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CNN Wolf Blitzer Reports

War Room: Is the United States Using Half-Measures in Afghanistan?

Aired October 30, 2001 - 19:00   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.
WOLF BLITZER, HOST: Tonight on WOLF BLITZER REPORTS: the "War Room."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD RUMSFELD, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: We do have a very modest number of ground troops in the country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: But will that get job done in Afghanistan? Critics say the U.S. is using half-measures against the Taliban and Osama bin Laden. Should the bombings stop for Ramadan? We will get live updates on the military campaign from the Pentagon and from Islamabad.

And I will speak live with Robert Kagan of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and "The Weekly Standard"; Robert McFarlane, national security adviser to President Reagan; and James Steinberg, deputy national security adviser in the Clinton administration, as we go into "The War Room."

Good evening. Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer, reporting tonight from Washington.

Here are some of the latest developments we are following this hour. Federal health officials say they are intensively investigating whether two of the latest anthrax victims were infected by letters sent to their homes. One is a New Jersey woman who lives near the Hamilton Township mail facility, where traces of anthrax have been found. She has skin anthrax, but has no apparent connection to the mail facility or any other known contaminated site.

That's also true of the New York woman with much more serious inhalation anthrax who worked at a Manhattan hospital. She is in critical condition.

Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta says U.S. air, rail, road and water ways are at risks for terrorist attacks. He told a summit on transportation security that continuing gaps in safekeeping are intolerable.

The Pentagon confirmed some U.S. forces are now on the ground inside Afghanistan. But is the U.S. military campaign there slowing down? s CNN military affairs correspondent Jamie McIntyre has this report from the Pentagon.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN MILITARY AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Pentagon says it is now concentrating 80 percent of its firepower against frontline Taliban forces, but says the shift is not a sign of frustration and a lack of progress, but rather part of a methodically planned military campaign that is just three weeks young.

GEN. TOMMY FRANKS, U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND: In my view, it is not at all stalemate. I believe that we are on the timeline that we established, which, essentially, is the timeline that we exercise at our initiative.

MCINTYRE: The Pentagon has now acknowledged publicly that pinpoint strikes against Taliban targets in the north have been more effective in recent days because of a handful of U.S. special forces, working with the opposition, are calling in strikes and using lasers to mark targets.

But with fewer than 100 planes a day attacking the Taliban, critics say the U.S. could easily intensify the pressure by carpet- bombing troop concentrations or putting in more special forces to better direct attacks.

RUMSFELD: Were anyone to make that suggestion, it would reflect a lack of understanding or knowledge as to the effort we have been putting into it. It's not easily done.

MCINTYRE: Rumsfeld acknowledges the war in Afghanistan is constrained, but insists the constraints are practical, not political.

RUMSFELD: In any conflict, there are constraints. And there are constraints because weapons only have so much precision. There are constraints because there are some things you simply don't want to do. And you make a conscious decision not to do them.

MCINTYRE: And to critics who argue the Pentagon needs to send ground troops in to root out the al Qaeda network and its Taliban backers, both the United States and its closest ally, Great Britain, say that may yet happen.

RUMSFELD: The United States of America has certainly not ruled out the use of ground troops.

GEOFFREY HOON, BRITISH SECRETARY FOR DEFENSE: Nor have we.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCINTYRE: Now, the Pentagon says, in three weeks, it has established air superiority over Afghanistan. It has eliminated most of the Taliban's military equipment, cut its resupply lines, and made it possible for U.S. troops to maneuver on the ground. As for a bombing pause at Ramadan, both the United States and Great Britain say that would not make military sense. It would give the Taliban a chance to regroup. And Pakistan's president today eased off on his call for a bombing pause, saying simply that he hopes the U.S. can achieve its military objectives before Ramadan, which begins in mid-November -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Jamie, are you getting any indication from your sources over there at the Pentagon that U.S. military activity is about to intensify, given some of the criticism that has been leveled that the U.S. is fighting with one hand tied behind its back?

MCINTYRE: Well, the U.S. military campaign may intensify, but Pentagon officials insist it's because the U.S. has carefully set out the conditions for that to happen. As the campaign has gone on, they have gotten more, better intelligence, better coordination on the ground.

