right now, it's not fully confirmed. Apparently somebody did walk into the lobby of the Hotel Palestine, which is not only the journalists' hangout right now, but it's also where the Marines are billeted and they have an office and an office space.
So we are not entirely sure who it is who has walked in. But if it was General Al-Sadi, this is one big personality in the weapons department, who presumably is Saddam Hussein's chief scientific adviser, who is the interlocutor with Hans Blix, throughout the months of weapons inspections, the last weapons inspections and the previous ones. He knows where all the secrets are buried. So if it's him, it will be an important thing.
BASH: It's Dana Bash at the White House...
ARRAF: What happens to people like that, I wonder, Dana?
BASH: I'm sorry, I just have a question back to Rym. I have a question about the thing that you mentioned, which is so fascinating, which is the fact that, in the Arab media, there's certainly a lot of negative images and negative rhetoric about the United States.
And that is something that the White House, of course, very much recognizes. And they've got a massive communications effort to try to combat that. We saw this week Tony Blair and George Bush put up speeches and addresses directly to the Iraqi people and other things of that nature to try to combat the things that you're talking about that are going on around on Arab TV.
Is there any sense that what the White House is trying to do is actually resonating in that part of the world?
BRAHIMI: Well, it's very difficult for people to actually admit that here, in a way. There are a lot of questions over whether the Iraqis are truly happy or not. And actually a lot of people I spoke to said, "No, the Iraqis aren't happy. The only people that are happy are those criminals that are looting. You can see that for yourselves through the pictures on the TV."
What's interesting, though, is, I think, as some people from a maybe more educated background put it, it would be a lot better, in their view, had the U.S. attempted to try and do something about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict before going into Iraq. And they feel that these issues are very much tied. And after Iraq has been stabilized, they will be expecting something to happen very concretely on the Middle Eastern front.
As for Saddam Hussein's legacy, well, interestingly enough, a lot of people didn't really know what to answer. They were a bit confused. They didn't know if he was going to go down as an Arab, a pan-Arab ruler, or as a traitor, in a way, because he ran away.
One person put it best, I found here yesterday. A young woman said, "No, we won't remember Saddam Hussein, but we will remember the war."
Back to you.
BASH: Rym, thank you so much for joining us.
And also thank you to Jane Arraf.
Thank you very much. Please, both of you, stay safe.
And we'll be back with more "On the Story" in just a few minutes.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) AMANPOUR: Welcome back to "On the Story" here in Baghdad. We've swung around again to try to show you these Marine positions, because over the last several minutes there has been quite a lot of outgoing fire by the Marines. Most of it outgoing, some of it heavy weapons, heavy machine guns being fired. We simply don't know at this point what it is, because it looks to be over the other side of the banks of the river Tigris.
Joining me now are Dana Bash at the White House, Elizabeth Cohen at the Walter Reed Hospital and Barbara Starr at the Pentagon.
BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Christiane, one of the stories...
AMANPOUR: Barbara, how is all of this...
STARR: Go ahead.
AMANPOUR: I was just going to ask you how all of this is being viewed at the Pentagon. They must be thrilled, right?
STARR: Well, I think they're pleased that they achieved military goals so quickly, with at least what they perceive, of course, to be a minimal loss of life.
But what's really interesting here this week is how some of the rhetoric has changed, and I think specifically about the hunt for weapons of mass destruction.
Now, we all remember Secretary Powell's presentation to the United Nations. We remember Secretary Rumsfeld standing here in the briefing room and saying that he was certain Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
So far, the U.S. military's been to several suspect sites. They haven't found a thing.
And now the administration says they're willing to pay people for information that will lead them to it. One of the big concerns, of course, is while all this looting's gone on in Baghdad, maybe records, documents, computers have been stolen. And the leadership is gone. And just how will they find this stuff?
So that's a big change in at least rhetoric from the administration, Christiane.
AMANPOUR: Barbara, that really is extraordinary, because this whole war was premised on the disarming of Iraq and the search for what the administration was sure and certain, weapons of mass destruction.
And certainly, we haven't seen any. And we know the Special Forces teams have been out and about during the war trying to locate.
How certain are they that they're going to find something? And if not, how are they going to reconcile that with the objective and the stated reasons for this war?
STARR: Well, that may be a very difficult question to answer. Of course, the Bush administration still thinks there is something there. No one knows for sure at this point.
They've also talked about the fact they are worried that the Iraqis shipped weapons of mass destruction out of the country just before the war began, possibly to Syria. But they have no evidence of that.
So, you know, all of this is on the list of unfinished business. This is why the Bush administration says it's not yet ready to declare victory.
But you know, there's another very important reason that they're not ready to declare victory, and that's very much a human story here at the Pentagon this week. There is a lot of concern about the seven prisoners of war and those still missing in action.
As the regime has fallen, as the streets appear to be much more friendly, the very difficult question this week is, where are those seven POWs? Why haven't they appeared? Why is it that whoever may be holding them hasn't released them? Is someone holding them as a last- minute bargaining chip? Just where are they?
We know Special Forces across Iraq are looking for them. We know they have been through several prisons, but so far, not a hint.
ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Barbara, you mentioned looking for weapons of mass destruction. Since those weapons aren't necessarily always large -- it could just be a test tube of a biological agent -- do they have much hope of finding them in Iraq or in Syria, as you mentioned?
