Larry Johnson on CBS and Larry King Live [MORE Video Updates] * Open Thread
By Bronwyn's Harbor on October 30, 2010 at 12:05 AM in Current Affairs
SAT. P.M. UPDATE: THE CNN VIDEOs, parts 1, 2 and 3 are up, right here, and are also posted at our YouTube channel, noquarterusa.
NOTE: The other two videos (Parts 2 and 3) are posted below the fold, above the CBS Evening News video.
SAT. A.M. UPDATE: THE TRANSCRIPT FOR CNN APPEARANCE IS NOW BELOW THE FOLD. Don’t miss it, especially the “exchange” between Larry Johnson and Fran Townsend. (No video yet.)
Here are parts 2 and 3 of Larry Johnson’s appearance on Larry King Live on Friday, October 30, 2010. You won’t want to miss the mini-fireworks between Larry and Fran Townsend. I loved it.
PART TWO:
PART THREE:
And here’s the video of Larry Johnson on Friday night’s CBS Evening News:
Older post: Catch Larry Johnson on CNN’s Larry King Live tonight at 9 p.m. ET. Larry, a counterterrorism expert of long standing, will discuss today’s brouhaha over the terrorism threats.
Larry was also interviewed by CBS News today, so you may see a clip of that interview on the CBS Evening News. (This is also an OPEN THREAD.)
We hope to have video of Larry’s appearances later.
I made this an open thread in case I don’t have time to do the usual open thread post tonight. Feeling a bit under the weather, but don’t want you all to miss your nightly open thread fix! ha! Hugs to all of you!
UPDATE: Here is the transcript of Larry on Larry King Live last night. It’s fascinating to read through. I’ve highlighted the section where Larry and Fran Townsend disagree.
KING: We’re back. Fran Townsend is CNN national security contributor. She served as homeland security adviser to president George W. Bush. Larry Johnson, a former analyst with the CIA. He served in the U.S. State Department’s Office of Counterterrorism. Peter Bergen, CNN national security analyst, is a fellow at the New America Foundation and the Center on Law and Security at NYU School of Law and is the author of “The Osama bin Laden I Know.” And Mohammed Jamjoom, CNN international correspondent, now based in Baghdad.
But first let’s check in first with CNN’s Rima Maktabi in Dubai. Dubai, of course, is one of the two places that a USA-bound packaged originated coming from Yemen. What’s the latest from there, Rima?
RIMA MAKTABI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Larry, Emirati officials confirmed here earlier that there was no shipment coming from Yemen towards the U.S. through Dubai on Emirates Airlines flight EK-201, which was escorted by the fighters — U.S. fighters in the U.S. However, a suspicious shipment or package originating from Yemen was discovered in Dubai earlier tonight, and it was found at a FedEx cargo aircraft.
The aviation officials said that this suspicious package has been sent to the lab to discover what’s in this package. However, this happened many hours ago, but so far, there’s not one statement that says what they found in this package. As we know, it’s Friday, the beginning of the weekend. Now it’s the morning of Saturday. It’s, like, 5:00 AM in the morning, nearly 5:30, and there were no officials that gave statements. Usually in such circumstances, Emirati officials don’t give statements to any media outlet. They would stick to the official news agency. And this is how we’ll be able to know about all of this. On the other hand, Emirates Airlines said — we spoke to an official who wanted to remain anonymous. He said that all cargo bound for the U.S. on Emirates flights is rescreened in Dubai, in accordance with U.S. procedures — Larry.
KING: All right. Thank you. Thank you, Rima. Excellent report on top of the scene in Dubai.
Now, let’s go to our panel. Remain with us the rest of the way.
Fran, what’s your read on all this?
FRAN TOWNSEND, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CONTRIBUTOR: Well, Larry, you know, look, I think what Tom Ridge is saying is right. This is a good news story in terms of getting information from our Saudi allies and acting on it quickly. Clearly, the intelligence was good enough to give us the tracking numbers to find these packages.
What we haven’t mentioned, though, and I think it’s worth pointing to is for the billions of dollars we’ve spent in security measures post- 9/11, our screening procedures we still had to rely on foreign allies. Why isn’t we weren’t able to se the vulnerability and prevent this from getting into the cargo system where it could have posed a threat to the United States? And I suspect that will be a subject of congressional hearings and oversight after this is over.
