Looks like a successful coup. Even if its not a successful coup, its successful in the fact that erdogan will be weakened. When there was a coup attempt last time, it didnt quite work but the Prime Minister was weakened and later had to resign. Whats been happening inside turkey for a while has been building. The secular have been very nervous about a growing cozy relationship between erdogan and islamists. He has been jailing reporters and shutting down certain media outlets. We can go back to the flotilla where the turkish erdogan, president erdogan, sent this turkish flotilla down to gassa and was picking fights with israel. We have seen a history here of erdogan becoming too close with the islamists. The istanbul bombing was a huge issue for the Turkish Military to see what could happen. The situation in nice probably put them over the edge to say we cannot allow our president and our country to get this close to the islamists. We have to take it back. Charles herb london saw this coming. He wrote a book called county sunni vanguard. The secular tradition as asserted itself. Turkey has a secular tradition. The islamization that was undergone by erdogan had many people upset. If you spent time in istanbul and ataturk, its basically a secular society. Its only the rural areas that had the islamic revolution. After the attacks in istanbul, there was no question the military thought it had to do something. The military has been purposed by erdogan. Angry about the way in which the purging has taken place. Charles turkey is a thank you to partner. They are obviously centrally located. They came to the fight against isis late. And not fully menned to the commitment everyone else has had. A lot of folks are saying it may not be bad news as long as it can stay relatively bloodless to get someone out of there who is not sympathetic to the wrong people. Erdogans policies have contributed to erdogans will contribute to the militarys willingness to overthrow him. Istanbul may be secular. But rural turkey is islamic. Its a middle eastern country. Its like going to new york city and saying everyone votes democrat and its only democratic. It doesnt represent the whole country which is considerably much more islamic than it used to be. Charles you said there is a large islammic population, much more than in the past. Charles could those folks actually rise up and try to protect erdogan who happens to be at some seaside resort town. Im not sure that was what coincidence. I think the military will maintain control of the country. Keep in mind the deal made with isel rentloverhe flillahat s meione forethatlear sugges there is some sort of accommodationist view that exists. Erdogan has hat had one foot in has had one foot in the terrorist camp and one foot in nato. Charles michael, again, we are going to be holding our breath until this settles down. But another bigtime news event from a regional of the world on fire. Completely unstable. And it always feels like the next news item could tilt the whole thing out of control. Is there some good news hidden in this . Its good news fit the pro u. S. Secular military we worked with the last 30 years. Its a military we work with very well. One of the things erdogan did was he started arresting the military officers he thought would be threats. Charismatic turkish officers that he brought up on false charges and made go away. When you coupproof a 34eu9, this is what happens. We are looking at a split military. If this is a coup by that wing of the military. Officers were charged by ataturk. Its a good thing if its our guys. Charles we are talking about ataturk, the father of modernday turkey who was influenced by the west. The mixed signals the world has gotten from turkey has not helped our cause. And again this is what we are waiting for to see if it can remain relatively bloodless and these people are sympathetic not only to the west. So far they put out communications saying they would adhere to the different sort of arrangements they had with the rest of the world. And also their own constitution where the military had an historic role making sure the person in charge didnt go too far from their original concept of the country. We have always been close to the secular inside the military. And they have always done a good job. I pray this is bloodless. I pray this is something that they can settle internally more from a political standpoint. But one thing i have to make clear is that turkey has stated for a long time that assad should go. Their enemy is assad. They thought the syria policy should be get rid of assad and all else will begin to come together. Its not so much that they were resisting going after isis as they were saying assad is the first priority. And assad should go is the u. S. Policy. So you have two nato members articulating a policy assad should go but nothing being done about it. The american policy was equivocal. When it came to assad the russians dictated this policy. When you listen to kerry, what he said at the recent meetings in vienna, for the foreseeable future, we can see assad in power. The policy is to get rid of assad. Andrew, the last week or so we heard overtures that the white house with russians, maybe we Work Together and plan bombings against isis, command and control together. We have seen turkey reaching out particularly since the attack on the ataturk airport. Could this speed up the process saying the central issue will work on the rest of the issues . I think it must be terrifying to be a u. S. Ally in the middle east and experience the americans legitimizing the use of Russian Military power to achieve russian ends. I have to think that the fire of those Turkish Military which for 200 years have seen russia as an existential threat and fought four wars with russia. The Turkish Military must have seen that meeting between erdogan and the russians and said this is the straw that broke the camels back. Turn ski has been have much concerned over the role russia is playing in this part of the world. But the youth has allied itself