strike signed the u.s.? >> one of many questions we'll be asking this morning. we know more about the alleged terror plot being hatched overseas by the al qaeda cell, khorasan, but it was the leader of yet another terror group confirmed killed in the strikes, all of this coming today, big, big day at the united nations, president obama preparing to take center stage at u.n. general assembly to shore up additional support against isis for the fight overseas. we're covering the fight against isis from every angle, beginning with justice correspondent, pamela brown, with more on the possibility of a home-grown terror threat. pamela, good morning. >> law enforcement agencies across the country are on heightened alert for lone wolves in the u.s. who may want to retaliate in the quake of the strike against al qaeda operatives in syria. across the country this morning, law enforcement on heightened alert. homeland security and the fbi warning that the air strikes in

syria may embolden home-grown extremists to strike. >> that's why we're worried, and doing everything we can to address the messages. >> the bulletin warning law enforcement agencies to be vigilant. asking them to scrutinize social media and be on the lookout for changes of behavior of extremists they may be tracking. >> lone wolves have very difficult to identify and confront. they're moving an an ideological path that they believe in. >> this, as we learn more about the alleged plotting. group khorasan that pushed the military to strike them monday night. a u.s. intelligence source says the group had already acquired materials and was in an advanced stage of planning to carry out an attack in the west and the u.s. or europe, but no specific targets are known. senior officials tell cnn that in july, security and international airports was

increased after intelligence suggested khorasan was creating easily concealed bomb force western recruits to smuggle on to airplanes. what makes the threats of khorasan attacks so worrying is their ties to al qaeda's master bomb-maker in syria. >> the concern is that al asiri has trained others in these techniques. the fear is that some have joined the group khorasan and are developing the new techniques. >> al asiri is thought to have developed the underwear bomb that failed to detonate on a plane to detroit on christmas day 2009. and a plot to blow up planes with bombs in printer cartridges. >> officials are still assessing the results of the strikes, trying to figure out if they were able to take out the key leaders in the khorasan group. chris? >> it will take some time, but important information, we'll

stay on it, pamela. no president likes to build up expectations, but this is a major moment for president obama, he will be addressing the world at the u.n. general assembly, he needs action to come out of this assembly the stakes -- a massive broad coalition that makes this a regional war or wind up owning the conflict himself. cnn's michelle kosinski live at the white house, i'm sure they feel the weight of the situation. >> should be doing now he's admitted a lengthy one, it's open-ended, there's no guarantee of success, 0 or even what the end game looks like. and you have countries like syria and russia, asking well

where is the international legal justification for doing this in syria. there's no u.n. resolution authorizing the force. still, there is significant support out there. 40 countries have pledged to do something in the fight against isis. so president obama will be looking for greater commitments and he's going to chair a segs session of the u.n. security council looking for a resolution to help stop the flow of foreign fighters to the region. >> this is getting to be very complex. although it seems as though the president's case is very strong, given the strikes, they don't like one word, it's war. if they don't like a phrase even more, it's american war. we'll have to see what comes out of it. while the president is preparing to make his case for the air campaign against islamic extremists, both in syria and iraq, pentagon officials are still assessing the effectiveness of the first round of air strikes, monday night into tuesday morning to

determine exactly how much damage was done to the al qaeda group khorasan as well as isis. so let's bring in our pentagon correspondent, barbara starr, good morning. >> good morning, brooke. as the u.s. assesses the damage, many syrian refugees and syrian civilians rebel groups are welcoming the action against isis, but of course, many syrians are not. piles of rubble now lay across parts of certain syria, after the u.s. and arab allies unleashed attacks. air strikes on isis and another brutal terrorist group enraging jihadists on the ground. the u.s. and arab allies are relying on precision bombs from fighters and bombers to stop isis. in the first round, firing against a training area, and other targets, specifically aimed at stopping its ability to command its army of fighters.

like the bombing of this isis finance center near raqqa. the target? a communications array on the roof, hoping to stop its flow of money and communications. and here, only a portion of a suspected isis command center destroyed. another specific target, selected to stop isis leaders, from talking to their troops. on the ground in syria. protests, some civilians chanting -- down with the coalition. >> and the night we got attacked, by a coalition. >> this dutch islamist walks through the rubble of a building in western syria, and declaring revenge. >> we will get the victory. >> u.s. military commanders now watching closely for how isis reacts. >> they will adapt to what we've done and seek to address their shortfalls and gaps against our

air campaign. >> and now, we've learned another terror leader, this man, the head of the al nusra front, also an al qaeda-linked organization may have been killed. the u.s. has not yet confirmed that. >> and everyone is now waiting and watching to see of course when the next round of air strikes unfolds, brooke? >> barbara, thank you very much. we've been told an attack on the u.s. and western interests was imminent, which was somewhat of a shock to many people. how imminent? what is the ongoing concern? is this about retaliation? a lot of questions, let's bring in cnn law enforcement analyst, tom fuentes and mr. bobby ghosh, editor of quartz. this came as a shock, fair statement, who is khorasan? we thought it was about isis or whatever you want to call those thugs over there. how much of a surprise was this? >> chris i don't think it's that big of a surprise to law enforcement and the intelligence

services. it's really not a new group. it's just you know, old, it's got like an all-star team of al qaeda, older fighters that have just regrouped under a new name temporarily in syria. which gives them a safe haven to train and prepare explosives and get their act together in terms of trying to get people to get on planes and come attack either in the west or the u.s. so it's not a new threat or not a new group or new techniques. we've had al asiri, the yemen bomb maker for years trying to perfect his use of petn, he developed the underwear bomb and he put explosives in the body cavities of his own brother. and got blown up. he put explosives in the 2010 printer cartridge effort to ship them to the united states that had explosives in the packaging. it's not new, and the techniques aren't new. it's more of the same. but a new name for the same group. >> and i'm going to talk to bobby about that name in a

second. because it matters in our terror vocabulary. he's a bad guy we need to know. i would argue it is new, in that for people like me and people watching the show, the idea that because of what's going on over there, you may have lone wolf extremists types who identify in some way or coordinated some way now attacking back here in the u.s. because of what's going on over there. how serious a threat is this? >> it's an ongoing threat and always been serious. the threat is heightened because of the air strike campaign beginning. but we've had this constant drum beat of leaders overseas trying to encourage lone wolves all along. everything from "inspire" magazine that comes out of yemen that every month has an article about how people can use their cars or use everyday things to kill other people. without having to train for explosives or firearms, we've just had the arrest by the fbi a week ago in rochester, new york, the guy that was going to kill soldiers when they returned.

we had the woman in denver a couple of months ago who was bent on going to join isis overseas, the idea of this, and the idea of the lone wolves has been a continuous thing. >> the idea is in the abstract. >> no, they has been more than abstract. we've had actual people, probably the bureau has probably arrested two or three people a year going back. >> but now it seems that it's more imminent than that i agree with you 100%. are we following the story more? paying more attention or giving it more attention? or does it seem as if the dynamic is heightening the threat in the united states? >> we're paying more attention and we're being asked to pay more attention. a couple of days ago we heard from the administration that they feel several people have come back from syria and the fbi is watching. the administration puts that word out that we should be paying close attention. >> the unga is going on right now, the u.n. general assembly.

they always lock down when the city when the president comes, they lock down the u.n. it's never like this. do you think that's feeding into this? >> it must be, there is a heightened sense, heightened concern all over the country and not just here. you're seeing things in australia, in britain, in the highest state of alert that it's been in many, many years. all over europe, so yes, there's an anticipation that there will be an attempt to strike back. >> what do we know about this leader, the name that's come up now, why khorasan is so important because of how terror experts have been following this name wherever he goes, goes the urgency. tell us about him. muhsin al fadhli is in his 30s, he's thought to be one of only a handful of people who knew about the 9/11 plot before it was actually executed. that gives you a sense of how close he was to the al qaeda high command. he's a sort of trained, he's

very good survivor. he's managed to stay under the radar for a long time. he's been looking clearly for a place where he can operate freely and the lawless part of syria is the ideal spot for it because he's surrounded by confusion and they thrive on that that's a good place for him to recruit. because there are lots of westerners coming in and people from all over the world coming to syria to fight the jihad and he's there to say come with me and i'll show you a way to fight. >> he's a pied piper. tom, et cetera end on this. right now in the u.s., what's the threat, what's the best information you're hearing about what the dynamic abroad is bringing potentially home to roost here? >> the potential as mentioned, that people from the u.s. and other countries could go to syria. it's a safe haven, almost a failed state so that gives them the great opportunity to train and learn the craft of being a terrorist. but, you know, it's more easy for them to come to the u.s. or back to the west undetected.

and the reason i say that is because you have a person from the u.s. can fly to france or germany or one of the european countries make their way without ever having to show a passport again, all the way over to the eastern part of europe. and go by water or land to turkey. into syria, train, go back to europe and fly back here. there will be nothing in their travel documents to show they ever went to syria. it's much harder to track who is going in and out of syria, than it is to track people going in and out of yemen or pakistan or afghanistan. >> so the availability of people who could do bad things has increased in risk. the question is what exactly would they be wanting to do here? that's what we have to find out. tom fuentes, bobby ghosh, thank you for helping us understand the situation. because as we learn how effective the strikes were against the khorasan group in syria, that will impact what the threat is as home as well. the man who is in control of

this situation, ostensibly is president obama. and he is trying to extend the coalition. warning arab nations that air strikes on extremist groups in syria and iraq could go on for years, they should be part of the situation, we're going to break down what he says the mission is and the possible repercussions, joined on "new day," by secretary of state john kerry, the man at the center of this for an exclusive interview and we'll speak with pentagon spokesman, rear admiral john kishy. he'll tell us how effective the attacks were and josh earnest and former secretary of state madeline albright, we have all the good guys talking about what should happen them, former nato high commander general wesley clark. plus, exactly what did we target.

why as it so quiet overnight? what does that mean? we'll get answers right after the break.

