NEWS TRANSCRIPT from the United States Department of Defense
DoD News Briefing Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld Tuesday, December 11, 2001 - 11:30 a.m. EST
(Also participating was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Richard B. Myers)
Rumsfeld: Good morning. As you know, earlier this morning we held a memorial service outside the site of the crash,
saluting those who died in the attacks on America just three months ago today. The terrorists killed nearly 200 of our
colleagues and friends here at the Pentagon on September 11th, and thousands more in New York and Pennsylvania. And, of
course, those are not just numbers, they were our friends and sons and daughters and colleagues with names and faces,
and loved ones left behind.
One of those faces is here on the board, I believe. This is Samantha Lightbourn Allen: http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Dec2001/011211-D-6570C-001.jpg
. Mrs. Allen was working as an Army budget analyst on the south side of the Pentagon on September 11th when American
Airlines Flight 77 was flown into the building. She was a devoted public servant who had worked for the Army for many
years; also a mother of a boy and a girl. She gave her life for her country. Her family and friends and colleagues miss
her. And certainly we will not forget her.
This war is far from over. I have been reading an awful lot of things and seeing on television a great rush to declare
it a success and over. And I regret to say that it is not yet. We have yet to achieve our very clear objectives. We know
it will take time. It does not end with the fall of Kabul or Kunduz or even Kandahar, or even with the capture of some
of the individual Taliban and al Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan.
As the area under the Taliban and al Qaeda grows smaller, there is no question but that the danger to coalition forces
will be growing greater. Yes, there's no question but that some of the terrorists are on the run, and there also are
pockets of terrorists and Taliban that are being attacked as we speak. But we all know that a wounded animal can be
dangerous, and so too the Taliban and al Qaeda can hide in the mountains, they can hide in caves, and indeed, they can
hide in cities, and I know they are. They know these places well. They can escape across borders and regroup and then
plot to strike again, as they have promised to do.
So as the campaign proceeds, we can expect that more of the enemy forces will be detained. We want to bring more
transparency as to how we handle detainees in this war. We want to fashion a system that is as open as possible so that
the American people can have a good comfort level about the process itself.
Whether we hold these detainees in Afghanistan, as we may in some cases; put them aboard ship at sea, as we may in some
cases; return to their countries of origin for punishment, as we may in some cases; or whether we bring some back to the
United States, which we may well do, we will in every case attempt to do it in the right way. And we're working with
knowledgeable people in and out of government to make sure that we handle detainees properly and in a manner that
reflects our country's values, but also in a manner that reflects the seriousness of their situation and of our
situation.
General Myers.
Myers: Thank you, Mr. Secretary, and good morning to everybody.
I certainly agree with the secretary that it was a touching moment out there at the site this morning as we remember our
friends and loved ones that were lost there, and not just the ones that were lost, but the ones that are still
recuperating in hospitals, that have been badly injured. For me it's a reminder of why we've undertaken this global war
on terrorism.
We're now to the 66th day of the military portion of this war, and I think the coalition and anti-Taliban forces have
been effective in reducing the threat of al Qaeda and Taliban in Afghanistan. Pockets of resistance remain in various
parts of the country, but it appears that the last effective al Qaeda stronghold -- to be determined, but the last
effective one right now is in the Tora Bora area. Also, while Kandahar has fallen from Taliban control and the city is
calmer as fighting has decreased in the recent days, it's important to note that armed Taliban elements are still there
and occupy small portions of that city, so it's still an uncertain environment.
Our air operations yesterday were all in engagement zones supporting opposition group efforts in the Tora Bora area. We
also dropped leaflets in and around the Kandahar and Jalalabad regions and continued our Commando Solo broadcast
missions, as well.
Anticipating attempts by al Qaeda and Taliban leaders to flee Afghanistan, we continue to conduct interdiction efforts
to halt that -- their fleeing and try to seal off as much as possible and as many as possible potential avenues for
their escape.
The Marines of our Task Force 58 continue operations to block escape routes out of Kandahar, and our maritime operations
continue in the international waters in the North Arabian Sea.
We also continue to support international efforts to provide humanitarian relief to the Afghani people and to help
stabilize the country. Two C-17s yesterday dropped more than 34,000 humanitarian daily rations north of Kunduz, bringing
our total to date for rations delivered to more than 2,360,000.
As you know, the Friendship Bridge between Uzbekistan and Afghanistan is open, and yesterday relief supplies crossed the
bridge for the first time, for distribution by nongovernment organizations, nongovernmental organizations.