STARR: Well, they certainly still believe they're there. But I think the hunt, as it were, is shifting a little bit from actually finding the material, the weapons, the laboratories, the missiles, whatever you will have there, and shifting more to looking for people, they say. Paying people for information that can lead them to these weapon sites.
Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld said he never believed -- yesterday, he said he never believed that the U.N. weapons inspection process would really work, that suddenly inspectors would knock on some door and there would be weapons of mass destruction behind the door. He felt the Iraqis had always hidden their programs so well that no one could just walk in and find them.
So now we're hearing, you know, it could take six months, it could take eight months to find this material. And it certainly appears that the U.N. is now being cut out of that process, because it is U.S. military teams that are moving across Iraq, intelligence teams, going to all these sites, collecting the material, testing it. All of it being held within the U.S. military chain of custody. So, again, a real shift in how all this is being approached. BASH: Barbara, we're going to talk more about the question of when and if to declare victory, and the view from the White House on the extraordinary events in Iraq.
More "On the Story," back after the break. Stay with us.
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(AUDIO GAP)
BASH: ... watching, especially people here at the White House. And it was not lost on the people here at the White House that it happened exactly three weeks to the day that President Bush first ordered the military strikes in Iraq. There you see that picture.
And of course the president himself, we are told, also watched some of that pulling down of the statue. And it was -- it was sort of an "I told you so" moment here at the White House, because it was just three weeks after the war had started, and the White House had a sense of vindication almost.
And you heard it in Dick Cheney's remarks that very day. The vice president said something that I thought was definitely worth quoting back, and that is that the people who said the war plan had been flawed, those critics were, quote, "retired military officers embedded in TV studios."
But while you had that vindication, that feeling of vindication, you also have a sense of trying desperately here to calibrate what they are calling the irrational exuberance about the war one day, swinging, they say, to the other side, talking about the irrational despair the next. So they're trying desperately to manage expectations here at the White House. STARR: But, Dana, how exactly are they going to do that? Because of course, there is this wild swing in what we see happening, in what we see happening politically. And now the political process begins to try and transform Iraq. That's going to be difficult. How is the White House going to work their way through this whole process?
It's hard. And, Barbara, you hear it, sort of the same things that we hear here at the White House, you hear at the Pentagon.
For example, the whole question of looting. These pictures that we're seeing of this massive looting and seeming chaos on the streets of Iraq and the power vacuum. When we ask constantly about that and what the plan is to deal with that, they refer us back to the days when the troops were trying to get into Iraq and people saying, well, the troops are getting bogged down, questioning the war plan. Them saying -- they say to us, "Look, you questioned us then. Don't question us now. This is something that we expected. We thought that there was going to be certainly some kind of chaos, at least at the beginning, but we will get through this."
And that is the way they're trying to deal with this, is by trying to -- when we see pictures, pictures like we see now, of trying to say, "Look, what you're seeing is a snapshot." They say it's almost like what you see when you're watching an embedded reporter. You're just seeing a snapshot of what is going on around the country, and you have to keep that in mind. That's what they're saying time and time again here at the White House.
COHEN: Dana, will we ever be sharing the president say that he's officially declaring victory in Iraq?
BASH: That's a good question. It's unclear at this point. The president himself was asked about that yesterday. The White House, for the first time yesterday, declared that Saddam Hussein's regime is gone, is over and done with.
So the president was asked whether or not he was going to declare victory. He said that that falls into the hands of Tommy Franks and the people at the Pentagon, the people in charge militarily of this war. They will have to decide when and if victory is actually at hand.
But as we were just talking about before, part of the problem is that one of the stated goals is regime change, but the other is weapons of mass destruction and finding that, and it is not going to be hard (ph). And, Barbara, as you were saying, it is going to take months and months to do that. That is certainly part of the reason they say why they went into this.
COHEN: Dana, thank you.
And when we come back on the story, we'll be talking about Jessica Lynch. She's due to arrive back in the United States later this afternoon. And we'll talk about her rehabilitation and recovery.
That's coming up next on "On the Story."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BUSH: We will respect your great religious traditions, whose principles of equality and compassion are essential to Iraq's future. We will help you build a peaceful and representative government that protects the rights of all citizens. And then our military forces will leave.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
AMANPOUR: So here, three weeks after the war started and the fall of Baghdad, of course the Pentagon has a right to feel vindicated. It did go very quickly.
But of course, also, at the time, a lot of not retired, embedded generals with journalists but actually active, senior generals were saying that if the civilians in the administration had had their way, there certainly would not have been enough troops on the ground. You remember all that talk about maybe 60,000, maybe just one division, doing this job. Well, certainly, many people say that that couldn't have happened. And many are saying thank God for the United States Army and the U.S. Marine Corps, that they insisted on having the number of troops that they need to do this job.
And even now, even while the administration may be somewhat playing down the effect of this looting, even now there aren't enough troops to really deal with this. And this is having a serious impact on the people here, even if it doesn't last too long. Hopefully it won't. People are in this vacuum, they're scared for the moment. And it has sort of a negative repercussion on the troops that are here, because people of course hold the current powers-that-be responsible -- Elizabeth.
