Transcripts For CNN CNN Tonight 20091202 : vimarsana.com

he is dropped something. reporter: he is dropped something. bend over. reporter: oh, is that it? they want you to bend over? really? don t be naughty, it s not nice. tis the season for windows that feature holiday trains. but one good caboose deserves another. jeanne moos, cnn, new york. i m wolf blitzer in the situation room. i ll be back with the full cnn military and political team in 30 minutes. up next, cnn tonight. tonight president obama announces his new plan for afghanistan. a large-scale escalation of the eight-year war. 30,000 more americans will be sent in to finish the job. what the president will do tonight is announce an accelerated strategy to take on al qaeda and its extremist allies to ensure that the taliban can t provide a safe haven for them to plot and plan. so is this the right plan for victory? not everyone is on board. president obama s own party is deeply divided. many democrats openly oppose doubling down in afghanistan. the costs of this escalation will be enormous both in terms of blood and treasure. everything would be on the table in terms of trying to prevent this error from occurring. congresswoman jane harman will be here to tell us why she is opposed to the surge. whatever the end game, afghanistan could now become the defining issue of barack obama s presidency. this is cnn tonight live from new york. here now john roberts. good evening, and thanks very much for joining us. decision time for afghanistan. just under an hour from now, president obama will formally announce a new strategy for what he has called the necessary war. the president will address the nation in a prime time speech from west point military academy. he is expected to call for sending an additional 30,000 troops to be deployed within six months. the mission, to disrupt, dismantle and destroy al qaeda and its extremist allies. but it will not be an open-ended american commitment. a specific timeline for withdrawal will be a part of the deal. cnn s ed henry is at west point. tonight he joins us now live. what else can we expect from the president tonight, ed? reporter: well, john, the president is going to order the military that he wants 30,000 more u.s. troops headed to afghanistan. and the key is he wants it with some speed. he wants it faster, this deployment than even general stanley mcchrystal, his commander on the ground had suggested when he had laid out in his now famous memo that he wanted these troops spread out, 40,000 of them, over a year. the president is only going to give him 30,000 of them, but he is going to do it in six months. and he is really going the make a big deal about that speed because he think this is key to try to break the taliban s back. in fact, we just obtain and excerpt in which the president s speech says the 30,000 additional troops that i am announcing tonight will deploy in the first part of 2010, the fastest pace possible so they can target the insurgency and secure key population centers. and to partner with them so that more afghans can get into the fight, and they will help create the conditions for the united states to transfer responsibility to the afghans. and that transfer of responsibility, as you mentioned, the president will lay out somewhat of a specific timetable, saying that beginning in july of 2011, about 18 months from now, he wants to start pulling these surge forces out of afghanistan. but the key is that moving past that date, he is not going commit to withdrawing other troops on any specific time frame or deadline. however you want to phrase it, that basically he wants to leave it to conditions on the ground. he leaves a very big hedge there, and that is part of the reason there is that divide you mentioned in his own party. some democrats claim that sounds a lot like former president bush talking about iraq, where he never had an exact time frame to pull troops, instead left it based on conditions on the ground and troops stayed there a long time and in fact are still there. it s also similar to president bush s surge in that president bush said the surge will last a certain amount of time and then we ll pull the surge troops out, leave other troops there. hasn t the president said he would like to see the bulk of american forces out of afghanistan before the end of his first term? reporter: that s right. when i interviewed the president in china a couple of weeks ago, he said he would like to see the bulk of u.s. forces out of afghanistan before he leaves office. he did not want to pass it on to his successor. obviously you can read that the end of his first term, or if he serves two terms, it will actually be seven years from now. but you re right that in the short-term his aides are at least hoping, their goal we re told is to get a bulk of u.s. troops out over the next few years. hopefully by the end of his first term. but key is they re not committing to that, and the president is not going to commit to that in the speech tonight. he said he is going to talk about a goal, but he is going to leave that wide open. that s part of the frustration among some democrats on the left. ed henry for us tonight at west point. ed, thank you so much. stay with cnn to watch president obama announce his new war strategy for victory in afghanistan. we ll have complete coverage of the president s speech less than an hour from now. and in-depth analysis from the best political team on television. the plan to send new troops into afghanistan will happen quickly. president obama is calling, as ed said, for an accelerated timetable. here is what it means in terms of actual boots on the ground. 