Bill Introduced to Expand Military
LOU DOBBS, HOST: Tonight: President Bush says there will be no blanket amnesty for illegal aliens. But in California, the issue is whether they should be allowed the privilege of driver's licenses. Tonight, in "Broken Borders," two of California's most influential legislators join us with very different views. "Exporting America" -- IBM apparently wants to export jobs in a big way, planning to send thousands of high-paying American jobs overseas in one of the largest outsourcing programs ever. Bill Tucker reports. The Christmas spirit noticeably absent in many of our communities across the country, as the majority of Americans apparently bow to the will of the few this holiday season. Peter Viles reports. The military is stretched to the limit, fighting wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and against terrorism around the world. Many in Congress are calling for more troops for the military. One of the leading advocates, Congresswoman Ellen Tauscher. She joins us tonight.</s>ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Monday, December 15. Here now, Lou Dobbs.</s>DOBBS: Good evening. "Good riddance. The world is better off without you, Mr. Saddam Hussein." With those words, President Bush today told Iraqis to put their past behind them and to look to their future. President Bush told a news conference in Washington that Iraq is now on the path to freedom. He said also that Saddam Hussein should be put on trial in a way that will stand international scrutiny. Our senior White House correspondent, John King, reports -- John.</s>JOHN KING, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Lou, that news conference ran 46 minutes. It was dominated by questions about the capture of Saddam Hussein and the impact that capture will have on the situation, especially the security and political situation, in Iraq. Mr. Bush said he believed it was a turning point, in terms of the political transition within Iraq, although he did say, from a military perspective, dangerous days, more sacrifices still ahead for U.S. troops on the ground in Iraq. Mr. Bush would not answer directly when asked if he thought Saddam Hussein should be executed, but the president made his views pretty clear through his body language. And the president also could barely contain his scorn for the former Iraqi leader, calling him just short of a coward.</s>GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Good riddance. The world is better off without you, Mr. Saddam Hussein. I find it very interesting that when the heat got on, you dug yourself a hole and you crawled in it. And our brave troops, combined with good intelligence, found you. And you'll be brought to justice, something you did not afford the people you -- you brutalized in your own country.</s>KING: Now, the president could not say exactly when or how Saddam Hussein would be brought to trial, but he made clear he wanted a fair process, an open, transparent process. And Mr. Bush said this much is clear to him: The Iraqis must take the lead in putting their former leader on trial.</s>BUSH: The Iraqis need to be very much involved. He was a person that -- they were the people that were brutalized by this man. He murdered them. He gassed them. He tortured them. He had rape rooms. And they need to be very much involved in the process. And we'll work with Iraqis to develop a process.</s>KING: Now, administration lawyers still investigating this issue and reviewing it, but it is the belief of the Bush administration that Saddam could be in U.S. military custody for several months, perhaps six months or more, until he can be turned over to a new sovereign Iraqi government. Administration officials say they will continue to review that and work with the Iraqis on what a war crimes tribunal should look like. And Lou, officials here at the White House also believe that that $750,000 Saddam had in his possession was money to pay for his security and his hiding, his own personal security, not to pay for terrorist attacks on U.S. troops -- Lou.</s>DOBBS: John, thank you very much. John King, our senior White House correspondent. American officers say intelligence from Saddam Hussein and documents in his briefcase have already led to the capture of at least two former regime members in Baghdad. While interrogators are focusing at least initially on gathering intelligence about insurgency, they also want information about weapons of mass destruction and the former regime's links to terrorism. National security correspondent David Ensor has the report -- David.