North Carolina People; General H. Hugh Shelton, US Army, Retired

That evening ladies and gentlemen you know in less time than our time in this country of manufactured celebrities and sports and they it are. It's wonderful to run into an authentic American hero. North Carolina people as a guest like that will save lives. I think American hero. Is. So lucky that he's a native North Carolinian and a graduate of North Carolina State. Going to meet and talk with John. He showed just a few Socceroos. Sponsored in part by walkover helping North Carolina people realize their financial goals. Since 1879. And through the financial contributions of viewers like you who invite you to join them in supporting UN CTV. Whether he got it settled in back home that we happened not my wife Karen and I are just delighted to be back in North Carolina and live in ballad on the coast in a wonderful town avoided city

lovely so please you're back home and you and I last talked you a putting a lot of energy into the developing a leadership program over at NC State. How's it going. It's going to reflect it continues to build momentum. We're delighted to get all facets of the program have continued to develop you know we have the annual leadership forum. We bring in a national of national law leaders to speak to the people we've run the youth institutes. We run one on the east coast down in Columbia the Eastern for each summer we run another one and you can see it Charlotte East of western part of the states the young people that come there are an inspiration to millions. Just make me very confident in America's future in terms of our leaders. And then we have lost the scholarship program a total of five different scholarships that we award different types of scholarships for Morrow to Sita 4-H to the national leadership of scholarships so it is just it's just a dynamite program and NC State does a wonderful

job with with the program. You know it's wonderful that you people sometimes don't understand the difference between administering something and leading something and you do and I'm sure that that's what you are discovering this potential talent all over North Carolina. Well we really are and you know I like to say you manage things as you lead people around all that's what we were you know on right now as the leading part of it and how you treat people and gaining an appreciation for for the attributes that go into into good leaders like integrity and ethics and character and that's what we stress. I'm so pleased to get a chance to talk with you again and I want you to teach school tonight a little bit and I want to ask you some questions that I'm sure every American would ask if I had the privilege I have of sitting here with you in the. Iraq this is a subject that on the minds of all Americans we went in and we were successful and then something went badly wrong. Help me

understand what's happened. Well it's a very as you know a very complicated situation that we have now. And I think you can trace the challenges that we have today back to the way that we went internationally. The thought process among many was that we would go in very quickly with a very small force overwhelm the Iraqis and then they would be liberated and just welcome us and everything would everyone would live happily ever after. If you really understood the dynamics of the Middle East and particular Iraq with the three different sects that you'd have to deal with. The Shia the Sunni and the Kurds you knew that the minute that you lifted Saddam who was the dominant force that held them up and kept them apart kept them from fighting each other. That you were going to have to have a some type of a force that would be able to ensure that you had a peace and a peaceful and secure environment to allow a new government to stand up

and it would take time. You combine that with the fact that early on the initial members administer the ministry or of the of the region. Jerry Brown were. Elected to eliminate the police force eliminate the military. These are the people that are armed. They have weapons they've been trained on how to use them. And now you have nothing on the street to keep the sex from going at each other. And so it it quickly started coming apart after we took out Saddam. And so it was almost the proof of the poison tree as the lawyers would say. We we now are facing a challenge that was bought about by not having sufficient forces early on in the process to carry out the rest of the plan which should have been early on to have the Gulf states involved in the operation. I plan that would use our diplomatic economic and all political to us as well as the military. Now what President Bush outlined the other night was the type of plan that we should have had four years ago.

We now have Secretary Rice going throughout the Middle East telling the Gulf states we need your support we need you to be a part of a solution to this. And we are also now talking about putting more economics into it getting the infrastructure build back up. I mean it's tragic that today the oil production and the electricity production in Iraq or less than there were when Saddam was there. And that doesn't give the people a warm and fuzzy feeling that things are getting better with the U.S. in charge. And so we really if you want to have a success in Iraq you have to use all those tools at the same time. You also have to recognize it as that as they go off state leaders are telling Secretary Rice right now. That the key to long term stability is it goes all the way back to the Middle East peace process. And they want to us to put more effort into seeking a solution between the Israelis and the Palestinians and that then takes away the tools that the fundamentalists and the extremists

tie up. To say that the US are just in there to get the oil there the infidels from the west that it is really that we are interested in bringing peace not only in Iraq but throughout the Middle East and in the Palestinian-Israeli issue. And that's the present but they view the U.S. through right now. And until they start seeing us favorably in that light then we have a long term problem tied right back into Iraq so that our present course of conduct and has proven very costly in terms of attitude no differences with our country. Not Friday I think divided. You just hit the key issue. I mean we're into an ideological war right now and a war that I might say that we are I don't think we're winning and that that's a main the main issue is that we have today in Iraq the military can't win this war there's no doubt about it's going to take the entire process and all of our to sort of a national power to it to have a successful outcome in Iraq. We're starting down that path right now.

