DEFENSE DEPARTMENT OPERATIONAL UPDATE BRIEFING
BRIEFER: GENERAL TOMMY FRANKS, COMMANDER, CENTRAL COMMAND
| LOCATION: VIA SATELLITE FROM THE MARRIOTT-WATERSIDE, TAMPA, FLORIDA |
TIME: 12:30 P.M. EST |
GEN. FRANKS: Well, good afternoon from Tampa. I'd like to start by
commending the Tampa Bay Devil Rays on their 3 and 0 start in this baseball season. I
mentioned earlier that I would gladly take credit for the motivational content of the
remarks that I gave the members of the team on Tuesday night before their opening game.
Maybe -- maybe I won't take credit for that, because one never knows exactly how far that
will go. I will say, however, that I am awfully proud of them, and I'm awfully proud, I
think we all are, of the hundreds of thousands of Americans who are attending sporting
events in this country and, in fact, going on with their lives.
You know, we all remember the horrific events of the 11th of September
of last year. And the day after tomorrow marks the 6th (month) anniversary of our
initiation of combat operations in Afghanistan. On that day, the 7th of October, 2001, the
Taliban controlled more than 80 percent of Afghanistan, and Afghanistan was in fact a
terrorist-sponsored state. Some 7 million Afghans on that date were reported to be in
danger of starving or freezing. Women couldn't work, couldn't attend school, couldn't
receive medical treatment. The al Qaeda used Afghanistan as a safe haven to plan,
encourage and finance global terrorism.
Today, Afghanistan has an interim government. The international
community has united to give Afghanistan a chance. Taliban is no longer in power. Al Qaeda
has been severely damaged. Schools and hospitals have reopened. People in Afghanistan are
receiving humanitarian support from international organizations and nongovernmental
organizations, who are now free to operate across that country.
So, much has been achieved over the past six months by our men and
women in uniform, also by members of this international coalition, a coalition which today
stands at some 69 supporting nations, with 35 nations having forces deployed in our
region.
Much has been achieved, much remains to be done. As I speak today, some
6,500 Americans and a similar number of coalition troops are deployed in Afghanistan.
They're involved in providing for stability, in hunting down remaining terrorists in that
country, in gathering intelligence to help prevent future attacks around the world. They
are coordinating humanitarian assistance efforts of international organizations and
nongovernmental organizations; assisting in the opening of schools and hospitals; have
assisted in the training of the initial forces of an Afghan national army -- some 500 to
600 of those troops have completed training in Kabul and will be used to enhance security
in the capital -- will begin further training of the Afghan national army later this month
or early next month.
And all this, all that I described has been and will continue to be
dangerous. Some have given their lives to this cause. Some have been injured. It will
continue to be dangerous business in the days ahead.
Terrorism remains an international threat, but in fact the threat will
be defeated. The outcome is not in doubt. I remain thankful for the dedication of the
Marines and the troops, the airmen, the sailors, who serve our nation and this global
coalition. And I'm thankful for the resolve and the support of the American people.
I'll pause here, and I'd be glad to take your questions. Let's go to
Tampa first, please.
Please?
Q Can you explain to us, if any, the prospect of our soldiers going to
Israel and helping out in that situation?
GEN. FRANKS: Yeah. I've read a great deal about it, and I've read the
comments in the media recently. And at this point, I will say I have been given nothing
that leads me to believe that any commitment of American troops to that crisis area has
been made. I simply don't think any decision has been made.
Yes, sir?
Q On that subject, are you doing any contingency planning for that? And
in the same breath, if you could look ahead to the next six months in Afghanistan and talk
about what might take place in the next six months.
GEN. FRANKS: Sure. With reference to the first question, Israel is not
in my region, and so I will tell you candidly that I am not aware of any planning to
undertake the type of operations that were asked about previously.
It's very difficult to predict what the next six months in Afghanistan
will look like. I know, this, we'll continue into the next six months to root out
terrorists in that country. Much reported -- well reported that there remains pockets and
pools of small groups of terrorists inside Afghanistan. We're going to continue to do that
work until we, in fact, have satisfied ourselves that there is not the possibility of a
remaining network of terrorists inside Afghanistan.
