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LEGAL VIEW WITH ASHLEIGH BANFIELD

Plan to Destroy ISIS in Iraq, Disrupt ISIS in Syria; Iran Says No to Aiding U.S. Fight Against ISIS; New Audio Containing Jihadist Code Words

Aired September 16, 2013 - 12:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Ashleigh Banfield. Welcome to "LEGAL VIEW."

The fight against ISIS is front and center on Capitol Hill this morning. Defense leaders for the United States saying that ISIS poses a threat to the U.S. and that they could be prepared in the future to recommend ground forces. Yes, boots on the ground. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin Dempsey, are testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Here's what Secretary Hagel said about the threat to the homeland.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHUCK HAGEL, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: While ISIL clearly poses an immediate threat to American citizens in Iraq and our interests in the Middle East, we also know that thousands of foreign fighters, including Europeans and more than 100 Americans, have traveled to Syria. With passports that give them relative freedom of movement, these fighters can exploit ISIL's safe haven to plan, coordinate and carry out attacks against the United States and Europe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: So the secretary went on to say that the intelligence community has not detected specific plotting against the U.S. General Dempsey detailed how the U.S. will help the Iraqi military.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEN. MARTIN DEMPSEY, CHAIRMAN, JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF: My view at this point is that this coalition is the appropriate way forward. I believe that will prove true. But if it fails to be true and if there are threats to the United States, then I, of course, would go back to the president and make a recommendation that may include the use of U.S. military ground forces.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: So big key to that discussion, I'm joined live now by Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr and chief national security correspondent Jim Sciutto. So, Barbara, I mean I've heard of mission creep in a year or so within

a campaign, but not within less than a week. And that sort of sounds like mission creep to be talking about boots on the ground?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think, you know, that what you're looking at here is a chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who very much wants to keep his options open, very much putting out there in public on the table that this thing can take a complete turn. And if he feels that there's a threat to the United States and that the appropriate military way to deal with it is to put combat boots on the ground, boots in combat -- U.S. troops in close combat in possibly Iraq, in possibly Syria, then he won't hesitate to at least go to the president, recommend it.

Later in the hearing, in fact, Dempsey said, and we had not heard this before, that the president has told him, the chairman, to come back to him, the president, on a case-by-case basis. If something develops and it looks like troops might be need, come to the president, make your case and that President Obama would make a decision about that.

The public language, Ashleigh, from the White House certainly has been no boots on the ground, no combat forces on the ground. But let's remember, you know, we're headed towards about 1,600 U.S. troops already on the ground in Iraq doing a variety of jobs.

BANFIELD: So, Jim Sciutto, what's the disconnect? Like I said, it's only been about a week, maybe not even, since the Obama administration effectively said no boots on the ground. Are they not talking, these two parties?

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, I don't think - I think they are talking. I think this really comes down to parsing the definition of combat. The administration, the president, his advisers repeating again today saying that the president has ruled out a combat role.

But what constitutes a combat role? Because General Dempsey was very specific about one instance, he gave a for instance of when he might ask for troops in a more forward position. He said, let's say that Iraqi forces were going to retake the Mosul Dam, a key piece of infrastructure. In that case, he said that he might put - or request that U.S. troops are put with those Iraqi troops in a role that's called close combat advisers. So instead of being at these operation centers that they have in Baghdad and Erbil, away from the front lines, they would be at the front lines. They wouldn't necessarily be there at machine gun positions or firing mortars, but they would be with Iraqi troops doing that and directing them.

You know, I've been in combat myself. I've been embedded with forces before. When you're that close to it, you're in combat no matter how you describe it. In fact, in the term that General Dempsey used, close combat advisers, there's that word, combat. The distinction that the administration appears to be making here is to say, well, they're not going to be combat forces. They're not going to be taking land back, taking positions, firing guns, weapons, et cetera. But, listen, in terms of risk, in terms of role, this puts them much closer to combat than we've heard before as a possibility. And as Barbara says, this is something that he may request from the president. But also as Barbara says, he says that the president said, listen, come back to me if you think you need that. That's also something we haven't heard.

