>> schieffer: today on "face the nation" the master mind of the 9/11 attack will be tried just blocks from ground zero in new york. should this trial even be happening? khalid sheik mohammed, the master mind of the 9/11 attacks and four other accused september 11 plotters will be tried in new york. will it be the trial of the century or a propaganda forum and what about security? republicans are saying it shouldn't even be happening. we'll get their side of the story from the top republican on the house intelligence committee pete hoekstra of michigan. then we'll talk with senator pat leahy of vermont who heads the judiciary committee. he thinks it is the right way to go. we'll also get the latest on the fort hood massacre. dana priest of the "washington post" and security analyst juan zarate will be here to talk about afghanistan and the massacre at forthood... fort hood. first trying terrorists in new york. on "face the nation." captioning sponsored by cbs "face the nation" with cbs news chief washington correspondent bob schieffer. and now from cbs news in washington, bob schieffer. good morning again. we begin with congressman peter hoekstra who is with us in the studio here in washington. senator patrick leahy is in his home state. he's in burlington, vermont, this morning. congressman, i will start with you. you're the ranking republican on the house intelligence committee. i want to get your take about the announcement that they will try sheik mohammed in new york just blocks from ground zero. most republicans seem to think this is a bad idea. most democrats think it's a good idea. >> most americans will think this is a bad idea. this is ideology run wild. we're going to go back into new york city, the scene of the tragedy on 9/11. we're now going to rip that wound wide open and it's going to stay open for, what, two, three, four years as we go through the circus of a trial in new york city? >> schieffer: do you think it's going to take 2, 3 or 4 years. >> you never know. you can bet that folks that are going to be tried and their lawyers are going to try to use this opportunity to extend it as long as they can because this is what they wanted. they wanted center stage and they're going to want to keep it for as long as they can. they will bring every motion forward that they can. it will drag this trial out. >> schieffer: the fact is he did ask to be brought to new york when he was first arrested. we all know he has confessed to this. do you think it will just turn into some sort of a propaganda show? >> well, that will be their objective. obviously our attorney general, our legal system, will try to keep it dignified and civil and bring some respect to it. that's not what ksm is going to try to do. they'll do everything they can to disrupt it to make it a circus and allow hem to use it as a platform to push their ideology. >> schieffer: the question i'd have, what would you have done? something has to be done with these people. >> i do exactly what the president is doing with some of other people that they have down in guantanamo. the president has said for some of these other individuals, we will use military tribunals. he hasn't really, you know, demonstrated to us as to why some will go into new york and be tried there and why others will go through military tribunals. he has clearly said that military tribunals are an appropriate step to use, but he hasn't said why it's okay for one or the other. i would have put him through the military tribunal process. we started that process. they pled guilty. why won't the president take guilty for an answer and say now let's go to the sentencing phase? >> schieffer: do you believe, i mean, is it your basic belief that these terrorists do not deserve a trial in an american court? and the benefits that come with that? >> not in american civilian court. i believe they have certain protections that they would get in a tribunal but to give them all the extraordinary protections that you and i have as american citizens and to give that to ksm, people who have mocked the american system, who want to do everything that they can do to destroy it and now give them those extraordinary protections that we enjoy, yeah, i think that's a bad decision. >> schieffer: do you think this puts the people of new york at risk? >> i think america is at risk continually from the threat from radical jihadists. we saw it in fort hood ten days ago. to say that new york is on list. i think new york has been on the list ever since 2001. we know we were attacked in 1993. we know that we were attacked in 2001. i think that al qaeda and radical jihadists, if they could attack us again in new york, they would. >> schieffer: they talk now in their reports that the administration is now examining various federal prison sites in this country. illinois. illinois is one of them. they were talking a while ago about perhaps putting them in prisons in michigan, your home state. how do you feel about that? >> well, the president has never answered the question why. i'm all about problem-solving. what problem is the president going to solve by moving these trials to new york or by moving get mow prisoners to michigans to illinois, to colorado? he hasn't outlined what problem he's solving. i don't see the problem of moving them from gitmo. it's been a great place. we've been able to keep them their safely. there are certain challenges with these prisoners. why move them into the united states while we are still under the threat from radical jihadists? >> schieffer: i want to turn to the massacre at fort hood because you were one of those in congress who immediately began pressing the government for answers when they were giving out very little