COHEN: Christiane, speaking of troops, 50 troops are headed home to the United States, as we speak. One of those service members is Private Jessica Lynch. She is due to arrive at Andrews Air Force Base at 4:30 this afternoon in Maryland and then will come right here to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
She will be arriving with pins and bolts in her right arm and in both legs. She suffered fractures there. She also suffered fractures in her right ankle and in her right foot and in a disc in her lower spine.
Her family made a statement today, and they said, "Jessie's recovery continues, and she is doing well. She is in pain, but she is in good spirits. Although she faces a lengthy rehabilitation, she is tough."
That rehabilitation will, indeed, be lengthy. I spoke to a specialist who said with injuries like that, it is a matter of months, not weeks.
BASH: Elizabeth, her rehabilitation will be lengthy, but it sounds like physically she's going to be OK. The question is psychologically, how long will it take, if ever, to get over what she's been through?
COHEN: She also is going to face another kind of rehabilitation, and that's psychological rehabilitation. She will have to go through a process, or probably has already, called decompression. And that is where she is interviewed by psychologists. She is asked to talk about what happened to her. And that also can take quite a while.
And an important part of going through that process is being out of the spotlight. We do not expect to see much of Jessica Lynch in the beginning. Psychologists say it's very important that she very slowly get back into normal life. And of course, she will be facing a media blitz, and they say that process needs to be very slow so that it's not disorienting to her.
STARR: Now, Elizabeth, we know that there's been something like 400 wounded U.S. servicemen that have -- and women of course, that have come back to the United States for treatment at Walter Reed, Bethesda Naval Hospital and other hospitals across the country. Has the medical community learned anything yet about treatment of these battlefield types of wounds and how to provide medical care on the battlefield, this of course being one of the most widespread military operations by the U.S. in some time?
Elizabeth, I guess you can't hear me.
But let me talk a little bit more about this. We know that this has been one of the most significant medical deployments by U.S. military forces in some time. They have set up field hospitals all over the theater. I mean, for weeks now, of course, days, we have seen CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta with the Devil Docs out in the field, performing battlefield surgery. This is, you know, not the MASH TV series, this is really significant battlefield medical care.
And now that some of these people are back in the United States, they're going to be facing long periods of rehabilitation. And one can only assume that the military medical community will have many lessons learned that it will be able to provide to other civilian elements of the medical community in orthopedic and rehabilitation medical care -- Elizabeth.
BASH: Barbara, it seems as though we're having a little bit of audio difficulty with Elizabeth.
But this whole idea of these troops coming back, you know, the president himself was at Walter Reed yesterday, and he met with a number -- Walter Reed, actually, and Bethesda Naval. He met with almost 75 of the wounded soldiers that have come back. And it was certainly a very emotional meeting, to say the least, for the president.
He also, interestingly enough, when he was there, gave -- witnessed U.S. citizenship ceremonies for two of the Marines there. And that really was an emotional, emotional meeting.
Christiane, I don't know if you can hear me, what are you hearing from -- Christiane, go ahead, I'm sorry.
AMANPOUR: Well, I think I'm being told that our time is up. I'd have loved to have answered your question. I don't know what it is.
But thank you for joining us for this special War in Iraq version of "On the Story." I'm Christiane Amanpour in Baghdad. And on behalf of Barbara Starr, Dana Bash, Elizabeth Cohen, Jane Arraf, Rym Brahimi and everybody who joined us, thank you.
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Aired April 12, 2003 - War; Iraq; Media ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to our special War in Iraq version of "On the Story." I'm Christiane Amanpour in Baghdad, with the story of Iraq in some chaos as it transitions to a Saddam- free future.
Joining us are Jane Arraf in northern Iraq, Rym Brahimi in Amman, Jordan, and Dana Bash in Washington, D.C., at the White House.
Well, from here, the picture looks fairly good. Here, Iraqis saying they are so relieved that Saddam Hussein is gone. Today a group of people on the city streets told me that for the first time now, they can breathe freely.
Certainly they have been way outmatched by a far-superior force, but also the Iraqis were underwhelmed by the idea of fighting to the last man for Saddam Hussein. So many of the people we talked to said that they simply didn't wish to fight for this man. It was their third war in nearly two decades.
But there is some concern as well, in this transitional period, in this period of flux, as the Marines are on the streets in east Baghdad and the Army in west Baghdad. There has been three or four days now of looting. There has been everything that anyone can get their hands on basically stripped from government buildings, even private shops and some private homes.
And the worst, perhaps, in terms of humanitarian concern, are the hospitals, where so much equipment, so much vitally needed medicine has simply been stripped away and taken off, perhaps to sell on the open market at some time in the future. Hospitals we spoke to today, those that have hired their own gunmen to keep the bandits away tell us that they can't even get any staff. And tomorrow, they say, they're going to go out with their vehicles to every staff members' house -- the nurses, the doctors, the radiologists, the anesthetists -- and ask them to come back to work.
So it is, as many people tell us, a moment of relief, but a moment that is imbued with very much mixed feelings.
DANA BASH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Christiane, I'm just curious, you mentioned the fact that there was very little resistance. Is there a surprise, in talking to the people in and around Baghdad, that there was such little resistance, after having lived sort of under the thumb of Saddam Hussein's regime for so long, that they just seemed to melt away? Is there surprise there on the streets about that?
