at 8:30 eastern we'll discuss the thre of the milton group known as isis. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national

joining us is angela agree link keene. what was the president's reaction to the bee heading of the second american journalist? >> we spoke today for the first time about the murder of mr. sotloff. the obama said was much the same as what he said when he spoke about the murder of james foley,

which is that he wants to go after isis. he says that anyone who attacks americans should be weary because the u.s. will retaliate. so he spoke very firmly about the beheading. i expect to hear more from him. >> he said the united states will not be intimidated and he'll build a coalition to degrade and destroy the group. did he set out a time line? >> he did not put a time line on such a coalition, but clearly he signaled a desire for the european allies to step up and join the americans in that effort, and he of course will be meeting with leaders of many of the european countries the next two days in wales. host: what is his schedule? >> for the rest of today he is in estonia. he is meeting shortly with the

leaders of all three baltic nations and he will give a speech a little bit later this morning, where he will lay out strategy for ukraine. he flies to wales later today and is there for the nato summit the next few days before returning to washington friday night. host: there is reports, conflicting reports, of a possible permanent cease-fire between russia and ukraine. what are you hearing there? what was the president's reaction? >> the president received a word via news services about reports of a cease-fire as he was meeting with the estony and president. his remarks after that were very cautious. he was skeptical that there actually was agreement for a permanent cease-fire. he said that he would wasn't to see evidence of russia withdrawing its forces and its equipment before he puts trust

into such a promise. host: okay. so why is the president in estonia ahead of meeting with the nato allies? why estonia? >> he tacked on the visit to the already scheduled nato summit trip because he wanted to come to former russian republic and talk about how the u.s. and nato are committed as allies with estonia and the other two baltic nations to their protection. nato membership guarantees protection and if russia should encroach on estonia or -- as it did in ukraine, mr. bam's message is that the u.s. and nato would have their backs. he is also hear because, of course, it's very close to mr. putin's back yard and it's clearly sending a signal that obama is serious about his message, which up to date has mostly involved sanctions. host: so we were just showing video of the president landing down in estonia, holding that

news conference as we referenced earlier this morning. he's going to speak again later this morning, 9:00 a.m. eastern time. and then what do you expect him to say this morning about nato and russia? what do these -- what do our nato allies want to hear from him? >> we expect him to talk about ukraine, i think that was already the plan, and obviously with the events of today it's all the more relevant. he is likely to speak fairly firmly to president putin. that's why he's here, is to deliver firm words and this is his chance to do it in his address. so will be calling on nato allies to step up and join the u.s. in that effort in terms of defense spending as well as in terms of their verbal support. host: what can the president expect to be on the u.s. side when it comes to the islamic state? >> the president is counting on

the european allies, germany, france, the u.k. especially, to be part of a coalition in combating islamic states. he wants partners in the middle east, not just western europe, so we can likely see the u.s. and the western european searching for allies that they can work with, closer to iraq and syria, as well. host: okerstrom okerstrom okerstrom with the president. host: president obama holding the news conference where he responded for the first time to beheading of the second american journalist, saying the u.s. will not be intimidated and he plans to build a coalition, but not outlining a time line to do that. >> the u.k. says it is not ruling out air strikes against the islamic state, says that the hostage video which the

president also confirmed today at the news conference is genuine. this from the reuter's article, the islamic state seizure of a british hostage did not make air strikes on the militants more likely but said he wasn't ruling that option out. out. we'll get your thoughts. what should the u.s., if any, what should the u.s. response be? daniel in washinton, d.c., you're up first, daniel, good morning. caller: hi, good morning. host: go ahead. caller: i just think that when we talk about american response to the situation, it sort of presupposes that we're not responding, or -- and it sort is

undermines the reasoning for the act in the first place. i think it's evil, cruel and wrong what has happened. however i think that just anything -- american response, in other words i think local negotiated settlements is the only way to resolve these types of matters. it's a chaotic empire. you have this terrorist that we're compelled to support and terrorists that we're not. it becomes very, very complicated. i think that the way to do it is through diplomacy. we're up to our neck with troubles with people, and our own policies get us in troubles sometimes. host: all right, daniel. let's hear from jim in chicago.

independent caller. what do you think? caller: good morning. the question should be this. i read in the paper this morning that president obama knew about isis two years ago, he and the administration, and they chose to ignore it. i would like to know where -- the cia where have they been when it comes to intelligence? i think right now, we can go in there but it's too late, because this is a monster that's out of control, and again this president knew about isis a couple years ago. there was some reports where an american trained them in jordan, armed them, isis wanted to go after the president of syria. host: jim, what do you make of the intelligence chairwoman, dianne feinstein, democrat of california, saying on the sunday show the president is cautious, maybe in this case a little too cautious? she has access to the intelligence and she has seen the threat coming from the

islamic state. caller: object justly she was being kind to obama. i think she was trying to say indirectly why aren't you doing something? are you being lazy? how come you don't do anything? i think she knows the democrats are in trouble come november because there is a mess in the middle east, and it all goes back to the president and this administration. they didn't do anything two years ago. host: jim, so what do you think the president can do? what can the united states do? caller: he basically does things depending on the election. he's not going to do anything until at the election. host: okay. jim. do you think -- what is the role of the united states here? caller: the role should have been to go in there a long, long time ago and don't support people who are evil. isis is evil. they were hoping that they would overtake the president of syria. host: all right, jim. democratic call her, what do you think? caller: first of all let me speak to the guy who just got

off the phone. you need to get your facts together, fellow, and stop putting out these republican talking points, and yes, there is an election coming up and you think the democrats are going to stay home while you are -- no, no. first of all this guy had no business being in syria. either one of them should not have been there. they over there on their own, chasing money, they're over there trying to get stories that they can come back and sensational lies them. they had him one time, they let him go. you go back to the same thing you're asking for trouble. as far as isis is concerned, the president just struck in somalia a day before yesterday. here is what the problem i. when you put it out in the news, the news media is telling the enemy exactly how you're going to do it, how thick the walls are, just come in and do it. i served in combat. here is what needs to be done. we have generals sitting up

there making all these decisions. intie these folks hands, like they did in world war ii. go in there with the intentions of destroying and stopping the war. you fight these people one time. you kill them, and that's the only way you're going to resolve this. and thank you republicans for calling but we don't need your rhetoric this time. host: it is in the papers this morning about the u.s. attack against the african terror leader, so that is in the paper today, we can tell you a little bit about that yesterday, the pentagon spokesperson addressing that, saying the u.s. did carry out those strikes but not sure if they actually killed the leader of that terror group. this is the opinion section of "usa today." europe undermines europe's no ransom hostage policy. they say when paying ransom is the only policy you'll just pay more of it. this is in the second column.

>> harry, what do you think? what should the u.s. response be to the second beheading of an american journalist? caller: i think they ought to get retired generals, because seems like a lot of these generals are going to fall in line with obama. isis started four years ago. the intelligence communed warned almost. he has been making speeches, al-qaeda is dead and so on. let's face it, we had a jv president. now they got money, they got billions of dollars they're getting, and the problem is he doesn't hire somebody or make somebody president because of the color of they skin, and that's what happened. that caller was keeping saying

racism. they started, they see what we had as a president, and now the whole world is going crazy, putin is laughing at us. our allies won't come to our side. he went to the united nations twice, he didn't get any response. russian said when he went about the red line in syria, mute to inhad to clean up, that's how bad it's getting. the prime minister of great britain is more stronger than obama is. putin is telling red lines on them. it's getting ridiculous with this guy. host: what strength has the prime minister of britain shown? caller: he gave a speech yesterday. first thing he almost admitted this political correctness has got to stop. they showed a place in england, the last 14 years has been -- 1400 women raped in pakistan, and the british couldn't say

one -- had to take a plot i call correctness course. you can't keep using political correctness, you got to fight these people the way they fight us, and let's face is this president is inept and incompetent. if bush would have done this or anybody i would have felt the same way. as a matter of fact some people blame bush for isis. it's getting ridiculous. quit playing the politics, get back to being american. host: how do you know they weren't around when george w. bush was the president? caller: because the intelligence community said that they started four years ago. host: okay. i'm going to leave it there so i can get another voice in. "wall street journal" tweeting this. obama says it's too early to tell what a possible ukrainian russia cease-fire means. this is because of conflicting reports. the ukrainian president after a phone call with president viewen said there was some sort of deal, but the russian government

saying there is not, so the president is saying it's too early to tell. we'll see what happens, what unfolds ahead of president obama's comments at 9:00 a.m. eastern time. paul in tennessee, republican, paul, go ahead. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i just want to point out there's a difference between george w. bush and barack obama. congress gave bush the authority to go to war in iraq. that includes all them liberal democrats that want to sit back and holler that they don't want to do nothing but blame george w. bush when they were given the authority to go to war. it is al-qaeda we're fighting right now. the only thing is george bush went to the united nations, barack obama went to began tani know bay. host: the president said you know that he does plan to keep in touch with congress, that he possibly go to congress for some

sort of authority to broaden air strikes out of iraq and into syria. . >> what is your reaction to that? >> you tell me. why does the president need authority from mr. nelson or any other congressman to go to war to defend somebody that has just got their head cut off from america? it's ridiculous. it just shows that this administration is incompetent, and only thing they want to do is reach back and blame george w. bush for every stinking thing they can because they have no idea what to do next. host: okay, paul. look at the tweet from peter alexander. he tweeted this out about the president's news conference. obama says goal to degrade and destroy isis. i have to clarify suggest shrinking isis to a manageable

problem. ft. lauderdale, florida, democratic caller, mavis go ahead. caller: i'm calling in reference to a situation that we find ourself in as a country. and i want to say to the person who just got off the phone not too long ago they're trying to say that isis was not around until the last three to four years. you look at these men who are fighting they weren't born within the past three to four years. these people are upset with america, but yes because of what george bush did. going into a country, i mean had no knowledge of what is going to happen. let's go and bomb them, bomb them, and then what happens after we leave. you know, and i was -- i would like to give up at least four congress people to go over there and fight on behalf of america. let mr. mccain, let's send

graham. they want to fight, let them go over and start the fighting. it's always easy to send other people's children to fight on behalf of america, but them are senators and congress people they sit back, they make nice, they be say war, war, war. what happens when we leave? host: okay. we'll take a look at this. this is a tweet from adam schiff. reports of isil beheading second journalist steven sotloff another gruesome reminder of their evil. isil must be confronted and destroyed. that from a democrat, and we'll read several other tweets for you from members of congress, as well. rick klein, who is a reporter for abc news tweets this out, seems to be a mixed message from

obama this morning, destroying or simply making isis manageable problem. we'll go to sandra in adelboro, massachusetts, independent caller. caller: good morning. i think they're nothing but savages, and they have no education. if they do have ad he you on case it's only bitterness and hate. we got to fight bitterness and hate with hate. i don't think so. we think with our brain and stop thinking how good it would be to attack them front on. we attack them sneakily. we get them. we stop at nothing. and remember, these are human beings that had their heads just removed with families that are

heartbroken, and you know what? it's only a stupid little kid, that's all they are, is children, who would like to take a cat down the street and clobber it and think nothing about it, and walk away and said hey, i'm a winner. no they're not. they're the loser we're the win he. we're going to come out on top because of one thing. we're going to use our brin and not our braun. host: what do you want the president to do? caller: what i want him to do is shut his mouth, not say anything about it, be quiet, don't let the whole world know what he's thinking, get the job done. that's how we used to do things. today we broadcast it across the nation. smart enup. don't tell anyone. get in there, get the job done. i think that's just what he's doing. he's not a dumb man. he's always been criticized because of his race.

