against sir ja. >> wolf blitzer picks it up from here. thanks for watching "around the world." >> happening right now, breaking news we're following. syria embracing a proposal to put its chemical weapons under international control. this comes as president obama faces one of the most crucial tests of his entire presidency, trying to make the case for military action against syria. is it a serious attempt? right now unfolding by syria to avoid a u.s. attack? also happening now, the former secretary of state hillary clinton is visiting the white house and she's supporting the president's plan on syria. she's breaking her silence. she strongly backs his decision to ask congress to authorize military action. we expect to hear from the former secretary of state. that's coming up in a little while. also right now, the obama

administration under pressure to make the case for military action. a new poll shows it's a very tough sell. syria is likely to dominate the white house briefing that is about to get under way. while the white house press secretary prepares to face reporters, i'm preparing for my interview later today with president obama. i'm wolf blitzer in washington. we want to welcome our viewers in the united states and around the world. is it a potential game-changer or is syria just playing games? we're talking about a proposal from russia to put syria's chemical weapons under international control to avert military action. now, syria's foreign minister says syria welcome the proposal. our senior international correspondent nick paton walsh is joining us from the u.p. u.n. secretary of state john kerry actually mentioned this as a hypothetical proposal earlier in the day. the state department quickly backtracking though. is this now considered a serious

proposal toe avert a new round of u.s. military attacks in syria? >> well, wolf, we're almost into the diplomatic long grass. remarkable what's taking shape. what started as seeming will i a slip of the tong by kerry has now snowballed into something which ban ki-moon welcomed as a potential avenue out of this crisis. of course, seized upon by the russians and syrian government, too. bear in mind cynically perhaps this process could take a number of weeks if it got under way in which of course curse international opinion may begin to side along with those who say the u.n. should be allowed to do its work. let me read to you what ban ki-moon said earlier on. i'm considering urging the security council to command the immediate transfer of syria's chemical weapons and chemical precursor stocks to places inside syria where they can be safely stored and destroyed.

now, that raises a whole load of practical issues. who would be sure enough these chemicals were actually moved, do they represent the entirety of something being transferred to other organizations in different countries? morass here but the key point is as you well know, we're entering 48 hours in which the obama administration was very keen to get its message across. the interview you did with barack obama, his address the subsequent day to the nation on this particular topic. now we have this bizarre side distraction emerged out of nowhere which is is potentially is gathering diplomatic steam. >> we'll see what the reaction will be from the obama administration as you know, we're speccing to hear from the white house press secretary jay carney momentarily. he'll be asked about this russian proposal by ban ki-moon's proposal. stand by, i want to get back to you nick. patten walsh. let's bring in christiane amman four, also fareed zakaria

joining us right now. christ christieian, what do you make of this latest development potentially designed to avert a u.s. military strike? >> to be fair, it hasn't come out of nowhere. this has been float inside great britain for over a week now. the idea that real deterrents in the face of having used chemical weapons, in the face of potential response would actually be to bring these weapons out and either have them destroyed or put them under international control. i asked that specific question to the syrian ambassador to the united nations on your program last week. and he said that is something we might be able to consider. so yes, it is getting a much more prominent play now, even the british prime minister has issued some comments, some statements that they would welcome such a move. and it comes at a time, wolf, when obviously, you can see the political writing on the wall right now. that is very difficult right now as it stands today if for president obama to win a vote in

cog res or his people say that and that the public opinion not only in the united states but in great britain, in fans and in.many parts of the world is against any military intervention. france, which is about the only of the major western allies which would take part with the united states in a military strike is now even saying, according to the president there, they may try to seek u.n. resolution. so this is coming in that context right now. wolf? >> yeah, it's very intriguing right now fareed, because if the president of the united states is looking for assurances that syria will not use chemical weapons once again, this may be a way out if in fact the russian proposal is serious, if the syrians are intent on making sure all of their stockpiles of chemical weapons are. you the under control, if the u.n. security council as ban ki-moon wants were to pass a russian resolution with russian and chinese support trying to destroy syria's chemical weapons

stockpiles, that would certainly offer the president of the united states a way out of this crisis. he could come out and say look, there are not going to be any more chemical weapons attacks if all of this is serious. >> he could, wolf. it is a blow for the administration's strategy though because they really wanted to use this attack as a way of sending a signal, a very strong signal about the use of chemical weapons. he had point out secretary kerry says assad has used these weapons perhaps in the teens, that is several times. it is also clear that this was a -- an occasion, the administration was going to use to shift the balance of power away from assad and toward the rebels. so they lose that option and they loss that ability to degrade assad's air power in particular. six airfields they were planning to strike. the whole thing, however, does demonstrate, wolf, something very striking. that is, if you take this syrian acceptance of this russian proposal and you add to it

