and welcome back to c, in where we begin with breaking news. a malaysia air boeing 777 went down in the eastern part of ukraine just a few hours ago. pictures from the scene show a wide swath of airplane wreckage. malaysia airlines flight 17 was on its tway from amsterdam to kuala lumpur marx l, malaysia, in ukrainian air space when it disappeared from radar. there are reports, and it is important to know these are unconfirmed but widely out there, that the plane may have been shot down.

more on the story in moments, but here's how your markets are reacting. the dow is slightly down. now, the dow was up on higher fed data until about 11:00 a.m. when word began to trickle out about the downed airline. the dow is off 68 points right now. let's take a look at boeing's stock. boeing's stock, ba, little changed, down a little bit, about .25%. the big move comes in russia, the rsx, the russian etf, trading down more than 5%. the russian market itself is closed, it is evening there, but the rsx is getting hit on this news. the ten-year treasury bond in the united states is seeing buyers come in as a form of safe haven. the yield 2.47%. investors putting their money into a risk off trade right now, and that is also exemplified by the move the gold. gold is up $16.80 an ounce to 1,316, more than a 1% move higher. really there were only two possible outcomes here. first an accident either

mechanical or pilot error causing a horrible crash. second, a little more devious. the possibility as some unconfirmed reports have claimed that the plane was, indeed, shot down. michelle caruso-cabrera with us now. what are we sure of at this hour, michelle? >> so you focused in on the key question, why did this plane go down, and we don't know. and that is why you've seen the reaction in the markets, the uncertainty about whether it was deliberately brought down, brian, or not. as you have said, there are reports it was sht down, but they come from both russia and from ukrainian sources. we do not have that from a source that we trust at this point. two sides in this conflict, these have been ongoing at the russia/ukrainian border where we have gotten conflicting information in the past on many different occasions. i would add one more layer to what you brought, a nuance that bob pisani highlighted earlier, if the plane was deliberately brought down as we have seen russian separatists do with other ukrainian planes over the last week, for example, did they

think, if that's what happened, was it a -- did they think it was a ukrainian plane? is this a mistake on top of that? that's what we're trying to figure out. we also don't know if there were americans on board. there are reports out of russia there were 23 americans on board. we have no confirmation of that. when the u.s. spokesman could not confirm that. we don't know why the lane went down. that is the key question we're asking. we don't know if there were americans on board. numerous airlines have now come forward to say they are directing their pilots not to go into eastern ukrainian air space because of what has unfolded here as well. and the president is expected to speak in delaware. we don't know if he's going to talk about this situation or not. but we'll watch to see that as well. that could advance the story a little bit more because we do know that president obama did speak with president putin this morning not was of the plane situation but because the united states imposed additional

sanctions on russia last night and russia had requested a conversation about the situation, and we are told during that conversation is when this news broke about the plane going down. brian, back to you. >> all right, michelle. thank you very much. again, we are expecting the president to address the situation at that speech outside of wilmington, delaware, in just a few moments. again, the minute the president begins speaking we will bring it to you. right now let us bring in phil lebeau. the boeing 777 a very reliable aircraft. at that altitude the airplane would likely be on autopilot and it would take a mechanical breakdown of almost incredible magnitude to cause an event like this, would it not? >> that's one of the things they'll be looking at, definitely, brian. usually if you have an incident at that altitude where there's no contact afterwards, well, that means that there's something catastrophic happened. sometimes it's mechanical, but it would also indicate that perhaps you had a missile hitting the plane or you had perhaps a terrorist event on board the plane. too much of that is too easily to be speculated upon. as you're looking at pictures

from the scene, we should note that the international air transport association has just put out a note saying that as best it can tell based on the information, there were no restrictions on the air space where mh-17 was flying at that time. that said, as michelle noted, there are a number of airlines that are now saying that pilots are being told, steer clear of that area, all the flight paths in that area are being moved to other places. you talk about the 777-200-er, standing for extended range, very common for these long-haul routes, something like from amsterdam all the way to kuala lumpur. there were 295 people on board this flight, 280 passengers, a crew of 15. it went down about 31 miles from the russian border. again, getting back to your question, what might have happened here, there are some key questions that need to be addressed and some facts we do know. first of all, last contact was at 33,000 feet. and there was no distress

