too much? that's the point. get real about your risks and do something about it. talk to your health care provider about ways to lower your risk of stroke, heart attack, or death. learn more at getrealaboutdiabetes.com we're travelling all across america, talking to people about their hearts. how's the heart? -good. -you sure? i think so. how do you know? let me show you something. put two fingers right on those pads. look at that! that's your heart! that is pretty awesome. with kardiamobile, you can take a medical-grade ekg in just 30 seconds, from anywhere. kardiamobile is proven to detect atrial fibrillation, one of the leading causes of stroke. this year make a resolution to take care of your heart. don't wait. get kardiamobile today for just $79 at kardia.com or amazon. veteran homeowners, with inflation on the march, here's a great way to get your monthly payments under control. call newday! while credit card rates can be 22% or more mortgage rates at newday are a fraction of those rates. with one easy lower monthly payment the newday 100 va cash out loan

lets you pay off your high-rate debt. and you can save $500 a month. nobody takes care of veterans like newday usa. >> john: pentagon press secretary pat ryder will give an update the first time on camera since lloyd austin's secretive hospital stay. both sides of the aisle demanding to know how was president biden in the dark for days before learning a top cabinet member landed in the icu. sixth in line to the presidency, he is, hello, john roberts in washington. a jam packed first hour. here we go again. >> sandra: good to be with you, sandra smith in new york. breaking in the last hour, this incident, now forcing the white house to launch a review of

protocols for cabinet secretaries, if you can believe that. secretary austin is still in recovery, we are told in walter reed, and the pentagon is not offering any information about that elective procedure that originally sent him into the hospital but ultimately landed him in the icu. >> john: even the deputy defense secretary does not know why he went into the hospital. oversees $800 billion agency with people around the globe, and the time he was admitted to icu and resumed his duties, iranian proxies attacked u.s. troops in the middle east eight times. >> sandra: peter doocy is live on the north lawn. how is the white house chief of staff trying to change protocol amid this incident? >> peter: in a big way, he is telling the rest of the cabinet secretaries if they cannot work for some reason they have to tell him in the west wing right

away so this does not happen again. at this hour, we still know almost nothing about what happened to lloyd austin who is still in the hospital, other than one of his subordinates was not feeling well. >> the best i can tell you is that the secretary's chief of staff was ill with the flu, which affected the notification timelines, again, we are going back now and looking at the processes and procedures as i mentioned to include both white house and congressional notifications to ensure we can improve the processes. >> peter: three things they are looking at. timeline of who reported what and when, as soon as austin was rushed to the hospital in an ambulance. they are doing an exam of how the pentagon can determine in the future if a defense secretary can do his or her job, and they are looking for recommendations for improving all of this. the condemnation, though, for the way this was handled by

austin and his team is bipartisan. jack reed, democratic senator -- tracking the situation closely and the department of defense is well aware of my interest in any and all relevant information. and republicans have a bunch of different issues with this. >> we certainly don't see strength coming out of the department of defense when they don't even know who is at the helm or for what reason. >> i just think you have an administration that has a major transparency problem. >> accountability is a word joe biden cannot spell. >> peter: president biden has nothing on camera today, no public events. he has not said a word about austin's continued hospitalization. sandra. >> sandra: and if the pentagon really did not learn of this per pat ryder, about to offer this briefing which we'll be watching and listening for, then should at least the chief of staff to

the defense secretary lose their job? i mean, there's a lot of growing questions at this hour, the briefing is going to be very interesting. peter, good to see you. thank you. >> peter: and worth pointing out, while all this is going on, the defense secretary is still sitting in a hospital bed at walter reed. we don't know what his condition is. they have not told us if president biden is going to go visit him at some point, if it's that serious, but he remains in a hospital. any time anybody is in a hospital for as long as he's been in there, it is usually not for something minor. and so there is this issue and everybody that we ask claims on the record and off the record that they don't know what happened. what the issue was. which is extraordinary. >> sandra: it is remarkable on a lot of fronts. we will ask retired four star general jack keane about that. he'll be joining the program in a few minutes. >> john: ironic we know more about the health of the secretary of defense's chief of

staff who had the flu than the secretary of defense. house republicans are pushing ahead into their investigation into biden family business dealings. house oversight committee wrapped a closed door deposition with georges berges, and to hold hunter in contempt of congress. james comer, if i could, chairman, let me get to hunter biden just a second. but let me ask you first of all this business with lloyd austin and this memorandum to the cabinet secretaries that the white house chief of staff just sent out to say oh, we are running a review of the protocols when somebody is unable to do their job as a cabinet secretary, what do you make of all of this? >> i'm not surprised, but again, this is another example of the questions that republicans have for this administration. who exactly is in charge? the secretary of defense clearly didn't think he was responsible to tell the president.

what other decisions is the secretary of defense making without getting advice or counsel from the president. president is the commander in chief and this just another example of the concern that we have that joe biden is not the one calling the shots. and to send an email out saying ok, from now on, and the only reason they are doing this is because the press is breathing down their necks. even the liberal media is offended by this. they are saying ok, from now on if anybody is going to be gone we need to know. we are talking about people in line of presidential succession here and no one knows their whereabouts, or their current state of health. >> john: yeah, and the line of succession aside, too, he's running the department of defense, which is our biggest agency. ok, let's turn to hunter biden now because the committee on oversight has released a resolution to hold him in contempt of congress. first of all, will that pass the full house, do you believe, and then when it's passed on to the doj, do you believe merrick garland will act on it?

>> first of all, i'm confident it's going to pass the full house. look, i think republicans realize if we don't hold the president's son accountable for defying a lawful congressional subpoena, then no one is going to comply with our subpoenas moving forward. and the house of representatives is only entity in the world that's attempting to hold this administration accountable. we are the only entity that's asking questions of this administration. the media certainly is not doing that, house oversight committee is. and this administration continues to obstruct this defiance of the congressional subpoena takes it to a whole other level and every republican in the conference is offended not only the president's son defied the presidential subpoena but how he did it, how he drove up with the big entourage of government employees, got out, played the pity card, wanted sympathy, said he was there to answer questions and got in his car and drove off. that's not going to fly. we have specific questions, we have done the investigation the

right way. we have tens of thousands of pages of bank statements, emails, text messages and depositions that we need to ask the president's son specific questions because this is a matter of national security and trying to determine whether or not this president is compromised because of the millions of dollars. >> john: comparisons made to steve bannon and peter navarro both held in contempt of congress for refusing to testify before the january 6th committee, they tried to claim executive privilege, they were both charged, navarro was handcuffed and marched out of reagan airport. they refused to cooperate until. hunter biden says he would be willing to testify before the full house in an open hearing. do you think that will play into the doj decision whether or not to charge? >> well, we are going to see if merrick garland in fact is running a two-tier system of justice. we have seen how he has treated

republicans who defy congressional subpoenas, now an opportunity to treat a democrat the exact same way. and look, hunter biden does not get to make the rules. i think we have seen through this investigation, through the course of this investigation that the irs was investigating hunter biden. the department of justice was investigating hunter biden. fbi was investigating hunter biden and at every instance they were told to stand down by the department of justice. now the department of justice is going to have the ability to hold him accountable and to abide by the constitution. we have a constitutional obligation to provide oversight of this administration, and we are doing that, and i don't think we need to demonstrate to a single person in america all of the crimes that we have uncovered, that the president's immediate family has committed. we want to know what role did the president play in these crimes and that's why hunter biden must show up for a deposition and answer a lot of questions that we have throughout the course of this investigation. >> john: one more quick question if i could.

your colleague, jamie raskin ripped you up one side and down the other, saying chairman comer does not want hunter biden to testify in public as he has refused to release over a dozen transcripts, he wants to keep up the distortions, blatant lies and conspiracy theories that mark the investigation. >> he's the biggest hypocrite probably ever served in congress. on our website, on our social media we show clips of raskin's chastising people for not showing up for congressional subpoenas. he is the ultimate hypocrite. if you google hypocrite right now, jamie raskin's picture will pop up. the fact he criticizes anyone that doesn't comply with a congressional subpoena, who is a republican, but he defends to the outer limits democrat shows his hypocrisy. look, this is the same thing that bannon tried to do. steve bannon tried to say he did

not want a closed door, he wanted a public hearing. we have lots of substantive question. this is a substantive investigation of critical nature to determine why the biden family received tens of millions from our enemies and the world. i think the american people have spoken. they want to know answers. it's not a complicated question yet no one in the administration has answered that yet. >> john: we will keep a close eye on this and the relationship between you and the ranking member. thanks so much. sandra. >> sandra: a lot more news to get to here, developing at this hour, boeking executives have been gathering for all hands on deck safety meeting following the faa grounding of nearly 200 of the 737 max 9 jets. this of course after the door plug blew off on an alaska airlines plane midnight. it happened on friday.

dan springer is now on that for us live in washington. what exactly do we know happened at this safety meeting, dan? >> yes, sandra, we know they had planned an executive retreat for today but canceled that after the incident on friday. we know it's an all hands on deck as you say company-wide safety meeting and being run, we think right now, by boeking ceo david calhoun shows the seriousness of it and the news is only worse today on the 737 max 9. after the planes where the door plugs got grounded, the airlines got to work, of course, and what alaska airlines says. as our maintenance technicians began preparing our 737 9 max fleet for inspections, accessed the area in question. initial reports from the technicians indicate some loose hardware was visible on some aircraft. it could broaden the ntsb

investigation. >> if we have a bigger system-wide or fleet issue, we will issue an urgent safety recommendation to push for change. >> the ntsb investigators have the door plug that blew off, thanks to a portland teacher who found it in the back yard. trees cushioned the fall, limiting the damage, and hearing more from the passengers what it was like for the 16 minutes in the air with the gaping hole in the plane. >> it was noisy, it was very windy, and just loud from -- you could hear the engine from outside the plane and just the air circulating inside the plane. >> sandra, you asked what we know about the meeting, we don't know that much, we assume it's still going on. we know a lot they have to talk about. we hope to get more from boeking

when it's all wrapped up. >> sandra: hopefully the discussion is this can't happen again. >> john: recurring theme today, this can't happen again. we are waiting for the pentagon and the white house briefings following controversy over the secret hospital stay for defense secretary austin. >> sandra: and new concerns about a nuclear iran as a u.n. agency reports tehran has tripled its output of enriched uranium. what we are learning about that. general jack keane is here. here's to... one year bolder. ♪ ♪boost♪ nutrition for now. >> woman: what's my safelite story? i see inspiration right through my glass. so when my windshield cracked, i chose safelite. they replaced the glass and recalibrated my safety system. that's service i can trust.

>> singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪ i'm jonathan lawson, here to tell you about life insurance through the colonial penn program. if you're age 50 to 85 and looking to buy life insurance on a fixed budget, remember the three p's. what are the three p's? the three p's of life insurance on a fixed budget are price, price, and price. a price you can afford, a price that can't increase, and a price that fits your budget. i'm 54. what's my price? you can get coverage for $9.95 a month. i'm 65 and take medications. what's my price? also $9.95 a month. i just turned 80. what's my price? $9.95 a month for you too. if you're age 50 to 85, call now about the #1 most popular whole life insurance plan available through the colonial penn program. options start at $9.95 a month.

no medical exam, no health questions. your acceptance is guaranteed. and this plan has a guaranteed lifetime rate-lock, so your rate can never go up for any reason. so call now for free information, and you'll also get this free beneficiary planner. and it's yours free just for calling, so call now for free information.

i think he's having a midlife crisis i'm not. you got us t-mobile home internet lite. after a week of streaming they knocked us down... ...to dial up speeds. like from the 90s. great times. all i can do say is that my life is pre-- i like watching the puddles gather rain.

-hey, your mom and i procreated to that song. oh, ew! i think you've said enough. why don't we just switch to xfinity like everyone else? then you would know what year it was. i know what year it is. here's why you should switch fo to duckduckgo on all your devie duckduckgo comes with a built-n engine like google, but it's pi and doesn't spy on your searchs and duckduckgo lets you browse like chrome, but it blocks cooi and creepy ads that follow youa from google and other companie. and there's no catch. it's fre. we make money from ads, but they don't follow you aroud join the millions of people taking back their privacy by downloading duckduckgo on all your devices today. >> john: the threat of iran as a nuclear power is looming larger today as a u.n. watchdog group finds tehran now has enough

enriched uranium to build several nuclear bombs. senior foreign affairs correspondent greg palkot out of london, tell us more about the concerns and how close could they actually be to getting a workable bomb? >> greg: pretty close, john. iran making trouble on several fronts, one of the most dangerous, according to experts now, potential threat of a nuclear weapon in iran. iran proxies busy, hamas at war with israel. hezbollah hitting from lebanon. militia's attacking u.s. troops, houthis striking ships, and iran revving up the nuclear program. up three times, in a few weeks if it wanted, they could have enough for at least three nuclear bombs. trump administration pulled out of a deal trying to rein in iran in 2018. last year sought to tamp down

the nukes but said to be dead now. so far, they have not pulled the nuclear trigger and u.n. inspectors are pushing for access. if iran goes further, analysts worry about the nuclear clout the regime could yield. >> they suddenly have this trump card they can play and decimate their neighbors. >> the question now is what to do about a possible nuclear iran. some are calling for a new iran nuke deal, seemingly a nonstarter. assassinations of nuclear scientists, bugs inserted in plant computers, and strength in dealing with iran is crucial or it could act up, worse than anything we are seeing now in the region. john. >> john: greg palkot, thank you. and breaking news on the defense secretary, over to sandra. >> sandra: i'm going to bring in retired four star general jack keane as we learn the news.

