31 U.S. Troops Dead in War Zone Crash; Downgrades U.S. Credit Rating
JOE JOHNS, CNN ANCHOR: It may be the deadliest single incident involving U.S. troops in 10 years of fighting in Afghanistan. An Army Chinook helicopter crashed overnight, and at least 31 U.S. special forces troops were killed. U.S. officials confirm that most of them were members of the U.S. Navy's elite SEAL Teams, and they believe the helicopter was shot down. Straight to Washington, D.C., now and our Pentagon correspondent, Barbara Starr. Barbara, any new details about that helicopter crash? What do the officials think happened?</s>BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, indeed, Joe, at this point, 22 Navy SEALs have lost their lives, many of them, most of them, we are told, members of the same overall unit, the covert unit of Navy SEALs that went after Osama bin Laden, not the same exact commandos. They have run a name checklist and none of the men that were on the bin Laden mission were involved in this tragedy. But nonetheless, 22 Navy SEALs have lost their lives. They were working as what is called a Quick Reaction Force. They had been called in to get on a helicopter, move very fast to try and help another unit that was pinned down, that was involved in a firefight and had called for some additional reinforcement, some additional help. That's when this happened. At this point, full investigation under way, but an official telling us they do believe there's a very good possibility it was shot down. There was enemy fire in the area. But nonetheless, they will conduct an investigation. And of course, right now, the prime mission really is for those casualty assistance officers to move very quickly across this country to hometowns, home bases, and try and get to the families who have lost their loved ones, notify them of all the details they can, and get them whatever help they need to get through this -- Joe.</s>JOHNS: So where does this crash stand compared to other deadly incidents? And there have been many in Afghanistan.</s>STARR: Well, I have to tell you, at this point, by all accounts, we think that, you know, this is perhaps the one with the highest casualty rate. There was an incident that involved both helicopters and a firefight in June of 2005, when 19 troops lost their lives in, essentially, what became a single incident. You want to acknowledge, of course, that every single loss is a terrible tragedy for the families involved. But it is the scope of this one, 22 Navy SEALs. This will be felt across the Navy SEAL community for some time to come. You know, think of it this way. It was 22 SEALs, a total of 25 special operations forces. There were some others from other services on board. They're going to have to replace them in Afghanistan very quickly. These are the units that go out every night on these helicopter assault missions into some of the toughest areas of Afghanistan, go after the insurgents, go after those so-called "high value targets." Those missions don't stop. That job continues and will continue. And as difficult it may be to acknowledge so soon after this, the men who lost their lives, they are going to be replaced. The military says it will continue with its mission -- Joe.</s>JOHNS: So the president is out at Camp David, as we've been reporting, and we all know that he's, you know, kept in constant contact, especially on important situations like this one. But who is it that is talking to the president? There you see a photograph that was released by the White House.</s>STARR: Well, sure. I mean, an incident of this magnitude, of this scope, certainly notified to the president. As soon as word comes in to the White House Situation Room, into the National Security Council, there are people who are always on tap with the president who will wake him up in the middle of the night when one of these crises occurs. He will -- has kept in contact today with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the U.S. military. They have continued to brief him on these developments as they move forward. The next step, of course, will be for the arrival of the remains of those who have been killed at Dover Air Force Base. That is now where for so many years, we have seen these very somber ceremonies of flag- covered caskets come home. There will be quite a number of them coming in the next few days, Joe.</s>JOHNS: Barbara Starr, thanks so much for that, a very sad day in Washington, D.C., and around the country as we look for more details on that helicopter crash in Afghanistan. Thanks, Barbara.</s>STARR: Sure.</s>JOHNS: A little while ago, I talked to a retire U.S. Army general who told me that the impact on the special operations community cannot be overstated.</s>BRIG. GEN. MARK KIMMITT, U.S. ARMY (RET.): My recollection, there are probably seven SEAL teams in the country. I don't know the exact number in each SEAL team, but probably not less than -- or not more than a couple of hundred, at the most. So when you start talking a total SEAL population of perhaps under 1,000, if, in fact, you've lost two dozen, it's not solely a tragedy for the families -- and it's a tremendous tragedy and our hearts go out to those families -- but there will be an operational consequence to the SEAL community of losing that large number.</s>JOHNS: Again, if the casualty figures are confirmed, this crash will be the deadliest single incident for U.S. troops so far in the Afghanistan war. The U.S. no longer has perfect credit. After taking the country's top rating down a peg for the first time ever yesterday, the S&P; said there is plenty of political blame to go around. But the agency's managing director says the downgrade could have been avoided.</s>JOHN CHAMBERS, MANAGING DIR., STANDARD & POOR'S: I think you could have done a few things. I mean, the first thing you could have done is to have raised the debt celling in a timely manner so that much of this debate had been avoided to begin with, as it had done, you know, 60 or 70 times since 1960 without that much debate. So that's point number one. And point number two is they could have come up with a fiscal plan, you know, similar, for example, to, you know, the Bowles-Simpson commission, which was bipartisan.</s>JOHNS: So just how big a deal is this? Poppy Harlow's here now to break it all down. Poppy, this essentially kicks the United States out of an exclusive AAA club. But what does that mean, really?