Aokalashknikof. Signing with the European Union. All parties should refrain from provocative action he. There are over 200 families that are grieving and they want answers. Nine people have been killed on a daring attack on kabuls most luxurious hotel. When electricity break down we break down everywhere else. Whats important is to share modes of attack and times of attack so we is can protect ourselves as modes of society. We begin with the crisis in ukraine and the growing confrontation over economic sanctions with the u. S. And the European Union on one side and russia on the other. Friday saw dueling signing ceremonies. While Russian Troops continued to confront Ukrainian Forces in crimea. And can ufng mo, Vladimir Putin, to russian are russia few hours earl yrl, signed the political side of an agreement that will bring ukraine closer to the European Union. A trade deal that will complete that pact is scheduled to be signed after ukraine holds president ial elections in may. Meanwhile, u. S. Economic sanctions to punish russia, are taking effect. Stock exchange in russia has plunged more than 10 in march, 2 today. Visa and mastercard have stopped handling transactions for rusia bank. Im joined by russ matlock, author of and frr washington, d. C. Im joined by jorn beenitez, a senior fellow at the Brent ScocroftInternational Security institute. It is good to have you both with us, ambassador matlock ill start with you. President obama has come under stiff criticism for what some have called toothless sanctions. Is it fair to say the toothless sanctions are starting to have bite . Frankly, i dont think this sanctions. First of all, right or wrong and there are many aspects that are wrong, russia is not going to give up crimea. And the sanctions are not going to bring that effect. The crucial thing is now, whats going to happen in ukraine . Can the ukrainians first of all and those who are working with them including the russians, eu and the u. S. , help them put things together, so that they can move ahead, and have a viable government. But the real damage to russia is not going to be the western sanctions. Its the cost of the action itself. Now, by taking crimea the way they did, theyre creating real problems for themselves. Economic, security, and also problems for the future. In many respects. Among other things, theyre going to find that the people in crimea are going to expect a very quick improvement in their living standards. Thats probably not going to happen. Theyre going to have to pour a lot of money into that. At least as much as they poured into sochi for the olympics, to get the infrastructure up. And you know, their action is going to create a more threat of terrorism around their borders. It is going to make other neighbors much more determined to come into nato. So russia is going to begin to feel the effects of their action, entirely aside from western sanctions. But i think the attention really now needs to be directat how to help the ukrain ians directed at how to help the ukrainians put their government together again. Not a truly effective government and thats where our attention should be. Now george do you agree with the ambassador . Weve seen these sanction he against individuals tied to putins circle and to a russian bank as well. Do you think the sanction he are going to have any significant effect on russian . I think the current sanctions are not Strong Enough and i dont think theyll have sufficient influence on putins rubrubric, yes, the problem here crimea will be much more costly for the russian government to sustain in the long term but i think right now we need the focus on the message that is world. There are two Dangerous Things and two dangerous precedents that were set by putins actions. One he used military force to change the borders of europe. Hes used his military and the gun to seize the territory and land of one of his neighbors. And the second dangerous thing is he used a very dangerous precedent and logic to excuse this. He said he went in there to protect ethnic russians. There are millions of ethnic russians living outside the border. To use that is nearly not only scaring his neighbors not only in Central Europe but central asia. Will moscow now use its army and forces to intervene and take our territory and try to retake the ethnic russians living in our states . Ambassador whats your reaction to what george said . As we said, Russian Troops on the border of ukraine, you were there when it was the soviet union, do you think Vladimir Putin is intending to extend his influence over his neighbors . He clearly wants to in some respect. And any russian leader would be sensitive to Foreign Military bases on the border. And i think it was a mistake in the west of having that goal, of perhaps bringing georgia and other cups into the European Union. I dont think putin and other leaders could accept that. The way the ukraine has been taken back has created an increasing increasing on the neighbors for protection. I would also point out that in a calmer world, it might have been possible to arrange very peacefully, of a changeover to russia if thats what crimeans wanted. In many ways ukraine is going to be better off without crimea if they can domicile kyle themselves to this. The problem was they can reconcile themselves to this. The way this is done by russia, whether there is any intent to use those methods elsewhere im not at all sure. We do have a number of nato members who certainly are feeling nervous. The ones that have borders with russia. And george we have leading senators marco rubio, john mccain, crut criticizing the obama administration. Should we . I think there are other steps we can take before we get to military aid but i do think option. I dont think its pro involve tick for us to provide military aid, there was no crisis here before putin created one. There was no ethnic tensions in the ukraine, there was no violence going on. This is a crisis that was totally