assad's interview that we have seen clips of, what i'm struck by is quite different from saddam hussein or many arab leaders. assad is not engaging in a lot of bravado, kind of crazy talk if you think of gadhafi's interview on the eve of that campaign. assad has been cool, very calculating, very clever in what arguments he uses. in the interview he talked about how there wasn't public support for this. he reminded people pooh of the colin powell speech at the u.n. and talked about the fact that the rebels are linked to al qaeda. this was not a bizarre rantings about american imperialism and israel. it was clearly designed to weaken the american public's support and so you add to it the acceptance of a proposal, and it all strikes me as suggesting that the syrians are playing a very clever game of counter offensive. >> the obama administration could certainly say that that threat of u.s. military power or

u.s. air strikes tomahawk cruise missiles kins requested the russians and the syrians to go ahead if in fact, this proposal is serious to control even destroy those chemical weapons stockpiles. we're awaiting reaction from the white house. the president secretary jay carney getting ready to brief reporters. i suspect this will be the first question on the agenda. i want to play a little clip of what bashar al assad told charlie rose in that interview in damascus. >> in the area where they said the government used chemical weapons, we only had video and we only have pictures and allegations. we're not there. our forces or police, our institutions don't exist. how can you talk about what happened if you don't have evidences? >> christiane, you've interviewed bashar al assad. i watched the interview earlier today with charlie rose. say what you will about him, he

seemed to know the talking points he wanted to deliver to the american public. this was an american television network. he was trying to score some points when he spoke of transparency. go ahead, you got the evidence. release the evidence. don't keep it classified. he seemed to be pretty sophisticated at least from that pr perspective, christiane. >> i think, yes, from a pr perspective, but you know, he's been saying the same thing for the last two and a half years that we haven't done anything. it's not me. i haven't given any orders. whether it's chemical weapons or whatever it might be, this is just a fight by my forces against terrorism. has been his mantra for the last 2 1/2 years. i'm not surprised at all by what he says in any kind of interview at this particular time because it is something that is designed purely for current situation. and it's so interesting that the syrian officials who are usually so tight-lipped and it's so difficult to sit down with any one of them have suddenly started to blanket the airwaves.

we all know why that's happening right now. i do think and clearly the president is facing this headwind, there is a lot of skepticism about the detailed evidence that yes, they have shown those videos, many of which were taken from youtube, in other words, publicly available videos. all the other things, for instance the intercepts of conversations, those transcripts, other such things have not been made public. perhaps certain officials have received those, but the public hasn't. and because of this whole idea of iraq and the big fiasco over that, that is undermining the u.s., the western case in terms of the evidence. and furthermore, some, for instance, the german intelligence is now saying according to local german reports, that they don't believe that assad himself ordered the latest chemical attack, but they do believe that there have been nobody else with that kind of capability. and perhaps his commanders did it without his knowing about it.

although then you get into the position of command responsibility. there have been more than a dozen according to intelligence reports chemical attacks over the last at least since 2012, and he knows about them. they've been publicized and that also is culpable under the whole chain of command international law regarding these things such as genocide and the use of chemical and other such weapons of mass destruction. >> fareed, later this afternoon i'm going to be going over to the white house to sit down with president obama for an interview that will air later today in "the situation room." you've been skeptical of a lot of this current crisis, what the u.s. needs to do. what would you want to hear from the president that would reassure you, fareed, someone who studied international affairs for a long time, what do you need to hear from the president right now that would convince you it's the right thing to go ahead and launch these air strikes against targets in syria? >> i think the most important thing with any strategy, wolf,

is what is your objective? what are we trying to do here? and once you figure that out, you can then use whatever tools you have, but you also then know when you've achieved that objective. you can understand how you can declare victory, and i think the problem with the administration's strategy is it's not entirely clear what the objective is. john kerry calls this a munich moment invoking the ath to world war ii and hitler's attempt to conquer the world. if it's a munich moment are we going to do two days of air strikes that is the president describes as a shot across the bow? it's a warning. if he's going to pursue a symbolic strike, it needs to be clear that's what the on the tiffti -- objective is or is there a broader strategy with broader objectives at work.

i think this is partly why there isn't as much public support because people wonder which of these two strategies is being pursued. >> if you listen to the secretary of state earlier in the day he said this limited strike would be unbelievably small, a direct quote from the secretary of state john kerry. so lots of good questions i have for the president of the united states. that interview, by the way, will air during our 6:00 p.m., right at the top of the 6:00 p.m. eastern hour ear in the united states and around the world in "the situation room." don't go too far away, guys. we have a lot more to discuss. breaking news we're following. a russian proposal that the syrians now say they're open to that ban ki-moon, the u.n. secretary-general says he's clearly open to. we're standing by for reaction from the white house. what will the white house press secretary say? he's going to be going to the microphone shortly. we'll have live coverage coming up. stay with us. we'll be right back. we'll do almost anything.