information. where do you think this thing stands now, congressman? are you satisfied with where it's going so far? >> no, i ti that the government has been too slow in giving us information. there hasn't been enough transparency for members of congress, for the press or for the american people. i think that we need to move very, very aggressively and do a full-scale investigation as to who knew what and where. you know, this alaki guy in yemen. he's been on our radar screen since 2001, 2002. my sources tell me we had evidence back in 2002 that would have enabled us to prosecute him. why didn't we prosecute him then? the other thing i want to know is people want to know who he's been talking to in the middle east. i want to know what alaki is talking to in the united states. have we been able to capture those communications? i want to know what's going on between the intel community, the department of defense, and the f.b.i.. i think we had a lot of information on hasan but i'm not sure that we put all of these things in place so that we would have been in a position to perhaps stop what happened at fort hood. >> schieffer: do you think the government was timid in questioning him because we now know that he was even carrying cards with the phrase "s.o.a.," some people say that's a soldier of allah. some say a slave of allah. who knows how it is interpreted. but there seemed to be so many red flags that were raised here that one group would know about it. another group would know about it. it never came together and it never set off alarm bells. >> i think the administration knew by the friday after the fort hood shootings that they had a lot of questions that needed to be answered there had been all of these red flags. but that they had never come together in one place. i think that's why they've been slow in providing people like yourself and myself with the transparency and the information because there's going to be a lot of tough questions that need to be asked that i'm not sure that they were prepared to answer. >> schieffer: you have called for a congressional investigation. can congress investigate this without hampering the investigation by the authorities that's going on? >> i sure hope so. i mean senator lieberman has called for an investigation. i really think we need to do an aggressive investigation. we need to use this opportunity as to what happened in fort hood to, sure, find out what happened in these tragic circumstances. but to get a better insight to what i think is a real and continuing threat from radical jihadists. i think most americans aren't aware of how severe this threat really is. >> schieffer: congressman, thank you very much for being with us this morning. i want to turn now to get the other side to some of these questions to senator pat leahy. he is the democratic chairman, of course, of the senate judiciary committee. well, you heard what the congressman said, senator leahy. tell me why you think he's wrong. >> i think that eric holder, our attorney general, is right. i think the president is right in holding the trials of these murderers in new york city. but we're saying to the world is the united states acts out of strength not out of fear. when i go around vermont people say let's try criminals. let's try criminals like ksm. let's get them convicted. we're very much a law enforcement type of state here. i was a former prosecutor. i'd like to just see them prosecuted. in the same which way we prosecuted timothy mcveigh. we're not afraid to do that. we're the most powerful nation on earth. we have a judicial system that is the envy of the world. let's show the world that we can use that power. we can use our judicial system just as we did with timothy mcveigh and send the people... and convict the people. >> schieffer: but timothy mcveigh was an american. he was not what some people would call an enemy combatant. won't this be a circus of sorts. that's what the congressman is saying. he's saying it's going to turn into a propaganda show. >> i have a lot of faith in our judges. they know how to run the trial. they know how to keep decore up in their court. if sheik mohammed wants to stand up and say as he did in guantanamo i committed all these murders and all these things. if i was a prosecutor i would sit there and let that jury hear it. it's going to be convicted. that's the important thing. we show the world that our judicial system works. i think that's why people like ray kelly who is the commissioner of police, one of the finest commissioners of police anybody has ever had there in new york city, said we're prepared. we can handle this. >> schieffer: but i guess the point that some people are raising is that someone who is an enemy combatant does not deserve the been anys that one gets... benefits that one gets in an american courtroom. >> bob, if somebody murders americans and they murder americans in america, they ought to be prosecuted in america. hopefully convicted in america. i mean, if somebody comes into our country and murders somebody walking down the street, we're going to prosecute them here. it doesn't make any difference whether they're americans or not americans. they committed a crime in america. that's what he did. i think that the administration is doing the right thing. they're using all the things we have available with major hasan we're using a court martial at fort hood. that's the appropriate venue for that. with these 9/11 murderers we're using the criminal courts in new york for them. the people who bombed the u.s.s. coal, we'll use the newly reconstituted military tribunals. i think it's an example we're showing the rest of the world we have systems that work. we're not afraid of these people. we're