28 March 2002

Rumsfeld Says Possible Biological Attack Is Chief Concern

Washington -- Terrorists and terrorist organizations want to acquire weapons of mass destruction, says Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, but he is primarily concerned about them getting and using biological weapons.

Interviewed on MSNBC March 28, Rumsfeld said nuclear weapons are relatively more difficult to handle, manage, transport and detonate than are chemical or biological weapons. The latter "can be done in relatively small places with dual-use equipment [i.e., with both military and civilian application], and there are a variety of delivery mechanisms. Some biological weapons involve contagions, and that's a terribly dangerous thing," Rumsfeld said.

Rumsfeld also spoke about the possible casualties caused by use of weapons of mass destruction, the extent and dispersal of the terrorist al-Qaida network, the U.S. strategy of denying terrorists sanctuary, and the decision to close the Pentagon's Office of Strategic Information.

Following are excerpts from the interview:

DoD News Briefing
Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld
March 28, 2002

(Television Interview with Brian Williams, MSNBC TV)

Williams: ... [W]e begin with Donald Rumsfeld himself reminding us how our world has changed.

Rumsfeld: Our margin for error has shrunk enormously. When you think of the power and reach of weapons, and the fact that the weapons of mass destruction can kill not thousands as we had with the attacks on the Pentagon here in this building where we sit, and also in New York, but tens of hundreds of thousands of people can be killed. We don't have a big margin for error. We have to be right. We have to see that we go after these folks where they are.

Williams: If we all knew what you know, would we be more or less nervous about daily life in the United States?

Rumsfeld: Oh, my goodness. I don't know that it serves any useful purpose to be nervous about things. It's a difficult world. It's a dangerous world. There are a lot of people who have been trained to kill, and to terrorize. They're located in 40 or 50 countries in cells today as we talk. And they are willing to sacrifice their lives to kill other people. Can we deal with that? Sure. Is it likely there will be another terrorist attack? Sure, it is true. ...

Williams: The United States didn't get them all. They are gone. Do you worry that too many of them got away?

Rumsfeld: Oh, goodness. I worry that they're all over the world. You bet. There were thousands trained in those training camps, but there is no question if it's not an army, a navy, or an air force, all they have to do is just melt into the mountainside, go into a cave, go back into their village, go across one of those porous borders of Afghanistan. They've transited, we know, they've gone through Iran down into ships, and headed -- tried to get into Yemen, and Saudi Arabia, and various other Middle Eastern countries. All you can do is keep after them, keep putting pressure. ...

Williams: ... September 11th made it painfully clear that terrorism against American targets is not the distant threat that many of us might have once thought. Hijacked jetliners fully loaded with fuel flying into office buildings took care of that. But is there an even greater, more deadly threat to come -- nuclear weapons in the hands of terrorists?...

Rumsfeld: There is no question but the terrorists and terrorist organizations want weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons, however, are more difficult to handle and manage, more difficult to detonate, more difficult to transport, and if I were asked, among those nuclear, chemical and biological, which did I think was the more likely and the more worrisome to me at the moment, I probably would say biological. It can be done in relatively small places with dual-use equipment, and there are a variety of delivery mechanisms. Some biological weapons involve contagions, and that's a terribly dangerous thing....

Williams: American forces are in countries, as we speak, that you probably never dreamed they'd be deployed in when you started this job. Where does it end?

Rumsfeld: Well, I think we have to keep the pressure on, and we can't allow Afghanistan to be stopped as a haven and a sanctuary and simply have some other country become the sanctuary and the haven. So what we have to do, as the president said, is go after the terrorists where they are, but also make sure that other countries are not creating a sanctuary for terrorists, as a substitute for Afghanistan. So we're trying to help train some folks in Yemen, we're trying to help train some folks in the Philippines, and relatively small numbers of people, in the hundreds, not in the thousands.

Williams: You have no concerns that we're in too many places right now?

Rumsfeld: Look, my concern is that the al Qaeda will find a country where they can find a sanctuary and a haven, and continue their attacks on the United States, on our friends and allies, and on our deployed forces, and on our interests. And we can't let that happen....

Williams: How often are you forced to shave the truth in that briefing room, because American lives are at stake?

Rumsfeld: I just don't. I think our credibility is so much more important than shaving the truth. So when I don't know something I just say I don't know it. If it's something I'm not going to talk about, I just say I'm not going to talk about it. If it's advice I give the president or the National Security Council I just tell them I don't get into that. If it's an intelligence matter I say that we don't discuss intelligence. There isn't a need for anyone to do that in the Pentagon.

Williams: The United States did use misinformation in World War II liberally. And a recent attempt in this building to maybe engage in a little misinformation you received some unshirted hell from people, and kind of took it back. Mistake?

Rumsfeld: I don't know. There's no question we have to do information operations. For example, if the Taliban is telling people that the food we're delivering is poisoned, we have to tell them it's not. If they're saying this is a war against Moslems, we have to tell them it's not, that that's not true. And so we had a radio program that we were beaming there, and that is not misinformation, that is not disinformation, it is information. And that is what we were doing. And the information operations activities that the Pentagon was planning to do in the Office of Strategic Information were perfectly appropriate.

For whatever reason, the implication was drawn that they were going to do things that were not appropriate. So what do you do? Well, I said, let's close up the shop. Since that's what the perception is, let's close it up. We'll go ahead and do what we have to do anyway. I said that at the press briefing, and we will. We'll do exactly what we have to do to protect the lives of the men and women in uniform, and to see that our country is successful, but it doesn't involve lying....