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CNN NEWSROOM

Examining DoD Briefing; Kurds Battle ISIS

Aired September 26, 2014 - 14:00   ET

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


DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Don Lemon. This is CNN's special live coverage of the war against ISIS.

You saw it right here on CNN. It's the top brass at the Pentagon. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, Joint Chiefs Chairman Martin Dempsey, updating the wars in Syria and Iraq, amid a battle in northern Syria that we are showing you here on CNN. Kurdish fighters are trying to halt a move by ISIS in an embattled Syrian city near Syria's border with Turkey. It's extraordinary footage. And here's how it looked just before the sunset, within the past two hours. That's ISIS right there that you're looking at. ISIS fighters taking shots at Syrian Kurds positioned over that ridge. The battle has been raging for several hours now near the Syrian city Kobani.

And then just a short time ago, a resident there told CNN that the Kurds are short on weapons, they're running out of ammo and the people of the town are panicked that ISIS will break that line of defense. No air strikes in that region, at least not that we know of yet. And in the past 24 hours, the coalition has targeted ISIS near Syria's border with Iraq, also near the Iraqi city of Kirkuk, and in the area west of Baghdad, near the military base ISIS seized this week, killing several hundred Iraqi troops.

With us now from Washington is CNN's chief Washington correspondent. That's Jake Tapper. He's joining us now from Columbus, Ohio. And also Colonel Peter Mansoor, U.S. Army retired. He's a CNN military analyst as well.

Gentlemen, thank you very much.

I want to first talk about the battle that we have been watching in northern Syria. CNN's Jim Sciutto just asked about it over at the Pentagon and here's what happened.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: You're aware of the threat faced by Syrian Kurds in northwestern Syria along the Turkish border, near Kobani. In fact, there was a firefight playing out between ISIS fighters and the Syrian Kurds on CNN just a short time ago. They appear to be facing the same genocidal threat that we saw the Yazidi people and others in Iraq. The U.S. came to others aide. Why hasn't the U.S. come to the aid of the Syrian Kurds from the air? And is that a step that you're considering taking? And I wonder if I could have a quick follow-up with the general. CHUCK HAGEL, DEFENSE SECRETARY: Uh-huh. Well, first of all, as General Dempsey said, we have a rather sophisticated and complete ISR picture of all that area, including the area that you talk about. So we are aware of what's going on. We are discussing how and what we can do with our coalition partners to help them deal with it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: So, Peter Mansoor, explain, if you would, the significance of this battle in northern Turkey, and why wouldn't the coalition be bombing ISIS right there, right now?

COL. PETER MANSOOR, U.S. ARMY (RET.): Well, the Kurds are in an existential fight for survival in northern Syria. What they need is air support, but they can't get it unless they have forward air controllers on the ground to help direct the strikes. You know, we can do a lot with that very expensive and high-tech suite of intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance assets that General Dempsey spoke of, but what we can't do is separate forces on the ground when they're in close contact. And so this, again, shows the limitations of an air strategy absent forward air controllers, special forces or some sort of boots on the ground to help direct them.

LEMON: To Jake Tapper now.

Jake, you know, with this fighting on the border with Turkey, this war has really come to the very edge of NATO. Why isn't Turkey playing a larger role here?

JAKE TAPPER, CNN CHIEF WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, initially, Turkish leaders said that they were concerned about the 49 Turkish hostages that ISIS was holding. They, obviously, have been freed in recent days, and there was some opening, it seemed to observers, when the -- when Erdogan said, I believe it was Tuesday, that Turkey would be willing to help with logistical and other support in terms of these air strikes.

But the truth is, Turkey views this conflict very differently than the United States and very differently than Iraq does. First of all, they view Assad still as the primary destabilizing force in Syria. Remember, there's more than a million Syrian refugees in Turkey because of the civil war, not because of ISIS. Second of all, some of the enemies of ISIS who are Kurds are enemies of Turkey as well. And then third of all, there are concerns in the Turkish government about how much the west, the United States and others are truly committed to a campaign against ISIS. So for all these reasons, there is a tremendous ambivalence by the Turks about how much they should become involved in this campaign of air strikes against ISIS.

LEMON: And, Peter Mansoor, you know, Jake just mentioned Iraq. Let's talk about Iraq a little bit. We talked about the strikes west of Baghdad today and the capture of the base by ISIS near Fallujah. As we look at that map, could ISIS be poised to make a move on Baghdad?

MANSOOR: Well, they're clearly inching towards Baghdad. It's unlikely that they would ever seize the city. They simply don't have the strength to do it and they'd be met with overwhelming resistance in the urban setting. But they're moving up, trying to get to the outskirts, trying to get to the south of the city and cut it off. And the battle clearly is shifting somewhat from northern Iraq down to the Baghdad region. And so our efforts will end up shifting accordingly.

LEMON: Gentlemen, let's get into some of the nuts and bolts of this press conference that just happened. Jake, let's talk about Khorasan first. Both Dempsey and Hagel said that they have no intel right now that any leader from Khorasan has been captured or killed. That's the latest update on that. But then also they said that ground troops -- this is Dempsey saying this, Jake -- ground troops, of course, will be need, but they don't have to be American. Where do we go from here?