AMANPOUR: Yes, quite a lot of surprise. It really was a paper tiger in the end. And you know what? Even today, when we went around town, for the, you know, several days we've been doing this now, we see heavy artillery pieces, for instance, under bridges that are still -- their nozzles are covered, they weren't even uncovered to fire.
We see many armored vehicles and tanks and other kinds of vehicles that have been picked out by aerial bombs, the U.S., and destroyed. And certainly, the people are just stunned that all the propaganda that they had over the last many, many years and certainly during the lead-up to the war amounted to almost nothing.
But let's not forget, that in the run-up -- or rather, while the Marines and the Army were racing across the desert, there were fanatical pockets of resistance. There was the Fedayeen, there were these militias. There have been people who are still popping out of the civilian infrastructure with sniper guns. So it's not completely secure, it's not completely over. And there is still a concentration now of armed Republican Guards and other elements in Tikrit, which is Saddam Hussein's birthplace.
But they have been surprised, very surprised; and also so worried because they don't know where Saddam Hussein is. And they're concerned, after all these years of Big Brother watching them and having survived so many attempts on his life and the last Gulf War, they're afraid, until they see his body, they're afraid that he might somehow jump up, like a phoenix from the ashes. We don't think that that's likely, but these are people who've gone through an enormous amount of tyranny, and they just don't know what happened, and they are relieved, at the moment, as well as being surprised and still somewhat afraid.
RYM BRAHIMI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Christiane, this is Rym in Amman.
There are a lot of questions over what the next step should be in order for the U.S. and Britain maybe to be able to bring some sort of law and order in Baghdad, especially. But of course, there is also the dilemma that if they do that maybe with too strong a hand, they might also be criticized as the occupying power for interfering too violently.
On the other hand, as an occupying power, the Geneva Convention says they should also be making sure at least that the humanitarian stations (ph), the hospitals, are able to be safe.
Are they telling you anything about that?
AMANPOUR: Absolutely. We hear it all the time. In fact, just outside the Palestine Hotel, where we are, there was an impromptu, organized, small demonstration, with people carrying a banner saying, "We want a new government as soon as possible in order to bring us security and to secure the peace." And they were chanting, "We want peace."
But it's a reflection of what people have been saying here for the last several days, that they do want the U.S. troops here to impose order. And they're wondering why that hasn't happened yet. So we hear from the U.S. that they don't have enough troops, but this is the dilemma right now.
BASH: Christiane, it's Dana Bash at the White House. The president is of course at Camp David right now, but before he left, he taped his radio address, which is starting right now. Let's listen.
(INTERRUPTED BY SPECIAL EVENT)
BASH: There you heard President Bush talking about the fact that he believes Saddam Hussein's regime is, quote, "passing into history," and telling a couple of stories of how coalition forces were, in his words, "being greeted as liberators."
And I wondering from Christiane if that is the sense that she is getting on the street in Baghdad.
Clearly, there are scenes of jubilation among Iraqis, but do they actually see British and U.S. forces as liberators? Is that how they're being greeted?
AMANPOUR: Yes, they are, and that is -- we've been reporting that for the last several days. There is no doubt that most of the people we talked to and most of the people you see in the television and other reports do wave, thumbs up, say thank you. They do feel that they have been released and freed from an enormous tyranny.
But they also want to be free of fear itself, in the words of one of your former great presidents. They want to be free to have their lives to be lived in security. And they perhaps have to go through maybe these kind of flux transition days of chaos, but they just don't understand why, in their view, if this war was so planned and everybody had planned to sort of get rid of the regime, why, they ask us, wasn't more security better planned? Certainly we heard that from a doctor.
And of course, you know, we asked the same of the Army and the Marines, and they tell us, "Well, this is not our job right now. We're still doing the -- we're still doing the remnants of the war fighting. And we're simply stretched thin."
But so, that is, you know, something that -- you know, one doesn't want to see the tarnish come on the rose. So one's hoping to see some kind of order imposed and sort of lawlessness end, so that this is a net positive feeling for the people here.
JANE ARRAF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is Jane in northern Iraq, in Irbil.
Christiane, after we come back from the break, I wanted to ask you and Rym particularly about something I'm curious about, whether you have that same reaction to seeing those posters torn up, the statues come down.
And we'll be back soon to talk about that, I hope, after this break. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ARRAF: I'm Jane Arraf in Irbil, in northern Iraq. We've covered just an amazing array of stories in this past week that have seen people's worlds absolutely change here.
Friday, yesterday, we were in Mosul, where there was this eerie silence after U.S. Special Forces, we thought, were in, following the surrender of Iraqi forces. All there was was chaos.
Just a few days before, we were on the front lines with Special Forces actually engaging in battle with Iraqi tanks.
But the one thing I've really been struck by is just that absolute change -- sudden change in tone, where I still get a shudder of something almost close to fear where I see people destroying those statues, putting daggers in those pictures of Saddam Hussein. It is so ingrained, even in people like us who have worked in Iraq for so long, that that is something you just do not do.
I'm wondering, Christiane and Rym, whether you've had the same surprise, that people have so easily switched from those years of fear and repression to being able to do that?
AMANPOUR: Jane, let me take that first. Yes, definitely, to see the symbol of the tyranny being brought down by people's bare hands is quite impressive.
