CNN American Morning - Transcript

CNN

SHOW: AMERICAN MORNING 07:00

HEADLINE: Discussing Testimony by Major General Antonio Taguba Before Senate Armed Services Committee; Recapping Yesterday's Hearing in Sexual Assault Case Against Kobe Bryant

GUESTS: Sen. Jack Reed, Alex Stone, Ryan Whitfield, Karen Champa

BYLINE: Soledad O'Brien, Bill Hemmer, Jack Cafferty, Jeffrey Toobin

HIGHLIGHT:
Reed discusses the testimony today by Major General Antonio Taguba before the Senate Armed Services Committee about his report on the Iraqi prison abuse scandal. Toobin discusses the legal questions involved in the court-martial of a U.S. soldier allegedly involved in the Iraqi prison abuse scandal, and the differences between military and civil law. KOA Radio's Stone recaps yesterday's hearing in the sexual assault case against Kobe Bryant. Whitfield and Champa discuss the unlikely accident which Whitfield survived after his truck went off a cliff. Cafferty reads viewer e-mail on whether the prisoner abuse scandal has changed their view of the war in Iraq.

BODY:
O'BRIEN: The general whose Pentagon report led to the Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal tells his story today in public on Capitol Hill. Major General Antonio Taguba will be questioned by members of the Senate Armed Services Committee in a hearing that begins in just about an hour and a half. In his report, Taguba writes of "sadistic, blatant and wanton criminal abuses" at the Abu Ghraib Prison just outside of Baghdad.

Democratic Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island is a member of the Armed Services Committee and he joins us this morning from Capitol Hill.

Good morning to you, sir.

Thanks for being with us.

SEN. JACK REED (D-RI), ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: Good morning, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: We're going to hear this morning not only from General Taguba, but also from the undersecretary of defense, Stephen Cambone, who you were very interested in bringing into this discussion.

What do you want to hear from him?

REED: Well, we're interested and I'm interested in finding out whether there was a policy that encouraged this type of behavior, that, in effect, set the context or the environment that might have prompted these soldiers to act dishonorably and in an abhorrent way. But we have to look high up into the Department of Defense to see if, in fact, they created an environment which led to this problem.

O'BRIEN: Do you, in fact, think that there was a policy that came from people at higher levels-and I'm not just talking about higher levels of the military intelligence officers, but levels like the undersecretary of defense and something like that-that endorsed or even created that kind of policy?

REED: Well, there certainly was a policy to soften up prisoners. That policy was put forward in General Miller's report to General Sanchez. He apparently approved it. But the real question is did they have encouragement? Were they being urged by the secretary of defense, Mr. Rumsfeld, or Mr. Cambone, to do this? How did it comport with Army regulations, the Geneva Convention?

There are serious, serious policy questions. I'm skeptical because here's a situation where General Miller was involved in Guantanamo and then also sent, essentially, over to Iraq, two different theaters of operation, two different commanders, yet this policy seems to be consistent and that suggests to me that it was not something that was unaware of in the Department of Defense.

O'BRIEN: Well, so, do you have any evidence so far in any of the reports that you have read or any of the interviews that have been conducted, anything you read in General Taguba's report that would be evidence that would lead you to believe that?

REED: Well, the Taguba report suggests that these treatment of prisoners was being handled in a way that the M.P.s would be softening up these prisoners. And then there is the suggestion of-or at least the implication that it was approved by General Sanchez. That's the whole point of our hearings today, to begin to ask these questions, to get answers.

I think we have an obligation to look not just at low level soldiers. We're putting a specialist fourth class on trial in Baghdad today. We just can't stop there. We have to look at every level and hopefully exclude the possibility, but we can't ignore the possibility, that this was something that was a mistake in judgment by the senior members of the Department of Defense.

O'BRIEN: There are apparently many, many more photos of abuse, some several hundred photos, some of them showing prisoners being sodomized by light sticks, things like that. Another, they're investigating an allegation of a sexual assault of a female detainee, or attempted, at least, by two or three U.S. soldiers.

To what extent do you think the public should have full awareness of exactly what happened and do you think it should come sort of as a general release or in general leaks that we've received so far?

REED: I think there should be a full and immediate disclosure of all the incidents. There's a sensitive question about the release of photographs, since they're so graphic and so disturbing. But certainly this revelation shouldn't come in bits and pieces. There should be a complete and full candid discussion of what went on in that prison, what went on in other prisons. And we should do it quickly. We shouldn't wait.

O'BRIEN: Senator Jack Reed is a Democrat from Rhode Island joining us this morning.

REED: Thank you.

O'BRIEN: Nice to see you, sir.

Thank you.