Additionally, I think we'll continue to work with the international
community, as I mentioned earlier, to support the training of an Afghan national army.
We'll continue -- or we'll remain linked with the International Security Assistance Force
in Afghanistan.
I would not predict how long our operations will be. I will tell you
that up to this point, we have maintained a capability to enlarge and draw down forces
inside Afghanistan, and I think you're all aware of that. I think the last time I spoke we
had about 7,000 or so Americans inside Afghanistan, and that number is down several
hundred as we speak.
And so we'll continue to work stability issues inside Afghanistan.
We're going to maintain our focus on our principal task, which is to root out these
terrorists, and as I said, the outcome of that is not in doubt. The timing may be, but the
outcome is not in doubt.
Please.
Q Thanks General. I'm Amy Sherrod (sp) with Fox News Channel.
Can you tell us as much detail as you can now that Operation Anaconda
has wound down and gone away -- as much as you can tell us about what the day-to-day
operations are like now, what kind of things the troops are focusing on and how they're
doing?
GEN. FRANKS: Sure. Sure. The troops are doing great. I'm in daily
contact with 'em, and I suppose it was a couple of weeks ago that I went to visit 'em in
Afghanistan. They're doing great. Their resolve is great. Their dedication is great. And
so I think we all feel very good about that. They know precisely why they're there. They
understand their mission, and they're doing it very, very well.
Now with regard to post-Anaconda operations, I've said all along that
our approach to the terrorist networks inside Afghanistan has to do with the taking of
intelligence from all sources, determinations of where we think we may find a group of
enemy troops. Then we move in with a force that's appropriate to that task, and we clear
it. And that's exactly what happened in Operation Anaconda. The business of the gaining of
intelligence, the fusion of intelligence information to create templates that tell us
where we are likely to find additional pools and puddles or pockets of enemy is ongoing as
we speak. Reconnaissance efforts are ongoing as we speak. And when we seize upon an area
where we identify enemy forces, then we will go there, and we'll clear it in a fashion
that might look like Anaconda, might be considerably smaller, could be larger. We just
don't know. And so what we do is we react to our intelligence and simply go to confirm or
deny and then kill or capture the enemy forces that we find there.
To the Pentagon, please.
Q General, Pamela Brett (sp) with Associate Press Broadcast.
On that issue, what is your latest assessment of the area around Khost,
and what is the surveillance and intelligence telling you about the pockets there?
GEN. FRANKS: The area of Shah-i-Kot -- which, you'll recall, is to the
east and south of Gardez -- from that area over toward Khost is an area where we are
continuing to operate. It's an area where we're conducting ongoing reconnaissance
activities, where we're continuing to interface daily with the local populations. As you
know, our sweeps in and around the Anaconda area, to include to the east and to the south
of that area, have permitted us to locate and get into a number of caches of weapons,
documents and so forth since the combat operations in Anaconda were completed, and so that
area between Gardez and Khost remains one of the areas that we're going to continue to
focus the sort of intelligence that I described a minute ago, Thelma, on as we move ahead.
Q General, this is Bob Burns (sp) from AP. Of the hundreds or perhaps
thousands of prisoners that the Afghans continue to hold, have you taken about all the
people from them that you're interested in? And also, could you update us on how many
people U.S. forces do have custody of in Afghanistan -- (off mike)?
GEN. FRANKS: Right. In Afghanistan today we have 236 detainees in
custody in a couple locations. I'm not exactly sure what the current number being held,
being detained by the Afghans is. We still have -- we still have some number of those
detainees we have not satisfied ourselves have been sufficiently screened. I would say the
vast majority of those being detained in Afghanistan have been screened by our people, but
there probably are a hundred, 200, that we believe need additional screening. And I
suspect that we'll get into that screening in the next week. We'll make determinations
whether they're of interest to us, and if they are, then, of course, we'll ask the Afghans
to release them to us and we'll also place them in detention. So I won't speculate about
how many of that number we will wind up detaining, because I just don't know right now.