</s>POPPY HARLOW, CNNMONEY CORRESPONDENT: It absolutely does. And there are more and more that are saying right now, Joe, that this is a wakeup call that the United States needed, that it wasn't on a fiscal path that was sustainable. And it does. Let's take a look at the countries that still retain their AAA credit rating, the United States not among them now, countries like Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Switzerland. The United States was part of that exclusive club up until 8:00 o'clock Eastern last night, when S&P; downgraded it. It is no longer part of that. Just to put this in perspective for you, we're still rated at AA-plus. That's still a very high rating. We're rated higher than China. This puts us sort of right in line with Belgium. This is still a high rating. But the concern is, what does this do, on one hand, to confidence, to the American consumer right now, given the high unemployment, given the lack of consumer confidence? What does it do to the stock market? We'll know that Monday morning here in New York when trading opens. And overall, what does this do to the investor at home? Does this drive interest rates up across the board? That's the fear. We don't know because this has never happened in the history of this country, so it's an unprecedented move and we head into uncharted territory, Joe.</s>JOHNS: Let's talk a little bit about S&P;'s reason for doing this. What are the factors they use to sort of make this decision to downgrade the U.S. credit?</s>HARLOW: So they follow five sort of different guidelines. We'll pull them up on the screen and show them to you. But there's two real key ones. You see "political climate," and that is number one for a reason. There was a lot of talk about the political fight in Washington over the debt ceiling deal that contributed to this decision. The real economy -- what's the state of the U.S. economy, and we all know how sour that is right now. The fiscal situation, taxes coming in -- you heard the head of S&P; talk last night about it will really determine how long they keep this downgraded rating on the United States if we see an extension of the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts. If we let those lapse, he said that will give us an additional $950 billion, so that that could help. Also, the external situation -- how is the global economy? It's not strong right now. And finally, monetary policy -- where does the Fed stand? Where are interest rates? The two key parts of that, Joe, is the political climate and also the fiscal path that we're on. And as you know so well, being in Washington, Joe, politics played a huge part in this.</s>JOHNS: Right, and that's the thing that sort of set off some alarm bells because it's kind of surprising, isn't it, for an agency like this to make a decision on the country's credit based on the internal political infighting, if you will.</s>HARLOW: I think it is surprising. I was certainly surprised to read that in the statement that S&P; issued. But at the same time, it's not unwarranted or uncalled for. I mean, we all saw how that debt debate played out in Washington and how unbelievable it was that it was carried to the 11th hour. I want to pull up a statement here that came from Standard & Poor's. I think this really exemplifies it. S&P; said, "The political brinkmanship of recent months highlights what we see as America's governance and policy-making becoming less stable, less effective and less predictable than originally thought." So what they're saying in this statement is that they do not believe that the political machine in Washington right now, lawmakers that we pay to handle our budget as a country, deserve a AAA credit rating right now. So you know, there's going to be a lot of arguing about whether or not it was warranted for them to take a political angle on this, but bottom line, they did, Joe.</s>JOHNS: It sure was brinksmanship, and it sure did make you feel as if it was unstable there in Washington,</s>D.C. HARLOW: Yes.</s>JOHNS: So hard to argue with that. Thanks so much, Poppy. There's a lot of uncertainty here since this is uncharted financial territory. Fallout from the credit downgrade is reverberating inside the Washington Beltway. Our Athena Jones is in Washington with reaction from the White House. Athena, what are the congressional leaders saying about this?</s>ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the congressional leaders, it's interesting -- you heard what Poppy said about what Standard & Poor's said about Congress. This is really an indictment of Congress and the kind of dysfunction that we've been seeing over the last several weeks, with Republicans and Democrats not able to get together and agree. And so they were able to agree at this last moment, but they kicked the can down the road. They put off the tough decisions on things like tax revenues and entitlement reform. And what you've seen is that even after this -- right after this decision was announced last night, you saw members of Congress sending out a whole slew of e- mails, and it looked like they're still in their respective corners. You had people like John Boehner saying, Well, this S&P; decision just proves that the Democrats have been overspending, we've got to cut, cut, cut. And you had Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid come out and say, Well, this downgrade shows that we need to have a balanced approach that includes taxes and entitlements. And so it's unclear going forward whether the two sides are going to be able to come together, as the S&P; wants to see, and as the White House has encouraged, Joe.</s>JOHNS: Wow. It's just pretty remarkable. And also on the campaign trail, you're actually seeing a lot of people out there, particularly Republicans, blaming the Obama administration, which is a very interesting dynamic, especially when you consider the fact that, clearly, the public blames both parties for not getting together on these things. Thanks so much for that reporting, Athena Jones in Washington.</s>JONES: Thanks, Joe.</s>JOHNS: In other news, polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs is back in court today for more testimony in the penalty phase of his trial. Jeffs faces up to life in prison after being found guilty of child sexual assault. The 12 and 15-year-olds were called his so-called "spiritual wives." A New Orleans jury has convicted four current police officers and one former one in the controversial shootings at the Danziger Bridge. The five were found guilty yesterday of depriving victims of their rights and other civil rights violations. Two men were fatally shot on the bridge in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Four others were wounded. The FBI has launched a nationwide manhunt for three Florida siblings. They're accused of eluding police in a high-speed chase and shooting, and a police car -- running it off the road. They're also wanted for allegedly robbing a Georgia bank. Their mom is urging them to surrender, but that's doubtful. Police say the three sent a text to their mom saying, There's a time for all of us to die. The University of Alabama was finally able to hold commencement ceremonies today, three months after a deadly tornadoes ripped through the state. The commencement, planned back in May, had to be postponed. Six students from the university were killed when the storm hit Tuscaloosa. Their parents accepted posthumous degrees for them today. Mixing politics and religion in Texas. Critics of Governor Rick Perry's prayer rally want to know how he would separate church from state if he runs for president. And a surprising retreat in Somalia. A militant group with ties to al Qaeda suddenly leaves Mogadishu.