30,000 will be deployed in the next six months. the first wave of marines could be there by christmas. those new troops will be added to the 22,000 that president obama sent earlier this year. the combined troop surges will bring the total number of u.s. forces in afghanistan to 100,000 with more than half of those sent in by president obama. the president tonight tried tried to emphasize that the united states is not going it alone, asking nato for some 6,000 troops. in an excerpt from his speech obtained by cnn, the president says, quote but so far great britain is the only country committed to sending more troops, adding about 500. our senior political correspondent candy crowley joins us now. candy, this is certainly shaping to be a major test of the president s foreign policy. it, because you know, john, during the campaign, president obama, then candidate obama kept saying we need to bring our allies together. we need to have not group decisions, but certainly there needs to be more conciliatory approach. well can t do it alone. enough of this cowboy approach. so what has he done over the past year? he has spent a lot of time overseas, the most traveled first year president of any president before him. and so here is now when the payoff comes. can he get these nato allies to pony up some troops? we already know france said no, we ve pretty much are not going to be doing it. germany is almost sort of hit its limit that it s allowed to. canada is already talking about the timetable that it s going to come out. now the president in these excerpts sounds very confident that he is going to be able to get these 5 or 6,000 troops from nato. but it is a test of whether his formulation of foreign policy is indeed going to work. this is one of the first tests. okay we have said to them you re our partners. you re our allies. we all want to be able to consult with one another. now let s see if the give-back is that the troops are forthcoming. let s take a look at results of recent cnn research corporation polling. the president has a very difficult sales job tonight. this is november 13th to 15th. when asked about the u.s. war in afghanistan, do you favor it or oppose it? 52% of americans said they oppose it. the majority against this war, candy. so he has a tough hill to climb. he does. and it can t happen in one night. this has to be an ongoing process. they re fully aware of that. when the president was in alaska, he said to the troops there, i won t send you some place where you are not supported, either by equipment or by the american public. he totally understands the american public has to be behind him. and i would submit to you that s precisely why you re not just hearing about the number of troops or about the strategy or about the goal, but how to get out. on the number of troops, we specifically asked that question of respondents. president obama decided to send 34,000 more troops to afghanistan, could you favor or oppose? split pretty evenly. narrow margin of people support it, 50% favor it. 49% oppose. but when asked if he sent a fewer number of troops, a smaller number of troops, look at this. 42% of people would favor that. 56% would oppose. so they do seem to be in favor of a larger troop engagement here. intrinsically, i think we could add these up and say that the american people understand, or believe that sending more troops will end the war more quickly, that many oppose it, but a look at it and say okay, well, the more troops we have there, maybe the more quickly this war will end. and it goes back to some of those vietnam era lessons learned. always have an exit strategy. always have a clear goal, and always go in with as much force as you possibly can have. and i think at least one of the things we re seeing in these polls is that s what the american people believe. candy crowley, great to see you tonight. members of the president s own party as we said a few moments ago are voicing opposition to the plan to send additional troops to afghanistan. california congressman jane harman is one of those taking issue with the increased troop levels. he is joins us now from los angeles. congresswoman. good evening. good to see you. if the troop increase were to come to a vote in the house right now, how would you vote on it? well, it s a moot question. if it were to come to a vote, i would vote no. but the president has already signed orders to send the troops in. what exactly congress will vote on and when we ll vote, we ll learn more about tonight. i don t know precisely what the president will say. let me be clear that in general, i support his new regional strategy. i especially think the incentives to get pakistan to become a full partner and to crack down on terror groups in pakistan that are destabilizing