And finally, there are -- as everybody is well aware, there have been many press reports of surrender talks in the Tora
Bora area. We have no confirmation of this. And just to go on the record, our military mission remains to destroy the al
Qaeda and the Taliban networks. So our operation from the air and the ground will continue until our mission is
accomplished.
And with that, I think we're ready for questions.
Rumsfeld: Charlie, you were not here yesterday -- (laughter) -- when the minister of state for defense of Japan and I
had a press conference, and you left no instructions as to who I was to call on. (Laughter.) And I was at a loss and --
Q: I was busy writing on the war --
Rumsfeld: Okay. (Laughter.)
Sir?
Q: How about today?
Rumsfeld: You're up. (Laughter.)
Q: Thank you. Mr. Secretary, you've made clear, as you do often, that the war -- this war is far from over. There are
reports from Somalia that perhaps small numbers of U.S. liaison troops or perhaps agents from that other agency are in
Somalia, investigating the presence of terrorist training camps. Is that true? And might that be a precursor to another
front in this war on terrorism?
Rumsfeld: Well, I've seen those reports. I, needless to say, have nothing to report about that. And I would just say
that Somalia clearly is a country along with six, eight others that have been on a list as nations that have been
involved in terrorism over some period of time. But we've no judgments and have no -- nothing to announce with respect
to Somalia today.
Q: So you're not confirming or denying the presence, possibly, of a small number of U.S. troops? Or can you say whether
or not they are there?
Rumsfeld: As you know well, we do not deny or confirm things of that type.
If we start doing it, then anything we don't deny becomes truth, and by process of elimination, we've confirmed
something that we had no desire to confirm. So once we start down that road of saying no, that's not true; no, that's
not true; no, that's not true, the first time I say anything else, why, it's confirming that something's happened. So
you shouldn't -- one should not read anything at all into what I said.
Yes?
Q: Can you give us a sense, both of you, of what you think is happening at Tora Bora now, if you feel that the al Qaeda
has been driven from what has been described as a primary cave and tunnel complex? American troops apparently have now
walked this complex. So where does this particular battle stand with al Qaeda apparently in retreat on at least on
front?
Rumsfeld: Sure. We have a good sense of where it stands. We know that the area is mountainous. In between the mountains
are valleys. In most of the valleys and mountains there are caves and tunnels. And they vary in their size and
complexity, but they are numerous -- a lot of them. The Afghan opposition forces on the ground are pressing in an area
that is decreasing in size. They have moved forward. They have been counterattacked by al Qaeda forces, and held.
There are Pakistani forces on the Pakistan border that the president has assigned up there to attempt to close the
border so that al Qaeda and Taliban do not escape out of Afghanistan into Pakistan. That is a very difficult thing to
do. It is a porous border. It's a long border. It's a very complicated area to try to seal, and there's just simply no
way you can put a perfect cork in the bottle.
The attack is continuing, although it's night now, and I suspect it's eased off. It is clearly a major fight. The people
that are in there are fanatical in many respects, and the forces opposing them are determined. There are U.S. military
people on the ground in the area in various locations, assisting with supplies and assisting with air strikes and
assisting with other things.
Q: Are you interested in a negotiated settlement of some kind in these talks that are going on? Or what is it that you
are working for as an outcome in this battle?
Rumsfeld: As you understand, we're not in control of every aspect of this because the larger numbers of forces are the
Afghan forces themselves.
Our interest remains exactly the same. It is to capture or kill all the al Qaeda and prevent them from escaping into
other countries or other locations in Afghanistan where they can continue their terrorist activities. It is to capture
or kill the senior Taliban leadership. It is to disarm -- have the opposition forces disarm the remaining Taliban, and
then they will decide what will happen with the lower-level Taliban Afghan forces who live in that country and
undoubtedly will stay. I'm sure some will be punished, and some will go back and hide in the mountains or the cities,
and still others will become part of opposition forces. And at some point, they will no longer be called opposition
forces, as has been pointed out to me. But that's our goal, and to see that Afghanistan no longer is a country that
harbors terrorists.
Q: So no conditions, no -- or if there's going to be a surrender, it can't have any conditionality to it, it's just a
clean --
Rumsfeld: You know, I'm trying to think of a condition. Let's say that there's a condition that's acceptable to us --
I'm trying to think what it might be. A condition whereby civilians would be allowed to leave, or something like that.
So it is not comfortable for me, since I'm not there, I'm not on the ground, we're not in control of the discussion, to
be ruling things out arbitrarily that I can't quite imagine what they might be, but it's conceivable that there could be
some perfectly rational thing.
