this is a special edition of "nightline." "strike on syria." >> tonight the breaking news, u.s. forces launching a military strike against the assad regime in syria. dozens of tomahawk cruise missiles fired into the air field that launched that horrific chemical weapons attack just days ago. >> it is in this vital national security interest of the united states to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons. >> the president's message to the american people tonight. the impact this will likely have on relations with russia and what happens next here. >> this special edition of "nightline" will continue.

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step for this new commander in chief. >> tonight i ordered a targeted military strike on the air field in syria from where the chemical attack was launched. >> reporter: the president addressed the nation from mar-a-lago, his florida estate, leveling a harsh indictment against syrian president bashar al assad. >> using a deadly nerve agent, assad choked out the lives of helpless men, women, and children. >> reporter: two u.s. destroyers in the eastern mediterranean fired dozens of tomahawk cruise missiles into a syrian air field, targeting runways, aircraft, and fueling areas to make the field inoperable. it's the same air field that the syrian plains involved in tuesday's chemical attack took off from. this video just released from the pentagon, the swift military response from the u.s. comes just two days after the news of that horrific chemical attack in

northern syria appalled the world. an attack allegedly carried out by the syrian regime of bashar al assad against its own citizens. as many as 86 people were killed, including 30 women and 20 children. killed by what turkish officials who have examined the bodies are now saying was sarin gas. these graphic images posted online by activists and people who live in the area show victims struggling to breathe. >> it is in this vital national security interest of the united states to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons. >> reporter: president trump's response tonight marks a 180-degree about-face by a man who repeatedly said over the years he didn't want to get involved in syria at all. just two days ago, he said this. >> i'm not and i don't want to be the president of the world. i'm the president of the united states. and from now on, it's going to be america first. >> reporter: back in 2013 after

assad's last chemical weapons attack, trump tweeted, again to our very foolish leader, do not attack syria. if you do, many bad things will happen and from that fight the u.s. gets nothing." but after seeing tuesday's images, like this one of a father cradling his lifeless children, the president had a dramatic change of heart. >> do you think assad should be concerned in syria? >> i think what happened in syria is a disgrace to humanity. and he's there and i guess he's running things. so something should happen. >> reporter: with tonight's air strikes, is trump may find himself deep in just the kind of overseas entanglement this avowed "america first" president has promised to avoid. >> tonight on call on all civilized nations to join us in seeking to end the slaughter and bloodshed in syria. and also to end terrorism of all

kinds and all types. >> reporter: syria's civil war started six years ago as part of the arab spring where citizens across the arab world rose up against tyrannical leaders. syria's president assad, on the surface a mild-mannered, english-speaking former onth molt, has viciously clung to power in a civil war that has killed nearly 500,000 of his own people. it has also led to the biggest refugee crisis since world war ii, with hundreds of thousands of syrian refugees streaming into europe. in his short time in office, president trump has made headlines with his controversial executive orders banning refugees, including those from syria. the grinding war in syria has drawn in many world powers, including iran and russia, whose troops are on the ground propping up the syrian regime. last year i was on the ground with the russian forces in syria. we went to sean board a

russian destroyer, sailed out into the mediterranean, saw how much firepower moscow has committed to this effort. the russian cruiser has cruise missiles on board. it not only is supporting the russian campaign in syria, it's sending a signal to the rest of the world about the russian navy's modern capabilities. >> reporter: at the main russian air base in western syria, the jets are roaring day and night. the perimeter bristling with helicopter gunships. this is the tip of the spear of russian air power in syria. >> reporter: the russian commitment here makes u.s. military involvement tonight in syria all the more complicated. >> terry moran is with us from london. what was the impact, would you say, of the russian intervention on the course of the syrian war? >> you know, dan, they changed the war. they won the war, essentially, for the regime of president bashar al assad when they came in. >> given how powerfully the russians have invested in the regime of bashar al assad, how do you reckon they're reacting

behind the scenes at the kremlin tonight? >> one very good thing is that apparently the u.s. military gave a heads-up to the russian military who helped rebuild the air base that was destroyed tonight, that there was going to be an attack, to deconflict essentially, to protect them. and so that was essentially good news. but what russia will react against is the very notion of unilateral action that threatens one of their allies. they are not tremendously committed to bashar al assad's regime. one of the russian officers we embedded with said when they arrived they were shocked how corrupt and degraded the regime was. but they do not want to see the united states picking and choosing regime change around the world. and they want to be at the table in any kind of determination of syria's future. >> terry moran reporting from london tonight, thank you. for more on this breaking story we have abc news correspondents martha raddatz and brian ross in new york. in washington, colonel steve

