Page 1085 - Central Command News Today

Still, the message delivered. >> i think the message was delivered. and again by nikki haley this morning at the un security council. they say the united states is still locked and loaded should assad try to employ chemical weapons be the hard part right now is what is next. in general, the commander of us central command responsible for lessons attack has so that the hard part is in front of us. we need to look at other means. we need to look at other means in terms of all us elements of nation...

And in libya many people in your party were shaking their heads and saying this is wrong when obama used the exact same rationale. where is the standard for you guys? >> you bring up a very good point but in this particular case you are talking about the use of chemical weapons. if you are in the middle of the use of chemical weapons you is to be decisive. there has been a clear demarcation that this is not acceptable under anybodys terms. the question will be whether or not we can properly attr...

Not always, does from time to time get horrified at humanitarian disasters and i think responds in a visceral way so i think he was easily convinced probably by kelly to write that tweet. putin probably recognizes theres nothing in it but public relations. i think that trump probably did feel very strongly about it. >> why do you suppose things seem to have been deteriorating so rapidly in syria or isnt just that we havent been paying attention to it? >> we havent paid much attention to it but t...

And other humanitarian disaster for no reason whatever. donald trump was recently saying as tuesday that he wanted to pull out completely in syria and now hes not only tweeting about whats happening there but hes invoked the name of vladimir putin in a negative way, something hes never done. >> since he made the comment about pulling out from syria, the central command commander whos responsible for that region said, no, bad idea. and i think that the -- the tweet involving putin is of real inte...

Troops out soon. and thats really the crux of the question now. even as the president was talking about, theres the top commander in the region publicly saying here in washington u.s. troops need to stay, that the job is not done. wolf? >> yeah, the head of the u.s. militarys central command. fred, youre in damascus. its not often we get someone reporting live from damascus. youve spent a lot of time in syria over the years. a quick withdrawal of these 2,000 u.s. troops from syria, what would it...

Difficult. >> bill: the commander-in-chief is aware of that. >> im certain that general mattis, the central command responsible for the middle east and the special operations commander are advising him of that. i hope it is a chess move to get others -- not only to support the troops on the ground. the saudis and others, but also the reconstruction cost. i think this is what set the president down the road when he found out that we had pledged over $200 million to rebuild syria and the region do...

White house declared in a paper statement, that isis is "almost completely destroyed." we have made tremendous progress against isis, particularly in syria but also in parts of iraq. a lot of that is due to the presidents change in the rules of engagement and a change of strategy. he deserves credit for that, full stop. but it is absurd at this point to say that the jihadist threat has been diminished, that isis is running away. it sounds like the president is on the verge of repeating the mista...

What happens is, if you dont go to the stabilization phase. you dont change the facts on the ground. you give control of events to others. in this case, the russians, the syrians and the iranians, it almost guarantees that three, four, five years from now, well have to go back there and kill other people who are trying to do us harm. >> were still in phase four in afghanistan and in iraq. >> we are. thats the attractiveness for a lot of americans. and i totally understand it. the presidents stat...

And dont necessarily see in the headlines every day. >> general marks, how does this affect military leaders, including those in the field who think, perhaps he actually does have some design drawn out here when you consider hes surprised them with other announcements. earlier this month, the president popped into the briefing room to announce a development and pentagon officials told cnn they didnt have knowledge the president agreed to meet with kim jong-un. how does this affect them? >> certa...

Iranian nuclear program to keep that deal in place. general joe jotell, head of central command and operations in the middle east, hes in favor of keeping the deal in place. so this is going to be a situation on so many levels, on iran, on north korea, and, in fact, on russia. the u.s. military taking a much harder line, actually, on what russia is doing than the political side of the house. theres -- pardon me. theres a lot of concern about russia putting new weapons in -- along europes western...