planted as a barrier to a photographer capturing the number one guy through a hole is like a hole in one. jeanne moos, cnn, new york. >> he's not going toe like that video. thanks for joining us. anderson starts now. good evening. with the impeachment trial looming, though no date set for it to actually begin, tonight evidence the trump administration does not want you to see. previously hidden contents of internal emails, including one that makes it clear the president of the united states directly ordered the central act in the central allegation against him with, withholding military aid for ukraine allegedly to extract ukrainian help in dirtying up joe biden. now, it took a lawsuit and a judge's order for the center for public integrity to first obtain these emails, and even then, as you can see, some were so heavily redacted, they were essentially meaningless. but now an online forum called just security, which is based at

new york university's center on law and security has viewed the unblacked out versions of those emails. what they found, it amplifies recent reporting from cnn and others about just how concerned and suspicious senior government officials were that the aid freeze to ukraine was against the law, or as the former top diplomat in the ukraine put it, at the time just plain wrong. >> as the committee is aware, i wrote that withholding security assistance in exchange for help with a domestic political campaign in the united states would be crazy. i believed that then, and i believe it now. >> he, of course, testified to congress. many of the people in these emails that we're now seeing, they did not. and some are being blocked by the white house from telling what they know. and what they know is probably an awful lot, which is why this new reporting is so important. we're going to talk to the author who broke the story, kate brannon in just a moment. but first, we want to kind of set the table on what some of her reporting has uncovered.

starting with a top defense official's email, an email questioned about the legality of what the white house was up to. the email is dated july 25th, and yes, that's the day president trump made that phone call to ukraine's president, asking for, in his words, a favor for us. so here is the one line redacted email that acting pentagon comptroller elaine mccusker wrote to the white house budget official, a guy named michael duffey. according to just security, behind that blacked line, just security has learned that she asked whether the decision had gone through the defense department's general counsel. in other words, it's official. mccusker wanted to know has anyone vetted the legality of this because the law requires that money appropriated by congress cannot be held back or impounded by the white house. which is precisely what subsequent emails show the pentagon was worried about, quoting from just securities report, on october 6, duffey, remember, he is the white house budget official, sent

mccusker -- she is the pentagon comptroller -- an email telling her that he planned to extend the hold on the ukraine funding by reinserting the same footnote into the budget document. the footnote still noted that the pause would not prevent the defense department from spending the money before the fiscal year ended if the hold was lifted. mccusker wrote back, asking to whom duffey spoke to confirm that the additional pause would not affect the ultimate execution of the program. good catch is what duffey wrote back. let's just remember, because this is confusing. congress had appropriated the money for ukraine back in 2018. the law required that it be spent by september 30th. the ukrainians fighting a war with russian-backed forces needed it immediately. yet according to impeachment testimony, was being held up really for no apparent reason except it's what the president wanted. here is foreign service officer david holmes talking what he was

told horrettly before the aid freeze went into effect. >> the official said that the order had come from the president, it had been conveyed to omb by mr. mulvaney, with no further explanation. this began a week or so of efforts by various agencies to identify the rationale for the freeze, to conduct a review of the assistance, and to reaffirm the unanimous view of ukraine policy community of its importance. >> republicans, you'll recall, downplayed that testimony as hearsay saying there is no direct link to the president. but these emails in just security's reporting on the unredacted content, that's where the connection is, where you can see at least part of the direction by the president. it would presumably be even plainer if bolton or mulvaney or any of these other administration officials who were up to their necks in this thing, this drug deal is what bolton called it, but they aren't talking. the new emails do reveal something else. they reveal what appears to be the emergence of a kind of cover story from the office of management and budget as well as

pushback from the pentagon on this policy. this all happened shortly after august 28th when politico broke the aid freeze story. that's when it suddenly came to light. that's when the president decided okay, you know what? actually, the aid will go through after that. you hear all these republicans saying well, look, there may have been a pause, but the aid went through. yes, it did, but only after the story was going to go public. the michigan hashing out talking points, the main one being that none of this would stop the aid from going out by the deadline. so here is a redacted email on the matter from elaine mccusker, the comptroller at the pentagon to michael duffey, the official at the office of management and budget. it reads "mike" -- and then a redaction. "just got outside of another long session on -- redacted again. things have evolved again. reach you in a bit. it's hard to tell what that means with all the redactions.