little later today, president obama will be making his case at the united nations general assembly for a broader coalition to fight isis and other islamic extremism. all of this as law enforcement agencies are beefing up security over concerns of retaliation. now as far as the strikes are concerned, they were against more than a dozen targets, they were carefully selected to try and cripple isis' communication and money. what exactly got hit? what were the targets? how effective were the strikes? with me now is cnn military analyst, retired lieutenant-colonel rick fwran kona. colonel francona, shall we look at the map? i guess my first question to you is it was very quiet overnight the second night. how do you read the quiet? >> either they there were less strikes or no strikes. i think that the pentagon is still assessing what they did on the first night. they put a lot of firepower in the first night, a lot of targets, it's one thing to hit the targets, but you have to go back and look at the pictures

and see, did we achieve the objective? did we destroy enough? did we do what we wanted to do? if not, then you have to put them on the restrike list and hit them again. >> walk with me as we assess. three waves of strikes, monday night into tuesday morning. this was more of the khorasan strike nye aleppo and then near raqqa, the isis stronghold. what was hit? >> well west of aleppo was the khorasan group and that was probably driving the timing here. they had all of these guys in one place at one time. they knew there was an imminent threat. were planning something. they said let's hit them now rather than wait. i think that was probably a good thing to do. those were the targets there. it really had nothing to do with isis, this is a separate issue. isis is concentrated in the raqqa area, that's their self-proclaimed capital. they want baghdad to be the capital of the caliphate eventually, but raqqa is is it for now. and they also hit areas along

the euphrates river into iraq. this is the resupply route for troops, supplies, weapons that go into iraq. they tried to interdict that. this center dot here is da dar assir, this is where the oil refineries are. and up here is to take pressure off of the kurds. >> training compounds, headquarters, command and control facilities, finance centers, supply trucks. all targets? >> that's mostly concentrated in the raqqa area. and that's what they need to get back and hit if they didn't get them the first time. >> looking ahead, first obviously you have this first phase before we even get into the potential second wave, which we don't quite know what that plan is. when you mentioned firepower specifically 48 u.s. and allied planes used, more than 160 bombs and nisles, all in night one, that's pretty active. >> that is. and normally, in these kind of campaigns, since we're dealing with an area where there are no

ground troops and these guys are pretty disbursed and they're not really a traditional target set, it's difficult to go back night after night or during the day. normally would you start a bombing campaign and keep it going 24 hours and try to keep up the cycle. but the targets are so elusive, they have to determine what they've hit and go back again. i think what we're going to see is probably watch this roll down into iraq and start to degrade them in iraq. giving the iraqi army and the peshmerga a chance to regroup and push these guys back. the goal of this isn't just to kill them here. the goal is to eliminate them everywhere. we've got to take the territory away from them. you cannot allow these guys to have territory. >> you said something a minute ago. i wanted to follow up on. you said no ground troops. >> none in syria. >> how does that work? we know that congress said yes to you know, training moderate free syrian army. but how does that work? you have this campaign from the

air, what about the ground? >> yeah, that's the problem. and this is the issue with syria, because the soonest we're going to see ground troops that we have trained and vetted and equipped, might be as long as 18 months, maybe as short as a year. many of the guys know how to fight, they need to be trained on the specific weapon set. but the numbers are not there. >> are you concerned about that? >> i'm concerned about the time and the numbers and i'm concerned that we're, we have now started a campaign here, that we really can't finish. because we need that other component. we can do it in iraq. but we can't do it yet in syria. unless somebody else is willing to put ground troops in there. >> we know christiane amanpour will be sitting down and interviewing the u.s. secretary of state john kerry at the top of the 8:00 hour, eastern time. you have to imagine the questions she'll be asking perhaps that will be included. what will you from a military standpoint. what will you be listening for in that conversation? >> i want to hear where we're going from this. we understand the goal of the first night was to stop the khorasan planning and to start

the degrading of isis. in syria. but you know, this is one big target set and we have to figure out what, what we're going to be doing in iraq. if it follows the plan as i see it, they probably want to start with the iraqi piece and roll these guys out. right now we've not taken any territory back from isis. we've only stopped them from taking more. >> okay. so the question, looking ahead, what are the additional future waves of this campaign. what does that look like? colonel francona, i appreciate it as always, your expertise. and there are a lot of questions about the overall strategy, what exactly success looks like against isis. so we have two former nato command who are will be joining us live coming up. general wesley clark and admiral james staboretis and a stunning report from u.s. health officials who say 1.4 million people in africa could be become infected with the deadly ebola virus, 1.4 million in the next

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welcome back to "new day." the number of ebola cases in liberia and sierra leone could go as high as 1.4 million by january, if no one intervenes and the more it spreads over

there, remember, the better the chance it comes here. senior medical correspondent elizabeth cohen is in liberia where the number of cases has spiked in the last week. in the last few weeks. so how bad are the new scenarios? >> these -- you don't have to go to the new scenarios for bad, chris, it's bad right now. let's talk about right now and talk about the scenarios, we just heard a new report there have been almost 6,000 cases of ebola with almost 3,000 deaths and the scenarios, let me talk about them for a second. these are scenarios where if the world does not do anything more, than what they are doing right now, and if people's behaviors don't change on the ground if west africans' behaviors don't change, we could have 20,000 cases by november and by january, between half a million and 1.4 million. and the death rate has been about 71%. but again, these are scenarios, if the world doesn't do more and

if west africans don't change their behaviors. hopefully neither one of those things will come to pass. chris, brooke? >> we get what it would take for it to get better and there's going to be that question about what does the rest of the world do. but let me ask you something, you are there, in liberia, i know you want to go, i know you're very passionate about this and spreading the word. what is it like to be on the ground there when you know there is this deadly virus everywhere? >> for me, personally, i, you know i'm obviously careful. and i don't get you know, near ebola patients. this is not spread through the air. so if you're standing at a distance, that's not considered a risky act at this time. but you know, it's definitely a different place than i imagine it was before. when you meet people, you don't shake hands, you keep your distance, some people sort of do this kind of elbow-bump thing, that way you're not touching people's hands, but you can tell that people are aware.

you never kind of get away from the virus, it's always here. >> well, look, it's interesting detail from our perspective, it's also important for you to show, that can be the reality, if ebola is on the ground where people are living. so be safe, thank you for the reporting and we'll be back with you, elizabeth. lot of news this morning, let's get to john berman, in for michaela. >> a life sentence for suleiman abu gaith, a osama bin laden's son-in-law. it makes him the highest-ranking al qaeda operative to be convicted and published in a u.s. civilian court. he was found guilty in march on three counts of conspireing to kill americans and providing material support for terrorists, there is no possibility of parole. the iraq war veteran who reached white house security and ran into the executive mansion was questioned twice by secret service agents recently. once after a traffic stop when troopers discovered an illegal shotgun and a map of washington. with the white house circled.

and of course inside the car of omar gonzales, that's his name. and again, outside the white house when he was stopped with a hatchet in his waistband. both times secret service agents determined that gonzales, the man with the hatchet in his waistband, was not a threat. three people are dead after a former employee opened fire inside a u.p.s. warehouse in birmingham, alabama, the gunman identified as 45-year-old joe tesney had been fired a day earlier. police say two higher-ranking workers at the facility were targeted and killed before the suspect took his own life. it's not clear why the married father of two had been fired. a clinton global initiative will wrap up today in new york city. they'll participate in panels on issues such as equality for girls and women and investing in babies' minds. this year marks ten years of the conference, established by the former president to discuss solutions to world problems. do not miss this, in new york today, the former president will

be interviewed by cnn's own erin burnett in a special town hall, you can see excerpts tonight and then at 9:00 p.m. the complete interview airs, president bill clinton, a cnn special town hall with erin burnett. that should be fascinating. also fascinating, the weather, which i think may be bleak here in the northeast, so let's get to meteorologist indra petersons for that. >> you said it, not me. we're talking about rain up the coast, on the west coast and the east coast. let's track what's going on on the eastern seaboard. plenty of available moisture because the low is on the ocean. so all the water making its way in. we're talking about rain concentrated around the carolinas, slowly making its way in to the mid-atlantic. by tomorrow, mid-atlantic and the northeast will be talking about the bull's eye for the showers filling in there. it's not going to be the only thing. we're talking about heavy rain, two to four inches as it takes its time. even as we get in through friday

before it finally clears out of here. so with that, we have a system moving in, so we have wind, building up. we're talking some good wind it could mean delays at some airports, 30, 40-mile-per-hour winds are going to be out there as the system climbs. the winds increasing the farther north throughout the day. and on the back side of this, keep in mind, it's a system so we're talking about cool air, as it makes its way closer, look at the temperatures dive down to the 60s to new york city, and same for boston. once it kicks out of here by the weekend you're going to see the cold air kick out and it looks nice just in time. so not a spoiler completely. >> it's been so nice. i'm not complaining. >> the glass is half full here. >> i'm little glass half full. >> three inches of rain, 40-mile-per-hour winds and the glass half full. >> she just moved to new york. it's nice now. >> bring a little bite in the morning. >> you get the cool air, you get the rain. >> can you explaining science to

snus. >> i don't care about science. i care about fishing and when the ocean cools off the fishing picks up. >> is that how that works? >> that's how it works. >> fishing forecast you can do. we are talking here in the main about fighting isis this morning. is the u.s. winning? qualified term? what do that mean? pentagon scrambling to figure out if the first wave hit its targets, what shape isis and khorasan is in now. a former nato commander joins us with answers next. >> and a plea from the wife of allen henning, the british hostage being held by isis. what message did the terror group send her?

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welcome back to "new day," a quieter night in syria following the launch of air strikes late monday. no strikes overnight confirmed by the pentagon, but still questions linger for the battle against isis, what lies ahead,

how effective will the strikes be? how will the coalition, how will the nations work together to split the burden? and then of course, looking forward, if the strikes don't slow isis, could the u.s. and troops send troops into combat? despite denials from the white house. let's ask retired u.s. naval general, david zabrides, who joins us from boston. admiral, good morning. >> good morning, brooke. >> let's begin bigger picture, we know that no new territory has been reseized by the u.s. or the coalition, it's been about intense strikes that first monday night. given that fact, how effective was the first wave of strikes and how effective will that be without a really strong group presence on the ground? two different questions, we'll know more about the effectiveness of the first three waves of strike. think in the next 24 hours. right now, the pentagon department of defense, the intel agencies are listening to

chatter on the cell phone circuits. looking closely at the internet. using satellite and overhead images. hopefully we'll get good news that some of the leaders of khorasan have been caught up in the tomahawk strikes. in terms of longer-term activity, i think we're going to need to get boots on the ground. if not u.s., certainly coalition to help make the strikes more precise and more timely. >> how do you convince the coalition members to provide boots on the ground. especially if the u.s. is not willing to do so? >> well, as the nato commander, i led the coalition in afghanistan and also the one in libya, and the word i would have for you is patience. you've got to work carefully with coalition partners, because each country has a different culture, has a different set of what are called caveats. things that they will not do. or will do. and each nation has a different political dynamic at work.

this is something our diplomats are going to have to work along with our military personnel to make sure we move the coalition to do collectively what we need to get done. >> hearing from the administration officials, we know that initial first wave, this is the beginning of a potentially very, very long fight, we don't know what the future looks like as far as targets and waves of an attack. what will you be looking for and listening for? you mentioned potentially taking out some of the leaders which would be a huge win for the u.s. and the coalition. what will success look like moving forward? >> i think the key is to put isis, the islamic state, under a three-front war, under real pressure from the north, by arming the peshmerga, who can come down from reactivating the iraqi army, pushing it to the north, coming up from the south and then the strikes in the west and syria. if we put three-front pressure

on the islamic state, we will see that they are not ten feet tall, very different situation than at the moment when they enjoy the interior position and can sortie to the north or to the west. the three-front attack will be key. >> how concerned would you be knowing that congress said yes to training these moderate syrian rebels, but they may not be ready to roll for potentially another 18 months, you have the air strikes, the lag time before they're ready to fight. dos that concern you? >> it does. and i think we need to continually reexamine the situation. we saw general marty dempsey talk recently about ultimately presenting more options as the situation changes. over time the possibility of putting at least special forces into syria to make the attacks very precise may be an attractive option. we'll see. we need to pes on our coalition partners, particularly the arab nations to be part of that

effort. perhaps the most significant thing about these strikes, brooke, is the fact that the arab nations participated. that's a very good sign. >> what about turkey? there were questions over turkey's involvement. basically you can stand on the border of turkey and see the black isis flag waving from syria. we know they're dealing with tens of hundreds of thousands of refugees in turkey. what role do you see erdogan and turkey play going forward? >> i think we've heard from president erdogan as recently as yesterday, saying that turkey will do its part. i take that at face value, they're very important bases, including one in eastern turkey that could be very important. and turkey is a nato member this is a nato border, and as a former nato supreme allied commander, the more we can involve nato in this activity, the better. i think turkey will be with this coalition over time, brooke.