he's in between white and black. that poor man is fighting an issue there in itself, and we are as a human being are rotten, rotten to the core. stand by this man, and applaud him, because you know what? he needs your help now. he doesn't need your cynicism, he doesn't need you to criticize him. he needs you to build and bolster him and he will get the job done. host: all right, sandra. elizabeth, illinois, republican caller. you're on the air. go ahead. caller: okay. first of all i disagree with the last caller. it's not his race, but we have anything against or we wouldn't have elected him in the first place. i think our president and congress ought to get together and throw bombs at them until they have nowhere to walk. get rid of them, because if they don't they're going to be over in america, after us. so we got to grow some hair on

our chest and get going before it's too late. host: okay. a republican of new hampshire sits on the armed services committee, the president must produce a strategy without delay to defeat isis. and here is another tweet. we need president obama to communicate a clear strategy and goals on how he plans to stop this threat. and then a third from rene almers, a member of the leadership team on the house, the president admitted he had no strategy to address the isis threat. this is unacceptable. america is looking for leadership. democratic caller, what do you think? caller: good morning. host: good morning. caller: i just find it amazing that you can listen to the rhetoric coming out the republican callers this morning.

two people can look at the same situation and see it so differently. president obama is the most intelligent president we've had in this country. the way he's using the military right now, it's the most intelligent way you can do it. you don't go fight terrorists by just bomb, bomb, bombing. you got to have a mental plan. you got to intelligently fight them. if you look at the way obama is using the military, not one military person has been killed. and we still getting the job done. the republicans and the media all they looking for is sensational is im. you know, they criticize president obama for everything he does. right down to his and the suit. how stupid is that? host: front page of the "washington times" here is the headlines.

host: john in new hampshire, democratic caller, john, what do you think the yo u.s. response should be? your senator tweeted out that the u.s. response -- that the beheading of the second journalist cannot go unanswered and the u.s. needs to destroy the islamic state. what do you think? caller: i think that's an obvious response, and obama stated the same thing. but what's most disturbing of this whole issue is back when the syrian issue on chemical weapons, when obama asked the congress, per se, i apologize,

but -- their guidance and assistance with taking care of the issues within the syrian crisis, which from my understanding this whole issue has developed. going through that period with mccain, ayotte especially in this state, were dumbfounded and very quiet, never asked to pitch iin and to provide their solutin to the problems. but also with that, and again, you know, i understand congress is on break, why isn't john mccain bringing the congress back? h the congress is coming back next week, and we will see what unfolds there. the "washington times" reporting others reporting senator nelson, florida democrat said tuesday he'll offer legislation giving mr. obama legal authority to target the islamic state in

syria. here is a quote. this will ensure there's no question that the president has the legal authority he needs to use air strikes in syria. let there be no doubt we must go after isis right away because thes u.s. is the only one that can put together the coalition to stop this group. specifically many lawmakers are calling on the administration to provide greater military assistance to iraqi and kurdish forces battling the islamic state in iraq. in addition to pleas that the white house authorize bombings in syria. here is a quote, sadly isis is bringing the bar barrity across the region, beheading those who don't share their dark eye did iology. . host: david cameron, the prime minister of britain, who proposed new travel and passport restrictions designed to elimit

islamic state abilities to return to britain said he's aware one of his country men is being held by the group. clinton, young son, go ahead with your thoughts. caller: hi. first of all, what is happening in the middle east has been happening for more than a hundred years, since before the demise of the empire, the factions there have tried to establish. they have been working on this, trying to do this before the end of world war i. that's the first thing. we think in terms of iraq and afghanistan and iran, but it's all part of the empire. we put those lines on the map. that's one. host: okay. caller: number two is that you know, the obama administration is clueless. they have nobody, there's no

gravitas from their administration. the problem with mr. obama is that he had a world view that's faulty, and he's run right into reality. he thought that what you hear some of the callers say it's all america's fault. no, this is the result of historical trends that have gone for hundreds of years, thousands of years. that's number two. number three, is the bush administration had a cohesive world view that matched reality. you know, like every administration, they run into the situation of events, and they deal with it. but mr. bush could solve those issues with resolution and he had a great brain press of people in his administration. obama does not have a cohesive

world view. and he's incompetent, and it's not that people are racist, he used to have 50% approval rating. people aren't stupid. they see this guy does not have a clue. host: major garrett who reports for cbs tweets thissous, probably traveling with the president. it's going to be a long run problem. threats evolve. that have a direct affect on europe. the president obama seeing this as a long run problem. greg in new york, independent caller. caller: i'm caging in regards to the isis question. my opinion is that isis is not really the biggest threat to america. a lot of this is propaganda. these are videos that are propaganda, no different than the very propaganda that our corporate media uses on a daily basis against americans.

the biggest threat in my opinion is the two party shape. and all these baby boomers that get on c-span, i watched this program for years and still to this day, think that one knows more than the rest, at a point when our president probably should have our support, to see so many americans complain about this and that after we meddled with so many countries' affairs and exacerbate situations, start wars, this and that, and all for money, really. all for banking, all for expanding territory of our capitalist bankers, central bankers, and really pushing upon -- pushing our way of life upon others. i understand that these guys are animals, i get it. and the extremism of islam, and

just islam for the most part, is very sue present i cyst religion. if you read the quaran, it's no different. a lot of this stuff is just divide and concur mentality. and it's about time that baby boomers really realize all the damage that they've done to the world to infer americans, you know, future generations, their children, their grandchildren. and voting for third parties, genuine third parties that are libertarians, greenes, and constitutionalists. host: how old are you? caller: 28. host: 28. greg in new york, that's his opinion, independent caller. on the ukraine russia situation, we told you earlier there are conflicting reports of a possible permanent cease-fire. the president saying it's too early to tell if those reports

are serious. the president making a stop in estonia ahead of his trip to wales where he will be meeting with the nato allies for two days. ahead of that trip fox news reports obama announces plan to send aircraft units to the baltics. here is a caption, a picture of the president, this morning walking with the estonian president, reviewing the honor guard in estonia. the president announced plans to send aircraft to the baltic republics as part of an effort to reassure the countries of estonia of their security, as nato members in the wake of ongoing arrest in ukraine. gregory court for "usa today" reports summit stops are meant to reassure obama wants to send a message to russia, reporting the baltic nation of estonia is one of three countries that borders russia.

thursday obama meets with other leaders in wales, ukraine tops the agenda. the catchword of the european trip will be, reassurance. the article holds that an attack on one member is an attack on all members, obama said last week the nato sum met needs to refocus attention on those assurances.

.

that from the financial times out of london. an independent caller, what are your thoughts this morning on the second beheading of an american journalist? how should the u.s. respond? caller: we first have to troy to take emotion out of it. emotion leads us to make bad decisions, and realize the history of beheading. the united states at one time beheaded slaves and stuck them on posts, to do the same thing, to paralyze the population. from that standpoint we always have to realize are we feeding into the problem by getting emotional and having a reaction that brings other people into harm's dangers. if we do decide and it should be some recourse, we have to realize it have to be a national

event. to send people soldiers over there and not support them in the sense of financial, in the sense of the slight of the public, it should be some type of no one ever talked about this, some type of draft, some type of support where everybody, rich, poor, black, white, all play a bigger part in this. this is not a one time or short-term event. the president is correct, he should look at it from the standpoint of long term. short term, the middle east is not a short-term problem. to go and fight an aggressive war or a conflict, when we're not at war, we keep thinking that term, it's a conflict. host: do you think this issue should be a national event. should it be an international event? caller: we first have to look at it from our standpoint. if we -- we should have other people play along, the arab

nations, europe, and so forth. but we first have to say what are we going to do? host: okay. caller: before you do anything else, you first have to determine what we are going to play, no matter what. now the degree we play has to be determined by who we can get to play along with us. host: okay. along that point, prime minister david cameron earlier today in his question and answer session talked about the role of isis in their latest act of bee heading an american journal list. take a look. >> i'm sure the whole house and the whole country will join with me in condemning the sickening and brutal murder of another american hostage and share our shock and anger that it again appears to have been carried out by a british citizen. let me be very clear, this country will never give in to terrorism. our position to isil will

continue at home and abroad. it is important that we are clear about the nature of the threat we are facing. it makes no distinction between cultures, countries and religions. there is no way to apiece it. the only way defeat it is to stand firm and send a very straightforward message. a country like ours will not be coward by these barbaric killers. if they think we will weaken in the face of their threats, they are wrong. it will have the opposite effect. we will be more forthright in the defense of values, liberty under the rule of law, freedom and democracy that we hold deer and i'm sure a united message to that effect will go forward from this house today. host: david cameron earlier today before the house of commons, we are covering that. prime minister question and answer session on c-span two. it continues right now. if you're interested, c-span 2, this our live coverage. from the u.s. embassy, this

picture tweeted out moments ago, u.s. embassy in estonia, a picture of president obama and his respective partners meeting around a table there in estonia, meeting with the baltic states there as the reporters have said to reassure the allies there that the u.s. will protect them. we are talking about the isis beheading of a second merge journalist, steven sotloff. what should the u.s. response be? we'll take a few more phone calls. kim in columbus, ohio, democratic caller. go ahead. caller: hi, how are you doing? i wanted to just say that i think barack obama has a plan. i don't think he's telling his plan. i mean, i think if he tells his plan, the media will tell everybody what his plan is. i think we have a very clever president. i like the way he's not letting our troops get killed. i think to me that's one of the

biggest things, we letting our troops get killed, i think it's terrible the way they killed those people. all these embassies we have, we got to worry about what they going to do, why don't we just bring our people home? why don't we just leave? and i can't forget that movie, where it says how america got tricked. hoover, that bothers me, it bothers me to -- makes me think that we really did get tricked. i remember i was thinking let's go get them. but to find out that iraq had nothing to do with it, we should have never been there. they wouldn't -- they wouldn't be -- what i'm trying to say if that president was still there, we wouldn't be having all these problems. he didn't even like al-qaeda. host: in the washington post this morning obama's unnerving

happy talk. worried about terrorists taking over much of syria and iraq if not for twitter. this explanation following obama's indiscrete admission thursday that we don't have a strategy for military action. adds to the impression that obama is disingaged. in short americans would worry less if obama worried more. a poll released last week found that 54% of the public think bam is not tough enough in foreign policy. americans are not necessarily asking for more military action.

that in the "washington journal" this morning. caller: first a lot of people, i'm not sure what do they -- he's not going to come out and

say exactly okay, we're going to go, i'm going to send seal team six on this day and we're going to send them over there and kill two al-qaeda -- isis people. i mean, it's like okay, no, we don't have a plan yet. we don't have a strategy. and two weeks from now he might have this whole thing whipped up. and there's so many people that get caught up in the we need something to happen right now. and the right now really isn't what this is -- i agree with the previous caller when they were saying this is a long-term thing, because this has been going on for years and this is really on my second point. this is something that has been going on, i mean they say a hundred years, this is like a gang over there. and i find it ironic that the united states is -- is the so-called majority people that are going over there to try to dictate, basically a race relation problem over there where you got classes and different races where they go we

want these people to be in charge. no, i think these people should be in charge. then you got a minority who is not even represented in the whole equation. and then all of a sudden it just seems so ironic that of all the people in the whole world you think the united states the one country that probably has the biggest race issue in the world, goes to another country and tell them they need to get their race relations in check? it just seems so odd to me, you know what i'm saying? host: i'm going to go on to myrna in capital heights, maryland, a democratic caller. your thoughts. caller: my thought is this. i partly agree with the caller who just called. why would obama tell them his strategy? just like he said, it would be all over the news. and also, if he didn't have isis worried do you think that they would be beheading american reporters?