according to just security, they've seen what is behind the redaction. it reads "i don't agree to the revised tps, talking points. the last one is just not accurate from a financial execution standpoint, something we have been consistently conveying for a few weeks." so this clash escalated all the way up to the president with the president on august 30th after which according to just security, responsibility for the freeze is tied directly to him. i'm quoting again, after the meeting with the president took place, duffey told mccusker clear direction from potus to hold. certainly democrats would like to hear from that guy, michael duffey. house speaker pelosi also weigh in tweeting late today, quote, trump engaged in unprecedented total obstruction of congress, hiding these emails, all other documents, and his top aides from the american people. why won't trump and mcconnell allow a fair trial? joining us now is kate brannon, editorial director at just security. kate, thanks for joining us. it's so fascinating, your

reporting, and what you found behind these redactions. it's quite clear at least in the opinion of the people writing was it was the president himself who personally directed the aid to be held. >> and every step of the way when there is sort of a moment where they think the hold could be lifted, it all comes down to what the president wants. there has been this pretext sort of this pretextual story of why the hold was there in the first place is they wanted to do a policy review, see that the money was being well spent. but it's clear from these emails that that's not taking place. there is no reference to anything like that happening. it's just is potus going to lift it? did potus decide to lift it? and sort of the repeated answers no, potus says keep the hold. >> the argument by jim jordan and others about oh, yeah, it's just on hold for a policy review, that makes absolutely sense. the president doesn't believe in foreign policy so much, doesn't want to spend a lot of money needlessly to a corrupt regime.

there is no evidence of any kind of policy reviews. in other words, the white house brought forth a 200-page white paper on ukrainian corruption that they compiled in those days as they were holding up the aid. and in fact we know the corruption review had already been signed off on by the military and the u.s. embassy in ukraine. that's what they were working on, anti-corruption efforts. according to these documents, the pentagon was clearly concerned about the hold. it seems like at least some were very up-front with the white house about those concerns. >> yeah. i mean, to go back to your policy reviewpoint, when the hold is first put in place, the pentagon wants to know why and they don't get a straight answer. what's also really important is when it's lifted, mccusker, who you were talking about, the acting pentagon comptroller asked her colleagues why has it been lifted now? i don't know. i'll see what i can find out there. is not a rationale at the beginning and there is not a rationale at the end either.

>> it's not how you imagine communications at the highest levels of our government to be. just the amount of confusion and sort of everybody in service to the whimsical thoughts of one man, the president of the united states in this case is if you're not used to reading these kind of things. even if you are used to reading government communication, it's really strange. >> yeah. that definitely came across as i worked my way through them from june through october is sort of the opportunity costs of trying to implement this hold, the amount of chaos it sort of created. it's difficult to get a contract out the door at the pentagon. it's an incredibly bureaucratic process. and so they were sort of bending over backward every step of the way to sort of slow it down, to buy time, and to hold things up. one of the directions from omb was basically like please keep doing all the planning and

preparatory work for these contracts. just don't obligate the money. and dod sort of repeatedly was there is only so much we can do until you give us -- you permit us to spend the money. then the money won't go out the door. and omb sort of kept pushing them on that. as you said earlier, the chief concern from the pentagon was that this hold violated the law and that it would violate the impoundment control act, which in fact it appears it did. by the time the hold was lifted, the pentagon couldn't get $35 million of the $250 million total spent by september 30th, and it required congress to step in and pass legislation that extend that money in order for them to buy weapons for ukraine. >> we're going to take a quick break. we're going have more with you. this is an important conversation. there is so much to know about. also tonight, what sizable new fundraising numbers say about bernie sanders' position with just a few weeks left for iowa and new hampshire. we'll talk money and politics and the rest of the democratic

field with some top strategists. howard dean is going to join us. later the attack in iraq, the influence of iran and the question of whether the united states is losing its influence around the world. fareed zakaria joins us for that. >> "anderson cooper 360" is sponsored by 1917. critics are calling it the best picture of the year and a cinematic experience unlike anything you have seen before. "1917" in select theaters christmas, everywhere january 10th. your orders are to deliver a message calling off tomorrows attack. if you fail, we will lose sixteen hundred men. your brother among them. we need to keep moving. i can't see! you keep hold of me! come on! what the hell are you doing lance corporal? trust me! skip to the good part with alka-seltzer plus.