KING: Larry, Fran said we — the “we” is she talking about UPS or FedEx or what?
LARRY JOHNSON, FORMER CIA ANALYST: U.S. government. Larry, 22 years ago in December of 1988, Pan Am 103 was blown up with a bomb in checked luggage. We knew even before that that there was that kind of vulnerability. So, how long did it take to get to a report where we required checked luggage to be interrogated to see if it had a bomb on board? It was after 9/11. So, it went over 14 years.
We’ve also known that cargo has been a vulnerability for more than 22 years.
Larry, we were able to put a man on the moon after John F. Kennedy announced it in 1961. We got it done in eight years. Here we are 22 years later, and we still do not have a — 96 percent of the cargo that comes from overseas is not screened. It’s not checked.
It was only in August of this last year that the congressional office GAO office identified that we finally have 100 percent screening on domestic cargo and even then, when you get in, when you penetrate that, it’s not using 100 percent of the most effective technology.
So, really this has been — you know, this is not an indictment of any one party or the other. Both Democrats and Republicans have failed at this. We’ve got 22 years of it. And we’re going to wait until we get something killed before we decide to do something.
KING: All right. Peter, are we supposed to have some American officials posted at every place cargo is shipped that’s coming here. Is that the purpose here?
PETER BERGEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: I mean, I think that would be pretty prohibitively expensive. I mean, you know, when we look at cargo that’s shipped in ships, which is (INAUDIBLE) analogies, will be, few of it — the small amounts of it are checked, but typically, if something’s coming from Yemen or Pakistan or a country of concern, then it is checked.
So, you know, you can have virtually 100 percent check even if you only look at relatively small number of countries, because typically, you know, people aren’t trying to put bombs into cargo let’s say in Germany. You know, it turns out of places like Yemen or perhaps Pakistan and other countries that you really need to focus on.
So, I mean, Larry is right to raise the issue that not enough is being done, but I think one way to do it and with constraints that we have in terms of money and resources, is to say — well, here are the country where we will examine very carefully.
And the other point that’s very important is, whoever made these bombs and also the bomb that was, you know, attempted to bring down Northwest flight 253 and nearly killed the Saudi interior minister, deputy interior minister several months before the 253 flight, that bomb maker is still out there. So, it’s not just the 13 packages that are floating around. It’s also the fact that this guy is obviously quite skilled and will continue to do this until he’s either captured or killed.
KING: We’ll ask Mohammed Jamjoom what they are saying about this in Iraq when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KING: Our CNN international correspondent member of the panel, Mohammed Jamjoom. He is in Iraq, but we understand from Mohammed, he was recently in Yemen.
What can you tell us about all of this?
MOHAMMED JAMJOOM, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Larry, I’ve been to Yemen twice this year and I can tell you the shift in tone in what officials are saying there about al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula between January when I was there and between September and October when I was there is startling. I mean, Yemeni officials that I spoke with there are expressing grave concern there now. Whereas, before, they were saying, hey, this is a problem, but we’re getting it under control.
And the last month and a half, you’ve had several senior level government officials who have spoken to us, who have said to us, we need help. We need help to get this under control. If we don’t, Yemen could become a failed state.
If Yemen does become a failed state, that helps nobody. It doesn’t help Yemen. It doesn’t help Saudi Arabia or other regional neighbors. It certainly doesn’t help the international community.
What we’ve seen since 2009 when Yemen and al Qaeda — when al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula first formed in Yemen, we’ve seen this group become resurgent. They have launched more attacks. They’ve become bolder.
They are announcing now to Yemenis and to the rest of the world that they are actively changing tactics. They have learned from al Qaeda in Iraq and other places in the Middle East. It’s a new kind of insurgency. They’re going directly after the government there. They’re also continuing to go after foreign targets there as we’ve seen this past month.
Now, in the last month, we’ve seen at least three different terror raids and counter-terror measures and sweeps that are going on in different provinces of Yemen.
KING: Yes.