</s>DAVID ENSOR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Lou, again today, Saddam Hussein, the prisoner, was interrogated by U.S. military and intelligence officials. In the first questioning yesterday, the former Iraqi leader was said to be defiant -- quite ready to talk, but offering no new information. For example, sources say Saddam has denied having any hidden prisoners -- Americans, Kuwaitis or Iranians, though the latter he certainly had. He's denied having any ties with terrorists, and he's denied having any weapons of mass destruction programs, though the CIA's David Kay has found evidence such programs were continuing. Now, U.S. officials say the initial questioning, as you said, is focusing primarily on the insurgent attacks against American forces, trying to figure out if there's anything that can be learned from Saddam that might save lives. No one's particularly optimistic, but they're pressing him hard.</s>REP. PORTER GOSS (R-FL), INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN: There are all kinds of methods of professional interrogation, of ways to persuade people, incentivize people, motivate people. Most of them are mental. Some of them involve sleep deprivation or things like that, or what I will call -- your atmosphere is shaped to encourage you to talk to me truthfully.</s>ENSOR: At the CIA today, director George Tenet and others met to discuss the hunt in Iraq for weapons of mass destruction. That search, of course has not found any weapons thus far. While officials say they're not counting on Saddam to reveal all about WMD, they are hopeful that his capture will make other Iraqis less fearful and more willing to perhaps tell what they know -- Lou.</s>DOBBS: David, thank you very much. David Ensor, national security correspondent, reporting from Washington. Insurgent violence today killed more Iraqis. Two car bombs in Baghdad killed 6 Iraqi police officers, 18 other people were wounded. And today we learned more details about the capture of Saddam Hussein from the Army. Senior Pentagon correspondent Jamie McIntyre has that story for us -- Jamie.</s>JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Lou, apparently not everyone in Iraq is happy to see Saddam Hussein in U.S. custody. Take a look at this confrontation between U.S. troops and pro-Saddam protesters in his hometown of Tikrit. Saddam Hussein is still a hero to many people in the so-called "Sunni triangle," the heartland of the Ba'athist party, and the demonstration underscores the fact that capturing Saddam will not be -- necessarily end the insurgency. We're learning now also that Saddam Hussein was lucky to survive his capture because, according to one of the commanders leading the raid, a special operations soldier was ready to toss a grenade down the spider hole where Saddam Hussein was hiding if there was any sign of resistance. Still, U.S. military commanders are pressing the hunt forward for members of the insurgency, still looking for guerrilla fighters. Some of the documents recovered from Saddam Hussein's hiding place have provided leads, and one military commander says some key individuals are among those arrested since Saddam Hussein's capture. While it's believed Saddam was providing some guidance or inspiration to the resistance, commanders don't think he was issuing any orders, and no communications equipment was found with him. So that moves up to No. 1 on the most wanted list now Izzat (ph) Ibrahim al Douri, one of Saddam Hussein's key deputies, No. 6 on the most wanted list, the king of clubs in that famous deck of most wanted. There's a $10 million price tag on his head. But Lou, it doesn't appear anyone will collect the $25 million on Saddam Hussein's head because Pentagon sources are indicating that the key Iraqi informant who provided the details on his location was a captured Iraqi insurgent -- Lou.</s>DOBBS: Jamie, thank you very much. David Ensor reporting on improving -- obviously improving U.S. intelligence in Iraq, the U.S. Army obviously working with better intelligence and moving quickly to capture Saddam Hussein. Do they, given that improvement in intelligence and their broader operations and more focused operations -- do they know -- have a very good idea as to who is really directing the insurgency? Because they have talked about the sophistication of the coordination of those attacks.</s>MCINTYRE: You know, they really don't. They did learn more about some of the cells that were organized against the U.S. forces from some of the documents they captured with Saddam Hussein. But it's still a big question mark to what extent these attacks are coordinated on a broad level. They know they're coordinated on a local level. But as they work through and capture more people, they're hopeful that they're going to essentially break the back of the resistance, at some point. But it's still not clear if there's any one person or persons who are really primarily responsible.