0 they are not there yet even though that's what the senate majority leader thinks, but they are not taking anything for granted inside the house. it's remarkable to watch. >> they shouldn't take anything for granted there's a lot of opposition between not only republicans and plenty of democrats inclined to vote no right now. brianna, how confident are officials over there that in the end they will get yay votes from the house and senate. >> reporter: wolf, they are feeling better today than yesterday and better yesterday than they were the day before. the white house officials i've spoken with are optimistic, not that they have the votes at this point, but that momentum is on their side. they think it's so key that they got this full throated response and support from nancy pelosi and john boehner today, not just them but as well the number two republican in the house. when they add that up with the tentative support they got from the key republican senators yesterday, lindsay graham and john mccain, they feel this extraordinary level of outreach that that i have seen from president obama and his administration that it is working. it's still unclear whether the votes are where they need to be at this point. there's still a lot of winning over to do and the white house says that they realize that. officials say that the president is prepared to be engaged in this as he heads overseas and heads to sweden this evening and goes to russia for the end of the week. there's still the question of if he does not get the vote he wants from congress, what does he do? officials here say they he has the authority to act alone but, wolf, they are still not saying he'll go ahead and do that. >> and he hopes that will not be the case, that he will have the votes in the senate and house. brianna, stand by and dana as well. we're less than a half hour away from the start of the hearing before the senate foreign relations committee. the secretaries of state and defense getting ready to testify as is the chairman of the u.s. joint chiefs of staff, general martin dempsey. i want to send it over to christiane a.manpour. you have an exclusive interview with the syrian ambassador to the united nations. >> yes, indeed, it does fall to bashar jaafari. and from the earlier days of his government's brutal crackdown, mr. jaafari defended the government's actions. they are trying to flood the zone as we're saying with its case as the obama administration is doing with its case. on monday, bashar jaafari made this plea to the united nations, said the syrian government calls on the secretary general to shoulder his responsibilities from preventing any aggression on syria. bashar jaafari joins me live from new york. mr. ambassador, welcome. >> thank you very much for having me. >> mr. ambassador, you just heard what wolf has been talking to with the congressional and white house correspondent, that is a formidable array of diplomatic and political power and military power that's arrayed now against syria. you see who's going to be testifying today later right after our interview. and the secretary of state and secretary of defense. is your government fully aware of how vulnerable it is to the might of the united states and its allies? are you prepared and are you aware that many of your significant military facilities are possibly going to be destroyed? >> well, first of all, please give me some minutes to clarify some very important points. number one, i'm a diplomat and my main job and mission is to extinguish fires, not to trigger wars and animosity among nations. supposedly sovereign and members of this big home called the united nations. number two, the issue is not related to a war against syria. it's about an aggression, according to the charter item 4 of article 2 of the charter, member states should refrain from any unilateral action or any aggression against any other member states. so the issue for us is not about military strike coming from here or there. it's about an aggression that will strike the whole syrian people. and i hope that these wars wore extremely important for the congressional leaders and congress members who are discussing in their hearings the -- whether they will allow the white house to strike or not. we are all -- >> mr. jaafari. >> we are all victims of any escalation of the situation. you cannot say by killing children and civilians. >> how will it affect the morale of your government if and when the u.s. takes this action and a lot of your military facilities will be destroyed? they are not saying they are going in as an invading force. you've seen these actions in the past, cruise muissiles, can be devastation. are you afraid of the allies collapsing? >> we're not war mongers, not war advocates. we are a peaceful nation, small nation. we don't pretend to be equally strong enough to confront the united states military. this is not the case. we are the victim of any aggression that might happen at any time. we are mainly a keen interest in safeguarding the interest of our people and preventing any aggression. we have been calling on the american administration for years since the beginning of the crisis to get involved positively speaking and resolving this crisis which is dramatic and regretful -- reg t regrettable -- the american administration closed the embassy in damascus and shut down diplomatic channels and worked out a secret strategy to help insurgents against the government. >> mr. jaafari, you are portraying your government as the victim, presumably that's your job at this point. but obviously what's happening is because of the aggression by your government against syrians, including right now the use of chemical weapons. there is a forensic syrian chemical weapons expert who has defected according to the opposition and is now in turkey and will, he says, make public what he knows about the regime's involvement in the use of chemical weapons. that is going to seal this situation, isn't it? >> christiane, these allegations are false and unfounded. you can repeat the same mistakes that the previous american administrations did at many times during vietnam war or cuban crisis, or the iraqi war with colin powell and the security council presenting high confidence, evidence at that time by the way he used the same description used by mr. kerry three days ago, when mr. kerry said, also, he had high evidence -- high confidence evidence. any opponent, any opposition could come out to the media or to any other intelligence sponsoring him and say his government did this and that. you may remember what mr. -- the iraqi guard did before the invasion