BANFIELD: OK. So I feel almost as though listening to General Dempsey detail effectively what the strategy is now that we are part of the fine-tuning. I mean we're watching this happen in real time almost. As Dempsey said, the new mission is destroy ISIS or ISIL in Iraq but disrupt in Syria. That's different than last week, too, Barbara.

STARR: Well, it is another wrinkle that we hadn't heard before. And I think you're absolutely right, we are seeing the fine-tuning and there's a very good reason for that. Behind the scenes, we now know that U.S. reconnaissance aircraft, mainly unmanned, are flying over Syria now gathering intelligence, looking at targets, trying to see where ISIS is on the ground, trying to see how close they are to the Iraqi border, how they're moving back and forth, where their command centers are, where their leadership might be located. You're seeing the U.S. military begin to gather all this intelligence up, process it and continue to figure out the best way to deal with it on both sides of the border.

Syria is still some days off, everyone will agree that we have spoken to, before there's any decision about moving on the Syrian side of the border. On the Iraq side of the border, again, all of this leading to more fine-tuning as they get the bigger picture about what's going on and, most importantly, as they try to get other countries in the region to basically weigh in and also offer up aircraft troops, supplies, airfield access, everything. The very bottom line for the U.S. is that they do not want this to be a U.S.-only operation. They want help from other countries in the region.

BANFIELD: Sure. But those other countries have said, they're not committing ground forces unless the U.S. does first. So it's a tough call.

Barbara Starr, Jim Sciutto, thank you to both of you.

I want to go right into country right now. The U.S. has kept up its assault on ISIS from the air. In fact, an air strike hit targets near Baghdad on Monday, the closest strike to Iraq's capital since this campaign began. Other U.S. strikes have focused mostly up in the northern part of Iraq. It's where the Kurdish Peshmerga forces, tough, tough forces, are themselves facing the extremist threat head-on. It's also where our Anna Coren has been behind the front line there. She joins me live now from Erbil.

And I know, Anna, there's a bit of a delay between you and me, but with this news today, I want to get a sense from you what the Peshmerga forces has been saying about the resources that have been committed thus far from the Americans, the air power and those assistants, those advisers on the ground. I don't even know if they know yet that there may be a possibility of boots on the ground. But give me the feel for where you are.

ANNA COREN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Ashleigh, we spent the day with the Peshmerga here in northern Iraq. It was around a township called Hassan Shah (ph), which is about 30 kilometers east of Mosul. Their mission was to take back a strategic position, a bridge, that had been blown up by ISIS a month ago. Now, this connects the highway from Erbil here, the capital of Kurdistan, to Mosul. And as we know, Mosul is Iraq's second largest city. It's also an ISIS stronghold. That will be the next phase of this operation to take back, to liberate Mosul.

That is some way off. And perhaps that is where these boots on the ground are going to come into play because we were out there with the Peshmerga and, as you say, these are tough forces. But they don't have the equipment. They don't necessarily have the skills to take on ISIS. Yes, they were able to push them out of these villages and these townships, but you're talking about maybe, you know, 100 ISIS fighters. When you go to Mosul, you are potentially talking about thousands and in a density populated urban environment. So it's going to be a completely different situation on the ground.

Whereas out on the open plains, yes, those U.S. fighter jets were active the entire time we were there. We were there before dawn. They were already circling. They were still circling when we left this afternoon. So they were active the whole time, striking those enemy targets. But it's different out on the plains. They can hit those convoys. They can hit those armored vehicles.

We sat down with the Kurdish president, President Barzani, yesterday, and I put it to him about ground forces. Would you welcome foreign ground forces in the future? And he said, we haven't asked for them. We have the boots on the ground at the moment. But certainly we would welcome them and we would welcome their expertise, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: Boy, I'll bet. Anna Coren in the middle of it all. Thank you for that. And stay safe with your crew, please, in Iraq for us live.