And let me just get out of the way and show you. The Marines have been running around behind me, and there's a bit of a firefight that's been going on. They've rushed up there, which is basically overlooking the banks of the Tigris. And we don't really know exactly what's happening, except that there has been about five minutes of gunfire, about five minutes ago.
So just to show you, perhaps in graphic detail, that it's not all over yet. It's still mopping up little pockets that are springing up here and there.
And in terms of the pictures and the statues, you know, it is happening, but I'm surprised that so many are still up here in Baghdad, to be frank. There are many murals still up. There are many statues still up. And I can't quite figure out exactly the psychology of that, except that there's been a lot of danger on the streets and perhaps people aren't, you know, going out and risking their lives at this precise moment. Maybe that will happen later.
But there's not as much tearing down of the symbolism here as there was, let's say, in Eastern Europe back in the early '90s.
ARRAF: And I wonder if that's because they actually have to see the body. There's so many people I've talked to who will not believe that Saddam Hussein is dead unless they see a body, and preferably, according to some of them, paraded through the streets like previous bodies have been.
I wonder what you think about that, Rym?
AMANPOUR: I think you're absolutely right. People are...
BRAHIMI: Jane, as far as -- sorry, Christiane, go ahead.
AMANPOUR: No, you go ahead. Let's be gentlewomen.
BRAHIMI: What I was thinking was, I think we had this conversation, if you remember in Baghdad, Jane, when we used to cover Baghdad, the two of us, when we were there together, we used to look at all those statues, if you remember, and we used to wonder, "My God, what is this going to be when it all collapses and when all those statues are pulled down?" Maybe in my case, I would probably have imagined that they would've pulled them down themselves. In many cases, the U.S. Marines had to help them pull them down.
But it is fascinating how all this flipped. The morning that the government, if you will, or the leadership totally disappeared, I remember receiving a phone call from one of the people who worked with us in Baghdad. And he said, you can't believe this. All the minders have gone. Everybody's disappeared from the hotel. The minister of information has disappeared, and the only person left was this one minder that actually went up to a couple of TV journalists and said, "Remember, I helped you. Maybe you could help me find a job in the future," which was also maybe a little bit sad in a way. But it is pretty stunning how it all seems to have collapsed completely.
And then there was also the head of the statue that was being dragged through the street of Baghdad. You kind of don't really want to think what would have happened if they'd been able to lay their hands on President Saddam Hussein himself. But it seemed to be very highly symbolic of what the frame of mind may be, and also a history, in a way, that's been happening over the past 50 years in Iraq.
So definitely, a fascinating moment for all. And definitely a lot of instability that we're still watching. I mean, I'm extremely curious to see, once I get there, what it's like and how it's changed.
ARRAF: And then those parallels with '91. Christiane, I'm curious, because you remember after '91, after the Gulf War, that society essentially split apart. I mean, people really draw that as a line. Before that, it was a law-abiding society, no corruption. After the Gulf War, there was crime in the streets, there were the kind of things we're seeing, although not in this scale.
And I wonder if this has something to do with the fact that it really did change, all the rules changed after '91. And maybe that's part of what we're seeing now, just that loss of control from way back then.
AMANPOUR: Yes, I mean, we've heard different explanations for what's going on. I mean, firstly, people say to us, "Look, we never were able to share, as Iraqis, in Iraq's prosperity and its resources." Somebody told me yesterday, that, you know, while the rich men and the government officials slept and ate well and lived well, we went hungry and we went, you know, without our freedom, and now this is our revenge. Somebody else today told me that, you know, in the past, when Saddam Hussein's regime suspected you of doing anything wrong, whether it was political or in any kind of way, they would not only haul you into prison, but take all your family wealth for the government. And this, now, they say, is revenge for that.
Perhaps it's just an incredible sort of pressure cooker, that the top has blown off and they're just sort of giving vent in any way possible. But we've certainly seen this in many, many places before, whether it be Albania, whether it be Somalia, Haiti, we've seen this a lot. The question is -- there is no government here right now, and the question is, when will any kind of civil administration start up and running and try to impose some kind of order? There isn't even a radio station that's really broadcasting any kind of orders or advice or anything.
And let's say, just the electric plant, for instance, none of the workers are there. And tomorrow, they're going to try to go with Marines and go to each of the workers' houses to try to bring them back and restart that electric grid, because this city doesn't have electricity mostly.
ARRAF: You know, there's a story that I think is really important, and I'm wondering if Dana or Christiane or Rym have any more on this. It's the killing of that Shi'a cleric in Najaf. And that is something that people had long feared, that it would be sectarian violence -- Shi'a/Sunni. We haven't really seen that. But that killing in Najaf particularly, is that the start of something?
BRAHIMI: You know, Jane, this is again something that we always expected it would be, not only Shi'a versus Sunni, but also have versus have-not, Ba'ath versus non-Ba'ath. There was, and there still is I think, a huge potential for chaos. And that killing in Najaf is certainly a demonstration that that potential is still very, very real.
Now, maybe it won't be as dramatic or as divided as we expected it to be, but definitely it's not all clear, and those divides might emerge.
"On the Story" will return a little later now. After some breaking news, we'll be talking about the reaction in the Arab world. I'll bring you some perspective from Amman. But for now, let's go to Leon Harris with some breaking news.