of iraq when he pushed the american intelligence to the high poj they sis of them having weapons of mass destruction. then they apologized later on, including mr. colin powell for this allegation. i'm really afraid we are repeating the same tragic and regrettable scenario in the case of syria today. >> the problem with what you're saying though, the problem with what you're saying is that you're confusing iraq and syria. syria does have chemical weapons and many, many doctors and independent investigators as well as national intelligence have concluded that those weapons have been used and have been used by the syrian government. this is not the first time, there's been many occasions and many tests of victims of biomedical tests, hair and blood and urine samples which have proven it. are you saying there are no chemical weapons in syria, or are you just saying you didn't do it? >> thank you very much for asking this very important question. number one, the syrian government did not say that sarin gas was not used. actually we were the first to say that in march the 20th, which means one day after the attack by chemical substances. and we insisted in our request on two things, a, to prove that the chemical weapons were used and b, who did it? the american delegation and french and british at that time objected to b. they just wanted to focus on whether the chemical weapons were used or not. we were highly interested from the beginning in shedding light on the use of chemical weapons by groups. this is number one. number two, we are not saying that chemical weapons were used -- chemical weapons in each conventional definition as one type of the weapons of mass destruction, what mr. kerry said two days ago about the signatures of sarin found in the results he referred to is not a big discovery. the syrian government said it five months ago. we said from the beginning that the sarin gas neurotoxic gas were used and nobody cared about it at the time because all of them knew and the british intelligence sneaked illegally inside syria and to analyze samples and came out with the result, which is that the only groups used the -- >> mr. jaafari. mr. jaafari -- the british and french and united states -- sir, the british and french and united states say chemical weapons have been used but that they have been used by your government. to simply not have access to the delivery systems to the wherewithal and stockpiles. this is unfortunately a historical precedent that people are gassing themselves. this is a major problem with your argument and it does sound that the syrian government is pretty afraid, all of a sudden all of you are out giving interviews, president assad, you talking to me and others talking to other journalists and i figure out you believe that there is going to be a major u.s. strike on your facilities? >> christiane, the reports emanating from usa and france and britain are not and could not be taken seriously and not credible because these three governments are deeply involved in the syrian crisis against the government -- >> sir -- nobody can take seriously -- >> give me some time, please to clarify my point. >> you've made your point. you've made your point -- >> to the security council. the judge from geneva testified that according to her information the groups used the chemical weapons. so please we have other resources of information who say exactly the opposite of what the america and british are saying. why anticipating on the results of the team of investigators who are currently working very seriously on obtaining results of their mission in syria? why preempting the results by this kind of irresponsible anticipation? why preparing the ground for an illegal military aggression against syria? >> if indeed -- >> what would be the result of the investigation -- investigative team? >> they seem to say they have taken a lot of samples. as i say, yet, again, there have been many, many tests done over the last year or so because you haven't used them just once but several times according to intelligence and opposition figures. so again, if indeed given what's going on, would you -- would syria agree to a proposal happening and being floated right now to allow the u.n. or others to come in and simply remove all of your stock piles and chemical weapons from syria? >> this is not the issue right now. the issue right now is about preventing the american aggression against my country. then any related issues to the weapons of mass destruction could be examined seriously later on. i would like to remind you that syria when it was a member of the security council in 2003, submitted a draft resolution to the security council on the establishment of a zone free from all weapons of mass destruction. we were objected to at that time by the american delegation. so we are keen interest in having all weapons of mass destruction out of the area of the military, including the israeli nuclear arment, which is the most dangerous weapon. >> let me ask you this, sir. nobody believes you basically, because everything you've said -- not just you but your government, everything you've said over the last two and a half years have simply been swatted away by the facts. you have simply escalated this war and the use of different weapons conventional and now nonconventional and so you are in a very, very weak situation in terms of having the credibility of your side. you're trying to say it's the others using them and not you. can i ask you because there are countries that favor you, such as russia and china and others, are you getting military or intelligence help from the russians? >> christiane -- >> in terms of what's going on now. >> i'm really worried at hearing these bellicose talks in the american media. the media is a very important weapon of mass destruction also. you, the media -- >> i don't think you can say that. >> you should lead the public opinion towards the right path. we don't need wars or aggression in the area. we are fed up with wars. the american people are fed up with wars. you have had thousands of american soldiers killed in our area, in iraq, afghanistan, libya and lebanon. we don't need wars. we need peaceful settlement of conflicts according to charter of the united nations. >> the problem is you're prosecuting this war. you're prosecuting this war and the way you have put it out is that you are fighting against terrorists. that is your government's -- >> absolutely. >> that's how you've been justifying it. here's the thing. even your arab brethren, arab league said that the use of weapons is illegal and those that use them and they believe