>> looping back to your point about leaders being killed. there are reports that the leader of the al nusra front says it's leader was killed in the air strikes. if so, what kind of blow would that be to the group? >> it would be significant, but not lethal. not existential, as we've seen, the groups have the capability to move people up from within. but let's hope that the leadership has been killed, it's a start as we say in that part of the world, inshallah. let's hope at least. >> we appreciate your expertise and your time. thank you, sir, very much. and president obama has a tough road ahead of him while he tries to gather support for the fight against isis in his u.n. general assembly speech. stay tuned to cnn we'll take it live. we'll talk next with former u.n. ambassador and secretary of state madeline albright about

what the president faces in the fight and the current secretary of state john kerry joins us live and we have pentagon spokesman rear admiral john kirby and former nato commander wesley clark coming up on "new day." the sleekest... ...sexiest, ...baddest, ...safest, ...tightest, ...quickest, ...harshest... ...or nothing. at mercedes-benz, we do things one way or we don't do them at all. introducing the all-new c-class. the best or nothing. what does an apron have to do with car insurance? every time you tie on an apron, you make progress.

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strikes in syria are news all over the world. it matters most on the streets

of the middle east. five arab nations are participating in the attack. so what is the reaction in that part of the world? cnn has reporters in several of the hot zones, let's begin with max fost anywhere abu dhabi. max? >> chris, leaders of the arab countries that have joined the u.s. coalition against ice nis syria have been uncharacteristically open about their involvement. the uae's minister of foreign affairs is has spoken out on the militant threat saying nobody is immune and that regional leaders can't afford to be passive. so an editorial in the national newspaper in abu dhabi set out the reinforce behind what's become a battle of true definition of sunni islam. it reads the perversion of ideology and religion that isil represents pose as real danger to the region. it's not an ideology that can be easily defeated. for all the pain and suffering

air strikes will bring, it's not the end and obviously as well as the gulf nations, injureden has also been involved in the assault. a senior government spokesman telling cnn that the country needs to safeguard its borders and will preempt any effort by isis to cross it. all of this sure to play out at the unga there in new york, chris. >> it's a point well made, not just a military war, it's a war for the soul of islam. and the people are paying the price. civil war has been. thank you very much, max foster. civil war has been ongoing for years in syria and now there's a a huge humanitarian crisis. tens of thousands of syrians fleeing the violence of the war in syria, now the war with isis. let's get to phil black, live at the turkey/syrian border. what's the situation? >> chris i'm surrounded by those i guess you could describe as the lucky ones, the ones who have lost everything to isis, but have not lost their lives. they made it into turkey from

crossing syria they have security, but they have suffered enormously. they've seen people die. in fear they grabbed what they could, they grabbed their children, they trekked northern syria to the border with turkey and there over the weekend there was a massive influx of refugees, some 140,000 people crossed the border. turkish authorities couldn't keep them back. now the turks are regulating things, letting them through very slowly. some of the people you're seeing here still holding on to their few precious belongings. these are people that have spent some days, waiting across the border before finally being let in today where they're undergoing medical checks, searched, registered as refugees, from here they will be taken to camps or to be settled with other family member who is are already here. they have suffered, there is no doubt. they do not know when they can get home when you talk to them, they say they don't care who runs syria. they just want to go home and

live peacefully. chris. >> also important to be here, key points about its involvement. the humanitarian aspect they're dealing with. another human aspect, the hostages, isis is holding many. there's still innocents in the balance here. brand new audio of one of them, british aid worker, alan henning. henning's wife, barbara, receiving a deeply disturbing audio recording of henning pleading for his wife. erin mcgloughlin joins us from london with the latest. >> the wife of 47-year-old british aid worker, alan henning, releasing an emotional statement via britain's foreign office that reads in part, i and people representing me continue to reach out to those holding alan, islamic state continue to ignore our pleas to open dialogue. i have been told that he has been to a sharia court and found innocent of being a spy and

declared to be no threat. i implore the islamic state to abide by the decisions of their own justice system. please release alan. now henning was a taxi driver from manchester known as a cabbie with a heart of gold. his wife pleading today for his release. as for his captors, one of them known as jihadi john by the british ples here, he's appeared masked in the grisly isis videos, british authorities say they're close to confirming his identity. british prime minister david cameron vowing to bring him to justice, whether it be in syria or here in the united kingdom. >> they have their own home-grown terror issue in the uk. there were big question marks surrounding their role in the first wave of air strikes, what do you hear about what the uk will contribute to the coalition? >> that's right.

there's speculation here this morning, in the united kingdom, that british prime minister david cameron could recall parliament on the question of british involvement in air strikes as early as friday. he's expected to make a speech at the u.n. general assembly later today on isis as well as the situation in iraq. perhaps we'll hear more then. but members of the opposition party saying that they would be open to concrete proposals to that effect. chris? >> we'll be waiting on that. thank you for the reporting, president obama the big headliner at the u.n. general assembly. there's a lot of news to be following. let's get to it. on alert -- a warning of pay-back in the u.s. following the first astrikes in syria. >> they were very close to the end game in their planning. >> homeland security urging vigilance nationwide asking law enforcement to be on the lookout for lone wolf extremists. the toll of the strikes on

the ground -- becoming clearer this morning. >> this morning, president obama takes his message to a global audience. >> we'll do what's necessary to defend our country. >> set to push for a stronger coalition at the united nations. what's his message, how can he rally support? and can the u.s. lead the charge overseas and protect its turf at home. john kerry, madeleine albright, john earnest and wesley clark join us live. >> we're just hours away from president obama's speech to the united nations. it's going to be a big pitch. he wants to tell the world to stand and fight with the u.s. against islamic extremists. it comes a day after the first air strikes were launched against isis in syria. concerns are building about possible lone wolf attacks. as retaliation in the united states. we'll be joined by former

secretary of state madeleine albright to get her perspective on the situation. but first, cnn's michelle kosinski live at the white house. we have to be big on message. what are you hearing? >> here's president obama before the u.n. on the world stage to say, yes, the u.s. is at war against isis. although riits highly unlikely he'll use the word "war." he'll say we've taken the fight against isis into syria. here's why the threat remains so dangerous. here's how it still affects you and here's why you should join us. now, members of his national security team have given us a few dae tails this morning, more about his speem spooech and they painted it as a broad vision of american leadership in a changing world as they put it. basically laying out how america has led the world on issues like ukraine, ebola, climate change, and now isis. it's not as if we're going to

see a u.n. resolution authorizing the use of force in syria it's already begun, anyway and it could face a veto. what president obama will look for is a resolution from the u.n. security council to have nations band together and try to stop the flow of foreign fighters to and from the region. as well as stop isis' flow of funding. >> this is bound to be a different u.n. general assembly. the president needs action to come out of this for the war on isis, michelle, thank you very much. brooke? >> as we await the president's speech today, calling on the world to unite against islamic extremists, pentagon officials are trying to determine how effective the strikes were against both the al qaeda group khorasan as well as against isis. so to the pentagon we go to correspondent barbara starr. barbara, what are we learning this morning? >> good morning, brooke. well a day later with first light, the first pictures beginning to emerge now of some of the damage from the u.s. air

strikes. we're seeing isis vow revenge. but the pentagon is trying to assess the damage. figure out exactly what they did accomplish in their view with this first round of strikes and where they go from here. as far as khorasan goes, the al qaeda-related group. they believe they were highly effective against them. and if the damage they caused pans out to be accurate, they say they do believe they have disrupted khorasan's ability to carry out that attack against the united states. as far as isis goes, still continuing to assess, they tell us the effect of those strikes, precision weapons used to destroy very specific isis targets, they're looking at all of that. now the question that may be emerging very quickly is where are the second round of targets? where's the pressure being kept up on isis? we've seen the initial bombing, we've seen key communications arrays, key command centers being destroyed. but there's a lot of concern

that isis leaders, isis militants have already fled, may be on the run, may be trying to blend in with civilian populations. it could make the next round of strikes very tough. brooke? >> we will ask that question, we will press that question of rear admiral john kirby when we talk to him later this morning. thank you very much. now chris, to you. thank you very much. there's a lot to know and even more to figure out in terms of what does it really mean. and we have a great opportunity for you this morning. we have madeline albright, former secretary of state, the first female secretary of state. former u.s. ambassador to the united nations. now the chair of the national democratic institute and professor of diplomacy at georgetown university. it is great to have you here on "new day." >> great to be with you, chris. >> we need you as much as ever right now. let's just start at the beginning. this move of military action involved in the united states against isis, in syria and iraq, is it the right move?

>> absolutely. because i think we know that isis is a threat, to the region and ultimately to us and the new group, according to what i've read, is a threat to the united states. and what is clear to me, chris, is american leadership is essential. and president obama has made that very clear. he actually as it turns out is in a perfect place this week in order to be able to muster support from friends and allies and to show that we are leaders, but we have to do it in conjunction with others, especially when it's in our area. >> what the president must get done as a solution, but first the problem. did the u.s. create this problem? through its actions and inactions in the region over the last few administrations? >> i think that the middle east is a very complicated place. in every way. in terms of created the way it was after world war i in dealing

with artificial boundaries and things that americans have never known about. we knew very little about islam but we certainly didn't know about divisions between shia and sunni and persians and arabs and a lot of complications. i personally do think that what happened during the iraq war is one of the causing aspects of this. >> specifically what? >> well i think in so many ways it militarized the situation and i happen to believe that we made a mistake in going into issue the way we did we certainly had to -- iraq the way we did. we certainly had to deal with saddam hussein, and that was the gulf war in the early '90s, but it doesn't prove anything to blame what happened in the past. we're dealing with a very, very serious situation at the moment. >> the specific criticism would be but for your decision to pull troops out of iraq or not force al maliki to keep them there, which many believe you could have. but for not arming the syrian rebels sooner, had you done that, you wouldn't be where we are today. fair criticism?