signal. so if something was not catastrophic in this case, you would have expected some type of a distress signal. also, how wide was the debris field? we've seen reports of nine or ten miles being the area of the debris field. that's important because the wide ter debris field, it indicates that the plane broke apart much higher in altitude and then it was spread out over time as it was going down. >> which would indicate some sort of externality, whether it might be a missile or a bomb, because airlines, no matter what the size, have something called a glide ratio, that if they are without power, an engine fails, a plane will be able to fly, will come down slowly, but it can glide. that goes to your point about the lack of distress signal. even if there were a catastrophic engine failure, theoretically the pilots would have had plenty of time to radio some sort of distress signal. >> right. you would think. and there are a number of redundancies on board the 777-200. this is one of the safest airplanes out there in part because of those redundancies,

and so that fact that we have not heard a distress signal being issued by this crew, that's a key point here in terms of what we think happened at 33,000 feet. >> all right. phil lebeau, see you again shortly. thank you very much. let's take another look at the markets. we are starting to ratchet back down again on the dow. we saw the dow stabilize in the middle of the morning but down 80 points to 17,058. the nasdaq and the s&p are also lower. let's go right now to eamon javers in washington. we are expecting the president, who is in delaware, to give a speech ostensibly on infrastructure to address the situation. but we have heard from the state department who said they don't know much at this hour. can we expect the white house to get specific? >> yeah. well, that's right, brian. we are expecting that the president will talk briefly about this. he's scheduled to give a prescheduled set of remarks at the port of wilmington in delaware. what we don't know is what the president is going to say, obviously. don't expect a whole lot of detail here from the white

house. presumably the united states military and intelligence agencies have some eyes on this region based on satellites and other technical means of information collection in this area where clearly there is military activity going on between the russians and the ukrainians. that intelligence activity would have been ongoing right in the same region where this plane went down. but you wouldn't expect that the president would get into any kind of level of detail here of what the u.s. intelligence agencies know as of right now about this. we have been told he will speak to this in just a few minutes' time when he steps to that podium in delaware. also a little more information now from the white house spokesman, josh earnest, about that call between president obama and president putin that took place earlier today. the white house saying that that call took place at the initiative of the kremlin. it was to discuss the intensifying economic sanctions that the united states put in place on russia just yesterday. josh earnest now saying that during that call was when some of the first media reports came

out about this airline crash. the white house now saying as i said earlier president putin mentioned those early reports during the call. so president putin and president obama had a chance to talk about this, but briefly earlier today, no indication at this point of whether there's been a second follow-up call to the earlier one or what it is that the white house is prepared to say just now. we'll keep your eyes on that podium and hear the president when he speaks. >> eamon javers, thank you very much. down to the new york stock exchange. bob pisani, what are the traders discussing today? what is their outlook? >> their discussion is about why the market reaction was so modest. take a look at the dow industrials. we got headlines a little after 11:00, but essentially the dow dropped about 60 points as it became clear there was a malaysian air jet downed in the ukraine. still trying to figure out the reasons, obviously. why the modest reaction? most traders feel down here that it's likely because most feel it

was not intentional, that this was some kind of -- nobody was intentionally shooting down a commercial airline. if that changes, of course, that will be a very, very different situation. other people are saying, listen, money is coming into here because it's got nowhere else to go, and there's been a whole school of people who believe there's nowhere else to put money even absent these headlines. there are sectors that are moving, though, volatile sectors today. the ones you would think would be moving -- biotech stocks volatile, solar stocks, tan, volatile, also seeing social media, socl, all those stocks moving as well here. i think the president is coming on right now. you can see the president walking over there. he's coming in. let's go watch the president right now. i think the important thing is dow still moving to the downside. >> everybody, please have a seat. please have a seat. it is wonderful to be back in delaware. before i begin, obviously the world is watching reports of a