It's four years late and I'm not sure that given the state of things in the Middle East right now that we're going to be able to solve the needed time in the near future. At best it would be a long term process to today. And when he said the president said in his speech the reference he made almost a passing reference but that we would engage in interception at the border of Iran on the border of Syria. That bothers me because I'm always saying that when you get up there on the border Suppan happens and inevitably you get drawn across it and then more are of more direct conflict this does this concern you. It does concern me to it to a degree but I have in my mind I see there are two issues. One is you've got Syria and Iran that are both contiguous to to a right. That's where we should have used our diplomatic followed by our economic and the and our Gulf allies to make sure that we don't march to very strongly those two

countries. And if they continue to come across the border or to continue to support the insurgency that's going on there now that they would pay a severe price for doing that. That's the first thing the second thing you could do is you can in fact there are means that we have of monitoring those borders from overhead satellite as well those are some some aircraft that we have that would be able to pick up active border crossing six Iraq and then that goes back to what are you going to do about it now or what how you're going to deal with the government of Iran and with Syria to say this is got to stop or are you going to pay a price in doing this. And we haven't done that it's somewhat analogous to to back to Vietnam. We do. We didn't seal the border with the North. We did. We allowed the North to keep continue to flow across and that was part of our problem we let them sit there and isolation while we fought an insurgency in the south and used it as a corollary between what's going on what was going away and what we've seen today in Iraq.

Well as an old Navy man myself I can say that I must admit I was really surprised to see that bill being put in charge of what's going on over there you don't have to comment on that but what about the lieutenant general who was assigned there. I know he served with you what can we expect there. Well I would say that both of these individuals I know personally and Fox fall under the iron mold that's going in and it is a great is a great Navy admiral. I think the world of him. I think you will have some real challenges since most of the countries there have armies rather than navies that will create a little bit of a challenge. Plus we're fighting two major. Ground wash right now which requires an understanding of what it takes to to fight and when and a ground war so that'll be a challenge for OCS in terms of day patrol Yes. Dave was my project for a year and a half I know him very well. He's a brilliant guy a great soldier. If anyone can be can make a silk purse out of a sow's ear

so to speak. Yeah I think General Petraeus can do it but again I go back to the military is only a piece of what's going to be required to win in this war. So even if Dave does everything just right. Unless the other issues that we just talk about in terms of the Middle East peace process working with the Gulf states the economic and diplomatic to us are employed. Then he still can't make a what we call a real victory leaving a a democratic and I don't mean a Jeffersonian democracy but at least a government that is elected and is functioning you placed when the US finally pulls all of its forces out. The mirror in question and you suggest this to me this way. When you look at our engagement now Iraq Iran Syria Israel Palestine even in Bosnia Northern Korea. How did you when you were chairman of Joint

Chiefs. All of you develop a world perception here and then create a troop flow. You talking about thousands more soldiers and sailors are somewhere our way if we go and do all of this. Well that's the truth. Start Friday is that you know before we had we had a major commitment of our forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. We did in fact have have plans in place that could deal with. At least two major contingents is it one time and we always had to look at North Korea with our 3000 troops on the ground opposed by millions of troops dug in lots of artillery within range of so that was a major concern and should be today because you never know what Kim Jong-Il may decide he wants to. We didn't have the major issue that we had today with Iraq we could contain Saddam as we were doing at a price yes but we had a little bit of help they are from some of our allies and we had him in place but we

had contingency forces in place that could respond to about anywhere that we had to go. Whether it is responding very quickly to a contingency in Kosovo as we did when we went in we we defeated the Serbs and at the same time maintain our guard in North Korea we kept a large number of forces down in the Middle East prepared to deal with Saddam if we had to. He came across but today we found our own armed forces it is very very challenged by the by the by current events. We have actually pulled forces out of Korea to deploy to Iraq. The op tempo would be the operational tempo of our forces today. I'm talking to soldiers sailors airmen Marines that have spent three and four tours already in Iraq or Afghanistan or combination of the two. And that's taking a toll on us. It's really stretched our forces to the limit I'd think very it's required us to pull out more and more of our National Guard and Reserves. And I think in the future at this op tempo this current