>> we always deal with unintended consequences of decisions or not making them. i do wish we had armed the syrians earlier. but the problem always was, who were they, how to figure out which ones to really arm. >> still a problem now, isn't it? >> we're vetting people and the president has asked for trying to figure out to train them, because we need help. and i think the part that's so important, chris, is that the u.s. has to lead. but in partnership with others. and that is what the president is doing, what secretary kerry is doing, is getting a coalition together and it's already working. because those that were with us on the strikes are were from the region. and so i think it's really important. >> you are a diplomat first, there's no question about that. but the reality on the ground, should the u.s. be so steadfast in its opposition to boots on the ground? to putting troops there to fight in a fight that is certainly going to be decided on the ground? >> well i think that there's always what the definition of boots on the ground really is. a lot of military people don't

like the term at all. there are trainers there. and what we do think is that our addition to this is what we can do in the air. we have a great deal of power in the air. and as i said earlier, it's the local various groups that can provide some of the activity on the ground with our training. but i do think it's important to make clear what america's stake is in this. and even more important to make clear what the stake is of the countries that are in the region. they are involved in a massive discussion and fight and debate in every way about the future of islam, how the countries relate to each other and the hardest part here is everybody wants immediate results. this is going to be a very long story. and it's going to require the president and officials and people like us to try to explain what this is all about. >> the president has a major moment in front of him today when he gives this speech as you well know. the u.n. often is a situation for the right things to be said

what is actually done is secondary. not this time because isn't the risk that if he does not get a broad coalition coming out of this situation, that does tangible things, this is the u.s.'s war, this is obama's war? >> well i think he does have a very important moment. there's a lot of things going on at the united nations. some of it that we also have to deal with climate change and then the president is going to chair a meeting of the security council, it's really an advantage that the united states is president of the security council this month and there are an awful lot of bilateral meetings going on and the president is persuasive as is secretary kerry and ambassador power. i do think what is the message is america is involved, but america is not alone. we need others to make sure that in fact, the very complicated situation in the middle east is not just america's problem, it is an international problem and the president is going to make that clear. >> it is perceived right now, in

most places in the world, that that's not the case, right? that this is the u.s. pushing the region to get involved, instead of the region asking the u.s. to help them in their fight for the soul of islam. and how do you change that when you have egypt playing very carefully? when you have turkey playing very carefully? when you have the saudis in a very complicated position? don't you need those big names to move equal to or ahead of the u.s. to make this a true regional war? >> well certainly moving with us, but that has happened. i find very interesting the saudis, the qataris, the jordanians, the uae have been involved in the strikes. and that is due to the work of president obama and secretary kerry. >> not committing troops, madam secretary. >> well i mean, let's see. i think one of the discussions is, who will in fact be on the ground. and it's going to take a while and i think that what the president is doing is having a lot of meetings up here. there's an awful lot going on. i don't think we should make a judgment at this point. what i find interesting is very

clear that the united states is in a leadership position, president clinton and i used to talk about the indispensable nation. we are, we are indispensable. but there is nothing in the definition of indispensable that says alone. it means we need to be engaged. the main thing, chris, we need to explain to the american people why this is important. what is in our national interests. and the president yesterday, president obama gave an incredible speech at the clinton global initiative, talking about america's responsibilities in civil society and individuals and human rights. and values that are not just americans, but that we are the leaders in terms of working, helping the world work through what is one of the most complicated periods that any of us have seen. >> we're being reminded here in the u.s. as to what the stake is with the khorasan group and what they're now calling a heightened state of alert here in the u.s. because of what they now perceive as an imminent threat, it came as news to many. so what's on the table is fairly

clear. what will be done will be the big question moving forward. today a big piece of the answer will come in the speech before the jebgeneral assembassembly. >> madam secretary, madeline albright thank you soef for joining us. >> a radical islamist cleric is said to be freed in jordan. a court acquitted abu jkatada ws freed. in jordan in the late 1990s, he was deported from britain last year. overnight, tensions flaring in ferguson, missouri, moments after an emotional city council meeting. a group of protesters smashed windows, emptied a local beauty shop. witnesses say there were sounds of gunshots in the area. protesters were chanting for the arrest of darren wilson. the ferguson officer who shot and killed michael brown. just released video shows

suspected cop killer, eric frein taking part in a vietnam war reenactment four years ago. according to the film maker, frein did not get along with others because he thought he had superior knowledge of military history. the manhunt for frein is in its 12th day. police believe he's hiding in the woods, perhaps not far from where he allegedly ambushed and killed a state trooper. can hair a cry for help from a woman who got pinned down between her submerged vehicle and the canal wall there. the entire ordeal was captured by a news crew in el paso who got into the waist deep water to help save the woman. after 15 minutes they were finally able to get her out. amazing video to see. >> amazing she went on her merry way after. >> nice to see they got in there to help the woman out. we weren't just watching. >> no, we weren't, all right,

berman thank you very much. coming up, america on high alert. word of possible revenge attacks by home-grown so-called lone wolf terrorists. it has law enforcement coast to coast on edge. and also, secretary of state john kerry has his work cut out for him. trying to get allies on board for a long fight against isis. his live interview with our own christiane amanpour coming up. and insight from pentagon spokes sectionman john kishy. white house spokesman, josh earnest and nato commander, general wesley clark.

welcome back to "new day," the pentagon says air strikes will be ramping up in syria. but here in the united states there is growing concern about homegrown terrorists. seeking revenge for the strikes overseas. now law enforcement officials nationwide are beefing up security. our justice correspondent, pamela brown, is here with more, good morning, pamela. >> good morning, john. across the country law enforcement is on heightened alert. homeland security and the fbi sent out a bulletin warning that the air strikes in syria may embolden home-grown extremist who is sympathize with al qaeda or syria to strike. the bulletin is asking law enforcement agencyings to be vigilant. asking them to scrutinize social media and be on the lookout for changes in behavior or appearance of extremists they

may be tracking. for example if they suddenly drop off the radar. suddenly shut off their social media account. it's important to note here the wake of the bulletin, federal officials tell me, they have no knowledge of any direct threats in the u.s. this is just as a precaution. and this as we learn more about the alleged plotting by the al qaeda group, khorasan, that pushed u.s. military to strike them monday night. a u.s. intelligence source says the group had acquired materials and was in an advanced stage of carrying out an attack on the u.s. but no specific targets are known. that's key point there. >> let's talk more about this. we'll bring in juliette khayyam, a senior u.s. security analyst. you've been on the inside of homeland security in situations like this. based on what you know, is this warning to law enforcement around the country to be on alert, is this just standard operating procedure? >> yes, it absolutely is. so in this instance, homeland security is sort of a consumer

of the intelligence that's coming from the c.i.a., foreign intelligence agencies, they're assessing it and then sending out what's called bulletins to local and state police departments, to tell them one, the most important thing, there is no specific threat. but any logical reading of what's happening in the world will tell you that it's likely to inflame passions and there are lone wolves out there who may have no ties to any terrorist group except in their own head, who might attack. this is pro forma, but part of what the department does, which is essentially communicate to the homeland, and all these different police departments who have no access to the intelligence that the federal government does. >> it may be common sense, but still important to do. pamela, do we have any information yet about how effective the attacks on this khorasan group in syria might have been? were they able, these air strikes, to ruth whatever planning might be going on there? >> well, officials are saying

that they were successful with the strikes in disrupting active plotting by al qaeda and isis, john. they targeted a training camp as well as command and control facilities linked to this group. officials are still assessing the success of the strike. and of course the key here is whether they were able to take out the leaders in the khorasan group. one of the leaders, muhsin al fadhli was in osama bin laden's inner circle, connected to the 9/11 terror attacks. so he's someone they would want to take out and others in that group. that is key, if they weren't able to take out those leaders, there's potential for them to carry out what they were plotting. >> juliette, it's interesting, what we saw over the last 24 hours puts an exclamation point on a lot of things going on for the last month-plus or so. the warnings at the airports and what-not overseas, apparently khorasan connected to that. a possible bombing plot. it's a window, on what security

and intelligence officials have been worried about for some time. >> that's exactly right. looking back now at the last two months, sort of hints of what was happening in britain or australia now start to make sense. and from the perspective of why did we go in now, i mean first of all, here's a terrorist organization whose sole intent is the u.s. it's just, they have no interest in any other political mission. second, they clearly had the means or at least the technology to plan an attack against a western airplane or a u.s. airline. and the most important thing, we were going to bomb in the area to attack isis. when we talk about how imminent was a terrorist attack. part of it is what are the atmospherics that the terrorists are working under. it makes sense, looking at it now, why we would attack both isis and the al qaeda remnants in the area sult imultaneously.

>> i wonder if you could tell us just what imminent means in this case. because they say they were in the final planning stages. >> they say they were in the final planning stages, but they didn't have a specific place, a marked target picked out. >> are we talking days, weeks, juliette? i think part of imanyonecy is are we about to lose track of this organization? so i'm, i cannot prove it. but i would suspect that we have human assets nearby that are listening in or have access to the terrorist organizations, because the intelligence seems too good. part of imminency is how much information can we get from the terrorist organization at any given moment? so even though there wasn't a specific place or time, our capacity to disrupt it was essentially imminent at that moment, when we decided to attack isis. it makes sense that you do both simultaneously.

because otherwise you're going to probably lose access to intelligence and not be able to disrupt the terrorist attack. >> we have the attacks against isis, the attacks against khorasan and be on the alert for possible lone wolves. which seems to be almost a third thing here. i don't think security officials are saying these are lone wolves that were trained or somehow in cahoots with khorasan. these are just potential bad actors who might be inspired by this organization. >> that's right. this has long been a concern by intelligence officials that there will be these home-grown violent extremists, these could be people with no concrete ties to any terrorist organization. this could just be someone who sympathizes with al qaeda with, isis. we know that there are about hundreds of individuals being tracked by u.s. official who is have the potential to be homegrown violent extremists. the concern here, john, there's a heightened concern that perhaps the individuals might expedite any plans they may have had to launch an attack here at

the homeland. >> just a disturbed guy with an internet connection. >> exactly right. were there any new air strikes overnight? we have no confirmation from the pentagon just yet. but the military's chief spokesman joins us next with answers. sfx: opening chimes sfx: ambient park noise, crane engine, music begins. we asked people a question, how much money do you have in your pocket right now? i have $40, $53, $21, do you think the money in your pocket could make an impact on something as big as your retirement? not a chance. i don't think so. it's hard to imagine how something so small can help with something so big. but if you start putting that towards your retirement every week and let it grow over time, for twenty to thirty years, that retirement challenge

