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CNN Wolf Blitzer Reports

How September 11 Changed America

Aired December 31, 2001 - 19:01   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.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Tonight on "WOLF BLITZER REPORTS," a year defined by one day.

The catastrophe of September 11th, how the day unfolded and how it changed America and the world so drastically.

RUDOLPH GIULIANI, MAYOR, NEW YORK: It's the most horrific thing I've ever seen in my whole life. We saw the World Trade Center in flames, a big gaping hole all the way on the top of it.

BLITZER: We'll look at that day and the incredible chain of events since then. Has America been up to the challenge?

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I can hear you. The rest of the world hears you, and the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon.

BLITZER: We'll get perspective from author and Pulitzer Prize winner David Halberstam; the Assistant Managing Editor of Newsweek, Evan Thomas; and former Presidential Adviser, David Gergen, all ahead on a special year end edition of "WOLF BLITZER REPORTS."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

Good evening, I'm Wolf Blitzer reporting tonight from Washington. To our viewers in the United States and around the world, Happy New Year. If it were a normal year, we would spend out time on this New Year's Eve looking back at all of 2001. But this has not been a normal year.

So tonight, we will not look back on all of 2001, but rather we'll look at September, 11th and how our lives have changed since then. We'll hear from our guests in just a moment.

But first, the impact of September 11th remains very much in the news everyday. Let's get a quick check of the latest developments.

JOHN KING, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks, Wolf. I'm John King in Washington with a look at some of the day's top stories on the War on Terrorism.

A U.S. Special Forces soldier has been shot and wounded in eastern Afghanistan. The incident occurred near Jalalabad when a vehicle carrying U.S. troops came under fire. The troops returned fire. The soldier is being treated for a leg wound which the U.S. Central Command says is not life threatening.

U.S. officials say a military operation is underway in the area of Baghran in southern Afghanistan, where Special Forces are joining anti-Taliban fighters in the hunt for Taliban Supreme Leader Mullah Mohammed Omar who is believed to be hiding in the region. Officials say the Special Forces may provide intelligence and targeting assistance for possible U.S. air strikes.

U.S. military officials say U.S. planes hit a suspected Taliban and al Qaeda leadership complex over the weekend. They say secondary explosions indicate ammunition or fuel was stored there. Local Afghan witnesses say the attack killed scores of civilians. The U.S. officials say they can't rule out that some civilians might have been killed.

A man in New Delhi, India was arrested today after he was found carrying detonators and five pounds of explosives. Police say he planned to use them to disrupt the city's New Year's Eve celebrations. The man is thought to be a member of one of the groups India has blamed for an attack earlier this month on its Parliament.

President Bush is predicting 2002 will be "a great year." Speaking to reporters as he visited a store near his ranch in Crawford, Texas Mr. Bush said the country will remain on a higher state of alert, but he expressed confidence the U.S. military will capture Osama bin Laden. The President also predicts good things for the economy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're a nation that has gone through incredible suffering and hardship, yet as a result of it, we're a strong nation and a united nation, and 2002 in my judgment is going to be a great year. It's going to be a great year because people are going to be able to find work again. It's going to be a great year because our military is going to do the job the Americans expect. It will be a great year because at home we'll protect the American people. And it's going to be a great year primarily because Americans have taken a look inward, reassessed our values.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: The President said there will be "nothing glamorous about his New Year's Eve," adding he expects to be in bed by 10:00 p.m.

Throughout the country though, millions of others will be up and out at midnight ringing in the new year under tight security. In New York's Times Square, revelers face checkpoints and searches, while rooftop snipers and bomb-sniffing dogs stand guard.

The latest attempt to rid the Hart Senate Office Building of anthrax ended today. Chlorine dioxide gas was pumped through the building in an attempt to kill off any remaining anthrax spores. The building has been closed since October 17th.

And the Health Director of Washington says the anthrax-tainted Brentwood Postal Facility may never reopen. Dr. Ivan Walks told a local TV station, contamination is all over the facility.

More news at the bottom of the hour. Now, back to Wolf with a special year end edition of "WOLF BLITZER REPORTS."

BLITZER: Thanks. On this last night of 2001, let's take a look at how our country, indeed how all of us have changed since September 11th.

Joining me here in Washington, Evan Thomas, the Assistant Managing Editor of Newsweek, which has a cover story tackling just these issues. And from New York, the Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and author, David Halberstam, perhaps known for chronicling the failure of the best and the brightest of the Vietnam War. And David Gergen who has advised Presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton. He now teaches at Harvard and works also for U.S. News and World Report.