pace continuous will cause even more of that and I know that's a concern for the for the Guard and the reserves as it should be. But they are stretched. I think today we have to we have to look at how we're going to sustain a force that we have given the current operational tempo as well as the building up of the forces and as we've recently decided to do. And that's going to place another great challenge on us to maintain the quality of the great force that we have in place today. Already this past year we've seen a quadrupling of the numbers of category for individuals that were allowed to come into the military a quadrupling of the non high school graduates that are being pulled in. And we're going to allow six to eight thousand waivers of moral issues to be brought into the military. That's a concern to me because we have such a great force today. But as you try to grow it and as you try to sustain it given the current challenges that creates some real issues in terms of

maintaining the quality of force that we've had in the past that becomes a killer. The problem to deal with the sophistication of weaponry today doesn't in terms of knowledge and quickness in learning. Certainly there's no question about it. It is the today's force the reason you know we're such a high tech force today from all weapon systems right down to the individual rifleman and the radio operator as a computer controlled radio. So obviously that if you're not careful you start to spend an inordinate amount of time not only training but retraining and retraining individuals to try to make you know to try to keep them proficient in their weapon systems or in the equipment that they're required to operate it is a hot take force today and it will be as you get even more so as we move downstream which demands quality people. And we have quality people today but I am concerned about the future as we lower the standards. You know we just lowered the age limit now I'm from originally we went from 35 to 40 and now we've upped it to forty two years old. We don't need a 42 year old grandfather out there on the

front lines as a rifleman. We need good young educated people and that's that's the challenge that we're facing and you need a lot of help from Congress to do that. You're good one to answer this question a lot of concern in this country about the quality of the material our people have in combat. The stories that they talk about tank carriers of personnel carriers being better than our own locally manufactor What's the truth about Cartwright I think that we have a we have some terrific equipment today and our people young men and women sans that are fighting. No question about it and there's a there's a. Real effort being made today to even improve what we've already got in their hands as as a research in development continues against such things as improvised explosive devices. But the truth is when they had the surge when they started building up the forces in Iraq when they pulled from the reserve components of the National Guard these were forces that had never been there had never been a division that they would deploy as fast as they were required to

deploy and therefore they had a lot of equipment and personal body armor that was not the very best that we had in the inventory. A great surge to try to get up to speed but it fell behind. It was behind the war fighting timeline. I think we've about close that gap right now. We still got so I think the armed forces are still got some work to do but it's getting better every day and I'm I feel good about the people that are actually on the ground now having the best equipment that money can buy. Can it be better. The answer is yes. But some of this stuff is being developed necessity as they say is the mother of invention. And as we see some of the areas that we need to have it even better for example protection around the neck. We've got good cowboy helmets we've got good personal body armor but there are still some exposed areas that we can get better and to include the extremities against these IED sets they referred to. And those efforts are being made as we as we speak.

You were recently at Walter Reed Hospital. Do Americans really know the extent of the injury casualties in this war. We hear a lot about properly so the respect of the men and given their lives men and women. But what about some of these injuries I read about the quickness of recovery the way we're saving lives but did win some pretty serious injuries to people in this conflict that they're one of the hidden costs I think of our efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan is that it is the severity of the injured. We're running about 8000 to one. We've lost 3000 great great Americans that gave their gave their all for our country. But in the process we also have had about 22 or 23 thousand that have been injured and many of those as as you read about have been severely injured their spinal cord and head injuries. There are also the lams people that have

basically been maimed and their lives have been changed for forever by by this war. When you go through that with the yard through the halls of Walter Reed You see a great young Americans missing two three lambs. You see those repaired brain injuries if they are injured in Iraq right now. Our medical care is so good in the forward areas that even we were saving lives today that even a dozen storm would have died right on the battlefield. The chief neurosurgeon for Walter Reed just came back from serving seven months. He was that far forward into the area so if you could get him in there you have one of the greatest surgeons in the in American military right they are ready to go to work. And so the hidden cost will be those that we're going to have to take care of that are coming out of this war. How concerned are you about the possibility of nuclear intervention here. I you know I am very concerned about the challenges that America faces in the