JAMJOOM: But the fact of the matter is: Yemeni al Qaeda keeps retaliating. They seem to be growing stronger and the government is quite concerned — Larry.
KING: Fran, as we discussed with Tom Ridge, there’s never going to be a winning day on the war on terrorism and the good guys are always on the defense, aren’t they?
TOWNSEND: That’s exactly right, Larry. I mean, what you have to do is keep up a persistent effort against these guys and try to gain a better understanding. And it’s always evolving you’re understanding about what are they going to try and use as root against us. It’s very hard, because you’ve heard it said before, they only have to get right once and government officials have to be right every day. And so, it’s a daunting, daunting challenge.
But you’re exactly right, Larry. There’s going to never be a winning day, because this doesn’t go away.
KING: So, Larry, what — it seems kind of — I don’t want to use the word, well, I’ll use it — hopeless. Is it hopeless?
JOHNSON: No. Actually, I sort of disagree with Fran to this extent. Both the Bush administration and the Obama administration have been effective in capturing and killing a number of terrorists. And you don’t — in fact, I offer this as further evidence that their capability has deteriorated. Yes, they have the desire in al Qaeda in Arabian Peninsula to attack us.
But we look at what happened with Abdulmutallab, the underwear pants bomber. The device he wore, number one, it was not sufficient to bring down the plane. It showed me that they didn’t know what they were doing, because if they knew what they were doing, he would have had a different amount of explosive on him — number one.
Then we see the guy in New York City that tried to blow up his truck. He didn’t even understand that what he had and how he assembled it wouldn’t be even work.
So, what I’m seeing is not the kind of sophistication that we saw with, say, Ramzi Yousef, the first bomber of the World Trade Center. We’re seeing sort of a second and third tier effort. What that means is we need to continue this effort to capture and kill these guys. And as you chase them and deteriorate their ability, yes, they’re going to try to hurt us, but they don’t have the capability to project force, sustain operations that we saw, say, 10 years ago.
So, I think we do need to take some credit that both the Bush administration and Obama administration are being effective in this, and we don’t take our boot off the throat of these guys.
KING: That’s encouraging. And we’ll be right back with more.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We will continue to pursue additional protective measures for as long as it takes to ensure the safety and security of our citizens. I have also directed that we spare no effort in investigating the origins of these suspicious packages and their connection to any additional terrorist plotting.
Although we are still pursuing all of the facts, we do know that the packages originated in Yemen. We also know that al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, a terrorist group based in Yemen, continues to plan attacks against our homeland, our citizens, and our friends and allies.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: Peter Bergen, what do you make of target synagogues in Chicago?
BERGEN: Well, if we take it as a matter of fact that Anwar al- Awlaki, an American citizen, is playing key operational role in this group, he would be not unaware of the fact that the president comes, he hails from Chicago, and he also would not be — you know, these guys were rabid anti-Semites.
And synagogues, we’ve seen, you know, al Qaeda has tried to attack and succeeded in attacking synagogues in Tunisia, in Morocco, in Istanbul. In the years since 9/11, they’ve blown up an Israeli hotel in Mumbai. In Kenya, they’ve tried to bring down an Israeli charter jet with surface to air missile, also in Mumbai and Kenya. So, you know, this is very much part of their modus operandi.
I mention that attempt to bring down the Israeli passenger jet with the surface to air missiles, raises an issue that relates to what Larry was talking about earlier. One thing that no country really has done except Israel is retrofit or fit its commercial jets with measures against surface-to-air missiles.
And bringing down a commercial jet with surface to air missile is not a “Chicken Little” scenario. It’s something that al Qaeda has tried. It is something that they have access to these weapons. Obviously, though, if they manage to succeed in doing that anywhere in the world, that would be really transformational and then just as we reinforced cockpit doors after 9/11, every passenger jet in the world would have to be fitted up with these measures which would be very expensive but it’s a sort of thing that only happens after the event and not before, unfortunately — human nature being what it is.
KING: Mohammed, U.S. officials believe al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, AQAP, is behind this. Why?
JAMJOOM: Well, this just bares all the hallmarks, Larry, of an al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula kind of attack. I mean, they are doing more and more bold attacks.