downed passenger jet near the russian/ukrainian border. and it looks like it may be a terrible tragedy. right now we're working to determine whether there were american citizens on board. that is our first priority. and i've directed by national security team to stay in close contact with the ukrainian government. the united states will offer any assistance we can to help determine what happened and why. and as a country our thoughts and prayers are with all the families and the passengers wherever they call home. i want to thank jeremy for that introduction. give jeremy a big round of applause. [ applause ] it is great to be in the -- >> all right. as you can see the president very, very brief opening comments related to the airplane. looks like it may have been a terrible tragedy. eamon javers, let's bring you

back in here. hard to read in obviously to those words. the president adding that the u.s. will offer any and all assistance necessary. do you believe, though, this is probably all we will hear from the president on this matter right now? >> that might be it for a while, brian. as predicted, the president here being very cautious. the white house doesn't want to get out ahead of this. there are a lot of moving pieces to this, a lot of potential actors involved in the situation, a lot of technical data that has to be sifted through and analyzed in order to understand exactly what happened in this case. the white house doesn't want to prejudice any of that and give a statement that leans in one direction or the other until they know exactly what it is they're dealing with. obviously if we're dealing with a situation in which a passenger jet was deliberately shot down, you're looking at a major international crisis and the white house will be dealing with it in the weeks and months to come. as of right now, they don't want to say anything that's going to impact the way they handle that in the weeks and months to come as they follow up on this. if it's something else, then obviously that unfolds a whole other series of responses from

the white house. so very cautious now from the white house. wouldn't expect necessarily you'll hear anything in the next coming hours now that we've got the president on camera talking about it. the white house might button up until we have a little more information. >> it is important to remind our viewers or anybody that might be coming into the news cycle at this hour that earlier today there was a shotdown fighter jet, in fact, reports that a ukrainian fighter jet -- this has not nothing to do with the commercial aircraft we're talking about now -- had been shot down by ostensibly a russian plane. that would be something that the president and vladimir putin would have spoken about extensively. >> well, presumably. we know that there have been jets of various kinds shot down in this region as part of this broader conflict between the ukraine, russian separatists inside the ukraine, and the russian government and russian military. a lot of violence in this area already happening over the past several days and weeks. clearly that's the backdrop for all of this. the call between putin and obama

was said by the white house to be focused on those economic sanctions. that was the news of yesterday in which the united states ratcheted up its sanctions designated several russian and ukrainian individuals including i should say an official of the fsb. that's a successor agency to the kgb, a rare economic sanctioning of an fsb officer of the russian government there and as well sanctioning a number of russian and ukrainian companies and financial entities. so that was the subject of the putin/obama call earlier today. we don't know what else they got into, although the white house is saying that putin noted the news coverage of this downed plane in this conversation with obama. we don't know whether that was the first time barack obama was informed about this. he might have been aware of it previously where at some point during the call. and we don't know who informed the president or who's monit monitoring it for him right now. a lot more detail still to come on contactually how these events unfolded earlier today.

>> eamon javers, thank you very much. of course reports a ukrainian fighter jet shot down by a russian aircraft adding a different level of intrigue to the story of malaysian air. we'll be joined by former cia director jim woolsey. hi, i just signed up for your credit report site and i have a problem. i need to speak with your fraud resolution department. ugh, we don't have that. what should i tell him? just make that super annoying modem noise... (shuuuuuuuh....zzzzzzzz...de ee...dong...shuuuhh...) hello? not all credit report sites are equal. classic. experian.com members get personalized help plus fraud resolution support. join now at experian.com. with enrollment in experian credit tracker.

let us bring in jim woolsey, former director of central intelligence. welcome to cnbc. still early in the investigation. your read on it, please. >> well, with all the appropriate caveats, it would be highly probable this was a russian or a russian rebel-assisted use of a weapon. and quite possibly the man pad of anti-air missiles that have shot down may be something in the order of ten aircraft and helicopters since early june. so this is the kind of weapon being used by the rebels against ukraine, the pro-russian rebels. and it would be surprising in a way if it were something else, but it could have been an

accident involving some other force, the ukraine, so we just don't know. >> yeah, we don't know. in fact, that's what we're trying to determine, obviously, but it is highly unusual for an aircraft, jim, of this size to simply fall out of the sky. who in that region might have either the means, the capability, or the desire to do something like this if, indeed, we discover that it was some form of sabotage? >> well, if it was low enough to be hit by a man-portable missile, then most anyone could have this. and there are a lot of those floating around that part of the world. and there are quite a few in the hands of the pro-russian anti-ukrainian rebels. this is not a real -- if that's what it is, not a real sophisticated weapon and something that can easily take down more or less low-flying

aircraft. so that's the first place i think one would look. >> jim, the reports are that the plane was at about 10,000 kilometers, maybe about 33,000 feet, six-plus miles into the sky. would a shoulder-mounted rocket be able to reach an airliner at that altitude? >> i think some of them would, yes. that's the normal flying altitude for commercial aircraft. i don't think all of them would, but i think some would or -- and also there are other anti-air missiles that are capable of operating and being held by small groups that are a little bit bigger than individual man portable and could still of course do the job even more easily. >> the difficulty here especially is that we have had so many different reports from some of the factions inside of ukraine claiming responsibility for this. some say it may simply be an accident. as we investigate this, where do we begin? who is credible? do some of these donetsk,

ukraine-regi ukraine-region-led groups have credibility, the ones that have said yes, we did it? >> well, there's a lot of lying in that part of the world and especially right now by the rugs and by groups friendly to the russians. so there really wouldn't be much reason for someone who was not involved in doing it, you know, a stray polish air unit for example or something like that. there wouldn't be any run for them to claim it, having done it. i think that putin knows that the rest of the world is very heavily in chaos, some of it created and caused by him, and so if he wants to intimidate the ukrainians using either his folks who work essentially for him even though they say that they're independently in favor of a different type of ukraine,

if there is any possibility that one of those groups, one of the ukrainian rebel groups funded by russia could have done it physically, the chances that they did do it, whatever they're saying is pretty hot. >> would this bring vladimir putin back to the table? does this force his hand in a way even if it is determined that it was an accident? >> no. i don't see it forces his handed a all. i think it was going through his mind, well, maybe my folks were shooting at a ukrainian aircraft and they messed up here, but we'll go on from there and shoot down the next one. i don't think putin has any feeling that he is losing on this at all. he's not being dealt with firmly at all by the europeans with sanctions, and he's not being dealt with very firmly by us. so, you know, i don't think he's

got much of a problem. he's just doing what he wants to do. >> if this was determined that it is not simply an accident, what happens next? >> well, we've just added some sanctions for putin, maybe we'd add a few more, but this doesn't seem to have much effect on what he's doing and the europeans are far less forceful with respect to sanctions than we are. i don't think putin is looking at any serious problems as a result of this. he's pretty well throwing his weight around as he wants to and he's not really being checked by the americans. and the real crisis will come if he moves against a nato country such as one of the baltic states, because nato is a treaty, we're all in it together, we're all allied, and the baltic states, which russia really thinks should be part of this empire essentially are now members of nato. so i think that is the crisis to

come that one wants to watch. >> former director of central intelligence jim woolsey, a real pleasure. thanks for joining us. >> good to be with you. >> let's take a look at what oil prices are doing at the moment. wti here and brent crude trading up. remember, we were below $100 per barrel just a couple days ago. wti up to $103.86, and we will get a full refort from jackie deangelis coming up. stay with us. [ male announcer ] the mercedes-benz summer event is here. now get the unmistakable thrill... and the incredible rush... of the mercedes-benz you've always wanted. ♪ [ tires screech ] but you better get here fast... [ daughter ] yay, daddy's here! here you go, honey. thank you. [ male announcer ] ...because a good thing like this... phew! [ male announcer ] ...won't last forever. see your authorized dealer for an incredible offer on the exhilarating c250 sport sedan. but hurry, offers end july 31st. share your summer moments in your mercedes-benz with us.