no. he's got them where to leave them alone, he know exactly what he's doing. who got obl? obama. as soon as he got -- leave the man alone. he knows exactly what he's doing, and he's using his strategy. keep his mouth shut. that's my comment. host: all right. politics, here is the politics in the nation section of the "washington post." over the counter birth control. at least 3 gop hopefuls have spoken during the summer in favor of allowing certain types of contraception to be sold without a prescription. representative cory gardner republican of colorado who is challenging mark udall, released a television ad in which he tells a room full of women, i believe the pill ought to be available around the clock without a prescription, cheaper and easier for you. the ad followed similar remarks by ed gillespie. and mike mcfadden who is

challenging senator franken in minnesota. so that on campaign 2014. also we are covering the north carolina senate debate, as part of our campaign 2014 coverage. that is live tonight, 7:00 p.m. eastern time, here on c-span. this is one of the races that many are watching to see what happens with control of the senate. the incumbent there, senator kay hagen, that debate tonight on c-span at 7:00 p.m. eastern time, part of our campaign 2014 coverage. back to your calls, rick in ohio, republican caller. rick, good morning to you. what do you think? what should the u.s. response be to the beheading of steven

sotloff? caller: first of all, it's a terrible thing that happened, it's not right. and our nation and all the free nations we should look at one thing, we're all one race, the human race. we need to get it together. we need to get these terrorists out of there. we should use -- i saw in your one article that i saw earlier i think drones are the way to go. we won't have the casualties of our soldiers, and we need to take care of it. and -- host: we understand your point, rick. got it. we'll go on to dave in michigan. republican caller. hi, dave. caller: good morning. i think what most of the callers need to realize is that isis is not just in iraq, it's also right here in america. throughout the cities of this country. and we have also about a number of airlines that are passenger planes that are missing in

libya, they just discovered that. they have the money and they have the weapons in iraq, but what they're planning to do is deliver that money to the cells here in america and then they will do their dirty deeds right here in this country. host: so you see this threat as more imminent? caller: oh, yes, it's much more imminent. by the way, obama released the leader of that isis group in the year 2010. host: where did you road that? caller: he was in the prisons in iraq, and they reeseed them when they came out of -- when he withdrew the troops, he let the guy just go. host: where did you read that? caller: where did i read it? i can't recall where i read it. i just know that i -- i believe i heard it on the news or the television. host: okay. all right. some other quick headlines for you this morning. companies and market section of the financial times, halliburton

agreed to pay $1 billion for the deep water settlement that the 2010 deep water horizon disaster, agreeing to pay $1 billion. on 2016 campaign news, chris christie, the governor of new jersey is making a trade mission to mexico, seen as a way to brush up on foreign experience prior to 2016. and then you have governor o'malley a democrat of maryland, saying that martin o'malley, telling people behind closed doors, private fundraisers, he is inching closer to a presidential run, telling them hillary clinton's candidacy won't stop him from seeking the democratic nod. lebron, georgia, independent caller. you're our last for now on this. go ahead. caller: yes. i think we need to -- we're missing the focus of exactly

what these little conflicts are over there. first of all, they're none of our business. second of all, if somebody wants to come over here to attack us, the way that we go over there and attack them, we're attaching them with the highest grade military in the world, and in retrospect what they have compared to us is throwing stones back. i can guarantee you we continue to go over there harassing these crazy people they will end up here. and i believe against our national security interests that george bush went over there for the eleath to help line the elite's pockets. and that's what these wars do, people. they get sold to us, and that's -- also you read something a moment ago about the percentage of the republicans that have flip-flopped on going outside of the country to handle these conflicts. well the reason is, because the republicans are always for the elite. the elite get to sell us.

military equipment. they get to sell us military contracts, they get to sell us. so watch out for what the elite and the republicans are trying to sell you. this is a national security interest for us, to stay out of that country. host: okay. we're going to leave it there. i want to let our viewers know, this headline from the washington freebie condition.

so that from th the washington e beacon. we're going to take a break from this topic for the next half hour or so, and then we'll return to it later. up next we're going to talk to kara dansky, the author of a new report from the american civil liberties union, looking at the excessive mill i tarrization of the american police forces. we'll talk with former ambassador nicholas burns on the isis, syria and russia situation. we'll get to that right after this break.

here are some highlights for this coming weekend. friday, live at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span, the nebraska supreme court will hear argument on the keystone excel pipeline. saturday signatures 30:00 p.m., former sec commissioners robert mcdowell, with campaign 2014 gearing up watch the latest debates on c-span. and republican nominee. author john yu shares his opinion on international law and what little affect it has on the behavior of powerful nations. mike gonzales and how he thinks republicans can make gains for the hispanic vote. sunday at noon on in-depth, our throw hour conversation and your phone calls with the former chair of the u.s. commission on civil rights

her vasive the issue was. so we conducted an investigation. 800 paramilitary rates over the course of two years and these raidslly that were being carried out not for the reasons most would expect. hostage, active shooter-type situations, but low often than not, pretty level ordinary law enforcement situations like serving search warrants on people's homes and excessive.at to be host: the report was released in june, 2014. before, what happened in ferguson, missouri. what, them to, did you see from news reports from ferguson, missouri that match up this report? guest: americans looked at the aftermath of the michael brown

found something that they found to be quite shocking in terms of the ilitarized and aggressive police response to what began as a peaceful protest. ut we know, in fact, what happened in ferguson is indicative and reflective of a the broader trend of militarization of policing. local police departments for the decades have been collecting weaponry from the pentagon, sometimes purchased they've gotten from the departments of justice and homeland security to amass these arsenals. host: what did it look like to the police force. weaponry did they have or equipment that you elieve is excessively militarized? guest: law enforcement agencies across the country are getting, armored personnel carriers, assault rifles, combat gear of many at varieties, that they're using, again, for law enforcement purposes. and much of this equipment and weaponry was created and designed for overseas combat.

host: when you did your report, what were you looking at specifically. what sort of data were you looking at so you could -- what were you lice forces looking at that you could analyze the situation and ultimately come up with this conclusion. guest: well, it's challenging. 18,000 law enforcement agencies across the country. public records requests to a couple of them. segments of the law enforcement that exist. we asked them to give us incident reports of their data.litary rates, raw so we examined these incident reports as well as invoices and transfers equipment and receipts from the federal government over the course of two years. because police departments are virtually autonomous. they have a tremendous amount of of records from the law enforcement agencies that we

in addition tong policies, protocols, training documents. gamut. the host: you looked at special weapons, tactics teams, s.w.a.t. teams. what did you find out? guest: s.w.a.t. teams were to deal n the 1960s with the emergency scenarios that, again, you and i and many s.w.a.t. uld expect teams to respond to. they're being used routinely for rdinary law enforcement, including searching people's homes, often for pretty small amounts of drugs. it's important to understand, when there's a search of a person's home, there's been no crime committed necessarily. there's no perpetrator. there's no conviction. there's no crime. it's essentially an investigation. so what we saw is the common paramilitary weapons and tactics to conduct investigations in people's homes referenced and others have referenced a study of a eastern gist in kentucky university, he found a istory of s.w.a.t. teams and

raids, showing the viewers some s, those findings, in the 1970 there were few hundred a year. in the 1980s, 3,000 a year. 2005, the last time the data at available, you're looking $50,000 a year. guest: right. even though it's important to nderstand that a lot of americans were looking at what happened in ferguson and were quite shocked, you're right, the s.w.a.t. raids has increased exponentially. ostly to wage the war on drugs is one of our findings. this is happening in ways that predominantly impact. stop you there. showing our viewers, mostly to wage this war on drugs. we're showing our viewers that 79% of state and use the s.w.a.t. deployments for search warrants. go to your nts to point of possible drug offenders, right? guest: the majority of people impacted by these were the color. of

that's the point to emphasize that communities of color have been policed for decades. what we're seeing today is what we've seen for a time for poor communities. host: when they come to raid the person's house, you don't know what they have on the other side of the door. they could have a gun. this equipment is being used to protect them. we foundhat's not what when we looked at the data. we found overwhelmingly they're s.w.a.t. raids and paramilitary tactic in low level cenarios sometimes with tragic and horrific results including the case of baby boo boo who was injured old critically a n a s.w.a.t. team raided home in which he was staying when they suspected a man of having $50 worth of drugs. i've spoken with members of law enforcement that say quite the contrary. paramilitaryice use

weapons and tact ins, what they're doing is not protecting hemselves and others, but undermining public safety an use going in with aggression, it makes violence. host: the pent b gone is saying they're not pushing it out, they're saying it's being requested. there's a cost to the taxpayer? guest: not a cost to the taxpayer federally. the pentagon purchased the weaponry. there's been a cost to the taxpayer. law enforcement doesn't pay for the equipment they get from the pentagon. they do have to pay to get that transported. it's not an expense. they have to pay for maintenance and upkeep. obama after the shooting death of michael brown in ferguson, missouri said he for a comprehensive review of these types of programs from the pentagon. recommendations to the president? guest: we think that reform can come in three ways.

are ink all three necessary. one is that there should be reasonable limitations on the weaponryon of military by local law enforcement. we don't think that law enforcement needs to have access combat uniforms and military weaponry that they access to.ave two are reasonable limitations on the use of the equipment. veryone agrees there are circumstances in which it's appropriate for law enforcement to have that aggressive response, not in kinds of cases that we saw when we did the report. we think reasonable limitations on the use of the equipment are appropriate. three, the accountability. we think that there should be tandardized data collection, reporting oversight, and accountability at all levels of government, including the federal government. >> do you see it on a federal level? encouraged to see the senator come in here. host: a tremendous amount of interest in this topic. people were shocked by what they

saw in ferguson. there's a lot of room to talk about oversight and accountability, reasonable use of ons on the equipment and acquisition of equipment. and we are hopeful that senator will draw out an important conversation about all three of the areas. missouri.ocrat of the senator from that state who chairs the senate subcommittee and deral, financial, contracting oversight. "the washington post" reporting she plans to use her perch there examine the federal programs that allow local police acquire this military equipment. first phone call for karen dance comes from joshua, deer park, washington, independent. go ahead caller: good morning. i generally don't agree with aclu does.at the i would say welcome to the party. you do not do half measures on this. you focus on the hardware. you need to focus on the picture.of the

>> our chief of police in spokane, he changed the colors of the police cars. he bought stingers. through the federal government which takes a local beat cop and turns them to whatever. i don't know. mistake if you focus on half measures and hardware. the hardware is horrific. in mayberry elieve and andy taylor. policing that local is and it'serything federalized and we have an issue. >> three issues. to a broader point issue, which is the culture of the militarization of policing. we touch on in our report but i didn't talk about too much this morning. it's true.

militarization of policing is not limited to equipment. t includes a culture of militarism that we see pervading local law enforcement. two, the issue of the use of local lance equipment by law enforcement is another issue we determine to be outside of he scope of what we were studying, your caller is right to point to it as a critical issue. washington isu of all over this issue. he should reach out. >> you -- he was a republican caller. you heard other calls from republican senators that agree with you that it's too militarized. are you encouraged by that? do you think something happens bipartisan level? guest: it's a nonpartisan issue. the board are concerned about it. host: tom, you're next. republican caller? caller: a question for the gentleman that you have on. hopefully you bring a republican or counterguest on. -- re getting this person this gentleman on the whole show to himself.

to : you must be listening the radio. dansky.alking to kara i thought -- i'm a police getting their point of view too. have any on't conservative guests. there's not an equal number of either.an calls taken so maybe c-span should do something about that. there are a int, lot of people who are all of the shooting at the militarized is a place word as far as the shooting and weapons and things like that. know police have many more vehicles and stuff like that. fori think they were needed what was being thrown at them. thank you. host: okay. uest: you know, i spoke with members of law enforcement in the wake of the militarized response in ferguson.