future regarding nuclear proliferation and the growing threat that's coming from some of the nations around the globe. You may have seen just recently our the strategic you caller general for China as it has basically waved off the U.S. as imitation to come in and have talks with our new quick commander about cooperation and about where where the two nations go in the future without nuclear arsenals. We have a limited nuclear arsenal we have brought it down since a considerable They do it to where now it is designed basically at almost a minimum level of make of maintenance. It is an aging in the tory and it takes a long time to put to field a nuclear weapon once you do start to start making them again. There are some nations around the globe that are not constrained by the same things that America is. And so when I look at the growing threat from China in that regard when I when I know that we've got still hundreds of thousands of nuclear weapons left in the in the

old Soviet Union now Russia. That is quite a concern. Plus you've got North Korea and Iran doing everything they can to develop there as you now have India and Pakistan that have the nuclear capability. So I think it's an area that we can't say we're not as much as all of us would like to say let's take out on equal forces and just do away with them and peace will reign forever. That's not the case and I think we have to be prepared to defend America against anyone that might want to threaten us or try to hold us hostage to a new quote threat in the future. This name Jesus as we do this program. I get the clear feeling that if you were talking to a group of college presidents today for example you would stress over and over again understanding of the cultures in the world understand the historic religious convictions of people try to find a way of communication and talking and rationalizing things without these killing fields that we've created.

Am I hearing you correctly sir Your him exactly correctly. I feel like that we have got to look at the world today. The global environment in which we live of America is a leader. It always has been. We have to act like a the way the world power that we are. We have to have respect for all the nations we have to understand that we need friends and allies. America can't do everything in the world. We can't solve all the world's problems. But if we if we stand up for four if we stand for the things that we have in the past if we engage other nations if we use all those tools are diplomatic to us are economic to us. Then we can we can make the world a better place in which to live off. But if we're going to go out on the battlefields around the world and try to fight each one of these brushfires Phalak of a better term or create brushfires in a process then we have we're going to be isolated and I really feel that today we are

probably in terms of the foreign policy in terms of the way that America is viewed around the world is a real load and we need to reach out and we need to embrace our NATO allies as an example we need to go over into the Pacific and engage our regional partners in the Pacific and and try to work through these issues that America faces that the world faces as part of as a global partner rather than just trying to be arrogant and say we're the world's greatest superpower We're the we're the nation that can solve the world's problems. We can should certainly help but and we can lead in that. And that's what we need to be doing. That you back home there's a good wife Carol got to the yard work and doing some gardening and put in around I guess. Well my honey do list is longer than I like to think about but she's a great partner for 43 years and I so it was just wonderful having her have you got a you got a home on down in Morehead Now have you settled in there.

We have settled in Dynamo Here we live on the water and it's a great place to we of it so it's one of those places that when you have to travel to go somewhere else as we do almost weekly minutes around are all over the nation. It's one of those do you hate to leave but it's certainly a wonderful think about coming back to it just traveling are you are you called by the powers that be from time to time I know you are from your vast knowledge of Desert Storm and all that you've done for our country but. Keep him moving around doesn't it. It does and as I told him when I left the Pentagon I'll never call you but my phone will always answer the phone when you call and I do. And awe and it you know it comes fairly frequently. Do you get to talk to many college audiences now. I've often wondered what someone like you would say to young people today. Let's just assume you look at a commencement session somewhere this spring. What's the message you want to give young people. Well I as a matter of fact I am speaking up to the University of Alaska in

Fairbanks where there are much more aggressive side this coming May 1. But I think the world the messages out have for them is there is a there's a great new world that you're entering into right here and go into it with a global perspective. Go into it with an attitude that you want to be all that you can be. Go into it with an attitude of you can the challenges are there and you're up to the challenge. Don't be afraid of it. Have CONFIDENCE. Have courage of your convictions and go too far to try to try to be everything that you'd like to be and whatever chosen field that you have. And because they've the opportunity is there. Well that's a very happy note to bring this conversation to an end I'm sorry we've run out of time but thank you again for joining me and all your friends looking at this broadcast tonight I know you rejoice in this great North Carolinian who is indeed an authentic American hero in our time.

So until next week then good night. Sponsored in part by walkover helping North Carolina people realize their financial goals. Since 1879. And through the financial contributions of viewers like you who invite you to join them in supporting you when CTV.