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welcome back to cnbc. i'm brian sullivan. we are continuing our coverage of malaysia airlines flight 17 which crashed a few hours ago in ukraine. the dow industrials were down. it had been higher prior to word of the plane. there was stronger than expected news out of the philadelphia federal reserve powering stocks a bit higher. once word of the plane crash came down, we started to see the dow jones industrial average turn lower as well. the nasdaq and the s&p are lower. there are five of the dow 30 which are higher at the moment. investors are selling stocks and

going into bonds, viewed as a haven for investors. the ten-year treasury note is up right now as the yield falls back down to 2.47%. we're also seeinging a bid in gold. the price of gold is up more than $16 an ounce again. when we start to see fear and risk and concern in the market, gold and bonds are tend to be viewed as safe havens. looking at the three big defense contractors, and we are, folks, because there have been reports though unconfirmed the plane may, may have been shot down. lockheed martin and northrop grumman shares are higher. if those reports turn out to be accurate, it could mean an escalation in the region, which by the way a region where u.s. airlines have said since april 3rd that they would not fly over. it is a very highly trafficked region for global airline passengers, actually. may not believe it, but you've probably flown over the

ukrainian region if you've gone anywhere in asia to europe. since april 3rd the faa has issued concerns about a general region over ukraine have u.s. airlines have not operated. german operator lufthansa has said it is unlikely to fly over that region for the time being as well. again, there are as many questions as there are answers. all we know, michelle caruso-cabrera, is around 11:00 a.m. eastern time we started to get word that malaysia air flight 17, a boeing 777 headed for kuala lumpur marx lay sha, disappeared from radar and indeed crashed in ukraine. >> absolutely. let's bring you a little more detail or further along, brian. interfax, russian news agency, is reporting that pro russian separatists in eastern ukraine say they have found the black box flight data recorder of this malaysian airliner. this is interfax, a russian news

agency. we don't know this. we can't verify this, but they are reporting that the russian separatists in east ukraine claim they have found the black box. what we are showing you here are photos fed in by reuters where a reuters reporter continue if i weres they have seen hundreds of bodies scattered around the smoldering wreckage of the passenger jet in a field where-in eastern ukraine, emergency services rescue workers said at least 100 bodies have been found near the scene and that the debris from the wreckage was spread across an area of up to 15 kilometers, nine miles in diameter. broken pieces of wings marked with blue and red paint, the same colors as the emblem of the malaysian airlines which lost track of the boeing 777 en route to amsterdam from kuala lumpur that was carrying nearly 300 people. the ukrainian interior ministry official saying all 295 people on board are dead, 280 passengers and 15 crew members as well. that is what -- the late thaes we have. that's what's come in in the

last few minutes. once again, interfax, news agency reporting that the russian accept ra tys claim they have control of the black box. back to you. >> and michelle, so far the amount of information and counterinformation that has come in has been extraordinary. the rebels effectively saying they shot the plane down, some on the russian side have said no we did not, the ukrainians are denying this, however you've had others the donetsk region faction of the ukraine, if you will, claiming responsibility, saying at one point on twitter, whether you believe it or not, that a little bird had fallen out of the sky and that they were to blame. there is a lot of information that is floating around right now, most of it completely unverified. >> that's a great observation, brian. that is absolutely true. that's why we have been very restrained in what we report or at least try to get you some context as to what we believe is the ability to verify it or what we have known from these sources in the past and whether or not they can be believed or not. the situation you describe, remember, this is a region

essentially at war, and what you are seeing unfold is essentially the fog of war as we have different entities with very big agendas trying to claim space and trying to move the situation and the story in a way that benefits their side. so there's lack of clarity. we don't know why this plane went down. that's the bottom line. >> all right, michelle caruso-cabrera, thank you very much. let's go now to eamon javers. eam eamon, it is entirely likely li at the end of the day this will turn out to be a tragic accident, but what is clouding it further are confirmed reports that a ukrainian fighter jet crashed or was shot down possibly by russian separatists earlier this morning. so there is an additional layer to this story. >> that's right, brian. when you talk about the white house response here, you realize that the white house will be getting intelligence reports from the u.s. military and from intelligence agencies about just exactly what was going on in that region.