fabricateby moscow. And the necessitate owe allies are concerned. Just today the Russian Foreign ministry talked about the ethnic russians in estonia. For the russians to talk about the type of intervention in estonia that we just saw in crimea. As the ambassador said, would that not risk an escalation . But its an escalation that is being done by moscow. Not done by the nato allies or the United States. Thats the problem with this. That is why i think we need to increase our sanctions. We are trying to act and deal with things very mildly and very diplomatically. Every time we do that. Key hear things about the ethnic russians inest toa estonia. Ambassador. We would have gone up the wall, you know, if others put bases in mexico. We know what we did regarding cuba. So regardless of all the other arguments and one can argue both sides , it is simply not wise to think that this is essentially a matter that is going to be solved by military pressure. I think its unwise politically for us to get too involved with what is in effect at bottom a family dispute and i dont think that helps either side. Can ambassador jack matlock, george benetez, thank you. Thank you antonio. Switching to the Malaysia Flight 370. On friday they had no luck finding two pieces of what could be aircraft debris that were detected by a satellite last sunday. Australian Prime Minister tony abbott told reporters the search planes would be back. It is about the most inaccessible spot can you imagine on the face of the earth but if there is anything down there we will find it. A few more possible clues have surfaced. According to cnn american investigators say chief pilot Zaharie Ahmed Shah deleted files from his Flight Simulator after malaysian authorities said they were removed. The british newspaper telegraph shows nothing other than routine chatter shortly before communication he s ceased. The pilot took off the significance of that if any is not known. Meanwhile the malaysian transport minister thanked the cungcountries for their help. Secretary hagel said hed update the minister in the future. Im joined by Mike Williamson, a Marine Acoustic credit specialist, founder of williams and associates, they specialize in deep sea searches for submarines and planes. The area that plane is being searched for, is not sow remote, it is deep. The depth of eight empire state buildings stacked on top of each other. With no nearby safe place to moor your ship from storms. Actually, working at depth is not the problem. We have routinely worked at these depths for times. Our equipment is rated at 6,000 meters of depth more like 20,000 feet. The problem is more like the weather and the poorly known conditions of where you would be searching. Really doesnt make any sense to search until you have some idea of where the loss datum the point of impact would be and from there you could develop a search plan. I want to get to that in a minute but also i want to talk to you about something you are familiar with. The malaysian minister is asking the navy for remotely operatevehicles for deep ocean salvage. What would you use if you did the job, how do your systems work and how long does it take you to get your underwater machines there . Are. Well, in a crisis situation most of this stuff can go by air. It usually goes by sea because its big, heavy stuff. But time really isnt of the essence at this point for the deep water search with rovs and deep sonars because i think what we have is a little bit of a time crunch with the battery life on the pingers. But basically the pingers are very short range. And youre only going to hear them if youre almost on this water depth almost directly above them. Ive heard so much about the incredible acoustic capabilities of american submarines, so if the plane is in the ocean and the planes black box is pinging you have to be at a very short distance to be able to detect it . Yes, they are very low powered battery operatetransmitters. Particularly in those conditions, youre going ohave routinely large away waves, breaking waves, bubble intrusion in the water and lots of am beend noise it ambient noise that makes it hard to hear those signals from those beacons. Even underwater in a submarine . Absolutely. The boxes have been underwater at least enough time to use up half of their power. If you dont have a clear idea where the aircraft sank is there any chance you will ever find it if the black boxes switch off . Actually, thats a good point point. The transponders in this situation probably the pingers arent going to be useful in finding the wrerk unless dks wreck unless absolute luck allows somebody to credit happen upon them. Without concrete evidence its really difficult to even make any sense to start searching. So even if they find the debris and the debris is from the airplane, what will it be like to backtrack and figure out where the plane went down . Because cant the debris go in all sorts of directions . I remember that famous case of the thousands of are uner ducks that fell off of the ship in the pacific and currents took them all over the world. How easy will be it to figure out the currents and go backwards and find where that plane might be . Well, its possible however. And so if you can find wreck wreckage that is confirmed from that aircraft then its quite possible to at least get a starting point. What we have now is really no starting point. The currents are very confused in that area. We have a general drift of about two knots going from west to east. But superimposed on that are all these gyres of much higher velocity. And the surface currents could be moving those debris in any direction. So backcalculating is going to be very difficult. So debris could go in all sorts of different directions. And its a tremendous challenge, Mike Williamson good of you to join us to explain just how difficult it will be. Ness. Coming up a resurgent taliban attacks in what was considered the most secure area of afghanistan. How strong is the