Mike Morell and Admiral James Winnefeld on "Face the Nation"
The following is a transcript of an interview with Former Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Winnefeld and CBS News Senior National Security Contributor Mike Morell that aired Sunday, October 27, 2019, on "Face the Nation."
(snip)
MARGARET BRENNAN: And the president thanked Gina Haspel--
MIKE MORELL: Absolutely.
MARGARET BRENNAN: -- the CIA director.
MIKE MORELL: And I think we'll learn more in the days ahead about what the intelligence was and how we got it and thank even more people. Bothered me a little bit some of what the president did in- in- in providing detail about taking back to the United States pieces of Baghdadi's body. It bothered me a little bit hearing the president talk about that- some of that Syrian oil being ours, right. Because that's what inspires- that's what inspires some extremists. You know the- the oil comments, Margaret, really validate- at least it sounds that people like it- validates 40 to 50 years of conspiracy theories about what American foreign policy is all about, right? And it's not. So a great, great day but I think the president could have handled the- the press conference a little bit better.
(snip)
MIKE MORELL: The Kurdish thank you stood out to me because it suggested to me that that's perhaps where the intelligence came from.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You had on this program before said you were concerned about losing some of that intelligence that might be getting shared. The president also said in his remarks that he planned or wanted to release some video of those last few moments of Baghdadi's life that he repeatedly characterized. Called him a dog, whimpering, crying. He wanted ISIS' followers to see him like that--
ADMIRAL WINNEFELD: This is piling on- this is- one of the- the one part of the president's remarks that did bother me was this continual piling on of humiliation. A little bit of that is appropriate. But you're sending a signal to some of his followers around the world that could cause them to lash out possibly more harshly in the wake of this.
MIKE MORELL: You don't want a locker room kind of feel to this, right? And that was the one thing we worked really hard on after the bin Laden raid is don't make those kind of statements because it does inspire other people.
MIKE MORELL: I think it's all right to say that we used, you know, DNA matching to figure out that it was him. But to actually talk about body parts and actually bringing them back with us, right? So that we have them here with us, I think is going too far.
ADMIRAL WINNEFELD: And one of the things, Margaret, that is- this fight is all about is religious freedom. It's about respect for other religions. And if you look back to the bin Laden raid as much as we-- detested that man, and as much harm as he did to our nation, we treated his body with respect that is due under Islam--
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mike-morell-and-admiral-james-winnefeld-on-face-the-nation-october-27-2019/
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