If you're suggesting amnesty, if you're suggesting that we let senior people go, if you're suggesting that we let them
stay armed or that they be left to go about their business, obviously not. That's just not acceptable.
Yeah?
Q: Mr. Secretary, what can you tell us about what the U.S. may or may not know about the whereabouts of senior Taliban
leadership or senior al Qaeda leadership today, if any of them have managed to escape? And since Pakistan seems the most
likely route out of Afghanistan for many of these leaders, what kind of assurances or agreements do we have with the
Pakistan government that they would do all they could to help bring in these leaders on the run?
Rumsfeld: Well, we take a look at the people we -- first of all, the list changes as we learn more. And there are
interrogations taking place, there's documentation being found and discovered and analyzed and translated, so that each
day we learn more and know more as more address books are found and phone books are found and computer hard drives are
found. As people have left areas, clearly our knowledge base is going up.
But we do have a set of names on a list that is being changed from time to time. In some instances people have been
killed. In still other instances they've been wounded. In still others we have reason to believe they might have escaped
to another country. In other cases we don't know where they are. In some cases we think we know where they are, and
we're trying to find them. But we don't announce where we think they might be because it would be unhelpful to us.
Q: But has the government of Pakistan made any kind of agreement --
Rumsfeld: They've been enormously cooperative. They've got a large number of battalions along that border. They have
been helpful in numerous respects. There's no --
Q: Have they pledged their cooperation in regard to rounding up any leaders that may try to escape through Pakistan?
Rumsfeld: I, as you know, try not to characterize precisely what other countries are doing, but -- except in a general
sense, it's safe to say that Pakistan has been very cooperative.
Yes?
Q: Mr. Secretary, in a similar vein, regarding the al Qaeda as opposed to the Taliban, has the flushing out of some of
these forces in the Tora Bora area, just in the last 24 hours, produced any kind of information or intelligence that has
shed any new light on bin Laden or their means of operating up there?
Rumsfeld: We literally see hundreds of scraps of information every day. The volume has not changed dramatically, except
insofar as, as we have gotten physical access to buildings, we have been able to get more things. Specifically in that
region at this moment, I would not be able to say that the level of knowledge has changed dramatically in the last 24
hours.
Yes?
Q: General Myers, are U.S. attack helicopters being used in that strike at Tora Bora? And are U.S. forces -- have they
been in any of those cave complexes at Tora Bora or Malawa yet?
Myers: As you know, we've used attack helicopters in the south with the Marines that are deployed south of Kandahar. To
the best of my knowledge, there have been none used in the cave area, but I could be wrong. But I don't think they have.
And as far as -- as the secretary said, there are literally thousands of caves, and I'm sure some of our forces have
been in some of those caves. Whether they're the relevant ones or not, I can't say at this point.
Q: If I could follow up, there is a reported cease-fire by the Eastern Alliance there as they negotiate this alleged
surrender. You say the airstrikes are continuing. Is there a cooperation or a coordination between the U.S. and the
Eastern Alliance as far as that goes?
Myers: I would -- I don't think I'd characterize it as a cease-fire. There are some valid military reasons to stop
fighting for a while before you resume, and that is probably what you're seeing. So I'd be very careful how you
characterize this. "Cease-fire" has a different connotation and --
Rumsfeld: I would add that the CINC is not enamored of cease-fire --
Myers: Not in his lexicon. (Scattered laughter.)
Rumsfeld: Yeah. General Franks is unambiguous with respect to his attitude about cease-fires.
Yes?
Q: Sir, moving to the discussion a moment ago about detainees, you initiated the comment that you, quote, "want a system
as open as possible." You're in the process, as you've told us several times, of developing a tribunal proposal. Is your
operating premise that these would not be held in secret, that they would be open to the public to watch, in some -- one
way or the other?
Rumsfeld: No, I don't have an operating premise that goes to that. And my guess is, it would be handled differently with
respect to different individuals, just as we know that various procedures historically have been handled differently
with different individuals. What we do try to do is take the early period to do -- engage in interrogation, with -- for
the intelligence-gathering purpose, as opposed to law enforcement purposes or anything like that, to find out everything
we can, so that we can protect the lives of Americans, both on the battlefield as well as here at home and our deployed
forces. And that is the first step that takes place.
Q: Sir, a follow-up, if I could, and a semi-follow-up. (Laughter.) Having -- if I get away with this -- (laughs) --
Rumsfeld: We'll have a vote -- (laughter) -- on how well it fits into that category.
Q: The question that has been raised about if the European nations, particularly Britain, would be the ones who ended up
with custody of an al Qaeda leader, Osama bin Laden or other, that there might be a problem with their turning him over
to the United States. Is --
Rumsfeld: There won't be.
