we'll hit all of the hotspots, syria, iran, china, egypt, and more. later in the show, the u.s. rolled out the red carpet for china's next president but what is going on behind the scenes between the two rival nations? we have a great panel of china watchers. also, believe it or not, the eurozone crisis is solved. how, what? stay tuned, we'll explain. first, here is my take. we're hearing a new concept these days in discussions about iran. the zone of immunity. the idea often explained by ehud barak, israel's defense minister, is soon iran will have enough nuclear capacity that israel would not be able to inflict a crippling blow to its program. israeli officials explained that we americans cannot understand their fears that iron is a exosential danger to them. but, in fact, we can understand because we went through a very similar experience ourselves. after world war ii as the soviet union approached a nuclear capability, the united states was seized by a panic that lasted for years. everything that israel says about iran now, we said then about the soviet union. we saw it as a radical, godless, revolutionary regime opposed to every value we held dear, determined to overthrow the governments of the western world in order to establish global communism. we saw moscow as irrational, aggressive, and utterly unconcerned with human life. after all, stalin had just sacrificed a mind boggling 26 million soviet lives in his country's struggle against nazi germany. just as israel is openly considering pre-emptive strikes against iran, many in the west urge such strikes against moscow in the late 1940s. the calls came not just from hawks, but even from life-long pacifists like the public intellectual bertrand russell. to get a sense of the mood of the times, consider this entry from the november 29, 1948, diary of harold nicholson, one of the coolest and most sober british diplomats of his generation. quote, it is probably true that russia is preparing for the final battle for world mastery and that once she has enough bombs, she will destroy western europe, occupy asia, and have a final death struggle with america. if that happens and we are wiped out over here, the survivors in new zealand may say that we were mad not to have prevented this. there is a chance that the danger may pass and peace can be secured with peace. i admit it is a frail chance, not 1 in 90. in a speech at the boston navy yard in august 1950, the secretary of the navy, francis matthews, argued that the united states needed to become an initiator of war of aggression and in this sense would become the first aggressor for peace. in the end, however, the global revolutionaries in moscow, the mad autocrats in pyongyang, the terrorist supporting military in pakistan all with nukes have been deterred by mutual fears of destruction. we call it deterrence. and, remember, israel has 250 nuclear bombs, many on submarines to ensure that iran realizes it would be mutually assured destruction. while the iranian regime is often called crazy, it has done much less to merit that term than did a regime such as china. over the past decade, there have been thousands of suicide bombings around the world by saudis, egyptians, pakistanis, palestinians, but there has not been a single suicide attack by an iranian. is the iranian regime really likely to launch the first? the efforts to delay and disrupt iran's nuclear program are working, but even if one day tehran manages to build a few crude bombs, a policy of robust containment and deterrence is better to contemplate than a preventative war. let's get started. general martin dempsey has had a storied career in the u.s. army. he commanded the first armored division, old ironsides, in the iraq war. he ran centcom. overseeing operations in the middle east. he's been the army chief of staff and he's now the nation's highest ranking military officer and the president's top military adviser, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. general dempsey, thank you for joining us. >> thanks. i'm glad to be here. >> what would you say to those who argue that the united states should arm the opposition movement in syria? >> i think it's premature to take a decision to arm the opposition movement in syria because i would challenge anyone to clearly identify for me the opposition movement in syria at this point. and let me broaden the conversation a bit. syria is -- it's an arena right now for all the various interests to play out. what i mean by that is you have great power involvement. turkey clearly has an interest, a very important interest. russia has a very important interest. iran has an interest. what we see playing out is that, not just those countries, in fact, potential not all of them in any case, but we see the various groups who might think that the -- that at issue is a sunni/shia competition for regional control. >> the iranians on the one stand -- >> i do. >> and the saudis -- >> and the saudis on the other hand. there's indications al qaeda is involved and they're interested in supporting the opposition. there are a number of players all of whom are trying to reinforce their particular side of this issue, and until we're a lot clearer about, you know, who they are and what they are, i think it would be premature to talk about arming them. >> militarily, is syria very different from libya in the geography, in the case of libya you had an eastern half of the country that the rebels had. they had a city, benghazi. or do you believe if you needed to, you could militarily intervene in syria in the same way you did in libya? >> not the same way we did in libya. syria is a very different challenge. it's a different challenge, as you described it geographically. it's a different challenge in terms of the capability of the syrian military. they are very capable. they have a very sophisticated, integrated air defense system, for example. they have chemical and biological weapons. now, they haven't demonstrated any interest or any intent to use those, but it is a very different military problem. that said, of course, we're looking at all of that. we're trying to, you know, gather the best intelligence we can and take a look at what options we might have should we be asked to provide those to the national command authority in this country. >> do you think intervening in syria would be difficult? >> i think intervening in syria would be very difficult. >> so what would you do? you're watching thousands of people be slaughtered. the regime because it willing to be brutal is surviving. >> that's a fact. the current