(NEWSBREAK)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BRAHIMI: We're back with "On the Story" with a perspective from Amman, Jordan, where I've been trying to find out about reaction in the region over what's been happening in Iraq, the toppling of the Iraqi regime, especially among all these people that, only a week ago, were demonstrating in favor not only of Iraq and to support the Iraqi people, but also for some part in favor of President Saddam Hussein.
Well, we headed off to the marketplace on Friday to try and talk to people. It was really, really incredible, the difference in behavior. A week ago we could have gone down there, so many people would have rushed to us just to talk to us, just to tell us how much they were against this war and how much they supported Iraq.
Well, this day -- that day when we went down, there was no reaction. People were actually shying away from the camera. They didn't want to talk to us. And the few people who actually did want to talk to us all expressed a lot of disappointment. So we heard things like, "We're really disappointed. Umm Qasr put up a better fight than Baghdad did. This is really very disappointing."
Some people, maybe the younger generation and more the poorer, younger generation here thought that seriously Saddam Hussein could have actually put up a challenge or at least maybe tried to win. But no, he totally disappeared, so a lot of a disappointment there as well.
But also, a lot of disappointment on the part of many people with regard to the United States. People are seeing, through Arabic TV channels, the looting. They're seeing what's happening there. And they're asking, "Why is the U.S. not putting an end to this? Why have they secured only the oil ministry?" This is the rumor that's going around. "And why have they not tried to secure at least in other places to help with civilians?"
Dana, I was wondering if you could give us a bit of your perspective, as well, on that?
BASH: I'm sorry, I thought you were...
AMANPOUR: Just in the last few seconds, there's been an escalation of this firefight we were telling you about, which is just about 20 yards from where we are. It's the Marines in their armored vehicles and their Humvees. And they are firing off, we heard the 50- caliber machine gun, and at one point, it sounded like a tank round as well.
From our point, we cannot see exactly what is the target. But we are, I believe, here on the bank of the river. And clearly they are seeing something that they're firing at.
But it just goes to show that things are not quite calm yet.
And on one other note, this idea of General Amir Al-Sadi having turned himself in, we're also trying to track this down and try to confirm this information. And right now, it's not fully confirmed. Apparently somebody did walk into the lobby of the Hotel Palestine, which is not only the journalists' hangout right now, but it's also where the Marines are billeted and they have an office and an office space.
So we are not entirely sure who it is who has walked in. But if it was General Al-Sadi, this is one big personality in the weapons department, who presumably is Saddam Hussein's chief scientific adviser, who is the interlocutor with Hans Blix, throughout the months of weapons inspections, the last weapons inspections and the previous ones. He knows where all the secrets are buried. So if it's him, it will be an important thing.
BASH: It's Dana Bash at the White House...
ARRAF: What happens to people like that, I wonder, Dana?
BASH: I'm sorry, I just have a question back to Rym. I have a question about the thing that you mentioned, which is so fascinating, which is the fact that, in the Arab media, there's certainly a lot of negative images and negative rhetoric about the United States.
And that is something that the White House, of course, very much recognizes. And they've got a massive communications effort to try to combat that. We saw this week Tony Blair and George Bush put up speeches and addresses directly to the Iraqi people and other things of that nature to try to combat the things that you're talking about that are going on around on Arab TV.
Is there any sense that what the White House is trying to do is actually resonating in that part of the world?
BRAHIMI: Well, it's very difficult for people to actually admit that here, in a way. There are a lot of questions over whether the Iraqis are truly happy or not. And actually a lot of people I spoke to said, "No, the Iraqis aren't happy. The only people that are happy are those criminals that are looting. You can see that for yourselves through the pictures on the TV."
What's interesting, though, is, I think, as some people from a maybe more educated background put it, it would be a lot better, in their view, had the U.S. attempted to try and do something about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict before going into Iraq. And they feel that these issues are very much tied. And after Iraq has been stabilized, they will be expecting something to happen very concretely on the Middle Eastern front.
As for Saddam Hussein's legacy, well, interestingly enough, a lot of people didn't really know what to answer. They were a bit confused. They didn't know if he was going to go down as an Arab, a pan-Arab ruler, or as a traitor, in a way, because he ran away.
One person put it best, I found here yesterday. A young woman said, "No, we won't remember Saddam Hussein, but we will remember the war."
Back to you.
BASH: Rym, thank you so much for joining us.
And also thank you to Jane Arraf.
Thank you very much. Please, both of you, stay safe.
And we'll be back with more "On the Story" in just a few minutes.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) AMANPOUR: Welcome back to "On the Story" here in Baghdad. We've swung around again to try to show you these Marine positions, because over the last several minutes there has been quite a lot of outgoing fire by the Marines. Most of it outgoing, some of it heavy weapons, heavy machine guns being fired. We simply don't know at this point what it is, because it looks to be over the other side of the banks of the river Tigris.
Joining me now are Dana Bash at the White House, Elizabeth Cohen at the Walter Reed Hospital and Barbara Starr at the Pentagon.
BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Christiane, one of the stories...
AMANPOUR: Barbara, how is all of this...
STARR: Go ahead.
AMANPOUR: I was just going to ask you how all of this is being viewed at the Pentagon. They must be thrilled, right?
STARR: Well, I think they're pleased that they achieved military goals so quickly, with at least what they perceive, of course, to be a minimal loss of life.
