James Foley's Mother Blasting U.S. Government; Pope Francis Says War is Madness
FEYERICK: Right now, the U.S. is building support for its campaign to destroy the ISIS terror group, and here is what we know. Today, Secretary of State John Kerry is in Egypt. He held talks with the country's President and Secretary General of the Arab League. Afterwards, Kerry said that it is increasingly clear that the, quote, "Message of hate," unquote, is being rejected. And, the family of a British man held hostage by ISIS has now issued a plea to his captors to contact them. David Haines' life was threatened by ISIS in a recent video. The aide worker was abducted last year. Contrast now with the parents with executed American Journalist, James Foley. Foley's execution is a key reason the U.S. is now preparing to go after the terror group. But, his mother, Diane Foley, is blasting the U.S. government for how it treated her and her family, as they tried in vain to free her son from captivity. She sat down with Anderson Cooper for this exclusive interview.</s>DIANE FOLEY, JAMES FOLEY'S MOTHER: We were told we could not raise ransom, that it was illegal. We might be prosecuted.</s>ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: You were told you would actually be prosecuted.</s>FOLEY: Yes, that was a real possibility, told that many times. We were told that our government would not exchange prisoners, would not do a military action. So, we were just told to trust that he would be freed somehow, miraculous. And, he was not, was he? We Americans failed him. I -- it is nobody's fault. It is just the fault of a lack of discussion around it and understanding.</s>FEYERICK: And, despite that criticism, National Security Adviser Susan Rice praised Diane Foley and defended the government's efforts to free the U.S. journalist.</s>SUSAN RICE, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: She is an extraordinary woman. She did an amazing job on behalf of her family and with her husband and other children, to do everything possible, leave no stone unturned, to try to bring Jim home safely. We are all heartbroken that that was not possible. But, I and others in the U.S. government work very hard with Diane Foley and her family, to try to be supportive, to try to provide what information we could. And, of course, as you know, the President ordered a very daring and very well-executed rescue operation, when, on the only occasion we had what we thought was fresh and we hoped actionable intelligence about the whereabouts of Jim Foley and the other hostages. Unfortunately, they were no longer there.</s>FEYERICK: And, Diane Foley also told Anderson Cooper that she is embarrassed about how the government handled her son's plight and that freeing James did not seem to be in the United States', quote, "Strategic interests," unquote. And, some very strong words from Pope Francis this morning. He said that war is madness and he hinted it World War III as the U.S. built a coalition to fight the brutal terror group, ISIS. He made these remarks while paying homage to Poland soldiers at the Italian World War I Memorial near the Italian-Austrian border.</s>POPE FRANCIS, POPE OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH: War ruins everything, even the bonds between brothers. War is irrational. It is only plan is to bring destruction. It seeks to grow by destroying.</s>FEYERICK: And CNN Senior Vatican Analyst, John Allen, joins me now from Denver. And, John, Popes have always given speeches against war. What do you think makes this Pope is message any difference?</s>JOHN ALLEN, CNN SENIOR VATICAN ANALYST: Well, Deborah, I do not think there is anything original in the message. I mean as you indicated, this kind of denunciation of world, and then the Pope Francis also denounced what he called the plotters of terrorism. All of that has been said since time in memorial by Pope. I think what is unique about Francis is what he does to try to back that up, because he is willing to roll the dice on some fairly bold initiatives. A year ago, when the western powers were contemplating going to war in Syria, he called the 1.2 billion Catholics of the world to a special day of prayer and fasting to try to stop that and of course he was largely successful. Last June, he brought the Presidents of Israel and Palestine for an unprecedented peace prayer in the Vatican gardens. Now, that was not successful in stopping the conflict in Gaza, but Francis has said, he believes it has opened the door that he wants to try to walk through. And, we now know this week, he is planning to travel to Turkey in late November. A trip that he hopes will take him as close as he can possibly get to the Iraq border, to try to meet with refugees from ISIS. And, that might be a chance for him to launch another initiative, such as, and this has been talked about, inviting Muslim leaders to sit down with him to talk about how together they might be able to combat religious extremism. So, Deborah, I think the unique element with Francis is not what he says, it is what he does.</s>FEYERICK: Yes. It is so interesting, because he is going to Turkey. He is going to hopefully meet with some of the people. But, in the end, you have got all these disparate heads of these factions in Syria, some also in Iraq. How does he reach out to them personally? Because you can reach out to the people, but can the people really change the message of what is going on with ISIS?</s>ALLEN: Well, I think, first of all, Francis -- I mean one of the distinctive touches of his diplomatic style is his personal engagement. And, I think what you may well see him do is try to reach out to the so-called moderate voices, that is the mainstream leaders of Islam in the Middle East and other parts of the world, to try to come together with him personally, to see what they might be able to do with the project different message. But, on the other hand, I think we also should say that Pope Francis' message about ISIS is somewhat unique, and that for the last quarter century, the Vatican has been kind of instinctively hostile to virtually every Western, and in particular, every American use of force in the Middle East. They opposed the two Gulf wars. They opposed the war in Afghanistan and so on. But, in this particular case, Francis has also said that it is morally legitimate to try to stop an unjust aggressor, which is a kind of indirect yellow light for these American strikes. So, I think you are going to see Francis moving on two levels. One is, trying to do something long-term to change the game, but in the short-term, I think also acknowledging that the use of force in this case may be the best of the bad options we have got.</s>FEYERICK: Right. All right, pretty forceful there. John Allen, thanks so much. Interesting as always that he is calling it morally legitimate to stop an aggressor. All right, John, thanks. And, we are going to be switching gears back to the NFL next. The NFL and it's commissioner in legal jeopardy because of the handling of the Ray Rice videotape. Our legal experts are going to be weighing in on all of that.