what they told me overwhelmingly is that law enforcement response was it was militarized, it was unnecessarily aggressive, nd that initially, what needed to happen was that the response to peaceful protests should be a response that's designed to deescalate. so if you send in law nforcement with that kind of militaristic weaponry and tact ins and culture, frankly, you risks of alating the violence. so what my friends in the law nforcement community told me was that, in fact, one said literally that what ended up ferguson is scare the shoulders of law enforcement response. there was an opportunity but they didn't take it. equipment is strictly a local and state issue. o washington, d.c. expert interference is needed. guest: it's not solely a local issue. the federal government that's fueling the acquisition of this military weaponry at the local level.

host: on that point. busy bee tweets in, does the program, the pentagon of old disposing equipment. is there a need for new items. guest: congress created this 1997.m in congress thought at the time it would be a good idea to give to transferuthority free of charge this military weaponry. interestingly, 30% of the weaponry that's transferred under the program is brand new. 60% of it is coming back from overseas. 30% is brand new. the d.o.d. spokesperson at a pentagon briefing addressed the 1033 program. here's what he had to say. on want to make one point this. i understand this is an issue of concern now out there. program is not -- we don't push equipment on anybody. his is excess equipment the

taxpayers have paid for. we're not using it anymore. it's made available to law enforcement agencies if they it, if they qualify for it. in other words, there's a lot of due diligence here. we're not going to give more equipment or equipment that's inappropriate for use by a law agency that's small and did you want need it. you know? just because they ask for a helicopter doesn't mean they get helicopter. there's a due process here. there's a lot of thought that goes into this. militarizing law enforcement, we're not pushing things out. this process by which equipment is available should they deem that they need it and they want it. host: your response. guest: i would agree with them department of justice isn't necessarily pushing the equipment and the local law enforcement asks for the equipment. it's another question whether it's appropriate for law enforcement to have that equipment. there's been due diligence. host: brian in massachusetts, caller.dent hi, brian. caller: how you doing? host: good morning.

i ler: first of all, definitely think the police should wear cameras because they are corrupt. my son , they charged with having a knife. they didn't have a knife. it wasn't even in the police report. court.nt to the lady said the son had a knife and attempted to stab somebody. i got up and said the next person who says my son had a to sue him.oing the judge checked the police report and said why are you saying that. are we even here. i went to the mayor, he wouldn't nothing. i tried to hire lawyers, $20,000 i give them. they said we won't do that when they charge people, we make money. host: on this issue, should the cameras? wearing guest: it's important that the cameras.ar it's important for the accountability purposes. oversight for e the use of the cameras at law enforcement. but oversight on the collection, information of the that's retained. there are privacy issues that when the police

use information from body cameras. absolutely. do that?o should the federal government that has oversight over the data because concerns?vacy should bit the local and state governments? guest: there's so much we think it's important that for any police department that equips the that they th cameras have locally placed the rigorous standards over the collection, maintenance, and distribution of data. we have some safeguards and policies and practices that we if d be happy to share there's interest. host: you want to share them now, go ahead. guest: in terms of safeguards? host: yes, go ahead. local police nk should have the rules regarding the data that's collected, the ength of time that the data is retained, and limitations on the distributions of the individuals captured in the video retained by a police warrant body camera should have access camera, but the police should be careful in terms of how they use that information.

go to dan in lumberton, texas. democratic caller. hi, dan. caller: how are you doing this morning? morning.ood caller: i have a question. the se of the act where military is not supposed to be citizens, t american is it possible that maybe because of demonstrations that place and stuff and they're getting to where they don't want the demonstrations shown much on tv and stuff. hey're going around the posi act. in militarized the police place of the military. guest: it was enacted after the civil war. prevent the to

federal military from getting involved in local law enforcement. it's been weakened over time and we don't think the act offers action in the militarization of policing. host: the lead author of the aclu report issued in june ofking at the militarization the american police force calling it excessive. i want to keep taking your morning.on that this democrats, 202-585-3880. republicans, 202-505-3881. 202-585-3882. the "usa today" with this ferguson hat the olice have begun

to get a clearlt picture of how much money the spending tourity is arm local law enforcement. host: difficult why? no oversight. accounting? guest: this is another frarns si issue. there have been efforts in ongress to determine how much money the department of homeland security is spending to militarize local law enforcement oft they haven't gotten much an answer. host: how do the grants work? the grants work by the department of homeland security state 's called the administering agency and the agency distributes it within that state to local law enforcement. other grants come directly from the department of homeland security to local law enforcement. so there is a lot of variation. complicated.ing

it ends up being part of the problem in terms of oversight. twitter says no police force should be outgunned by gangs. they need to be able to take on the threats. but shorty said if police get video should not show up on tv, social media, or files.a ralph, what's your question or comment? caller: i read an article cameras on theut police. they found the number of complaints against police fell of what they were before. a boy from chicago. kicked n the curb and the teeth in. but that's called cushing. stop until one year, three police officers were killed. i mean people started to shoot back. it's to the point where these guys are completely lawless and not filtering out the sociopaths.

guest: there are a few bad apples out there, that's the get from ferguson and other examples, horrific examples of law enforcement gone wrong. really much more of a systemic problem. again, we see from the defense of rtment, the department homeland security, the department of justice, billions of dollars worth of funding and equipment going to local law enforcement. host: charles, texas city, independent caller. hi, charles. caller: good morning. on to what the last caller was saying. i was watching a video on facebook. individual. a marine -- if anyone wants to look it up, i think it was army marine. up against a he was a cop. he walked up to the guy. he was wrong for how he stepped cop. the

but the cop sliced him. and then as he's dealing with what's going see on. you hear him like -- [ grunting ] and like this and so on and so forth, you can't see what the doing.an is he has a body cam on. so if you want to change directions and so on and so forth, you can sort of manipulate how -- what it's not.ng and what it's in addition, you talk about the data base, how the information to be adjusted once it goes the data base. and then finally, and this is a scary question, because you're force of the the united states. you're talking about -- but question.e states sanctioned murder. it okay to t is defend yourself.

t what point am i wrong for attacking the individual. the whole thing with michael brown, this is the tip of the iceberg. of people don't understand how often this goes on. going back to way back in history. so, at what point -- where do how do we do we -- engage in the state sanctioned murder? who has theability, right to kill? not to arrest, but to kill. karadansky. this points to two things. the caller reiterated to something i said earlier. the police are unnecessarily aggressive and militarized in poor communities of color for a long time. communities of color know how aggressive the police have become. think your caller is pointing to that problem. this is not in many ways a new

problem. the second point is that i have spoken with members of law who are deeply oncerned and police engage in communities in hyper aggressive and militarized fashion, it public confidence in law enforcement, makes the job of law enforcement that much harder. the police are there to protect serve, not to wage war against communities that they re designed and supposed to be protecting. >> smith station, alabama, caller there. good morning to you, caleb. >> good morning. >> i wanted to say, of the police, okay? aw enforcement is used to protect and serve. nd you know the complaints .bout providing law enforcement

we don't see militarization cases going on every day normally. things do popses, up, like what happened in ferguson. first day, michael brown was shot, and then the ext day, the whole city is rioting, looting stores, seeing eople shooting their ways into stores, burning buildings down. i mean that -- that right there alone, that is a war zone. so i can imagine if i was sitting out looking out my front at the streets of ferguson, what are we going to -- what do we need out there. we need a force that can stop things like that. that point. guest: it's important to remember that initially after mike brown was killed, there protests.ful the community came out to whatss their concern about happened to mike brown and the protests were peaceful at that point. is incouple , it

bent upon law enforcement to -- to have a presence and to ensure feels safe.y law enforcement's job there is to deescalate and make sure that things don't erupt. what happened in ferguson is the law enforcement came in with a hypermilitarized and hyperaggressive response that fueled the problem and escalated the violence. host: from your report, an estimated 500 law enforcement aths have received mine resistant ambush protected mrap withstand ilt to armor-piercing roadside bombs. the problem isn't the equipment per se, it's the police wanting to show off. when does the city of 23,000 need an mrap? guest: and i think the number closer to ow, it's 600 since it came out in june. a number of people coming back and afghanistan say this is crazy. people who operated mraps in and afghanistan. it's an armored vehicle built to

armored piercing roadside bombs. and there's no reason to be driving this down main street. host: in glen oak, maryland, independent caller, go ahead. caller: good morning. one of the things that i would hear you talk about here s sort of like the elephant in the room, that's race to the issue. race and racism. at the dichotomy, the pictures there in ferguson, we ee overwhelmingly an african-american, a black community surrounded by an hyper militarized a te force and generally white force that's understood and perceived by the black community to be racist. that racism is a very, very big part of the american ulture in relationship to race relationships. relationships here. and that response from the of the black community was a racist response, response, e military

but a culture that actually perceived the black community as an enemy. so i would love to hear you talk a bit about that. host: i think it's absolutely true to point out that the excessively been aggressive and militarized in predominantly black and also for a very nities long time. caller.gree with your oich we looked at the 800

paramilitary raids. we pulled out information we wanted to annualize. one of the pieces of information was the number and race of individuals that were impacted by the raids. we counted it up. analysis. we found that of those 800 a majority of the people impacted were black and latino. the race disparity became more exacerbated when you look conductedds that were for the purpose of searching people's homes. so, again, the police have been paramilitary weapons and tactics to search people's homes color for a s of long time. in the raids that we looked at, in terms oh it was race of the people impacted. host: if you want to read the aclu.org's to website. it is, war comes home. andrea, you're our last caller, go ahead.

-- er: i was just thinking host: you there? i think we lost her. go on to derek in spalding, independent caller. caller: roundrock, texas. have a couple of quick questions. not going to give an editorial. constitutes militarized equipment for one? like where do you draw that line? what is militarized equipment? guest: any equipment from the defense department is considered equipment. we looked at, for example, the use of armored personnel of assault e use rifles, flash bang grenades, rams.ing host: if you missed it, you can aclu.org. website at the report is there. war comes home. of excessive militarization american policing. aclu.dansky of

guest: thank you for having me. host: going to return to the of isis asthe threat well as what's going on between and russia. possible pending permanent cease-fire between the countries. former ambassador nicholas burns coming up next. and later we will open up the get your s to thoughts, continue the thoughts on the threat of isis. but first, a news update from radio. >> it's 8:32 a.m. eastern time. has this ated press report, lingering questions about michael brown could be judge d today when a considers two media requests to release any possible juvenile of the unarmed 18-year-old who was killed by a issouri police officer last month. juvenile records are confidential in missouri. o it's not definitively known if mr. brown was arrested before adult.lly became an

said mr. brown had no adult criminal record. ell, ahead of friday's jobs reports, dan diamond writing in forbes said that the, quote, nation's economic recovery has been slow but the labor market 230,000 jobs ut per month so far this year. total on to write by jobs per month, 2014 has seen the fastest rate of growth since 1998. the strong gains so far also meant that as of may of 2014, economy finally recovered the millions of jobs that the labor market lost 2008 and 2010. the bureau of labor statistics provided his data. and new jobs from former u.s. enators, center for public integrities alexander cohen reports that gas prong bank, gpb, a russian bank targeted ith sanctions by president obama over the ukraine crisis and the state-owned energy

gas prong has hired majority leader trept lott, a republican in mississippi and john bro, a r democrat of louisiana. hey're listed as the main lobbyist under the gas prong bank account for the firm squire patten laws. they're lobbying on laws and regulations including inapplicable sanctions. those are some of the headlines on c-span raid -- radio.