The recordings of private phone calls between a convicted U.S. terrorist and friends of his overseas. Deadly friends of his overseas. Ahead, you're going to hear how a man believed to be the head of ISIS' media campaign talked with compatriots about waging jihad against America years before ISIS even existed. And wait till you hear the code words they used.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: A couple of key words to pay attention to here, believe it or not, peanut butter and jelly, culinary school and YMCA. Those are code words that a convicted terrorist in the United States used, according to court records, to communicate with his jihadist buddies overseas. Those conversations were caught on tape. And they happened years ago, before ISIS was even really the force that it is as you know now. But that jihadist on the phone, Ahmed Abousamra, is now believed to be a part of ISIS, possibly leading their social media campaign. Deb Feyerick has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Boston man wanted for questioning in connection with ISIS and its grisly propaganda spoke frequently with friends about waging jihad against America and U.S. troops. Ahmed Abousamra, pal to Tarek Mehanna and other often spoke in code according to court documents. "Culinary school" was code for training camps. "Peanut butter and jelly," code for jihad. Listen as Mehanna talks to another English speaker apparently in Somalia who tells him to come fight.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, right now, I'm in a culinary school and I just made peanut butter and jelly.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right. Right. (INAUDIBLE).

FEYERICK: The phone call recordings were introduced at Mehanna's terror trial. Other court records show Pakistan was referred to as "p- town." Yemen was the "YMCA." And the FBI was referred to as "Bob" or "Brian." Listen again to Mehanna asking his unidentified friend for an e-mail address.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have like an e-mail or something that you're used -- checking or just the phone?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, actually, I'm not even on the Internet. Trust me, there's no way I'm going to be on the Internet.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. OK.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No there's -- not that there isn't some here, but where I am right now, no.

FEYERICK: Prosecutors say Mehanna and suspected ISIS fighter Abousamra traveled to Yemen together in 2004, initially telling U.S. authorities they were going to check out schools. Prosecutors say they were unable to find a training camp in Yemen. However, Abousamra allegedly traveled to Fallujah in Iraq in February 2004 during U.S. fighting there. Two years later, Abousamra was studying computer science at the University of Massachusetts in Boston when FBI agents questioned him about his travel. He left weeks later and fled to Syria. His buddy, Tarek Mehanna, never traveled there, though his other friend encouraged him to wage jihad.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Come immediately.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But, look, look, I'm not getting nasty. I'm going to give you advice and I have to let you go real quick.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Come now.

FEYERICK: Deborah Feyerick, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BANFIELD: The Obama administration has stressed that a big part of its strategy to take on ISIS involves getting the help obviously of local fighters in Iraq and Syria. And that means arming and training what the president calls moderate Syrian rebels. Let that soak in. Moderate Syrian rebels.

With Syria in the middle of a bloody civil war, how on earth does anyone determine who is moderate and, by the way, what does it take to be moderate these days?

Here's what Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said about that this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HAGEL: DOD will work closely with the State Department, the intelligence community and our partners in the region to screen and vet the forces we train and equip.

We will monitor them closely to ensure that weapons do not fall into the hands of radical elements of the opposition, ISIL, the Syrian regime or other extremist groups.

There will always be risks. There will always be risks in a program like this. But we believe that risk is justified by the imperative of destroying ISIL, and the necessity of having capable partners on the ground in Syria.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: The House is expected to vote on aiding Syrian rebels tomorrow.

I'm joined now by CNN military analyst Colonel Rick Francona. So I don't know where to begin. You and I have had countless conversations about who these people are, how on Earth one vets them in the middle of a situation where we can't even put boots on the ground and only have a moderate number of advisers.