we are told that they have fairly good eyes on that area of the world given the military conflict that's been going on there and that it would be presumably something that they would notice, if a missile left the ground and hit an airplane in that area. so we would imagine now that at some point the u.s. government will know what happened here, whether or not we get full details is is another question. but we saw the president come out earlier at a preplanned event in wilmington, delaware, where he simply said that americans' thoughts and prayers were with the victims, whoever they were, but was not able to confirm there were any americans in fact on board this airplane. and also said that the united states will offer any assistance that it can in helping to determine what happened here. now, as michelle noted, itgoing to be very difficult to figure that out. if these reports bear out that in fact russian separatists have the black box recordings, that might be very important in all of this because the russian separatists may or may not have

an interest in releasing those recordings depending on what's on them. we don't know any of that yet. but the possession of that black box is going to be very important in this three-sided war zone here as to who was at fault if anybody in fact was, brian. >> much like in the situation with the malaysia air flight 17, russia also denying shooting down that ukrainian fighter jet earlier today. eamon javers, thank you very much. as eamon mentioned a few minutes ago, the president at a preplanned event in wilmington, delaware, did briefly address the situation. let's listen. >> right now we're working to determine whether there were american citizens on board. that is our first priority. and i've directed my national security team to stay in close contact with the ukrainian government. the united states will offer any assistance we can to help determine what happened and why. and as a country, our thoughts and prayers are with all the famies of the passengers,

wherever they call home. >> the president speaking in wilmington, delaware. back to the markets and the price of oil as well. jackie deangelis down at the nymex. prices bump up in wti and brent crude. >> exactly right. as a matter of fact, oil closing a few moments ago up almost $2 on the day, back above $103, $103.19 the settle, a 2% pop today. if you look at the intraday chart, you can see after the news of the plane crash hit, we did see oil spike. of course we had a little bit of a bullish inventory report yesterday that was sending us higher and keeping those prices supported as well. really what we've seen here is the geopolitical fear premium was coming off the table. you mentioned it before, wti was under $100 a barrel a few days ago. now it is coming back on the table because what traders do at least here at the nymex, they shoot first, ask questions later. there are so many unknowns about this situation right now, but they are worried what it could do for the price of oil if we find out more detail that this was not necessarily just an accident.

meantime, i do want to say that we are looking at this, the highest levels we've seen in a week here and traders are saying while they were looking at levels of like $98 before, now they think domestic kruld could go as high as $105. back to you. >> jackie deangelis, thank you very much. all right. we're going to a short break. after the break, we'll bring in a former ntsb investigator, get his take by looking at pictures of the crash site on what he thinks may have happened here. the dow is down 70, gold up $17 an ounce. she's still the one for you. and cialis for daily use helps you be ready anytime the moment is right. cialis is also the only daily ed tablet approved to treat symptoms of bph, like needing to go frequently.

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he offered the u.s. help to determine what happened and why. let's bring in former ntsb and u.s. air force investigator dr. alan deal. thank you for joining us. how much can be determined if anything for from look tagt the photos that we have received from the crash site? >> well, obviously the aircraft was totally destroyed by the impact and/or the in-flight explosion. but reports have it that the -- at least somebody on the ground has found the black boxes so that will be very critical. but clearly this was nothing like a survival accident. even though we know sometimes with a missile hit large airliners have been able to land successfully, that wasn't the case here unfortunately. >> phil lebeau reporting that the one thing we do know here, doctor, is there was no distress signal. we know the 777 is a workhorse airplane, has a fairly large glide ratio even if it were to lose power in the air.

from the lack of distress call, what, if anything, can you determine? >> there are couple possibilities. one, the crew itself was incapacitated. reports very tentative coming in, they were at 33,000 feet so, this was probably a radar-guided missile, which may have done a head shot and literally taken out the crew members when the in-flight explosion occurred. again, speculation. we don't know. the other thing is they just simply lost the ability to control the aircraft. this is an aircraft that has kra kaud rupely redundant system. but if it took a shot from a missile, it literally could have been destroyed by the hit. there are a couple things we are hearing that suggest there are some solutions to this. obviously the investigation is just starting, and i can talk a little bit about that if you want later, but there are some lessons already that seem to be emerging from this.