But what's really interesting here this week is how some of the rhetoric has changed, and I think specifically about the hunt for weapons of mass destruction.
Now, we all remember Secretary Powell's presentation to the United Nations. We remember Secretary Rumsfeld standing here in the briefing room and saying that he was certain Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
So far, the U.S. military's been to several suspect sites. They haven't found a thing.
And now the administration says they're willing to pay people for information that will lead them to it. One of the big concerns, of course, is while all this looting's gone on in Baghdad, maybe records, documents, computers have been stolen. And the leadership is gone. And just how will they find this stuff?
So that's a big change in at least rhetoric from the administration, Christiane.
AMANPOUR: Barbara, that really is extraordinary, because this whole war was premised on the disarming of Iraq and the search for what the administration was sure and certain, weapons of mass destruction.
And certainly, we haven't seen any. And we know the Special Forces teams have been out and about during the war trying to locate.
How certain are they that they're going to find something? And if not, how are they going to reconcile that with the objective and the stated reasons for this war?
STARR: Well, that may be a very difficult question to answer. Of course, the Bush administration still thinks there is something there. No one knows for sure at this point.
They've also talked about the fact they are worried that the Iraqis shipped weapons of mass destruction out of the country just before the war began, possibly to Syria. But they have no evidence of that.
So, you know, all of this is on the list of unfinished business. This is why the Bush administration says it's not yet ready to declare victory.
But you know, there's another very important reason that they're not ready to declare victory, and that's very much a human story here at the Pentagon this week. There is a lot of concern about the seven prisoners of war and those still missing in action.
As the regime has fallen, as the streets appear to be much more friendly, the very difficult question this week is, where are those seven POWs? Why haven't they appeared? Why is it that whoever may be holding them hasn't released them? Is someone holding them as a last- minute bargaining chip? Just where are they?
We know Special Forces across Iraq are looking for them. We know they have been through several prisons, but so far, not a hint.
ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Barbara, you mentioned looking for weapons of mass destruction. Since those weapons aren't necessarily always large -- it could just be a test tube of a biological agent -- do they have much hope of finding them in Iraq or in Syria, as you mentioned?
STARR: Well, they certainly still believe they're there. But I think the hunt, as it were, is shifting a little bit from actually finding the material, the weapons, the laboratories, the missiles, whatever you will have there, and shifting more to looking for people, they say. Paying people for information that can lead them to these weapon sites.
Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld said he never believed -- yesterday, he said he never believed that the U.N. weapons inspection process would really work, that suddenly inspectors would knock on some door and there would be weapons of mass destruction behind the door. He felt the Iraqis had always hidden their programs so well that no one could just walk in and find them.
So now we're hearing, you know, it could take six months, it could take eight months to find this material. And it certainly appears that the U.N. is now being cut out of that process, because it is U.S. military teams that are moving across Iraq, intelligence teams, going to all these sites, collecting the material, testing it. All of it being held within the U.S. military chain of custody. So, again, a real shift in how all this is being approached. BASH: Barbara, we're going to talk more about the question of when and if to declare victory, and the view from the White House on the extraordinary events in Iraq.
More "On the Story," back after the break. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(AUDIO GAP)
BASH: ... watching, especially people here at the White House. And it was not lost on the people here at the White House that it happened exactly three weeks to the day that President Bush first ordered the military strikes in Iraq. There you see that picture.
And of course the president himself, we are told, also watched some of that pulling down of the statue. And it was -- it was sort of an "I told you so" moment here at the White House, because it was just three weeks after the war had started, and the White House had a sense of vindication almost.
And you heard it in Dick Cheney's remarks that very day. The vice president said something that I thought was definitely worth quoting back, and that is that the people who said the war plan had been flawed, those critics were, quote, "retired military officers embedded in TV studios."
But while you had that vindication, that feeling of vindication, you also have a sense of trying desperately here to calibrate what they are calling the irrational exuberance about the war one day, swinging, they say, to the other side, talking about the irrational despair the next. So they're trying desperately to manage expectations here at the White House. STARR: But, Dana, how exactly are they going to do that? Because of course, there is this wild swing in what we see happening, in what we see happening politically. And now the political process begins to try and transform Iraq. That's going to be difficult. How is the White House going to work their way through this whole process?
It's hard. And, Barbara, you hear it, sort of the same things that we hear here at the White House, you hear at the Pentagon.
For example, the whole question of looting. These pictures that we're seeing of this massive looting and seeming chaos on the streets of Iraq and the power vacuum. When we ask constantly about that and what the plan is to deal with that, they refer us back to the days when the troops were trying to get into Iraq and people saying, well, the troops are getting bogged down, questioning the war plan. Them saying -- they say to us, "Look, you questioned us then. Don't question us now. This is something that we expected. We thought that there was going to be certainly some kind of chaos, at least at the beginning, but we will get through this."
And that is the way they're trying to deal with this, is by trying to -- when we see pictures, pictures like we see now, of trying to say, "Look, what you're seeing is a snapshot." They say it's almost like what you see when you're watching an embedded reporter. You're just seeing a snapshot of what is going on around the country, and you have to keep that in mind. That's what they're saying time and time again here at the White House.
COHEN: Dana, will we ever be sharing the president say that he's officially declaring victory in Iraq?
BASH: That's a good question. It's unclear at this point. The president himself was asked about that yesterday. The White House, for the first time yesterday, declared that Saddam Hussein's regime is gone, is over and done with.