taliban and our social media producer, Hermela Aregawi is tracking social media now. Ill tell you more coming up, also wed like to hear from you throughout the show. You can join the consideration by tweeting to us ajconsiderthis or posting on our facebook or google plus pages. The taliban has again tabled a brutal attack in the heart of kabul. Killing nine and wounding six others. Making their way into the serena hotel. This follows an attack in january on a kabul restaurant where 21 people were murdered. As afghanistan prepares for president ial elections in april to replace outgoing President Hamid karzai, the taliban has vowed to disrupt the elections by any means necessary. These attacks in the capitol city raises important questions about afghanistans ability to ensure its own security. Joining us from washington, d. C, is michael ohanlon, director of research for the Foreign Policy program at the brookings institution, his most recent book is healing the wounded giant, maintaining military preeminence while cutting the defense budget. Michael, good to have you with us. And kabul has been on attack, 21 people were killed a few weeks ago, now nine at a very well protected hotel. What did you see while you were there . How strong is the taliban . Its a great question. I was in kabul until about two hours before that attack and it was a very peaceful week. What you are struck by in kabul, if you are a person whos traveled in much of the developing world is kabul seems like a relatively poor city but a busy overcrowded teeming lively city. It is not barricaded the way that baghdad was during the worst of the violence in iraq. It is not a city that evades or sort of you know emanates fear. Its a city that seems to be going about its life. These attacks are targeted at the places where they are can calculated to do the most Public Relations damage. They are serious it is true and our hearts go out to all lives that are lost. But i have to say for most afghans, kabul is a reflt relatively safe city. Even if the city isnt that barricaded, the serena hotel is less than a mile from the president ial palace, it has multiple request security checkpoints. How could an attack have taken place in one of the most secure places in the country . Thathats a good question. The last big attack in the serena hotel they boofd up security after that beefed up security after that time. And they had a stretch of relatively stable ongoings. They have beefed up their protection against car bombs and weapons going in. Apparently these were small weapons near the shoe area of the assail ant assailants and evaded detection. Some risk cannot be evaded and the fundamental issue here is in much of the country were actually seeing improvements in security and the taliban are smart enough to know that creating a spectacular attack of this type in the Media Capital and political capitol of the country has a disproportionate effect on safety, for april 5th president ial poll, i hope not but it could. On balance its a serious tragic thing but not indicative of the trent i dont think. The upcoming election in afghanistan, they are threatening those who might want to go out and vote. What is their goal . I think they would like to create the sense that the place is going to fall apart, that 2 2014 would be a meaningless election, and theres no nato followon force and theres no legitimate president who follows on the steps of president karzai they can create a fear which lends to a visual spiral where the businesses and other people who keep the afghani cultural moving forward starts to depart the country. And create an imminent sense of defeat, which the taliban created in the mid 1990s. I dont think theyll succeed, they are forcing a military force 400 strong who was responsible for tracking down the serena assail ants last night. And doing a major job of keeping the streets safe in the country. Theyll try. In this traditional year. In this transitional year. Hes also allowed releases of prisoners that were accused of being members of the taliban. So instead of appeasing the taliban could that be emboldening them . Well, i do disagree with those specific decisions by president karzai but i hesitate to say that hes part of the problem. Certainly Many Americans find his actions disrespectful, but i actually want to avoid piling gasoline on the fire. I think we get into these spats with president karzai and we start disagreeing with each other too much in public. We are allies in this war and most of what hes doing im convinced is in his own mind at least out of concern for wellbeing of the country. I do have a lot of disagreements with his specifics, and i dont want to blame him for state of violence and i dont think he should blame us for sense of violence. The Pakistan Taliban is the real concern. Within the alliance we are shona na shona as the afghans say, shoulder to shoulder, and we have to keep that solidarity going forward. If the americans end up leaving that might make the taliban lose even more steam because they have been so focused on getting the americans out of there. Is there a chance as the government is supposed to hold on to 93 of the country at this point that the taliban is ripe for compromise . Well, the taliban, were going to test that theory because nato is going to draw down its force he by a grand total of at least 90 forces by a grand total of at least 90 . The forces are either here or not, they will try that. But the Coalition Forces will be far less visible next year, in fact they are already far less visible. Well see if the talibans need to push out the socalled infidels, if that really works with the parch can afghan population. The Formidable Fighting hard for their country they are losing several thousand people a year but theyre still able to recruit enough to make the streets of kandahar much safer than they were three years ago, to make kabul still safer than it was just three years ago, to make mazari ri slifsri sharif safer.