ready to stand up to them. i don't think we should run and hide and cower. let's use our system. let's convict them. >> schieffer: what if he should be acquitted? >> i don't think he's going to be acquitted. i've discussed the evidence that's available. again i'm not... i've not prosecuted this kind of case but i've prosecuted a lot of murder cases. i think most prosecuteors know what is going to happen. you have eric holder who is one of the most experienced prosecutors this country has ever had as attorney general. he's got one of the greatest teams of prosecutors around him. i've gone over the case with him. i'd rather be the prosecutor than the defense council in this case. >> schieffer: you know, anybody who has watched law and order or any of the other crime shows on television knows that the first thing that happen s when a law enforcement arrests someone, they advise them of their rights, that they have a trite to an attorney and so on. there was no attorney here. this man was water boarded 183 times. do you think that we can find untainted evidence, enough of it, to convince him... to convict him because if you say, well, he didn't have a lawyer from the beginning, would that say to people, to a judge, well, you can't use any of that evidence? >> no, i think that we have plenty of evidence as obtained outside of the... keep in mind, they indicted him long before this water boarding. they had evidence enough to bring indictments against him long before that. with the review i've had of the evidence available, i have no question that they have enough evidence untainted by the water boarding that will be admissible in court. he will be convicted. >> schieffer: let me just ask you because you're the chairman of the judiciary committee about this investigation that's going on down in fort hood. obviously somebody dropped the ball in all of this process. this man should not have been at fort hood. do you think congress ought to actively open an investigation into this, senatorly hey? >> i agree with the congressman that there's a lot of the dots were not connected. the fact of the matter is there will be congressional investigations. i think we have to do it carefully in a way that we don't interfere with the prosecution that is going to be, the court martial prosecution. we don't want to step on things that will make it more difficult to prosecute him because, of course, he should be prosecuted for these murders. but obviously in the congress we have a reason for oversight. i've already talked to director mueller of the f.b.i. about this and the attorney general. the attorney general will be before the senate judiciary committee on wednesday. i fully expect that he'll be asked a number of questions about this. ultimately we should know where mistakes were made, where they were made for the sole purpose of making sure those mistakes are not made again. the same way we did after 9/11. you know, the evidence was there and the information was there to stop the attack in 9/11. the dots were not connected. had they been, we just want to make sure these mistakes are not made a second time. >> schieffer: we'll look forward to those hearings in the coming weeks. thank you so much, mr. chairman, for joining us. we'll be back in one minute. (announcer) we call it the american renewal. because we believe in creating cleaner energy that creates new jobs. being the number one manufacturer of wind turbines in america. and developing lower emission, fuel-efficient aircraft engines. ecomagination means growing the green economy by harnessing our most powerful resource- imagination. the american renewal is happening. right now. dana priest, investigative reporter of the "washington post" and juan zarate who is our consultant on national security affairs, a former member of the national security council under george bush. dana, i want to talk to you first because you won the pulitzer for the series of stories you did about the conditions at water reed hospital. how did this happen? why did not somebody raise or why didn't it ring an alarm when we found out the series of things we found out about this doctor who was there who was just shuffled off to fort hood? >> well, he was a doctor and he's in a medical setting with medical professionals, psychiatrists. they aren't necessarily like the infantry troops that are going to have the threat at the forefront of their mind. he's intelligent, soft spoken. no indication of violence. no speaking about violence. very polite. but he has a fascination with studying religious conflicts among muslims who are serving in the military. i think you can't really make... you can't call them red lights like everybody is doing in hindsight now. it looks like he was trying to figure out what do you do with people who are con flicked and he's recommending that the military give them conscientious objector status. he wasn't, you know, so there's no more than that. the people... i know some of the people who were with him during this period of time in his fellowship at the end of his term at walter reed. i don't think they believe that he was crazy. i think they believed he was very odd and that he didn't pose a threat. if they thought he was mentally ill, again, these are doctors. they would have given him up to.... >> schieffer: again very poor performance ratings. his contemporaries were raising questions about the lines that he was saying. we now know he had business cards printed up that said what soldier of allah. >> i think what we don't know is did somebody say to him, do you have these conflicts? how much discussion was there among his superviseors and him about his interpretation of islam? i think that's where the army you'll find is reticent. i