Thanks to all of you for joining us, and David Halberstam, let me begin with you on September 11th. When did you realize that our world had changed?

DAVID HALBERSTAM, PULITZER PRIZE WINNING JOURNALIST, AUTHOR: Well I think it's almost the first thing that flashes through your mind. I mean, as the immediacy of the event, that it is terrorist, that they can strike like this.

If you live in New York, the Twin Towers, this symbolic building. You're aware that the immunities that had existed for 80 or 90 years, this country really since World War I the most powerful country in the world.

But removed from the carnage, separated from the carnage of the century, that that separation, the immunity had ended, that we were vulnerable to the enemy from within because of terrorism, and that the sense of security we had had for so long was over, that our lives were completely different now.

BLITZER: Evan Thomas, in the new issue of Newsweek, you have a beautiful cover story. Among other things, you write this. You say: "This is the story of September 11, the day that changed America. It is a story of good and evil, despair and shock, determination and courage." But how do you know for sure that this won't have more than just a passing change of America?

EVAN THOMAS, ASST. MANAGING EDITOR, "NEWSWEEK": Because I don't think it's over. I wish I could say it was over, but I think that terrorism is with us, maybe not on the scale we saw on September 11th but maybe worse.

We're going to be living with this threat for a long time. In many ways, it's been a good thing despite the death and the loss and the grief. We have been a brave country and dealt with this in a courageous and kind of purposeful way that was somehow missing before this. But I think the threat is here to stay.

BLITZER: And David Gergen, that notion that things could get worse, a lot of Americans probably think it can't get much worse. Do you agree with Evan?

DAVID GERGEN, "U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT": I do. I think we're apt to face individual bouts of terrorism. An individual terrorist blows up a plane or blows up a truck near a building or something like that and there would be a lot of deaths. I'm not so sure that we will face as complex and as sophisticated an operation as we saw on September 11th. I think our intelligence agencies are doing a good job disrupting those networks that are out there.

But sure, we're going to face a long twilight here of time when we all have to adjust. Evan said it well in his piece in Newsweek, and we've looked into the face of evil again. It's been a long while since we'd done that. I think that, you know, historians felt many that the 19th Century really came to an end when World War I broke out, and that began the 20th Century.

And I think we're all going to feel that somehow before September 11th we were living in a different age. Increasingly, it was an age with boundless prosperity. We were getting frivolous. We got hedonistic in many ways, and September 11th, you know, was really a thunder collapse that we've now become much more serious. We are more communal. We are rallying around the notion of country again. But I think we're also very much aware that evil still lurks among us.

BLITZER: David Halberstam, in your latest book that came out before September 11th, you wrote it before September 11th. You did write this, and I want to read it to our viewers: "The nation's interest still remained inner-directed. To much of the of rest of the world, America was immensely powerful, but for a nation that powerful, it was shockingly self-absorbed." That was your sense then. Is it still your sense now?

HALBERSTAM: Well, I think it's obviously changed because we have a formidable new enemy, not one that you lightly can use all of your military force against and one that will continue the struggle even after Phase I, which I think we're seeing come to an end. And so it's out there.

But are we really going to look beyond the immediacy of the struggle with terrorism? Are we going to pay attention to the rest of the world? Are we going to go back with so much of our media, both news and entertainment into this kind of binge?

Binging of self-absorption, you know, we've been pretty good for a couple months, but the tendency, the instinct, particularly for example in the networks, is to do shows that drive up ratings and that tends to be - to use frivolous stuff. So I - even in the journalistic parts, I'm not sure how completely we've turned into the new country we need to be.

BLITZER: Evan, all of us were guilty in the news business of dealing with, I guess stories we look back on that were sort of frivolous at the time.

The Gary Condit-Chaundra Levy story, Newsweek did it. CNN did it. We were all guilty of playing that story, probably much more thoroughly than it ever deserved to be played. Has that changed since September 11th?

THOMAS: Yes, thankfully. I mean one of the good things about September 11th is I haven't written the words Gary Condit since then. I mean we've been liberated from a kind of coverage that I think was pretty demeaning to us.

I mean it was fun and it was lurid and it was fast paced, but it was a bit of a downer really, to have to spend all our time doing those tabloid stories.

Since September 11th, we've been dealing literally with issues of good and evil, of life and death, and that has been a very great story. And I think for the most part, the media's done pretty well.