They insist they're not fighting with one hand tied behind their back. They say that they don't want to, in their phrase, overrun their headlights -- that is, go so fast that they find themselves in trouble. They say they have a methodical plan and they are sticking to it. That may involve intensified strikes in the future as well as the insertion of ground troops.

BLITZER: Jamie McIntyre, at the Pentagon, thank you very much.

Now to our "War Room," where we turn to experts with backgrounds in the senior ranks of the government and the military. Joining me tonight: Robert McFarlane, who was national security adviser to President Reagan when anti-U.S. terrorism incidence reached a peak; James Steinberg of the Brookings Institution, formerly deputy national security adviser in the Clinton White House; and former State Department official Robert Kagan, now with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Gentlemen, thanks for joining us.

And let me begin with you, Mr. Kagan. You have been critical of the way the U.S. is unleashing this war right now over these first three weeks. Why?

ROBERT KAGAN, CARNEGIE ENDOWMENT: Well, I think we have been trying to do something which was a little bit impossible, which is to establish a post-Taliban government in Afghanistan before the military campaign is really played out.

We have been very slow to bomb the frontlines of the Taliban that are facing the Northern Alliance up in the north. And one of the reasons we didn't want to bomb too heavily up there was because we didn't want the Northern Alliance to win too quickly, because we are trying to put the coalition together. Well, now here we are two, three weeks later, the Pentagon is surprised to find out strong the Taliban still is. And now they're hastening to try to get this war moving in the right direction more quickly. But we have lost some valuable time. BLITZER: And, Charles Krauthammer, writing in "The Washington Post" today -- and I want you to respond to this, Mr. Steinberg -- he writes this. Let me put it up on the screen.

"The war is not going well. And it is time to say why. It has been fought with half-measures. It has been fought with an eye on the wishes of our coalition partners. It has been fought to assuage to the Arab street. It has been fought to satisfy the diplomats rather than the generals."

JAMES STEINBERG, FORMER DEPUTY NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Wolf, I think we need keep in perspective what our objectives are here. Our objective is to defeat the al Qaeda network. Part of that effort is in Afghanistan. You need to deprive them of using Afghanistan as a sanctuary. But we've also got to deal with them as a worldwide network. They are present in Europe. They are present in Southeast Asia.

We need the support of our partners to help deal with that. So we need a strategy that will help us win in Afghanistan, but also help win globally.

BLITZER: Is that a legitimate concern, Bud McFarlane? You were once the national security adviser to President Reagan.

ROBERT MCFARLANE, FORMER REAGAN NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Wolf, I think the first phase of the military part of this conflict has been waged pretty well.

That is, it's destroyed almost all of the physical infrastructure of the Taliban and much of its command-and-control facility. What we have to do now in phase two is go after the troops themselves. We would have a lot better job -- or an easier job of that -- if we relied more on Afghans themselves. That's going to be tough to do.

But there are dozens, literally, of qualified Mujahedeen commanders that are ready to get into the field and take their country back. And for them to do it would remove any martyrdom claim by al Qaeda or bin Laden and also make it easier to maintain whatever coalition we can.

KAGAN: The Pentagon is doing a very good job right now of making it look like everything is moving according to plan; everything is exactly the way they expected it to be. But, of course, the Pentagon has been making contradictory statements over the past couple of weeks.

We heard not more than a week or two weeks ago that the Taliban was on its last leg and was eviscerated. Now we are hearing senior military officials saying: Well, they are little tougher than we thought they were.

And the truth is, I think, it's pretty clear the military campaign has not gone the way the Pentagon wants it to. And I don't think, really, we are doing any service by pretending that everything is going according to plan when it isn't. I think we need to reexamine the strategy that we have been conducting up until now. And there has been a shift, obviously, as a result of dissatisfaction.

BLITZER: And you would just go in there and do what, though?

KAGAN: The first thing you would certainly do would be to get in and arm the Northern Alliance. We have been very foolish, it seems to me, holding back in our support for the Northern Alliance. To do exactly what Mr. McFarlane wants to do, you have got to arm them and provide the air cover necessary for them to make progress.

