Hersh Stands By Report

Hersh Stands By Report, Says Delta Force Sending A Message To Superiors
Tue Nov 06 2001 10:58:23 ET

Seymour Hersh, who penned a NEW YORKER article this week in which he reported on a "troubled" Special Forces raid in southern Afghanistan, took to CNN last night to defend his work.

Hersh said, "The operation was much too big. It was too bulky, and instead of going in like Delta likes to operate -- use small units, four to six men going in, and, you know, these are guys that, you know, they crawl around in the jungle or whatever, with figuratively, knives between their teeth, and they are very tough. They're very competent." Rather, the "mission was laid on like General Motors coming to, you know, to the Afghan war. Sort of as we did in Vietnam. We had 16 helicopter gunships prep the area. 200 Rangers came in advance to serve as a blocking force. And then a hundred Delta Force, a reinforced squadron they call it." Hersh tells CNN's Judy Woodruff:

"But the operation was "noisy. It was slow. By the time they got through the house, where they found nothing, and came out, they were counterattacked. And there was a heavy -- a very pitched battle, so I'm told. It was a mess, so I'm told. And there were 12 casualties, three seriously, nine, most of them from shrapnel." It was "just a debacle. A near disaster, I wrote." Asked about Pentagon denials of heavy opposing fire, Hersh said, "These are very honorable people. And I don't think it really matters -- I'm talking about General Meyers and General Franks, and the Admiral [John Shufflebeem]. I don't want to get into a war of words or shading of meaning.

Whatever they say publicly, I hope privately they fix it. . Delta Force doesn't deal with reporters very often. The reason I learned about it is, they were upset about what happened. This isn't the way you run Delta Force. You can't have this kind of big scale operation. And so, they're throwing a message over the fence, to the leadership, really, through me.

It doesn't matter what they say publicly as long as they fix it in private." Hersh added the US put in "quick call to the Brits, and some special British air commandos came in a few weeks right after that, I think the 21st or 22nd, we made a call for help.

And British commandos are there now and they're trying to work out a different way of operating. The British want to go in big. Set up a firebase in the middle of Taliban territory and saying, hey, we're here, come and get us."