>> washington journal continues. ost: former ambassador nicholas burns this morning a professor of school of diplomacy n international politics joining us from harvard this morning in cambridge, massachusetts. the former undersecretary of political affairs for 2005 to 2008, welcome, sir. thank you. begin with the news this morning. the guardian tweeting russia and ukraine's permanent cease-fire appears to unraveled already this morning. it was announced before we went at 7:00 a.m. eastern time by the ukrainian government that hey reached some sort of permanent cease-fire. but it appears to have already unraveled. ambassador burns, your reaction? somewhat unpredictable. he's holding the country together. russians have invaded. the russian troops have come across the border in the last

ten days. for months, the pro moscow separatist fighters ukraine, the tern big cities, doniesk, unliveable, chaotic, and violent. so he's trying to get a ease-fire in order to get himself so breathing space before he continues the struggle to reunite his country. but the kremlin denied there was a cease-fire. that it did olds not intervene so it cannot agree to a cease-fire. the cease-fire is broken down. issue is that the european union and the united states have considered further russia.ns against a last-minute attempt i think by president putin of russia to to look sanctions, like a peacemaker. to look like someone who is interested in a cease-fire when motive is to destabilize ukraine. host: this announcement comes ahead of president obama's news

conference in -- this morning. he talks. about to speak again at 9:00 a.m. eastern time. comes, it goesent away. you've got the president meeting with the nato allies. financialtten for the times on august 31, three critical tests for nato leaders in wales. what are those tests? >> the nato leaders are meeting. president oh what is in one of allies. he'll go to wales tomorrow for a two-day summit of nato. this is the most important alliance. it's the most successful in modern history. this is one of the most the quential summits in long history of nato. number one, is the problem posed by russia? putin's action in a rimea and destabilize eastern

ukraine are redividing europe. drawing the new dividing lines it we all thought disappeared at the end of the cold war. the response has to be tough minded. going to fight putin for ukraine. we have no obligation to do so. no interest to do so. simply -- nato can raise new sanctions against putin to drive up economic costs to what he's doing. that's number one. number two, there's the issue of isis. the islamic state, this califait that's taken control of sir in and western iraq and in the wake of this abysmal uncivilized, act yesterday, the murder of an american citizen, steven sotloff, certainly if the united states is going to continue its isis, itaign to contain would be advantages you if the allies at nato would agree to back up the united states and contribute to the military mission so that the doesn't have to shoulder this responsibility alone.

and, third, the issue about afghanistan. nato troops have been in afghanistan since 2003. there are over 40 countries have helped the united states to try to keep that country peaceful. depart scheduled all to by 2016. there's an open question -- is that a smart decision? we've seen what happens when you take all of the troops out of violence.os and that may very well happen again in afghanistan. so one of the questions for the they leave ashould very small residual force to and to e afghan army provide external security on the afghan-pakistan borders. hose are three very important issues for president obama and the nato colleagues to discuss on thursday and friday. those issues open for discussion with all of you this to nicholas ng burns. democrats, 202-55-3880. 2-585-3881. 20shgs independents, all others, 202-585-3882. we'll get your phone calls here

in a minute. ambassador burns, talk about the other news that president obama morning in nia this the news conference when he reacted to the beheading of the econd american journalist saying that the u.s. will not be intimidated by the islamic state a that he would build coalition to degrade and destroy the group. your reaction to that statement? host: this is the right thing for president obama to say. this is an abysmal act by a terrorist group and the president spoke for everyone in country. the sadness of the murder of an american citizen and our outrage terrorist group would do this kind of thing twice in two weeks. so this is a -- this group, isis real threat to all of our friends in the middle east. it's a threat to the united extent that we know our government believes that some american citizens have joined this group. that european citizens have

joined this group. want those people to be trained by isis and to return to ur country on european passports or american passports. of homeland defense, we all know this after 9/11, that you have to meet the threats. be smart about it. the president is absolutely not get t we should into another land war at the middle east. we did that with iraq, be smartan, we have to about this by using air power to isis.in the president is right. the strongest thing we can do is coalition that would include the arab states, turkey, allies, asian allies to dry up the financial support for his group, to isolate them politically and contain them militarily. we can do that by air power. them militarily. we have to put troops in the ground, congress, the president, aren't ican public willing to do that. we can contain them, keep them

kurdistan.raqi i think the president has a good strategy in place. isis hasquestion is, if the base in syria, should the conduct air strikes in syria? decided onnt has not that. that's an open question dhoip you think he should. make of dianne feinstein saying that the being too s perhaps cautious when it comes to the islamic state? guest: i served in government for a long time. sympathize with the predi predicament we're in and the the president has in his box. for's the right way forward the united states. we the public don't want a big war in the middle east. we at the same time, we know can't leave the middle east. we know that we have to be --

se our power in an intelligent defend america and american interests. the president has done that well in iraq. my own sense is we should strikes having said all that in syria. that's the base of the group. that's where their headquarters that's where their financial apparatus is, we've got to strike them where they are. capacity to do so. ost: this is a tweet from karen nelson who says let's take this day-by-day response by our government. it's sickening as beheadings continue. is there an urgency here? guest: excuse me? is there an -- urgency here?e an guest: i couldn't make out the question. host: is there an urgency here, and should there be? guest: well, i think that the the country. can't protect the american overseas. what happened to steven sotloff

foley.es it strikes at the heart of who we are as a nation. saddens every american. we have to rep respond to it. we have to respond to it in a way.red and intelligent the president has to do that. s i said before, do we now expand the operation to strike into syria? do we ask some of the arab to join with us in those attacks. one of the things that struck me in the last couple of weeks is absence of outrage by arab happening.out what is isis is now murdered two american journalists. murdered thousands of civilians in iraq and syria. nd you do need the moral leadership of the arab world to confront this world. because it grew out of their own communities. it's part of their own communities. and particularly the sunni eaders, this is a sunni terrorist group. the sunni leaders in the group, in he united arab emirates kuwait, in saudi arabia, in

bahrain, oman, egypt. they need to condemn this group their d the weight of governments to isolate the group and contain it and defeat it. 2, we lier on c-span covered the prime minister's question and answer before the house of common sense. and the prime minister david cameron reacted to the news of this second beheading. here's what he had to say. >> i'm sure the whole house and country will join with me to the sickening and brutal murder of another american hostage and share the shock and it again appears to have been carried out by a british citizen. with ther thoughts are hostage and his family. their ordeal is unimaginable. clear, this e ountry will never give in to terrorism. our opposition will continue at home and abroad. it's important in a we are clear nature of the threat we're facing. it makes no distinction between

and res, countries, religions. there's no way to appease it. the only way to defeat it is to send a very d straightforward message, a ountry like ours will not be cowed by these barbaric killers. if they think we will weaken in threats, they eir are wrong. it will have the opposite effect. we will be more forthright in of the values, liberty under the rule of law, freedom, democracy, that we hold dear. and i'm sure a united message to that effect will go forward from this house today. ost: ambassador burns, the united message from that house will go forward today. know, you have to agree with everything the prime minister cameron said. be saidthink that could by an american leader and it really is quite fitting that he that and stand shoulder to shoulder with president obama who's also in europe today. of our the support allies. we need all of our allies to

join in this fight to isolate contain and eventually defeat isis. britain is our most famous and loyal ally. the reality here is that you know that the press is reporting that it's possible that the person who has killed both james sotloff is a ven b british citizen. tape with a london accent. the british, of course, are with us in this fight. prime minister said, hostage.p british the message between the united states and the united kingdom. to thing i would like mention, some of our european allies have agreed to pay the liberation of their hostages. i have two views on this. one is obviously if family do everything they can and must do everything they can do get the loved ones back. the an't deny that to family members. if any of us have a son or a daughter or a brother or nephew

hostage, we would do just about anything we could to get them back. governments have a different responsibility. the policy of the united states since the diplomatic my career in the jimmy carter do not ion that we negotiate with terrorists and we do not pay ransoms to terrorist groups. the policy of many of our nato allies. one of the issues that president bama needs to raise at this nato summit in the uk in the we two days is, shouldn't have a consistent policy? "the new york times" has a remarkable report last week that the last five years, european governments and organizations in paid $125 million ransoms to these middle east terrorist groups to liberate hostages. and one can understand on a human basis, you know, the people home. these of course, but if you pay $125 to terrorist groups,

you're funding them. ou're encouraging them to take more hostages. so it's a complex issue. one that needs to be raised alliance-wide, nato, hopefully to have one policy that we don't make concessions to terrorists and don't send money to terrorist groups. host: the piece, paying ransom bankrolls, al qaeda terror. the "usa today" editorial board weighs in on this. "the new york times" article saying that 66 million as been paid in the last year alone. the countries that pay ransom, spain, switzerland, other european nations make to do s while claiming so. this makes kidnapping a profit center. "usa isagree that the today" editorial board with this saying it's undermining the no ransom hostage policy. jackie, santa clara, california, democratic caller. hi, jackie.

comment and ve a question. maybe if there are muslims listening this morning, maybe answer my ll in and questions. i don't know much about the koran, islam, muss limbs, except i see on tv, but i thought it's been in the news that the muslims have the greatest number of religion across the world. i don't understand the hierarchy leaders ho the muslim are. the christians have priests and pastors. ho represents what kind of leaders are in the muslim faith? why we n't understand don't hear from some of them or to -- to -- some groups to get together and tell the think these guys are bad or wrong, they should be every day making it clear what the difference is

isis and the real religion. host: all right. nicholas burns? guest: i agree with jackie, the caller from santa clara, california. what's needed is for arabs to condemn this nd group isis in their own communities. you'd begun to see that. saudi arabia, critical of other muslim enough. but not to eradicate a group like this requires a lot of different actions. ilitary strikes of the type we're conducting. it requires political and economic isolation. it requires from the grassroots basis people from their own communities to reject them. unfortunately what's playing out across the middle east right now war between sunni arabs, sunni and shiah muslims. too many have gone to support group isis. so it's really the

responsibility of the government baghdad, a shiah-dominated government to reach out to the sunni leaders and to try to in to the fold, to make them part of the government in baghdad, to share ower with them, so there's an alternative to isis. way, at the other end of george w. bush's time in launched a surge of american forces in iraq. part of that will reach out to sunni community in some of the same towns and provinces in isis that are supporting and have those people join the united states and iraqi army in defending iraq against terrorist groups. was a brilliant policy at the end of his term by george w. patreaus.general david it's really the iraqi government's responsibility in iraq. the hill newspaper reporting this morning. a tweet with that report. boehner speaker john is saying that the congress is limited until obama outlines his

isis strategy. think, ambassador burns? >> what we should and could unitedfrom congress is a congress, senate and house, to condemn. i'm sure we'll see this, to murder, the brutal murder of steven sotloff yesterday. eyond that, when president obama gave a press conference last week. line, we don't s have a strategy yet, the president was referring to not syria. whether or not we extend this group from is irbing s to syria. there are consequences to that. when you're crossing the border, use force. not supporting the syrian government. we're opposed to the president bashar assad there. is in the midst of an brutal civil y war. syrians, million people are homeless. for us to go into that war and

using an actor by american air strikes against isis. i think we should do it. ut it's sufficiently complex and i certainly understand why president obama needs to take a here to t of time we do that on what scale and who else might support us in doing it. we don't want to act alone. i would imagine when president obama returns from his trip to europe, there will be between the republican and democratic leadership on capitol hill. hope we have a united washington. we see that these days in a partisan washington. but here's an issue. americans can unite, outrage against the murder of merican citizens and trying to do the right thing to prevent this kind of thing from happening again. hear from larry from stanford, kentucky. good morning. problem.i have a any other that

is back out.we do we don't finish anything. if we're there, stay there until we get the job done. host: ambassador burns? >> an interesting question. --still have american troops to speak to your question. we have american troops in japan germany. they arrived there in the late 1940s as we try to rebuild the countries from the second world war in to second ies after the world war. we've had the staying power when finished e faith and the missions. you can't stay with every cause. a consensus among republicans, in the bush administration that we couldn't stay in iraq forever. the question was when would you leave, on what basis would you troops behind. the question in afghanistan, here's why the caller's question

is so important. e have been there since ock of 2001, a month after 9/11, our special forces went in. our army went in. been there every since. we have 40 countries with us. a big international effort. to leave an is basically lock, stock, and barrel. take everybody out. in the he combat troops end of 2016. i think that's precipitous. we need to stay the course. more that can be done to stabilize afghanistan. we can take most of the combat troops out. can certainly leave train, american troops to the iraqi army. and to help defend against the the rist groups on afghan-pakistan border. hat should help reduce our own casualties. won't be as exposed. but the job isn't finished there. pertinent question to ask. > robert, brooklyn, new york, republican. caller: two questions. that the rebels was armed by regular citizens.