And now we're hearing that the mission's even changed. At this point, we're hearing from General Dempsey that the mission is to destroy ISIS in Iraq but only disrupt it in Syria.

This is a bit of a game change?

FRANCONA: It is a game change, but I think it's reality setting in. It's that there's no easy way to do this in Syria.

Iraq, it makes sense. We've got 300,000 fighters between the Peshmerga and the Iraqi army. You combine that with American airpower, certainly they're going to have the capability to stop and then roll up what ISIS has done in Iraq.

Once they get back into Syria, however, there's no boots on the ground. And if we're relying on the Free Syrian Army to be our boots on the ground, I think we're making a miscalculation.

The commander of the Free Syrian Army said yesterday he's not interested in a coalition -- the coalition. He doesn't want to participate with the United States because he's not interested in fighting ISIS. He's interested in fighting the Syrian regime.

BANFIELD: Has America called him, by the way? If he's not interested in aligning with us and our entire strategy is apparently arming him and training his forces --

FRANCONA: It seems like we're not listening, because he's said, I'm not interested in this, but we're pressing ahead with plans to train them, setting up a training program in Saudi Arabia for them.

BANFIELD: Why telegraph all this? All I keep thinking is, back in 2001, America went after al Qaeda in Iraq and chased them through the white mountains and stopped at the Pakistan border effectively.

And here we are, 2014, and they're still there, and it's still a problem. Isn't this kind of the same? We're going to be chasing them now and all their heavy artillery and all their special goods that they want to protect and their people into Syria where we will only be disrupting them?

FRANCONA: We're allowing them to set up a sanctuary, using that border out there, which ISIS doesn't recognize, but we do. And so they're going to move anything that's high value across that border.

They know that if they get pushed back into Syria, right now, they don't believe that there'll be anything they have to contend with anything except air strikes, but those air strikes will not be as effective.

BANFIELD: Colonel, why was this said in a public hearing? Why are we telegraphing these maneuvers and these strategies to ISIS?

I get it that cable news is bananas over this conversation, and congressmen are freaking out. But there are some things perhaps better left unsaid?

FRANCONA: Yeah. I would have preferred, as we had this conversation last Wednesday when the president made his remarks that he was going to bomb Syria sometime in the future, most military people would have preferred that he said something like, and last night we began operations in Syria.

So ISIS is not stupid. There's a lot of former military people in ISIS. They know how this works. They know how we operate. They watched us do it for a decade. So they know what's coming and they're getting ready for it.

BANFIELD: All right, well, to be continued. Colonel Francona, thank you for that.

As the United States leads a coalition against ISIS, one key player in the region, big important player, nowhere near the table. That's Iran.

Could that country be a spoiler? Could that country be an ally? Is either one possible?

Just ahead, a look at why Iran's goals are at odds with America when it comes to ISIS, even though they hate ISIS just as much.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: This is some critical information. As we've been discussing the possibility of American air strikes possibly inside Syria, there's some news today that ISIS inside Syria has some pretty good anti- aircraft equipment, effectively the Islamic State, ISIS, saying that they've shot down a Syrian military fighter jet.

According to the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, that plane was shot down while conducting air strikes on that group's stronghold of Raqqa. That is up in the northeastern part of Syria.

So, critical information, because up until now, we have known that ISIS had this kind of heavy artillery equipment. They have taken over air bases inside Iraq and Syria as well, now this report perhaps being the first time we're hearing that they have actually been successful in shooting down an aircraft, this as Americans have said that we'll consider air strikes inside Syria.

And in the fight against ISIS, one question that keeps coming up is what is going to be the role of Iran, if any? The leader of Iraq's Kurdistan region said he would welcome any help from Iran, and he thinks Iran and the United States should set aside their differences to fight ISIS, despite how vast they are.

That is certainly a complicated task. Iran was not any part of the international conference in Paris yesterday. On Friday, Secretary Kerry said this. "It would not be appropriate given the many other issues that are on the table with respect to their engagement in Syria and elsewhere."