Q: There will not be?
Rumsfeld: There will not be. Either a country will indicate that they will turn them over to us, quite apart from
whether or not their laws may be different with respect to the death penalty, or they will be positioned in places where
they're unlikely to come in contact with someone that we would like to have control over. (Scattered laughter.)
Yes?
Q: If I could just follow up --
(Cross talk.)
Rumsfeld: (Chuckles.)
Q: Talk about the possibility of taking the Taliban fighters on Navy ships or sending them back to their countries of
origin you mentioned.
Rumsfeld: Well, al Qaeda are, for the most part, the non-Afghan people. They would be the ones that would more likely go
back to their countries of origin. Taliban in large number are Afghans, and their country of origin is obviously
Afghanistan.
Q: Well what about the foreign Taliban, what will be done with them?
Rumsfeld: I think it's a definitional issue. Most of the foreigners are characterized and catalogued and grouped as al
Qaeda. The non-Afghan people in their -- the al Qaeda process tends to group them in clusters of organizations that they
call al Qaeda, not Taliban. So I guess maybe it's better not to use the words at all. But the people who don't live --
who are not from Afghanistan in some instances, conceivably, could be sent back to their countries of origin, if the
countries would like them and if the country had views that are not terribly different from ours about the fact that
what they've been engaged in is not a good thing for the world.
Q: Do the Marines hope to corral some of these down at Camp Rhino at all? Do you have a sense -- are they going to
actually apprehend any of the al Qaeda or Taliban fighters there?
Rumsfeld: We -- there are several ways it can happen. One way is that they can be kept where they're captured, or where
they surrender, for a period of interrogation. That could be anywhere. It could be with any one of the various
opposition forces, it could be with U.S. forces in control of them, I guess, is the proper word. Then they could be
moved to some other location that is more appropriate for managing the control over an enemy individual or group of
individuals. And that could be an opposition force headquarters, it could be Camp Rhino, which is about the only place
besides maybe Bagram where we have enough people that we could manage that ourselves without having it terribly
interfere with our other responsibilities.
Q: Mr. Secretary, to follow on that: How confident are you sending some of these fighters back to their home country of
origin that the justice system there will satisfy what we expect?
Rumsfeld: We wouldn't send them back if we didn't have a high degree of confidence.
Q: Mr. Secretary --
Q: Every country, you're satisfied, you're going to get that type level of --
Rumsfeld: No! We would only send them back to a country where we felt that the country had a similar attitude to ours
about the undesirability of people running around engaging in mass murder.
Q: And those countries are?
Rumsfeld: Well, time will tell, won't it?
Q: Mr. Secretary, the other day, the United States took the extraordinary step of dropping a daisy cutter somewhere up
in Tora Bora. You folks apparently had a pretty good idea of where someone you thought was. Have you found intelligence
to borne out (sic) your hunch?
Rumsfeld: Well, there are not a lot of those, so they don't use them frivolously. There's no question that when that was
used, I thought it was yesterday -- was it yesterday?
Q: (Two were ?)
Rumsfeld: Yeah.
Q: Sunday.
Rumsfeld: Day before?
Q: Sunday.
Q: Sunday.
Rumsfeld: Well, very recently. That they felt they had good reason to use it in that location.
Yes.
Myers: And --
Q: Mr. Secretary --
Myers: And I just -- let me just add, Mr. Secretary, it was effective. I mean, we've been on the ground and it had the
desired effect.
(Cross talk.)
Q: Which was what? What was the desired effect?
Q: Can you describe to us anecdotally what the --
Myers: The desired effect was to kill al Qaeda.
Q: What sort of results are you aware of? What did your people on the ground see?
Myers: Dead al Qaeda. (Laughter.)
(Cross talk.)
Q: Is there any way of --
Myers: No, I can't quantify for you, but --
(Cross talk.)
Q: (Inaudible) -- as well as outside the -- in the cave? It killed people out of the cave?
Myers: I don't want to go into the details. It has the desired effect. Let me just say that.
Q: Leadership? Do we know if it --
Rumsfeld: It takes time to sort out people, whether they're prisoners or they're dead. It -- you simply cannot believe
what you hear necessarily. It is perfectly possible that someone would want to be thought to be dead. In which case, you
would be advised that this is somebody that it may not be. And we're a little slow to jump to conclusions or to leap at
our -- everything we're told. We try to look at people and talk to other people and try to understand precisely what the
situation is. So it is not something that happens overnight. It takes time.
Myers: First reports are always difficult to sort out.
