Sunday, July 6, 2014

partial Face the nation: McCain, Graham, Durbin on Iraq and Israel


 

Face the Nation Transcripts July 6, 2014: McCain, Graham, Durbin


(CBS News) -- Below is a transcript from the July 6, 2014 edition of Face the Nation. Guests included Sen. John McCain, Sen. Lindsey Graham, Sen. Dick Durbin, Charlie D'Agata, Alex Ortiz, Sandra Brown, Jeffery Deaver, Lee Child, David Ignatius and Karin Slaughter.
Bob Schieffer: And today on FACE THE NATION: the man thought to be the mysterious head of the militant group ISIS makes a dramatic appearance in Iraq and urges followers to step up the fight, while, back home, the immigration crisis on our own border intensifies.
The militant group ISIS released this video and says it is Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi telling worshipers in Mosul that God has ordered him to lead the revolution there.
In Israel, the violence continues over the murders of three Israeli boys. We will get reports from the Mideast and we will hear from Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham just back from the region, and the Senate's number two Democrat Dick Durbin.
Then we will take a break from the news for our annual summer reading panel, as we bring together five authors who think truly evil thoughts, David Ignatius, whose new book is "The Director." Karin Slaughter's latest is "Cop Town." Sandra Brown's new book is "Mean Streak." And Jeffery Deaver, author of the Lincoln Rhyme series, and Lee Child, who writes the Jack Reacher series. They are contributors to new collection of stories, "FaceOff."
Sixty years of news because this is FACE THE NATION.
And good morning again on this Fourth of July weekend. We're going first to CBS News correspondent Charlie D'Agata in Baghdad -- Charlie.
CHARLIE D'AGATA, CBS NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Bob.
First of all, an Iraqi government spokesman that we spoke to said that this video is a fake. It's not al-Baghdadi, and Baghdadi was actually injured in fighting earlier this week, but pretty much everybody else says that it is.
And if so, it underlines a sort of confidence from ISIS militants to put their leader on full display in Mosul's largest mosque. This is a man with a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head. And he's standing there at the pulpit ordering Muslims to obey him and to join the fight here.
At the same time, ISIS militants sent out these pictures showing what they say is the destruction of something like 10 Shiite and Sunni mosques and shrines throughout territory they control in an effort to spark more sectarian violence here. SCHIEFFER: Charlie, is the Iraqi military doing any better on any front here?
D'AGATA: Bob, it really depends on who you speak to. If you talk to the Iraqis, they say that they are making progress, specifically just to the south of the northern city of Tikrit. They're stopping an ISIS offensive from getting any closer.
But at the same time, this week, Saudi Arabia had to bulk up their border, send 30,000 more troops there. They say that Iraqi forces had abandoned their post. The Iraqi government says that is not the case, but it shows you what kind of disarray we're in. And one thing that is clear that we repeatedly get from Iraqi sources is that they cannot take or retake territory currently under ISIS control without significant support from the United States.
SCHIEFFER: All right. Charlie D'Agata in Baghdad, thank you so much, Charlie.
And we turn now to the escalating violence in Israel.
CBS News man Alex Ortiz joins us from Tel Aviv -- Alex.
ALEX ORTIZ, CBS NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Bob.
Well, overnight, we have seen more Israeli airstrikes pounding the Gaza Strip after dozens of rockets were fired this weekend, that after the worst street violence East Jerusalem has seen, scenes reminiscent of the last Palestinian uprising more than a decade ago.
This latest round of violence was triggered by the back-and-forth kidnappings and murders of teenagers, first, three Israeli teens, then a Palestinian boy killed in a suspected revenge attack that set off violent street battles.
And, today, Israeli police have arrested suspects they think are responsible for the abduction and murder of that child. As the threat of further rioting looms, there have been efforts on the parts of authorities from both sides to step back from the brink and de- escalate.
But, Bob, the question is whether the statements of politicians can actually restrain the simmering anger in the streets. Today's calm is tenuous at best, but, beyond that, there's little effort to actually address the broader situation. With peace negotiations having broken down, all it would take is another casualty to unleash further bloodshed.
SCHIEFFER: Alex, there was also some shocking video of Israeli security forces beating a 15-year-old teenage boy who it turns out is an American citizen in Israel for summer vacation. I understand there is a new development on that story as well.
ORTIZ: That's right, Bob.
Well, that video has certainly increased tensions here. It shows Israeli soldiers repeatedly kicking and punching a bound Palestinian boy in the head. Now, he's just been released into the custody of his parents after they posted bail. He has to remain under house arrest for a week-and-a-half before they travel back to the United States.
SCHIEFFER: All right, Alex Ortiz, thank you very much, Alex.
And here in Washington, we're joined now by Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, who spent a lot of time there. They are also just back from Afghanistan. Let me start with this video we just saw of this child. State Department has put out a statement condemning the beating. They're demanding a full investigation. But is there anything the United States can do here, Senator McCain, to calm this situation?
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Well, this is one case where I do believe that our secretary of state should go to the region.
This is a role -- this is a place -- many places, I don't think we do play a role. In this case, I think that our secretary of state, Secretary Kerry, could go to the region and try to maybe do a little shuttle diplomacy.
This thing is in danger of spiraling out of control. There's a whole lot of reasons for it, but right now this is a time where the United States could play a constructive role.
SCHIEFFER: Senator Graham?
SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: Well, when you start killing children, you set yourself on a path that is hard to reverse.