ganyard, military analyst. at the white house, abc news reporter cecilia vega. brian, you've been reporting on the sensitivities around intervening in russia's zone of influence. what did the u.s. military have to take into account as they carried out these attacks? >> one of the sensitive parts of the attack was make sure no russians were targeted or hit. they also had to make sure that the russian anti-aircraft missile systems didn't launch and go after the cruise missiles that were coming off the u.s. ships. so that was very sensitive. they were looking really for a one-night war, without escalating this, without bringing russia into it in some way, forcing the russians to defend or to retaliate. it was also important in terms of the the relationship and the dynamics of isis and al qaeda which remain active in syria. whenever the assad regime is weakened, it's a victory in a sense for isis and al qaeda. the point was to make this just a message, not a real weakening of the assad regime. >> you use this term one-night war. what can you really achieve with

a one-night war? does this change the facts on the ground at all, martha? >> i don't think it does. this wasn't a strategic strike, hurting asaud going forward. it's this one air field. it is a punishing air strike. it took out aircraft. they took out fuel supplies, they took out some of the surrounding infrastructure. but he has many other air fields. i mean, obviously it was meant to control the air attacks with chemical weapons and it may do that to a small degree, but we don't really know where any other chemical weapons are. they removed massive amounts of chemical weapons in 2013 after assad agreed to that, but they clearly hid some of them. don't know where the others are. but the americans were very sure this was the air field. they knew those two aircraft, where those two aircraft took off from. obviously they didn't know at the time they were armed with chemical weapons. but they were absolutely certain that's where they took off from. >> colonel ganyard in washington, d.c., where do we go next with this? are we now embroiled fully in

syria's civil war? >> hopefully not, dan. hopefully this is it. i think as martha and brian were talking about, the attack was so prescribed, it was so -- in such a small area that the intent here was to send a message and not to get into a wider war. if you look back at some of the targets that the pentagon had offered up to president obama, there was a wide variety. it was going to be not only a punishing strike, but it was going to degrade the syrian military. in this case, this is just one small air field. it's an auxiliary air field. it really isn't going to change the facts on the ground. it's a statement, it's really not a degradation of syrian military capability. >> do you think this has any ties at all to the decision this week to take his chief strategist steve bannon off the national security council and perhaps empower the military minds around him? >> i don't. this was more of an emotional decision by the president. but one of the things we need to realize is this was one air field. it's where the chemical attack was launched from.

but assad has been killing babies by the thousands over the years. and this one strike tonight is not going to stop the assad regime from dropping barrel bombs and conventional weapons on civilians. so we may see a decrement of people being gassed to death but he's still going to continue to kill innocents throughout syria. >> let me pick up on what you say with cecilia. you say hopefully not, hopefully we're not pulled into a wider war. we heard the president say tonight he's calling on all civilized nations to end the slaughter on the ground in syria. what's your sense of where the white house wants to go now? because that certainly sounded like a pretty big goal. >> well, dan, one of the things that president trump has stuck to since the campaign, through his very short presidency, is this promise to not tell us exactly where he's going to go and foreshadow what his decisions will be militarily. what we are seeing in this white house right now is a president making these decisions and evolving about his positions on syria in realtime.

if you just go back not that long ago, to last year, he had said, essentially, this is not our problem, the fight in syria has nothing to do with us. and just yesterday, right here in the white house, his position he said had changed after seeing those images of those children in syria after that chemical attack. president trump had said that he was moved. and you're seeing decisions being made from a very different person, right, than someone who was campaigning. a big shift happening here tonight from president trump. >> indeed. we're going to be talking about president trump's evolution as this show continues tonight. but let's stick to the situation on the ground in syria. what's next here in terms of retaliation? does the syrian government have to respond? is there any other potential blowback we as americans should be worried about? >> i suspect there won't be much of a response. because it wouldn't do much good to respond that way and president trump might decide to hit them again. i want to pick up a little bit on what is celia said too. he may not like to tell us when a tactical military strike is

coming, but what is the strategy going forward? what are they going to do if the rest of the world doesn't rally around him? they certainly didn't rally around barack obama to take action against bashar al assad. then what's next? does president trump decide for another air strike? then another air strike? you have to talk about what your strategy is, what your goal is in syria, and how you accomplish that. do you accomplish that -- it's kind of clear rex tillerson wants to put pressure on russia, he wants to have some diplomatic pressure to bring the world together. but that's a very, very big if. >> so many variables at play tonight. we want to point out, i mentioned before, the rather stunning evolution we've seen on the part of president trump. when we come back here on "nightline," we're going to take a look at what he said as a candidate, what he's saying now, and what might explain it. the-cr products i've used. enough! i've tried enough laxatives

