[Chetry:] Welcome back. Eleven minutes past the hour. New this morning. If you're planning on hitting the road for the big holiday weekend, traffic may be bad for you but at least gas prices won't be. According to AAA, gas prices have dropped for the 12th consecutive day. The average cost of a gallon of regular now $2.62. In July of last year, that same gallon would have cost you an average $4.11.
[Roberts:] He may be in big trouble with his wife but not the law. South Carolina law enforcement officials have reviewed Governor Sanford's travel records and say there was no evidence of a crime. Investigators say there is no reason to believe that the governor used public funds while visiting his mistress in Argentina. The governor, his wife and children will spend the Fourth of July holiday together in Florida.
[Chetry:] Vice President Joe Biden is in Iraq this morning. It's a surprise visit. It comes as American troops withdraw from key areas of the country. The VP will meet with U.S. troops as well as Iraqi leaders, and he will also re-emphasize President Obama's promise to drawdown U.S. forces in Iraq.
[Roberts:] This morning thousands of U.S. Marines are on the move in southern Afghanistan. It's the first major offensive under President Obama's strategy to turn the tide there. And just to the east, the search under way right now for an American soldier being held by insurgents suspected to be Taliban. Gary Berntsen is a former officer with the Central Intelligence Agency. He spent an awful lot of time in Afghanistan fighting there and planning. He's also the author of "Human Intelligence: Counterterrorism & National Leadership" as well as "Jawbreaker" talking all about the operation in Tora Bora. And Gary is with us now. Gary, when these Marines embarked on this operation "Strike of the Sword," they were told by their commanding officer that they're going to make history. He said, "You're going to change the world this summer. It starts this morning." No outside power has ever been able to do that in Afghanistan. Can they change history this time around?
[Gary Berntsen, Former Cia Officer 1982-2005:] They can if they understand that the goal is to attempt to stabilize and eventually to put the Afghans in charge of their own future and their own destiny. This is not about America conquering the Taliban. It's about America attempting to help the Afghans reestablish security so that the Afghans eventually will be able to take this over. We're not sure about what the form of this, whether it's going to be central government or tribal groups, Afghan tribal groups, what this formula will look like as we go forward but that's what it is.
[Roberts:] On our big vista wall behind you here, we've got a graphic of Helmand province. This is where this operation is under way. Tell us a little bit about the geography of the area. They're fighting in a specific little slice right down through the center, the Helmand river valley. Tell us about that.
[Berntsen:] Right. The south of Afghanistan has been the homeland of the Taliban. Mullah Omar who's the leader of the Taliban, never visited Kabul, the capital. Kandahar next door, the next province over to the east was its capital, but Helmand is the place where the majority of the opium comes out of. Probably 50 percent of the opium that comes out of Afghanistan which is almost 100 percent of the world's opium comes out of that place. And they're fighting on the river valley there, the Helmand river valley and there's a ton of opium in there. Establishing control for this valley and for this area is critical. And in addition to sort of hoping to break the Taliban's control of that province of which, you know, NATO only controlled half of it, it's also a system as they start to do interdiction on the opium which funds the Taliban.
[Roberts:] Now, according to reports, when the Marines moved in there, they encountered very little resistance from the Taliban. They kind of melted into the surrounding areas. A lot of places to hide in there. How do you suspect the Taliban is going to take this new operation? Will they sort of regroup, you know, and then sort of harass the Marines. Or could they just kind of wait them out because they can't stay there forever?
[Berntsen:] Well, essentially, they don't want to do a head-on assault on the United States Marine Corps because they're going to lose.
[Roberts:] That one is
[Berntsen:] They're going to lose.
[Roberts:] Yes.
[Berntsen:] They're going to lose. Then you have head-on confrontations. They're going to sort of just try to move back, take control of villages and areas where the Marines aren't. And it's going to be essentially, you know, a chase of the Taliban around this area. But it's going to be you know, the Marines are there to seize and to hold and to build the local security forces at the same time. And also to support, as you were mentioning earlier, sort of a strategy that does, you know, all these other things in Afghanistan. The doctors, development, all of that.
[Roberts:] I guess it's an implication of the Iraqis to the strategy in Iraq to clear, hold and build. This is General Stanley McChrystal's first operation that he's been leading in Afghanistan. Can you apply the Iraq model to there? Is there any reason for the locals in Afghanistan to side with the United States?
[Berntsen:] You're not going to duplicate it exactly. But some of the principles of it will be useful and, of course you know, building the security forces as we did there. But I think McChrystal, the good thing about McChrystal now is that he's going to stay not just one year, but his command is going to extend for three years. He's got a group of officers. They're going to rotate them. We have not had the level of continuity in Afghanistan that we have needed. And apparently they're redesigning the command model to extend for three years. This is a good thing for us.
[Roberts:] Let me ask you about the soldier who was captured in northeastern Afghanistan. Special ops forces are out there looking for him. What do you think the chances are to find him?
[Berntsen:] This is going to be very, very difficult. We do have the cooperation of the Pakistanis on the other side of the border. The Pakistanis are putting some definite pressure on the Taliban. So the possibility of some success and, you know, rescuing him has increased by that. We have rescued hostages in the past. Some of them have, you know, freed themselves as the "New York Times" journalist. And so I wouldn't think of this as completely without hope but this is a tough thing. Very difficult, and they'll attempt to use this in IO, information operations against us, propaganda to try to break the will of the American people. They'll try to show film or photos to try to sort of, you know, to sort of cause a loss of faith.
[Roberts:] As they do
[Berntsen:] Thanks, John.
[Roberts:] Seventeen minutes now after the hour.