And I think a good idea to try to engage and get the parties back into their corners. But one thing about Israel, they will try to investigate, I think, and bring somebody to justice. The other side is not very good at that.
SCHIEFFER: Let's get back to Iraq.
What is your take, Senators, on this new video? Is ISIS now trying to scare us? Is the threat to the United States from ISIS growing? I guess those are the two questions I would have to ask.
GRAHAM: Well, according to direction of national intelligence, the FBI director and most of our intelligence community, ISIS presents a direct threat to the homeland in Syria, now Iraq.
Americans and Western Europeans are going to help their cause. And they can flow back here. So, yes, they are a direct threat to the homeland and they're getting much stronger as we speak.
MCCAIN: I think it's important to recognize that we did have this situation stabilized, thanks to the surge, that we could have left a residual force behind which would have stabilized the situation.
This is not like a hurricane or an earthquake. This didn't have to happen. This is a failure of United States policy. And, by the way, there still is none that I can discern, either a policy or a strategy, to handle this situation.
This guy Baghdadi when he left Camp Bucca, a prison camp that we ran, he said, see you in New York. We now have the largest and richest enclave of radical terrorism in history that not only encompasses Iraq, as we know, but Iraq and Syria. So, we have to look at this as a Syria-Iraq problem. And one of the things that we need to do, of course we want Maliki to be replaced, but we got to stop ISIS first. And that means that we're going to have to do airstrikes. And we need to step up our support for the Free Syrian Army that is really right now getting very badly beaten.
SCHIEFFER: Just one thing, Senator. You say we left. The Iraqis would not sign the status of forces agreement, which would have put troops under our control, legal control. Are you just saying we didn't try hard enough to get that agreement?
(CROSSTALK)
MCCAIN: I'm saying that they were ready to sign. I'm saying that this administration, this president didn't want to stay, and we were there in Baghdad and in Irbil when they agreed to do it.
Now, we were actually there. And the president of the United States would never give them a number of troops and their mission that they wanted to leave behind. In the words of General Dempsey in testimony before the Armed Services Committee, it cascaded down to 3,000 people. The president campaigned he was going to get us out. And the president is going to make the same mistake in Afghanistan, unless he reverses that decision, that he made.
You're going to see the same result in Afghanistan. We just came back from there. They feel abandoned.
SCHIEFFER: Senator, do you agree with that?
GRAHAM: I think the big fear I have about what we're doing in Afghanistan is that we have great capability now.
We can watch a part of the world that is a safe haven for terrorists. Thirteen years after 9/11, there are more safe havens. There are more terrorist groups with more weapons and more capabilities than before 9/11, and we're having less capability, less presence.
If we get down to 1,000 troops by 2017, and dismantle our eyes and ears in Afghanistan and Pakistan, it will haunt us far worse than Iraq. The counterterrorism mission in Afghanistan is a front-line defense against -- for the homeland and it is being destroyed by this idea of leaving completely in 2017.
Mr. President, reverse your course. Keep our counterterrorism capabilities in effect to protect us here at home.
MCCAIN: We're not advocating combat troops.
We're advocating leaving sustaining capability to give them the capabilities that they don't have right now. By the way, one thing different from Iraq, there are two good men now who we hope will resolve their differences and we can get a president of Iraq. That will make a very big difference. Both Ghani and Abdullah are good people.
(CROSSTALK)
GRAHAM: If I could just add, what we're doing on the counterterrorism side, which protects the homeland from -- al Qaeda is not decimated. The groups operating in Pakistan and now Afghanistan are lethal. They're growing. We're about to shut down our ability to detect what they're up to and hit them before they hit us. This literally is insane, given the way the world is falling apart.
SCHIEFFER: Well, talk about this al-Baghdadi, if that is who we saw in the film. And do either of you have any doubt that that is who that is?
MCCAIN: I have no doubt.
And, remember, when he left Camp Bucca, the camp that we ran in Iraq, he said see you in New York. There's no doubt of what their ambitions are. They state it very clearly. They now have this large enclave. And they are succeeding.
And that message is going around not only around the Arab world, but they're recruiting Muslim extremists as we speak. They're very good at P.R.
SCHIEFFER: So, we should go after him directly, because he...
MCCAIN: There's $10 million on his head.
(LAUGHTER)
MCCAIN: Of course we could.
But that is not the point here. If Baghdadi goes, somebody else is going to take his place. It's the situation which we have allowed to deteriorate because we didn't leave troops behind, because of the decision on Syria. There's a long series of events that have taken place which have caused us to be where we are today. And it all goes back to American leadership.
SCHIEFFER: The president is now asking for half-a-billion dollars in aid for the rebels that are opposing Assad in Syria. Is that going to do it, or is that coming too late?
(CROSSTALK)
MCCAIN: Not unless we take out Assad's airstrike -- air -- air capability, these terrible barrel bombs, and also give them more weapons than we have them today.
Three years ago, fine, two years ago, when president overruled his entire national security team's recommendation to provide weapons to these people, but now, it's not enough, unfortunately.

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  1. Face the Nation Transcripts July 6, 2014: McCain, Graham, Durbin

    CBS News-11 hours ago
    There's a whole lot of reasons for it, but right now this is a time ..... a 14-century-old battle within the religion of the Muslim people? ..... And it's just scarily appropriate for the mess that we're all looking at in the Middle East now.

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