Assad Defiant News Today

Consequences for harboring assad and allowing him to wage war on his own people. i think we need to ratchet up the pressure on russia. the main policy approach of the administration has been to pull back, allow assad to say in power and let russia work its will. we are seeing the consequences with the weapons attack as well as many others that have been perpetrated over the past 12 months. >> jeremy and dennis, thank you both, i appreciate it. we are going to fit in a break. coming up, how is ru...

>> i certainly think it was necessary to respond to the use of chemical weapons, not because of the importance within syria, but the message it sends more generally, that chemical weapons cannot be treated like any other weapon. there will be other dictators like assad and they shouldnt think using chemical weapons is a get out of jail free card. >> let me press on that for viewers. sometimes people wonder about that. there is a criticism of western powers as well that our policies result in the...

Account maintained by assads department says it honorable cannot be humiliated. to go deeper, i was to bring in the author of "the future is history." she is a known expert to our office as a putin explainer, even if you are more than that and thats not the only thing you want to do with your life. gives you plenty of fodder. you are an interesting thinker, independent thinker. you dont play for a team, so you bedevil people. you are critical of vladimir putin, but disagree with some of the amer...

Unlawful, horrendous activity, assad waged war on his own people. i was struck, ari, i love dennis perspective on this, why the administration selected such a narrow approach to the fission. there was a phrase in the pentagon, dont waste a crisis. they could have expanded the target set to degrade assads war making may sheen against his own people to try to change the balance of power and send a stronger signal to russia that hey, we need a different dynamic that erodes assads power. >> ambassad...

>> i know assad is winning. >> when donald trump tweets mission accomplished, what does that tell you. >> the mission accomplished is to slap assad on the wrist to say we are not going to tolerate his killing of people with gas and things like that. hes killing 500,000 or 600,000 have been murdered. they have been slaughtered. i deal with syrian groups all the time. they tell me whats happening on the ground is horrific. while i think its good to strike, to tell him this is unacceptable, so hell...

To escalate. they have been explicit about that, especially with assad. the next step, the next move is in assads court. if you uses chemical weapons again, they have vowed to strike again. ari? >> we have been reporting on this all day. in a presidency known to have a lot of critics and make mistakes, this is a day that seems to have gone reasonably well with, and i have had them in our coverage with people who are critical of donald trump saying this worked, yet, it seems two little words, mis...

Put the russians in a position where they might retaliate, number one. two, i think they were highly sensitive to the iranians, worried they might respond using shia militias against the americans. and in iraq, it is 5,000. i suspect that drove the administration. do i think it would have been smart to hit the command controls which gets to the basics of assads power, absolutely. i think what was driving the administration, make a statement, increase the prospect of assads use and the russians c...

Thinking. they say a version of the tweet speaks for itself. in this instance, ari, you have seen senior administration officials and military leaders back the president up on this. the spokesman at the pentagon said today, the mission was a success and we heard from nikki haley, echo those same comments, even from mike pence. what we have seen take shape is this rhetorical pressure campaign, capped by nikki haley, the u.s. is locked and loaded and could take further action against assad, if nee...

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They continue to do their battle assessment, they want to know exactly what they hit and what they met. initial reaction, they think they have a good amount of success. all the missiles landed on to t target, none were shot down and none failed. they didnt have casualties from the fixed wing aircraft they have. in terms of what they accomplished, they think they knocked out and set back assads chemical weapons capabilities. theres an important difference between degrading and destroying. >> we b...