And look to elections for Mark Halperin and John Heilemann. Can the democrats do enough targeted messages from the president , Vice President , clintons and others to remake the electorate in some of the rails where voters dont usually vote younger, africanamerican, asias, hispanics, women turn out to vote in a midterm, thats hard to do. On the republican side, the strategists will tell you they dont think they can live up to running against the other party unless they can appeal to social issues. Social issues not in their favor in most cases. Foreign policy, a lot is going on, but a lot of republican strategists arent saying well win it on Foreign Policy. Six months ago, no doubt people thought republicans were in place to reclaim the senate. The story has changed in these sick months. We do not have a Midterm Election thats looks like the previous two. In 2010, we had a big wave election, a big republican year. In 2006, we had a big wave election, a very big democratic year. Thats not what the data shows about this election. Charlie richard haass, steve coll, Mark Halperin and John Heilemann when we continue. Theres a saying around here you stand behind what you say. Around here, we dont make excuses, we make commitments. And when you cant live up to them, you own up and make it right. Some people think the kind of accountability that thrives on so many streets in this country has gone missing in the places where its needed most. But i know youll still find it, when you know where to look. Rose additional funding provided by and by bloomberg. A provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Charlie we question thin this evening with an assessment of i. S. I. S. And the latest from ukraine. Earlier today, president obama started a trip to europe, stop in estonia and wales later this week. Ukraine accused russia of invading with ground forces. President putin said he could take kiev in two weeks. N. A. T. O. Said it would boost to protect members in. Iraq, i. S. I. S. Has come to a temporary halt. A siege broken in amerli. A video shows the beheading of steve coll, held captive for i. S. I. S. Over a year. Joining me to talk about the latest developments and u. S. Role in both conflicts is richard haass, president of the council on foreign relations. Steve coll is the dean of Columbia UniversityJournalism School and writer on the new yorker magazine. Welcome. Thank you. Charlie you wrote a piece, the Assad Government may be evil but a lesser evil. Therefore it is a lesser evil. It doesnt have a global reach like i. S. I. S. Doesnt have a global ideology. You cant simply fight i. S. I. S. In iraq. You have to fight them in syria as well otherwise they have a sanctuary. We need a ground partner. We can provide the air force. We need somebody to hold the ground and take the ground from i. S. I. S. We only have a couple of choices. Ideally the syrian opposition. Problem is theyre weak, divided. Youre talking years before they would be strong enough. Another would be a panarab force, the jourdainians and others. Again, history shows very hard to organize these. Arabs often arent willing to provide the foot soldiers. What are you left with . We wont do it ourselves. Charlie no boots on the ground. Then youre left with, by a process of elimination, some sort of a process of working with the Syrian Government, maybe try to cut a deal, essentially saying, look, you lay off the internal opposition, you lay off your own people, well lay off you and they can begin to retake territory some time, perhaps, we do start working gradually with a local opposition. It may be having a tacit or possibly formal arrangement with the Syrian Government which we dont much like but sometimes in life you have to choose. Charlie is that in any way similar to whats going on in iraq where shiite militias have been a force and helped by american air attacks. We have no relationship with them, not working with them, but somebodys coordinating whats happening in the air to whats happening on the ground and the de facto result is were working with them. Exactly right. Its both alike in that parties killing each other not long ago are at least now not shooting each other o and are now working together. Other thing thats similar, is syrian, United States, russia, saudi arabia may have to coordinate their policies. We have been on opposite sides of proxy wars but when an enemy is an enemy to all, you have to put aside some of your initial preferences and Work Together in a limited fashion. So, yes, there are interesting possibilities. Charlie this question, what about the countries like saudi arabia, a large sunni nation who have been supportive of the United States, are they going to sit back now or are they going to support this effort knowing shia are involved . It might be extraordinarily difficult for the saudi government. They are strategically opposed to iran on every count, have real problems with the shia, and one way or another, it is said, facilitated the rise of i. S. I. S. By private donations. The saudis recently have belatedly woken upup to the fact that at the end of the day they are in the crosshairs of i. S. I. S. , because i. S. I. S. Will see them as the impure custodians of the two places. So its in saudi arabias interest if only out of selfpreservation, to get syria out of i. S. I. S. Six months ago, it was said if saudi arabia and syria could park differences and coordinate, i think thats possible. Charlie and you think the president is going to deal with ukraine as well as this. Tell me how you measure the threat of i. S. I. S. To our National Security, to the National Security and the general security of the middle east and europe. Quite seriously, charlie. Both directly and indirectly. Directly, like you, i worry about these guys with american passports, european passports going home after this graduate school in terrorism. I worry about that and i think people like ourselves in new