>> such as? >> well, the vast majority of accidents in general and these fracture sizes are sometimes called are caused by human error in excess of 80%. the russians learned about this in the korean airline shootdown in '83. they accidentally shot down a korean 747. we, the united states, learned about it in '88 when one of our missile cruisers shot down an iranian airbus full of pilgrims. that was in '88. and what both of these came down to is mice communication. in the airlines today, there's a type of training that i helped get started when i was ntsb investigator. it's called crew resource management. i worked for the pentagon. i asked our pentagon, our military, to adopt this training for everybody that has to make critical dangerous decisions with limited information. that wasn't really done by the u.s. military and we've seen

accidents unfortunately because of it. but i think that's something that may well come out of this. this missile system can track mobile targets, whether or not it jumped from -- there's a report today they shot down a tactical fighter. we'll have to wait and see. >> very quickly, and i'm sorry to cut you off but we are running out of time. there have been reports, and i must urge our viewers these are unconfirmed, that the crash record site could be as much as nine miles in diameter. if that indeed proves to be accurate, would that in your professional opinion point to an external event, either a missile or a bomb? >> yes. and it clearly suggested it happened in flight. if those reports are correct, that airplane didn't impact the ground and spread itself over nine miles. >> dr. alan diehl, thanks for coming on. >> thanks for having me. >> we'll take a short break. stay with us. we have some dramatic new

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around you are looking at video that we just received here into the cnbc newsroom. this is believed to be at least some part of the impact of malaysia air flight 17 into eastern ukraine. you can see that it is some distance away. but there was a clear streak in the sky followed by a fireball followed by a large plume of black smoke. again, that is video we just received here and it is purported to be from the scene of the crash of malaysia airlines flight 17. interfax again also reporting that the black box to the plane has been recovered, possibly, though, by russian separatists. joining us michael ruben of the american enterprise institute and peter brooks of the heritage foundation. thank you for joining us on a difficult day. michael, your read early as it is on the situation right now. >> well, one of the issues i think we need to think about is if this was a shootdown from below, what technology exists to prevent this from happening again? we may be seeing a window into the future, especially with

proliferation of surface-to-air missiles, which have gone missing in libya and so forth. the only airline i'm aware of that equips its civilian airlines with anti-missile defense is actually israel's national carrier el al and charter flights. indeed, back in 2002 in mombasa, kenya, terrorists tried to shoot down an israeli charter flight and it was able to defeat the missiles. the question is whether the american and international airline industry are going to be able to go through that expense and whether consumers are going to stand for it. >> peter brooks, you're a former naval pilot and i know you speak russian as well. it is still too early to speculate, although there are some clues the lack of distress signal, the reported size of the wreckage scene here. what is your take on what likely happened to malaysia air flight 17? >> my sense is that a russian surface-to-air missile took down the airliner. the question is whether was it in ukrainian territory, was it supporting the separatists.

in recent days we've seen a significant increase in the air war in this conflict. there have been some ukrainian aircraft shot down. there's been some bombings. and my sense, if i had to speculate right now, is that this was obviously some human error involved in this, but they may have believed they were taking down a belligerent aircraft. the big question for me right now, though, is to what level is russia, moscow, specifically moscow complicit in this? was this a rogue commander of the russian forces that may have gone across the border into ukraine? or was -- and if he did so or if he wasn't a rogue commander, was moscow somehow -- give approval for these assets to be used in ukraine to be used in the air war there or in the conflict in eastern ukraine between the separatists and kiev? >> okay. so two possible causes here, michael, either a tragic

consistent or some sort of externality, i.e., a bomb or perhaps a missile, as peter suggested. taking out the first one, because if it's a tragic accident, it's an accident and we will simply go on. michael, if indeed this turns out theout to be some sort of externality, a missile, fighter jet, or what have you, what might, if anything, be the most appropriate western and u.s. response? >> vladimir putin is started to play footsie with being a rogue regime. he may want to blame it on rogue xlanders. if this is russian commitment going to the russian separatists and if there is not adequate command and control, that's simply not an excuse. buck has to stop with the kremlin which means we can't just put mild sanctions on russia. the united states has got to start being serious about the aggression that vladimir puten now personifies.