But Secretary Kerry also said yesterday it doesn't mean that the United States won't talk to Iran about Iraq and Syria.

Listen to what Iran's ayatollah, however, said about that just after he left the hospital after having prostate surgery. He said, "During the past two, three days, I had a source of entertainment, which was listening to the statements of the Americans on the issue of ISIS and fighting against it. They made absurd, hollow and biased statements," end quote.

I'm joined now by Fareed Zakaria, host of CNN's "FAREED ZAKARIA GPS," and perhaps one of the best sources on trying to sort this out, if that task is possible.

Iran does not like ISIS on its western border. It has been fighting against ISIS, the town of Amerly was liberated by Iranian-backed militias, Shiite militias.

And yet when it comes to ISIS in Syria, it doesn't want to have any part of this. Can you help to explain somewhat?

FAREED ZAKARIA, CNN HOST, "FAREED ZAKARIA GPS": Well, you know what's happening is, on both sides, Iran and the U.S., what you're seeing is people worried that because the United States and Iran have a common enemy, they might become friends.

So you notice the reason Secretary Kerry had to issue that statement that you read was because the Saudis and the Gulf states, the UAE said, you can't in any way seem to be supporting Iran, even though they're against ISIS, so Secretary Kerry had to draw that line.

In Iran, there are forces like the Revolutionary Guard, parts of Iran, Iranian society probably, Hezbollah, saying, please make sure you don't suddenly find yourself in an alliance with the U.S.

The most interesting piece of this is that the person most strenuously and consistently objecting is the supreme leader, which is not a good sign. I think what you read maybe was a statement, but mostly what he's been doing, interestingly, has been tweeting.

He has been nonstop tweeting for the last two weeks, almost every tweet has been some ridiculing of the U.S. or some nasty statement about the United States and its evil motives. So that's a sign that they're as worried as the United States is.

BANFIELD: Is it window dressing? Is the ayatollah saying -- is he truly convinced that America is allying with Saudi Arabia and the UAE and other Gulf states, his enemies, in order to use the ISIS as an excuse, to use the battle against ISIS as an excuse to really be at war with Iran and take out Assad and take out his pipeline to the Mediterranean? Does he really believe that, or is just what they're telling their people?

ZAKARIA: You're sort of mind-reading him, because that seems to be what he's suggesting. In one of his tweets, he said, they're trying to turn Iraq and Syria into Pakistan, a country where they can go in and bomb indiscriminately.

BANFIELD: A puppet state.

BANFIELD: Exactly, which is of course not true, Pakistan.

So why is he doing this? It may be that it's cover for a certain amount of tacit cooperation, that he's trying to maintain his anti- American base and his anti-American credentials.

It may also be -- and I've been wondering about this, because this is all very recent. I'm trying to figure it out. It may be that the nuclear talks are not going well, and the Iranians know this is not going to happen. And they're trying to explain why, that the United States is evil, hates Iran, would never -- there's something interesting going on here.

This is not the tweets of a leader trying to prepare his population for some kind of deal with the U.S. on either the nuclear front or on something like this, so it looks like bad news. And you're right to pick up on it. It's really interesting.

BANFIELD: I just keep wondering if there's actually secret talks. I've always wondered and I continue to wonder, especially when I saw what happened at Amerly, but I just wonder if it's good to say it for the local population, it's good to say it while you're actually having backdoor meetings?

But can you come another day? We'll talk about that.

ZAKARIA: Be delighted.

BANFIELD: Any day, you're always welcome. Fareed Zakaria, thank you.

ZAKARIA: A pleasure.

BANFIELD: This hour, President Obama is heading to Atlanta and the Centers for Disease Control. He's going to get a briefing on the worst Ebola epidemic in the history of the world.

Ahead, how United States troops are being committed to help fight that deadly disease before it becomes a problem outside of west Africa, too.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)