he way over to the middle east and president obama called them back over. but the armed rebel because most a new e are taking on name every two or three years which is -- by the americans there. and all to safety. the president did not want to arm them in the first place. c-span was against the president not to arm. was against the president to arm the rebels. robert, we'll get nicholas burns to respond. host: a lot of people have been in ical of president obama the last two months have been too cautious. pulled back on american leadership in the middle east. certainly believe that i served as a career u.s. foreign officer. i believe that america -- we have vital interest on the ground in the middle east.

assertive be a strong actor. but we have to be intelligence. -- intelligent. one of the virtues he's shown in ffice is that he reflects, he assesses things before he jumps in. options, at all of the and sometimes the right option is to move ahead and act. and sometimes the right option is not to move ahead. this issue of whether we should i was forrian rebels, it two and three years ago. i thought we should have armed the rebels. a missed opportunity. obama obviously, you know, thought it was too dangerous that if you arm some groups you shouldn't be sure where the arms you gave them would end up. be sure if they would turn the arms against us. i think we have no choice. isal -- isis or isal -- two names. iraq, this is a brutal, virulent, well financed, organized terrorist group, we have to be engaged in the

fight to stop it. the state of ber iraq and leave syria in permanent chaos and revolution. of the in both countries could spread to lebanon. jordan, ld happen in turkey, countries that have very important to us. so i think we have no choice but now.et involved the question is how. that's what the president is struggling with. host: ambassador burns, what ould happen if u.s. air strikes -- if u.s. strikes syria. does strikes in syria without assad's consent? host: the state department and white house have spoken to that. we don't have a relationship with assad. issue there. president obama thought assad should leave office. abuser.uman rights he's thrown that country in chaos and revolution. him.ve no sympathy with i don't think the united states will be put off on the question f air strikes to syria on what assad is going to think and we wouldn't ask his permission.

the largest question is what are if we do so.ces do you risk getting dragged into a bigger war? do you prevent that? how can youle conduct air are es in a way that surgical that can weaken the isis group so therefore it won't as strongly as it's been fighting, aggressively in iraq and syria without a commitment that we don't want to assume, ie, a commitment to have us stay there long time. nother question i think the administration is struggling is effective.ikes be we have that in iraq. called the iraqi army. he kurdish forces, they're fighting isis in iraq. in syria, you don't have that. theyria, we can't work with syrian government in the syrian military. we oppose them. and many of the terror -- of the groups, excuse me, in syria, are so extremist, we wouldn't want to be associated them. or give them support. so can we find moderate groups

in syria to work with? i believe we can. we should. but it's complicated. it does take time. >> sandy, democratic caller. hi, sandy. caller: i'm a democrat. i support obama in everything he's done. he's fought this smartly, okay? people are not realizing he's silting back and doing the air strikes. we do need boots on the ground, defeat these terrorists. i got a question, i don't why we can't just go in and just get them to the evel where they can handle it on the ground and then pull back out. e don't have to have a long drawn out thing. they're bad, fast, and if we is t get faster, then obama weighing every option and people give them better ideas than what the pentagon

gave him. he doesn't like those ideas. host: ambassador? guest: well, i think the idea u.s. military could go in very quickly, destroy isis to withdraw is not going work. isis has -- no one really knows, maybe 10,000 fighters, maybe more. it's supported by a lot of sunnis on the ground in syria opposed to the assad overnment which has been historically discriminatory to the s sunni population. iraq by the d in large sunni population in the of iraq, because they don't feel their interests are eing taken care of by the shiah-dominated government in baghdad. there's grassroots support for this group. money.ave a lot of they broke into the national bank in mosul, iraq's second took over y, they mosul and took the money out, they have taken control of oil fields. and ey're pumping oil they're selling oil on the

international market. but they're, maybe, selling it. they're getting proceeds from it. it's well financed, supported by tens of thousands of fighters. it's probably supported by undreds of thousands of sunni civilians on the ground. we just can't go in there. not one place we can go to wipe isis. t's a cancer that's metastasized and spread across both iraq, the western part of iraq and northern syria, it's growing. and so i think the best we can do realistically right now is contain it. and what the united states tried to do is keep it away from iraqi kurdistan. you remember about three weeks forces moved irbil, 5 kilometers of the most important city in that part of iraqi kurdistan. rang alarm bells. that's when the united states tarted to use the air power to contain the group, to move it back. you remember the mosul dam, the

dam near mosul. used the air power to push the isis forces away. control ofant to get the dam in northern iraq. so the use of air power can contain. isis. limit it can't defeat it. it's the complex question that he president and all of the critics are facing, how do we move to defeat isis without putting ground forces in to play. as i said before, part of the answer is to work with local governments, local armies, the american, the kurdish forces, iraqi army. the iraqi army has been unreliable in the past. pashmirga are good fighters in the mountains, not so good on got esert plains when they the -- they didn't do well against isis forces. so this is a very difficult set for the president host: bloomberg business week isis ted on the money that has. and they report a lucrative riminal empire supports the islamic state's operations.

according to a recent rand eport, the diverse criminal operations bring in $1 million a day, operating on a spoils of principles, it lives mainly off of plunder, emptying the captures, wns it confiscating and stealing goods, mainly machinery, construction automobiles, which the group sells at discount to uyers in iraq elsewhere and seizing the property of those who have been forced to flee. ne region of syria alone, the group netted $36 million from smuggling plundered archaeological artifacts. rosemary next in jackson, michigan. republican caller. rosemary? caller: hi, i want you to know that i just love c-span. the reasons i listen is pretty, you're intelligent. and i think this morning it's been so enjoyable because mr. intelligent, pragmatic. he knows which he's saying. fact that iate the you've got him here and enjoying

this program. give the two comments? host: sure? caller: just like a cancer, a operating s into the room, he opens you up, with his assistants, takes the cancer out hopefully you're fine afterwards. i think that we have go in there land, on sea, and in the air just like in world war ii, and get the cancer out. and as far as ransom and paying people, don't give them a cent. that's the worst thing we could do. rosemary.y, nicholas burns? guest: i very much agree with caller, rosemary, on the second point that she made. from president carter, president reagan, all the way down to obama, we have refused to pay ransoms to terrorist groups. further hostage taking. t encourages them to take more hostages. and this inconsistency where some of the european countries, not the united kingdom, but some of the italian, spaniards,

germans are paying ransoms, it's abhorrent. there needs to be a conservative nato policy. on the first question, i would ust have to say the problem we've faced, we've all seen this since 9/11 in iraq and fghanistan, when you face terrorist groups, the fighting -- the campaign, the ilitary campaign is completely different from what we experienced either in the first or second world wars and even in korea. when there's an opposing army of the state, there's a capital. you defeat the army and take the capital, the war ended. hat's what happened in the second world war when the soviet forces and american and british converged in berlin. the nazi army, we took the capital. germany, the war ended. that's not how it works with isis. that's not how it works with many terrorist groups. hey're living within communities. shadowy. they'll move on to another city. they'll go to the mountains or desert to escape you.

they're financed by illicit means. they recruit people all over the world, unfortunately, american american very few, the citizens leaving our country to isis.ght for the same is true for the european countries. i think it requires -- i learn this after 9/11. requires us to use military force. not, more ften than effectively, you have to use economic means to dry up the ability to finance themselves. to use political diplomacy to isolate them, to create a big coalition. obama said president this morning in estonia. a big coalition to isolate them. use law enforcement and our court system to find the terrorists, if they're in our them.y, to apprehend to arrest them. to try them. and to put them in jail. of that sogot do all it's not just a question of 82nd airborne or the u.s. marines over, we saw how marines army and our fought in both iraq and afghanistan.

but if you put them to a battle isis, you're really leaving them there for many, many years to come. won't be defeated easily i don't think that's a choice this president is going to make. doubt the american a ple and the congress want big long decade war on the ground. so what president obama is trying to o, he's fight this war through asymmetric means, through different techniques. warfare, political and economic means. i think you have to do all of it's got to be a comprehensive strategy to be effective. it's going to take a long time. what the president has been saying, we're not going to see victory overnight. we won't unfortunately. this is a new nature of what we as americans are fighting around the world. ambassador burns, president -- is h speaking in speaking in estonia right now ahead of nato summit. in.re listening we want to cover it live on

c-span 2. >> once and for all, the or outdated thinking that's caused this crisis. is not aimed nce against any other nation. alliance of democracies, dedicated to our collective defense. , untries like estonia, latvia lithuania, they're not post soviet territory. you're sovereign and independent nations with the right to make your own decisions. gets to veto n your security decisions. not ledests in ukraine, by ne-yo nazis or fascists. they're led by ordinary ukrainians. old, nd women, young and who are fed up with a corrupt regime. to share in the progress and prosperity that we

see in the rest of europe. they did not engage in an armed seizure of power. brokered greement was or constitutional reform, the former president then abandoned is office and parliament endorsed new elections. ukrainians have a new democratically elected president. forward to welcoming the president to the oval office this month. president obama in estonia speaking before the leaders of the baltic states. we're covering that live on c-span 2. if you're interested in hearing of his remarks. ambassador burns right there touching on the situation ukraine and russia. what do these countries, these need to ate countries hear from the president. what do the rest of our nato

allies need to hear? guest: the clip you just played was very interesting. as president obama really responding, speaking there to president putin. to some of theng disinformation or propaganda or, if you will, lies, that putin has put forward about what's happening in ukraine. want real an people independence from russia. be a state tot to russia. they heard a response to president putin that needed to be said. states are fascinating countries. they were made independent at the end of the first world war the treaty of versailles. they were independent in 1918 1940, stalin, the red army, of their tripped them nationhood, exiled them to siberia. them.red many of took them over, incorporated

them forcibly to the soviet union. we're e of the things proud of in the united states, president fraj lynn roosevelt way to president george h.w. bush never recognized the forcible occupation of the states into the soviet union. we kept the goal, the baltic goal here in the united states in 1991.ned it to them we were instrumental in trying o make them independent again in 1991. we took them in to nato at the 2002, made the n decision to to do so. so i think president obama is estonia, he's in the capital of estonia, one of the three baltic states to send this message. you're one of us, you're a member of nato. you're protected by nato. article five of the treaty says in effect if one of us is all of us are attacked. we'll help, we'll respond. the message to president putin is, you may be putting troops into ukraine to destablize ukraine. in to the baltic states to destabilize estonia,

latvia, lithuania. part of nato territory. the u.s., britain, germany, spain, would fight for that. president putin is many things, brutal, cynical, but rational. baltic attack the states. he knows then that he would confront the united states and the nato allies. obama is saying that this morning. reaffirming that pledge to the estonia, latvia, and lithuania, they desperately need to hear it. lived the soviet reality. they know what putin is like. they need the support. that's why the president is there. >> ambassador burns, that pledge does not apply to the ukraine and the world news section of times this morning has the headline, "the west debates arms for ukraine." guest: two different issues here. should the united states and the west, the european countries, send arms to ukraine can defend ine itself, arms, not people, not soldiers. nd i think that the answer is yes. ukraine's very important, very

