By Gen. Carter Ham, U.S. Africa Command
Robert Burns, the Associated Press
U.S. AFRICOM Public Affairs  Print     Share  

STUTTGART, Germany, 

Mar 25, 2011 — The following is a transcript between General Carter Ham, commander, U.S. Africa Command (U.S. AFRICOM), and Bob Burns, Washington Bureau reporter, the Associated Press. The interview was conducted over the telephone and focuses on the anticipated transition of command of the coalition efforts in Libya to what will likely become a NATO-run operation.

GENERAL CARTER HAM: Hi, Bob.

ROBERT BURNS: Hi!

GEN. HAM: How are you?

MR. BURNS: I'm well.

GEN. HAM: Where are you? Where are you?

MR. BURNS: I'm sitting in the Pentagon. Where are you?

GEN. HAM: Well, I'm not sitting in the Pentagon and for that I am thankful. I'm at U.S. Africa Command headquarters in Stuttgart.

MR. BURNS: Okay. I was just going to mention, as well, congratulations, by the way. And I happened to be there with Secretary Gates when he presided at your -- [change of command]

GEN. HAM: I saw you at - I saw you but I know you were on a - when you travel with him, you travel on a pretty tight timeline.

MR. BURNS: And you hit the ground running, huh?

GEN. HAM: Yeah. That's right. Yeah. Yeah.

MR. BURNS: Yeah. Listen, I know you're very busy and you've done a bunch of interviews and it's very late there so I won't drag this on. But I appreciate you taking a little bit of time.

GEN. HAM: Absolutely.

MR. BURNS: Let me ask you -- as you know, Admiral Gortney did a briefing here at the Pentagon a few hours ago. And the question always comes up: When you get down to the real core purpose of what you're doing in Libya, to get Qadhafi to change -- to back off and to stop threatening and attacking civilians -- he said, well, you know, we're making progress, but he hasn't really changed his behavior yet.

Is there something more or different that you can do in terms of offensive operations to make more progress faster?

GEN. HAM: Well, I guess my start point was that I wouldn't agree with the statement that we haven't done much. There's 600,000-plus people in Benghazi who, had we not taken action, would be in a very different circumstance today than they are.

MR. BURNS: Right.

GEN. HAM: We forget about that.

MR. BURNS: Yeah. Right.

GEN. HAM: So I think there are some good successes. But we shouldn't kid ourselves. And Ajdabiyah and Misurata and certainly in Zawia and Zintan, there are some very significant problems. What we're looking at is how can we most effectively counter these regime forces that are threatening civilians, attacking civilians, without causing more civilian casualties?

MR. BURNS: Right.

GEN. HAM: I mean, Ajdabiyah is a great example. It's a small town and, you know, as the regime forces go in there, the fact of the matter is, we could easily destroy all the regime forces that are in Ajdabiyah. But we would destroy Ajdabiyah.

MR. BURNS: Where is that again?

GEN. HAM: In Ajdabiyah. We could easily -

MR. BURNS: Oh, Ajdabiyah, or whatever the -

GEN. HAM: Yes.

MR. BURNS: The place south of Benghazi?

GEN. HAM: Correct. Yeah.

MR. BURNS: Oh, okay.

GEN. HAM: Yeah. Yeah. So we could do that. But we would -- first of all, we'd be -- we'd be killing the very people that we're charged with protecting. So that doesn't advance the cause much. So what we are doing is that -- you know, it's also important to remember, this is but day seven of this effort.

We know a lot more now than we did on day one. We are able to target more precisely. We have an increasing understanding of his command-and-control networks, of his supply networks and we're attacking those nodes to not only disrupt his ability to conduct -- to attack civilians today, but also to degrade his ability to attack civilians into the future.

MR. BURNS: Okay. Admiral Gortney also mentioned that -- in that same context of dealing -- well, more precisely, in dealing with those Qadhafi forces that are already inside urban areas, that he said it's being considered to bring in aircraft like AC-130s and drones that can apply more precision with less collateral damage. Is that something you're planning on doing or thinking about?

GEN. HAM: Yeah, I think I'd talk to Admiral Gortney and say, we might not want to talk about specific capabilities that we might want to bring to bear in the future. But that is the - but that's the challenge. How do you -- how do you more precisely target these regime forces without causing civilian casualties?

MR. BURNS: Right.

GEN. HAM: So you know, our more precise weapons systems is what we're looking for. And it's not just us, by the way. I mean, it's French and U.K. and Canadians and Danes are doing this as well. And they've been -- they, too have been affected.

MR. BURNS: Now, the command arrangement is apparently about to change.

GEN. HAM: Yes.

MR. BURNS: Is there going to be a period of time when there's going to be essentially a split command between you and -- is it going to be Admiral Locklear on the NATO side or is it going to be General Bouchard or who?