BLITZER: David Gergen, you've advised many President. You've been around Washington for a long time. I want you to listen to one of the most memorable sound bytes from President Bush, shortly after September 11th, when he addressed Congress on September 20th. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: Tonight, we are a country awakened to danger and called to defend freedom. Our grief has turned to anger, and anger to resolution. Whether we bring our enemies to justice or bring justice to our enemies, justice will be done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: He certainly has come through since September 11th to those who doubted him beforehand. He's had a pretty remarkable ride since then.

GERGEN: He absolutely has. He rose, I think that all of us sense a personal growth that there was a seriousness about him, that he found his mission in life.

He said in that speech, you know, we have found our mission. We have found our moment. What really has happened here is George W. Bush has found his mission, his moment.

He's been determined since then. He's been decisive. I think he's been very focused, and all of that has worked for the country's benefit. So at the end of the year here, he finds in the Gallup Poll, right not only the most admired man in America, but he's the highest level that Gallup has ever found in the polls since 1948 when it started being most admired.

So I think all of that has worked to his - positively for him. I would say, Wolf, to go back to David Halberstam's point, there is a risk that we become so focused on terrorism we don't realize that there are other dangers in the world too, such as the one that's been building up on the environment.

That the real challenge for America is that we not only face terrorism, but we embrace these other world causes and become the leader in the world in embracing them and engaging on them, so that we can head them off before it becomes too late.

BLITZER: David Halberstam, compare September 11th to Pearl Harbor, to the assassination of President Kennedy.

HALBERSTAM: Well, I think we should separate the assassination of President Kennedy, because that changed the office, but it didn't change the equation of the nation. We weren't at war. It was unsettling. It showed that the office of the Presidency was vulnerable, but it didn't show the country was vulnerable.

December 7, 1941, they bring guys like me out because I can still remember it. You know, it was a shock and the Japanese had attacked us at Pearl Harbor. But the world had been at war for a couple years, so in a way we were better acclimated. Then there was an obvious sense for almost everyone in the country what you were supposed to do. Who was supposed to go in the service. Who was supposed to work in a defense camp. I mean, the mission was clear and it was a different time, different economy. And it was a war in which everyone served. September 11th is different.

I mean, it's an elite army we send. It's almost an invisible enemy. The job for the President, it seems to me, is to do a very - in the future. He's done very well in the first couple months on the military national security part, which in some ways may be the easier part.

We have this mighty defense arsenal. It's quite brilliant. The high technology weaponry's wonderful. We've got people of the highest order running it. We've never had better people. But the mission, the dual mission in the future is to have us balance between sort of a good life, life as usual, and yet going to a higher level where we are all as a citizenry engaged in a better society.

We understand changed missions, that we all owe something, that it isn't just an elite or the government that does this for us, but that there are responsibilities that run throughout the society in the private sector at the very top, whether it's people in the networks, down to ordinary citizens.

That you can't have an elite taking care of a giant country, that's going to be a very interesting role for him, how to balance all that and to govern in his own party with a particular wing of that party that has been in the past fiercely anti-government.

BLITZER: All right. Stand by everybody. When we come back, we'll talk about the heroes of and since September 11th, the men and women who've risen to the challenge. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) BLITZER: Welcome back. We're looking at the events and the impact of September 11th and the Americans whose courage and leadership have made them heroes.

Evan, one of those heroes of course, Rudy Giuliani, who emerged as one commentator said, not only the Mayor of New York, but the Mayor of America. Listen to what he said on that first day, September 11th.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GIULIANI: We will strive now very hard to save as many people as possible, and to send a message that the City of New York and the United States of America is much stronger than any group of barbaric terrorists, that our democracy, that our rule of law, that our strength and our willingness to defend ourselves will ultimately prevail.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: He has been remarkable these past few months, hasn't he?

THOMAS: Yes, he has and the story's made even better because his personal life was a mess. People were running him down. He was considered to be a has-been and a bit of a loser really.

BLITZER: Prostate cancer.

THOMAS: Yes. I mean his life was a mess, and he comes across and was, not that he didn't just appear to be, he was a truly great leader at a time of crisis He brought out that side of America that says, "don't tread on me. Watch out. We're not somebody you can hurt easily." And, he kept people calm by just having this kind of steady, serious, direct manner that was really a tremendous relief and it was inspirational.

BLITZER: And David Gergen, he not only inspired people in New York, but he inspired people indeed all over the United States, around the world.

GERGEN: I think he did. I think there in the first 24 hours, especially because President Bush had to be taken to a variety of places, couldn't speak up. Rudy Giuliani was the voice of America. He gave all of us a sense of participation. He helped us understand what we were going through.

But most of all, he gave us courage. It's interesting, he had been reading a book about Churchill shortly before this, about five days in London at the hinge point, the hinge of fate there, when Britain almost went down, where they almost decided to throw in the towel.