afghanistan, india, and us is a very worthy. i also support efforts to work around the karzai government in afghanistan. and to support both the military and civilian efforts at lower levels. what i oppose is a larger military footprint. i think that for two reasons, that doesn t make a lot of sense. one, it is a recruiting tool for the taliban to say we re becoming even bigger occupiers of afghanistan. but number two, it keeps the afghans dependent on our expertise and our logistics. and i think it s time to take the training wheels off and let a capable afghan force fight for its own country. it is time not to enlarge our military footprint. according to many military analysts, and they re almost in agreement about this, that there needs to be stability and security in afghanistan. they differ on how to get there. do you believe that there would be greater stability and security in afghanistan if the president were to draw down troops as opposed to put more in? well, i i think put mortgage in is the wrong direction. i think we do need to support the effort to reduce corruption in the afghan government. that s a key, and the president is focused on that. i think there is broad recognition that the karzai government operates at incredibly inept and corrupt levels, and that s what the work-around surging our resources at lower levels government and investing only in ministries that perform is all about. but i think that that s our first move. i then think once we once we increase training of afghan forces, yes, we should reduce our footprint, and the president will tell us than tonight. i don t know much about that. that news just leaked a couple hours ago. and i m looking forward to hearing him. i do think, and have i supported this that the president needs to articulate an exit strategy. we don t want to be long-term occupiers of afghanistan or iraq, which we are not going to be, or other countries in the world. congresswoman jane harman, good to speak to you tonight. thanks for coming in. thank you, john. coming up at 7:30, wolf blitzer and the rest of the best political team on television will continue our team coverage leading up to the president s speech in afghanistan. wolf, what can we expect? what we can expect that we re going to have all of our best correspondents and analyst ace saysing every line that the president has to say, because there are deep ramifications. in fact, let s walk over to three of them right now. gloria borger, christiane amanpour, and john king. what does the president most importantly need to do tonight? i think he needs to explain to the american people very clearly what it s in our own national security interest to make this kind of investment in afghanistan, and after he does that, he needs to explain to them that it is not an open-ended investment, that there is an end point to it. and that it will succeed. it s a tough job he s got ahead of him. he s going to say the troops are going to go in big numbers right now. but starting in july 2011, we re going to start bringing them back. so he is trying to get both sides of this. speaking to experts on the ground today, they said the last thing the region needs to hear is an exit strategy, because the thing that everyone wants to hear is that the united states is going to stay to finish the job. many people believe that it will take some two years of heavy war fighting to beat back the taliban, and then maybe another three years to consolidate and to enable the building, the development, to allow afghanistan to stand up on its own two feet. and look at the stage craft for tonight. we ve got a picture of the podium where he is going to be speaking, in the theater at ike hall at west point, named after dwight eisen hour. we re not going to see him surrounded by a lot of cadets and soldiers, though they will be in the audience. remember during iraq war, especially when political support dipped, by surrounding themselves, using the troops for political purposes. but the white house said he very much wanted to go to an army installation because it is the army that has paid the heaviest price of two, three, four deployments to iraq and afghanistan. and wolf, they re going to pay that price again. he has essentially accepted general mcchrystal s assessment of the situation on the ground, that it is deteriorating, that it is getting worse, and if he doesn t get more troops soon, it will continue to drift. the president is going to be telling the american people, but also the army families, those who serve and those who support them back here, you have these two or three more very tough years ahead and you will be deploying again and perhaps again. you ll be using the map to explain what is going on? we ll lay out the threat of afghanistan using the matt and lay out some of the political challenges for the president. one of the things we ll show is this is now president obama s war. yes, miss stwarks made in the bush administration, and he will make that case tonight that he is trying to end what he calls drift. but he runs the risk now, wolf, as he escalates this war that if there are casualties, this is a very risky business and a risky proposition, that he is the one that will be