Q General, Barbara Starr from CNN. There were reports from your people
in Afghanistan earlier today that they have now seen leaflets from suspected Taliban and
al Qaeda offering bounties to Afghans who kill or capture Americans or other military
personnel in Afghanistan. I'd like to ask you what you can tell us about those leaflets,
how concerned you are about them. And I also wanted to ask whether now you have been
briefed about the Abu Zubaydah situation by other elements of the government and whether
you have any sense of the intelligence gained in that raid and whether or not another
terrorist attack in fact has been averted.
Thank you.
GEN. FRANKS: Thank you. The latter question first. No, I actually have
not been briefed on anything that's come out of Abu Zubaydah. I know that he, as I think
we have said all through this, since early in the week, he is under U.S. control. I can
tell you candidly that I don't know where he is under U.S. control, and I have not seen
the results of any discussions with Abu Zubaydah.
With regard to the former question, I have also seen the reports, and
I've received reports from my people on leaflets or pamphlets being passed out in one
localized area inside Afghanistan offering rewards for the kill or capture of Americans.
And so yes, I've seen that. I have not seen the leaflets or the pamphlets myself.
I suppose if you ask me what do I think about that, well, I think it
confirms what we've been saying, and that is that Afghanistan remains a very, very
dangerous place. It's a dangerous place for our people to operate, it's a dangerous place
for coalition forces to operate. And as we all recognize, there are groups of enemy troops
still in that country, and that's why I think we've all been a little bit reluctant to
predict how long our operations to kill or capture those enemy troops are going to go on.
So concern about the leaflets -- "awareness" is probably a
better word. We're going to pay attention to what we're doing in there, but we're also
going to remember that Afghanistan is a dangerous place for us to be operating.
Back to Tampa, please.
Ma'am?
Q General, Pakistan has recently joined the coalition village here at
MacDill Air Force Base.
GEN. FRANKS: Yeah.
Q Can you talk a little bit about what exactly their role is they're
playing now, and how that changes what you're doing here on a daily basis in Tampa?
GEN. FRANKS: Right. Pakistan having joined our coalition village here,
here at MacDill in Tampa. Actually, we're continuing to do what the coalition has been
doing since we started our operations.
Our cooperation with Pakistan has been very good all through this
operation. It continues to be very good. I asked President Musharraf, oh, I guess two
months ago, if he would be interested in placing a full-time liaison with us. He said he
would. And so we have that liaison cell here. And what they do is they simply make it easy
for us to cooperate and coordinate our daily activities with Pakistan, as we do with the
other 28 or 29 national cells that we have out here. So it's a productive relationship,
but it hasn't changed the way we do our business.
Q General?
GEN. FRANKS: Sir?
Q Yeah, Robert Green (sp), Reuters. Have you been able to locate any
groups of Taliban or al Qaeda outside of Afghanistan? And if you have or can, what could
you do about that?
GEN. FRANKS: Right. I think it's interesting to ask that. Part of being
in this coalition means that each of these governments in the coalition work with us to do
-- to answer the question that you just asked. And so I'll use -- I'll use an example of
Pakistan.
Pakistan has cooperated and coordinated with us along their Western
border for months now, and in fact, as we work with them, our liaison activities work with
them inside Pakistan, you know that the Pakistanis have responded themselves to groups of
-- to groups of enemy people; some very recently -- the business of the Zubaydah takedown;
some two, three months ago, wherein they had been able to capture some enemy troops, they
turned them over to us. And so I think that's what we -- I think that's what we actually
see.
I've also talked about Yemen and President Saleh's desire to work with
us to rid his country of terrorist cells that operate in Yemen. So that's another example
of where I think we find terrific coordination.
And so I think it's -- now that's just inside my area of operations. I
think we see that on a global scale also, although I'm not as familiar with the areas
outside my own area of responsibility.