BLITZER: But that, Jim Steinberg, that would alienate the Pakistanis, whom the United States needs badly right now.

STEINBERG: I think we need to work with all the forces. As Mr. McFarlane said...

BLITZER: But you can't always work with all the forces.

STEINBERG: No, I think we can in this case, Wolf, because I think that there are a lot of people, including among the Pashtuns in the south, who despise what the Taliban have done to their country. They are our real friends in this.

And, after all, we don't want to own this problem when it is over. If we do this ourselves and we try to impose our own view about what the future of Afghanistan is going to be, we could become the objects of the attacks. We have seen the experience that the Soviet Union had. We have a lot of power going on our side, but only if we work with the full range of Afghan interests to try to not only defeat the Taliban, but create a more stable environment so that we don't have more terrorism in the future.

BLITZER: We have got a question from a viewer, an e-mail question: "Why have we not taken an airfield in Afghanistan to serve as a base of operations?"

We have a map, actually, of Afghanistan. Let's put it up and I'll go to the Telestrator right here.

There is Kabul, of course, which is right over here -- the capital. There is a base, Bud McFarlane, Bagram air base. The Northern Alliance seems to be going back and forth from that base -- the Northern Alliance up here in the north. Why not simply take that air base right now, use it as a U.S. facility to launch strikes or commando operations?

MCFARLANE: Well, that is feasible.

I think, as well, you could launch them from the base we're already using in Jacobabad down here in Pakistan. The distance and time of flying and so forth is not significant from Bagram. I think as well, though -- going back to Jim's point -- that whatever we do, we need good intelligence. If we are going to hit something when we shoot, from wherever we are based, that, again, relies on good intelligence on the ground.

We don't have it of our own people. The Afghans do. The Pashtuns haven't yet been heard from. And I think what we need to do is get into the field, engage with them, form relationships, and begin to exploit. Their intelligence can be of great help in shortening this war.

BLITZER: Well, I was going to say you, relying on the intelligence over there, it seems that -- at least the way the U.S. administration is waging this war -- is that they are trying to do the job basically by themselves.

KAGAN: What, that the United States is trying to get the intelligence basically by themselves?

BLITZER: Yes.

KAGAN: Well, I think, you know, we can't assume that we are going to get all this help that we want from the Afghans.

MCFARLANE: Yes, you can.

KAGAN: Well, I mean, I don't see it materializing yet. But let's say eventually we can.

MCFARLANE: No, if you jut over to Peshawar and look there, there are dozens of commanders sleeping three in a bed, wondering: Where is the United States trying to engage with us?

It's just not happening.

KAGAN: I noticed we sent Abdul Haq to try to work something out and he winds up getting assassinated.

MCFARLANE: The trouble is, we didn't send him in. We had a year ago of notice that there were Taliban vulnerabilities. And that's the time, a year ago, that we could have engaging with all of these dozens of Taliban -- or anti-Taliban leaders who were ready to help.

KAGAN: Well, all I wanted to say is that we don't have an infinite amount of time to conduct this campaign and wait for all the pieces to come into place. Time is not on our side right now in Afghanistan. As we see right now, even with the campaign that we are conducting, the coalition is a little shaky.

The longer this bombing goes on -- I think we should bomb through Ramadan, but we are going to get criticized for it. I think we need to bring this thing to a head a lot quicker than we are going right now.

BLITZER: All right, stand by for one minute. We're going to take a quick break. We have a lot more to talk about, more from the "War Room."

Plus, we'll go live to Islamabad. Should the United States bow to Muslim wishes with a bombing pause for the holy month of Ramadan?

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Welcome back.

Senior U.S. officials tell CNN, President Bush's national security team opposes stopping air strikes during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. But inside Pakistan and the rest of the Muslim world, there is pressure for a break in the bombing.

CNN's John Vause in live in Islamabad with more.

John, tell us what you are hearing over there.

JOHN VAUSE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, the Ramadan issue is just one of issues facing President Musharraf here in Pakistan.