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or vision changes. taking ozempic® with a sulfonylurea or insulin may increase low blood sugar risk. common side effects are nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, stomach pain, and constipation. some side effects can lead to dehydration, which may worsen kidney problems. once-weekly ozempic® is helping me reach my blood sugar goal. ♪ oh, oh, oh, ozempic®! ♪ (announcer) you may pay as little as $25 per prescription. ask your health care provider today about once-weekly ozempic®. we're talking about tonight about information hiding behind redaction bars and the things they black out in those letters they don't want you to see. it goes straight to the heart of the impeachment of president trump. it makes the reporting by our guest tonight kate brannen and just security so significant. kate is back now with us. there is a thing in your article, in your reporting which is extraordinary. it's not only extraordinary just as a policy but also it shows personalities and the humankind of betrayal and trust and lack

of trust between people in different branches of government. there was despite weeks of being warned about the dangers of holding the aid, the office of management and budget, this guy mike duffy, who had been in communication with the comptroller of the pentagon who deals with the money explained what happened right at the end in two emails that you saw. >> yes. as i was reading these emails, it sounds silly, because they are very wonky, but the personalities coming across it was a bit of a page-turner in that mccusker and duffey are exchanging these emails all summer about the hold, about the concerns from the pentagon about it. mccusker is repeatedly warning him and telling him about the pentagon's concerns about the legality, and duffey seems to kind of understand her and understand the situation, or at least sort of that's what's coming across, and they talk to each other regularly and in a pretty familiar tone.

and then i think it was september 9th, she sends him an email again stating quite firmly like the serious legal concerns the pentagon has. and he writes to her in what i thought was a sort of remarkably formal letter. he ccs a bunch of lawyer, pentagon lawyer, omb lawyers, and writes her this stern letter saying -- basically throwing her under the bus if the money is impounded and in fact the law is violated, it's going to be on you for dropping the ball and not doing all the preparatory work that you were supposed to, and it's really going to be the defense department's fault and not ours. and she writes back to him she -- she takes everybody off the cc line and writes just back to him and says "you can't be serious. i'm speechless." because she has sort of epically been thrown under the bus by him. >> for anyone who works in the office, to suddenly get an email from somebody you have been corresponding with for months,

that you have rapport with, and trying to do what's good for the country, suddenly get an email and cc'd are all these attorneys who haven't been involved in it, throwing you under the bus, and then she just emails him back directly without ccing, it's a little microcosm of just what goes on. that's fascinating. >> yeah. and i mean, in terms of the substance of it, what he is saying to her is ludicrous, which is sort of why she returns the response that she does. >> and this guy michael duffey, he is the associate director of national security programs in the office of management and budget. he was the one who said "this order came directly from president trump." he is also the witness that the democrats want to call to testify. the more you see these emails, the more you want to hear from him from bolton, from the chief of staff. i mean, it's -- mulvaney. >> yeah. there is this real line, because mulvaney had previously been

with the director of omb, and i believe he remains the acting director, but his -- the person who held duffey's job before him is a man named robert blair who moved into the chief of staff's office when mulvaney became the chief of staff at the white house. and so there is a real like omb group of people that are tied to this story from mulvaney to blair to duffey, and the entire sort of ukraine hold was communicated through that line. it went from trump to mulvaney to blair to duffey, and then out to the department, the state department, the defense department. so this group, this small group of omb officials are really kind of key to the puzzle. >> kate brannen, thank you so much. really fascinating reporting. >> thank you so much. >> at the top of the broadcast, we showed you house speaker nancy pelosi's reaction to kate's reporting. house intelligence committee chairman adam schiff has just weighed in on the story as well. from his part of the statement, quote, these incriminating documents reinforces the need for all of these materials to be