you need overwhelmingly sectarian sanctions. go after whole sanctions. actually, the russian economy is much more tenuous than people believe. vladimir puten before his invasion of crimea was being mocked by russians as being the second coming of leonid brev nerve brezhnev because of the stag nation russia was undergoing. we need to be able to take advantage of that leverage. unfortunately, today, in the white house and the state department, it seems that leverage has become a dirty word. >> just to wrap up, we had the former director of central intelligence on earlier. he suggested even if the plane was at 33,000 feet or so, there were surface-to-air missiles that could be utilized at that range. as a former naval pilot, would there be accurate surface-to-air missiles or would this have had to either inside the plane or perhaps from another plane, come from the sky?

>> no. russia has some of the best surface-to-air missiles in the world. they have missiles that would be able to range in aircraft at 33,000 feet. one of their most strategic systems can send missiles up to 100,000 feet. definitely within the possibilities of -- and capabilities of russian surface-to-air missiles and anybody else they may have sold them to. >> peter, michael, thanks for joining us here on cnbc. . folks, again, move developments continuing to roll in this the crash of malaysia air flight 17. coming from a major u.s. airline. phil la bow is work, the phones. he is about to sit in the chair. he will tell us what he has just learned right after the break.

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17. the flight was not a codeshare with delta and delta does not operate any service that flies over the region of the ukraine that was the subject of an faa security advisory. again, we've heard this similar statements from other airlines. not only here in the u.s. but around the world, that are all staying clear of this area, brian. as this incident has been, out of an abundance of caution, not getting anywhere close to it. >> it is still likely this could simply be a tragic accident, but the signs, including information from the faa, as well as private carriers like delta are suggesting whatever this may turn out to be, they recognize that even the airspace over the region is dangerous. >> brian, look at debris field. look at the video of the large pieces and panels of that plane. this blew up at 33,000 feet. something happened up there. could have been an accident but that's -- those pictures say it all. >> as one of our producers pointed out, unless is be simply had their phone or video camera trained to the sky, there would

have been some advanced notice to get the second piece of video they caught on tape. much more on this developing story right after this. rohn's d, but i've managed. ♪ i got to be pretty good at managing my symptoms, except that managing my symptoms was all i was doing. ♪ when i finally told my doctor, he said my crohn's was not under control. ♪ he said humira is for adults like me who have tried other medications but still experience the symptoms of moderate to severe crohn's disease. and that in clinical studies, the majority of patients on humira saw significant symptom relief. and many achieved remission. [ female announcer ] humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal infections and cancers, including lymphoma, have happened; as have blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure. before treatment, get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you've been to areas where certain fungal infections are common,

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take them on the way you always have. live healthy and take one a day men's 50+. a complete multivitamin with 7 antioxidants to support cell health. age? who cares. once again, welcome back to cnbc. we're going to show you some video that came in minutes ago to the cnbc newsroom here. ostensibly, you can see fireball, black smoke, going into the air. this is reportedly from the crash scene of malaysia air flight 17. but again, folks, so many questions still left

outstanding. though you just laerd our airline and transportation reporter phil lebeau say it, all signs point to this plane having exploded at 33,000 feet. dow down 77 points. gold up $17 an ounce. mandy is on assignment today. she'll be back soon. stay tuned for far more developments in this breaking news story about malaysia air flight 17. thanks for watching. bill and kayla right now. brian, thank you. yes, we do have continuing coverage of that tragic crash of a malaysia air flight 17 over ukraine. i'm bill griffeth here at the new york stock exchange. >> i'm kayla tausche in for kelly evans who is off today. we'll follow up on reports this plane may have been shot down. first, the markets today have been somewhat resilient in the wake of this news, turning on a dime earlier in the session. but right now you can see the dow down 83 points. it had been down as much as