held accountable. he said he wanted to focus on afghanistan away from iraq, and that s what he is doing. yes. he called it a war of necessity. and i think that s exactly what you re going to hear this evening. his mission is going to remain the same, which is to dismantle and destroy and defeat al qaeda. and we ll hear him talk than tonight. we got more than a dozen of our analysts and correspondents standing by. we ll have full reaction to what the president is about to say, john. in the meantime, let s go back to you. looking forward to it, wolf. thank you so much. coming up, the decision to escalate has been made. now we ll ask military experts where in afghanistan the new troops will be sent to fight. announcer: in today s markets how can you get your investments heading in the right direction? 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casey wian tonight, casey, thank you so much. coming up, much more on the president s decision on afghanistan. is sending 30,000 more troops there a good idea? two foreign policy experts with extensive experience in the region will join me here, coming up next. we re now about 37 minutes away from president obama s announcement on a new strategy for the war in afghanistan. joining me now are two experts on the country. john naugle is president of the new center for american security. and a long-time member of the council on foreign relations. a former marine captain and resigned his position in protest over how the war is being handled. gentlemen, good to see you tonight. john, let s start with you, if we could. the president has made the decision. 30,000 more troops to afghanistan in the next six months. how would you best put those troops to use? if i were general mcchrystal, i would focus on the south initially. kandahar is the home base of the taliban. it s where the taliban began. but currently we don t have enough troops to clear and hold it. i would spread the rest of the troops across population centers in the south and in the east. but i d reserve at least 4 or 5,000 of them to work on training the afghan army and the afghan police. capable afghan security forces are going to enable an american exit strategy from afghanistan. some time not too many years in the future. is it we understand from a briefing there will be a brigade at least in the initial surge forces assigned to training afghan security forces. so it sounds, john, like they might have been listening to you, there. matthew, you re opposed to a troop increase there. also, i wanted to talk to you about this idea that general mcchrystal says if the u.s. were to draw down troops in afghanistan, there is a likelihood al qaeda would come back. the president seems to concur with that. but you disagree. why? i disagree. al qaeda is an organization that doesn t really exist as an organization anymore in the sense that we think of it. it s an ideological movement. it recruits individuals or small autonomous and independent cells worldwide. it exists on the internet. it does have leadership, but the leadership is primarily figurehead thousand. it uses the ideology driven across the internet, and it picks up people around the world. well need to attack al qaeda with intelligence and law enforcement focus. army combat brigades are not going to affect al qaeda. the 60,000 troops in afghanistan are not affecting al qaeda s operations. do you agree with that, john? i don t. i think that al qaeda does have an internet presence, but it also still has a physical presence. it s on the ground inside pakistan, which is the real key of the problem here. so much of what we re doing inside afghanistan is intended to prevent pakistan from sliding further down hill and to encourage pakistan to continue its efforts against al qaeda and the taliban on its side of the border. matthew, if not a troop surge, what would you do? what do you think the proper solution in afghanistan is? sure. you have to look at al qaeda as a different problem than looking at the civil war in afghanistan. with regards to the civil war in afghanistan, you need a political solution, a political settlement. this war has been going on for over 30 years. you need something to bring both sides of this conflict to the table. in 2001, we removed the party that was in power, the taliban, and replaced them with the northern alliance, which roughly represent the two different sides in the civil war. we never did anything to politically settle this conflict. i think we re making a mistake by labeling what is happening in afghanistan as insurgency and not as a civil welcome back, and that we need to drive for a political solution to end this. all right. we ll see what the president has to tonight. matthew hoh and to see you. thank you very much. coverage on president obama s speech on afghanistan continues in just a moment. stay with us. s a hospital where technology has a healing touch. there s a factory giving old industries new life. and there s a train that got a whole city moving again. somewhere in america, the toughest questions are answered every day. because somewhere in america, 69,000 people spend every day answering them. siemens. answers. eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee