On impeachment. Senator Susan Collins reveals she and what is referred to as a small group of senators working to make sure there will be witnesses in President Trumps Impending Senate impeachment trial, however, the members of that group remain a mystery. This all comes as House Speaker nancy pelosi whos repeatedly said shell send the articles of impeachment against President Trump to the senate when she is, quote, good and ready, signals that maybe shes good and ready. Will you send both articles to the senate . Forwarded by the house, yes. Joining me now from capitol hill, msnbcs garrett haake. I want to start with the first piece of news of collins an small group of republicans. As we know, we only need a small group of gop senators in order for Mitch Mcconnell to decide to allow impeachment witnesses. What do we know about the story . Reporter well, look. We know that this is not a formalized operation here. Collins isnt whipping other senators of this but there is discussion of she and other senators witness curious, lets say and mitt romney saying publicly and to me yesterday he does want to hear from john bolton and see who else once this trial gets started. A lot of this is gong to come down to the rules that the senate sets up and i know this is kind of in the weeds but get ready to hear a lot anlt how the senate chooses to structure the trial. So much is made of following the clinton rules. One difference of senators like collins and romney to see from the clinton rules is after both sides presented the arguments under clinton a motion to dismiss, then there was a vote on witnesses. Senators like romney and collins have expressed some discomfort with that. Theyd like to see that order switched and make sure theres a chance to vote on the witnesses before a vote on dismissal. You would need 51 votes for either one and collins and romney if they get one more vote, another republican with them make sure theres not enough republicans to vote to dismiss the trial before there is at least a vote on the up or down question of witnesses so you will hear a lot anlt the rules package, hay about collins, romney, murkowski, expressing some openness to witnesses at least making sure to have an opportunity to take that vote when it becomes that time. Garrett, lets talk about when it becomes that time. This news about nancy pelosi maybe being ready to send these impeachment articles over to the senate. Reporter yeah. Thats right. So the house is now out until monday night, really Tuesday Morning. Pelosi said she wants to talk it through with the caucus Tuesday Morning and then could see a vote to do two things, names and formalizing the impeachment managers will be, the prosecution in this case. And formally sends things over to the senate. That could happen as early as tuesday night or wednesday and doesnt mean that the senate trial exactly starts on wednesday. They dont start to present arguments wednesday. There are steps to have happen. Theres process steps. The senators have to get sworn in. Moving parts to come into place before what you would recognize as a trial to get started and pelosi explained this is not something she said she was doing under pressure. Take a listen. What feedback have you gotten from your colleagues on the articles . Absolutely total cooperation. It cracks me up to see on tv, oh, pressure, pressure on that. No. You dont have a story. Reporter this comes after especially on wednesday, ali, we heard from a lot of democrats saying it was time to get this process moving. On thursday a lot of those same democrats walking the comments back. Now at least the party is in alignment again on the steps theyll take going forward. Thank you, my friend. Were also following breaking news out of iran where we have a disturbing new look at the crash of a ukrainian airliner there this week. This video that we are about to show you appears to show the moment that the Ukrainian Airlines plane was struck by a missile. Minutes after taking off from teheran airport. The boeing 737 then bursts into flames before crashing, all 176 people on board were killed. Now, the United States and its allies believe the plane was brought down by an Iranian Missile by mistake. Iran denies that assertion but a staterun news agency quoted a Foreign Ministry spokesperson saying that they invited ukraine and boeing for the investigation. Secretary of state mike pompeo was asked about the consequences if an investigation concluded that the iranians were indeed responsible for the crash. We do believe that its likely that that plane was shot down by an Iranian Missile. When we get the results of the investigation im confident we and the world will take appropriate actions in response. The crash came hours after iran fired several missiles at Iraqi Military bases used by u. S. And Coalition Forces in the fight against isis. Not clear whether the two incidents were related. Today the United States imposed additional sanctions against iran for that attack. But i want to get the latest on the plane crash. I want the go to nbc news chief global correspondent bill neely joining us now from kiev in ukraine. Bill, the ukrainians lost a lot of people. The canadians have lost a lot of people on that flight. They dont want a shoddy behind the scenes investigation. They want to be part of the iranian investigation into where that plane is, whats happened to it, whats in the black box. How are the ukrainians responding to this . Reporter yeah. Absolutely significant, ali. Within the last if hours i have been able to speak to the Ukrainian Foreign minister and he talks about just that. He talks about this large team