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welcome back to "new day," a sobering and startling scenario about the spread of ebola from the centers for disease control. a new report says the number of cases in liberia and sierra leone could spike to between 550,000 and 1.4 million by

january. if there is no further help from the international community. and no change of behavior among locals. we're going to have a live report from liberia coming up this hour. those numbers are startling. a woman was arrested at new york's jfk international airport for allegedly trying to smuggle two handguns, 350 rounds of ammunition and 33 pounds of maure marijuana through security. the woman was carrying a canadian passport. and trying to fly to barbados. the new york police department is launching an investigation after video surfaced online appearing to show officers using excessive force against two women. one of whom is pregnant. the incident happened over the weekend in brooklyn. police officers wrestled one woman to the ground and moments later the woman is shoved to the ground. no word on the circumstances leading up to that scuffle. so chelsea clinton is going to have a baby any day now. but the gender of that baby

still very much a mystery. the world wants to know. so yesterday at the clinton global initiative, chelsea opened up to withering questioning from cnn's fareed zakaria about her choice to keep the baby's gender under wraps. >> there's so few mysteries in life, fareed, in which any answers is a happy one. and so my husband and i decided that we would enjoy this mystery for the nine-plus months that we were granted and we are eager to find out what god will have given us. >> but isn't it strange that the doctors around you know, but you don't know? >> no. i think the doctors around me know lots of things that i don't know. >> good answer. president obama jokingly offered up his motorcade for chelsea's trip to the hospital when she goes into labor. >> president bill clinton will be interviewed by cnn's erin burnett at a special town hall, you can see excerpts tonight and at 9:00 p.m. the complete

interview airs. a special town hall with erin burnett. this is cnn breaking news. you see it there, we do have breaking news, the u.s. confirming five air strikes carried out overnight. one in syria, four in iraq, all targeting isis vehicles and weapons, let's get some detail from barbara star from the pentagon, what do we know? >> good morning again, chris. let's talk about the air strike in syria. a coalition aircraft and a u.s. aircraft, so two aircraft going after the same target. weaver told it was an isis staging area, near the iraq border but inside syria. an area isis was using to stage vehicles and personnel to move them across the border into iraq to spread the fight. the u.s. aircraft struck the target overnight, the damage assessment still going on, even as u.s. war planes continue to

strike isis targets across the border in iraq. we've seen another target in syria now. interesting the last couple of targets we've seen in syria is what the military generally refers to as pop-up targets. they see a target of opportunity, they see vehicles, they see personnel on the ground. and they go after it. they're not right now by all accounts doing what they did in the first round, going after those strategic fixed buildings, command centers, headquarters, areas where isis commanders may be. we'll have to see if they get back to that. >> chris? >> i guess they're going to have many points of objective there, right, some are built-in infrastructure like the oil refinery where they want to take money from isis and the others are the pop-up targets. are you getting any sense, we know they don't want to tell you what they do next, but how varied is the attack in terms of different things they're trying? >> i think you've hit the point. any military campaign this will be no different. they will go after a broad range

of targets. they're going to go after the pop-up targets to keep isis from moving additional fighters and additional equipment across the border into iraq. and they also go after the pop-up targets to keep isis from trying to take more territory in syria. those are the sorts of things that are the near-term targets that you see day to day. but there are almost, many people will tell you still going to have to work and go back against these more strategic targets. the headquarters, the buildings, where the leadership may be. because that's what's going to put isis back on its heels over the long-term. i think a lot of military people, a lot of analysts are are going to be watching over the next couple of days to see where the deeper target list is. they've hit 20 targets in the first round, presumably they're not done with that just yet. >> what looms larger is what we haven't heard. we know that this isn't about taking out a number of humans.

but we are going to hear about who was killed and that will come out and the military will have to respond to that propaganda that comes out in that information. and who will be doing the fighting. that's still unclear. as well as the mission being somewhat unclear at this point. so barbara, thank you for staying on it. we need the reporting and we'll come back to you when you have it. brooke? >> let's talk more about this with pentagon press secretary, rear admiral john kirby. good morning. what we were hearing from barbara starr, the latest reporting, by no means have things been quiet in this part of the world. we know two strikes in syria, counted as one, since it was a single target hit and in iraq. two air strikes west of baghdad, two air strikes southwest of erbil. walk me through the assessment, why the target's effectiveness? >> the ongoing campaign against isil. an offensive campaign. we've been clear, we're going to put the pressure on them and we're not going to be constrained by the border

between iraq and syria as we do this. the targets we hit, some were defensive in nature. in and around erbil, we've been doing it for quite some time. the strikes around baghdad, more offensive in nature and as barbara reported, two strikes on a single target, a staging area inside syria. inside the iraq/syria border overnight. again all aimed in every regard, whether you call it offense or defense, to continue to put pressure on isil, wherever they are. >> just to be clear, as we were reporting after the initial waves of targets monday night, tuesday morning, you have khorasan, right closer to aleppo and then you had near raqqa the other targets against isis. so let's focus first on khorasan. were any of these strikes in syria targeted toward khorasan targets? >> no, they were not. the targets in syria hit overnight, it's two strikes, one target, is a staging area near the iraq/syria border that we know isil uses to move personnel

and equipment back and forth across the border. >> what about leaders? do we know if any leaders from the first wave with the khorasan targets or the isis targets, or now we're hearing reports of an al nusra leader being killed. what can you confirm? >> i want to stress what general mayville stressed yesterday, the focus of the strikes in syria over the last 24-36 hours has been about getting isil's capabilities to sustain and train and regroup themselves. yes, we did hit some khorasan group facilities. but it wasn't designed necessarily specifically to go after a high-value target. we're still assessing the damage assessments from all the strikes. we don't have anything, any confirmed reports that we hit any major leaders. >> how long will this kind of campaign continue? this offensive in both iraq and syria? >> i think we need to steal ourselves, certainly here in the military we're stealing

ourselves for a long conflict. i couldn't give you a certain date on the calendar, when it will be over. but the guidance we've been given, the orders that we've been given are crystal clear, we're going to degrade, destroy, defeat isil. that could take years and we're preparing ourselves for that length of time and that effort. >> the president is speaking at the u.n. general assembly today, saying america's not alone. we know about the sunni governments, which is key in sending a message in this part of the world. what about turkey? since one of the targets was near turkey, what kind of role are the turks playing here? >> the turks are going to have to decide that for themselves and they're going to have to communicate that to the turkish people and the international community at a time of their choosing and however they want to characterize it. by dint of their geography, where they are on the map, they're going to be a partner in this. they're going to be a participant. there's no question about that. they are already so severely impacted by what's going on in syria, just in terms of refugees across their border.

over a million of them that they're trying to care for. they're already involved. they have knowledge of the region, they have knowledge of some of the groups. we're going to rely on their expertise and their experience. but how specifically and tangibly they participate, that's really up to them. >> what about admiral kirby. what about ground troops? we know that there were 500 iraqi soldiers who were slaughtered over the weekend. so just looking ahead, as you have this air campaign coalition air strike campaign, how are you protecting the good guys on the ground. >> we're protecting them, mostly through air power. i'll tell thaw some of the gains that the iraqi and kurdish forces have been able to make inside iraq has been enabled by the air power we provided overhead. that said, the iraqi government has an air force, too, and they've been lending air power to support their troops. we need to remember this is a sovereign state. they have an army. they have an air force and

they're using it. we're in support, but they're supporting their own troops as well. when we talk about ground forces, just to remind you, the commander-in-chief couldn't have been more clear -- there's not going to be a combat role on the ground for the u.s. troops. butt the ground troops that are most important. the ones we need to all think about more and rely on more, are the indigenous forces in iraq, it's iraqi security forces and peshmerga and in syria, it's going to be this moderate opposition we hope to begin training and equipping in the near months. >> let me take you back to a comment you made. you said we hit what we were aiming at, referring to the first wave. what were we aiming at? >> we were aiming at infrastructure and capabilities that we know isil, specifically, tries to capitalize on. this is not just a normal terrorist group this is a group that wants to govern, they want to control streams of revenue, and raise and recruit and train forces that are loyal to them. so if, because of that, they

make themselves vulnerable in some of the places that they operate. and some of the things that they try to own. we hit a finance center, we hit training camps, we hit supply depots. this morning as barbara reported, we hit a staging area near the border that they were using to move personnel and equipment and material across. we hit those kinds of targets. when i said we hit what we were aiming at, i meant it. we have done overnight, battle damage assessment. some of our folks in the operations center here at the pentagon. everything that we said yesterday is bearing out today. we believe that the battle damage assessment that we conducted shows that the strikes were extremely successful in terms of hitting what we were aiming at and causing the damage that we wanted to cause. you probably saw the photos yesterday, we were hitting portions of a building or just the communications gear on top of the building. not to destroy the whole building. not only did we hit what we were

aiming at, but we caused the kind of damage that we wanted to cause. >> it's encouraging to hear that moving forward and listening to barbara starr's reporting, that because of the fears of air attacks, that isis are fleeing, blending in with civilians in society. how do you take that challenge in terms of attacking and dismantling from here on out. >> it's not unexpected that they would do that. we've seen them change the way they communicate and operate inside iraq because of the pressure that we and our iraqi partners have been applying to them. we expect to see it in syria. we talk about them being adaptive and smart, we're pretty smart ourselves, we're pretty adaptive ourselves, i think we'll be able to handle it. >> rear admiral, john kirby, thank you so much for the latest news, the latest round of strikes in iraq and syria. the stakes are high for president obama this morning. he's here in new york, he'll be speaking at the u.n. general assembly in a couple of hours. as we now have confirmation, the united states launched the

second round of strikes, general wesley clark will join us next here on "new day." and put your bag right here." "have a nice flight." ♪ music plays ♪ music plays traveling can feel like one big mystery. you're never quite sure what is coming your way. but when you've got an entire company who knows that the fewest cancellations and the most on-time flights are nothing if we can't get your things there, too. it's no wonder more people choose

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we do have breaking news, more air strikes in syria and now in iraq as well. five in all, one target inside syria. the pentagon just moments ago here on "new day" calling the streaks quote extremely successful. general wesley clark, former nato supreme allied commander joins us. the author of "don't wait for next war: a strategy for american growth and global leadership" couldn't have timed the book better, general, because as we all know, no matter how effective the military strikes are, that we're going to discuss it will take more than that to change the tide of what is going on in that part of the world. just to bring people up to date. here i am, right, aleppo this was khorasan, this was the u.s. only going after the offshoot group. the planners that led us to an understanding of the imminent threat in the u.s. these are the main strikes against isis, raqqa, a punch in

the nose. helping the kurds up north and their fight, the peshmerga against isis. oil refinery to cut off the water and now general getting into what matters today. on the border of iraq and syria to help the fighters there, new ones to help the fighters. what is going on? what's the point of the strikes? what's the situation on the ground? >> about two-thirds of isis is in syria and about one-third we believe is in iraq. the total number of fighters is maybe 30,000, some people say 40,000, some press reports say as many as 15,000 of those are saudis. how do you bring airplanes in, five miles up in the sky and deliver these strikes against people running around on the ground. intermixed with civilians and close to friendly forces? you've got to have exquisite intelligence, eyes on target to bring it in close to the troops. or you've got some means of

collecting battle damage and reattacking. this is all part of the process. these strikes in iraq are designed to help the defenders blunt the isis strikes. and hopefully they'll demoralize isis and label the defenders to regain terrain. inside syria, we're still attacking the base areas. we're looking at it, we're assessing the strikes and we're going to look for more targets and go back and get those. the problem with an air campaign like this, we ran one of these in kosovo 15 years ago, we have a lot better technology and we're a lot more experienced. the problem is always find the enemy. what can be seen can be hit, what can be hit, what can be hit can be destroyed. but can you find it and see it. that's the key here, we're going to use everything we've got at our electronic intelligence overhead imagery, i'm sure there are unmanned vehicles and now we're looking at how the enemy reacts to the strikes yesterday.

it's going to be a long-term campaign. >> it's hard. because the urgency of the media wants to push it now. this is war, what's happening now. and everybody keeps being on message that this is, this is just the beginning, because common sense tells you why only five strikes. when there were all of these strikes, what happens? is it too hard or pace matters, timing matters. >> pace matters, timing matters and it's a matter of collecting the targets and you're in a struggle against an enemy. it's in a wrestling match. high tech and we've got big advantages, and they have advantages, they can hide among the civilian population. >> we know the playbook. that's what they'll do. >> we know some of the playbook. but they're just as intelligent and adaptive as they can be they want to escape and they know what we can do. they've seen it. when we rolled it out in kosovo the first time. nobody had quite seen it.

we did it in afghanistan and iraq. they worked against us in iraq all the time we were there. so it's more familiar to them. they know the pattern, they know the way they work. we keep sharpening our intelligence, they keep reacting against us, it's a dynamic struggle. we have to be patient enough. we have great intelligence collection, great homeland security. we can win this without putting troops on the ground. we don't want our u.s. troops on the ground. putting u.s. troops on the ground will strengthen their forces, and our troops show us a bunch of people standing out there in ragtag uniforms and carrying ak-47s, we can't tell one from the other and most of our soldiers don't speak arabic. it's not our culture. when we go g in there, it's not our country. we really must have support from the peshmerga, the iraqis.