So the president was asked whether or not he was going to declare victory. He said that that falls into the hands of Tommy Franks and the people at the Pentagon, the people in charge militarily of this war. They will have to decide when and if victory is actually at hand.
But as we were just talking about before, part of the problem is that one of the stated goals is regime change, but the other is weapons of mass destruction and finding that, and it is not going to be hard (ph). And, Barbara, as you were saying, it is going to take months and months to do that. That is certainly part of the reason they say why they went into this.
COHEN: Dana, thank you.
And when we come back on the story, we'll be talking about Jessica Lynch. She's due to arrive back in the United States later this afternoon. And we'll talk about her rehabilitation and recovery.
That's coming up next on "On the Story."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BUSH: We will respect your great religious traditions, whose principles of equality and compassion are essential to Iraq's future. We will help you build a peaceful and representative government that protects the rights of all citizens. And then our military forces will leave.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
AMANPOUR: So here, three weeks after the war started and the fall of Baghdad, of course the Pentagon has a right to feel vindicated. It did go very quickly.
But of course, also, at the time, a lot of not retired, embedded generals with journalists but actually active, senior generals were saying that if the civilians in the administration had had their way, there certainly would not have been enough troops on the ground. You remember all that talk about maybe 60,000, maybe just one division, doing this job. Well, certainly, many people say that that couldn't have happened. And many are saying thank God for the United States Army and the U.S. Marine Corps, that they insisted on having the number of troops that they need to do this job.
And even now, even while the administration may be somewhat playing down the effect of this looting, even now there aren't enough troops to really deal with this. And this is having a serious impact on the people here, even if it doesn't last too long. Hopefully it won't. People are in this vacuum, they're scared for the moment. And it has sort of a negative repercussion on the troops that are here, because people of course hold the current powers-that-be responsible -- Elizabeth.
COHEN: Christiane, speaking of troops, 50 troops are headed home to the United States, as we speak. One of those service members is Private Jessica Lynch. She is due to arrive at Andrews Air Force Base at 4:30 this afternoon in Maryland and then will come right here to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
She will be arriving with pins and bolts in her right arm and in both legs. She suffered fractures there. She also suffered fractures in her right ankle and in her right foot and in a disc in her lower spine.
Her family made a statement today, and they said, "Jessie's recovery continues, and she is doing well. She is in pain, but she is in good spirits. Although she faces a lengthy rehabilitation, she is tough."
That rehabilitation will, indeed, be lengthy. I spoke to a specialist who said with injuries like that, it is a matter of months, not weeks.
BASH: Elizabeth, her rehabilitation will be lengthy, but it sounds like physically she's going to be OK. The question is psychologically, how long will it take, if ever, to get over what she's been through?
COHEN: She also is going to face another kind of rehabilitation, and that's psychological rehabilitation. She will have to go through a process, or probably has already, called decompression. And that is where she is interviewed by psychologists. She is asked to talk about what happened to her. And that also can take quite a while.
And an important part of going through that process is being out of the spotlight. We do not expect to see much of Jessica Lynch in the beginning. Psychologists say it's very important that she very slowly get back into normal life. And of course, she will be facing a media blitz, and they say that process needs to be very slow so that it's not disorienting to her.
STARR: Now, Elizabeth, we know that there's been something like 400 wounded U.S. servicemen that have -- and women of course, that have come back to the United States for treatment at Walter Reed, Bethesda Naval Hospital and other hospitals across the country. Has the medical community learned anything yet about treatment of these battlefield types of wounds and how to provide medical care on the battlefield, this of course being one of the most widespread military operations by the U.S. in some time?
Elizabeth, I guess you can't hear me.
But let me talk a little bit more about this. We know that this has been one of the most significant medical deployments by U.S. military forces in some time. They have set up field hospitals all over the theater. I mean, for weeks now, of course, days, we have seen CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta with the Devil Docs out in the field, performing battlefield surgery. This is, you know, not the MASH TV series, this is really significant battlefield medical care.
And now that some of these people are back in the United States, they're going to be facing long periods of rehabilitation. And one can only assume that the military medical community will have many lessons learned that it will be able to provide to other civilian elements of the medical community in orthopedic and rehabilitation medical care -- Elizabeth.
BASH: Barbara, it seems as though we're having a little bit of audio difficulty with Elizabeth.
But this whole idea of these troops coming back, you know, the president himself was at Walter Reed yesterday, and he met with a number -- Walter Reed, actually, and Bethesda Naval. He met with almost 75 of the wounded soldiers that have come back. And it was certainly a very emotional meeting, to say the least, for the president.
He also, interestingly enough, when he was there, gave -- witnessed U.S. citizenship ceremonies for two of the Marines there. And that really was an emotional, emotional meeting.
Christiane, I don't know if you can hear me, what are you hearing from -- Christiane, go ahead, I'm sorry.
AMANPOUR: Well, I think I'm being told that our time is up. I'd have loved to have answered your question. I don't know what it is.
But thank you for joining us for this special War in Iraq version of "On the Story." I'm Christiane Amanpour in Baghdad. And on behalf of Barbara Starr, Dana Bash, Elizabeth Cohen, Jane Arraf, Rym Brahimi and everybody who joined us, thank you.
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