Sir?
Q General, I'm wondering if you've got a sense of disruption of al
Qaeda command and control, coordination, if you've got a sense now of how your operations
have --
GEN. FRANKS: Yeah. I think without a doubt, the operations of al Qaeda
coming out of Afghanistan have been -- I'll use the term "dramatically" -- they
have been dramatically damaged, dramatically degraded. And so I feel good about the work
that our forces have done inside Afghanistan. But I'd be quick to say that when that
organization has reached some 50 or 60 other countries around the globe, I think that it
would be -- I think it would be naive of me to say that al Qaeda does not still possess a
capability to conduct terrorist operations as we speak. And so we feel good about what's
happened in Afghanistan, and we feel good about a great many operatives who have been
taken down in other places around the world. But this one also is in the category of a
long way to go before we relax.
Sir?
Q Sir, on the reported coup attempt, were you made aware of the roundup
of these suspects? And if you can assess the importance of lack of importance of that
attempt yet --
GEN. FRANKS: Let me characterize it by saying an internal issue with
the interim authority inside Afghanistan, in terms of the planning of that operation -- we
have been concerned for some time about the possibility of groups inside Afghanistan
bringing together weapons possibly for the purpose of attacking our own people. And so we
have been interested in the area around Kabul. We have been watching our intelligence very
carefully. And so it did not -- I'll say it this way: It did not surprise me when the
Afghan interim authority went in and, I think, took some 300 or so detainees out of that.
I understand about half of those have now been released. But it didn't surprise me, and I
think that that's one of the things that we can expect from a government that's finding
its own footing -- that it will increase its own capability to look for terrorists and
coup attempts and that sort of thing. And I think that's what happened in this case. I
have not talked to -- or my people have not yet talked to any of the detainees, and so we
have not made any connection to al Qaeda or Taliban or anything like that. Okay?
Q You were not briefed on that operation? You were not told of the
impending roundup?
GEN. FRANKS: Oh, you mean before the operation.
Q Well, yeah.
GEN. FRANKS: No. We knew that the capability of the interim
administration in Afghanistan was growing. We knew that in the event that they came across
intelligence which would indicate -- the actionable intelligence which would indicate to
them that there was a problem somewhere, that they probably would go after it. We did not
know that they were going to go down on this specific pocket that I made reference to a
minute ago.
Back to the Pentagon, please.
Q Tony Capaccio with Bloomberg News. Could you bring us up to speed on
the examination of evidence that al Qaeda might have gained or tried to gain weapons of
mass destruction, in terms of number of sites you've now examined? And to what extent have
any plans or manuals you've found been more sophisticated than that which could be gleaned
from the Internet by any lay person?
GEN. FRANKS: I can't handle the -- Tony, I can't handle the last part,
about the lay person. I will say that we have over the course of time identified 60 what
we call potential weapon-of-mass-destruction sites that we wanted to get into and that we
wanted to study. We have now been into all 60 of those locations, some of them on more
than one occasion. We have taken files and, I'll still call them, cook books out of a
number of these locations. We have taken samples. And what it has indicated to us is a
desire on the part of al Qaeda's leadership to create weapons of mass destruction.
As of today, to my knowledge, we have not yet identified evidence of
weaponized weapon of mass destruction; that is to say, any sort of experimentation having
been turned into a weapon of mass destruction. Haven't seen it.
Q General, Brett Bear (sp) with Fox News Channel. To take you to
another area under your command, are U.S. boots on the ground in Ethiopia, or are U.S.
Special Forces going in there? And if I could follow up after that.
GEN. FRANKS; We currently have no -- we currently have no military on
the ground in Ethiopia. We have said before that -- in fact, I think when I returned from
my recent round of visits to the Horn of Africa -- that we are working in an intelligence
sense with the nations of the Horn of Africa -- Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Djibouti -- but
we have not put Special Forces on the ground inside Somalia. And I won't predict whether
we will or not. But we're in the business right now inside Somalia that sort of looks like
business we're conducting elsewhere, and that is we're working to identify places where we
may find terrorists organizing or training. And so that's the work that we see going on in
Somalia right now.