>> we know this isn't going to be enough. we know it's going to happen on the ground and we know we don't want that to be us. it becomes who is we? how big is today, for president obama? as much as they're bragging about the coalition of the five arab nations, they're not heavy hitters, they don't have boots on the ground, they have cultural conflicts, how big is today for him to make the case? >> we will have made the case through ambassadors and news release, but this is a chance for the president to look him in the eye personally at the united nations and engage and build legitimacy. he must build the legitimacy of this effort. and the legitimacy is we have the right to self-defense and we are defending the iraqis who have asked us for help. our problem is much of syria is an ungoverned area. we can't govern it. we don't want assad to govern it. who is going to govern it? we believe the moderate syrian opposition should govern it.

right now that opposition doesn't have the forces to control the terrain. we have to help the political opposition build the linkages between the politicians and civic leaders on the top. the refugee population, which is all over the world, and the fighters on the ground. we have to help the syrian opposition coalesce so it can govern the ungoverned areas. >> that's a much bigger factor in the future of syria than any of the red dots we have on the map. >> exactly right. the red dots might empower it. they may blunt isis. but we're still left with the problem of assad. whom the president has said, lost his mandate and he is supported by vladimir putin. this is putin's card to get back into the region and block western influence, and u.s. influence. so putin is on the sideline saying you're going to need assad's troops, and also saying what we're doing is not legitimate. we can never forget there's a

bigger arena out here. you not only have the terrorist cells all over the world. but you also have the united states engaged in trying to use diplomacy, to stymie iran's quest for nuclear weapons. >> it redefines what leadership is, no the just as a shameless tease back to your book. but it can't be, this isn't enough any more. times have changed. >> just focus on this. >> and leadership can't just mean this. >> everybody knows the u.s. military might, these are expensive blasts on soft targets so far. that's not going to be the future of success and that's why leadership we're going to have to see what role it takes today, is a big demonstration. >> exactly. >> general clark, appreciate the perspective. don't forget the book, because it matters, you have to figure out how to lead without using bombs all the time. can you preorder it online now. i'm going to push the general to get me a copy. it hits stores in october. coming up next -- an exclusive with secretary of state john kerry in the next hour.

couldn't be more important timing for that interview. plus, the man they said they wanted to talk to, the police in virginia. but the disappearance of the uva student, hannah graham, he's gone from somebody they want to talk to, to a person of interest, to now a suspect. what police are saying about jesse matthew, the charges he faces and the information ahead. denver international is one of the busiest airports in the country. we operate just like a city, and that takes a lot of energy. we use natural gas throughout the airport -

for heating the entire terminal, generating electricity on-site, and fueling hundreds of vehicles. we're very focused on reducing our environmental impact. and natural gas is a big part of that commitment.

you're watching "new day." an arrest warrant has been issued in the disappearance of hannah graham. police charging this man, jesse

matthew with abduction with the intent to defile. he was the last person graham was with when she vanished two weeks ago. let's go to jeanne casarez who is tracking this for us. >> reporter: law enforcement is now able to bring in more and more authorities to search and find jesse matthew. now he's been charged with a felony. it has been 11 days since university of virginia sophomore hanna hah gram was last seen. now this missing persons case has been taken to another level. kidnapping. >> he's charged with a class two felony of abduction with the intent to to defile. >> reporter: new charges against the man police say was the last person seen with her before she vanished september 13th. prosecutors believe.

hannah was abducted by jesse matthew for an immoral purpose. police have a felony warrant for his arrest. law enforcement believe matthew could be a flight risk saying he has contacts in various states. >> there's state and federal resources that have been deployed to help accomplish that task. >> reporter: according to police surveillance video, it shows matthew putting his arm around 8 the 18-year-old. the two ended up at the temple restaurant and bar and were seen leaving together after having drinks that matthew purchased. matthew already wanted on two counts of reckless driving has not been seen since saturday when e he walked into the police station and asked for a lawyer. technicians at the virginia department of forensic science continue to test items collected of matthews' car and apartment.

they are testing for dna to build a biological profile of the person who may have committed a crime against hannah. the director of the laboratory says it's like putting together the pieces of a puzzle. >> they are looking for anything that could be foreign. blood, fluid, percent per ration. >> with this new charge of abduction, police now more than ever want to find hannah. >> we absolutely are continuing our search for hanna, even as we speak. >> so the question now is what is this charge, abduction with intent to defile? it is kidnapping but it is also a sex crime. and abduction means here in the state of virginia the commonwealth that by force, by intimidation, or by deception. so what is the evidence they have now that they believe she was kidnapped? the police chief has been asking anyone to come forward that saw

them together in the last hours that night. what was their demeanor? what was their interaction? so possibly witnesses have come forward to show intimidation, force or deception. >> thank you for clarifying the charge. we heard you explain this and we're thinking what would that mean. just horrible thinking of the family. they want their little girl back. thank you very much jean. big day in new york. president obama will be taking center stage in a couple of hours at the u.n. general assembly rallying support from allies and reluctant partners in this fight against isis. white house spokesman josh ernest is here with a preview of that. also don't miss our interview with secretary of state john kerry. that's coming up. christiane amanpour will ask him tough questions, coming up next. [ male announcer ] some come here

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right under this tree. ♪ (man) some things are worth holding onto. they're hugging the tree. (man) that's why we got a subaru. or was it that tree? (man) introducing the all-new subaru outback. love. it's what makes a subaru, a subaru. good morning, welcome to "new day." it's wednesday, september 24th, 8:00 in the east. i'm here with brooke baldwin. more airstrikes in the middle east. four in iraq, one in syria. the pentagon calling the strikes so far extremely successful. what does that mean? lucky for you christiane amanpour will speak with secretary of state john kerry live in a moment to get some answers.

let's begin with barbara starr at the pentagon with the latest. barbara, extremely successful. how do we put meat on those bones? >> the copentagon acknowledging details about the strike in syria. just inside seyria near the border with iraq. it was a group of isis suspected vehicles and the staging area where they used to regularly cross into iraq. a popup target that they saw. what about the targets in the first round of strikes that captured the world's attention. the pentagon says that the pentagon stragss top commanders have looked at the battle damage assessment and they believe they have achieved a very good effect. they believe they hit all the targeted they wanted to hit and

caused the damage they wanted to cause. in the case of the group of al qaeda operatives they hit, they believe they possibly indeed have disrunned their plot to attack the united states or western targets. there's a a lot of concern that we hear behind the scenes that isis operatives may have gone into hiding. leaders may have moved. they may be blending in is and may be tough to dig them out and figure out where the additional targets may be. we'll have to keep an eye on it. >> come back to us when you have more. it's just starting in terms of what's happened. thank you very much. >> that's just starting. in a couple hours from now, we'll be hearing from president obama. two hours away from a big address at the u.n. general assembly. this is a high stakes speech to rally support for the global

fight against isis. to the white house we go to michelle kosinski. tell me about the speech. >> president obama addresses the u.n. today as the leader of a coalition that is at war against isis. he's gathered some arab ko countries, bipartisan support at home, that's a pretty good platform from which to tell the world this is a big problem, it affects you too. here's what you can and should be doing about it as well. and that said, the plan as it stands right now is admittedly a lengthy one. there's no guarantee of success or even what the end game looks like exactly. you have countries like syria and russia asking where's the international legal justification for doing this in syria. it's not as if we have a u.n. resolution authorize iing it. there's plenty of support out there. at least 40 countries have agree ed to do something in the fight

against isis. president obama arrives looking for broader commitments as well as a security council resolution to help stop the flow of foreign fighters. >> michelle kosinski, thank you. the president speaking two hours from now. so many questions on the table right now about what comes next in the fight against isis. what's been achieved so far? here to answer some of them is john kerry with christiane amanpour. >> chris, thank you. we'd also to welcome our viewers who are joining from around the world as we take this first opportunity to interview secretary of state john kerry at this amazing time in history right now. welcome to the program. >> thank you. >> welcome to cnn. can you confirm what we have all been talking about that there's a second day of strikes underway on targets in syria and iraq? and that the leader of the group and another major leader have been killed? >> there's definitely a second

day and there will be a third and more. this is going to go on. the president has been very clear that we're going to do what's necessary to get this job done. so the answer is, we'll go on for some time in various forms. one of the things i'd like to emphasize is that everybody is fixated on the strikes. but this is a very broad-based strategy, which involves foreign fighters. the president will chair a u.n. security council meeting today on foreign fighters. it involves cutting off financing. it will involve major effort to reclaim islam by muslims, by those to whom it belongs. i think you will hear more from saudi arabia, from the council, from people all around the world who are outraged by what isil is doing to islam. >> can you confirm the death of the leader of the khorasan

group? has the leader been killed? >> i can't personally confirm that at this moment, no. >> regarding one of the things you just mentioned and the president said to cut off the flow of funding to isis and other such groups, many of the coalition partners have been blamed for either directly funding or turning an eye away from the funding going to these gro groups. what are you going to say to them? are you convinced they are on board to stop this funding? >> i'm absolutely convinced they want to stop the fund iing. they proved that in the air, in their willingness to join historically to many people's amazement they all came together. we had a very frank meeting yesterday with all of them with the president. they are committed to this because this is a threat to every nation, and they see that. it's also a threat to legitimacy, to state hood, to

their futures. it's much bigger stakes than immediate counterterrorism and so forth. let me talk about the funding for a minute. in the very beginning when the efforts to oust assad took place, there were people who made calculations that the important thing is to remove assad. yes, there are some bad apples there, but we want to get him out. that, unfortunately, resulted in funding to different groups and it was frankly a sloppy ross. it did not provide the concerted effort that was needed. so since then, there's been a real focus on this financing. . and state-sponsored support of these groups, i believe, is over, is ended. there are still individuals within certain countries who have been funneling money to these groups, and the theory back in the beginning by many of these people were well, we're going to get rid of assad and focus on these bad apples.