And let me try to set the scene a little bit about Yemen. Yemen is a very poor country. It’s the poorest in the Middle East. It has very porous borders.
They’ve got several different conflicts going on right now. You don’t just have a growing al Qaeda problem. You have a rebellion that keeps going up in the north. You have a separatist movement that’s going on in the south. You have deep poverty.
This is country that may run out of water in the next five to 10 years.
All of the conditions are there for it to really be a magnet for militants. They can come there. They can operate really at will. They have done so.
And, you know, Yemen’s government is a very weak central government. They don’t really operate that much outside of the capital, outside of Sana’a.
You know, Ali Abdullah Saleh, he’s the president there. He’s been the president for over 30 years. He’s done that because he’s been able to maneuver tribal affiliations. He’s been able to get loyalty of the tribes.
The Yemeni government depends on that when they’re outside of the capital city. But because they are so beholden to the tribes to remain in power, they also have to be very careful in how they go after al Qaeda and how they carry out attacks in these mountainous, rugged regions outside of the capital, because if they anger those tribes and those sheiks and all those people in those different townships, then they have an even bigger problem on their hands — Larry.
KING: And we’ll have more after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KING: Fran Townsend, Larry Johnson seems to think that these terrorists are getting worse. We’ll ask you about that.
But, first, let’s check in with Anderson Cooper and what’s happening on “A.C. 360″ at the top of the hour — Anderson.
ANDERSON COOPER, HOST, “A.C. 360″: Larry, I have some interesting information coming in. We continue the breaking news, getting some new information about those two packages that were known to contain explosives. We know that they’ve been found. There are still more out there apparently, more being tracked — 13 that we know of right now being looked for. We don’t know if there are explosives in there but they are being searched for.
The question, of course, is: where are they? We’ll have the latest on that.
We’ll also have the intel behind the intercept and where the explosives were discovered, why fighter jets were scrambled to escort a 777 into New York’s JFK airport today.
Also, on another subject, Dr. Phil joins us, firing back with strong words for Clint McCance, the Arkansas school board official who posted gay slurs on Facebook and then apologize on this program last night and resigned. The question is: does Dr. Phil think the apology was real? He doesn’t mince words about that tonight. It’s our big “360″ interview.
We’ll have those stories and the question: Is McDonald’s telling its employees to vote Republican? Details on that story, Larry, at the top of the hour.
[EXCHANGE BETWEEN TOWNSEND AND JOHNSON HERE.
KING: That’s 10:00 Eastern, 7:00 Pacific with Anderson Cooper.
All right. Fran, Larry Johnson seems to hint that these people are not getting smarter.
TOWNSEND: Well, look, Larry, there is something to be said for this. The attacks that they are attempting are much smaller. But I don’t take the sort of comfort that Larry Johnson suggested. First of all, the underwear bomber — PETN, if properly detonated, could have caused a huge problem on that plane and may in fact — it is not clear to me that it wouldn’t have blown a hole in the fuselage particularly given where he was sitting.
(CROSSTALK)
TOWNSEND: Larry, I disagree with you. Let me finish.
(CROSSTALK)
KING: Larry, let her finish. Larry, let her finish.
JOHNSON: OK.
TOWNSEND: The second thing is: the Times Square bomber, I met with a senior NYPD official just this week who was explaining to me, it was actually, he clearly had been trained. It was constructed properly. What happened was that, at the last minute, he swapped out two of the elements to this thing for lower grade materials and that’s why it didn’t detonate. And frankly, if he had not swapped that out and had constructed it correctly, as they’ve said, he would have killed people.
And so, look, the good news is: these attacks are smaller. They have not been able to successfully execute these attacks and that does indicate we’re having some success. But they’re no less persistent and they’re still coming at us and they’re still coming at us at a greater pace.
And so, I think we need to continue to take this actually quite seriously.
KING: Larry?
JOHNSON: My point on the explosives is, 80 grams will not bring the plane down. And we know that because of what happened with Pan Am 103. The scientific study was done. There’s a certain amount of explosive that was determined would bring the plane down, and it’s that level of explosive that is used in the explosive detection machines for checked baggage.