u.s. defense secretary austin did undergo minimally invasive surgical procedure to treat and cure prostate cancer, he was admitted to the hospital with complications from that procedure on january 1st. he was under general anesthesia during the initial procedure, on december 22nd. so the procedure, december 22nd, he was admitted due to complications january 1st. he underwent surgery to treat prostate cancer and also the postoperative symptoms he had included nausea, severe abdominal, hip and leg pain. urinary tract infection, these are just some of the details we are getting right now. let me continue to go through this as i bring in general keane. general, your thoughts on this. obviously the story has been we are thankful he's out of the icu

with the complications that he had. still in the hospital is the latest that we know. but it was the appearance of breach of protocol and lack of informing the white house that really bothered many on both sides of the aisle. your thoughts as we learn more about thinks condition. >> well, i do think likely when we get into the details of what is the procedure, certainly the white house, you know, has to give into it, and i don't blame them for trying to figure out what the heck is going on here. are there procedures followed or not. but i think on the very first one, on the 22nd, i do believe a principle cabinet officer, or even principle general officers key principles like that, if they are going to have surgery, certainly their bosses are going to know that. in the case of the secretary of defense, i think the american people need to know that as

well. i mean, i understand, i know lloyd austin very well, i respect him. infantry paratroopers together for a number of years. but the reality is, you give up a lot of your privacy when you become a public official. and the fact that it's elective, it's cancer, prostate, the american people should know that, chain of command should know that, and back into the hospital again on the evening of january 1st, it was obviously a complete failure and breakdown in reporting on that. likely one of the complications the chief of staff, normally the person doing the reporting, was sick herself. but certainly there's other staff that would -- should be assuming those responsibility, and they know that and they got to fix it. but i do think the american people should have been advised of it as well, not just the appropriate people like the president and national security

advisers and all the joint chiefs, etc. because this is a very senior public official who was in the hospital and in intensive care following what was likely simple surgery, in that sense, but now we have an added complication to it. so full disclosure should be made not only to the chain of command, but to the american people. >> sandra: and the white house put out a statement they are reviewing that chain of command and making sure everyone has the plan in place. again, his chief of staff, who had the flu, reasoning was we did not learn of secretary austin's visit to, latest visit to the hospital because his chief of staff was ill. just want to continue to update on what we are getting from the statement from walter reed medical center, that secretary austin does continue to make progress and anticipate a full recovery, although this can be a slow process they are warning. going through the timeline, that has been where there is a lot of confusion, general. he had a change in his

laboratory evaluation, early december 2023, we are now learning. they identified prostate cancer, which they determined required treatment. it was then december 22nd after consultation with his medical team that he was admitted to the hospital and underwent that minimally invasive surgical procedure to treat and cure prostate cancer. he was under general anesthesia during that time, clarifying this most recent complication he was not, and never lost consciousness. his prostate cancer was detected early and prognosis is excellent, thankfully. on january 1st it was then that he was admitted to walter reed with complications from that december 22nd procedure, including nausea and severe abdominal and hip and leg pain. january 2nd, a day later the decision made to transfer him to the icu for close monitoring and higher level of care. general, you know, i understand

that you're, i believe your take is maybe this is blown up in a way it did not need to be, but there is protocol in place, obviously, that you are saying you wish was followed and we should have been notified in december this was his diagnosis. but what is the risk to the president not knowing that he's hospitalized and that he's in the icu? >> well, yeah, that's a serious breakdown, no doubt bit, and protocols and reporting processes in place to ensure something like that does not happen. it is quite routine that takes place with principles that their staff are reporting higher up to other staff and notifying appropriate people. i've been in the system myself with my own subordinates and also with my superiors doing this. it's rare that you would ever report it yourself unless you worked in a physically in the

same facility with your bosses or subordinates. other than that, it's usually staff reporting to staff about it. i would receive disclosures to me and during, you know, daily updates about subordinates who are going on leave where ill at home, working, in the hospital for check-up, and staying overnight for some reason, or surgery itself. but the reporting thing i think they can fix easily, but i do believe listen, this is a snaffu, nothing bad came of this, thankfully, as a result of this mistake, and snaffu, and i understand the emotion around the event, and i think the secretary himself, knowing him, accept responsibility for this not going right and i'm sure the staff feels the same way about it. they caused an uproar in the nation about it and it's embarrassing to have something like that and i think they will go about it fixing it pretty

quickly. >> sandra: general, before i let you go, can i ask you please about the new concerns of a nuclear iran, as we were just reporting, a u.n. agency reports tehran has tripled the output of enriched uranium. what about the growing threat should we know? >> well, certainly we have known iran is on a march to acquire a nuclear weapon and they have gotten very close to it with the amount of centrifuges and highly enriched uranium in their possession. i think likely they have been holding back from completing the process because they are still seeking removal of more sanctions and this administration has been awfully kind to them over the last three years and have given them money they had no business giving them, and iran frankly, sandra, is flush with money because we eased up on the sanctions dealing with their production of

oil. the previous administration had shut them down pretty much and they were back on the heels and that is likely why they have not gone and completed this cycle. i suspect because they know full well while the administration has been reluctant to impose suffer sanctions on them, they would not have much choice, given the fact that they have in their possession a nuclear weapon. so our audience understands, rushing to develop a weapon is one thing. being able to deliver a weapon is quite something else. and we would likely be months away from their capability to do that, according to open source reporting that we all have access to. so that is a factor in this equation. it's not something we have to react overnight to in the sense that now they have a nuclear weapon. the reality is we have got to reset our strategy dealing with iran, sandra.

this administration has failed, i think miserably to confront iran. they have appeased them and you can see what they are doing here. they are clearly trying to achieve their objectives in the middle east, to dominate and control the middle east and drive the united states out of it, and obviously protect their own regime. and they are accomplishing a lot of that as we speak and the strategy for three years has not worked, and the nuclear part of it is parcel to that. they tried to renew the nuclear deal and that blew up in their face. we have got to get the right strategic strategy in place and make certain iran knows that they are going to be confronted, sanctions are going to be imposed on them, and we are going to isolate them with our allies and partners in the region. that is what the arabs want, that is what israel wants. and we have got to help lead that process in doing it. >> sandra: general keane, great to get your thoughts and analysis on all of that.

we thank you for your time today, sir, and that is a live shot of the pentagon, the briefing is about to begin. we will go to that likely, this could come up as well as the condition of the defense secretary. general keane, thank you. >> take care, sandra, thank you. >> john: back to the issue of the defense secretary when we got this release from walter reed medical center, said is there a doctor in the house, it was dr. makary here with us. i don't understand the secrecy, prostectomy. >> the initial report was chief of staff was sick, the flu around new year's day, turns out he had elective surgery a week and a half prior on december 22nd, and relatively routine, common surgery. he's 70 years old, he's got

prostate cancer probably, i don't know for sure. >> john: which 70-year-old doesn't have a prostate problem of some type. >> minimally invasive prostate surgery, likely done robotically at walter reed and that's generally a one-day hospitalization, looks like he came back around new year's day and then they moved him to the icu. he had fluid in his abdomen and some urinary tract infection symptoms. that's when they sort of became concerned and when we learned more about what happened. >> john: in terms of his recovery now, it's a possible complication of the surgery, i take it it's not typical, i know a lot of people who have gone through similar surgery and not had complications, one of them is with us in the studio right now, but it's possible this stuff can happen. what's the prognosis in terms of recovery? >> all of us that do surgery have had the complications over the years. these are manageable, trained,

ok, fluid in the abdomen, how can we remove it with a surgical drain, how he had the fluid removed. so difficult or nuisance, when you have a vip, sometimes you move him into the icu to give him all the nursing care and the attention. they may not have icu level needs for their medical care, but you manage these complications and you get through them and a very high likelihood of a good result. he's a big guy and i'm sure that's one of the reasons why they are being extra careful. >> john: the same time the secretary of defense was recovering from the complications from prostate surgery, the marine corps, heart attack on november 28th on a run, we have a graphic, what's the bicuspid valve and how is it treated? >> it helps regulate the movement of flow from chamber to

chamber, and natural wear and tear that occurs over the years, and that's what resulted in this not working well, put stress on the heart, had the heart attack back in october, he's 58 years old, that's pretty young, but that's what happened. >> john: describe the graphic, what are we looking at. >> bicuspid valve is regulating the back flow so when you see the valve at the bottom, which is two leaflets on the left side of the screen, you see the two leaflets close every time the chamber empties and that prevents the back flow, allows the heart to function efficiently. when that does not close well from wear and tear over the years, more strain on the heart and you can get a heart attack. >> john: normal involve has three leaflets, that's on the left, and the bicuspid is almost a congenital defect from birth, and typically it not a problem until later in life. >> the tricuspid valve, it's a

normal involve, the question is was it working properly or not. he may have had a congenital abnormality, don't know. >> sandra: to the pentagon, pat ryder is briefing following the news out of the defense secretary. listen here. >> officials regarding his medical care and for the sake of ensuring that everyone here today and everyone watching has the same information, i will read that full statement. this is a statement from dr. john maddox, trauma medical director and dr. gregory chestnut, walter reed national military medical center. beginning. as part of secretary austin's routinely recommended health screening, he has undergone regular prostate-specific psa

surveillance. changes in laborator december 2 identified prostate cancer which required treatment. on december 22, 2023, after consultation with his medical team, he was admitted to walter reed national military medical center and underwent minimally invasive surgical procedure to treat and cure prostate cancer. he was under general anesthesia during this procedure. secretary austin recovered uneventfully from his surgery and returned home the next morning. his prostate cancer was detected early and prognosis is excellent. on january 1, 2024, secretary austin was admitted to walter reed national medical center with complications from the december 22nd procedure, including nausea, severe abdominal hip and leg pain. urinary tract infection.