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proposal. the united nations secretary-general ban ki-moon says he wants a u.n. security council resolution to consider not only that, but going one step further and actually destroying all of syria's chemical weapons stockpiles. they have a lot of chemical weapons. we have not yet received formal reaction from the white house. but we're standing by on the left, you see the white house briefing room. white house press secretary jay carney will go before reporters. some of them have walked in. some of them will be walking in shortly. once jay carney comes there, we'll have live coverage. we're also waiting to hear from the former can the of state the former secretary of state hillary clinton. she has been relatively silent, only speaking through a spokesperson just a little while ago earlier last week. but now she's going to break that silence and tell us what she thinks about this crisis in syria. stand by. we have live coverage of all of this coming up. meanwhile polls released this

hour show how concerned americans are about the risks of military action in syria. most say the risks aren't worth it. in the new cnn/orc poll, 72% say a strike against syria would lead to a alarmer war that could spread throughout the middle east and other parts of the world. 67% say an attack would likely result in syria using chemical weapons again in the future, 31% say that's not likely. americans are also worried a strike would lead toe boots on the ground. two-thirds say it's likely the u.s. eventually would have no choice but to send ground troops into syria. people are also concerned about terrorism. six in ten think an attack could lead to terrorists using chemical weapons against u.s. targets, including inside the united states. clearly, president obama is going to need all of his powers of persuasion to change americans' minds about syria. can support from hillary clinton help the president? the former secretary breaking her silence on how the u.s.

should respond to the syrian regime's suspects use of chemical weapons. she's visiting is the white house today on an unrelated matter and also weighing innen ot syria debate. let's bring in our senior white house correspondent brianna keilar. how significant is this show of support from hillary clinton? >> i think, wolf, it's significant in that it's telling. it's telling that president obama has a problem and it lies, obviously, not just with the republicans but within his own party. that's part of the reason why i think hillary clinton is going to be weighing in next hour. she's here to talk about a wildlife trafficking event so obviously this is very many unrelated but we understand she will be be briefly talking about syria as she will we expect briefly talk about it tomorrow when she gives a previously scheduled address in philadelphia. i do want to tell you, we've gotten a little reaction in a senior administration official just on this latest that we're hearing about russia saying that

syria is open to giving up its chemical weapons to international control. i've been told, wolf, by a senior administration official that john kerry was serious about the concept of it though not the timeline. he talked about seven days in his comments but i also think that on the flipside, we've heart from our jim chute ta talking to a u.s. official who said this was a major goof and that kerry went off script. what you're seeing and aides have been hud ling trying to figure out how to respond to the latest news, i think you're seeing the scramble going on at the white house to adjust to this latest information that's been put out by the secretary kerry. >> what would be the downside, if any downside, from the administration's perspective in seeing and checking out to see if this russian proposal does have merits and that syria will basically be forced to eliminate its chemical weapons stockpiles, especially given the tough struggle the president's having in getting a resolution passed

in the senate and the house authorizing the use of military force? >> i think said to the president what if they were to give them up, they would say that's great. i don't think when the administration is dealing with russia ordealing with syria, they take what russia and syria say with a grain of salt. observers of syria, wolf, don't expect assad would ever give up his chemical weapons. they find it sort of disingenuous that russia and syria would propose this and the administration for a long time now has felt na russia's role in all of this is to slow things down, gum up the, would to buy time. so they're very skeptical that's what's happening again here. >> i'm coming over to the white house in a little while. i'm going to be sitting down with the president for an interview. he's giving a lot of interviews today. he's giving interviews to six news organizations, television nous organizations.

tomorrow night 9:00 p.m. eastern, he'll address the nation from the white house. are we expecting some new arguments from the president now or is it going to be more detail of what he's been saying over the past couple of weeks? >> i think initially we expected, wolf, that he was maybe not going to say anything very new, that more than anything, he was relying on trying to get a bigger audience to make his case. but i do wonder and edon't know this, i wonder if the white house is rerecalibrating here trying to make a different argument or a honed argue because what we've seen in recent days, last week on monday and tuesday, there was a tremendous sense of momentum here and here when you saw john mccain, lindsay bram graham, you saw house seeker john boehner and house minority leader nancy pelosi signing onto the president he's idea. it's a different mood here now

and there's a sense preds obama needs to do something to convince the american people. it's very much up in the air whether there are going to be changes, wolf. but i suspect maybe that's something you'll get a sense of when you're here later today. >> thanks very much. that interview, by the way, will air 6:00 p.m. eastern in "the situation room" here on cnn. let's go to capitol hill right now. a lot of action last week with hearings on syria. now all 535 members of congress, the house and senate are due back in chambers today ready it debate and eventually vote on military action in syria. we're keeping a close count which way they are leaning. here's the senate, for example, pretty evenly split, 25 yea, 23 nay. a lot of undecided. in the house 14 again8 against now. still plenty of undecided at the same time.

let's bring in chief congressional correspondent dana bash. dana, what kind of push is the white house making towards congress this week beyond the interviews he's doing today? his address to thefation tomorrow night? >> a lot more of what we saw last week. classified briefings here on the hill. we're going to see a big one with house members tonight or at 5:00 eastern bringing people to the white house at various times and various groups. the congressional black caucus which is a very important group of people for the president generally, very support. ive of his policies. in this case, so many of them are undecided. many are noes based on what they're hearing mostly from their people back home, their constituents. then we're going to see lots of other discussions behind the scenes. but one of the things so fascinating, you just showed cnn's count. we've been very consecutive. we have a lot of gray area. the that show undecideds. a lot of those members, particularly in the house are at this point leaning no.

and in the senate, which is where this is going to be taken up first, it's really unclear. it's very much up in the air where things stand. they do not know if they have the votes now. and we have been hearing throughout the day more people if they're coming out coming out and saying no. i just have to tell you the reason has been fascinating. we talked about this many times last week. it is not because these members don't believe that bashar al assad was behind the chemical attacks and it's not because they don't believe it is morally important for the u.s. to stand up. it is, as seminar lamar alexander, the latest republican to come out and said no said in his statement, it's because he is concerned about the uncertainty what happens after the mirt attack. he says i know what plan a is, but what about b, c, and d and that really is the key thing that will lawmakers across the board, across the capital, across party lines say they're not hearing from the administration. that's what they feel so uncomfortable about, wolf. >> the press secretary for the

white house dana, jay carney is about to walk to the microphone and start taking reporters' questions. high on the agenda right now, obviously, the breaking news we're following, this russian proposal that would allow the syrians to consolidate their chemical stockpiles, chemical weapons stockpiles for international control and inspection, perhaps even as ban ki-moon, the u.n. secretary-general is proposing, going to the security council and destroying all those weapons. if that were to happen, i assume that would be warmly welcomed by members of congress because it would, in effect, eliminate if it were to be achieved and that's a huge if, is obviously, obviously, about you if it would eliminate the need for u.s. military strikes and it would basically end this immediate crisis for the u.s. are you getting any reaction up on capitol hill to this russian proposal? >> oh it absolutely would cause a big sigh of relief to be

briefed here on capital among democrats and republicans certainly undecided. one thing we should note is that there has been something along these lines that has already been proposed by two senate democrats, consecutive democrats who have said they're going to vote no on military authorization, joe manchin of vest virginia and heidi heitkamp of north dakota. they have something out there saying let's delay this for 45 days and try to get bashar al assad to turn over his chemical weapons and during that time to develop international consensus what to do. it's the same kind i have vein. and they were already told they will get a vote on this if this happens this week. so we already saw some kind of for lack of a better way to say it, face-saving measures proposed by the president's fellow democrats on capitol hill. there are other things being discussed if they feel they will not have what is expected to be

60 votes needed to pass authorization regardless of what happens in russia. >> here's jay carney, the white house press secretary. >> thanks for being here. we wanted to wait for ambassador rice to finish her remarks before starting this briefing. today, i have with me at the top of this briefing the president's deputy national security advisor tony blinken whom many of you know. tony is here today because while many of us were traveling last week with the president, tony and other senior administration officials were engaged in the effort to provide detailed information to members of congress about the chemical weapons attack in syria on august 21st. he was part of a group that provided classified briefings to i believe 185 members of the house and senate and is engaged in the overall outreach effort that so much of the administration is participating in now. so what i'd like to do is ask

tony to provide to you at the top here a summation of the presentation that he's making. together with other officials and then he can stay and take a few questions and then i've got to let him go, continue that effort. and i'll take your questions on syria and other matters after that. with that, here's tony blinken. >> good afternoon. you know, since the events of august 21st and this use of chemical weapons by the assad regime against its own people, we reached out almost immediately to members of congress who were spread across the country. weigh saw the their views what we should do and heard different views as you continue to hear today. one of the things we hear was a desire by congress to have its voice heard and its vote counted in in matter. the president believes we're much stronger and effective if we can act together especially on matters of national security.