And Churchill rallied people, and I think that Giuliani understood how important courage is, that courage is courageous from a leader, and I think he spoke to that.

I also think he helped to put a stake through the notion that we've been so obsessed with people's sexual lives, that we sort of assume if somebody's in a bit of a mess in their personal life, they can't lead, and Rudy Giuliani showed that's absolutely false, that when the chips were down, he stepped up and he was magnificent.

BLITZER: And David Halberstam, there were other heroes that emerged, of course, over these past several months, the firefighters, the police officers, the emergency medical personnel, the U.S. military, even the postal service. It's been a remarkable love affair that the American people have had with these heroes.

HALBERSTAM: Well, I'm doing a piece and maybe a book on the firemen from the house near where we live, a 40 engine, 35 truck, and my heroes have always been ordinary people, and they lost 12 men that day. And that image that we all have of everyone else leaving the building and the firemen going in, that's a great, great image and there's a brief film clip of some of those men.

I think maybe more than an hour into it, Lieutenant Ginley, Steve Mercado, Mike Doria, I think Mike Lynch, going in and they're really going in to the valley of the shadow of death and they are so steadfast and stoic and calm in this moment, as they descend the stairway, taking them to the south tower that it's just extraordinary, particularly as you see it afterwards and you are haunted by knowing what has happened to them.

I think that it's a reminder of what is at the core of this country, what makes it, going back in fact a couple of years ago, the Oklahoma City tragedy, that underneath the sort of silly part, the trivial part, what we see on so many talk shows at night, there's a toughness, a grittiness of ordinary American life, of people going out there and doing the right thing day in and day out, and it really showed in those memorable moments than and afterwards in this city.

BLITZER: And Evan Thomas, very briefly, when we sit down a year from now and look back on 2002, I assume 2001, September 11 will still dominate 2002.

THOMAS: Well, it depends on what happens in 2002. I mean this is going to be a test of our staying power. We're in this for a long run. There may be more attacks. We'll find out. I think we'll show what kind of people we really are, but we're going to be tested.

BLITZER: OK. Evan Thomas, David Halberstam, David Gergen, thanks so much for joining us on this New Year's Eve. And when we come back, we'll have a check of the latest developments. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TUCKER CARLSON, CROSSFIRE: I'm Tucker Carlson in Washington. Coming up on "CROSSFIRE," 2001, it was the year that changed everything in the world and in politics. President Bush, Gary Condit, Jim Jefferds, Al Gore, Rudy Giuliani, Bill Clinton, all people who shaped and were shaped by the past 12 months. We'll tell you who prevailed and who self-destructed. Plus our totally accurate, sure- fire, never fail, though not fully guaranteed guesses on what to expect in the new year. All that next on "CROSSFIRE."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: "CROSSFIRE" begins in a moment, but first, a check of the latest developments. The Pentagon confirms a U.S. Special Forces soldier was shot tonight in Afghanistan. The soldier suffered a non- threatening, non life threatening wound to the leg. The soldier was in a vehicle with other Special Forces troops that took fire from enemy forces. The Special Forces soldiers and another group of U.S. troops returned fire.

U.S. Special Forces are also joining the hunt for Taliban Supreme Leader Mullah Mohammed Omar. They're working with anti-Taliban forces in the Baghran district of southern Afghanistan, where U.S. officials believe Omar and many of his followers may be hiding. The Special Forces would help locate targets if air strikes are ordered.

On the eve of the new year, President Bush says he believes it will be a "great one for the United States." Speaking in Crawford, Texas Mr. Bush predicted an improving economy, a continuation of the War on Terrorism and a flourishing of what he called the nation's culture of compassion.

Security is tight at New York waits for the ball to drop in Times Square. Thousands of police officers have been deployed and New Year's Even revelers may be searched, scanned and sniffed for weapons, explosives, and radiation.

New York's Office of Emergency Management has reduced the estimated number of people who were killed in the World Trade Center attacks. That estimate is now 2,937, with 593 people confirmed dead, 380 listed as missing, and 1,964 death certificates issued for victims whose remains have yet to be identified.

The Environmental Protection Agency is waiting for the results of its latest attempt to kill any remaining anthrax in the Hart Senate Office Building. Poison gas was pumped through the building early this morning to try to kill any remaining spores. It should take about a week to find out if the operation was successful.

That's all the time we have tonight. Thanks very much for watching. I'm John King in Washington. Have a safe and a Happy New Year. "CROSSFIRE" begins right now.

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