january 2nd, decision made to transfer to icu for close monitoring and higher level of care. further evaluation revealed abdominal fluid collection impairing function of small intestine. a tube was placed through his nose to drain his stomach. abdominal fluid collections were drained by nonsurgical drain placement. he's progressed steadily throughout his stay. his infection has cleared. he continues to make progress and we anticipate a full recovery, although this can be a slow process. during the stay, secretary austin never lost anxiousness and never underwent general anesthesia. prostate cancer is the most common cause of cancer among american men, impacts one in every eight men and one in every six african american men during their lifetime. discussions about screening,

treatment and support are often deeply personal and private ones. early screening is important for detection and treatment of prostate cancer and people should talk to their doctors to see what screening is appropriate for them, end of statement. secretary austin continues to recover well and remains in good spirits. he's in contact with his senior staff and has full access to required secure communications capabilities and continues to monitor dod day-to-day operations. we will keep you updated when he is released, until then daily status updates on his condition. we in the department of defense wish him a speedy recovery. department recognizes the understandable concerns expressed by the public, congress and the news media in terms of notification timelines and dod transparency. and underscore again secretary austin has taken responsibility for the issues with transparency

and the department is taking immediate steps to improve our notification procedures. yesterday the secretary's chief of staff directed the dod director of administration and management to conduct a 30-day review of the department's notification process for assumption of functions and duties of the secretary of defense. while the review is underway, effective immediately, the chief of staff also directed several actions to ensure increased situational awareness about any transfer of authorities from the secretary of defense to include ensuring that the dod general counsel, chairman and vice chairman of the joints chief of staff, service secretaries, chief of staff, white house situation room and senior staff of the secretary and deputy secretary of defense are all notified and the notification for transfer of authorities includes an explanation of the reason. we'll keep you updated regarding the results of the review and any additional significant changes to process and

procedures as appropriate. as i highlighted to many of you yesterday, nothing is more important to the secretary of defense and the department of defense than the trust and confidence of the american people and the public we serve and will continue to work every day, work hard every day to earn and deserve that trust. separately, deputy secretary kathleen hicks is travelling today en route to u.s. space command in colorado. tomorrow preside over the u.s. space command change of command at 12:00 p.m. eastern time between general james dickinson and lieutenant general steven whiting. livestreamed on defense.gov. and dr. chase began talks yesterday with people's republic of china, deputy director of the central military commission office for international military cooperation at the pentagon for the 17th u.s. prc defense policy coordination talks. meetings conclude today and

we'll issue a readout later this afternoon. finally, some of you may be aware, united states of america, vietnam war commemoration was launched in 2012, authorized by congress under the secretary of defense and support of a national 50th anniversary commemoration. to thank the vietnam veterans and their families for their service and sacrifice on behalf of our nation. notably thousands of organizations known as commemorative partners have joined to honor the 7 million vietnam veterans at home and abroad and the 10 million families of all those who served. saturday, january 13, 4:00 p.m. eastern, commemoration of the service, courage and legacy of vietnam war veterans and gold star families and renewal of american commitment to account for those heroes who remain missing 50 years after the war's end will be observed at the national cathedral in

washi washington, d.c. the event is open to the public and will also be livestreamed. for more details, refer you to the air and space forces association or national catholic website. with that, i will take your questions. start with associated press. tara. >> hi, general ryder. thank you for doing this. have you or the staff had a chance to speak to the secretary and has he shared at all why he was reluctant to make his condition public until now, and given the seriousness of his treatment, do you suspect that he might have to take a step back from some of the more rigorous parts of his job, such as a lot of the overseas travel he's been doing and maybe delegate that to secretary hicks? >> the staff has been in contact with the secretary. i have not personally spoken to the secretary. but i do know, for example, that he's in regular communication with his chief of staff. as for his travel schedule, of course i don't have anything to announce.

i can tell you that he is actively engaged in his duties as i highlighted, and fully engaged and so, you know, completely confident in that, and we'll obviously keep you updated in terms of his status in the hospital. >> has he expressed at all why he was reluctant to share what he was going through until now? >> i don't have that specifically from the secretary, tara, but obviously as i highlighted, you know, it's prostate cancer and the associated procedures are obviously deeply personal, and so again, you know, we'll continue to work hard to make sure we are being as transparent as possible moving forward and again, wish the secretary a speedy recovery. >> just last, you know, there is still a lot of questions on the process about all of the notification that didn't happen. when he was taken by ambulance to walter reed and had personal security detail with him, why at that point wasn't there like a call to an operations center or something that would have triggered a greater awareness

that he was getting medical care? >> yeah, so again, a fair question and for the sake of not doing the review here from the podium, as i highlighted, the director of administration and management has been directed to lead a thorough review to look at exactly those kinds of questions. so relevant facts and circumstances during the period in question to evaluate the processes and procedures by which the deputy secretary of defense was notified and the associated timeline. so again, we'll commit to being as transparent as we can in terms of the results of that review. liz here. >> thanks, pat. chief of staff and the senior military adviser were both told on tuesday that secretary austin was in the hospital. could the chief of staff have asked the sma to make the proper notifications for her, since she was sick with the flu? >> again, we fully recognize there are questions in terms of notification timelines as well as the transparency issues that we have highlighted.