mean they don't know enough about it. they may not even know enough about it to have a general discussion. apparently nobody informed the counterintelligence people who would have been the people.... >> schieffer: do you think there was a certain timidity because he was a muslim and someone thought it would be politically incorrect. >> i do think the army is very concerned about diversity in its forces. they need muslim leaders. right now they are trying desperately to increase their ranks of people who speak arabic and who can help them in the middle east. i think, yes, they're timid about that. that is going forward is going to be a big issue for them. you've already heard secretary gates and others say we can't broad brush the muslims who serve in our armed forces now with just this case. >> schieffer: let me switch quickly to another big story that's coming down the pike here. that is what is the president going to do on these troop increases that they're asking for in afghanistan? we're seeing the white house saying it is costing $1 million a year to keep one american troop in afghanistan. and saying maybe we're get to go the point where we can't afford it. what do you think and what do you hear about when this decision is coming, juan? >> i think what we're hearing from the administration, bob, is that sometime after thanksgiving the president will be prepared to give a speech. to the nation and perhaps other parts of a roll-out. to explain the number of troops and frankly to describe the strategy that the administration is going to resolve in terms of afghanistan. interesting that the issue of the budget is coming up because i think you're start to go see all sorts of issues including our ambassador in kabul objections to perhaps any more troops without a reliable partner in karzai. there's a lot going on within the system, within the process to throw doubts into throwing more troops at the issue without a clear resolution of the strategy. all of this though signals unfortunately, i think, a little bit too much indecision. i don't think anyone faults the president for taking time to make the right decision. but i think it's how he's doing it. how the process is unfolding that is starting to look indecisive and a bit weak. >> schieffer: i know you followed this closely, dana. you were pentagon correspondent for a long time. what are you hearing? i mean because this series of leaks, you know, we had a leak early in the week that said he would give mcchrystal everything he wanted. it came from a very reliable source. but then we see suddenly the leak from the ambassador there that, well, maybe we shouldn't do that. it sounds to me like i hear what you're saying, juan, maybe he's reconsidering, maybe he had almost made a decision and now he's rethinking it again. >> we really do have a split government. and the eye linements are not the natural maybe state against defense. they're much more nuanced than that. but it comes back to what is the goal? is the goal to defeat al qaeda? if that's the goal, well, according to my sources there are only about 100 al qaeda left in afghanistan. >> schieffer: 100 al qaeda in afghanistan. >> they're over in pakistan. again if your goal is to defeat al qaeda, then pakistan is where you need to go. they've been very reluctant to do that. if it's not that, if it's more regional stability or standing up a stable political process, that is probably going to take a lot more than 40,000 troops and more time. >> schieffer: thanks to both of you. we'll find out. back with closing thoughts in a second. you know why i sell tools? 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as king noted, he had enough sense to keep quiet until he could hire a lawyer. and the answer to all of those questions will be interesting to know. but the obvious questions remain the more important ones. why didn't someone notice him before 13 people died? i have listened carefully all week to various military and government spokesmen that we should not rush to judgment. but there were just too many red flags to ignore. internet postings, communications with known terrorists, low performance ratings. why did they not set off alarms? whatever the shooter's motives, whatever demons drove him, i find myself in the same place i was at the beginning of all of this. this man should not have been shuffled off to fort hood. this heinous crime should not have happened. back in a minute. been putting our clients first. according to a leading independent research firm, in 2009 clients rated wells fargo advisors the #1 u.s investment firm for doing what's best for them. with advisors nearby and nationwide, we're with you when you need advice and planning expertise to meet today's challenges. wells fargo advisors. together we'll go far. >> schieffer: that's today's broadcast. we'll be back right here next week with "face the nation." captioning sponsored by cbs more and more, the quality of our lives depends on our connections. reverse transatlantic trade growth access to high-speed internet, at home and on the go, is no longer a luxury. it's how our children access education. it's how we find jobs, discover information, and connect with family and friends. it's the spark that drives innovation, creates investment, and builds a stronger economy. to shape a better tomorrow, at&t is investing in america's future - working to create an internet that's smart, mobile and safe. last year at&t invested more than any other company in the u.s. and we're continuing to invest this year, to expand and enhance our wireless and wired networks. we support a national plan that ensures high speed internet access and enables adoption by all americans, over the next five years.