york, weve got to take this extremely seriously. I fear this, quite honestly, down the road. But also, these guys are not content just to destroy. In their minds, they want to create. They call themselves the Islamic State or caliphate, they have ambitious designs and are not looking at just iraq and syria, but potentially jordan, lebanon, middle east, and interests in this part of the world and beyond. This is not a selflimiting group with a national or territorial set of ambitions. Charlie far different from al quaida. Far greater ambitions and capacity. Charlie in terms of organizations, money, financing, a whole range of things that give you power to go beyond where you are . Absolutely, plus they have ththe momentum. Its important to break their momentum in iraq and that will slow down the recruiting and then you need to take the battle to them in sir. I cant w i. Charlie nothing but this kind of relationship will be able to stop them. You cant do it by air power alone, you cant do it without troops on the ground in the same way you had troops on the ground in iraq. Air power has its limits. It cant acquire territory. People can hide, as we say, or recently saw in gaza. So air power alone cant ferret out a group. It can get them to act defensively and put them more in a crouch, but ultimately you have to go after them on the ground. Were not doing it for understandable reasons. We need a local point, or as in the case of iraq, a set of local partners. Charlie youre not only a diplomat but you read a lot about international affairs. I was struck by a piece today by Winston Church hill when he was talking to Franklin Roosevelt and said, after the war, this is an unnecessary war. It didnt have to happen if we had done more. Is there some kind of corollary there . Just as consequential as what you do in Foreign Policy is what you dont do. People are so much more rigorous about assessing the pros and cons of actions, if we do this, it will cost that or the risk. They are rarely as rigorous when it comes to assessing inaction or some version of the status quo. We used to have the phrase paralysis by analysis. I think the administration somehow got that. They did all the analysis, showed how every course of action wassiesicky or costly and they ended up being paralyzed and didnt assess with the same degree of rigger the costs of not acting in syria. Charlie do you think theyve changed and are on a road where they recognize the threat and prepared to change . Theyre clearly in motion. Its happening slowly and incrementally but quite reluctantly. What worries me is theres a lot of history to suggest that incrementalism can be a bad way to go about things. You lose the shock and awe thing. You really want to break the momentum and send a message, and i worry were not doing that. Charlie whats the risk of doing it . The risk of doing it is charlie you do it and maybe stop i. S. I. S. , but are there unintended consequences that would be very bad . Absolutely, theres a risk you do a little bit, doesnt work so there theres the pressure for escalation. Theres the risk faio something and you kill, as will harntion innocent people and you alienate the population which could reverberate against you. You may motivate people to join the other side, an example of the west killing muslims or arabs, which, again, is one of the reason it is essential we have local partners on the ground. Charlie thats why the president has been slow, we have been trying to simulate local partners, right . Yeah, but its not enough to say we dont have good options when charlie we dont have a strategy is what hes saying. We could have and should have done more to develop an interior partner in syria in the last couple of years. Iit was never a priority to develop a syrian opposition. Charlie there was a fear we would get drawn in at the time. Absolutely. Charlie theres also the issue of, so lets assume you stop. What happens then in what do you do about syria then . Or do you then go to assad and say, okay, weve finished off i. S. I. S. T we now have to talk about whats going to happen in syria. He says, what do you mean . I helped you to beat i. S. I. S. Im elected. Im the president of syria. If you want to defeat me, lets make a deal. You put your finger on a key thing. This is not a permanent answer to the challenge of syria. Assad wont be able to gain the territory of his entire country for military and demographic reasons. Charlie because the 100plus 200,000 syrians have died. He wont have that support. You probably will end up with a new political map inside sir. I cant thats again you will want to have a diplomatic compliment to whatever you do on the ground militarily and a circle of countries, the friends of syria, some of a Contact Group to meet including the iranians, saudis, the United States, the russians and others to begin to sort out what the future political character or personality of syria will be. There has to be a special place fofor assad and where the sunnis would have a place. You can end up with aloite and a sunni dimension of syria. Charlie steve coll joins us. Stay with us. Charlie as i said, steve coll joins us. A staff writer for the new yorker magazine, but even more importantly, the dean of the Columbia University graduate school of journalism. Another tough day for journalism because we learned a journalist was beheaded. Gev mgive me a sense of contextn this. There are an extraordinary number of journalists at risk in jihaddestcontrolled terrorist in syria and a number in captivity. I dont think the full number is publicized because negotiations are going on in some cases. Charlie for ransom. Involving european governments whose policy is in some cases to pay ransom for citizens held in captivity by al quaida or al quaidarelated groups or others. Apparently the bad news today is the second of two american journalists we knew i. S. I. S. Was holding has been executed as actually i. S. I. S. Threatened