So, it’s not a matter of opinion. It’s a matter of scientific fact and physics. Eighty grams, yes, it would have caused him to have sort of the ultimate circumcision, that’s true. And it might damage some of the people around him, and I certainly would not want to be sitting next to him when it went off. But that said, it was not sufficient size to bring down the plane to cause a catastrophic decompression.
My point is: the fact that he didn’t understand that is some good news. And the fact that this guy in New York City swaps out materials without understanding that you don’t do that if you know what you’re doing.
So, I think we’re still left with the reality that fortunately, we got some second and third tier guys out there who have first tier dreams. They’ve got big dreams, big plans, but thank God they haven’t proven to be smart enough to do it and I hope they keep getting stupider. That’s my desire.
KING: And we’ll be back with more right after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KING: Peter Bergen, you interviewed Osama bin Laden — do you think he’s got any part in this?
BERGEN: Well, ideologically, sure, because, I mean — you know, the U.S. military has commander’s intent. Petraeus doesn’t have to tell every soldier in Afghanistan what to do, they kind of get the central mission is defeating the Taliban and bin Laden is very adept at putting a larger strategic vision which is taken out by people all over the world, some even people who have never met anybody in al Qaeda.
So, from an ideological point of view, he’s got a lot to do with this. And al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula doesn’t have any links with al Qaeda central operationally now is acting exactly as bin Laden would like them to act, which is really a form of great success, as far as he’s concerned.
KING: Mohammed, from your vantage point, are you — do you find any optimism at all? JAMJOOM: Well, Larry, I can tell you that the conditions on the ground in Yemen have gotten a lot worse, frankly. I mean, the country’s facing so many problems. And as I mentioned before, officials now are expressing a level of concern that they weren’t just months ago.
And, you know, that really is concerning for regional neighbors, for the international community as well. And it’s one of the reasons you’re seeing a stepped up presence as well as far as the U.S. and the U.K. when it comes to counter-terror training.
Now, one of the interesting things that happened when I was there, we had an interview with the head of the counter-terror forces, General Yahya Saleh. And he acknowledged for the first time to us that the U.S. and the U.K. had been involved with Yemeni security forces in airstrikes that were happening in Yemen. That has — that has been a very, very sensitive issue. And up until the past month, the Yemeni government was really denying that, the U.S. wasn’t commenting.
So the fact the Yemenis aren’t just asking for help but they’re starting to acknowledge that how much help they’re getting and saying that the U.S. is even assisting in airstrikes, you know, that’s significant and that shows the level of concern there and it shows they’re trying to ask for as much help as possible and that they know that they need it — Larry.
KING: Fran Townsend, to this point, you were formerly in that seat and around the center of all this. Is Obama handling this well at this early juncture?
TOWNSEND: Look, you know, the only — the only thing I found curious was that the president himself — as you said earlier, Larry — became the briefer-in-chief. That was a little unusual.
But I will tell you, John Brennan, his counterterrorism and homeland security adviser, is doing exactly what I would have been doing. I think they’re coordinating it. They’re talking to their international allies.
They’re marshalling all the resources of the federal government. They are leading this effort to identify these other packages. They’ve worked the private sector quite well, UPS, FedEx, DHL, to stop the shipments until they get a handle on it.
I actually think they’ve done a very good job.
KING: Larry, I only have about 30 seconds. Do you share that view?
JOHNSON: Yes. I think they’re doing what they need to do. But we still have to recognize we’re relying upon the Saudis in this case to tip us off. That’s good news. But we shouldn’t have a system that’s basically like having your best friend or a friend give you a tip on what’s going on. Relying on intelligence is not a security system. It’s a good system for going to the casino or horse track to win but it’s not a good security system.
KING: Peter, is it going to get better before it gets worse?
BERGEN: I think, you know, Osama bin Laden and his team are on the losing side, on the wrong side of history and I think, you know, the fact is, that only 14 Americans have been killed by jihadist terrorist attacks since 9/11. Not something we could have predicted in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. Thanks to the efforts of people like Fran Townsend and others.
KING: Well said all of you. Thanks very, very much.
CNN, of course, right at the top of the scene.
– END OF TRANSCRIPT –
by Ronald Scott
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