MSNBC "Hardball With Chris Matthews" - Transcript

Interview

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Let‘s start with the president‘s trip to Dover Air Force Base to pay respects to Americans killed in Afghanistan. U.S. Democratic congressman Tim Walz of Minnesota is a veteran. He‘s also on the Veterans Affairs Committee. And retired general Barry McCaffrey, of course, is MSNBC military analyst.

General, I want to start with you. If the president accepts the request from General McChrystal, the field commander in Afghanistan, and gives him 40,000 more troops to start with, what kind of a mission will that be? How many years will we be in Afghanistan? And what are the expected casualties over that period of time?

GEN. BARRY MCCAFFREY, U.S. ARMY (RET.), MSNBC MILITARY ANALYST: Well, you know, the president‘s got this huge dilemma he‘s facing. My gut instinct is we‘re there for a decade. The coming three years will be very difficult. I‘d be unsurprised to see $300 billion and 15,000 U.S. killed and wounded. This is tough work.

The question the president and the Congress have to address, though, Chris, isn‘t 10,000 or 40,000 troops, it‘s what are our political and military objectives, and can he explain that to the American people and gain their support? Without their support, this is not a sustainable operation.

MATTHEWS: Well, let‘s take a look--let‘s go to the congressman, Tim Walt. What do you make of a proposition that the United States goes in there whole hog in a counterinsurgency program to defend the country of Afghanistan from a Taliban takeover, a full effort, population defense, and helping to rebuild the institutions of that country, nation building? Is that a smart thing for us to be doing?

REP. TIM WALZ (D-MN), VETERANS AFFAIRS COMMITTEE: Well, I think it‘s where we‘re at, Chris. And I think General McCaffrey‘s assessment was very close. I think the problem was here that we didn‘t have that clear mission. I think it‘s also incredibly important talking about Secretary of State Clinton‘s visit to Pakistan. This is much more about Pakistan than it is about Afghanistan, of trying to make sure that the Taliban insurgency into Pakistan does not destabilize a nuclear power.

So the fact of the matter is, I don‘t know if there‘s any real good solutions here. They are all going to be difficult. The good news is, is that the president‘s taking a thoughtful approach. He‘s listening to everyone across the spectrum and trying to come up with a plan that has the best chance of success. And I think success needs to be defined as denying a clear operating and a clear place for al Qaeda to be able to conduct their missions out of, and that‘s going to be a difficult task, as the general stated.

MATTHEWS: Well, it seems to me the general has a very strong plan in mind, General. General McChrystal‘s talking about 40,000 more troops now. He may be asking for more later. He may wish to have even more now. But clearly, he‘s talking counterinsurgency. He‘s talking about defeating the Taliban. That‘s the mission he was told to undertake, and that sounds like a very big mission, to prevent the Taliban, who are people from Afghanistan, from retaking control of that country against a government which is perhaps seen by the people there as corrupt, which is incapable of protecting itself and denying the Taliban the ability to take over the country.

In other words, General, I want to ask it again. Are we basically replacing the Karzai government in terms of the defense establishment of that country?

MCCAFFREY: Well, I think the president‘s March strategy, which he fired the commander on the ground, put in a new guy, Stan McChrystal--who I might add is probably the most effective counterterrorist fighter we‘ve had in 25 years. The real mission he was assigned, now, Chris, the military component was build the Afghan security forces, build an army, and a tougher proposition, help build the police force. We just had three DEA agents who were killed in action along with our soldiers last week.

So Stan McChrystal isn‘t going to build a new nation. That‘s going to be Ambassador Eikenberry, the Treasury Department, Agriculture, State and others. What Stan‘s going to do is protect the population until an Afghan security force can step forward. Is that doable? That‘s a legitimate debate.

MATTHEWS: But that is a war between the United States and the Taliban. The Taliban can pick its time, pick its place. It can identify itself as Taliban simply by its decision to attack at any given moment. We can‘t go around the country killing people because we think they‘re Taliban, we have to wait for them to attack us in fixed positions. Doesn‘t that put us on the defensive, General?

MCCAFFREY: Well, I think the public rhetoric in Washington is entirely that. It implies we‘re going to go to 10 populated areas, we‘re going to cede the rest of the country to the Taliban, we‘re going to embed in the population and protect them there. It‘s going to be a stretch. Again, the key is, this is not an operational nation. It‘s a war between the Pashtuns, the Tajiks, the Haidars, et cetera. Afghan versus Pakistan is ill-defined. As the congressman correctly points out, our vital national security interests are more likely to be in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia than Afghanistan. This is tough lifting politically for our president.

MATTHEWS: Well, especially given this. Former CIA field officer Bob Baer, who‘s been on this program many times, and you know him, General--he wrote in "Time" magazine this week, "The real question for the U.S. should not be about the morality--should not be about the morality of a drug dealer on the CIA‘s payroll but whether it‘s a metaphor for the huge challenge we face in Afghanistan. Do we stand any chance at all of building a modern, peaceful nation with confederates like Ahmed Wali Karzai?" He‘s the drug-dealing brother of the president over there, who‘s apparently on our payroll. "Vietnam would suggest the answer is no."