And I --
Q Okay, since you bring up Somalia, if you could -- if I could follow
up, do you see that al Qaeda is setting up shop there or there are increasing members of
al Qaeda in Somalia? Are you getting that kind of sense, intelligence-wise?
GEN. FRANKS: We're continuing to build our intelligence and our
situational awareness in Somalia. And I don't think I'd characterize it right now with
respect to exactly what we're finding. We still need to do an awful lot of analysis on
what we're seeing, and I wouldn't mislead you by saying to you, Tony, that we're not
seeing activity in Somalia or that we're seeing a large activity. I think it's too soon to
tell right now. We're doing our -- we're doing our analytical work.
Q General, Mark Mozetti (sp) with U.S. News and World Report. Moving to
another country, Iran. Earlier in the week, Secretary Rumsfeld talked about Iran's efforts
at exporting terrorism throughout the region. Could you talk about your sense of what Iran
is doing with regards to terrorism, and also Iran's efforts to possibly destabilize the
Afghan government along the western border?
GEN. FRANKS: I can't -- I can't demonstrate direct action by Iran to
destabilize activities inside Afghanistan, either activities on the western border or in
Kabul. I would characterize the activities of Iran as not helpful to what we're trying to
do in the global war on terrorism.
Q General Franks, this is Tom Jeltin (sp) from National Public Radio.
Q Isobel Mascarena (sp) with WTSB-CBS. General, looking ahead as you
plan things out, what is the likelihood that more American soldiers will be needed to be
sent out, called out to Afghanistan to finish the job? And if so, what kind of numbers are
we looking at, and how close are we to finishing the job?
GEN. FRANKS: We are -- I am right now not on the cusp of a decision to
request to put large numbers of people inside Afghanistan. Now, having said that, I want
to be clear also that that does not mean that in the future we'll not seek to do that. I
can't predict, you know, sort of in response to your question, that we intend to build to
a certain level over time, because that has not been the nature of -- you know, the nature
of our effort.
What we'll do is we'll continue to assess the threat, and if the threat
-- if the threat remains handleable by the force structure and the force size and the
force composition that we have in Afghanistan now, then we'll stay with that. If, on the
other hand, the force -- the enemy force there turns out to look differently than what we
believe it looks right now, then I wouldn't predict what we would do. But we'll keep all
of our options on the table. Right now I do not predict -- I do not have a plan that says,
"Okay, by the end of May or by the end of June, we intend to grow the number."
No such plan exists.
Ma'am?
Q Annette Miranda (sp), ABC 28.
I just want to know, out of the 6,500 you said Americans that were in
Afghanistan, how many of those are from MacDill? And do you plan on any more sending from
MacDill?
GEN. FRANKS: I really can't answer the question. I actually don't know
how many are from MacDill. As you know, MacDill supports tanker operations for the United
States Air Force, and we certainly are conducting tanker operations in what we call the
footprint around Afghanistan. But we are not basing any of our refueling assets in
Afghanistan. And so I'm sure that there would be some from MacDill who will be in the
area, working and staff and so forth, but no major operations being supported out of
MacDill at this time.
Sir.
Q General, good afternoon. Mark Wilson --
GEN. FRANKS: Hi, Mark.
Q -- from WTVT here in Tampa.
I want to ask you a question about the Eastern Afghanistan region that
borders Pakistan. I know several lawmakers, one of them a Florida senator --
GEN. FRANKS: Right.
Q -- said recently, it is his opinion that Osama bin Laden may be
there.
GEN. FRANKS: Right.
Q Not that that's why you would be searching, but can you tell us, in
that region, how many roughly cave complexes you would like to search, if you haven't
searched, and what kind of resistance maybe you're encountering there still?