it would do when it beheaded james foley abilit about a week ago. Charlie richard and i were talking about syria if we have to do something and if we have to make a temporary relationship with assad then we have to do that. How do you see what has to be done with respect to i. S. I. S. And all of this sort of Shifting Sands of alliances that become in play . I. S. I. S. Is a grotesque organization and a very serious problem in and of itself. Its also a symptom of a deeper instability and failure of International Policy in iraq and syria. I. S. I. S. Feasts off the suffering of sunnis in syria, primarily, as well as the agree advantages of sunnis in iraq, and its strength is a manifestation of desperation among tribal populations, exmilitary officers and other people rallying to its black flag to try to rebalance their situation. Charlie part of the general corps of saddam hussein. In some cases and i think a lot of midlevel and lowlevel sunni officers from the Syrian Military have come to the rebel side and ended up in i. S. I. S. There as well. But, you know, you have tribal leaders, you have oil engineers, evidently, since theyre operating oil fields. You have people who can maneuver in battle and are experienced in military organization and then you have sociopaths and teenagers and foreign volunteers. So its kind of an eclectic organization. It may not be very stable internally. So the question is how do you break it up and also build a deeper stability in the region. I. S. I. S. Is fighting a desperate war with assad that both sides may want, whether its really wise of the United States to stand back and watch more syrians suffer and die, all that war plays its while that war plays out, im doubtful, because its from the suffering the extremism has asen. The alternatives if easy would have been pursued by now. Charlie has the president been, in a sense, paralyze bid overanalysis and waiting for the right form of government and the right combination of forces to come to bear and whats happened is i. S. I. S. D1s grown in strength starting in syria and then iraq . Well, i think its hard from the outside to understand exactly what they have flipped through in their options charts and why they have taken the kind of restrained decisions they have taken. But from the outside, i would say there are a couple of failures that seem evident on the ground. One is theres been an enormous optimism or overinvestment in the development of a National Unity government in baghdad which could lead an army into battle in sunni heartlands where i just dont think theres any evidence that that shiiteled government can control territory and address the grievances of sunnis who are defecting. So first thing you have to do is be realistic about the capacity of the iraqi state and realistic about the project of charlie you have to be realistic about the fact you cant stop i. S. I. S. Without going to syria. Thats correct, but you also have to have a strategy that crosses a fictional border and includes a strategy in iraq. The second thing is the hard problem of syria where this reluctance to take the risks that farming, equipping and building out the Free Syrian Army with moderate groups in syria those are substantial risks. Charlie what about relationships with assads forces. Tacit or explicit. Theres a question of whether to tacitly or specifically side with assad in i. S. I. S. I would be interested in richards views about it. It would be deeply disturbing and a cynical allegiance even passively. Charlie convince me. At least potentially the options that are feasible. Is it desirable . No. But when you look at the range of options from doing it ourselves, to organizes a force to building up a viable resistance soon, you may say too hard, and some time of a tacit division of syria where we leave assad alone in the alowite areas and work with the soons may be the least of the options available. Things deteriorated over the last three years as you know better than anybody. The tacit division of syrian to alowite, thats where instability will arise from. Charlie what is assad prepared to do . He wants to survive. Charlie surely he wants to do that, prepared to survive, for sure. But what is he prepared to do in order to survive . Well, he may decide his principle strategic target is no longer the syrian civilians or opposition but is i. S. I. S. And we need to incentivize him to get to that point. Charlie do we have to make a deal with him to incentivize him . We make a deal with him or his backers including iraq. We encourage him to see the wisdom on some sort of deal that he focus on i. S. I. S. Which he hasnt done heretofore. Do you accept the idea he invited i. S. I. S. s rise because it feeds his narrative . He certainly tolerated it and did not make it his strategic priority to eliminate. Did he want to go all out with him now to reconquer the original syrian state . Thats where it gets interesting which you could persuade the russians and the iranis to sign into it. You have a region where everyone is waking up saying i. S. I. S. Is really dangerous and we could ultimately be a target and that has everybody thinking. You listed two options, pan air force and building up a moderate sunni opposition which may be too hard. Are they really . Have we tested it . I dont know that we tested the pan air force. A lot have looked at the syrian and moderate opposition force. It is tough going. You have risk. You have to assume loss of equipment, heavily infiltrated. Its tough three years ago but is tough on steroids now. Charlie how about iran . Here we are, our great enemy, were negotiating like crazy to get them to do something about their nuclear policy, and heres an opportunity where we have the same enemy. We have been trying to develop this grander bargain with iran for a number of years, now, with Nuclear Programs resolution would be essential to that charlie whats the grand bargain . Well, the bargain