so i really think this review is going to help us get to ground truth in a holistic way so that we can learn from it importantly, but also ensure that we are doing better next time. so i think we really need to allow this review to run its course in order to do that. in the meantime, we have taken some immediate steps as i highlighted at the top. >> under procedure for the sma to notify the white house national security adviser? >> again, certainly we want to make sure that notifications are happening in a timely way and as we have acknowledged, some shortfalls to it's important to look at what the shortfalls were, what could have been done better and make sure that going forward we are improving the processes. so again, this review will help us. >> do you still think it's appropriate to call his medical procedure on december 22nd prostatectomy if it was treating prostate cancer? >> we released this information

as soon as we had it and so again, i'm going to refer back to the statement and going forward we'll use that as the baseline in terms of describing, but you know, and this particular case as soon as we had the information made available to us we provided it to you. >> it seemed frankly like you were deceived telling everyone it was elective medical procedure and telling it to the public. it does not seem elective if he had prostate cancer and this is treating it. >> i'm not a medical professional and we will give you the information as quickly as we have and recognizing as i say that we could have done a better job last week. so again we have this information now from the medical professionals, and i think that you know, it will go a long way in terms of helping understand the situation and what needs to be done going forward. >> when was president biden notified the secretary was diagnosed with prostate cancer?

>> refer you to the white house. i don't know. >> memo by austin's chief of staff that lays out the 30-day review to be done, it does not mention the initial december 22nd hospital stay. has the pentagon determined in that instance all appropriate notification procedures were followed, despite the deputy secretary and white house not being notified he was undergoing surgery, we know he was under general anesthesia for. >> i think that the information that we gather and the lessons that we learn from the period, from last week, will be applicable across the board, right. so, would similarly apply to the situation on december 22nd. the bottom line is ensuring that if there is a transfer of authority, making sure that the appropriate senior leaders in the chain of command know and that importantly there's a rationale to be able to provide perspective in terms of why the transfers of authority are

occurring. so certainly lessons learned there that will be applied to transfers in the future. >> he transferred his authorities to the deputy secretary prior to undergoing general anesthesia? >> that's correct. >> whose decision not to alert the president that the defense secretary had prostate cancer? >> again, as far as the situation in terms of what the elective surgery was, and the secretary's condition, we are providing that information to you as we received it. we received that this afternoon and we are providing it to you now. so, i'll leave it there. >> clearly you didn't know, the chief of staff, did the chief of staff know? >> i'm not going to go into the specifics on who specifically knew what, when and where. our review will help us better understand that, other than to

say as soon as we had this information to make available we provided it. we got it this afternoon and provided it literally minutes before i stepped in here. >> one last one. did he lose anxiousness at all during the december 22nd surgery? >> to my knowledge, no. >> a couple questions. has the secretary been on any medication that may alter his judgment, either of the hospital visits? >> i have no indications anything would affect his decision-making abilities. he's, as i highlighted at no time unconscious or under general anesthesia and is in the presence of medical professionals for the duration, when he resumed full duties on friday evening, that was in consultation with medical professionals, and as we have highlighted in the press releases we have put out, he continues to stay very actively engaged with his senior staff

and is making important decisions about national security and defense. >> has he asked his chief of staff to resign or has she offered to resign? >> no. >> and quickly, the white house chief of staff put out a staff to different cabinet secretaries about procedures. does the secretary believe he is a distraction for the administration in which he serves during an election year? >> the secretary continues to remain focused on recovering but more importantly on carrying out his duties as secretary of defense and defending the nation. tom and then carl. >> different topics, two questions. first of all, secretary blinken said the death toll in gaza is too high and another said -- [inaudible] does the pentagon agree with the assessments, my first question and i have a second. >> sure. well, as we have said for a long time, any civilian death is a tragedy, and of course the secretary and others as we have

engaged with our israeli partners have continued to encourage them to do everything possible to mitigate civilian harm and will continue to do that. again, no one wants to see innocent civilians killed in this conflict, whether they be palestinian or israeli and so we'll continue to work toward that end. >> second question, quoted over the weekend condemning u.s. weakness dealing with the open threat in the red sea. do you have any updates on that you can share and reaction to the claim that the u.s. has been too weak? >> the u.s. is not being too weak. we are working very actively with international partners to address the houthi threat. operation guardian is bringing nations together for commerce transiting the red sea and we will continue to work very

closely with those partners to help deter by presence, and also helping to safeguard the ships that are transiting. additionally as you saw last week, a statement was put out by multiple nations highlighting that there will be consequences for any type of houthi, continued houthi attacks and so that warning still applies. i'm not going to speculate or get into hypotheticals as it relates to addressing those issues, other than to say it should be taken very seriously. karla. >> first of all, the secretary is expected to host an honor cordon here thursday at the pentagon. is that changed, canceled, is the pentagon preparing for somebody else to host it in his stead? >> karla, i don't have the specific details in front of me other than to say we will continue to assess the secretary's schedule in terms of here at the pentagon, and certainly as we have updates or

