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In libya a turd sandwich, but he was quoting an aide who likes that term. >> ted koppel, you spent time with henry kissinger in the earlier days who knew something about the big ideas for the world. is this administration getting the big ideas right in the tumult in the middle east? . don't think anyone has the big ideas right yet. first of all, let's take a look at what happened not so many years ago, and tom would know more about this than most of us, bob, too, afghanistan. we supported the mujahideen in afghanistan when they were there to drive the soviet union out. we supported them and fo...

We won't be the ones enforcing the no-fly zone. it won't be our ships enforcing the arms embargo. you see that reluctance shot through his rhetoric. >> tom ricks, we began the discussion this morning, richard engel reporting on the rebel, they're getting closer to tripoli. then what? that's the moment we leave? are we going to supply the rebels? i mean if gadhafi stays, can we really say mission accomplished? >> i think they'll say we can. all obama is saying is give war a chance. not all war. all we did was kick the door down, let the brits and french and others do it. and i think his notion ...

And in his nobel acceptance speech he said war is never glorious. it's a manifestation of human folly. and here he is going to war. i think he felt the pressure. and the question is, is he going to be able to extract the u.s. in a way that's honorable and limited. and as you know, tom, the military people say, you're going to get a general in there, whether it's any toe general or a u.s. general. it's going to be like general mcchrystal in afghanistan and say, well, i can solve this problem. how about 20,000 troops or 30,000 troops? it's hard to find the "off" switch in war. >> let me get anot...

Very well still prevail in the civil war. >> all right. we will leave it there, senator lugar. thank you very much. coming up, the obama doctrine. is the president's handling of the conflict in libya a sign of a new era in american foreign policy? how will it affect his efforts to confront the deficit and create jobs back at home as well as his reflection? our roundtable weighs in. bob woodward, ted koppel and tom ricks from the center for a new american security and nbc's white house savannah guthrie. breathe in, breathe out. as volatile as markets have been lately, having the security of a...

Is a bad guy, but we know very little about the people who seek to replace them. >> tom, do you know? is that a central question here? >> i think it is a concern, are we turning libya over to islamic extremists? but i don't think all islamic extremists are necessarily our enemy. what we're at war with is violent islamic extremists who want to attack the united states. i think what you're seeing now is something very different, which is some of those islamist extremists are cheering the united states. an f-15 went down over eastern libya, and one of the two-member crew was embraced by the crowd...