of state in the center europe. and so it deserves the right to eserve itself from this insidious invasion launchled by president putin. on the other hand, the united states has been very careful and nato has since the 1990s to say we're friends, we're partners in nato. we're not ready to take a country in nato. we pledge to r, defend that country, fight for that country. e don't take countries in with border disputes with their neighbors. we don't take countries in whose completely aren't committed or a strong majority committed to joining. deeply divided country, and it's a major crimea,ial dispute now, annexed by russia and eastern crane. so there is no chance that nato is going to take on ukraine as a take on d responsibility legally of

defending ukraine against russia. obama made the right decision here. we're not going to put american troops in ukraine. we can support them with military assistance, we should, with political and economic support. host: diane in bellville, michigan. caller.dent hi, diane. caller: thank you for having speaker on today. prior to being removed from minister, he requested us to help him. now, i can just hear congress money, money, money. where's it going to come from. we going to pay for this? he asked for our help. there in , went in 2003. if he asked for help, shouldn't him for monetary compensation? and as for jackie who called earlier, i'm not demeanoring you, jackie, but go to the library, go on the internet, you you can buy koran, it for the same price as a

bible. would urge her to do that and -- host: okay, diane. nicholas burns? been a well, it's controversial issue whether the obama administration did enough to help president maliki. points.k when the united states took all of its troops out of iraq at the of 2011, that's president obama's decision, we made a not keep hat we would a small number of troops there to train the iraqi army. that's because we could not negotiate a treaty to give american troops immunity from prosecution. have a t want to situation where an american soldier can be brought up in front of a local court. being president is criticized for not having negotiated that treaty and not having kept troops there. think -- that's an open question. my own view is we should have left a small number of troops in iraq. and we're seeing the problems associated with the fact in a we don't have trainers there. trainers there in the iraqi army fell on its face

lost mosul to the isis forces about six weeks ago. question is whether or not we didn't give us is tan shl economic support to prime minister maliki. he's a shiah. he ran things from baghdad with shiah circle of supporters around him. alien ated the sunnis, not the majority, but an important iraq.ty in they're using isis. excuse it. it explains why he returns to isis. obama did the nt right thing by saying in effect to prime minister maliki, you you if can only help you have a fully representative government in baghdad. and prime minister maliki had to that.n because of now, there's a new leader in. message to american him is you need to govern in an intelligent way. you need to bring the kurds and sunnis in to baghdad, share

power with them. iraqis can feel that the central government is representative of them and helping them. sunni population has not felt that for a long time. > we're talking to former ambassador nicholas burns served as undersecretary of state for political affairs from 2005 to 2008. he's now a diplomacy, an professornal politics for harvard. joining us from cambridge. anita, republican caller. you're on the air with ambassador burns, go ahead. caller: good morning. i want to say i'm muslim. i'm american muslim. lady that called in, there is a newspaper put out by muslims. now one is from the group called the final call. and in the group that i was which was elijah mohammed's son is called muslim journal. i would also say for christians, you can look up al sharpton's brother

kenneth glass who served 14 ears in prison called the ordinary people society. look him up. he'll tell you the different are happening in america that are not fair. host: all right, anita. texas, overton, independent caller. excuse me, actually -- here's nancy. nancy, go ahead. overton, texas. independent caller. go ahead, nancy. not r: hi, he says we're funding all of these terrorist roups, but obama has been funding them. hamas, he's ding been funding the muslim brotherhood. supports our troops. hy is the marine still in mexico. why isn't the d.a. being held accountable for everything that they have done. the government being held accountable? the president is support ing supporti

supporting certain terrorist groups. guest: that's not true. president obama is a good man. he's governing in a centrist ashion much in the way the predecessors have done on terrorism. we don't support terrorism, we don't fund it. referring to is when the egyptian people had free democratic elections, they dominated overnment power.moslem dominated the government was in power, the united states continued some but not all of the economic assistance we extended to egypt, a great friend to the united states. not fair to say he funded groups.t not true at all. host: new jersey, republican caller. caller: thanks for having me. host: good morning, turn the volume down on your television. we're getting fieldback. caller: thank you. crises o comment on the in syria and iraq. host: okay, go ahead. guest: oh, yeah. is doingresident obama a very good job. you know, we have to be very

in the way we deal with the crisis in iraq and syria. but i just think that we have to get rid of the assad regime any moderate growth in -- so -- host: ambassador burns, go ahead? well, i would just say contain hat we have to and defeat isis is a coalition. some on the e ground there that we can support. they're moderate. more of want to support the strident terrorist groups. that's the complexity. these are not easy choices. i have been in support of

president obama on many issues. of him of not supporting some of the moderate groups in syria. this, of course i would. issues for the president to make. i think he deserves some time to right.is host: what about going after isis money. in is a tweet from wild and wonderful. where is the money? surely they're not hauling it around in captured transport vehicles? to go after it? guest: not an peshths on this. i don't know all of the facts. i know isis literally took the millions out of national bank in mosul. they're making a lot of money by selling oil. assume most of that is on the black market. if they were using the international financial system, doing wire , transfers, you could shut them down, you could -- through through thenctions, treasury department, the other

ministries of finance around the world. you could make life difficult them. but they're operating on the black market, it's more difficult. sent you k whoever that tweet is right. that this is one of the pressure points they need to use leverage against isis. financing sources of if that's possible. host: annie, flint, michigan, hi, annie. caller: calling directly to what you just spoke to. bombing the oil wells with the isis controls. very difficult to put the fires out. out of texas is the only company put the fires and out and bring the oil wells back on-line. that could be done as soon as iraqi government is in control again of the oil wells. it would dry up an apart of revenue rce of completely. they could no longer operate the oil wells. that the no be done? guest: good question. i don't know if the u.s.

military looked at this as an option. disadvantage is environmental. you remember back in the first back in 1990 and '91 george hw bush went to saddam from slodge kuwa kuwait. some of the oil fields were bombed. here were tremendous problems with the environment. that's one limitation. outstanding. is we can target people in a car, as you know. done a good job at kind of beating isis back and pushing them back militarily. ask a bigger question, how do you defeat them. ow do you dry up sources of financing? i think there are pros and cons about whether you should strike at oil facilities. host: susan is watching from virginia. right out of washington, republican caller. aller: thank you for your services and clear explanation on some of the difficult topics

consequences.ious i have a quick question, if you on't mind about the ukraine, ukraine is not a member of the nato alliance. so i do understand why do not -- we're not obligated and legally really help them ed to militarily with boots on the ground. but my question would be after we negotiated, i believe, in the earl live 1990s, the dismantling of the nuclear weapons that were for russia in the ukrainian territories, wasn't an greement reached with the ukraine that if they do give up the nuclear weapons, we, the sure which european powers were with us on this, but obligated to protect them if their on by gnty was trampled any outside country? if you don't on mind?

very good question. thank you for asking it. i was working for president clinton. kraine, kazakhstan and belarus had weapons. they had those three kouventryes plus russia with nuclear weapons. worried that war lords or criminal gangs would steal the nuclear weapons and we'd be in a of trouble. so we negotiated -- president clinton took the lead on it. achievement.lliant he negotiated with the kazakhs, so ukrainians, and belarus they would give up their weapons, they sent them to russia. we had a friendly relationship president yeltsin, he was a democratic leader, small d. agreement that you're referring to in december in budapest in with the ukrainians. they were the united states, britain, russia. we said if your territorial -- you, you crane. territorial integrity in

the future is threatened, we, british, and , the the russians, will work to safeguard your territorial integrity. we did not give ironclad security guarantees. we'll send the army in, we said we'll work politically, the intent of it to help you preserve your country. obama kept to that agreement. we never promised american soldiers, we never promised we'd join a war to support ukrainian borders. e did promise and did commit political support and moral support. and i think that the united has ginn that to ukraine. it wouldn't be smart. catastrophic mistake to fight russia over ukraine. russia and the united states are he largest nuclear weapons powers in the world. if we got in a fight with ussia, who knows whether a conventional fight would turn nuclear.

we can't fight russia. bipartisan it's a show. president bush made the same when president putin of ded georgia in august 2008. president bush decided at the time we would not fight russia country of , the georgia in the caucuses. i think both president brush and president obama have made the right decision. we're not going to go to war for countries, but we offer the military support, our military assistance, military our troops but not and our economic support. a t's the right policy that democrat have both taken. host: the headline is eurasi union feels the strain. they report that cracks are beginning to show in vladimir grand project to form a

eu sian union to rival the as the partners have balked in joining moscow's trade war with west. back in may, president putin was russia, s saying belarus, and kazakhstan are a different level of information. if they looked at imports of meat, fruit, fish, dairy products, and other countries, belarus and kazakhstan refused follow suit. host: right. president putin, he's a kgb guy. he thinks in terms of blocs. he sees the military union, an union.c he sees nato. he thinks he needs to counter it with something. he's created the union with belarus which is a dictatorship. kazakhstan, an authoritarian government. those governments, the kazakhs. gas. have a lot of oil and they trade that with the world

market. they trade, they drive to the u.s. don't want to be part of an economic boycott of the united states. this is artificial, this grouping. if putin is running a country, it's isolated in the world. country to find one that would truly stand up for russia and fight with it. the united states has 27 allies in nato. six treaty allies and security allies in asia. countries that will work with us, fight with us, have our conflict. president putin doesn't have that. his strategy is failing. tried to force ukraine under the previous leadership in this union. rebelled.nian people they see the future as trading with the european union. authoritarianth a unrefined economies like the russian economy. springdale, arkansas, republican caller. how's it going. host: good morning.

caller: i want to draw a quick isis and etween criminal gangs in the united states. we've all seen this coming for over a year. that the g out now obama administration is getting eports on isis' danger and threat for a year now. no police force will go into a a few rhood, arrest criminals, and then totally eave the area and think they have done their job. you leave a police presence in. that's number one mistake in iraq. president should have seen this thing coming. isis jv was to call asinine. if anybody is j.v., it's the administration. going to leave it there, ambassador, go ahead? guest: you'd like me to respond. host: yes, please. this.: i'll say the comparison of a criminal gang in the u.s. versus isis. illicit, illegal, derive

their money for religious isis has a religious hilosophy, a sunni group that wants to fight the shiah muslims more than they want to fight the united states. they've focused more of their attention on the government in the religious shrines of the shiah faith. we're in the middle of this support the ed to government of iraq, we need to support the territorial unit of country and impose the criminal groups. it. >>s a lot greater threat. that i think president obama, i've not been uncritical of him on this show or in the past. think he's doing his best the e's got us pointed in right direction towards a rational policy in isis. burns, as the or president gets ready to go meet with allies in estonia today as what are you going to be watching for coming out of these meetings? guest: watching for whether or

not the president -- president colleagues e nato agree on tougher sanctions against the russian government. the just marched across border 10 days ago with over 1,000 troops, which is an of ight violation international law. we shouldn't want to live in that kind of world. so needs to pay the economic price. that's the first thing i'm looking for. will the nato leaders agree to provide the military ssistance to the ukrainian government. and, third, will they agree to greater level of economic assistance to the government. the question of the middle east, will they rally around the european leaders and canada,nister harper of will they rally around president obama and support what the united states is doing on these strikes and agree to volunteer to go with us? and provide some of the military financing, and the pilots to carry out these air strikes against isis. that's very important to us. and again i'd say, we talked about this on the show in the times, cana couple of the europeans agree with us that

we should not make concessions and pay ist groups ransoms that finance the terrorist groups. that's a -- that's a policy that no sense. certainly for the united states. ambassador r nicholas burns, thank you, sir, for your time. very much.nk you pleasure to be with you. host: coming up next, a short break. your thoughtsack, on what should the u.s. response be to the beheading of a second american journalist? we'll get to that right after this news update from c-span radio. >> 9:36 a.m. eastern time, more update on iraq, an international rights group says number of iraqi soldiers slain by islamic state militants than eral times higher previously reported. human rights watch says new islamic indicates the state group killed between 560 captured in a post near the city of tikrit.