</s>DOBBS: Jamie, thank you. Jamie McIntyre, our senior Pentagon correspondent. My guest tonight says that although the insurgency continues, the capture of Saddam Hussein is an enormous breakthrough in the liberation of Iraq. Rod Nordland is "Newsweek" magazine's Baghdad bureau chief. Rod is the winner of numerous journalism awards, including the prestigious Pulitzer Prize and the Polk Award for his reporting internationally. He joins us tonight from Baghdad. Rod, good to have you here.</s>ROD NORDLAND, BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF, "NEWSWEEK": Thank you.</s>DOBBS: Rod, has there been -- let me ask you the most obvious and perhaps simple-minded question that you'll hear in a while, but in the course of the day in Baghdad, was there a noticeable change in mood amongst the people of Baghdad?</s>NORDLAND: Well, I think the most striking thing has been the relatively low-key nature of the celebration. You know, after Uday and Qusay, his sons, were killed, there was so much shooting in the air in celebration that it was really dangerous to go out. And there's been much less of that this time. And there's been a kind of -- kind of quiet atmosphere. You know, most -- a large proportion of the people here are Sunnis, like Saddam, and a lot of them felt very both embarrassed and kind of ashamed of the way in which he was captured, the way in which he was found hiding, and the way he was treated as a common prisoner, having his hair checked for lice and so on. And I don't think that went over very well. Certainly, it did among Shi'ites, who have much more reason to hate him. But amongst people of his own sect, it's a kind of strange reaction. Even though they're glad to see him captured, they're not thrilled that it was Americans who did it.</s>DOBBS: There is for most of us in the United States a peculiar gap in comprehension. The United States, with considerable force and loss of blood and lives, has -- the United States has liberated the people of Iraq, who have been under the oppression of the Ba'athists for more than three decades. There seems to be no sense of gratitude. There seems to be, in fact, a bit of, if you will -- a sense of entitlement in it all. Could you reconcile us -- reconcile that issue for all of us?</s>NORDLAND: Well, I don't know. I mean, one way of looking at it is that -- I mean, certainly, that's true. And perhaps it's partly the Iraqi character. Partly this is not just a developing country and a third world country. It's also a country with great riches, and Iraqis are aware of that. So when we come in with developmental aid and reconstruction aid and so on, they feel like, Well, that's all going be paid for from our oil wealth, and so on. But it's still a little bit hard to understand, for instance, when you have soldiers being paid $50 a month, quitting their jobs for higher pay, when that's 25 times more pay than they earned during Saddam's time.</s>DOBBS: Your best judgment -- asking you to forecast the next few months -- your best judgment about where the United States goes, in terms of bringing about higher levels of security in Baghdad and around the country, the impact, if you will, of the capture of Saddam Hussein, the effect, if any, on the ability to better control security in Iraq.</s>NORDLAND: Yes. I think all along, that's been the biggest question. What happens once we get Saddam? Will that cut the ground out from under the insurgency, and will we see fewer attacks and less impetus behind those attacks? I think it's just a bit too early to say. I mean, certainly, in the last 24, 48 hours, there's been no decrease in attacks. And maybe we'll have a better idea in a few days. I think there are some people who will give up the insurgency, who feel like there's no hope in carrying it on. But there are some dozen groups, and some of them have already -- have already said they're not fighting for Saddam, they're fighting for other interests. And I think we'll see them continue on, and we'll certainly see a pattern of terrorist attacks, perhaps by foreign elements or people inspired by foreign elements. So there's still a pretty long, hard slog ahead.</s>DOBBS: Rod, thank you very much. Rod Nordland, the bureau chief -- Baghdad bureau chief, "Newsweek" magazine. Coming up next here, "Exporting America" -- reports tonight that IBM is preparing to move thousands upon thousands of highly-paid American jobs to overseas cheap labor markets. Bill Tucker will report. And we'll update the list of companies that we've confirmed to be exporting jobs to those overseas markets. And building up the U.S. military -- a major push building in Congress. It's gaining momentum. Congresswoman Ellen Tauscher is the author of a bill to significantly expand the military. She's our guest. And: Bah, humbug. The American Civil Liberties Union is taking on Christmas this holiday season. Peter Viles reports.