GEN. HAM: Yeah, let me try to explain this as best I can. So we started this on the 19th and I was the overall commander. Locklear was the joint task force commander in exercising the three missions of [UN Security Council Resolution] 1973 - arms embargo, largely maritime, no-fly zone and protect civilians.

MR. BURNS: Right.

GEN. HAM: NATO has already accepted the arms embargo. That's today under NATO command of an Italian admiral. He -- that Italian admiral reports to Locklear, but Locklear, as commander, Joint Force Command Naples, his NATO role, and then of course Locklear reports to Stavridis.

MR. BURNS: Right.

GEN. HAM: On the no-fly zone, currently Locklear owns that mission. He has an air component commander who's U.S., and she reports to him and he reports to me. NATO has agreed to take that mission, and this weekend, I suspect on Sunday, Lieutenant General Bouchard will take responsibility of that mission. And then he, too, will report to Locklear in his NATO role, Locklear to Stavridis.

And my role at that point will be only to support the air component, which is still U.S.-led but increasingly coalition, to support the no-fly zone. And then I still run the protect mission, and Locklear runs the protect mission, but this time with his U.S. Joint Task Force hat on. But -- yeah.

MR. BURNS: Okay. I think I got all that, but I do have one question on that note. Why are they making Bouchard the guy when Locklear's already there in that same command, that joint NATO command as the commander? Why -- Bouchard is the deputy commander. Why don't they just say Locklear's in charge?

GEN. HAM: Because Locklear has broader responsibilities. So Bouchard I think -- I think -- we think, U.S. thinks that the decision will be that Bouchard will also take the protect mission. So he'll own both of those and then report to Locklear, because Locklear has -- Locklear's got a -- he's got the NATO training mission in Iraq, he's got Kosovo, he's got a number of other missions of the - and antipiracy and a bunch of other things. So Bouchard would be another one of his NATO subordinate commands for that - for the Libya mission set.

MR. BURNS: Okay. Will you still -- at that point, if those -- if all of that happens over the next several days, will you still be involved then?

GEN. HAM: U.S. Africa Command will always be involved because Libya's in our area of responsibility. But I would -- but if this plays out the way I think it's going to play out, then I would no longer have a direct command relationship for the forces exercising this mission.

Q: OK. Would Odyssey Dawn then -- the sun would have set on Odyssey Dawn, or what --

GEN. HAM: Correct. Yes.

Q: OK. And you said Sunday. Is that because you think the NAC is going to make that decision on Sunday?

GEN. HAM: Well, my understanding is, they've already -- they've already made the decision on no-fly zone.

Q: Oh, right.

GEN. HAM: Yeah. It is my understanding that they have agreed in principle to take the protect mission. And they're going to discuss on Sunday the specifics of how they would do that, who is going to contribute forces, what the rules will be, and the timing of that.

And so we'll see that play out. And I think there is -- there certainly is an expectation, I think, on the U.S. side that there will be a NAC decision on Sunday. But you never know.

STAFF: Bob, this is Vince. We need to wrap it up soon.

Q: Just one last point, yeah, to clarify that then. On Sunday, with regard to the no-fly mission, that Bouchard would take responsibility on Sunday.

GEN. HAM: Yes. Yep.

Q: That's your interpretation?

GEN. HAM: Well, I think that's a - I think that's a done deal. I think Bouchard taking the no-fly zone is a done deal.

Q: Right. But the timing of it -- I mean, the transition.

GEN. HAM: Yeah. So what -- essentially, what happens is, on the no-fly zone, is that Bouchard becomes the commander. And so he'll oversee and make the decisions about the air tasking order and the conduct of the no-fly zone. Those missions will -- their mission will still be coordinated by the -- by the Air Operations Center in Rammstein. But we are in the process of - which is U.S., but has pretty large coalition participation. As --

Q: But General Woodward would still be doing the air tasking?

GEN. HAM: Yeah. She's doing that now. What we -- what we are already in the process of doing is transitioning from what is currently a U.S. command-and-control system -- the communications, Internet that we use -- we're today establish -- putting in NATO computers and NATO networks to facilitate that.

We brought in officers from the Air Component Command in Izmir, Turkey, and the -- and the place I can't pronounce in Italy, the Combined Air Operations Center. They're today sitting side by side with Maggie Woodward's folks. U.S. Air Forces in Europe have sent a number of planners to the air operations center in Italy to help them get stood up, and to accept this mission.

So we're not -- I mean, we're doing a lot of things in advance of an anticipated decision, so that when the decision is made, we can make this transition seamlessly and with no disruption to the mission.

Q: OK. So Sunday, we should expect NATO to be in charge of the no-fly zone, and then --

GEN. HAM: Correct. Absolutely.

Q: OK. All right. OK. Well, you've got to run. Thanks for taking the time out - (inaudible, cross talk).

GEN. HAM: OK. All right, Bob. We'll see you down the road. OK, thank you.

(END)