GEN. FRANKS: I don't know that I would say cave complexes -- another
hundred or another 200, so I can't really give you a number. I can tell you that
historically -- and sort of an informative point -- historically, the eastern part of
Afghanistan that you described has been a place where foreigners have aggregated. I mean,
this goes back a long, long time. If you look at recent history, you'll find some horrific
battles during the Soviet work in Afghanistan, over that 10-year period of time in that
same area, in Shah-i-Kot and to the east, over toward Khost. And so a great many caves,
tunnels and that sort of thing were built in the Soviet era. In fact, I suspect some were
probably built before then, and we may well find some that have, you know, been worked
over since the Soviet occupation, which ended 10 or so years ago.
That's one reason that we pay special attention to the eastern side.
another reason that we pay special attention to the eastern side is because the terrain in
there is terribly inhospitable. And so it's possible -- or at least the enemy thought it
was possible to put reasonably large groupings of troops in that area around Shah-i-Kot --
Operation Anaconda area.
Well, there are similarly difficult areas in the east of Afghanistan
along that border, which as we've said for a long time to Pakistan is porous. I mean there
are hundreds of places for people to cross along there. And so rather than trying to
describe the number of caves, tunnels, and so forth, we've just sort of placed that in the
whole mosaic of Afghanistan. We work our intelligence, and then when we receive historical
indicators, or other sorts of indicators, then we go confirm or deny. And that's why I
think it's hard to say, well, three months, six months or whatever, because we react to
what we see.
Okay. More? Back to the Pentagon, please.
Q General Franks, this is Tom Geltin (sp) from National Public Radio.
Given what you said earlier about the threat from groups bringing together weapons in
Afghanistan, I'm wondering how you view the capability of local Afghan forces there to
deal with security issues in the country? And related to that, if you had your druthers,
sir, would you like to see the International Security Assistance Force able to extend its
operations outside Kabul?
GEN. FRANKS: Let me take the second part first. The ISAF, the
International Security Assistance Force, is performing an invaluable service inside Kabul.
When one talks about the expansion of that force into other areas, I think we have to be
careful that we sort of have terms of reference that go like this:
ISAF inside Kabul is perceived to provide a certain degree of security.
If someone were to say, "General Franks, do you support having similar levels of
security to what we see in Kabul expanded elsewhere inside Afghanistan," I think we
would all say we would like to see security expanded around Afghanistan. That does not
necessarily mean that we need to expand the number of troops, that we need to go back to
the world at large and create some thousands-large force that we then place in Mazar-e
Sharif and Herat and so forth.
And so, actually, I don't think that it is necessary at this point to
expand the International Security Assistance Force. But I will say that I think the
relationships that we have, our Task Force, Operation Enduring Freedom, with the various
militias -- some call them "warlords" -- in areas in Afghanistan, those
relationships need to be maintained because what they do is they give us situational
awareness and they permit us to leverage the forces that currently exist in Afghanistan in
the pursuit of al Qaeda. And so we want to continue that kind of work. The relationships
that we have inside Afghanistan with these various militias or pockets that exist are good
relationships. We work on those relationships every day.
Now, the trick for us in the future will be how to take from these
tribal or ethnically based militias and bring forces to form a national army so that one
gains a sense of national pride and so that the authorities in Afghanistan have military
capability to do a variety of things. One is to provide for the security of an
administration in Kabul, but an equally important one may well be to provide security
along borders because, to be sure, we face the smuggling issue and the narcotics issue and
so forth. Afghans have faced this for a long time.
And so we like our relationships, but we believe that the building of a
national army and the creation of a force that can better handle borders and so forth is
in the interest of the country.
Q General Franks, it's Bob Franken from CNN in Washington. While you
oftentimes don't discuss future operations, there has been, as you know, quite a bit of
public discussion recently about another military operation in Afghanistan on the scale of
Operation Anaconda and that it might be imminent. Can I ask you to discuss this, sir?