Congressman, this is beginning to look a lot like ‘65 and ‘68. We‘ve got Madame Nu. We‘ve got the brother Nu. We‘ve got Diem here, a weak leader--not a mystic, perhaps, like Diem, but a weak leader who‘s apparently not popular. He‘s got a brother who‘s a drug dealer who‘s on our payroll. And we have the unwillingness, apparently, or the inability of that government to defend itself against the Taliban. That‘s going to be our job.

WALZ: Well...

MATTHEWS: Should American people--should we as a country be the main defense force of the Afghanistan people?

WALZ: No, we can‘t be. And it has to be the Afghans doing it themselves. And the general‘s right, the toughest hurdle to overcome is the police force, and I think we‘re making progress on that, but I can understand the American public. And I spent 24 years doing this. It shouldn‘t have taken eight years to train these guys up. We‘re not close to getting them there yet.

And I think that this myth that was started and perpetrated for seven years, that Afghanistan would be a functioning multi-party democracy and a first world economy was absolutely ludicrous. And I think as far as Karzai is concerned--I stressed all along we needed to go to a run-off. I think the legitimacy of the Karzai government is probably always going to be in question.

MATTHEWS: OK. Well, let‘s take a look at what the president said today, Congressman and General McCaffrey. Let‘s listen to President Obama today after his visit to Dover Air Force Base to honor the war dead. Let‘s listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It was a sobering reminder of the extraordinary sacrifices that our young men and women in uniform are engaging in every single day, not only our troops but their families, as well. And so Michelle and I are constantly mindful of those sacrifices. And obviously, you know, the burden of that both our troops and our families bear in any wartime situation is going to bear on how I see these conflicts. And you know, it is something that I think about each and every day.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTHEWS: It was clear he was up all night. The president didn‘t get back to the White House on Marine One until about 4:00 from Dover.

Let me ask you, Congressman, if you had to choose between an all-out effort to defend the government of Pakistan against--or Afghanistan, rather, against the Taliban with 10,000, or 40,000 more troops, rather, now and maybe more later, or a decision to basically say, That government‘s not defensible, it isn‘t our job to do it, we‘ll take our chances with an alternative plan, what would you do?

WALZ: Well, no one‘s presented the alternative plan at this point,

Chris. And I don‘t think at the Karzais‘ level that there‘s going to be

that. But at the local level, I think there is. And I agree General

McChrystal was the best person for this job. But before we undertake this

I‘ve been out and I want to know--I want to know how they‘re going to do this. I want to know how we‘re going to measure results, and I want to know before the president goes back and stands at Dover again, as it will happen, that what we‘re asking them to do is achievable and that it‘s in this nation‘s best interest.

MATTHEWS: OK...

WALZ: That has to be articulated still.

MATTHEWS: Within the military establishment, General McCaffrey, I understand that the experience of Tommy Franks when we first went into Iraq is very educational. Don‘t accept a mission without the resources to carry it out or you‘ll be blamed in history. And I guess that‘s the question for General McChrystal. And here‘s the question to you, General. Is there a middle ground here? Does the president have to basically take the advice of his general and give him the resources he‘s asked for, the 40,000 troops now, or else admit that he‘s not doing it?

MCCAFFREY: No, absolutely not. It‘s entirely legitimate for the commander-in-chief to sort out the diplomatic, economic, covert intelligence, allied support, as well as the direct resource requirements from his military commander on the field. Of course that‘s appropriate.

My guess is they‘ll end up, the government, joining hands in some course of action. Then they‘ll feel they bought into it and they‘ll go to the American people, the Congress, and try and gain support of it. You know, the congressman‘s a retired Army command sergeant major with time in combat. I think he called this entirely correctly. This process is important. It‘s got to be deliberate...

MATTHEWS: OK...

MCCAFFREY: ... because once embarked, and it‘s 42,000 killed and wounded so far--this is going to be tough work.

MATTHEWS: OK. It‘s murky for me. I need to have one quick answer for both of you. Is there a middle course between giving the general on the field the 40,000 troops he wants and saying no? Is there a middle course, or is that just muddling through, like LBJ did? Congressman?

WALZ: No, I think there is, Chris, because I think it‘s different. I think we get a tighter mission on training the Afghan security forces...

MATTHEWS: OK...

WALZ: ... and I think that‘s possible.

MATTHEWS: OK, General, is there a middle course here, or is that just BS‘ing ourselves, to offer a middle course?

MCCAFFREY: Well, there may--of course, there‘s a middle course because you can use contractors, economic leverage, allies. However, there‘s a bit of me says arguing about 10,000 to 40,000 is nonsense. You know, you could give him 50,000 and it won‘t change the reality. What are the political and military objectives, and can they get the country to support it?

MATTHEWS: OK. I just remembered the old rule, Don‘t throw a 50-foot rope to a guy drowning 100 feet from shore. And I just wonder whether we have to be careful about that. Congressman Tim Walz, Army veteran, of course, and General Barry McCaffrey, thank you, gentlemen.

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