path of trying to gain some international consensus is the proper path rather than take a decision to do anything unilaterally. and i know that's diplomatic efforts are ongoing, but, you know, i wear the uniform i wear to provide options when asked. and we'll be prepared to do that, but this would not be -- it would be a big mistake to think of this as a another libya. >> another difficult military challenge. do you believe that israel has the capacity to strike iran in a way that would significantly regard its nuclear program? >> i think that israel has the capability to strike iran and to delay the production or the capability of iran to achieve a nuclear weapon status. probably for a couple of years. but some of the targets are probably beyond their reach and, of course, that's what concerns them. that's this notion of a zone of immunity that they discuss. >> and if that were to happen, do you believe that iran would engage in retaliatory measures, not just against israel, but against the united states' interests in iraq and afghanistan? >> that's the question with which we all wrestle, and the reason that we think that it's not prudent at this point to decide to attack iran. that's been our counsel to our allies, the israelis, well-known, well-documented. we also believe we know that the iranian regime has not decided that they will embark on the effort to weaponize their nuclear capability. >> do you think that is still unclear, that they're moving on a path for nuclear technology but whether or not they choose to make a nuclear weapon is unclear? >> it is. i believe it is unclear, and on that basis i think it would be premature to exclusively decide that the time for a military option was upon us. i mean, i think that the economic sanctions and the international cooperation that we've been able to gather around sanctions is beginning to have an effect. i think our diplomacy is having an effect. and our preparedness. i mean, fundamentally we have to be prepared, and that includes for the most part at this point being prepared defensively, but just as i mentioned in the earlier segment about our preparedness to provide options should the nation decide to do something in syria, we have to have the same options available should the nation decide to do something in iran. >> when you observe iranian behavior, does it strike you as highly irrational? does it strike you as sort of unpredictable or do they seem to follow their national interests in a fairly calculating way? >> that is a great question, and i'll tell you that i've been confronting that question since i commanded central command in 2008, and we are of the opinion that the iranian regime is a rational actor. and it's for that reason, i think, that we think the current path we're on is the most prudent path at this point. >> do you think that the israelis understand that the united states is counseling them not to strike, and do you think that they will be deterred from striking in the near future? >> well, i'm confident that they understand our concerns, that a strike at this time would be destabilizing and wouldn't achieve their long-term objectives. but, i mean, i also understand that israel has national interests that are unique to them, and, of course, they consider iran to be an existential threat in a way that we have not concluded that iran is an existential threat. so i wouldn't suggest sitting here today that we've persuaded them that our view is the correct view and that they are acting in an ill-advised fashion, but we've had a very candid, collaborative conversation. we've shared intelligence. and i was in israel about three weeks ago and spent two days there with the senior leaders, and so we're -- we are continuing that dialogue. >> if you were a betting man, would you bet that israel won't strike? >> well, fortunately, i'm not a betting man. >> when we come back, more with general dempsey. is it your best judgment after meeting with egyptian officials, egyptian military, that the americans who are being held there will be released and will be able to come back home? >> well, i can't guarantee that. and we are back with the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, general dempsey. let me ask you about the news this week which is, of course, about china and xi jinping, the soon-to-be president of china. the chinese military budget is going to double within three years of 2015, that is the estimate some people have. does that worry you? >> well, let me, you know, raise from the tactical to the strategic issues. you know that in our new strategy we've taken a decision to rebalance ourselves toward the pacific, and in so doing it's not as though we're flipping a switch. we've never left the pacific really, but we want to become more engaged in the pacific. i think this is more opportunity than liability to improve our relationship with china and i am personally committed to having that as the outcome rather than get into an arms race or into some kind of confrontation with china. >> you're just back from egypt. >> uh-huh. >> is it your best judgment after meeting with egyptian officials, egyptian military, that the americans who are being held there will be released and will be able to come back home? >> well, i can't guarantee that. what i can tell you is that in my engagement with them, and i have known the field marshall and the generals, the three key interlocutors with whom i met, i can tell you that we came to a very clear understanding of how serious this was and also a clear understanding that our relationship would be somewhat stalled until this particular issue is resolved. now, that said, we did, i did, reinforce the importance of our relationship with the egyptian military, and i do believe that egypt is in many ways a cornerstone of the future of the region in that if this arab spring is to have a positive outcome, i think we'll see it first in egypt. and so, you know, the stakes are extraordinarily high, and i made that clear. >> you know that in egypt many people, including now the largest political party there, the muslim brotherhood, believe that the egyptian military seems very reluctant to yield power, both in terms of giving up some of its political power but also its economic privileges. do you sense that this is a problem that is an obstacle to egypt's democratic development? >> well, i think that the various parties in egypt are kind of circling each other trying to determine just what they intend to do. my personal observation is i think that the military is actually eager to cede power because