it has been the syrian government, kicked you out of the arab league, those who use them should be tried like war criminals. i guess i want to know in a final minute or so, how do you sleep at night, mr. jaafari, defending regime government that has caused so much bloodshed and really crossed the line from any kind of civil war into weapons of mass destruction, into one of the highest crimes of intel national law. how do you personally sleep at night? >> i believe that the use of chemical weapons or nuclear weapons is a horrible appalling crime. those who perpendicular such a horrible crime, whether israelis or others, should be held accountable to the international established mechanisms. not to the bully of the war, the policemen of the war represented by the american intelligence reports or false allegations coming from france or britain or saudi arabia or israel. we are in favor of a peaceful settlement of all of the con flibl flikts in the area and my country has been a victim of intrusion, interference in the domestic affairs by foreign intelligen intelligences. don't forget there is room of operation and jordan operating right now by the saudis and the pentagon and where they are training and instructing thousands of syrian mercenaries to invade syria from the south. the same thing exists in the north within the turkish territory. please, we have to look at the picture in its entirety and comprehensiveness. we are not training for wars or for agresing anybody else. we haven't declared war to the united states or any of our neighbors. >> mr. jaafari. >> we have a domestic crisis. yes, wrong doings happened in the past. yes, injustices took place in syria in the past. we need to correct these and we believe in what obama said as his logo in elections, a change, yes, we can and yes we need. in syria itself as well as outside of syria, the whole area needs peace. we don't need further wars. we don't need further destabilization. after all, all of these bloodshed, that would happen sooner or later. all of the victims will be innocent, whether they are -- syrians, iranians turkish and saudis or jordanians. >> mr. jaafari. >> the sons will be the victims. >> thank you for joining me. >> thank you. >> christiane, thanks very much. christiane amanpour, i want to pick your brain for a second before i let you go. what did you think, it's not often we hear a syrian official, high ranking syrian official envoy from the government of bashar al assad to the united nations making their case. give me your reaction. you had obviously very forceful tough interview with the ambassador. >> well, it's to be expected. he's obviously defending his government. they obviously don't need to be struck by the united states. it is going to be something whereas i try to get out of him women degrade their military facilities, at least many of them, even if it's not an invasion which nobody is planning. it will affect the military capabilities at least according to commanders and politicians. also what's interesting is that they are now, quote/unquote, what you're saying, flooding the zone. it's hard to get the syrian government to talk. they only do when they want and need to. they believe something is going to happen and they try to put the spin on what is going to happen. i'm sure mr. jaafari won't argue with that use of that word because he's now having to talk the party line. i think what's interesting though is they failed to realize thousand they brought this on themselves. it couldn't be clearer that neither president obama nor prime minister cameron or international community wanted to intervene in syria. for two and a half years they have not. it is the syrian regime with the accusations and most people believe is their use of chemical weapons that has brought the international community to this point where we are right now, wolf. >> very, very sensitive moment, not only in regional history but world history. we're standing by for an important hearing before the senate foreign relations committee. christiane, we'll talk to you throughout the day here on cnn and cnn international. we're standing by and go to the senate foreign relations committee. we're going to hear the secretaries of state and defense and chairman of the joint chiefs getting ready to testify before republicans and democrats, a critical vote coming up maybe as early as next week on the floors of the senate and house of representatives after president obama urged them to authorize the use of military force in syria. we'll also get immediate reaction to what's going on, including christiane's interview. ron paul will join us live. we'll get a different perspective from mike quigley, a democrat of illinois, much more of our special coverage coming up right here in the situation room. ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] some things are designed to draw crowds. ♪ ♪ others are designed to leave them behind. ♪ the all-new 2014 lexus is. it's your move. yeah... try new alka seltzer fruit chews. they work fast on heartburn and taste awesome. these are good. told ya! i'm feeling better already. [ male announcer ] new alka seltzer fruits chews. enjoy the relief! i put in the hourswhere nei am today by luck.ts chews. and built a strong reputation in the industry. i set goals and worked hard to meet them. i've made my success happen. so when it comes to my investments, i'm supposed to just hand it over to a broker and back away? that's not gonna happen. avo: when you work with a schwab financial consultant, you'll get the guidance you need with the control you want. talk to us today. we're only minutes away from the senate foreign relations committee hearing. we'll hear from the secretaries of state and defense, testifying together with the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. lots of anticipation, let's bring in two guests, former republican presidential candidate, former congressman ron paul and democratic congressman mike quigley of illinois. congressman paul, first to you, you are totally, correct me if i'm wrong, totally opposed to any u.s. military force in syria right now despite all of the evidence that the syrian regime united statesed chemical weapons against its own people, is that right? >> yeah, but i don't accept your statement because i think that a lot of people question some of that evidence. but i don't -- that is besides the point because of the policy that i advocate is nonintervention foreign policy. i don't believe it's in our interest or national best interest to be involved. i don't think it's legal under national law or international law. i think kill