so as of now and made the announcement about his intent to take action but also to take congress's authorization to do so. since then, we've been engaged in a detailed process of trying to provide congress all of the information we have so that they can make the make the best informed decision possible. we conducted over the past week or ten days, be a series of briefings, of them classified, some unclassified, many conversations, as well on an individual basis of members. the classified briefings that you took part in along with senior officials from the intelligence community, the defense department, the state department and jointent chiefs i believe had about 185 members, republicans and the dras of both houses take part. and we've had individual conversations coming out of those briefings, as well. as we were doing that, we, of course, were working to build strong international support. the president at the g-20 worked on a joint statement on the need to reinforce the prohibition

against the use of chemical weapons. at that time, 11 countries including the united states signed on. we now have an additional 15 who joined that statement. secretary kerry was in europe working with europeans and we've been working every day at the u.p. u.n. and country by country. in terms of what we provided congress, let me just describe the top lines of the briefings. so obviously i won't get into the classified part. but the bottom line as we told congress is that we concluded with high confidence that the syrian regime used chemical weapons august 21st with rockets and artillery against its own civilians. we told them we concluded well over 1,000 people have been killed including hundreds of children. we ran through in detail the intelligence that shows preparation for the attack, intelligence that shows the attack itself and its effects, post attack observations by key praptds and then more recently, various physiological samples, blood, skin as well as soil that showed that sarin was used.

there's also been as you all know an extraordinary body of contemporaneous public information coming out about this incident, videos, social media much of which has been shown recently on television, reports from ngos, from doctors, from other countries. all of this taken together weigh told congress led us to the conclusion that assad had poimped his own people with gas august 21st. we paid the case it was very importanton stand up for the international prohibition against the use of chemical weapons, a prohibition that has been in place basically since the end of world war i. we saw the terrible effects of poison gas being used on soldiers in world war i, the geneva protocol emerged saying you can't do this again. one of the very positive benefits of that is since world war i, not a single u.s. soldier on the battlefield has been exposed to poison gas. we noted for kong its own strong stances on this prohibition.

the senate overwhelmingly passing the chemical weapons convention in '97. both houses of congress passing the syria accountability act in be 2003 motivated in part by syria home run chemical weapons. now syria has used them. we made the case enforcing this prohibition and this norm is profoundly in the national interest. first and foremost to deter assad from using the weapons again and making it more difficult for him to do so, to prevent the threshold against use from dropping lower and lower to the point where our own soldiers and citizens could be exposed. to make a political settlement in syria more likely, not less likely. and, of course, to stop the threat to the neighbors, including israel, jordan, turkey, lebanon and iraq, which as secretary kerry said about a week ago are just a stiff breeze away from syria. finally we've made the case because others are watching. iran is watching what we're doing, north korea, hezbollah is watching what we're doing.

if we don't enforce this prohibition, they will take the wrong lesson from it. many members asked how -- what we proposed to do fit into our larger strategy for syria. and we explained that as we act to deal with the chemical weapons problem, it's in the context of a broader strategy that we've been pursuing for some time to try and bring the civil war in syria to a negotiated political transition. we believe that's the best way to do it because it offers the greatest prospect for there not being a vacuum after assad leaves that could be filled with things as bad if not worse and the best prospect for keeping the country together. the broader strategy to deal with the conflict has involved it putting pressure on the assad regime, isolating it. it's involved building up the opposition and a humanitarian program, the largest in the world by any single country and involved a diplomatic track to

get agreement on the principles for political transition would look like. what we're posing to do to deal with the use of chemical weapons on august 21st, is taking place in the context of that the larger strategy, separate from it, but it's happening simultaneous to it. of course, the primary on theive of the force that we propose to use is to deter assad from using the weapons again, is to degrade his ability to do so but it could have the additional benefit of advancing the broader strategy of ending the civil war by making it clear to assad we can hold at risk things that he holds very dear. finally, the last two points that we made in our briefings to congress along with some of the details of the intelligence and some of the military plan that we're looking at is we thought it was very important to say what this is and what this isn't because what we found in our engagement with members is that many of them had just returned from their home states and home districts and they were going to state fairs, they were going to town halls and they were hearing

from constituents. and it is perfectly normal and understandable that when an american hears in the news a headline or on television hears military action in syria, they immediately think of the last ten years, the frame that they process that through is a decade of war, iraq, afghanistan, 100,000 american troops, 150,000 american troops in the other. we made it very clear to the members of congress we were engaged with what this is and what it isn't it this is a limited tailored but effective military action to deal with the use of chemical weapons. what it is not is open-ended. it is not backwards on the ground. it's not iraq. it's not afghanistan. it's not even libya. finally, the case we made to members of congress involved baensing the risks of action against the risks of inaction. we made it clear there are always ricks in taking military action and we spend many hours trying to game them out to take steps to prevent them and to

mitigate them. but it's our judgment that the consequences of inaction are much greater and graver still if we don't act. the international norm against the use of chemical weapons would be dangerously weakened. the threshold for the weapons would get lower and lower. the message to assad would be he could act with impunity and he'll do it again. it would make a political settlement in syria less likely and send a message to iran, north korea and other groups it's safe to pursue and even use these weapons. that's the case we made. we asked kong are esto support a limited but decisive response to the use of chemical weapons. and let me stop with that. >> with that we'll start a few questions for tony. >> i thanks for doing this today. one of the other questions some lawmakers have is whether the president plans to proceed with a strike regardless of how they vote. and you said over the weekend that it is not the president's desire nor his intention to use

his authority without congressional backing. do you stand by that statement that he has no intention of striking without congressional authority. >> we heard at the very outset in our earliest consultations with congress, they wanted their voice heard. that's the reason the president went to congress because he believes we're stronger when we act together. we heard clearly from them that they wanted to be in on this debate. i'm not going to jump ahead with the process. i didn't speak very artfully. the president is clearly it is his desire and insent to secure the support of congress for this action. but i don't want to get into hypotheticals of what will or will not happen after the vote. >> you're not necessarily standing by that? >> i'm saying there's no point in jumping ahead of where we are now. >> tony, as you gather more evidence and this physiologic

evidence that you said, have you passed to 100% sert tied that this happened? >> here's what's important to understand. the intelligence community has different levels of confidence that it expreys in any given assessment. low, medium and high. high is as high as they can go. they will not tell you with 100% guarantee that anything has happened in terms of the assessment that they make. they put together the facts. and we have sertitude in the facts and you put those facts together and you make an assessment. then you evaluate that assessment. you grade it. and their grade is high confidence. that is well beyond beyond a reasonable doubt which is a standard that i think many americans are familiar with and that is the standard that we've been using. >> did this decision go all the way up to assad himself? >> assad we believe and we have the intelligence and evidence to back this up up, is in control of the chemical weapons program

and would have, let me put it this way, any standing orders to use these weapons would have been issued by as sad and our colleagues in the intelligence community showed in great detail the different individuals in the chain of command who were engaged in the activities of august 21st. >> a couple things. charlie rose interviewed president assad and said several things. among the things he said is there would be repercussions if there's a united states military strike and that the united states should be fearful of that direct and indirect repercussions. he made a couple veiled references to 9/11. secondly, today the syrians and russians have announced the concept of international supervision and control of or make the of the chemical weapons stockpiles of syria. is that something that the administration would regard as a favorable move or not? and lastly, you've had the briefings but lost ground in the

senate. there are more senate delegation saying they don't want to support this. why are you losing ground. >> let me just say this, first of all, we take every possible. precaution to make sure we can prevent and defend against that might arise from the use of military action. and we've done that and we'll continue to do that. and it is our judgment that president assad and syria would have very little interest in picking a fight with the united states of america. so i don't think that is likely at all. second, with regard to the reports today about this russian initiative, we've seen the reports. we want to take a hard look at the proposal. we'll obviously discuss the idea with the russians. and, of course, we would welcome a decision and action by syria to give up its chemical weapons. the whole point of what we're doing is to stop syria from

using these weapons again. but i think it's important to keep a few things in mind. first of all, the international community has tried for 20 years to get syria to sign onto the chemical weapons convention, joining 189 other countries in doing so. now it is only one of only five country that haven't done it. just last week, president assad wouldn't even say whether he had chemical weapons despite overwhelming evidence he's actually used them. of course, we also tried to work with the russians at the united nations repeatedly on syria and chemical weapons for months. until now, they have blocked all of our initiatives including sempl press statements never mind a security council resolution. it's also important to note syria has one of the largest stockpiles of weapons around the world. it would certainly take time, resources and probably a peaceful environment to deal with this. all of had that said, we'll take a hard look at this and talk to the russians about this.

it's important to note this proposal comes in the context of the threat of u.s. action and the pressure that the president is exerted. it's even more important that we don't take the pressure off and that congress give the president the authority he's requested. finally in terms of where we are with congress, you know, my sense is this. from all of these briefings. my sense is that when members of congress have a chance to see the intelligence, to read it, to get the briefings to ask questions, they come away convinced of two things. chemical weapons were used august 21st against civilians in syria and the assad regime is the one that used them. many members have yet to get this classified brief. now as they're coming back today and this week, they'll have the opportunity to do that. we have senior officials going out to provide the same briefing we gave last week. i believe when they see the evidence, it is compelling. it's overwhelming. and then it comes down to a

pretty basic question. are we or are we not going to do anything about the fact that assad poip poisoned his own people with gas, including hundreds of children. that's the question before the members of congress. when they have the evidence and see the facts i think they'll come to the right conclusion. >> tony, you said you are taking a hard look. >> there you heard the news from the deputy national security advisor to the president tony blinken saying that they are getting ready to study what the russians have proposed. jim acosta of cnn now asking a question. >> some hours ago, we haven't had a chance to look at it yet or talk to the russians about it yet. we will. >> are you aware the secretary said assad could turn all of it over without delay? >> i think he was -- i believe he was answering a question and speaking hypothetically what if he were to do that. of course, we would welcome company assad giving up his chemical weapons doing it in a

verifiable manner so we can account for them and destroy them. that's the whole purpose to make sure he can't use them again. that would be terrific. but unfortunately, the track record to date including recent statements by as sad not even acknowledging he has the weapons doesn't give you confidence. that said we want 0 look hard what the russians proposed. >> is this an ultimatum, an aescape hatch for bashar agassad. >> we'll see where it goes. >> an opening, a potential opening, a relatively encouraging reaction from the who you, the deputy national security advisor tony blinken saying regarding this russian proposal to put syria's chemical weapon stockpiles under some sort of international control. we would welcome the proposal if in fact it were to happen. he then said they're doubtful,

they're skeptical about it, but it does have an opening for the united states to avert any military action against syria. gloria borger is our chief political analyst. gloria, this may be and i'm very cautious right now, it may be an opening to avoid what so many members of congress want to avoid, what so many people in the american public want to avoid, u.s. military involvement in syria if the russians are seniors and the syrians are serious. >> well, you have to hear the skepticism though in tony blinken's answer because his answer was don't forget, this comes in the context of the threat of force. if you want to unwind this a little bit and go back to when the secretary of state john kerry said this, it was more of a point of debate. it did not seem to be a serious ultimatum. i think probably a lot of people were kind of surprised about it. it was more hypothetical than it was real. obviously, the russians then jumped on it and said okay, you know, maybe this is a way out of

it. so i think what you're hearing from the administration is saying look, now that the russians are trying to do this, we can't ca cast it aside but i think their skepticism is very clear about whether assad would do this given the fact that he has always denied he had chemical weapons in the first place. >> you did hear tony blinken, deputy national security advisor to the president, also say if this is serious, if the russian proposal is serious, hold on, if the russian proposal is serious, if the syrians take this seriously, it would be as a result of the impressive threat of u.s. military force that convinced bashar al assad maybe that this is his only way 0 survive and if he believes this is his only way 0 survive and avoid a u.s. military involvement in syria, you know what? you don't know if what he's going to do. >> that's right. so you don't know whether what something secretary of state kerry said inadvertently perhaps may actually provide a little

bit of an opening for the white house. and so we'll have to see how this plays out. obviously, they're skeptical. but you're right. you just never know given the fact that there's overwhelming public sentiment in this country against a military strike. >> and this could put on hold any decision on a military strike for a while. may even make votes in the u.s. senate and house unnecessary if in fact, this russian proposal to end this crisis -- >> lots of members of congress are hoping for that. >> a lot of them don't want to vote on it. the president certainly doesn't want to lose that vote. gloria, you're going to be joining me later in the situation room, as well. we have some analysis coming up. the new hosts of "crossfire," they are standing by to discuss this latest breaking news. we'll be right back. [ male announcer ] this store knows how to handle a saturday crowd.