the number had been put at 160-190. well, getting back to ukraine nd russian president vladimir putin. he's called on pro russian on eastern ukraine to as the associated press reports, the advancing and for ukrainian army to withdraw the troops from the region. ukrainian president said iev and moscow agreed on a cease-fire. but president putin's spokesperson said later that to ow was not in a position agree to it because it's not party to the conflict. was quoted by russian news agencies saying iev must withdraw its troops and stop artillery strikes for the at he looked agreement to be reached in on friday.elarus debates are starting to happen all over the country. north didates in carolina's senate race will take part in their first debate

tonight. kay haggan set to meet her challenger, tom tillis. a first-term senator vulnerable in a state that republican mitt romney won in 2012. she turned the senate race to a referendum on how mr. tillis has the legislature as house speaker. eanwhile, mr. tillis has been painting senator haggan as an obama democrat citing her vote care e president's health overhaul. they're fighting for one of the gop needs seats the to retake the senate. you can watch the first of three debates tonight at 7:00 p.m. c-span or listen to it live here on c-span radio. 2014, 100 ampaign debates for the control of congress. those are some of the latest headlines on c-span radio.

washington journal continues. host: and we are back. yournutes left here to get thoughts on the isis beheading of a second journalist, american journalist. what should the u.s. response 202-585-3880., republicans, 202-585-3881. independents, 202-585-3882. and you can send us a tweet or on comments

facebook..com/c-span. the travelling with president for "the new york times." with the t of estonia headline, after the beheading of steven sotloff, obama pledges to punish isis. president vowed on monday to militants that videotaped the beheadings of two american journalists he said repulsed the world. saying the united states would lead a regional and international coalition to beat back the terrorists. clear, that is to degrade and destroy isil. threat. longer a not just to iraq, but to a region and to the united states. using an said alternative acronym for the islamic state for islam and syria. speaking at a news conference here on the eve of a nato summit in wales as he articulates the broader strategy militants.the isis not only that we're going to be ringing to justice those who perpetrated the terrible crime

against two fine young men, the united states will continue to and a regional international effort against the barbaric and ultimately empty represents.roup what are your thoughts? elanie in leonard town, maryland, independent caller. you're up first. hat should the u.s. response be? caller: i think we should totally destroy them. plague isil is a total on the world. isil is nothing but the dirt under my fingernails. thought t deserve any other than kill them. melanie, leonard town, maryland, an independent caller. ome thoughts from members of congress on this. kelly ayot, senator from new the armed member of services committee. sis' barbaric murder of americans must not go unanswered and the president must produce a defeaty without delay to

isis. this from roy -- this tweet from as a r roy blunt republican in missouri, withe need president oh bah to strategy and clear goals on plans he stops this threat. a couple of examples on what of congress are saying on twitter. you saw earlier the hill ewspaper reporting that the speaker of the house john boehner said congress is limited until the president outlines combat the y to threat of isis. albuquerque, new mexico. republican caller. good morning. caller: good morning. my sister is a war photographer and in the congo. i think there should be no response to those beheadings. journalists from around the orld who photograph conflict and my husband also has theographed the war between cartels in mexico.

there should be no response. all be looked over. and conflicts have to be viewed and down the will come.ution host: silver spring, maryland, democratic caller. jennifer? caller: i would like to agree with the lady. the media and everybody who of the war a part should know there's consequences to this. in mind, isis is a party of iraq. we went to iraq illegally. to be honest, i don't agree with the method which they're going but the ng things, "the states on one hand, new york times" and the associated press should be these ible for setting people in harm's way.

not embedded with the army. we need to know about the there's a ter resolution, not while it's going on. on. his is what causes the isis party to recruit people is the fact we're giving them a lot of mass media time. what do you think, john? aller: i'm thinking that's what caused the problems. any time they have the afghanistan government. them come to power and support them. in : all right, john, al hyattsville, maryland. good morning to you,al caller: good morning.

i think there's a lot of hatred president obama. they're contributing to the hatred for isal. think if they stop the hatred, everything will be all right. lewis in louisiana, independent. caller: hi, good morning. good morning. caller: thank you for letting me come on. with your , go ahead comment. caller: good morning, thank you for letting me come on. take ment is we need to them out. ake them out quick, fast, and in a hurry. host: reminder to you and others, turn your tv down. leads to the confusion and the feedback. tweet ift had this yesterday.

reports of isil beheading second steven sotloff, a gruesome reminder of their evil. must be confronted and destroyed. that's what the congressman had to say on twitter. "washington times" reporting this, senator bill nelson, florida democrat, said tuesday, offer legislation giving to obama legal authority target the islamic state in syria. the president has the legal in ority to use air strikes syria. let there be no doubt. it's the only coalition to stop the group intent on barbaric cruelty. the death of the second american in the video promised that uture killings are inevitable, providing greater justification for u.s. intervention, specifically, many lawmakers are calling on the administration to provide greater military ssistance to iraq and kurdish forces battling the islamic

state in iraq in addition to the white house authorized bombings in syria. republican na, caller. wayne, what are your thoughts? this, : my thoughts are that we are again pursuing a fighting approach to what we call nonuniform that's asymmetric warfare. it will, again, eventuate in these people. there will be assigned lawyers them expense, put incarceration for an undetermined length of time and of atisfactory resolution the problem, because other groups will spring up. right. all mark knoller who reports on the white house had this tweet this morning saying that secretary kerry said the murderers of james foley and know that off should

the u.s. will hold them accountable no matter how long it takes. john kerry state will be in wales for that nato summit as well. democratic caller. hi, raymond. they can't go anywhere. sell nothing. the money stops, they're broke. anyway, thank you. host: kingsland, georgia, independent caller. hi, andy. in er: i served in iraq 2003 and in 2010. i kind of feel as though the strategy is sending mixed messages to isis and other at large. and that sends a clear message turn makes us n vulnerable here in our own country. their they need to get game together, get their act

together. incredibkr a credible strategy . problem.ing this it's not going to go away. there are a lot of tribal issues there in n the ground syria and iraq with sunni support. really, if you dig deep into the tribal issue.a it's pretty much as i see it. host: all right, andy. d.c., an in independent caller. nina, how do you see it? a ler: i see this all as we lash from the fact that force going with brute where it's not effective where you have a tribal people that essentially, very, very scrap by. what we're doing is we're giving them more ammunition to go know, they're -- they're fighting a war that's war that we type of fought in world war i and world war ii. to react to the beheadings

f these two journalists in a way that feels a lot like the rute force go in and kill them kind of strategy makes us feel naive like journalists who are going to a situation where it's more violent, more brutal, proper way to protect themselves, we are also naive by thinking that without more an intelligent surgical perhaps strikes, surgical intelligence gathering, to believe that we anything the same way we've done it before, with brute force, is naive and stupid and smarter than that. host: so, nina, what do you for about paying ransom the -- these journalists or other americans that are captured? the same time, we are americans and we want to costs.ericans at any ransom can be paid. money is not and has never been terms of saving our

own people. so just pay them. essentially -- they're essentially a tribal people much like in other parts of the world. host: okay. all right, nina. in, i n alabama tweets think our current strategy is just fine. ir strikes backed up by arming kurds in iraq militias to contain isil. pat? democratic caller. pat, what do you think? caller: my comment is everybody needs to back up and rep mind began.dy when this it started when the u.s. invaded iraq. the problem we're having to pay a direct result of that. first of all, that's the emocrats, republicans, and independe independents. can't blame a current president or administration for trying to do something different than the bush administration did. the deeper we get to iraq with

isis president mccain as he ould like to be called, he cannot put troops on the ground, every conflict that the u.s. is involved in. the u need to think about beginning before you think about the end. pat.: okay, the hill newspaper reporting that the house speaker john boehner said that congress is obama outlines his isis strategy. here's a quote -- it's his as the chief executive to outline a plan that will protect american interest, lives, both at home and abroad. the speaker said this on hugh radio show and until the president is willing to lay out a plan, the congress has few it.ions ahead of boehner said he believes obama has authority to target isis in but questionable whether the authority extends to air strikes against the group in syria. nelson, a bill democrat of florida sits on the armed services committee. statement saying he

would introduce legislation the g the president authority to go after isis in syria. missouri, johnson, republican caller. hi, wayne. amazed at the m bravery of these isis-type eople are when they cut someone's heads off, why -- if they're so brave, why do that covered?r faces it's -- it strikes me they're show their ough to face. and anyone who can go into a town and grab a little heads old and cut their off to show how brave he is, his face is -- i allah wanted a that, never did want it. they should be wiped off of the face of the earth. beach, lbert, virginia independent caller. you're on the air. caller: awe, yes, hi, good morning. host: good morning.

caller: we need a new vision for the middle east. we need a new strategy. to put the saudis, the israelis, the syrians all together. any time ot happen soon. but our best -- we need more intelligence on the ground. we need people to fight this fight. because we won't be able to do it ourselves. unfortunately the best -- the best ally that we could have is bah w unfortunately shared bah shared assad. ready to fight the fight. are preventing us from doing that. host: where did you read that? they're anti- -- they're pro sunni. the others are pro shiah, iran. the hezbollah access in israel.rabia and saudi arabia and israel are not on speaking terms. they should resolve the issue. down all of us and

have a new broad vision for the middle east for the future of middle east. i suspect an existence for 200 years. up to the forefront. they're existing under the ottoman turks. suppressed.g ow the only guy that can help us out is bashar assad, unfortunately. host: henry, texas, good morning, henry. person who mentioned asymmetrical was spot on. i think when we go in one of situations where we're dealing with the nonconventional relishes the ally collateral damage that all of expertise and prowess as by hiding etc., among civilians, populace, and bit.e demagoguing a little anyway, i think we need to not make that mistake. isrealies -- we did it in

iraq. up, israelis were scooping and in '06 and in lebanon. that.st got to quit doing we need to -- if we're not going andompromise our principles engage in the sort of conduct reprehensible and feed the political ends for a lot of these people who are things that are way beyond the pail, we need to just go ahead and realize that we can't in that sort of thing. they're going to suffer in olace and the local population or at least fade into it. no-winner.a i think that what the guy said of t assad, it's kind like -- i'm sorry, like -- like saddam hussein. he was our ster, monster. he was convenient, he kept the ira iraqis. i called the local radio station, i said listen, don't go the end $400 billion to

israelis. an unfriendly, anti-western shiite government and be done with it. okay. caller: okay. host: henry in brownsville, texas. dennis, independent caller. what do you think the u.s. be after a uld second beheading of an american journalist by isis? go ahead? i think our response should be the same. it should be pretty much and should think we act before going into iraq again. mean, people failed to remember that iraq is actually a country.red it was manufactured by the british and the british invaded is now iraq and created the country of iraq. and basically what we're seeing now is a lot of sectarian violence. hey drew borders without thinking ahead of the people who were there. and basically what we're seeing right now is a sectarian civil war.

there thinking we can impose our will and defeat isis is creating another vacuum for else to come in. there's a domino effect. t's just a recycling of different -- different people, different things and try to rule country. another thing, we cannot make region care st about itself. the neighboring countries such saudi arabia,ael, they don't have any -- any teeth don't fight and they feel that they need to step in region to police their and the west have to come in all and do it come in for them. that's a nonstarter. eems like it's not going to go anywhere. >> all right, reuters reported u.s. is 30 that the going to push for the coalition to fight this, quote, cancer of state coming from the

secretary of state john kerry. he and defense secretary chuck meet with the european counterparts at the nato summit to enlist support against lition to act the islamic state militants. kerry will travel to the middle east to shore up by tries directly affected the islamic state threat. daniel, blooming ton,in ip, republican caller. caller: hello, thanks for taking my call. hat should the response to be of the isil issue in the middle east? there are few different ways to look at it. directly, i want to point out -- these people are of the but however like every phase within that realm of how people interpret the message