(Cross talk.)
Q: Do you know if any of these people killed were leaders? Do you know whether any of these people killed were al Qaeda
or Taliban leadership? You said you were going after them.
Rumsfeld: Any in that particular bomb?
Myers: I think it's going to take time.
Rumsfeld: I don't.
Yes.
Q: Mr. Secretary, Secretary of State Colin Powell stated today in London -- (inaudible) -- that this war is not going to
go beyond Afghanistan. May we hear your comments here? You are in charge of this war.
Rumsfeld: I don't believe he said that.
Yes.
Q: Mr. Secretary, last week, India Globe carried a report that Osama bin Laden said that he is responsible for the
attacks in New York and in Washington at the Pentagon. Now also he said, after his death, his jihad will continue and
U.S. big money on him and the big military did not play any big role and also they cannot catch him alive. Now, do you
believe today, sir, that he's still there, because according to many reports and a lot of -- many Pakistanis told me
that he had already fled the area of Afghanistan.
Rumsfeld: Just so we understand each other, everything you said was an unattributed report in some newspaper?
Q: It came from London, yes sir, Telegraph -- London Telegraph.
Rumsfeld: The London Telegraph.
Q: And also Wall Street --
Rumsfeld: And the Wall Street Journal. Huh. Well, there are so many reports about what he said or might have said or has
on tape or recorded or told somebody that to try to chase them around I think really is not fruitful on our part. There
is no question but that a tape exists on which he is seen to say things in -- not in English, I might add. Therefore I
am not one to say precisely what it was he said. There are various people trying to translate that and understand
precisely what was said and -- it is an amateur video. And whether or not it'll be released or when is a question for
some others than me. But if it is, it will be released with some translations that would show what various experts in
the language say he said, and then people can make their own judgments, one would think.
Yes.
Q: Any update on Taliban military leader Mullah Omar? Do you know where he is? And do you have any reason to believe
that either -- any of the actions either by commission or omission involving the Pashtun tribes led to him being able to
get away?
Rumsfeld: I have no reason to believe that's the case. I also wouldn't rule it out. But it's based on the assumption
that he's gotten away, and I don't even know that. So you've got a hypothetical buried in a hypothetical.
The fact of the matter is that until you have somebody, you don't have them. And we are looking very hard, and we are
looking at lots of scraps of information, and we intend to pursue him until we find him.
Q: Mr. Secretary --
Q: Would it be fair to say you have a general idea of where he is, or -- ?
Rumsfeld: Why would -- how can one know that until they have found him? One can't know that. And I would be misleading
you if I pretended --
There are people who will answer that question differently. They will say "Yes, we know, roughly in this area for this
person and roughly in that area for that person." And if you push a little bit on it, you'll find that, in fact, they
should be answering roughly like I do. (Laughter.)
Yes.
Q: (Off mike) -- President Bush is doing -- revisiting his 1999 Citadel speech on military transformation.
Rumsfeld: Exactly.
Q: I asked you this a couple weeks ago and you didn't have a lot of time, but can you give us a sense of what's playing
out over Afghanistan today by way of technology that's transformational, that's helping go after al Qaeda as they hide
in mountains, caves and in cities?
Rumsfeld: Well, as I answered it the last time you asked it -- (laughter) -- it remains a good question, and it remains
a subject that we are both thinking a lot about, and that we are talking about, and that things are being considered
with respect to the '03 budget about.
I'll give you a short answer, and then I'll yield to General Myers.
But it seems to me that one of the things -- two things I would cite that we, reasonable people, when this is over and
we look back, will comment on in one way or another. One is the value of unmanned aerial vehicles. And second, I would
say, is the connection, the linkages between UAVs, combat aircraft and bombers, and people on the ground, and the value
that is created by those linkages and the use of smart munitions creates a very powerful effect.
Myers: I would agree with what the secretary just said. And just to put a little finer point on the UAV piece, what it
has really allowed for us over there is persistence over the battlefield. We've talked about this a little bit. But it's
so unlike Vietnam, where you took snapshots of the battlefield, and you may do it at 10:00 in the morning, then you take
another snapshot at 2:00 in the afternoon, and at 4:00. And persistence really counts. So -- and it's not just as it
applies to UAV, in my mind, it might also apply to other systems, space systems, where you're still in kind of a
reconnaissance mode you might want to go; one of the decisions you might make in the future, as we look at the lessons
learned, is that you need persistence with all of our intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets.