of ukrainian investigators and experts, some of them military people, a team of about 45 who have f you like are the worlds eyes and ears in teheran at the moment, an only major team there apart from the iranians themselves. He says his team has been able to examine the wreckage, look at the bodies and body parts, take chemical samples and have a good look around including being able to see the black box flight recorders and to begin the process of getting the information from those flight recorders. At the moment he said that ukraine could not make any decision on whether it was some kind of catastrophic accident or whether the plane was taken down by a missile. But interestingly, also tonight, here in kiev, ali, ukraines security and Intelligence Ministry has said it is focusing on just two theories. Number one, the missile strike and, number two, the possibility of an explosion inside the plane which it called a terror attack. Im not sure how much you can read into that. The Intelligence Service is not going to be looking at mechanical failure. The Intelligence Service is looking at those two theories so the missile strike by ukraine is not openly saying it is clearly one of their Top Priorities at the moemtd. Bill, thank you, my friend. Bill neely, chief global correspondent in kiev, ukraine, for us. You saw that video. We get a lot of video here. So do you. We have a method here at nbc of trying to determine whether the video that we get is valid, whether its legitimate, where it was taken, where it was taken from and by who and what to make of it. Joining me is Emanuel Saliba who works to verify the videos. This is not just typical where you get video of Something Else gong on. This is video thats actually really important to helping make the determination about was this thing shot down, was it taken down with a mechanical problem. Tell us what we have. Just as you said for people at home it is confusing. You have different governments saying Different Things about what happened. Right. Whats important is that we here at nbc make a determination. The first thing is to pull up flight radar and we pulled up the flight path. From the airport in teheran heading northwest. Exactly. We know it took off at 6 14 local time. Two minutes later, the last recorded place where the plane flew over and it was paran. We worked this is the neighborhood that we believe this plane where we have the last transmitted yot it. Data from flight radar. We tried to figure out where the video was taken. We worked with a company with High Resolution photos the day after the plane crashed. This allowed us to locate the video. Thats a way to verify how we know that it was taken in the area. If you swipe to the next one, heres what i did. Screen shots of every seasoning l frame of that video and identified markers that i could trance pose on to that sat fiat imagery. I used color blocks to locate them. At the next slide here, i placed them on that satellite imagery and it helped us determine that this video was actually taken in that neighborhood. Telling us that it was likely that it is showing the plane. You determined that it was from around here, right . Right. So we think and theres a robust team here at nbc that is verifying. Not guessing. 24 7. What we determined was the person standing there between building a and b and the other markers to identify the video telling us that this was taken in the nabld just west of the International Airport right near where the last signal was received. Got it. Y youre matching the data, the angle of that video, where anything else in that video is that you can identify is and youre trying to match it together to verify what we what information youre getting. Exactly. One thing that people pointed out online is the video why was this person taking a video early in the morning . The New York Times spoke to the person who shot it. They said they heard something and then started to record the video so it it kind of lends itself to the theory this might be the second missile that were seeing in the picture. Interesting. Might have heard something first, go outside. Take video. Capture the airplane and thats what we have to work on. One last thing is other people noted, well, it is really dark and looking at the sun rise time in teheran its 7 30 a. M. Winter. Important to remember. We see ali arouzi out there in a winter coat. Its winter like north america. Thank you. This is the kind of stuff we do before bringing it to you on tv we have teams to try to make sense of whether we are looking at something that might be real or nonsense and theres lot of nonsense outside there. Thank you for doing what you do. Thank you. As we learn more about the plane crash, President Trump is saying more about the threat that led him to launch a drone strike last week that took out a top iranian general. Heres what he told fox news moments ago. Dont the American People have a right to know what was targeted . I dont think so. Well tell you that probably it was going to be the embassy in baghdad. City of large scale attacks planned for other embassies and if those were planned why cant we reveal that to the American People . I can reveal that i believe it would have been four embassies. All right. He says he can reveal four embassies. The comment came hours after secretary of state mike pompeo and treasury secretary Steve Mnuchin announced a new round of sanctions against iran over the attacks on Iraqi Military bases hosting u. S. And Coalition Forces. The sanctions will target people involved in irans construction, manufacturing, textile and mining sectors as well as its largest steel and