THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: The drumbeat to attack. In just a few minutes, the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee opens hearings on U.S. policy on Iraq and whether the U.S. should actively try to remove Saddam Hussein from power.
Wolf Blitzer is standing by in Washington with a preview -- good morning.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, Paula.
We...
ZAHN: Good to see you. We usually see you at night.
BLITZER: It's good to see you in the morning. I have a feeling in the next few weeks and months I'm going to be seeing you a lot as the U.S. gears up for possible military action against Iraq. The debate on Capitol Hill formally beginning this morning.
In a few minutes, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Joe Biden, will convene two days of hearings with outside experts, military, diplomatic experts, to review three basic questions: what exactly is the threat from Iraq right now? Two, what are the various options military, economic, diplomatic in dealing with that threat. And three, what would be the regional fallout? What would be the fallout in Iraq and the region if the U.S. did engage in another airstrike, ground war against Iraq? We'll be getting into all those details as the course of this day continues.
I want to bring in our defense analyst, Patrick Lang. He's joining me. A former pentagon official, knows the situation in Iraq about as well as anyone here.
Patrick, thanks for joining us.
Let's talk, first of all, about the threat right now.
PATRICK LANG, FORMER PENTAGON OFFICIAL: Sure.
BLITZER: It's been almost four years since U.N. inspection teams were in Iraq. What is the nature of the threat that Iraq poses to the West, to the United States right now?
LANG: Well in the past we knew a great deal about Iraqi weapons programs for chemical, biological and nuclear weapons as well as ballistic missiles to deliver them. And we knew that with ballistic missiles they had achieved two-stage rockets before the Gulf War and we thought that they were within a year to two years of detonating their first weapon. And in the inspection regime that following the war, the inspectors did a very good job of ripping a lot of this up. We -- although we always believed that Saddam managed to hide some of it. And now we've been gone for four years, and what's driving us really is what we don't know about what he's been doing since then.
BLITZER: Is the possibility of an overthrowing Saddam Hussein's regime by striking limited command and control facilities in Baghdad, fomenting a coup, if you will, is that realistic?
LANG: You know I have a hard time believing this because I know what a police state that is in fact where every man and every woman is threatened by the regime and by his police. And it's the kind of thing where -- in which if you try to do something like this and fail, he's going to kill everybody you know, including your grandmother and your pet dog, you know. So I think that this has to be a really serious matter that which people would be sure before they'd risk something like that.
BLITZER: So the U.S. in terms of prudent planning can't just assume targeted air strikes could get the job done in terms of what they call regime change or overthrowing Saddam Hussein?
LANG: You know I don't think so. Think about the stress we put them under in the Gulf War which we ripped their whole -- all their infrastructure to pieces. And we kept doing that and we've had repeated air strikes against the country for violations of the no-fly zones and things like that and none of that has happened so far. He's still very firmly in power. So I think we have to assume he's pretty well seated.
BLITZER: All right, we're going to continue talking about this throughout the course of the day as these -- as we monitor these hearings.
Patrick, stand by.
Paula, and as we do get ready for the gavel to come down, Senator Joe Biden beginning this debate, remember, there won't be any representatives from the Pentagon or the White House or the administration testifying during these two days. Former officials, military, diplomatic, other U.S. experts will be testifying, regional experts, including opposition figures opposed to Saddam Hussein. So it should be lively and it should set the stage for what is going to be a continuing debate over these next several weeks and months -- Paula.
ZAHN: And is it any clearer when the administration might tell us what they have decided?
BLITZER: I think it's going to be by all accounts everything that I'm hearing late this year presumably November, December, early next year. It's going to take some time if the U.S. does decide to launch -- to get involved in another Gulf War II, in effect, another military invasion, air strikes and ground troops. In the meantime, the diplomats will be seeing if they can set the stage for cooperation from Turkey, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, other countries in the region whose support would be necessary to get the job done.
ZAHN: Well we know you'll have a hotline to a bunch of government offices down there. We'll look forward to having you be our eyes and ears on the Washington front.
Wolf Blitzer, thanks, good to see you in the morning for a change.
BLITZER: Thank you. Great to see -- I see you every morning, Paula.
ZAHN: We -- well thank you. Boy, that's nice to hear,...
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, very much so.
ZAHN: ... but we'd love to have Wolf Blitzer have it having you on the air, too.
HEMMER: Yes, I know (ph).
ZAHN: Thanks, have a good show tonight.
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