And the other thing the secretary said was on the -- is really on the interoperability and how we fuse our command and
control communications and computers and the whole ISR piece together with decision-makers so we can get the loop of all
that, where we see something and we want to act, and we can bring effects to bear on whatever the target is in a more
timely way, in a more coherent way. We're doing a lot of things together. It's working reasonably well. We can do better
in the future, and we always can. That will always --
Q: A question on precision-guided weapons --
Q: (Off mike) -- in particular, are there any examples in the last couple of weeks, since it's gone operational, where
it's helped track in real time an al Qaeda convoy or small groups of vehicles and destroyed them, to help destroy them?
Myers: I think one of the most innovative ways they have used some of the assets, the Joint Stars -- people understand
what Joint Stars is. It was made -- it was designed in the Cold War, basically, for a very linear battlefield -- a front
line, bad guys on one side, good guys on the other.
Here it is using to cue other systems. It has been used to cue Global Hawk, which cues other systems. So you go from,
you know, wide area search to -- you see something moving. You see it's a bus. Is it a school bus or is it an al Qaeda
bus? And you keep refining. And you don't know that from the Joint Stars alone, so you have to bring other assets to
bear. And that whole cycle is being refined, as you would imagine, Tony.
Q: Mr. Secretary?
Q: Just a question on --
Rumsfeld: Can I add one more thing?
Q: Sure.
Rumsfeld: I find -- it is a fascinating question, and it's going to take an awful lot of thought. But one of the things
that I think is taking place is that we are beginning to understand better that if you're not after an army or a navy or
an air force -- you're after something other than that -- that bringing all elements of national capability and world
capability to bear on something -- the economic and the financial and the law enforcement and the intelligence
gathering, as well as overt activities, as well as covert activities -- that that combination makes life difficult for
those that it's applied to. And that pressure ultimately is felt.
And in tandem with that, of course, that's been transformational, is the patience of the Pentagon press corps --
(laughter) -- which has been increasingly admirable once we got out of the quagmire. (Laughter.)
Q: Mr. Secretary, a question about precision-guided weapons. There have been a few that have gone astray. There have
been some press reports that have suggested that there may be a problem with some defective batteries that could have
resulted in some of these accidents, and that the defects may have been covered up during the production process. Is
this something that you're aware of? Are you looking into this possibility? Do you dismiss it? Are you aware of it at
all?
Rumsfeld: I've never heard that.
Myers: That's the first I've heard of it as well. And of the -- well, we don't want to go into the incidents themselves,
but it doesn't look like batteries.
Q: Do you have -- it doesn't look like. Do you have any preliminary indication about what caused it?
Myers: General Franks does and his components do, but that's their business, and it's -- and we shouldn't comment on
that.
Q: Mr. Secretary?
Q: Mr. Secretary, you said several minutes ago that you had reason to believe some people had escaped. I wanted to ask
you to clarify that -- whether you were simply referring to Taliban fighters in southern Afghanistan, or do you now have
any reason to believe that any Taliban or al Qaeda leadership of significance has already left Afghanistan? What were
you referring to?
Rumsfeld: I was referring to a scrap of intelligence that was floating through my head, and I can't quite grab it, as to
where -- how many days or weeks ago it was, but that a relatively senior mid-level Taliban or al Qaeda was wounded. And,
in fact, it was extracted and taken out of the country somehow or another to receive medical attention.
Q: But I -- can -- but --
Rumsfeld: So that has happened. I'm 90 percent sure that that is -- that type of thing has happened. I'm sure -- it may
have happened in instances that I'm not aware.
Q: I'm sorry, just to make sure I understand, you mean taken out of the country by --
Rumsfeld: By them.
Q: -- people sympathetic to them.
Rumsfeld: Exactly. Exactly.
Q: Do you know what country they might have been taken to?
Rumsfeld: In this instance I don't think I do. No.
Q: Was that Zawahiri? Was that Zawahiri, Mr. Secretary?
Rumsfeld: Can't remember.
Q: Mr. Secretary, do you agree with the -- there was a report in India Globe, I asked you last week, also that the Wall
Street Journal report carried by India Globe also, that two -- at least two helicopters by Pakistanis and some
commanders was --
Rumsfeld: I read that as well; I don't believe it. I have no -- no -- basis to confirm that. In fact, every time we've
checked on that report we've not been able to validate it. That does not mean it didn't happen; it just means that we
have no information that would confirm that.
Q: Mr. Secretary, the White House says this morning that --
Rumsfeld: White Houses do not talk. (Laughter.)
Q: White House officials --
Rumsfeld: No, no -- well, I mean, buildings can't speak. (Laughter.)