iron manufacturers and u. S. Sanctioning eight iranian officials involved in the missile attack and other destabilizing activities. Todays sanctions are part of our commitment to stop the iranian regimes global terrorist activities. The president has been very clear. We will continue to apply economic sanctions until iran stops its terrorist activities and commit that it will never have nuclear weapons. This came hours after iraqs Prime Minister asked pompeo to send a delegation to iraq for troops to leave the country. The request comes days after the Iraqi Parliament voted to expel more than 5,000 u. S. Troops that are stationed in the country following last weeks drone strike that killed a top iranian general. Pompeo said the u. S. Is willing to talk with iraq but not about withdrawing troops. We are happy to continue the conversation with the iraqis of what the right structure is. Our mission set there is very clear. We have been there to perform a Training Mission to help the Iraqi Security forces be successful and to continue the campaign against isis. To continue the counter daash campaign. When we can deliver upon a right structure with fewer resources dedicated to that mission we will do so. He said counter daesh campaign. Thats a name for isis. Joining us is two guests. The Deputy Assistant secretary of defense for strategy and force development, former. Also with us former commandant of the Army War College and board of advisers to the task force which is developing, recommending and implementing ways to ensure that squads outmatch any potential adversary so you two are the experts on this. Professor carlin, let me start with you. I want to quote from a the Washington Post piece that quotes you about the Decision Making process that leads to the type of decision that was taken to assassinate Qassem Soleimani. Such moments are usually proceeded by hundreds of people building powerpoint slides and asking lawyers questions. These individuals create the parameters of the decisionmakers to consider. They identify the possible options and vetting the effects. That work enable it is commander in chief to make decisions about his military operations wisely. Thats interesting, professor, and thats what ive heard from a number of other experts except we have over the course of three days heard reasons of why this took place. President trump gave one to a group of his supporters at a rally yesterday. He said it was attacking embassies and then from pompeo and heard from members of congress and senators that they were in a briefing and they were not told that. I understand the briefing was classified but we have it on pretty Good Authority thats not what was discussed. It is terribly disconcerting. We we have heard so many stories as you noted an one cant help but to see chaotic incompetence in all of it. Its one thing not to tell the American People much. Its another thing to as were hearing from the reports not to tell members of congress effectively anything at all. It is just profoundly worrisome. The decision to kill Qassem Soleimani is one that had been considered and discarded by multiple u. S. Administrations. And unfortunately, a week later i dont think any of us still know why he was really killed when he was killed and where he was killed. I think its really important, general, what the professor said. Theres no reason i know this but some people should and a general agreement spelled out by the Founding Fathers that Congress Needs to be in on some of the decisions particularly if they could lead to war. One of the things i think we have all seen particularly over 18 years of war is really disciplined and how concerned and apolitical this gang of eight has been in making decisions in the past. So i think the assertion that the gang of eight to somehow leak this information before the operation went down for political purposes i think is clearly unsubstantiated. Do you have any memory of that happening . The allegation that we couldnt the law doesnt provide to Tell Congress or the gang of eight even before. Could have been done the hour or two hours after. Theyre available to come to the white house. But the allegation that democrats would have leaked this information about the killing of a wanted person i cant think of any example of that. Can you think of one . No. I think if you go back over the key events, the killing of al baghdadi, the killing of bin laden, even going back to the 80s in the ragan administration going after gadhafi, an air strike in northern libya, all that i think shared on both sides of the aisle and congress kept their secrets pretty well. Professor, lets talk about the troop removals. We understand that President Trump has just told fox news he is okay with the removal of troops from iraq. Theres a few issues here. Iraq said they wanted them out. America said we are not taking them out. One wonders whether it puts troops in danger in a country not invited but separate and apart from that, going to i think a lot of americans dont want troops in iraq but going from 5,000 to 0 is different than 5,000 to say 1,000 or something because it means removing autoof the strategic operations, material, equipment. All this kind of stuff. Talk to me of what the viewers to make of this. American troops leaving iraq. Absolutely. Its a monumental shift. They are there right now under the invitation of the Iraqi Government which as you noted is ready to start negotiating the withdrawal, no doubt to Qassem Soleimanis delight and if they withdraw we should be profoundly concerned about what happens in the fight against isis. Which, frankly, we are not really talking abo