TAPPER: Well, I mean, the hope, and it's one that a lot of military experts and members of the military don't think is necessarily reliable, but the hope is that there will be enough Syrian moderates, Turkish fighters and Iraqi fighters that that will be some sort of ground troop presence. But even Jay Carney a couple days ago on my show started talking about -- Jay Carney, the former White House press secretary -- started talking about how he didn't think it was unforeseeable that there would be more American troops sent to the region to embed within these units of Iraqi, Syrian and Kurdish fighters.

So I do think that there, obviously, needs to be some sort of -- according to all military experts at least -- some sort of a next phase that will involve more ground troops. And the question I guess is, is how much will those troops be entirely from these three groups from the region and how much will they not? I don't think there are going to be - we're going to be able to see UAE, Jordanian, Saudi troops the way that we've seen them participate to a degree in the air campaign.

LEMON: Yes, and he said they don't have to be. He didn't say they weren't going to be. He just said they don't have to be.

So, thank you, Jake Tapper. Thank you, Peter Mansoor. Appreciate it.

And just before Hagel and Dempsey took to the stage, historic moments on CNN. Our cameras caught a dramatic firefight between Kurdish forces and ISIS terrorists. Our report, just yards away, as tracer fire lit up the sky. You're going to see how this ended in real time here on CNN. And we're going to take you live to the Turkey-Syria border to see what's happening there right now.

And the FBI admits an al Qaeda cell targeted in the U.S. air strikes could still have plots in motion against Americans here in the United States. This is CNN's special coverage. Don't go anywhere.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: So you're about to see something that most of us have never seen on television, so pay close attention. For weeks now we have been speaking of ISIS brutality and seeing the terrorists in action only in the way they want in propaganda videos. But here now, witness ISIS as you never have before, live, in battle, taking fire and getting hit. Remarkable viewpoint coming from CNN crews positioned in Turkey near the Syrian border in a town called Karaca. A warning for you though, that what you're about to see is dramatic war violence, including a man apparently getting shot about 13 seconds into this video that we're about to show you. The voices you'll hear, our Phil Black at the border speaking to CNN's John Berman just a few hours ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PHIL BLACK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: CNN photojournalist Claudia Otto (ph) saw some of those ISIS fighters take casualties on the top of that hill. Still seek shelter there, trying to use that territory to their advantage and protect themselves from incoming fire from their Kurdish opponents.

As I speak, there is small arms fire being traded. I'm not sure if you can hear it over our microphones. But that's what's been going on really for the last few hours. And in addition to that, we've been hearing a lot of heavy artillery fire as well. Mortars. One (INAUDIBLE) in and struck not far from their (ph) ISIS position only about 10 minutes ago or so.

Dusk is falling now. It's getting a little bit harder to make out precisely what's going on at that distance. I apologize for that. And the fighting itself appears to be slowing as well. But as it stands at the moment, those ISIS fighters on the top of that ridge appear to have been stopped or at least their advance slowed down at that location by the fighting of the coalition opponents.

Now, the thing that I think is quite striking, watching those ISIS fighters -- I'm just being told, sorry, John, that one of those fighters at the top of the hill was just injured. They've just taken casualties at the top of that hill.

What I started to touch on earlier, what I think is quite striking, is you see those fighters out in the open, on the top of that ridge there, is that they are being not - I should say they are not being interfered with at all by any form of air power. And that's really a crucial point that the fighters on the ground have made to us and indeed the many refugees that we've been talking to crossing into Turkey in recent days. They've all been asking the question, where is this coalition air fire that is striking ISIS positions elsewhere in Syria, elsewhere in Iraq, we are told, but not here on the ground where ISIS is still advancing, still trying to claim new territory, where refugees tell us they have still been killing innocent civilians in villages that they come to and take control of.

So that is the scene here. An extraordinary scene as dusk is falling here on the Syrian border. ISIS fighters in action. We just saw tracer fire move across the skyline there. Something of a ooh and ahh from the crowd here. This crowd of Turkish Kurds, when they have seen a lot of incoming fire going into that ISIS position, they've been cheering their Kurdish brothers on the other side.

So what is clear, as I say, dusk is falling, but, John, the fighting is very much continuing. JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Phil, stick with me if you can. Please be as

careful as you need to be in this situation because we have seen what I believe to be tracers or some kind of fire going by on the - on the picture in front of us, as well as we can hear the gunfire.

This really raises several important issues all at once. As you say, it shows the enormous range that these ISIS fighters are operating in across Syria and across Iraq as well.

I believe we're now hearing cheering as the battle is being taken to ISIS right now. I think the people where Phil is, these refugees who have been driven out by ISIS, the human toll.

BLACK: The ISIS' reputation has sent a shockwave of fear through the Kurdish villages and towns in this region. That is what triggered an enormous refugee exodus into Turkey over the last week. Estimates put it at somewhere close to 200,000 people moving into Turkey in just a few days, literally picking up whatever they can carry, moving through the dusty landscape and then cueing to move across the border to safety and security and to what you have to say is an uncertain future in refugee camps.