Q: White House officials say this morning that in regard to the Osama bin Laden tape, that the Pentagon is at least in
charge of the process if not the decision to release the tape. Can you tell us what the Pentagon is doing in regard to
that tape and whether you, in fact, are involved in the decision to release it?
Rumsfeld: The answer to the last portion is that I'm involved. I don't know that I'm involved in the decision to release
it. But what one has to do in a case like this is to see if the authorities, the people who make these decisions, feel
it should be released. And I'm told that they do. And the second thing one has to do then is to make sure it's checked
with the intelligence community so that by doing so something is not revealed that could cause someone to lose their
life or to reveal some piece of information about intelligence capabilities. The third thing that has to be done is to
make sure that in the event it is to be released, that translations are made of the spoken words in the tape by more
than one person so that if -- outside people, not inside people -- so that no one would even no one would even think of
suggesting that it was anything other than as accurate as it could be. And then it would be presented to people, one
would think, and they would be allowed to make their own judgment.
Now it may very well be that that could happen by the Pentagon. It may happen by some other agency of government. And it
may very well be that for some reason it may not happen. I've seen it. Everyone, you know, can draw their own
conclusion, if and when it's released.
Q: And what is your conclusion?
Rumsfeld: I have not gone -- I am so careful and so conservative that I have not gone through the process I've just
described yet. And I've not had a chance to look at differing views as to what is actually spoken. And the other problem
is, it seems to me it's not unimportant to try to connect the words with the body language and the presentation that's
being made, so that you can connect it. Now that's hard to do if you don't understand the language. So I don't -- I'm
disinclined to leap to a judgment about it, although I am very proud that I was not the person being taped saying what
he said.
Q: Have you been asked for your input into whether it should be released?
Q: Mr. Secretary, may I ask a question about humanitarian aid? You're seeing more and more pictures of the starving
Afghans reaching for food. And while there have been successes like the opening of the bridge, today, for instance, the
shipment going across the bridge was stopped, presumably, perhaps, because of security concerns. Is the United States
going to do anything more to provide any security or allow coalition forces to provide security?
Rumsfeld: Everyone is working on getting the humanitarian assistance -- food, medicine, and clothing -- disbursed and
distributed in that country. There are lots of people in great need, there is just no question about it. There are an
awful lot of people in government and out of government, from our country and from some other countries, that are
working on that problem.
Q: The British --
Q: And will you -- will there be more security provided? That's what the --
Rumsfeld: The Bonn understanding was that there was to be a request for a security force in Kabul. The process is going
forward whereby the countries who have offered to participate with respect to the security force for Kabul are being
talked to. A lead country is being selected. They will then work closely with the central command to determine the
number of troops, the timing. The goal was to reach -- to try to accomplish it by December 22nd, which was a date that
came out of the Bonn discussions.
Whether that will be possible or not is not known. We are obviously leaning very far forward to try to be helpful to
that process, and -- however, it will not solve the problem that you're talking about, which is, essentially, the fact
that there is lawlessness in the country. There are people who have needs, and as those needs are -- as people try to
meet those needs, some people try to avoid having those needs met, and they try to take the food or take the medicine or
take these things and sell them.
Now, there is no national police force in the country. There is no national armed service in the country. There are
factions, and in those areas, those factions are doing their best to control lawlessness and to try to see that the
distribution of the food takes place. And all in all, I'd say they're doing a pretty good job. Does it mean that there
aren't sizeable pockets of people in great need that have not been reached through the distribution system? They exist,
and they've got to be dealt with. So --
We're going to make a last question.
Jim?
Q: (Off mike) -- real simple.
Rumsfeld: Go ahead.
Q: Could you expand a moment on what types of prisoners you think the United States should be detaining? Are we talking
about only people on the list of al Qaeda leadership? Are we talking about foreign fighters? Could you expand --
Rumsfeld: Sure. Let me see if I can put them in some baskets for you. Anyone -- Taliban or al Qaeda -- who has
information, intelligence information, that can add to our knowledge about the terrorist network in Afghanistan or in
neighboring countries or anywhere on the face of the earth, we want. We want a chance to talk to them, to interrogate
them, to find out what they know; to find out what the patterns and procedures and training approaches are of the
various organizations, and to learn every single thing we can. That's one category.
So that's very broad, very large numbers of people. We'd like to get our hands on them, control them for a period, go
through that intelligence gathering process. It's enormously important, and it has been helpful already.
Second: We have less interest in the lower-level Taliban people, because they're Afghans, and the people of Afghanistan
are going to have to deal with them in one way or another. With the senior level Taliban people, we are quite
interested. They are clearly closely connected to al Qaeda and have expressed the same types of views, the same types of
approaches, and they need to be punished; they need to be taken care of in one manner or another by somebody.