it morphed into something more threatening so i think people have really pulled back. there's a sense of purpose now in this focus against isil. >> you say a sense of purpose. the president laid out a multiyear task ahead. quickly, the khorasan plot, can you confirm precisely what it was? >> these are remnants of core al qaeda. these are people who were definitively plotting against the united states in the west. we have been tracking them for some period of time now. and it is true that we didn't put a lot of public focus on it because we didn't want people -- we didn't want them to know that we were tracking them as effectively as we were. so this would have happened with or without isil. we were focused on them, and the moment actually was right. there were active plots against our country. we knew where they were and we

did what we needed to do. >> can you tell us what the plots were? >> i'm not going to go into that, but suffice it to say, we knew there were active plots. >> we'd like to ask about the military campaign. you are a former military. you fought in vietnam. this is an insurgent war. can they be flushed out by air power alone? once you have done the first few days of targets, sure ly it nees special forces on the ground to be able to identify future targets? >> there are a lot of different parts of this. intelligence comes from people on the ground. there's no question about that. but there are lots of people on the ground already in different forms. i'm not going to go into all of that. but there are other intelligence systems, lots of inputs to intel with respect to isil. >> do you feel you have it to be

able to expand the campaign? >> general allen is going there this next week with the ambassador. they will be there working on this networking of intelligence, this networking of entities on the ground. we will be training openly thanks to the congressional vote syrian opposition. we believe that with the open effort against isil from many different players in the region there's going to be much greater confidence in this possibility of the opposition. and there will be more recruits. there will be -- the morale will go up. people will be more willing to fight. in addition o to that, there are other options. the president has been clear there won't be american special forces on the ground, but there are plenty of ways to begin to bring greater pressure on isil. >> plenty of ways, you have been doing this now for six weeks plus in iraq itself against isis and whatever targets. they have not been flushed out.

they are not retreating. they are also not flooding back to the central government, the prime minister who you have helped stand up. >> the government is in its infancy. in its very first days, still in formation. and it was very important that the prime minister came here for the meetings. they will go back and they will continue to do what they need to do. we will be working to reconstitute the military. the military has not yet come back together completely. i won't go into the numbers, but there are an adequate number of brigades ready to fight and capable to fight. of course, they haven't been flushed out yet. >> more villages are falling. >> that's possible for a period of time, but what we have done is stopped the onslaught. that's what we were able to

achieve with air power. they were moving towards irbil. they were moving towards baghdad. baghdad could well have fallen. irbil could have fallen. they could have control of all the oil fields. we resecured the mosul dam. we broke the siege at sinjar mountain. so air power has been effective. and now as their supplies begin to get hit and other things begin to happen, i believe there is the possibility of a slow degrading that ultimately, because the president has been clear, this will take time. you and others should not be looking for some massive retreat within the next week or two. there are going to have to be major efforts to do the kind of things that happened with the awakening that took place years ago. >> that leads to the next question. i interviewed the new prime

minister last night. he says that he wants to bring the sunnis in. clearly that's the backbone of the strategy, the political part of it. do you believe that he gets it and that he will be able to do something dramatic and radical to convince the sunnis that they are part of this nation again? >> it's absolutely critical. the first steps have been taken. i believe he understands the challenge. obviously, he has pressures on him. we all understand that. we're all going to have to work together very carefully at this. but it's imperative, i cannot underscore how imperative this is that this be one nation with all the parties coming together with an opportunity to be part of the decision making and part of the future. if it does break down into the sectarian divisions and refusal to share responsibility and decision making, that will be very problematic. we believe this government came together precisely around that

promise. that's why there's a new prime minister. that's why there's a new president. that's why there's a new speaker, and they are clear lir moving in the same direction at this point in time. >> regarding bashar al assad, we know bashar al assad must go. that's what the president of the united states said. that's what many regional allies said three years ago. he's not only there, but you have informed him of the strikes. you have informed iran of the strikes. i'd like to get your confirmation about how that happened. there must be no sense that this is going to help bashar al assad. are you sure that what you're doing in syria will not help bashar al assad? >> well, let me make it clear. bashar al assad has lost an ability not because we say so, but because the facts on the ground tell everybody that when you have killed 200,000 of your own citizens, when you have driven a huge percentage of your

population into exile, a million and a half refugees in turkey, a million and a half in jordan and lebanon, another 4 million dislocated within your own country. you gas people, you torture people. how do you imagine having legitimacy to govern your country? this is about isil now. but we are continuing to train openly and to equip and arm the moderate opposition. and over the years, we have done pretty good at vetting. we did it in iraq, we did it in afghanistan. our folks know how to separate people and begin to determine to the greatest extent, to the greatest extent possible who is really moderate and prepared to fight. remember something, even in these last two to three years while assad has been waging his

efforts against both the opposition, but also not going after isil, while that's been going on, it's been the opposition that's been fighting both. and they have survived. they drove isil out of the province. they held the line, they pushed them. they have proven themselves to be willing to fight and now we believe if isil begins to have less capacity to get in their way, they will have more capacity to achieve their goal. >> there's been a huge amount of debate within the obama administration for the past three years of this war in syria. many, the whole entire practically national security apparatus of the president, wanted to do something like this much earlier. former secretary panetta said recently that we should have done this much earlier what

we're doing now. the president dismissed people mostly who promoted this kind of thing. thought they were trigger happy, used certain terms against it. do you regret this wasn't done sooner? would it have been easier if we were doing this a few years later precisely what you're doing now? >> first of all, let me make it clear. the president never dismissed anybody. the president engaged in extremely thoughtful and comprehensive discussion to figure out the pros and cons and pluses and minuses. and the president made his decisions based on judgments that were shared by a lot of different people. so i'm not going to get into the debate of the past. i honestly don't have that luxury right now. others can carry that debate. we're focused on the now and we're focused on the future.

and what is clear is the president has determined that he has the legal authority -- there were serious questions about legal authority. there was a big debate over chemical weapons even. we didn't have the same kind of legality to do chemical weapons that we do now have because of the request of the government of iraq. we didn't have a request from syria because international law clearly recognizes a right of self-defense and collective self-defense and we have the legality to do what we're doing today. and i think it's important that we have allies who are prepared to engage in this too. isil raised this threat level to appoint that everybody understands the stakes. there's much more at stake than just isil and iraq and this is not just an internal fight. this is a fight that involves all of us because there's a a level of depravity, of this fundamental evil in what they

are doing that challenges states and challenges values and what we have lived by for a long time. and if that was free to run rampant over those kocountries, there could be chaos in the region and far greater dangers for erveg. so we're standing up to that. that's the right thing to do. the other debate can go on, but we're focused on what we're going to do now and what we're going to do too succeed. >> finally, you talk about a regional situation at stake. you made a huge amount of efforts. do you believe that by the deadline of november 24th you will have a deal, the french foreign minister says as things stand now, no, the gaps are too far. what diplomacy are you proposing now? >> there are still gaps, there's no question about it. but we have the month of october and several weeks in november to continue to negotiate. we have been very clear with

iran that we need to try to see some progress. we need to move forward. we're working very, very hard to make sure this historic moment is appropriately put to use but without -- and this is very important, without compromising one bit what must be achieved in an agreement. we made it clear that each pathway to a potential nuclear weapon must be cut off. there has to be a clarity to iran's willingness to prove that it is a peaceful nuclear program. and this has to stand the test of scrutiny of all of us. of congress, of our friends in the region, and of each of us. i said many times no deal is better than a bad deal, but our hopes are, president obama's hopes, the entire administration knows the world will be better

off if iran and the united states can find the agreement that satisfies everybody's test that they do not have a pathway to a bomb, that they will be living by international standards and more in order to prove that, and that we can see a way towards a safe and secure nuclear bomb free region. that's the key here and that's what we're working towards. >> thank you, so much more to ask you. i know your time is up. thank you for joining us this morning. >> good to be with you. >> back to you, chris. >> christiane amanpour, thank you. great timing for the interview. you covered the range of topics we need to understand. there's a lot to digest in what just happened between christiane amanpour and secretary of state john kerry, specifically about the fight against isis and the separate strikes in al qaeda. what it means, what's going forward, what is this plan, we're going to be back after the break to discuss it all. also those strikes in syria and iraq sparking warnings about

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welcome back to "new day." christiane amanpour sat down exclusively with secretary of state john kerry. christiane amanpour is back with us. let's have a discussion about the news that was made looking ahead to the president's speech at the u.n. along with us is phillip mod, counterterrorism expert. out of the gate, secretary kerry saying this campaign would go on for some time. this isn't just about strikes. it's about cutting off financing, stopping those foreign fighters, what was your biggest takeaway? >> well, precisely that. in his own way, he was urging what everybody said, strategic patience and this is going to be a long fight. it's not a couple days of aerial

bombardment. we confirmed that they are in a second day of bombing. he talked about how you're going to move from the initial targets to continuing the campaign to try to flush out the insurgents, the isis insurgents who have really dug in so heavily inside iraq and in syria. he says you're mot going to see them being flushed out immediately. it's a long campaign. we're in it for the long haul. the allies are in it for the long haul. i asked about turkey because he's been meeting with turkish counterparts. he said they will be involved "big time" in all aspects. turkey said they will get into this fight in all different aspects, and that's what the secretary of state confirmed as he was heading off to his big round of meetings today. he talked about the necessity of cutting off isis funding and all the other extremist groups

funding which has either been by direct gulf state approval or by turning a blind eye and allowing their own national sympathizers to funnel money to them. . he believes they have the commitment from those states to do that. e he thinks the alliance will stick together. he also believes that the new prime minister of iraq who i interviewed last night does get it and knows that the backbone of this it is a political resolution that involves convincing the sunnis, who let's face it, prefer to stick with isis than the central government under maliki and fled the isis advance and join the isis advance. he believes this new prime minister gets it, and to be honest, he must get it, is what he told me. >> phillip, you got to hear what the secretary of state was saying. now the big concern, obviously, what happens over there and what it means back in the u.s. we're hearing about lone wolves in this new eminent threat and

that's why they hit this khorasan group. they kept it quiet because they u didn't want people to know. are these attacks going to spur counterattacks back here? >> i think that's possible, but if you look at the warnings that come out from the fbi and the homeland security department, these are the typical things you'd do in a circumstance like this. it doesn't mean they have information that suggests that we'll see a lone wolf event in the united states. this is a prudent measure going to state and local police departments saying, hey, watch out, we're in the midst of a military campaign. we have to keep our heads down here. >> here's the other question. you asked specifically about bashar al assad, the leader of syria, who is -- his enemy is isis. your question to secretary kerry was, are you sure that what the susquehanna doing isn't going to ultimately help assad.