they have seen how difficult it can be to manage the street, manage the media, manage a judiciary. although the military has been largely running the country for decades, they haven't been under the unblinking eye of the people and the media. in this new world in which they find themselves. i think they're eager to cede power and go back to barracks but they also have some vested interest in protecting their budget and protecting their, you know, their authorities that they've become quite accustomed to, and they're going to have to work that out internally. >> are you optimistic about egypt? >> well, you know, i am optimistic because i do think that the arab spring can produce a democracy, and i think that, you know, i'd be eager to see a competition of ideas actually play out. but, you know, i'm concerned because in some way i think the competition of ideas may be somewhat stymied. >> the budget. are you as a military person completely comfortable that the budget cuts proposed by the obama administration will leave the united states' military with all the capacities it needs to defend its interests, its values, its global role? >> any strategy and any budget that supports any strategy has risks. i think the risks to our strategy and the risk that this budget may not deliver what we intend are manageable. so i am confident that our -- the revised strategy, the process we went through that did precede the budget and the budget that supports it, i am confident it will protect our national interests and allow us to provide options to the nation when, by the way, we confront things that we didn't predict. >> "the new york times" had a report on the fact that the united states is going to build up its special forces. sort of things like the navy s.e.a.l.s, commando forces as it were, and that this is going to become a core part of u.s. military capacity. is that the way of the future? >> let me state it a little differently. i think that among the lessons of the last ten years of war, two capabilities are prominent, and we have to better understand how to utilize them. one is special operating forces which have quadrupled in size and which will grow by about another 3,000 or so in this budget just submitted. and the other one is cyber. special forces have clearly demonstrated their capability. i think it's a matter of integrating all three of these, you know, the conventional, the cyber, and the special forces in ways we haven't thought of before, and i think we're going to be fine. >> do you worry about the moral/ethical dilemma of sending a drone into some country that we are not technically at war with and eliminating some foreigner? >> i will tell you, i'm very confident that we have the legal basis for those activities in which we're engaged, and i think it's a healthy thing to actually continue to assess the ethical basis, and to this point in time i'm quite comfortable with where we are, but it bears scrutiny as we go forward. >> you're an army general who's been recently elevated into this job. what's the biggest difference in doing this job than your previous long, distinguished career in the army? >> well, the pace is certainly different. i guess it's safe to say that by the time issues come to me, there's no easy issues to deal with. they're all rather complex problems. so the pace is different. i think, you know, the responsibility, i mean, it does weigh on me that it's not only the roughly 2.2 million men and women in uniform, but their families, and also the nation's security. you know, and i'm not talking about security today. i'm talking about not only prevailing in our current conflicts and challenges, but also preparing the force and th nation for the future. so i think it's some combination of pace and level of responsibility, but i'm honored to do it. >> in this job you're part soldier, part diplomat, and in the diplomat role, i'm wondering whether you're going to use what has now become at least on youtube a famous singing voice. ♪ start spreading the news ♪ i'm leaving today >> are you going to try and unleash that with your chinese counterparts one of these days? >> i did actually challenge my chinese counterpart during that visit of their bands to a sing-off. hasn't taken me up on it yet, but if i thought it would get us in a better place with china, i'd do it. >> general dempsey, pleasure to have you on. >> thank you, sir. lots more ahead of the show. we have a great panel of experts on china. but up next, europe. amidst all of the talk of the eurozone's demise, a quiet bit of magic has actually solved the problem. for now. what in the world do i mean? stay with us. ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 let's talk about the cookie-cutter retirement advice ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 you get at some places. ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 they say you have to do this, have that, invest here ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 you know what? ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 you can't create a retirement plan based on ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 a predetermined script. ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 to understand you and your goals... ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 ...so together we can find real-life answers for your ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 real-life retirement. ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 talk to chuck ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 and let's write a script based on your life story. ttd#: 1-800-345-2550 oh! 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[oinking] [hissing] [ding] announcer: cook foods to the right temperature using a food thermometer. 3,000 americans will die from food poisoning this year. check your steps at foodsafety.gov. imagine a region of the world where stocks have had their best january in nearly 15 years. bank shares are up 20%, the rates at which governments borrow money has fallen sharply. investor sentiment is at its best in months. you think i'm talking about asia, maybe the brick nations. nope. the region is actually struggling europe. what in the world, right? the story is actually quite simple and was pointed out to me by sebastian mallaby of the council on foreign relations. after months of endless hand wringing, unnumerable talk and considerable pain, it seems the eurozone has actually been saved, quietly but effectively. the savior is this man, mario draghi, the new head of the european central ba