if things need to be delegated we'll certainly do that as appropriate. the business of the department, the day-to-day business, obviously, continues, and the secretary of course is conducting his duties from the hospital, and so we'll be sure to keep you and others updated in terms of who may be carrying out those specific duties or functions or if we have to reschedule things. but right now, i just don't have any specifics. >> and just so i understand the timeline, president biden did not find out austin was in the hospital until thursday, correct? >> correct. >> and we don't know at this time when president biden was notified or if he was notified before thursday that the secretary had prostate cancer, correct. that's still unanswered? >> i would have to refer you to the white house. i don't want to get into who was telling the president what and when. >> why did it take so long to get to president biden and why did the statement take so long when the chief of staff returned on thursday, assuming she returned on thursday morning,

the statement did not come out until friday after 5:00, so that's two full business days. what was the delay in the statement? we usually get statements about strikes or meetings much, much earlier. >> yeah, thanks. you know, i'll provide you a broad overview, i covered a lot of this during the gaggle yesterday but i recognize not everybody was there. and so you know, when the notifications occurred to the staff on tuesday, because the chief -- the secretary's chief of staff was ill with the flu, it impacted a delay in reporting it to the deputy secretary staff and to the national security adviser. again, we recognize that there were some shortfalls in this, in terms of, you know, the obvious question about delegation, and so again, that's what this review is going to help us look at is where we can improve processes to ensure these kinds of things don't happen again

going into the future. the bottom line is -- >> i understand that. post thursday, post her return on thursday, it still took from all day thursday and all day friday to get a statement out. that's where i'm wondering where the delay was there as well. >> yeah, again, this goes back to what we'll look at, but we recognize that we have to do a better job in terms of the timeliness and the transparency when it comes to, especially the secretary's health and we are committed to making sure we don't do this again and that we do a better job next time. let me get to some other questions. joseph. >> thanks. can you provide any updates on the three service members injured in the christmas day attack? >> joseph, i would have to refer you to the army, i don't have those. >> could you give us the latest numbers of attacks in iraq and syria? >> sure. so there's -- since january 4th, let's see here -- there has been

nine attacks since january 4. there's been 127 attacks total, 52 in iraq, 75 in syria. >> just finally, dod, you previously said that the pentagon was looking into reports of israeli use of white phosphorus in lebanon, i believe it was november, october, i was wondering if there are updates on that. >> i don't have any updates. i haven't seen anything substantive come back, i don't have updates on that. >> are you still looking into it or closed that? >> you know, i want to -- i would refer you to the israelis, obviously. they would know whether they did or not. but i'm not aware of any updates or anything significant coming back at this stage. >> thank, general. yesterday you talked about iraq. do you have a deadline for the u.s. withdrawal in iraq, if not then, how long are you going to stay. are you going to stay as long as the isis threats remain or totally up to the iraqi

government if they want you to stay or leave the country? >> yeah, so you know, we are in iraq at the invitation of the government of iraq, and as you highlight, we remain singularly focused on the defeat isis mission. we do remain in close consultation with the iraqi government when it comes to u.s. force presence in particular the safety and security of those forces, and so we are engaged in a coordinated and deliberate process of the government of iraq to discuss the evolution of that mission in a manner that preserves these gains against isis and helps to ensure that they can never come back. so i'm not going to speculate or get into internal iraqi government discussions but certainly we'll continue to consult with our iraqi partners. >> [inaudible] >> we are there at the invitation of the government of iraq. >> two questions, japan, can you give us update on the u.s. as it

stands in japan disaster relief operations? >> so, we do remain in close communication with the government of japan. we are ready to assist if asked. at this time to my knowledge there has not been any specific requests but we'll of course continue to keep you updated. >> on taiwan, [inaudible] china said direction is a choice between conflict and peace. how concerned is the pentagon that china might step up pressure campaign against taiwan, depending on -- depending on the outcome of the election? >> yeah, so we strongly support taiwan's free and fair elections, which we view as a model for democracy, not only in the region but also globally, and the united states does not take sides in taiwan's elections. we are committed to fair treatment of the candidates. our policy on taiwan will remain the same regardless of which

party is in power and we look forward to working with whomever taiwan voters elect. the u.s. one china policy will be continued to be guided by the taiwan relation act, the three >> so you've been addressing the campaign against is is in iraq. maybe the reemergence of isis. how would you assess the threat of isis in iraq today? >> it's really interesting having watched this over time. so, you know, isis in iraq and syria have been largely suppressed. i think it's one of those things that you have to keep after obviously. you know, one of the major challenges is the detention facility, which of course we continue to work w