what was his answer? >> well, he clearly said that our fight right now is against isis. they call it isil, there are a lot of different acronyms for this. in any event, that's all clear. the iraqi prime minister confirmed to me last night that the united states told them that we're going after isis, we're going after this group and not going after bashar al assad. as you know, they warned bashar al assad or informed him that this was coming. there's overt acceptance from damascus. there's no interference from iran. they were informed this was going to take place. i have spoken to very senior american diplomats, former ambassador to syria and iraq that said on no account should the united states be perceived as cooperating with or in any way helping the bashar al assad regime. and let's not forget, many people including the french

foreign minister, former american ambassador told me that bashar al assad has been part of the help towards isis. they are not against each other. they have been cooperating. isis has filled a convenient role for bashar al assad, pulling away the free syrian army to fight two fronts and also by having isis being able to say, look, we're always said we were fighting terrorists and this is what we're doing. . >> you have been very strong on this. let me take this premise and give it to mr. mudd. one of the points she's been making is this coalition is tricky because the nation states play it both ways when it comes to isis and other extremist groups. that's going to be a block, it's a relationship block. how do you deal with that? how do you get people on board to fight someone when a percentage of their population may overtly support groups like this? >> look, i think behind the

scenes sitting at the table at the national security council, this is a pretty basic decision. it's going to be ugly. we have the saudis who have been involved with the opposition in syria. i question whether we fully understand what they are up to. if you're going to stage strikes against an arab country after 13 years in pakistan and afghanistan, you have to take the ugly. if the u.a.e. want to be there, if the saudis want to be there, despite what ugliness is going on behind the scenes, if they want to front this war with us, take the money and run. take it. >> phillip mudd and christiane amanpour, thank you both very much. you can go to cnn.com to watch the whole interview with secretary of state john kerry. >> that's just one of the high profile interviews that we have here. christiane amanpour has been sitting down with leaders all over the place. her schedule is full after speaking with kerry and iraq's

new prime minister in the coming d days she will interview emir from qatar. they will be seen on cnn. so many big interviews. she has her own website. >> she's christiane amanpour. >> the only person she doesn't have in the circle of influence is the president himself. that's to come i'm sure. but today president obama has a big agenda. he has to deliver a message to the world. the u.n. general assembly, it's just 36 hours after the first strikes in syria. has it made him stronger? will he be able to rally in a way he couldn't have before to get this true coalition to destroy isis? the president's spokesman josh ernest will join us next and give us what the message is from the white house. the stakes could not be higher. so many of these men and women have, have sacrificed so much. through soldiers to summits, wells fargo supports our veterans

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welcome back. new airstrikes overnight. the military action is prompting warnings around the u.s. for potential retaliation. lone wolves have been encouraged to strike and the new strikes may give them ammunition. so law enforcement is being beefed up nationwide. our justice correspondent pamela brown is here with me with more. what are they being told? >> this is just a precaution. law enforcement agencies have received this bulletin asking them to be on heightened alert

for home grown violent extremists who may want to retaliate and launch an attack in the united states in the wake of the strikes in syria. >> reporter: across the country this morning, law enforcement on heightened alert. homeland security and the fbi warning that the airstrikes in syria may embolden home grown extre extremists to strike. >> that's why we're worried and they are doing everything we can to address the vieolent message. >> reporter: the bulletin warning law enforcement agencies asking them to scrutinize social media and be on the lookout in behavior in extremists, like if they drop off the radar. >> lone wolfs are difficult to identify and confront. they are moving on a very ideological path that they believe in. >> reporter: this as we learn more about the alleged plot by the al qaeda group khorasan that pushed the u.s. military to strike them monday night.

a u.s. intelligence source says the group had acquired materials and was in an advanced stage of planning to carry out an attack on the u.s., but no specific targets are known. u.s. officials say in july security at international airports was increased after intelligence suggested khorasan was creating easily concealed bombs for western recruits to smuggle on to aerps. what makes the threat to worrying is the ties to al qaeda's master bomb maker. >> he's trained a number of apprentices in these techniques and some of them have migrated to syria. the fear is that some of them have joined this group and are helping them develop the new techniqu techniques. >> u.s. officials say they targeted a training camp linked to the group. officials are still assessing the result of the strike trying to figure out if they were able

to take out the key leaders in the khorasan group. we are learning that the initial assessment according to that that it was a successful strike. chris? >> pamela, thank you very much. what's going on militarily, we keep being told it's going to take a long time. but there is something that's just 90 minutes away that couldn't be more important. president obama will make the case to the world to their leaders to join the cause and take on isis. how will the president move ahead if he gets help? what if he did you want? we'll have josh ernest. thank you for being with us. >> it's nice to see you in person. >> i know it's much harder to look at me in person. we'll fight through it. this is a big day. no way to mitigate that. what is the mission for the president when he goes to the u.n. today? what must happen? >> the president is going to give a speech to the united nations general assembly. it's an opportunity for the president to be clear about american leadership and american

priorities around the globe. what he will be talking about is a forward-looking vision about how the united states is engaging on a variety -- against a variety of challenges, but lead i leading the world as we do so. the thing that's gotten most headlines is the military action against isil. that's a good place to start. the president is acting boldly to protect american interests. there are also strikes against an organization plotting against the united states. but we didn't do it alone. we worked with five arab partners. isil is fighting a war against the globe, include iing the mus world. that was an important staumt. the president will put that in the context of other things we're doing around the world. leading a coalition to confront iran and to come into compliance in regards to their nuclear program. leading the world to ensure russia is going to expect territorial integrity in ukraine. ebola, another good example where the united states is

expending significant resources to help those in africa. this is an example of american leadership. these are all examples of american leadership. it's in the form of the vision the president has that the role the united states can play in the role as we seek to protect our interests around the globe. >> a lot on the plate, no question about it. you could argue that all of them flow through what's happening with isis one way or another. that becomes then about the definitions. right now you're saying the u.s. is say a leader, but we're not alone. how do you avoid this situation being seen as the united states war with other people helping out in the region, which was different what it was promised as. >> what's so important is that we did in the military operation carried out about 24 hours ago, there were five other arab nations that were active participants in that operation. we have also seen strong signals

of support from other kocountri around the globe that indicated a willingness to help in their own way. building this international coalition is key to ensure iing people around the globe and our enemies understand that the united states is not going to be acting alone. the united states is going to play a leadership role, but not acting alone. the reason for that is if we're going to make the kinds of security gains in iraq that are going to be required to snuff out isil's ability to make significant gains across that country, we need to make sure the iraqis are fighting for their own country u and providing for their own security. they can count on support from the american military. they u can count on political support from the american government, but it needs their responsibility to wage this conflict in their own country. >> they keep falling back on the u.s. because they can't get it done. that's that's why we're in this situation. if it's going to be different, you need the big names. you need turkey, egypt, a saudi

arabia where they are not just training fighters and giving money, but they are putting their own blood into the mix. do you think the president can do that? >> i think the president has already enjoyed significant success in terms of getting some important commitments from other countries in the region and around the world. they are critical to this effort and critical to its success. we're not going to be in a situation we're going it alone. this is another reason i think we are optimistic about the progress that we're going to continue to make in terms of building an international coalition here. the countries in the region have their own vested interests. you have this extremist organization on their doorstep. and for so long, you have had these sunni-led governments in the region who have been very concerned about shia-led governments in the region. the fact of the matter is, the greatest threat now is from sunni extremists who are killing and reeking havoc in the name of their brand of islam.

>> what does it mean that they are not provoking this situation and asking for the u.s.'s help? this is a battle for the soul of islam. it's obvious from what's going on. this is the faith that dominates so many of those nations. not this one. and yet the reverse seems to be the dynamic. how is that explained to the american people and the world in a way that makes sense? >> some of that is the united states is the indispensable nation in the world. other countries look to the united states and to the american president for leadership. let me give you a good example. the president convened a meeting with representatives of the five a rob countries that participated. the other was the new shia prime minister of iraq. the fact you had a shia leader and iraq sitting down with five sunni leaders in the region to talk o to the american president about the challenges in the region is an indication of the president's leadership, but also as an indication of the commitment of nations in the region to really confronting this threat.

prime minister haider al abadi's predecessor did not have a good working relationship. he fought his relationship with others. . so the fact you had the iraqi prime minister with other arab leaders with the president of the united states at the u.n. is an indication we are having some success in building the kind of cohesive international relationship that's required. >> there's a price if you don't get involved. there's a price if you do. one of the surprises here early on was that you went after khorasan. they may have had dangerous words that coming out. and then later reports out of the pentagon and the white house. eminent threat, have to be worried. lone wolf attacks here in the united states. is any of it specific? are you looking at actual plots or is this it about deterring a motivation from abroad? >> what we saw from this extremist group was more than motivation. they were actively plotting

against the united states. a core principle of his presidency will be to deny a safe haven to those extremist individuals or group that seek to do harm to the u.s. thaps why the president ordered this military action to take strikes against them. that makes them different than isil. isil we know at this point, we do not have clear intelligence to say they are plotting against the u.s. homeland, but they pose a threat to the americans in the regi region. but they have designs on plotting against american interests in the region. the president indicated we're not going to allow them to have a safe haven. the president says we're not going to act alone. that's why building the coalition was so important. this is a counterterrorism strategy we have used successfully in other places. is to build up the capacity of local forces. that's why this element of trying to train syrian opposition fighters to take the fight to isil on the ground in

their own country is a key component. >> it has to be because you have taken the best fighters out of the equation. this won't be u.s. boots on the ground. it's going to come down to somebody else. the question is who is it and that makes today a moment that cannot be hyped. this is a major moment we'll be watching closely. we appreciate you being here. >> appreciate it. >> that speech we're talking about from the president, you'll be able to see it live here on cnn at 10:00 a.m. eastern. up next we have wolf blitzer. he has a preview. he's going to talk to us about the address and how he can come away with a larger coalition against isis. stay with us.

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(male announcer) today's the day to ask your doctor about levemir® flextouch. covered by nearly all health insurance and medicare plans. in about an hour, president obama will address the united nations general assembly. this is an important chance to rally the world after launching airstrikes on isis strongholds in syria. this is such an important speech. such a high stakes moment, which is why we have our high stakes man at the united nations right now. wolf blitzer joins us. wolf, great to see you there this morning. by launching these strikes when

the u.s. and its allies did, it created an enormous responsibility for president obama, but also an enormous opportunity. he has to justify the actions, but at the same time, he has a chance to win support for them. >> it certainly will help build this international coalition. the fact the united states was backed by five arab allies against isis targets in syria as well as this al qaeda offshoot, that's going to generate, i think, some momentum for the united states to build this international coalition. but make no mistake about it. a lot of this coalition is going to be rhetorical. they are not necessarily going to be providing weapons. they are not providing arms or training rebels. they are not going to be involved militarily, but they will offer political support and when the president goes before the united nations security council later today, he's chairing a special session.

it rotates every month. he's going to seek this resolution to generate international support. the fact he got these five arab countries on board, that will help him in the political momentum. i'm sure the timing may have been coincidental, but maybe not. >> you bring up a great point. most of the bombs, most of the skin in the game is american skin. but the coalition symbolic and important. also maybe a bit symbolic and important. this president who campaigned on peace and disentanglement from conflict goes to this body as a war-time president again to justify this new action of war. >> and it looks like the last two years of his administration he's been in office for almost six years. he was hoping there would be no wars, but the last two years almost certainly it's going to take a couple years at least if

not a lot longer to completely eliminate, destroy, defeat isis. the u.s. can immediately start e degrading isis. but remember there are maybe 30,000 or 40,000 troops. they got formal army personnel in iraq and syria. they control a vast amount of land. they have maybe a billion dollars, we heard from a top minister yesterday. they have a billion dollars in the bank. they can use that money and they can create a lot of problems. this is a long, drawn out process and it's going to dominate the president's final two years in office. he didn't want to necessarily be a war president. but now he has a new war he's directly involved with. >> this new phase that he will explain to this world body. a very big moment. you will be there to cover it. we'll see you in a little bit. >> thanks, john. >> chris? >> that does it for us here at

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