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later today, we will see the return of cnn's "cross fire" that begins at 6:30 p.m. eastern. let's get a preview. joining us, newt gingrich and van jones. two of the hosts, four all together, of the new "cross fire." mr. speaker, newt, i don't know what to call you. let's call you newt. let's talk about this. there may be an opening right now. let's be cautious. there may be an opening, a, to avoid votes in the congress, avoid a u.s. military strike if in fact this russian proposal to

control all of syria's chemical weapons stockpiles is serious. >> apparently, the syrian foreign minister has said yes, we're very interested in working this out. and i was reminded of bobby kennedy in the cuban missile crisis when they got a very hard message from crus chauv and a soft message at the same time. a woman would drop a handkerchief at the dinner table and when a man would pick it up, she would say, yes, i will accept your proposal of marriage, and they didn't want to hurt their feeling so they got married. he said, skip the hard message, go to soft message and see if we can build that. you have the russians and apparently the syrians say and the secretary of the united nations saying why don't we have the u.n. take control of the syrian stockpile? this is an opportunity

potentially for the president to have an enormous victory. >> an enormous victory for the president because he could hear as we heard tony blij nken his national security adviser saying if this could happen, not only control all of the syrian chemceche chemical weapons and there's a lot of them, but destroy them at the sime. if the united states security council would pass that, the president could legitimately say thank you very much. it was the threat of u.s. force. bashar al assad was so nervous about the fact of going down in the face of u.s. pressure, he agreed to destroy his weapons stockpile. >> this could play out like a good episode of the "west wing." usually these get botched up and get worse and worse. this could be the case like in greek theater, things get messed up and then a god comes down from the machine and fixes everything. that could be the case. literally, a misstatement by john kerry.

>> we don't know for sure it was a misstatement. it may have been. >> seemed like it. >> it may have been something. over the past couple weeks, people have been saying, experts outside of the government and others have been saying, there's a military solution or the u.s. could do nothing, but maybe there's diplomacy in the middle that might work and maybe if he could get the diplomats on board, he could avertwar waref if you will. >> this could work out very, very well, if he did it on purpose or not, to your point, if the world is smart enough to take up the statement from john kerry and run with it, get tut of an impossible situation for everybody, we're in a situation where the president of the united states is likely to lose a vote in congress, which is unprecedented, which would be horrible and then he has to go against congress, which would be horrible, or stand down, which would be horrible. the only hope is the possible misstatement from john kerry.

>> maybe it could work. if you're bashar al assad and you say, whado i do? give up my chemical weapons and survive? or not give up my chemical weapons and face the wrath of the united states military? >> i have a good friend who knows the russians very well. he has been saying putin would solve this if obama understood how to do this. if putin picks up the phone and says to assad, this is it. if you don't do cave, they're going to bomb you and we can't help you. >> this is assad. he knows every dirty trick in the book. there is hezbollah. he can give some of those weapons over and still give his allies some others. so that then he gets to have his cake and eat it. we have to let this thing play itself out. >> there's a timeliness. if he's going to agree to this to keep them under control, it could be two, three, four weeks, he could ship some of those. van is absolutely right.

>> let's not get too happy. >> there have been four efforts this year to do that, and the israelis have bombed all four. very clear, every time you put a truck on the road to lebanon, if we think it has something dangers, we kill it. >> they have done the four air strikes, they didn't announce anything in advance, they just did it and there was no real esponse. >> they understand it's a tough neighborhood. it will be interesting to see, even this evening when you do the interview that will be on at 6:00, does the president now take into account the possibility that you could actually have a diplomatic solution that is better than anything he had thought of? that would be -- >> not only deferring and degrading. that would potentially be eliminating syria's chemical weapons stockpile. that would be a huge political diplomatic, national security win for the u.s., right? the president would have to deserve a lot of credit for that. >> he could take the credit. he would deserve the credit, and

i think it would get him out of what is going to be an embarrassing defeat coming down the road next week. >> very quickly. >> to your point, creativity in a crisis. this is what i think people have been hoping for. we wound up down this rabbit hole. my big hope is if this is not the right creative outcome, there are others. we don't need another war in the middle east. >> thanks very much. expect a lot more lively debate when "cross fire" returns later tonight, 6:30 every week night after "the situation room," newt versus van with stephanie cutter, s.e. cupp. stay with us for "cross fire." i'll be back 5:00 p.m. eastern. my interview with president obama at the white house. that will air at 6:00 p.m. eastern. news room continues with brooke baldwin after a quick break.

good to see you. i'm brooke baldwin. a major development in the crisis in syria. syria's foreign minister said the country, quote, welcomes a proposal to put its chemical weapons under international control. all of this could be a result of a statement by president obama's