GEN. FRANKS: Bob, let me -- I will try. I can't predict, and even, I
guess, if I could, I wouldn't. But let me go back to this business of working
intelligence. We work intelligence across the whole of Afghanistan 24 hours a day. Right
now, as of this minute, I don't see something that indicates a size enemy force that would
warrant something such as you described, Anaconda, and so wherever the rumors come from
that there's one of those just about to start, I probably would take issue with it. But
I'd be equally quick to say that that does not mean that in very short order, if we were
to develop intelligence that indicated to us that a formation of enemy of size sufficient
to justify a large conventional force like the one we used in Operation Anaconda being
employed, then we certainly wouldn't hesitate to do that.
So, honestly, I can't predict because we simply take a look at what we
have in intelligence, and that's what we react to.
Q General, this is Tammy Kupperman with NBC News. And I was wondering
if you could update us on the investigation into the death of Chief Warrant Officer
Harriman at the beginning of Operation Anaconda. You last briefed that it may in fact have
been caused by friendly fire.
GEN. FRANKS: The update that I can give you -- this is the incident
that happened on the 2nd of March. And the investigation is probably mid-way through. I
checked on that just a couple of days ago. There are no insights that I am comfortable
offering on it right now, but it remains on our list of investigations that we are going
to complete. And as I said last week, as we complete these, I will be -- I'll be releasing
summaries of what we learn, and I will do that. I would expect sometime within the next
few days we should have on the street and out to you the results of one or two or three of
these investigations.
Back to Tampa.
Ma'am?
Q Again, Nannette Miranda, ABC 28. What about the second American
Taliban? Can you look ahead on that for us? And are there any more American Taliban?
GEN. FRANKS: Well -- well, we don't know for sure because when we
historically, going back several months, have detained people, in many cases they lie to
us -- oh, perish the thought. In some cases they're simply not willing -- they're simply
not willing to tell us much at all.
And so if you were to ask me -- Are there any who speak English? -- I
would probably say there are some who speak English. Are there any that I believe are
Americans? I will tell you, not that I know of right now.
Now, with respect to this particular case, I think it will unfold in
the days ahead as judgments are made in Washington about what the correct handling of this
detainee is. So I've read the reports, but I am not on the inside of the thinking about
what the next step should be with this man.
More? Tampa?
Sir?
Q If I could get back to the Devil Rays -- (chuckles) --
GEN. FRANKS: Please, do. I like their won-loss record right now.
Q Yeah. Well, you know this is making a lot of us --
GEN. FRANKS: I hope no one in Detroit's listening.
Q (Chuckles.) But in all seriousness, you made your own tour of duty
last couple of weeks, throwing out first pitches. You were in Texas. You had a Yankee
game, as well.
GEN. FRANKS: Right.
Q Give us a sense what's going through your mind six months after this
has begun. What do you see when you see these full ballparks, when you see the flags, when
you hear the thank-yous, you get the handshakes?
GEN. FRANKS: Yeah. I think what I see is something that is not widely
reported, and that is that the sense of resolve and the sense of dedication that remains
in this country six months after we started Operation Enduring Freedom is truly
remarkable. It is an enjoyable thing for me, to be sure, to see thousands of people in a
ball park. But the symbology associated to that is what I believe is terribly important.
One who would believe that the attention span of the people in this
country is terribly short I think would be terribly disappointed. The sense that I get, in
fact, is that America will do her best to go about our daily lives. At the same time, I
believe that the sense of commitment to this ongoing global war on terrorism is very, very
solid. And so that's the sense that I get. Whether it's from throwing out a pitch or
whether it's from talking to moms and dads who have youngsters involved in Operation
Enduring Freedom, the feeling that I get is a very good feeling about this country.
Tampa, last one. Back -- ma'am.
Q Could you explain to us your decision to extend your contract through
next year? You were going to retire. We haven't gotten a chance to ask you that. What was
your decision process to help you stay another year?
GEN. FRANKS: The decision process for something like that probably
involves several things, and I won't talk a lot about it, because it sort of brings this
to a personal level, and I don't think this is about personality. Your question is a kind
one, but this is about a lot more than just one person deciding to stay to be a part of
this activity.