They're mostly all Afghans, as the way I'd use the word "Taliban", and that means that to the extent there are people --
a relatively small number of people at the top that we would like to have control over, and not just for intelligence
but for disposition. There are lesser people that one would think at some point the government of Afghanistan, as it
gets its sea-legs, might very well address.
With respect to al Qaeda, from the top to the bottom, they're bad folks. They have been doing perfectly terrible things
in Afghanistan and around the world, and it would be just a crime if they are let loose in any way to go to the
neighboring countries or to other countries, our country, or anywhere in the world to continue the terrorist acts that
they've been engaged in. And so they ought to be stopped and they ought to be imprisoned, and they ought not to be
permitted to do that.
Last, the senior al Qaeda leadership. Those are people that we obviously hope to get control over and have a much -- a
very deep involvement as to what their ultimate disposition might be.
Q: Roughly how many people are in that last category?
Rumsfeld: I'm kind of not going to get into numbers. It's not hundreds.
Q: (Off mike.) (Laughter.)
Rumsfeld: (Laughs.) It's not hundreds or thousands.
Q: Could you clarify something you said earlier? You said, with regard to capturing of these prisoners, "They will turn
them over to us or they will not be in positioned in places where they will come in contact with the people we would
like to have." Does that mean that the folks that are fighting alongside the United States, whoever they are, over
there, have formally agreed to hand them over to the U.S., or is this like the arrangement with the Afghans whereby
everyone understands the personal force of General Franks and they're not likely to cross him?
Rumsfeld: Well, I -- in my response, it was in the context of a question relating to the European Union's no death
penalty position. And I was not referring to the Afghan forces on the ground.
Q: Right. I'm clear on that.
Rumsfeld: Okay.
Q: So --
Rumsfeld: Now. So what did I mean? What I meant was that if a country has a sensitivity or a sensibility with respect to
the death penalty, that's their privilege. We just don't want it to get in our way with respect to the people who fit in
these senior-level categories. That means that either forces on the ground or -- with whom we're cooperating or who
might be involved in the security force in Kabul would understand that idiosyncrasy on our part.
And they would agree either that they would not take control over people and turn them over to us, or we would agree
that they would not be put in proximity where they might have occasion to take control over such people.
Q: That was a condition of involvement?
Rumsfeld: Oh, I wouldn't put it quite that way. But certainly --
(Cross talk.)
Q: Has Great Britain --
Q: How many -- how many -- (inaudible)? How many -- (inaudible.)
Rumsfeld: Well, that's the problem. It's not a matter of enforcing it. This is a matter of discussion and working things
out with reasonable people and friends and --
Q: But given your lack of --
Q: Has the old U.S. ally Great Britain given an assurance that if it comes into possession of Bin Laden it will turn him
over to the United States?
Rumsfeld: When I first heard that this issue was being raised, I checked, and the response we've received is not to
worry. And I believe that they have made public statements to that effect. But I have not seen them in writing, so it's
not for me to say whether they have or not, but I'm told they have. And I'm told that regardless of whether they have
said so publicly, it will not be an issue.
Thank you.
Q: Sir, a clarification, sir, of something you said, if I could?
Rumsfeld: Well, I don't want to leave things confused. (Laughter.)
Q: Well, it could be me. But you talked a moment ago about your being slow to judge Bin Laden and the contents of the
tape. To judge what? His culpability?
Rumsfeld: Well, I was asked what my opinion was about it, and my response was, I would have to sit down with it. I would
have to make sure I was looking at it in exactly the way it was presented. I would have to see the written transcripts,
plural, because I have seen people in translation come up with three different answers for the same thing being said,
and you need to look at that, before I would rush to some conclusion about it. That's all. Although I did add that I
certainly would not want to be Osama bin Laden and have said what it appears he has said.
Q: (Anything to ?) say about a conclusion about the evidence about the fact he was responsible for this? Is it hard --
have you not yet reached a conclusion based on what you --
Rumsfeld: I've said that -- regarding of whether I have reached a private conclusion, which I'm not going to get into, I
would not want to say to the world something unless I had done the kind of due diligence that I think a person in my
position is responsible for doing.
Q: Could it be staged or a fake?
Rumsfeld: That is so remote, so unlikely from what I've seen. I think I would rule it out. But --
Q: Have you been asked for your input on how the tape ought to be handled? (Laughter.)
Q: (Inaudible) -- and I have six more questions. (Laughter.)
Q: We'll be here all day, Mr. Secretary.
ENDS