produced, and that a fair trial in the senate cannot take place without them. joining us now is intelligence community member and california democratic congresswoman jackie speier. congresswoman speier, first of all, i'm wondering what your overall reaction is to these documents and how much it makes it all the more important that testimony is given from the people who are actually sending these emails. >> you know, anderson, i actually feel what is most important is for us to get the documents. what i've seen over and over again when we've interviewed many of these people is their great ability to forget or not remember. and the documents don't forget, and the documents, as we have seen by this outstanding reporting is -- says it all, that the president demanded this, that ukraine was put at risk, and that they have consistently refused to turn over any documents to the

committees that have had jurisdiction for oversight. so what has been released has been released through a lawsuit that's been filed, and then subsequently, evidently these emails have been acquired through some whistle-blower. so we are in the dark. the american people are in the dark. the congress is in the dark. and there is a massive cover-up going on with this administration, and it makes me fearful about what else we don't know. >> what's so interesting about that, things are looked through now so tribally, which is an overused word now, but through a particular lens of who you support and who you like and who you believe. but when you kind of step back from all of this and you just think wait a minute, so in all these levers of government and at the top, the highest levels of the white house, everybody who knows really and was really involved in this, they aren't talking for a variety of reasons, but they are not giving

testimony. they are not sitting under oath. they are working for us for the american people, and yet they are keeping the secret and also as these documents are public documents. these are -- should be documents that american people can see. and it is just when you step back from it, it's kind of mind-blowing that, wait a minute, what argument is there really for just not being honest and open in a public hearing? >> and what does the rule of law mean in this administration? when all of these individuals have been subpoenaed, all of these document. s have been subpoena and they have been ignored. now for you and me, if we ignore a subpoena we go to jail. so for a long time i have been of the opinion that we should use what congress has, which is the power of inherent contempt and bring these individuals in to the house chamber and slap

them with fines because that's the only thing that i think will make them talk. >> speaker pelosi, she's still not transferred the articles of impeachment to the senate. how much do these documents you think change her calculus, or should change the calculus? >> well, it should change the calculus not just for the house but for the senate more importantly because if this was barack obama, there would be no question that these people would be coming forward as witnesses and that documents would be released. and furthermore, whether it was clinton or nixon or if it had been barack obama, there has been cooperation by the president and his office in the past. this is the first time we've seen this gross effort to cover up and withhold documents that as you point out belong to the american people, certainly belong to the oversight committees that have the

responsibilities to determine whether or not the law is being broken. >> congresswoman jackie speier, i appreciate your time. thank you. still to come tonight, with the breaking news on the strike against an iranian figure in iraq, senator bernie sanders and also president donald trump breaking the books. both reported big numbers to close out 2019. we'll take a look also at what that haul could mean for their political futures ahead. you don't use this old thing, do you? no! or how 'bout this dinosaur right here? nope!

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here, it all starts withello! hi!... how can i help? a data plan for everyone. everyone? everyone. let's send to everyone! wifi up there? uhh. sure, why not? how'd he get out?! a camera might figure it out. that was easy! glad i could help. at xfinity, we're here to make life simple. easy. awesome. so come ask, shop, discover at your local xfinity store today. 31 days. that is how close we are to the iowa caucuses. just 31 days. new fundraising numbers are giving us a snapshot into the current state of play with the big takeaway that bernie

sanders, or at least his fundraising operation appears to be surging at probably just the right moment. his campaign says it raised almost 35 million in the fourth quarter of last year. tops among democrats, nearly 10 million more than second place pete buttigieg. elizabeth warren said today she is going to report numbers soon. shortly after today's numbers were published, sanders took a direct shot at joe biden's ability as a candidate saying, quote, it's just a lot of baggage that joe takes into a campaign, which isn't going to create energy and excitement. he brings into this campaign a record which is so weak that it cannot create the kind of excitement and energy that is going to be needed to defeat donald trump. moments ago biden responded. >> what do you say to bernie sanders? >> good luck, bernie. >> thanks, guys. >> good to see you. lots of luck in your senior year, bernie. >> joining me now is howard dean, former democratic presidential candidate and chairman of the dnc and also

ayesha moodie-mills. governor dean, this back and forth between sanders and biden. it does seem the close were get to iowa, the most obvious statement of all, the sharper the attacks are becoming. that's par for the course. >> this is so familiar to me from 16 years ago. >> i bet. >> it really is amazing. yeah. this is what the -- what happens. you've got 30 days to go. iowa is going to focus the presidential race and the attention of the democratic primary voters on this winner of this race and the next two or three. and so, yeah, this is the battle for the presidency of the united states. and it's going to get rough. >> what we haven't seen is sanders going after elizabeth warren, senator warren. obviously do they have to do that? or is there any reason for him? she has been sort of imploding

and certainly phrasing problems and not -- she seems to have lost some momentum from some of the debates. do you think sanders feels he doesn't need to kind of go down that road and possibly alienate people who if they like warren and they decide she is not viable would go to him? >> the fist thing i would say is i wouldn't characterize elizabeth warren's campaign in any way, shape or form as imploding. when you raise $20 million in a quarter or whatever she is going to report, that's hardly imploding. the reason why, you're not going see bernie sanders go directly after elizabeth warren. yes in this democratic primary in an ideological battle. and the two of them are idealogically on the same team. this is a battle between progress, do we care about lifting up all the people, do we care about the small guy, about small donors? what is the vision for the democratic party in america, about inclusivitnclusivity, who be at the table, and then there is doing business as usual. that's really what this debate

is all about. so when you see joe biden saying i've been the guy around for a really long time. remember me, i'm going to do more of that. people who support a elizabeth warren or a bernie sanders don't really believe that that's the way we should move forward. we actually need some kind of change. we need growth. that's the difference. >> governor dean, when you heard bernie sanders saying look, joe biden's not going to get people excited, you know, you look at pete buttigieg's numbers among african americans just about anywhere, but in south carolina is where that poll was taken, 0% in one poll. do you see that as a major problem for biden, for buttigieg? >> i don't see it as a major problem, but it is a clear distinction between bernie and elizabeth and to a lesser extent andrew yang on the one hand and biden and pete. the interesting person for me in iowa is amy klobuchar, who lives next door and can dish it out to trump as well as anybody else. but, sure, look, i don't know

who i'm going to vote for in the vermont primary. and for me, i'm very much torn, because i want as aisha was talking about, i want real progress and change, but old, i want to beat trump more. whoever is the best person to beat donald trump is who i'm going vote for on super tuesday. i have no ytd who i'm going to vote for now. >> that's interesting. how do you get to what are the markers that you look for? is it just who's still viable and strong at the point when you got to cast a ballot? >> absolutely. the first four races are really, really important because we added south carolina and nevada when i was chairman, we now have obviously the first states don't look anything like the democratic party looks like nationally. but when you add in nevada, which is a very high percentage of hispanics and asian americans and add in south carolina with 60% of the voters in the democratic primary are going to be african american, you do get

a cross section in these first four states of what our party looks like. and that's why they're so critical. whoever comes out of this really strongly and looking like they can take on trump and beat him is who i'm going to end up supporting. >> i would just add to this. we're having a conversation about money raised and who has the number of dollars in the banks. but the conversation that really we should be paying attention to is how many donors does each campaign have. and what i find fascinating that we don't talk about enough is that bernie sanders's campaign has hit over five million individuals who have given contributions to him of whatever the amount. what that means is bernie sanders has five million voters already baked in around the country. biden doesn't have a fraction of that in terms of the number of people that are powering a campaign. so we can look at polling numbers and we can look at cash on hand and what money does, it gives you the opportunity to put more people on the ground and to try to pull more people to the polls. but when you've got people who

are already invested, they're going to show up and actually go vote. i would look at this beyond polling, beyond who is doing all the trash talking, if you will, and see who is putting the people in power to actually put them in office. that's who's going to ultimately wrack up the delegates because they have real voters. i think the billionaire class running right now, the billionaire boys can buy as many ads as they want to on television, but that's not going to manifest on people actually going to the voting booth. >> governor, do you agree with that? >> i do agree with that. i think aisha is exactly right. although how good your organization is matters a lot in iowa and presumably, how many donors you think have something to do with your organization. so we don't know who has the best organization yet. we're going to find that out in iowa. we may get some big surprises. but i absolutely think that bloomberg and steyer have got a big problem. you can not win these four states without people on the ground, and bloomberg's not even making any effort.

i respect mike bloomberg, i really do, but i do not think you can win the democratic nomination with an advertising campaign. i don't care how much money he spends. >> howard dean, appreciate it. thank you. >> aishac. mills, thank you. always a pleasure having you. up next, the leader of the quds force has been killed in an attack at the airport. this is really big. unknown at this moment who is responsible for the strike. we'll get a live report with late details in just a moment. with advil, you have power over pain, so the whole world looks different. the unbeatable strength of advil. what pain?

qassim soleimani.

breaking news tonight from baghdad. iraqi state television reports the commander of the iranian quds force unit within the revolutionary guards has been killed in a shelling attack at the baghdad international airport. also reportedly killed the deputy head of iraq paramilitary forces. arwa damon joins us from baghdad. you and i were talking earlier, a couple of hours ago, and there had just been the sounds of three explosions. is that what this is? >> anderson, we're not entirely clear, but yes, that seems to have been the case. initially these reports came out as three katyusha rockets

hitting in the vicinity of baghdad international airport, and the images emerge that we're showing two vehicles on fire. following that, we began getting news from sources within the popular mobilization forces. this is that iranian-backed iraqi paramilitary unit. those sources were initially saying that a senior member was in the pmf was killed saying it was the head of their protocol department. but now we're hearing from iraqi state television who is also quoting a source within the pmf saying that the head of iran's elite quds force, qassim soleimani, a name who anyone who has been following what's been happening in the middle east and involvements with iran will know very, very well that he has also reportedly been killed in this strike, along with abu mohandez. he is the head of kataeb

hezbollah. that is the same group that the americans targeted on sunday. he is also the deputy commander of the popular mobilization forces, that they were both reportedly killed in this strike. we don't know at this stage who was responsible for carrying out this strike, but anderson, if these reports end up being true, this is potentially going to shake iran, iraq, the entire region in a way that is very difficult to predict right now but is not going to end up well for the people in this region. many of those analysts right now who are looking at this situation, especially looking at the death of qassim soleimani, who was such a figure within the quds force. he was seen often in the battlefield in iraq and the fight against isis, a very shadowy figure himself. if this ends up being true,

anderson, as i was saying, this is really going to potentially change the nature of what's happening in iraq, in iran as we know it. it is very difficult to see how iran does not somehow respond to this in a way that is very, very potentially significant. >> explain -- talk a little bit more about soleimani. as you said, he is sort of shadowy. you would see images of him popping up in different areas near front lines, overseeing kind of big picture military campaigns on behalf of iran in a number of places. >> he does. the quds force is a shadowy branch, again, of iran's revolutionary guard corps that is tasked with their operations outside of iran and in

unconventional warfare. qassim soleimani was often reported to have been seen both inside iraq and inside syria. he is an individual who's name quite often would strike fear in the hearts of those who were potentially the target of his and his group's operation. he has been instrumental when it comes to implementing iran's foreign policy vis-a-vis the various proxies that it has, not just here in iraq but also in syria and lebanon and yemen and elsewhere. he really is such a key figure when it comes to the revolutionary guard corps, when it comes to the fact that he is the commander of this force. this strike is fairly brazen, fairly audacious to a certain degree, to be taking out someone of such significance at a time when there is such tension in

the region. add to that the fact that reportedly also the commander of kataeb hezbollah was also killed in this very same strike, those two vehicles hit just on the outskirts as they were leaving baghdad international airport it would seem. anderson, the repercussions of this, we cannot even begin to imagine right now at this stage. >> let me bring in -- stay with us if you can, arwa. i want to bring in fareed zakaria, co-host of "fareed zakaria gps." talk about the significance of this and also what we have been seeing in iraq over the last 24, 48 hours. what is going on? >> sure. everything was said exactly right. soleimani is difficult to convey how revered he is in iran. imagine the french foreign legion, at the height of the french empire. this guy is regarded in iran as a completely heroic figure, personally very brave. >> i was wondering, earlier when

arwa was talking, i was trying to think of somebody, and i was thinking of de gaulle, although he became the leader of the country. it's not quite right. put it this way. other than the supreme leader khamenei and maybe the president, he looms larger in iran than almost any other figure. he is regarded as personally incredibly brave. the troops love him, and he has been the kind of mastermind of iran's policies in syria, in iraq. so when general petraeus was fighting the iraq war, the surge, i remember him telling me that soleimani was his principle antagoni antagonist. that's the guy the american generals were bumping up against. stan mcchrystal had to decide at one point whether or not to attack a convoy that had him in it. it was a big decision because potentially eliminating soleimani would have huge blowback. so if in fact this has happened, i think the iranians will have to respond and will respond in

some way. >> to whom? >> to the united states. i think they would view it presumably this is in some way an american-directed attack. we still don't know. >> we cannot confirm who is behind this. >> right. >> this is not occurred in isolation. we've seen what happened at the u.s. embassy. we've seen statements that have been made. >> right. it's inconceivable to me that the iraqi government would have done this. but to step back, what's been going on is the united states, the trump administration has decided it is going to pursue a policy of maximum pressure on iran, getting out of the iran deal, calling the revolutionary guard a terrorist organization, essentially make it impossible for iran to sell oil anywhere. the iranians therefore feel trapped in a box and have been lashing out in various ways. they've shot down drones. they've attacked saudi oil facilities. now this. the iranians as you know

attacking american contractors and killed some. so right now we are in a situation where the trump administration has ratcheted up the pressure. it's not clear what they want, what the goal of this is, because the demands they have made of iran are so extravagant, essentially that iran surrender its role in the region and perhaps even essentially engage in a regime change. that's not going to happen. so the problem with the administration's strategy right now is where does it go? because the iranians won't stop. they have many levers. they have militias in lebanon, in syria, in iraq. they could destabilize the iraqi government in a way that would make the united states even more vulnerable. >> iran is obviously incredibly has through a vacuum have become incredibly powerful within iraq. >> the important thing to remember is iraq is a shia majority company. iran is its next-door neighbor, also shia.

iran has enormous power, but the united states is also a big stake holder in iraq. i mean, the american embassy in iraq, people have to understand it's not a normal embassy. it's i think 100 acres. it's like a mini city. and for that embassy to have been stormed, it's actually much bigger in some ways than the storming of the iranian embassy. obviously it wasn't successful, but my point is the american embassy in baghdad is the symbol of american power. >> yeah. >> for that to have been in some way attacked, it's a -- we've suddenly ratcheted up the pressure here, and it's not clear where this is going. >> and if the u.s. is involved in this, this certainly another big ratcheting up. fareed zakaria, thank you. arwa damon as well. up next, we'll get reaction to this attack in the baghdad airport from the pentagon. i'm finding it hard to stay on top of things

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new details in the story that's just breaking out of baghdad. iraq ki state television reports that has been killed at the airport. we can't confirm who is behind

this. cnn arwa damon is in baghdad now. what are local reports saying? what information do you have about who might be behind this? >> well, anderson a lot of the blame is being pointed at the united states from the popular mobilizations forces themselves saying that they believe america is behind the strike. >> when you say popular mobilization forces, that's -- >> that is a paramilitary force that was formed in response to isis sweeping through iraq years ago that is mostly made up of thee shia militias that are funded by iran funded and trained. these very same fighters within the pmf, the vast majority of them got their experience battling the u.s. for years during the u.s. occupation of

iraq. the commander of the force cost money during the battles against isis and afterwards was a very prominent figure on the battlefield in the sense that he was often in iraq or at the very least reported to be in iraq. he is revered not only in iran but also among many of the shia fighters inside iraq as well. his reach stretches across the entire region. he is believed to have been killed along with hezbollah. that is the group that the americans had already targeted on sunday. they are part of this popular mobilization force which is part of the iraqi security apparatus. they are blaming the americans now -- e we don't have that confirmed. but given how tense the situation is here right now, just the perception that it could be the americans has the potential to escalate the security situation here.

i think right now in ways that we can't even really begin to grasp. >> arwa damon, we're going to continue to check in with you throughout the night. thank you. be careful. we'll monitor the situation and bring you updates. the trump administration had no doubt that president trump was orchestrating the freeze on aid to ukraine. documents ahead.

good evening. chris cuomo is off tonight. we have late breaking news out of baghdad on the report of killing the iranian general. he was killed, we understand, in a strike in baghdad airport. this is a video of the explosions that we just got. it's a very big deal, particularly in the region. nobody has claimed responsibility or taken responsibility for the attack at this point. the demise of him removes a major troubling figure from the scene from th