On a personal level, I talked to my wife about it, and there was no
doubt in her mind that this was a good thing, because she knows that I enjoy doing what I
do. The other part of that is that if the secretary of Defense and if the president of the
United States asked anyone in America to do something which they believed is for the good
of the country, then whoever they ask ought to think long and hard before they say no. And
so I'd leave it at that.
Back to the Pentagon, please.
Q General Franks, Eric Schmitt with the New York Times. I wanted to
ask, besides the area in Khost and Gardez, what other specific areas in Afghanistan are
your forces now focused on? And secondly, you said there are no areas right now where
there's a large enough concentration to stage an operation similar to Anaconda. But what
would be the threshold now? We haven't seen any specific bombing attacks as we had even in
January and February, and we have not seen any raids on the scale of even Hazar Qadam. So
should we look -- I mean, is the Anaconda model or is something maybe smaller,
potentially, is that the kind of operation that we're going to be seeing in the future, as
opposed to very discrete type of things?
GEN. FRANKS: Eric, with regard to where else inside Afghanistan we are
paying really close attention, the honest answer is "everywhere." It -- what you
see is, when we undertake an operation like Anaconda, you know, one can be inclined to
think, well, that must be because that's where they're focused. Well, not exactly.
Operation Anaconda could have gone into someplace else in Afghanistan, but in fact it
followed the intelligence into the area of Shah-i-Kot. Now, if one extrapolates to the
future, you can say: What sort of operation would we anticipate next, and where would it
be? The problem with trying to predict that is that if we go back six months, I doubt that
any of us would have predicted the precise times and places where we've conducted the
operations that we've conducted. What's necessary is to take the task -- to take the
intelligence and then identify the task that needs to be performed, and then identify the
troop composition and the troop size that's necessary to do that task.
And so where are we looking? We're looking everywhere inside
Afghanistan, and also outside Afghanistan. The force composition will be tailored based on
where we find aggregations of enemy forces in the future. Not a circuitous answer, that's
just the most direct answer that I can give you. I won't predict what we'll find -- what
we'll find next, but we're looking everywhere.
Pentagon.
Q General, it's Pam Hess with United Press International. Could you
explain why it took five months to determine that Hamdi was an American citizen? Was it
that he was among those lying, saying that he is not an American, or was he claiming to be
American and, because he was of Middle Eastern descent, was not believed until it was
checked out? And how did you come up with his birth certificate? Was it something his
parents offered, or did he happen to have it on him?
GEN. FRANKS: Actually, when we detained him it was up in the vicinity
of Mazar-e Sharif, and I think from the very beginning there was possibility in everyone's
mind that he might be an American, because he spoke English. And as to what happened
beyond that, in terms of how the information on the birth certificate and all of that was
run down, I really don't know. I'm really not sure.
As you know, we brought detainees back, gosh, several months ago out of
Afghanistan and into Guantanamo Bay. I can tell you that at the time he left -- at the
time he left Afghanistan, we could neither confirm nor deny that he was an American
citizen. And so, and a very rare thing that I'll do here, but I'll speculate that that
work to confirm or deny his citizenship has been what's been ongoing since he arrived in
Guantanamo Bay. So that's the best that I know about him.
Last question, Pentagon, please.
Q Jim Mannion from Agence France-Presse. Has there been any movement of
forces by countries surrounding Israel or in the region around Israel in response to the
Palestinian-Israeli conflict? And specifically, has Syria massed troops in the Bekaa
Valley in Lebanon?
GEN. FRANKS: Actually, I can't -- actually, I can't answer your
question, and I don't like to ride this notion of the lines and so forth, but Syria and
Lebanon, as well as Israel, are not in -- are not in my area of responsibility, and so
actually I don't know. And I'd be surprised if Secretary Rumsfeld would permit me to talk
much about things that are going on outside my area of responsibility, and I don't think
I'd want to. In terms of inside my area of responsibility, I have not seen forces being
repositioned in response to the crisis that we're looking at.
Thank you very much.
Q Thank you.
####
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