What they have left behind is a small fighting force of Kurdish fighters who say they are armed and prepared to fight very hard to try and slow down this advance. And they say they have managed to do that successfully to some degree. But they have been reporting to us each day that ISIS has been making progress. A few more miles each day.

Now, just take a look up at that ridge line now. What you're seeing is tracer fire moving in to that ridge line that is currently occupied by ISIS forces. And around me, the Kurdish crowd is cheering. Take a listen.

Now, John, it is getting quite dark here, so increasingly difficult to make out the actual figures on the ridgeline itself. But we can see from their tracer fire that they are still receiving incoming fire and it is at that position that our photojournalist, Claudia Otto (ph), has seen ISIS fighters take casualties.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Fascinating to watch. Up next, we're going to take you live to that border to see where those fighters are going. And I'll speak with the man who watched that firefight just from yards away. There he is, CNN's Phil Black. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: So just before the break you saw CNN video of Kurdish Syrian forces battling ISIS. Now let's return to that scene, the scene of the firefight. Our correspondent, Phil Black, is at the Syrian-Turkish border.

Phil, it's dark now where you are. What can you hear? Has that fighting ending? PHIL BLACK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Don, it has largely ending. We're still

hearing the occasional burst of small arms fire. A short time ago, there was a very large explosion in the distance. We couldn't quite work out what that was. But for the most part, it is silent. It appears that the fight, as intense as it was just a few hours ago, has effectively ceased for the night. And it really was a few hours ago that we saw that very intense, ongoing firefight between ISIS fighters at the top of a ridge line, just across the border, not far from where we are now, and those Syrian Kurdish fighters so desperately working to hold them off, Don.

LEMON: Yes. And it was -- you know, it stopped you - it stopped most people in their tracks. When I saw this video, and I saw you on the air live earlier, I had to just watch the entire time. And we understand that someone living in the Syrian town right near this firefight said that people there are waiting for coalition air strikes. Is that what you're hearing among the refugees that you're with?

BLACK: Yes, very much so. It has been a repeated question for several days now. We've been spending a lot of time talking to the refugees that have been fleeing that very fighting or fighting like that that we witnessed. This approaching ISIS force through this region has triggered a humanitarian crisis, a very large one. We know some 140,000 to 150,000 refugees crossed into Turkey earlier in the week and we're seeing thousands still every day as ISIS gets closer.

And as they do, as they flee, they have been asking, where is or where are these air strikes from this international coalition? Yesterday the Kurdish fighters across the border in Syria issued an official statement saying they want to collaborate. They would like to work with this international coalition. They desperately want to see this air power over this region. They're prepared to help provide the sort of targeting information that they think they can provide that would make those air strikes possible. To our knowledge, so far there has been no response from the international coalition to that specific request.

But it's a tough ask. It really is. Because in this sort of fight, it requires qualified eyes on the ground to talk the air strikes in to insure that they hit the right targets. And, of course, as we know, and we've been talking about, that is one thing that has been missing and is missing from this sustained international military effort, Don.

LEMON: And to see the civilians so close, and to see you so close and the civilians watching it as if it's a supporting event, and even applauding at times, how are you able to discern the fighters we saw earlier from ISIS?

BLACK: What we're using to discern them effectively is the directions in which they're fighting and also the degree to which they are armed and the apparent equipment that they appear to be traveling.

What we know is that ISIS fighters have been advancing through this region towards a main town, Kobani. It is just south of the Turkish/Syrian border. It is the center, if you like, of this predominantly ethnic Kurdish region. There are lots of villages surrounding it. And over the last week or so, ISIS fighters have been advancing through this region towards Kobani. That appears to be the goal.

And it is that advance that has triggered the refugee exodus that we've seen through this week. so from where we are standing now, due east of here is Kobani. The fighters on the ground behind us tell us that ISIS is fighting towards this town from the east, where we are standing now, from the south and from the west as well. So from every available direction really because north of Kobani is Turkey. They can't do that just yet.

So we know that ISIS has been fighting to get there. We know that because the refugees have seen them, have witnessed the fighting, have lost loved ones to it, both small arms fire and artillery as well. And we know from those Kurdish fighters on the ground that they are working desperately to try and slow down that advance. But they believe that they are under armed compared to the ISIS fighters and they are also smaller in number. So they fear that ultimately they can't hold out indefinitely. That is why they are so keen to have any sort of assistance that they can possibly get and it is why they are appealing to this international coalition to lend their air support, their air power to this fight, Don.

LEMON: Phil Black with just an extraordinary, extraordinary position there, being able to watch that. Phil Black, be careful, of course. Up -- it's very close. Up close and personal with what's going on over there on the Turkish-Syrian border.

Up next, will the United Kingdom join in on this war on ISIS? Just moments ago we got the answer after a fiery debate involving David Cameron. My next guest says Congress should cut its recess short and they should do the same thing.

Plus, a disturbing story out of Oklahoma, a woman beheaded at work. That's right, I said a woman beheaded at work. And investigators are looking into reports that the suspect was trying to convert people to Islam. Stay right here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)