with russia and allowed russia to dictate middle east policy. Charles right before we aired, john kerry spoke with lavrov, his russian counterpart. He was trying to be somewhat reserved. But he didnt seem to be upset by the events we are witnessing right now. We are watching and hearing actual gunfire. People are ducking. So far it has been bloodless, though reports of one explosion at a tv station and some high ranging official within the turkish government being killed. This is the first time we have heard this type of gunfire. Michael, go ahead. Its a good thing it was our guys. But to working with russia and syria, russia does not keep arms lent away from assad. Anything we do in syria that works with russia is benefiting assad. Its not likely something we should do. Assad remains a number one driver for recruitment. And it alienates the 80 sunni population in syria if we ally ourselves with russia and by extension assad. Charles it feels like in America Donald trump has been okay with russia going in there and together socalled heavy lifting and saying we are not sure if these socalled legibles are our allies. Whats your position on that. Im uncomfortable with that position. I think the u. S. Position with it comes to turkey, lets just focus on that. Its a very difficult position. We have to remember that its a nato ally. Erdogan was elected by the people. Sometimes we dont always like that. But i dont think we should be going around publicly talking about supporting a coup. That being said, the secular military generals doing this have seen turkey devolve into something that they are not comfortable with. And so the overall goal of supporting democracy and human rights and having a policy and having a turkish leader that is for democracy and human rights unequivocally is probably the position where we should be. The u. S. Position should be we are for the people, we are for democracy, and try to do a dance as much as possible. Chair sky news arabic saying the turkish chief of staff has been killed. We are hearing gunfire in istanbul. Well continue to bring you breaking news out of turkey. The Prime Minister said a group within the military is engaged in a coup attempt. It will all shake i asked my dentist if an electric toothbrush was going to clean better than a manual. He said sure. But dont get just any one. Get one inspired by dentists, with a round brush head. Go pro with oralb. Oralbs rounded brush head cups your teeth to break up plaque and rotates to sweep it away. And oralb delivers a clinically proven superior clean versus sonicare diamondclean. My mouth feels super clean oralb. Know youre getting a superior clean. Im never going back to a manual brush. By switching to xfinity x1. Rio Olympic Games show me gymnastics. X1 lets you search by sport, watch nbcs highlights and catch every live event on your tv with nbc sports live extra. Im getting ready. Are you . X1 will change the way you experience nbcuniversals coverage of the rio Olympic Games. Call or go online today to switch to x1. Charles a Turkish Military group reportedly seized power from the embattled turkish president. There are reports of tanks opening fire around the Turkish Parliament building. Michael pregent and mike baker will join us shortly on the phone. You have extreme expertise in this area of the world. It will be a while before we know how this shakes out. But from an initial looksee, a lot of experts say this could be good news for america. We dont know, its a fluid situation. I just got off the phone with an inside source before i got on the air and president erdogan has gotten on skype and asked people to go to the streets. And that hes still in power. Charles i have seen the photos of him on the internet on skype. But if someone is on skype, you are not going to get a lot of confidence from the guy in charge and you look out your window and the military has a tank in your front door. There are reports his seaside resort is surround by the military. The question becomes within the fractions within the army, who is in charge and whats going on. This is such an important region for the United States that i cant tell you how nervous our hearts are. Charles now as you hear gunfire and shots and maybe the turkish chief of staff has been killed. We hope it wont devolve into a massive civil war. I think it can be avoid. The military worked closely with the United States. We have our guys the military and presumably they will prevail. A turkey that is closer to the United States philosophically and ideologically would make an awful lot of sense in trying to control the chaos that exists in the middle east. Charles your initial assessment, its fluid to hear mustafas words. Whats your assessment. They lived through a lot of coups in the last few decades. Some are over and done with in blazing speed. You would hope that all the effort we put into the operation on the intelligence side with our liaison partner and the military side that those relationships that we worked so hard to build over the years will hold steady. You hope one of those individuals will give you have a heads up before Something Like this you know is coming down the pike. I believe it will evolve into more stability. I have a feeling this will be fairly well received by a significant part of the population there in turkey. The military views itself as the keeper of the flame of turkish stability. And part of our relationship with the military has been consistently i would say good. Its up and down. But unlike at times when Government Relations seem on the rocks when there are problems. Oftentimes on a working persons level, we have more consistency and strong relationships and i think that will play out here. Charles there are rumors erdogan has left the country. We are watching scenes and we are getting a sense at least from what we are looking at of jubilation. It looks like these folks are happy that someone who can clamp down on religious freedoms, someone who jailed journalists. The last couple elections have been questionable. This is not the