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welcome back to "nightline" breaking news, president trump ordering air strikes against syria after that horrifying chemical weapons attack on civilians. donald trump has long argued that america should stay out of the syrian civil war. so tonight's action marks a stunning turnaround. let's listen to mr. trump's evolution in his own words. >> syria's a mess. you look at what's going on with isis, now think of this. we're fighting isis, isis wants to fight syria, why are we fighting isis in syria? let them fight each other and pick up the remnants. they ask me, what are you going to do in syria, what are you going to do, are you going to attack russia, start world war iii?

syria -- i don't want to start world war iii over syria, believe me. i don't like assad at all but assad is killing isis. russia is killing isis. and iran is killing isis. and those three have now lined up because of our weak foreign policy. i will tell you that attack on children yesterday had a big impact on me. my attitude toward syria and assad has changed very much. i think what happened in syria is one of the truly egregious crimes and it shouldn't have happened. >> let's go back to cecilia vega at the white house. cecilia, it's clear if you look at trump's statements that the images out of syria had a huge impact on him. however, the images out of syria in 2013, when the government there launched a chemical attack on its own people, those were also searing. what do you think has changed in the meantime? >> you know, dan, i was on capitol hill today.

that is exactly what one democrat told me, that president trump, had he not seen those images? 2013? they're wondering what caused this soul-searching move and shift in the president's tone. especially we're hearing that from his critics tonight. the president stood right here in the rose garden, it was just yesterday, he said he saw those images along with the rest of the world, those images none of us could look away from, children, elderly, families. the president said, i now have a responsibility. and something in him has changed. and it was a remarkable thing to hear, especially from a president as you know that so many feel like he doesn't have the ability to change on a dime. he doesn't seem like a man who emotes very much. to hear that coming from him was something pretty shocking. >> we ask for god's wisdom as we face the challenge of our very troubled world. we pray for the lives of the wounded and for the souls of those who have passed. >> his speech tonight was

remarkable, at least in my eyes. i'd never seen him talk about god so much. you watch him more closely than almost anybody, have you ever seen him speak like this before? >> not in the terms that he used tonight, praying for the wounded, praying for the dead, may god watch over their souls. but he is a man who does bring in some relimb just language into his speech at times. if i were to put myself in his head a little bit, do a little donald trump whispering if i can, i think there is nothing about this job that won't change someone. that he has to be moved, being a president of this country, 70-order days in now, and be faced with the images and the consequences of his actions as he sits in that oval office and makes decisions like the one that he made tonight. i'm not surprised to hear him bring faith into this conversation. >> and we hope that as long as america stands for justice, then

peace and harmony will in the end prevail. >> it's interesting to hear the president, a president who again both as president ask candidate has tried to talk america out of deeper involvement in syria. tonight he tried to reframe getting rid of weapons of mass destruction as in america's vital interests. >> and earlier tuesday, he said said he didn't want to be president of the world, he wanted to be president of the united states of america. now he's talking to the world. i just want to go back to your idea about religion. policy is often personal. when a president gets in there and they can relate to something, it becomes personal. i think that's what happened to donald trump. >> he is a grandfather. >> he's a grandfather, he has grandchildren. he watched those videos and i am sure he thought of his own, like you probably thought of your own son and the rest of us thought of our own children or grandchildren. it is a personal decision sometimes. you don't want to be emotional when you make decisions, when you make such important decisions like that.

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we want to thank you for watching abc news tonight. we're going to have much more on the air strikes against syria first thing in the morning on gma and throughout the night on abcnews.com. thank you again for watching and good night. i don't have any symptoms. [female announcer] of cancers affecting both men and women, colorectal cancer is the 2nd leading cancer killer in the united states. and it doesn't always cause symptoms,

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