There is growing disquiet here in Pakistan amongst the general population as this military campaign enters into its fourth week. There's also problems for President Musharraf on the northwest frontier. Thousands of Pakistani men have gathered at the Afghan- Pakistan border waiting to travel inside Afghanistan to fight alongside the Taliban.

It's not unusual for Pakistani men to travel to Afghanistan to fight with the Taliban. In the past, they have put out calls for recruits for reinforcements for their military campaigns. But now, though, the Taliban is saying: Not yet. We'll wait for the ground war.

Also in the north, there is demonstrators blocking the Silk Road to China. We are told that local law enforcement is moving into place. That blockade has been going on now for almost a week. And they are saying they will use force to move those demonstrators if they have to -- all of this, of course, against a backdrop of almost daily anti-U.S. protests, which are becoming anti-Musharraf protests. And as far as Ramadan goes, we know that President Musharraf has said that he would like to see the bombing campaign end before Ramadan. But General Musharraf says that he understands that, if the military objectives are not met, that this military campaign must continue -- Wolf.

BLITZER: John Vause, in Islamabad, thank you very much.

And should the United States consider a bombing halt?

Let's continue our "War Room" discussion with the former Reagan National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane; former Clinton Deputy National Security Adviser James Steinberg; and Robert Kagan, a former State Department official, now with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

The British, Jim Steinberg, are suggesting: Well, maybe a Ramadan pause would be useful in the sense that they're very concerned, apparently, about what's happening inside Pakistan, and the whole Musharraf regime could be undermined.

STEINBERG: I think it would be a real mistake, Wolf. We can't give either the Taliban or al Qaeda the benefit of sanctuary of a holy month. They're the ones who are the killers. They're the ones who need to be addressed. If we simply send out a signal to them that says, "This is a free month for you to reorient yourself, to rebuild your defenses, to carry out other terrorist attacks," they are not going to respect Ramadan. And I don't think we should either.

BLITZER: Is it at all important right now, Bud McFarlane, to be overly concerned about not only Pakistan, but Saudi Arabia, Egypt, other moderate elements in the Arab world, how they are going to react -- and the Islamic world, for that matter -- to a continued pause -- to continued strikes during Ramadan?

MCFARLANE: Well, Wolf, all of those states will remain with us or not as a function of whether we win or not and show the determination that we are going to prevail. And so the Ramadan issue is a red herring. It didn't stop Egypt and Syria from starting a war right in the middle of Ramadan in 1973. And so we will be criticized. But, as Jim says, you can't afford to break the momentum by a Ramadan pause. And there's no evidence whatsoever it would induce any reaction from the Taliban, except greater pace of operations.

BLITZER: Robert Kagan, you have been among those saying it's time to already start -- escalate this campaign, not only inside Afghanistan, but to take it, for example, to Iraq as well.

KAGAN: Well, that's right. I think that it's a big mistake to think this war can be confined to Afghanistan. The war on terrorism is going to have to deal with Iraq at some point.

Saddam Hussein is sitting on weapons of mass destruction. Are we really going to wait around for three, four, five years to see whether he is going to use them on us?

BLITZER: Would you say at some point -- what do you mean: right now, a week from now, a month from now?

KAGAN: I would start right now undertaking the plan which Congress has authorized to support the internal opposition in Iraq. Now, that will require U.S. military action to create a zone in the south where that opposition can operate from.

But, yes, we should start right now. And, it seems to me, we have fallen, to some extent, into a trap. You talk about an asymmetrical attack on us. Terrorists use asymmetrical tactics. We should be fighting where we want to fight when we want to fight. And I think Iraq right now is a very important target.

STEINBERG: Well, I think our priorities are to deal with this organization, al Qaeda. We know where they are operating. They're not operating just in the Middle East. They are operating in Europe. We need to work with our European friends to crack down there in Southeast Asia.

What we need is a worldwide campaign to break up these cells to deal with this organization which has directly targeted us. We have a big problem with Iraq. It is dangerous that they are developing weapons of mass destruction. And we need to have a strategy that has support of others, because if we try to solve the public by ourselves, we are not going to necessarily undermine Iraq. We may actually be creating an environment where there will be more terrorism.