democracy turkey envisioned itself to be. We are seeing the crowds live on the streets. Thats jubilation. Those arent the people erdogan called into the streets via skype. Those are the people support the coup from what it looks like. My gut tells me pro u. S. Military officers to insure democracy prevails in turkey. You had people roaming the streets beating up people for not adhering to ramadan in istanbul, in what used to be a secular capital. Religious police went in and both everybody up and they werent necessarily punished by the erdogan government. This is a good thing. Charles could this be equated to iran when the shaw was in power and the ayatollah came back . A different set of circumstances but the evolution of iran from a westerninfluenced nation to the darkest Islamic State . There is no question that there is something to it. What you have here is an erdogan who tried to change the secular environment that was created by ataturk and existed in turkey for a long time. There is no question he supported the attack. Well see if there is a civil war or not. Charles we are going to come back. But we are hearing jubilation in the streets. The breaking news, the countrys Prime Minister saying a group within the military engaged in an attempted coup. [announcer] is it a force of nature . Or a sales event . The summer of audi sales event is here. Get up to a 5,000 bonus on select audi models. The former operative obviously we will probably not know the outcome but turkey with a history of clues what should the west do because if there is a coop can we publicly support that against an ally. Surely is not a good thing that we support a military dictatorship coming into a country. Its hard to say if the coup leaders are part of democracy. The region with the least amount of democratization produces the most terrorist. Terrace. I would be concerned to see if the secular tour. I might expect to see more radical. They want to walk a fine line in the beginning. Charles how do we handle this from a military perspective, do you think we will still be able to use turkey as a staging area quacks do you think anything will change. They are saying everything will be a hereto do you think that will be true quacks. The administration at the White House Level tries to walk a fine line between the situations like this. In a way they are looking to cover their back side. But in reality the extremists is going to get much more radical simply because we come out at some point and continue to work with the secular military government. What we need to do and typically do regardless of what the public statements are is we look at what is in our best national security. Every country does. But we look at whats in our own national security. Frankly thats what we have. Charles we are watching live feed. There is gunfire. We are not sure where it is coming from. And then as soon as it subsides everyone gets up. Theres not a sense of panic there is a sense of jubilation. Maybe they are firing guns in the air. It is a very jubilant position right here. We were talking about the history there he comes in and he has a great early part because the economy is going very well and then he starts to go off the rails a little bit. I remember when he built this palace and everyone asked him not too. Was that the beginning of the discontent with him as a leader. Its an interesting analogy when he took over in egypt as a result of the democratic election there were 33 Million People on the streets and the second revolution. They were opposed to him because of the extreme islamization of the country. We are seen Something Like that in turkey. Theyre gonna say we are not going to support a military coup. On the other hand what we have to think about as they pointed out the National Interest of the United States. If in fact they can bring about stability in turkey and create an environment where turkey once again is a reliable ally than it seems to me that the United States might have to modify its position. Charles and the idea that he was a member of the Muslim Brotherhood has always rubbed a lot of americans the wrong way. Charles we will bring you the very latest on the terror attack in france. There is sad heartbreaking news. Eightyfour people are dead. You focus on making great burgers, or building the best houses in town. Or becoming the next highlyunlikely dotcom superstar. And us, well be right there with you, helping with the questions you need answered to get your brand new business started. Were legalzoom and weve already partnered with over a million new Business Owners to do just that. Check us out today to see how you can become one of them. Legalzoom. Legal help is here. Charles and out to france. Not to france. Innocent lives lost in the terror attack in nice. Could it had been prevented with tighter security or per valence surveillance quacks . We talk about the political stuff all the time but just the idea and the notion that someone have a rental of the and with no markings parked it for nine hours. Told Police Officers he was delivering ice cream and there was no refrigeration on it was still given the aok. People were thinking that is a direct result of political correctness. Thats right charles. That wasnt supposed to happen. When i heard about this horrific event that took place last night. They set up a security perimeter around the event. Its the same way we do in washington dc. We set up a perimeter and you never allow vehicles especially a box truck like that to make its way inside the perimeter to where people are. Says to me one there was a Security Breach where as some policefficer dropped the ball and didnt secure the area he was supposed to or be this was a planned event with someone on the inside and maybe they allowed this truck to get in here. I think the investigation has to come up with some very revealing facts as we go further into the week. Charles carl you had been warning about this kind of stuff. The idea that it was this successful and easy it is frightening. They are not getting the message. We are