Gen. Tommy Franks on the Iraq and the Debate

This is a partial transcript from "Hannity & Colmes" September 30, 2004, that has been edited for clarity.

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SEAN HANNITY, CO-HOST:  Welcome back to Hannity & Colmes. I'm Sean Hannity coming to  you live from the University of Miami. Still to come tonight, Senator Bob Graham (search) will join the debate.  First, joining us now is the author of the number one "New York Times"  bestseller, "American Soldier (search)," former CENTCOM (search) commander, our good friend General Tommy Franks.  General, good  to see you, my friend.

GENERAL TOMMY FRANKS, FORMER CENTCOM COMMANDER:  Great to be with you again.

HANNITY: You are a great American.

FRANKS: Thanks a lot, sir.

HANNITY:  What does it mean to you — because you have come out strong,  very publicly for the President, when somebody votes for a war, votes for the $87 billion  before he votes against it, says it was the right thing to disarm Saddam, and now says it depends on the outcome  if it was the right thing?

FRANKS:  Well, I think — someone asked me a few minutes ago what I  thought about the debate, I said I thought the President looked exactly like I thought the  President would look.  I mean, he looks like someone who is telling the truth.  And he looks like someone who has a  vision.  And I felt good about what I saw tonight.  I saw what — from Senator Kerry what I thought I would see.  I will tell you this, Sean, I would find it very difficult to look in the eyes of an ally or to look  in the eyes of a mom or a dad and describe what their sons and daughters are going through, as a, quote,  grand diversion.

HANNITY: That really bothered you?

FRANKS: Yes, it did.  It bothered me.  Right.  Yeah.

HANNITY:  How much does it bother you — he was asked yesterday by  Diane Sawyer — I think this really was highlighted by the President in terms of flip-flopping. Was it worth it?  His answer was, and he used the phrase "depends on the outcome."  What does that mean to you  as a leader of these men and women?

FRANKS: Sean, I don't read that much into that specific comment.  But  what I think is that it's — you got to — you got to respect the troops.  You got to — you got to  believe in your heart that what you're doing, if you are going to fight a war for the United States of America  is precisely right, at precisely the right time, and so the senator's comments, give me a little problem.

HANNITY: What does it mean, now, when he voted for the war, says it  was right to disarm Saddam, and now, as he said, wrong war, wrong place, wrong time, as the  President kept repeating tonight.

FRANKS: Oh, well, I think part of that is politics.

HANNITY: But what does it mean to the troops?

FRANKS: Well, I think the President did a good job tonight of saying,  it's the same comment as with "grand diversion."  I mean the fact is that the senator as did the  rest of the Congress, the President and all my military commanders looked at the same intelligence.  When we all  believed that we were looking at weapons of mass destruction, that they were going to be used on our  troops, Sean and...

HANNITY: You were prepared for that.  You write about that as you  fully expected that.

FRANKS: And then it should come as no surprise to any of us, that we  say, well, we were wrong. We thought it was...

HANNITY: John Kerry was wrong.

FRANKS:  ...there and it was not there.  And so it seems to me, in for  a penny, in for a pound and the same guys who thought we were right when we went in should say,  well, we were all wrong together. But I just read politics as the reason why we try to parse that issue.

HANNITY: But John Kerry laid out the case that Saddam was a threat  with nuclear weapons as strongly as the President.  One of the things that came up tonight, I've  got to ask you this, this idea that we should have stayed in Afghanistan and we had no - even though we voted  for the war, which I found an amazing inconsistency in statement by him — should have stayed there.  And we were diverting the troops. You are being quoted as the source that was the wrong thing.  And I know  having read some interviews that is not your position.

FRANKS: You know, I heard it tonight, and I also heard about it from Senator Graham's book. And a comment I've made is unfortunately, that the senator heard  something the general didn't say. Because the fact of the matter is, that I was responsible for both  Afghanistan and Iraq, the numbers speak for themselves, as a matter of fact.  On the day we started operations  in Iraq, we had about 9,500 Americans operating in Afghanistan.  That number in fact inclined.  It  increased during operations in Iraq, and continues to increase today, that number never came down.  And so I  was a bit surprised at the mention of something which I know to be factually incorrect.

COLMES: General, thank you for doing the program.

FRANKS:  Great to be here.

COLMES: We're going to have Senator Graham on with us.  You are claiming you never had that conversation.

FRANKS: It's not a matter of a claim.  We were — the senator came by.    I had the notes pulled out; I talked to people who were with us during that conversation.  And  I'm not — all I'm saying is what the senator heard is not precisely what I told him.

COLMES: Here is what Knight-Ridder reported about a year ago, they  said up to half the intelligence, special forces hunting for Bin Laden were diverted from Afghanistan to Iraq.

FRANKS: And that's very simply incorrect.

COLMES: That's not true.

FRANKS: The special forces, the infantry, the intelligence assets, the Predator (search) unmanned aerial systems were in no case diverted to go into Iraq.

COLMES: "The Washington Post" reported on April 18th of this year that  $700 million was shifted from Afghanistan to Iraq in the summer of 2002, the President  shifted that from supplemental funding for Afghanistan to preparatory task for the Persian Gulf.

FRANKS: Well I think when you are talking about money, you talk about  fungible assets, and when you talk about the way the federal government manages the money on  any given day there may well be money in a pot and not in another pot.  However, that simply becomes  a matter of moving assets — money in this case — from one place to another.  It does not imply any  reduction in the level of focus on Afghanistan.

COLMES: If are you taking resources, taking money and diverting it to  another area...

FRANKS: Not if you knew that $800 million was going to appear in that  particular pot tomorrow. It's a matter...

COLMES: Is that what are you saying happened?

FRANKS: Absolutely.

COLMES: And so there was not any...

FRANKS:  Absolutely not.

COLMES: ...resource or any dollar that went from one to another.

FRANKS: No, I will not say that there was not at a given point in  time, for the purpose — for the purpose of staging troops or something, money that was shifted from an  Afghanistan account in order to do preparatory work for Iraq.  What I will say, Alan, is that in every case  where that happened, that money was very quickly having been authorized and appropriated, placed back  into the accounts, because you will recall during this period of time, the amount of money being given to  the Defense Department was not declining.  It was inclining.  And so on any given day, I believe we  could find money moved from pot to pot...

COLMES: The question is whether the money got to where it needed to be quickly enough or whether the resources were there...

FRANKS: Oh, no question.

COLMES: ...to get Bin Laden and could have — could the President have  done a better job focusing on...

FRANKS: I don't think so.

COLMES:  ...the very people who attacked us on September 11th...

FRANKS:  I don't think so.

COLMES: ...versus a country that didn't?

FRANKS:  I think I heard the senator tonight, who reads the same  intelligence that I think we all read, to include — I think he made reference to some Central  Intelligence work, indicating Afghanistan.  I believe that the intelligence community would not find Osama bin Laden  in Afghanistan today.  I just thought it was interesting that wherever he is, it's not Afghanistan.

HANNITY:  Hey, general, congratulations on the book.  It's just a huge best seller for you.  You're a good friend, a great American.

FRANKS:  Thanks, it's great to be with you.

HANNITY:  Thank you for all you've been able to do for our country.

FRANKS:  It's an honor to be here with you.

HANNITY:  It's an honor to see you.  Thank you, my friend.

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