So that is what we need to focus on. That ought to be our priority.

BLITZER: All right, stand by for another minute. We have to take another quick break.

When we come back, I will ask our "War Room" experts: What happens next inside Afghanistan?

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Welcome back.

Bud McFarlane, let's look ahead. Winter is coming inside Afghanistan. Ramadan begins November 17. What do you anticipate happening between now and then?

MCFARLANE: Well, Wolf, again, I think the Pashtun Afghans haven't yet been heard from. Bear in mind, these are the people who beat the Soviet Union, ran them out of Afghanistan. I think they're going to start operations of sabotage and small-unit raids that will have a real effect on the Taliban.

BLITZER: Those are going to be opponents of the Taliban.

Is he overly optimistic?

KAGAN: I just don't think we are going to have time for this to come together. And I think the Bush administration, and President Bush, particularly, is not going to want to be told that he is going to have to wait until next spring to start making real progress. So I would anticipate, if we don't see real progress in the next week or so, you are going to start talking about a major American escalation, including the use of ground troops before Christmas.

BLITZER: Heavy-duty ground troops? The Clinton administration was always reluctant -- Kosovo, every place else -- to introduce large numbers of ground troops. Does the Bush administration have the stomach to do that?

STEINBERG: I don't think it's a question of having the stomach, Wolf. I think it's a question of what our national interests are here. We need to win this war. But we need to win it in the way that Bud McFarlane is talking about: which is in support of the Afghan people, not to turn this into a U.S. invasion, where the problem becomes people turning against us, both in Afghanistan and around the world.

We can be patient here. We need to keep the pressure on. We need to keep the efforts going as strongly as we can. But we shouldn't have artificial deadlines. Our goal is to disrupt what is going on in Afghanistan to make it impossible for bin Laden to use that as a sanctuary. We're doing that now. We need to continue to keep that pressure up and not create an artificial sense that we have got to win this thing tomorrow.

BLITZER: Patience: Is that the key word?

KAGAN: I'm praying there is not going to be another major terrorist attack in the United States. But if there is, this conversation is going to take on an entirely different aspect. And there is going to be zero patience.

BLITZER: What do you say about that, Bud?

MCFARLANE: Well, I disagree. I just spoke to a group of senior people today in Norfolk, primarily military, who you would expect to be more impatient than anyone. But they understand. This is something we haven't faced before. It's going to take a long time.

I think Robert has a point that there are other things we can do in other countries. But the primary focus is going to remain Afghanistan until we get the Taliban taken down and capture bin Laden. I think we can do that.

BLITZER: OK, Bud McFarlane, Jim Steinberg, Robert Kagan, thanks for joining us.

And for our viewers in North America, "CROSSFIRE" comes your way at the bottom of the hour.

Bill Press joins us now live with a preview -- Bill.

BILL PRESS, "CROSSFIRE": Indeed, Wolf.

Switching topics here: After last night's warning by Attorney General John Ashcroft, we are all alert. The only problem is, we don't know what to be alert about -- or where or when. Did his warning serve any purpose other than to make people more nervous?

Two members of Congress square off in the "CROSSFIRE" -- coming up next, Wolf.

BLITZER: We will be watching. Thank you very much, Bill.

And coming up over here: Senators make their next move in their effort to keep anthrax out of Washington -- that and more of the latest developments inside Afghanistan in the air and on the ground when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Welcome back.

Here are some of the latest developments in America's new war: As U.S.-led airstrikes pound Taliban strongholds, the Defense Department announces that some U.S. ground troops are now operating on the ground inside Afghanistan.

In the anthrax scare, Senate leaders have accepted an EPA plan to fumigate the Hart Senate Office Building to kill any anthrax spores that may still be inside.

And President Bush will throw out the first pitch at tonight's World Series game at Yankee Stadium in New York City. Aircraft will temporarily be restricted from flying near the game. That call was made by the FAA.

That's all the time we have tonight. Please join me again tomorrow twice, both 5:00 and 7:00 p.m. Eastern. Until then, thanks very much for watching. I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington.

"CROSSFIRE" begins right now.

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